Some Roman Catholic Issues: Transubstantiation/Apocrypha

There seems to be a tremendous amount of confusion on the part of a number of people regarding some of the issues of some of my recent videos, especially in reference to Roman Catholicism.

One of the problems seems to be that for a lot of people, they use the terms real presence and transubstantiation as synonyms.

And no one who reads church history and considers the development, even the development of doctrine, not even looking at biblical parameters, the development of doctrine over time, can make that kind of conclusion, can be that confused, recognizing that there were people who did not make that connection, that in fact transubstantiation requires an entire philosophical framework to be even understandable that many in the early church could not possibly have even possessed.

And I think also in another area, in regards to the Apocrypha, the appearance of Gary Maciuta's book seemingly has resulted in the creation of a number of Roman Catholics who think that the acceptance of these books was universal.

Their Catholics are saying everybody has always believed these books to be fully canonical scripture and no one ever disagreed until Martin Luther.

And so I'd like to provide two clips from previous debates. One I had posted earlier quite some time ago, but it was back when

I was just posting video to use in my blog. I didn't have any type of interaction or anything like that in it.

And that is from the mass debate from 1999, where I address that development over time and the establishment of the

Aristotelian concept of transubstantiation, accidents and substance, and what that ended up meaning to the concept of the real presence now being changed into transubstantiation.

And then a section I haven't posted before, and that is a portion of my opening statement with Gary Maciuta and the debate that we did on Long Island.

So hopefully this will be helpful in at least helping the people understand what the parameters of the discussion really are.

Now, toward the end of the first millennium, one finds such notables as Gottschalk and Ratramnus opposing the concept of the literal materiality of the elements of the

Eucharist. When Paschasius Radbertus, though not using the later scholastic terminology of transubstantiation, presented very much the same concept, the debate was joined, demonstrating that surely such a concept was not the ancient and constant faith of the

Church. The renowned historian Philip Schaaf notes, quote, In both cases, the conflict was between a materialistic and a spiritualistic conception of the sacrament and its effect.

The one was based on a literal, the other a figurative interpretation of the words of institution and of the mysterious discourse in the sixth chapter of St.

John. But remember, folks, Council of Trent said this has always been the faith of the

Church. How, indeed, could two viewpoints exist side by side and result in such controversy if Trent is correct, that it has ever been a firm belief in the

Church of God? In the debates that took place toward the end of the first millennium and at the beginning of the second, those who defended a symbolic understanding of the

Eucharist were able to quote on their side the testimony of Augustine. It is ironic to note that in regard to two dogmas of the

Roman Catholic Church, transubstantiation and the concept of the Immaculate Conception, the testimony of Augustine had to be overcome and that with great difficulty.

The word transubstantiation seems to have first been used by Hildebert of Tours in 1134.

Others mention other differing candidates for the first people to use it, but it was a long time after the apostles, before that term came into use.

I'd like to introduce to you a key issue. If one believes in transubstantiation, then one will worship the consecrated host as God.

The Council of Trent says that we're to do so. Yet history records that the elevation and adoration of the host is not an ancient practice, and as the

New Catholic Encyclopedia notes, such items as the tabernacle, pick, saboreum, etc., begin to appear only at the same time as the use of the term transubstantiation.

While the ancient Church carried the host to the sick, the idea of reserving the host in a tabernacle for worship came about at this later time.

As Schaff notes, quote, the elevation and adoration of the host were practiced in the Latin Church as early as the 12th century.

Honorius III in 1217 made obligatory the ringing of a bell at the moment the words of institution were uttered and the worshipers might fall on their knees and adore the host.

The Lambeth Synod of 1281 ordered the church bells to be rung at the moment of consecration so that the laboring man on the field and the woman engaged in her domestic work might bow down and worship.

Synods prescribed that the picks, the receptacle for the host, be made of gold, silver, ivory, or at least polished copper.

A light was kept burning before it perpetually. In case a crumb of the bread or a drop of the wine fell upon the cloth of the priest's garments, the part was to be cut out and burnt and the ashes thrown in the saccharine.

