No Ideology – Just Facts!
Irenaeus of Lyons
The Eucharist in the Ante-Nicene Church
Irenaeus of Lyons
Irenaeus was the bishop of Lyons France (Gaul) in the mid second century. He wrote his Against Heresies around 180 A.D. an invaluable work that details Gnostic practices and beliefs and furthermore soundly and biblically refutes them. In addition to Against Heresies, there are several fragments extant that mostly come from Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History.
There are many aspects of gnosticism Irenaeus labored to refute, but for the purpose of this article I will highlight one. Gnostics believed that humans were divine souls trapped in a material world created by evil entities. Irenaeus contended that God divinely created the world and everything in it. And it was elements of the creation that Christ commanded to be received as His body and blood for a memorial of His sacrifice.
Bread and wine are created things that nourish our created bodies. These elements of creation, Irenaeus taught, are established as the body and blood of Christ whose blood was shed truly and physically. The Gnostics maintained that Christ’s body was not created like ours denying His human nature. Therefore, it did not make sense to them that the body could be eternally saved; but Irenaeus asserts that the body will be resurrected incorruptible.
This is the context in which Irenaeus describes the Eucharist. Irenaeus likens the rebirth of the believer to the Eucharist and vise verse.
“Then, again, how can they [the Gnostics] say that the flesh, which is nourished with the body of the Lord and with His blood, goes to corruption, and does not partake of life? Let them, therefore, either alter their opinion, or cease from offering the things just mentioned. But our opinion is in accordance with the eucharist, and the eucharist in turn establishes our opinion. For we offer to Him His own, announcing consistently the fellowship and union of the flesh and Spirit. For as the bread, which is produced from the earth, when it receives the invocation of God, is no longer common bread, but the eucharist, consisting of two realities, earthly and heavenly; so also our bodies, when they receive the eucharist, are no longer corruptible, having the hope of the resurrection to eternity.”
Again, the context is the resurrection of the believer. Irenaeus is speaking of Christians when he said, “the fleshed nourished with the body of the Lord and with His blood.” That is, those who believe on He who was crucified for their sins are nourished with the body and blood of the Lord. Their bodies will not remain in corruption because they will be resurrected. For we offer to Him His own, that is of His own creation. But offerings in the flesh are only pleasing to God when the flesh is united with the Spirit. The flesh united with the gift of the Holy Spirit offers to God the praises of thanksgiving. Flesh void of the gift of the Holy Spirit cannot offer anything to God.
Irenaeus transfers this reality to the bread of the Eucharist by claiming that the bread, which is of God’s creation, receives a Spiritual aspect upon receiving the invocation. The bread, he states, is “no longer common bread, but the eucharist, consisting of two realities, earthly and heavenly.” Earthly, because it is bread which is of the creation, and heavenly, because it is blessed and received by those who themselves are both earthly (in the flesh) and heavenly (born of the Spirit).
Irenaeus clearly denies the notion held by the Catholic Church that the bread is no longer bread; he calls it, “no longer common bread.” Compare this to what the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said in an answer to a relevant question.
“Does the bread cease to be bread and the wine cease to be wine?
Yes. In order for the whole Christ to be present—body, blood, soul, and divinity—the bread and wine cannot remain, but must give way so that his glorified Body and Blood may be present. Thus in the eucharist the bread ceases to be bread in substance, and becomes the Body of Christ, while the wine ceases to be wine in substance, and becomes the Blood of Christ. As St. Thomas Aquinas observed, Christ is not quoted as saying, “This bread is my body,” but “This is my body” (Summa Theologiae, III q. 78, a. 5).” (Emphasis mine)
Irenaeus said the bread was no longer common bread, thus maintaining its status as bread; and the Catholic bishops say it is no longer bread at all. The earthly aspect of the bread from the Irenaeus quote is acknowledgment that the bread is of the creation. The spiritual is attached to the Eucharist itself, which is the celebration of the passion of the Lord and the unity of the body of Christ. The Catholic Church is in opposition to Irenaeus’ understanding of the Eucharist elements.
