The fact that I answered and refuted this claim of yours proves my point
Finito
Richard
You have not refuted anything. The two statements that yesterday you deemed contradictory were NOT contradictory and everyone except you understands that. This shows that you don’t possess, or don’t accept, the basic rules of Logic.
Your intellectual honesty or cognitive development (I won’t pretend to know which, and it may well be both, but at least one of the two must be true) never even began in the first place.
Alright, Knor, here we are. I’ve actually taken the time to analyze the… well, I honestly don’t know what to call it without becoming terribly uncharitable (not toward you, of course, but toward its author). So, in the interest of Christian charity, I’ll describe this thing in the gentlest, most charitable terms I can possibly muster: an utterly unsalvageable piece of garbage that deserves to be thrown into a dumpster fire, reduced to ashes, and then mercifully erased from the very memory of creation itself. 
My refutation will be divided into two parts due to its considerable length. Unfortunately, such a detailed response was necessary to expose the full extent of the errors and deliberate misrepresentations in the article you linked.
Sections 1–10
The article Did the Early Church Teach Transubstantiation?, was written by Nathan Busenitz and published on The Master’s Seminary’s website on April 21, 2016, deserves a much more critical examination than simply accepting its collection of patristic quotations at face value.
Its central argument rests on a remarkably elementary assumption: that whenever an early Christian author calls the Eucharist a symbol, figure, memorial, or spiritual food, he must be denying the kind of sacramental reality affirmed by Catholic theology.
That assumption is not a historical finding. It is the very proposition Busenitz is required to prove.
Yet, instead of consistently proving it, he REPETEADLY selects quotations that appear to support his interpretation while ignoring passages that refute it.
The result is…let’s just say a striking example of how a theological case can appear persuasive when ancient texts are read through categories they did NOT share.
Let us examine the evidence.
1. Busenitz’s Qualifications: A Seminary Polemic Is Not Equivalent to a Major Work of Patristic Scholarship
First, intellectual fairness requires acknowledging Busenitz’s actual qualifications.
He teaches historical theology at The Master’s Seminary and has published on historical-theological subjects. It would therefore be inaccurate to claim that he has no experience studying Christian history.
But his own curriculum vitae identifies his PhD, awarded in 2015, as a doctorate in systematic theology from The Master’s Seminary.
This matters because the historical authority of an argument must be assessed in relation to the author’s training, research, methodology, and engagement with the relevant literature.
Now compare this with J. N. D. Kelly, the Anglican scholar who served as University Lecturer in Patristic Studies at Oxford and was elected a Fellow of the British Academy.
Kelly’s Early Christian Doctrines is an extensive academic study of the historical development of Christian doctrine. His professional research was directly concerned with the subject Busenitz is discussing.
An evangelical seminary blog post is not automatically equivalent in scholarly weight to a major historical investigation by an internationally recognized specialist in patristics.
This is not an argument that Kelly must be correct because he had an impressive academic career, it is an argument that Busenitz must actually engage the evidence and scholarship rather than expecting his readers to treat a collection of quotations as though it settled the historical question.
Indeed, Busenitz explicitly begins by declaring Scripture the final doctrinal authority, that is a recognizable Protestant theological commitment.
There is nothing inherently illegitimate about confessional scholarship: but his article should be evaluated as a theological argument written from that perspective, not mistaken for an impartial summary of scholarly consensus.
Busenitz’s Master’s Seminary faculty profile
J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, fourth edition (1968), original PDF
2 He Begins by Blurring the Very Doctrine He Claims to Refute
Busenitz asks whether the early Christians believed that Eucharistic bread and wine were transformed into Christ’s physical body and blood.
He then frames the question as an alternative between literal physical transformation and symbolism.
This framing is misleading because Catholic transubstantiation does not teach that the Eucharist undergoes an ordinary, empirically observable transformation into human tissue and blood.
Catholic theology distinguishes a conversion of substance from the continuing sensible appearances of bread and wine.
The doctrine maintains that Christ becomes truly and substantially present under the sacramental appearances, not that a communicant sees or tastes ordinary pieces of human flesh.
This distinction is essential.
Consequently, if an ancient writer rejects a crude interpretation of eating Christ’s flesh, that alone proves nothing against the Catholic account of sacramental presence.
It might refute physical cannibalism, It does not automatically refute transubstantiation.
An argument cannot seriously claim to have refuted Catholic doctrine while failing to distinguish that doctrine from the crude materialism Catholic theology itself rejects. It just shows one’s own ignorance or dishonesty.
Official Catechism of the Catholic Church, §§1374–1377
3. Tertullian: The Article’s Central Inference Is HISTORICALLY UNJUSTIFIED
Busenitz places considerable weight on Against Marcion IV, 40, where Tertullian describes the Eucharistic bread as a figura of Christ’s body.
From this, Busenitz concludes that Tertullian regarded the Eucharistic elements as symbols of Christ’s physical body. He then employs Tertullian as an interpretive key for earlier witnesses, including Ignatius of Antioch and Irenaeus.
