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To: bkaycee; wagglebee; RnMomof7
Let me give you a suggestion. When you are quoting a Father of the Church, you really ought to take a look at the full text, in context, rather than depending upon a secondary source, like The Eucharist, written by somebody by the name of William Wallace (whoever that is).

The quote you used, from Mr Wallace, said this:

‘While we consider it no longer a duty to offer sacrifices, we recognise sacrifices as part of the mysteries of Revelation, by which the things prophesied were foreshadowed. For they were our examples, and in many and various ways they pointed to the one sacrifice which we now commemorate. Now that this sacrifice has been revealed, and has been offered in due time, sacrifice is no longer binding as an act of worship, while it retains its symbolic authority. . . Before the coming of Christ, the flesh and blood of this sacrifice were fore-shadowed in the animals slain; in the passion of Christ the types were fulfilled by the true sacrifice; after the ascension of Christ, this sacrifice is commemorated in the sacrament.’ Philip Schaff, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, vol. IV, St. Augustin: The Writings Against the Manicheans and Against the Donatists, Reply to Faustus the Manichean 6.5, 20.21 (New York: Longmans, Green, 1909), pp. 169, 262.

The actual text (from Stothert's translation) (with all the context and non of the elipses) says this:

5. With all this, you venture to denounce the sacrifices of the Old Testament, and to call them idolatry, and to attribute to us the same impious notion. To answer for ourselves in the first place, while we consider it no longer a duty to offer sacrifices, we recognize sacrifices as part of the mysteries of Revelation, by which the things prophesied were foreshadowed. For they were our examples, and in many and various ways they all pointed to the one sacrifice which we now commemorate. Now that this sacrifice has been revealed, and has been offered in due time, sacrifice is no longer binding as an act of worship, while it retains its symbolic authority. For these things "were written for our learning, upon whom the end of the world has come." What you object to in sacrifice is the slaughter of animals, though the whole animal creation is intended conditionally in some way for the use of man.

Commentary: this is part of a large work known as Contra Faustum. Faustus was a Manichean with whom Augustine was having a debate. The point to which Augustine was responding in this book is contained in the first paragraph of the document. It says:

1. Faustus said: You ask if I believe the Old Testament. Of course not, for I do not keep its precepts. Neither, I imagine, do you. I reject circumcision as disgusting; and if I mistake not, so do you. I reject the observance of Sabbaths as superfluous: I suppose you do the same. I reject sacrifice as idolatry, as doubtless you also do. Swine's flesh is not the only flesh I abstain from; nor is it the only flesh you eat. I think all flesh unclean: you think none unclean. Both alike, in these opinions, throw over the Old Testament. We both look upon the weeks of unleavened bread and the feast of tabernacles as unnecessary and useless. Not to patch linen garments with purple; to count it adultery to make a garment of linen and wool; to call it sacrilege to yoke together an ox and an ass when necessary; not to appoint as priest a bald man, or a man with red hair, or any similar peculiarity, as being unclean in the sight of God, are things which we both despise and laugh at, and rank as of neither first nor second importance; and yet they are all precepts and judgments of the Old Testament. You cannot blame me for rejecting the Old Testament; for whether it is right or wrong to do so, you do it as much as I. As for the difference between your faith and mine, it is this, that while you choose to act deceitfully, and meanly to praise in words what in your heart you hate, I, not having learned the art of deception, frankly declare that I hate both these abominable precepts and their authors.

And so all of the points Augustine makes should be taken as a response to the above assertion by Faustus. So let us take a look, point by point at what Augustine has to say:

The point being, looking at the actual document can help protect you from falling victim to shoddy research on the part of some secondary source, like the above incident.


Now, if you would like to talk Augustine and the Eucharist, we can do so.