If a drop happened to fall on a stone or a piece of wood or hard earth, the priest or some pious person was to lick it up.

The festival of the Eucharist, Corpus Christi, celebrated the first Thursday after Trinity Sunday, had its origin in the vision of Juliana, a nun of Liges who saw the full moon representing the church year with one spot on its surface.

This spot indicated the church's neglect to properly honor the real presence. She made her vision known to the

Bishop of Liges and the Archdeacon James Pantaleon. A celebration was appointed for the diocese and when

James became pope under the name of Urban IV, he prescribed in 1264 the general observance of the festival.

John XXII inaugurated the process wherein, on Corpus Christi day, the host was carried about the streets with great solemnities.

He also says that the denial of the cup to the laity became common in the 13th century. It was at first due to the fear of profanation by spilling the consecrated blood of Christ.

Let me ask you a question. Why did it take more than a thousand years before anyone was concerned about spilling the consecrated wine?

And why do the miraculous stories about consecrated hosts literally explode in number only after the beginning of the second millennium?

Well, as Beckwith says, but the undeniable truth is that the New Testament, by contrast with the early fathers, and by contrast with its own practice in relation to the books of the

Hebrew Bible, never actually quotes from or ascribes authority to any of the

Apocrypha. Did they know of those books? Of course they knew of those books. But remember, they knew of a lot of books.

Paul quoted from pagan philosophers. Jude quotes from the Pseudepigrapha. That doesn't mean they accepted those books as canonical, but they had read those books and were aware of their existence.

Now what about early Christians and the Apocrypha? It was stated that all of the patristic sources utilized these books as direct scripture.

In reality, those early writings are so fragmentary that many books of the Apocrypha are never even made reference to.

Some never make any reference to the Apocryphal books at all. And so it is a very large step from a few references to saying all held a particular perspective.

We do know that Melito of Sardis inquired of the church in Palestine concerning the Old Testament canon around A .D.

175. He discovered that the canon did not include the Apocryphal books. How can it be that he would inquire in Palestine, I must ask, if in fact the canon of the

Old Testament, including the Apocrypha, was a matter of apostolic tradition, as Trent had claimed?

What about the Septuagint? We are often told, well, the Greek Septuagint contained these books.

Well, many of the manuscripts that we have, in fact all our manuscripts of the Septuagint are Christian manuscripts.

They're not produced by the Jews. And many of them do contain one or more or all of the Apocryphal books.

But there is no one single Septuagint. It wasn't like you put out the New American Standard Bible back then.

You had handwritten versions that had different levels of clarity and value to them.

It developed over time in the centuries prior to Christ. Now Philo and Josephus, Philo the

Jew and Alexandria, Josephus the Jewish historian, both used the Septuagint, but both rejected the

Apocryphal books. Evidently, some in the early church, ignorant of the Old Testament canon and the backgrounds of the people of Israel, assumed that since some or all of the

Apocryphal books appeared in their Greek translations, then they must be canonical. Those early writers who knew the most about the

Old Testament did not make this mistake. And remember, very few of the early church writers knew the

Hebrew language. There was a division, a schism, between Judaism and Christianity very early on. And especially after origin, most looked at the

Old Testament as nothing but a book of allegory anyways. And so without knowing the Hebrew language and without knowing the backgrounds that are so important to the proper exegesis of the biblical text, it is easy to see how that kind of ignorance could take place.

However, Athanasius, the Bishop of Alexandria, the great defender of the Nicene Creed, in his 39th

Festal Letter in 367 A .D., rejected all the freestanding Apocryphal books, only accepting the

Greek additions to the canonical books that he had, possibly not even being aware that they were, in fact, additions to the canonical books themselves.

Who else? Hilary of Poitiers, Cyril of Jerusalem, Athanasius, Gregory Nazianzus, Basil the

Great, Epiphanius, Amphilochius, Rufinus, all rejected the freestanding

Apocrypha as fully canonical in their writings. Indeed, J. N. D. Kelly has said, the view, which now commended itself fairly generally in the

Eastern Church as represented by Athanasius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzus, and Epiphanius, was that the deuterocanonical books should be relegated to a subordinate position outside the canon proper.