Posted on 07/10/2004 8:06:02 AM PDT by yankeedame
(Please bare in mind that I post this b/c I am genuinely interested in learning the opinions of others on this subject. This not posted to be contentious, arguemenitive, or with any sort of ulterior motive. Thanks. -YD)
I came across these lines while reading Richard Marius' book on Martin Luther. It concerns a particular teaching of Luther's contempory, and rivial, Andreas von Karlstadt (or Carlstadt). To wit:
"...However Karlstadt precipitated a contention that shook the whole reform fabric to its very centre.The cause belli was the doctrine of the Eucharist. Karlstadt gave an exhaustive statement of his doctrine of the Lord's Supper. The literal interpretation of the institutional words of Christ 'this is my body' is rejected, the bodily presence flatly denied. Luther's doctrine of consubstantitation, that the body is in, with, and under the bread, was to him (Karlstadt) devoid of all Scriptural suport. Scripture neither says the bread 'is' my body, nor that 'in' the bread is my body. In fact, it says nothing about bread whatever. The demonstrative pronound 'this', does not refer to the bread at all, but to the body of Chrst, present at the table. When Jesus said 'this is my body', He pointed at Himself, and said 'this body shall be offered up.This blood shall be shed for you.' The words 'take and eat' refer to the proffered bread. The words 'this is my body" [refers only] to the body of Jesus. He (Karlstadt) goes further and maintains that 'this is' really means 'this signifies'. Accordingly grace should be sought in Christ crucified, not in the sacrament."
Mark 14:22 While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, "Take it; this is my body."
it....it....it....this
When we look at the Body of Christ , we focus on th efinished work at the cross to redeem mankind from the Original Syn of Adam!
When anyone detracts from the Savior's life giving Grace in order to confuse or distract it is good to seek an answer from the best authority, which in this case is not Luther but Saint Paul. Paul wrote most of the "rest of the Bible" I suggest you study inside the Epistles of Paul, rather than a "contemporary . The entire story of salvation is perfectly spelled out by Paul!
When Luther began to read what Paul wrote in the scriptures his catholic eyes were OPENED!
The bread and wine are analogues same as the use of the word new wine in Matt 9:17.
Matt 9:17
17 Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.
The New Testament is full of analogues if we took every word as it is spoken at face value then we become like Nicodemus who asked
John 3:3-4
3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
4 Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?
I've found that the key to Communion lays in the significance of faith alone in Christ alone.
He received the sins of many, imputed upon Him by the Father, while He was in His body. He remained faithful to the Father, even unto the separation of His spirit from the body and soul from the body.
His body was broken due to sin, which he didn't commit or cause, but which He received while faithful to the Father.
We receive the bread, the body of Christ, broken for us as a consequence of His faithfulness to the Father. We take the bread in faith of His work on the cross which had very real meaning and action.
The wine being the blood of the New Covenant, serves an additional binding within a Covenant. The Covenant is unilateral, but by drinking the wine, while in fellowship with Him, and by faith alone in Christ alone, we also exhibit the same faith He exhibited on the Cross. We recognize that the New Covenant also leads us to an indwelling of the Holy Spirit, which is discernable from the Old Testament enduement of the Spirit. This truly is a new Church Age, wherein every believer is indwelt by all three persons of the Godhead.
There may be some significance to transubstantiation, although I've found simple faith in Him to be sufficient in the Eucharist and Communion, rather than belief of consuming His flesh and actual blood. By leaving the issue by faith to Him, we are covered in either case.
"When Luther began to read what Paul wrote in the scriptures his catholic eyes were OPENED!"
Your assertion bears no relationship to reality. First, Luther was a professor of Sacred Scripture long before he rebelled. Second, he came up with all sorts of new doctrines when he began to substitute his own personal beliefs for what had always been believed by Christians. To do this, he even went so far as (among other things) to insert the word "alone" after "faith" in Romans 3:28 in his German translation of the New Testament--which, by the way, was far from being the first German translation of the NT. (For some reason, I guess, the Holy Spirit was unable to make that verse sufficiently clear for the uneducated to understand with out Dr. Luther's help.) Of course, the only place where the phrase "faith alone" actually exists in the New Testament is James 2:24, where the efficacy of "faith alone" is flatly denied.
Moreover, Martin Luther believed all his life that the Lord Jesus Christ is truly present in the elements of Holy Communion, as Lutherans do to this day, though in his later years he departed from strict conformity with Catholic doctrine in that regard.
On this topic more generally, the Catholic (and Orthodox) doctrine of the Real Presence of the Lord Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist is so clearly spelled out in the Bible in numerous places (the Gospel accounts of the Last Supper, St. Paul's account and reflections on it, and the Lord's own teaching at the Synagogue in Capernaum, related by St. John in his Gospel) that one can only be persuaded to explain them away by the desire to conform to some prejudiced belief, springing from false traditions of men that arose in the sixteenth century, contrary to the plain meaning of plain words in the Bible.
That's an interesting statement and one crucial for Karlstadt's thesis.
Any Scriptural support for that? Or is it Karlstadt's imagination?
This is funny considering that the older he got, the further away from Catholic doctrine he became. Having read some of Luther's works, he sure didn't interpret Paul's epistles as Catholics did.
Christian.
I suppose that is all in your perspective. Luther was attempting to restore the Catholic church but he soon found out that she was unreformable.
As for your plain words, I suppose that all depends upon how you take Jesus' literal words "This IS my body." I think it unreasonable to suggest that he literally meant that the bread he was holding in his hands would turn into his body. He literally indicated that he was referring to the present state of the bread, not its future state. And, I notice that the disciples didn't make any note that they were eating man flesh. Same thing with the wine. Not a single comment that they were drinking human blood. It does have a distinct flavor and I would have expected at least one comment, especially since it was EXPRESSLY forbid in the Law.
Christian.
...in his opinion. But I have often wondered how much Martin Luther led, and how much he was pushed by those religious,social,and economic "dissidents" waiting in the wings.
Oh? How so? (Asked in genuine curiosity)
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