The problem with this argument is not merely that it overlooks an alternative interpretation. It overlooks substantial evidence that Tertullian himself understood the Eucharist in explicitly realistic terms.
Consider first what Tertullian actually says in Against Marcion IV, 40.
His immediate purpose is to refute Marcion’s denial of Christ’s genuine flesh. Tertullian argues that Christ could not have represented His body through bread unless He possessed a genuine body in the first place.
But significantly, Tertullian also states that Christ made the bread His body by declaring, “This is my body.”
The reference to figura therefore occurs within an argument that simultaneously affirms Christ’s real humanity and describes the Eucharistic bread in terms of becoming His body.
Nothing in this passage establishes that the Eucharistic figure is merely an external reminder of an absent body.
And this becomes considerably clearer when Tertullian’s other writings are examined.
3.1. Tertullian’s Eucharistic Realism in De Resurrectione Carnis 8
In On the Resurrection of the Flesh, chapter 8, Tertullian discusses the relationship between the human body and the soul in the sacraments.
He establishes a remarkable parallel:
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In baptism, the flesh is washed with water so that the soul may be cleansed.
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In the Eucharist, the flesh is nourished by Christ’s body and blood so that the soul may be nourished by God.
This is not an incidental remark. It forms part of Tertullian’s argument that the flesh participates genuinely in divine salvation and is therefore destined for resurrection.
The physical body participates in sacramental realities whose effects extend to the soul.
The significance of this passage has been explicitly recognized by the eminent patristic scholar J. N. D. Kelly.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 211, Kelly writes:
“Clearly his assumption is that the Saviour’s body and blood are as real as the baptismal water.”
AS REAL AS THE BAPTISMAL WATER. This is an extraordinarily important observation.
Kelly doesn’t argue merely that Tertullian’s words are compatible with a realistic Eucharistic interpretation. He identifies realism as the underlying assumption of Tertullian’s own argument.
Just as baptism involves actual water through which a spiritual effect is communicated, the Eucharist involves Christ’s body and blood as the sacramental nourishment of the Christian.
To interpret Tertullian as teaching a merely commemorative Eucharist, one must therefore account for this strikingly realistic sacramental language. Busenitz’s appeal to figura does not accomplish that.
3.2. Kelly Explicitly Rejects a Merely Symbolic Reading of Tertullian
The evidence becomes even more decisive on p. 212.
Kelly directly addresses precisely the passages on which Busenitz relies: Tertullian’s description of the bread as figura and his use of the verb repraesentare.
Kelly warns against interpreting these expressions according to modern assumptions about symbolic language.
In ancient sacramental thought, he explains, the relationship between a sign and what it signifies was not necessarily one of simple separation or absence. A sacramental symbol could participate in, or communicate, the reality signified.
Moreover, Kelly emphasizes that repraesentare, in Tertullian’s vocabulary, could retain its fundamental meaning: “to make present.”
But Kelly’s conclusion goes considerably further.
He explains that Tertullian accepts the identification of the Eucharistic elements with Christ’s body and blood while preserving a distinction between the sacramental elements and the reality they communicate.
In Kelly’s interpretation, figura is Tertullian’s attempt to account for two convictions simultaneously:
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The consecrated elements truly are Christ’s body and blood.
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The elements nevertheless continue to appear to the senses as bread and wine.
This is crucial.
For Kelly, Tertullian’s figurative language does not weaken Eucharistic realism. Rather, it helps explain how Tertullian understood the relationship between sacramental appearance and Eucharistic reality.
What Busenitz treats as evidence against the Real Presence, Kelly interprets within Tertullian’s acceptance of that very reality.
3.3. Tertullian’s Other Writings Reinforce the Realistic Interpretation
Nor is Kelly’s interpretation based on a single isolated expression.
In De Idololatria 7, Tertullian condemns Christians who manufacture idols and then dare to approach the Lord’s body with the same hands.
His language is striking: those who handle the sacred reality unworthily are described as committing an offense against Christ’s body itself.
Likewise, in De Corona 3, Tertullian describes the extraordinary reverence Christians display toward the Eucharistic bread and cup, including their concern that even a portion should fall to the ground.
The cumulative evidence must be interpreted and aknowledged, not selectively reduced to a single occurrence of the word figura.
3.4. The Historical and Methodological FAILURE
The central weakness of Busenitz’s argument is now apparent.
He moves from the legitimate observation that Tertullian calls the Eucharistic bread a figure to the much stronger conclusion that Tertullian regarded the Eucharist as merely symbolic.
That conclusion does not follow from the premise.
Indeed, Kelly’s detailed treatment of Tertullian provides a powerful historical objection to precisely this inference.
Kelly explicitly recognizes the realism of Tertullian’s sacramental theology, identifies Christ’s body and blood as genuine Eucharistic realities, and interprets figura and repraesentare within that framework.