Not only does Irenaeus deny the change in substance in the bread and wine, he also illustrates in the following quote that the universal church recognized that the altar whereby we offer our gifts to God is in heaven. And heaven is where our adoration is directed, not towards the Eucharistic elements.
“Thus is it, therefore, also His will that we, too, should offer a gift at the altar, frequently and without intermission. The altar, then, is in heaven (for towards that place are our prayers and oblations directed); the temple likewise [is there], as John says in the Apocalypse, “And the temple of God was opened: ” the tabernacle also: “For, behold,” He says, “the tabernacle of God, in which He will dwell with men.”
There is also a fragment extant from Irenaeus that sheds a bit more light on the question of the Eucharistic bread’s substance. Apparently during the persecutions at Lyons, one of the accusations placed upon Christians was the charge of cannibalism. This charge was made because the non-Christians heard that the Christians ate the body and blood of Christ. This fragment from Irenaeus shows that the Christians indeed did not consider that the Eucharist was the literal body of Christ.
“For when the Greeks, having arrested the slaves of Christian catechumens, then used force against them, in order to learn from them some secret thing [practiced] among Christians, these slaves, having nothing to say that would meet the wishes of their tormentors, except that they had heard from their masters that the divine communion was the body and blood of Christ, and imagining that it was actually flesh and blood, gave their inquisitors answer to that effect. Then these latter, assuming such to be the case with regard to the practices of Christians, gave information regarding it to other Greeks, and sought to compel the martyrs Sanctus and Blandina to confess, under the influence of torture, [that the allegation was correct]. To these men Blandina replied very admirably in these words: ‘How should those persons endure such [accusations], who, for the sake of the practice [of piety], did not avail themselves even of the flesh that was permitted [them to eat]?’” (Fragment 13)
The slaves had heard from their masters that the eucharist is the body and blood of Christ and so confessed it to be. But Irenaeus clarifies for us that the slaves confessed in ignorance by saying they imagined it was actually flesh and blood. Irenaeus’ point is made even clearer in Blandina’s reply to the Greeks’ attempt to make he and Sanctus confess the same. The slaves themselves would not even eat the meat that was permitted them to eat much less the literal flesh of Christ. To Irenaeus the idea of real presence in the Eucharist as believed by Catholics today would have been ridiculous.
about 6 months ago
You should discuss this quote of Irenaeus also:
“So then, if the mixed cup and the manufactured bread receive the Word of God and become the Eucharist, that is to say, the Blood and Body of Christ, which fortify and build up the substance of our flesh, how can these people claim that the flesh is incapable of receiving God’s gift of eternal life, when it is nourished by Christ’s Blood and Body and is His member? As the blessed apostle says in his letter to the Ephesians, ‘For we are members of His Body, of His flesh and of His bones’ (Eph. 5:30). He is not talking about some kind of ‘spiritual’ and ‘invisible’ man, ‘for a spirit does not have flesh an bones’ (Lk. 24:39). No, he is talking of the organism possessed by a real human being, composed of flesh and nerves and bones. It is this which is nourished by the cup which is His Blood, and is fortified by the bread which is His Body. The stem of the vine takes root in the earth and eventually bears fruit, and ‘the grain of wheat falls into the earth’ (Jn. 12:24), dissolves, rises again, multiplied by the all-containing Spirit of God, and finally after skilled processing, is put to human use. These two then receive the Word of God and become the Eucharist, which is the Body and Blood of Christ.”
about 6 months ago
Here is a translation that is free of biased editing. Notice, if you will, that this version is cohesive with what Irenaeus said just before it, and the additional context offers a clearer understanding.