The first quote I will provide is from his AD 408 letter to St Boniface (# 98):

9. You know that in ordinary parlance we often say, when Easter is approaching, "Tomorrow or the day after is the Lord's Passion," although He suffered so many years ago, and His passion was endured once for all time. In like manner, on Easter Sunday, we say, "This day the Lord rose from the dead," although so many years have passed since His resurrection. But no one is so foolish as to accuse us of falsehood when we use these phrases, for this reason, that we give such names to these days on the ground of a likeness between them and the days on which the events referred to actually transpired, the day being called the day of that event, although it is not the very day on which the event took place, but one corresponding to it by the revolution of the same time of the year, and the event itself being said to take place on that day, because, although it really took place long before, it is on that day sacramentally celebrated. Was not Christ once for all offered up in His own person as a sacrifice? And yet, is He not likewise offered up in the sacrament as a sacrifice, not only in the special solemnities of Easter, but also daily among our congregations; so that the man who, being questioned, answers that He is offered as a sacrifice in that ordinance, declares what is strictly true? For if sacraments had not some points of real resemblance to the things of which they are the sacraments, they would not be sacraments at all. In most cases, moreover, they do in virtue of this likeness bear the names of the realities which they resemble. As, therefore, in a certain manner the sacrament of Christ's body is Christ's body, and the sacrament of Christ's blood is Christ's blood, in the same manner the sacrament of faith is faith. Now believing is nothing else than having faith; and accordingly, when, on behalf of an infant as yet incapable of exercising faith, the answer is given that he believes, this answer means that he has faith because of the sacrament of faith, and in like manner the answer is made that he turns himself to God because of the sacrament of conversion, since the answer itself belongs to the celebration of the sacrament. Thus the apostle says, in regard to this sacrament of Baptism: "We are buried with Christ by baptism into death." He does not say, "We have signified our being buried with Him," but "We have been buried with Him." He has therefore given to the sacrament pertaining to so great a transaction no other name than the word describing the transaction itself.

The next quote comes from his Sermon #272:

One thing is seen, another is to be understood. What you can see on the altar, you also saw last night; but what it was, what it meant, of what great reality it contained the sacrament, you had not yet heard. So what you can see, then, is bread and a cup; that's what even your eyes tell you; but as for what your faith asks to be instructed about, the bread is the body of Christ, the cup the blood of Christ. It took no time to say that indeed, and that, perhaps, may be enough for faith; but faith desires instruction. The prophet says, you see, Unless you believe, you shall not understand (Is 7:9). I mean, you can now say to me, “You've bidden us believe; now explain, so that we may understand.” Some such thought as this, after all, may cross somebody's mind: “We know where our Lord Jesus Christ took flesh from; from the Virgin Mary. He was suckled as a baby, was reared, grew up, came to man's estate, suffered persecution from the Jews, was hung on the tree, was slain on the tree, was taken down from the tree, was buried; rose again on the third day, on the day he wished ascended into heaven. That's where he lifted his body up to; that's where he's going to come from to judge the living and the dead; that's where he is now, seated on the Father's right. How can bread be his body? And the cup, or what the cup contains, how can it be his blood?” The reason these things, brothers and sisters, are called sacraments is that in them one thing is seen, another is to be understood. What can be seen has a bodily appearance, what is to be understood provides spiritual fruit. So if you want to understand the body of Christ, listen to the apostle telling the faithful, You, though, are the body of Christ and its members (1 Cor 12:27). So if it's you that are the body of Christ and its members, it's the mystery meaning you that has been placed on the Lord's table; what you receive is the mystery that means you. It is to what you are that you reply Amen, and by so replying you express your assent. What you hear, you see, is The body of Christ, and you answer, Amen. So be a member of the body of Christ, in order to make that Amen true.

And so on.

The point being that you really should take the time to research the primary sources, which are eminently available, rather than depending upon a tract from a person who is sworn to steal the souls of Christians for the devil save the souls of Catholics.

227 posted on 09/21/2010 1:15:38 PM PDT by markomalley (Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus)
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To: markomalley; bkaycee

What all this proves is there was no agreement on what the Lords supper meant and there was no required belief until 1215 when it was declared a doctrine of the church..and yet even today many deny transubstantiation and have a more reformed view of it


235 posted on 09/21/2010 1:35:14 PM PDT by RnMomof7 (Jhn 8:43 Why do ye not understand my speech? [even] because ye cannot hear my word.)
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