“When, therefore, the mingled cup and the manufactured bread receives the Word of God, and the Eucharist of the blood and the body of Christ is made, from which things the substance of our flesh is increased and supported, how can they affirm that the flesh is incapable of receiving the gift of God, which is life eternal, which [flesh] is nourished from the body and blood of the Lord, and is a member of Him?— even as the blessed Paul declares in his Epistle to the Ephesians, that we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. He does not speak these words of some spiritual and invisible man, for a spirit has not bones nor flesh; but [he refers to] that dispensation [by which the Lord became] an actual man, consisting of flesh, and nerves, and bones—that [flesh] which is nourished by the cup which is His blood, and receives increase from the bread which is His body. And just as a cutting from the vine planted in the ground fructifies in its season, or as a grain of wheat falling into the earth and becoming decomposed, rises with manifold increase by the Spirit of God, who contains all things, and then, through the wisdom of God, serves for the use of men, and having received the Word of God, becomes the Eucharist, which is the body and blood of Christ; so also our bodies, being nourished by it, and deposited in the earth, and suffering decomposition there, shall rise at their appointed time, the Word of God granting them resurrection to the glory of God, even the Father, who freely gives to this mortal immortality, and to this corruptible incorruption, because the strength of God is made perfect in weakness, in order that we may never become puffed up, as if we had life from ourselves, and exalted against God, our minds becoming ungrateful; but learning by experience that we possess eternal duration from the excelling power of this Being, not from our own nature, we may neither undervalue that glory which surrounds God as He is, nor be ignorant of our own nature, but that we may know what God can effect, and what benefits man receives, and thus never wander from the true comprehension of things as they are, that is, both with regard to God and with regard to man. And might it not be the case, perhaps, as I have already observed, that for this purpose God permitted our resolution into the common dust of mortality, that we, being instructed by every mode, may be accurate in all things for the future, being ignorant neither of God nor of ourselves? (A.H. 5:3:2)”
about 1 month ago
I can see how one could interpret the Iraneus passage to support a symbolic role for the Eucharist. But it is an uncharitable stretch to conclude from this quote that Ireneus would consider real presence ridiculous.
My understanding of real presence is that Christ is really present in the Eucharist, body, blood, soul, and divinity. But the presence is not physical. The Eucharist is not meat. It does not become an eye, tooth, or finger. It is not of the type of flesh which would sustain the charge of cannibalism.
The type of flesh and blood in the Eucharist would later be fleshed out (pun intended) in the doctrine of transubstantiation.
But at the time it is clear that the Eucharist was very special. It was special enough that catechumens, those preparing to be initiated, were kept in the dark about its nature. It is notable that they did not report to the authorities that they were eating
I find it easier to understand the doctrine by switching mental gears. Rather than thinking like a scientist, think like a lawyer.
For example, if somebody were to come along and kill me today it would be a crime. A human being is murdered. However, if I were to undergo certain training and initiating, my murder would not only be a crime, but become an act of war. When I put on a uniform the United States Armed Forces, I become qualitatively different in a very real way. I become America in a way more than just a symbol. Likely, I am changed deeply in ways not merely physical.
Of course, in my example I remain an independent man with my own personal life and a capacity for dereliction of duty. In the case of the Eucharist the transformation is complete. God has that kind of power over reality.
Anyway, that is the best formulation I could come up with quickly. I’m not sure what Iraneus would say about it, but hopefully he would not find it ridiculous.
By the way, St. Blandina was a woman and a martyr. And I am not a serviceman or veteran. I respect what they do deeply. I believe that their lives are an appropriate secular analogy for transformational sacrifice.
about 1 month ago
If you were to become a soldier you would gain a new identity, but you would not change in substance. Likewise, the substance of the bread and wine of the Eucharist does not change, but rather remains bread and wine which when blessed represents Christ’s body and blood. That is what the early Christians believed, and it is evident that that is what was handed down from the apostles. If you believe the doctrine of transubstantiation, you are placing your faith in the Catholic leadership rather than on the evidence from the early church.
about 1 month ago
Whether you believe “this is my body” metaphorically or literally, you’re placing your faith in an interpretation.
It sure would be nice if Jesus, Paul, Ignatius, Justin, or Irenaeus would comment on this blog and explain what they meant.
Assuming that doesn’t happen, we should all go read John 17.
about 2 days ago
To me, St Irenaeus’ words that the bread and wine “receive the Word”*, that indicates the “Real Presence.”
*from Jonathan Brumley’s citation