To be clear, this does not mean that Tertullian had already articulated the later scholastic doctrine of transubstantiation. Such a claim would be historically anachronistic.
But the absence of a later metaphysical explanation is not evidence for the presence of modern memorialism.
The historical question is whether Tertullian understood the Eucharist as a merely commemorative symbol or as a sacramental reality through which Christ’s body and blood are truly communicated.
The evidence examined by Kelly strongly supports the latter interpretation.
And a further methodological problem remains: even if Tertullian’s Eucharistic language were genuinely ambiguous, it would still be illegitimate to impose a restrictive reading of this later author upon the earlier and independently situated testimony of Ignatius and Irenaeus.
Their writings must first be interpreted on their own terms.
Busenitz has established that Tertullian employs figurative language.
He has not established that Tertullian denies the Real Presence.
More importantly, he has not adequately confronted the substantial evidence that Tertullian positively affirms a realistic understanding of the Eucharist.
The distinction is fundamental.
Far from providing an unambiguous patristic foundation for modern memorialism, Tertullian’s writings, as interpreted by Kelly, offer substantial evidence against reducing the early Christian Eucharist to a mere symbolic commemoration.
Primary Sources and Scholarship
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Tertullian, Against Marcion, IV, 40.
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Tertullian, On the Resurrection of the Flesh, 8.
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Tertullian, On Idolatry, 7.
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J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 211–212, section Progress in Eucharistic Doctrine.4. Ignatius of Antioch: The Anti-Docetic Context Does Not Make His Eucharistic Teaching Disappear
4 The Ignatius problem
Busenitz acknowledges that Ignatius identifies the Eucharist with the flesh of Christ.He then argues that Ignatius was simply emphasizing Christ’s genuine bodily existence against Docetism.
But there is a glaring problem: why does Ignatius specifically condemn his opponents for refusing to acknowledge what the Eucharist is?
In Letter to the Smyrnaeans 7:1, Ignatius identifies the Eucharist with the flesh of the Savior that suffered and was raised.
His argument explicitly connects Eucharistic belief with the reality of the Incarnation.
This does not mean that Ignatius had already developed the Aristotelian distinction between substance and accidents, it means that Ignatius understood the Eucharist as being Christ’s real flesh in a way clear enough to become part of his argument against heresy.
Kelly examines this exact context in Early Christian Doctrines, p. 197, and interprets Ignatius’s Eucharistic language realistically.
Notice what has happened.
Busenitz appeals to the anti-Docetic controversy as though it automatically weakened the realistic interpretation.
Kelly examines that very controversy and regards it as a reason to take Ignatius’s language seriously.
Repeating that Ignatius opposed Docetism is not a rebuttal to Eucharistic realism. It is merely a statement of the context that must be explained.
And on that question, Busenitz’s explanation fails completely.
Ignatius, Letter to the Smyrnaeans 6–7
Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, p. 197
5. Irenaeus: Kelly Explicitly Affirms His Eucharistic Realism
Busenitz argues that Irenaeus merely repeats Christ’s words of institution to defend the reality of the Incarnation.
But J. N. D. Kelly explicitly rejects a merely symbolic understanding of Irenaeus’s Eucharistic teaching.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 198, Kelly states:
“So Irenaeus teaches that the bread and wine are really the Lord’s body and blood.”
Kelly considers this testimony particularly compelling because Irenaeus presents it incidentally while refuting the Gnostic and Docetic denial of Christ’s real humanity.
Even more significantly, Kelly observes that Irenaeus “seems to postulate a change”, citing Against Heresies IV, 18:5, where consecrated bread is described as no longer ordinary bread but the Eucharist.
Furthermore, in Against Heresies V, 2:2–3, Irenaeus appeals to the nourishment of human flesh by Christ’s Eucharistic body and blood as evidence for bodily resurrection.
Thus, the very anti-Gnostic context Busenitz invokes to minimize Eucharistic realism is treated by Kelly as particularly significant evidence of it.
Irenaeus did not formulate the later scholastic doctrine of transubstantiation. But Kelly explicitly affirms that he believed the Eucharistic elements really are Christ’s body and blood.
Busenitz has not demonstrated that Irenaeus taught mere memorialism. Kelly’s historical assessment points in precisely the opposite direction.
Sources: Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, p. 198; Irenaeus, Against Heresies V, 2.
6. Justin Martyr: Kelly Explicitly Undermines the Memorialist Interpretation and shows the lack of rigour on Busenitz’ part
Busenitz cites Justin Martyr’s description of the Eucharist as a remembrance of Christ’s body and blood in Dialogue with Trypho 70, suggesting a symbolic understanding.
But J. N. D. Kelly explicitly interprets Justin’s Eucharistic teaching in the opposite direction.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 197, Kelly explains that Justin’s description of the Eucharist as a memorial of Christ’s Passion implies “much more than an act of purely spiritual recollection.”
Why? BECAUSE JUSTIN HIMSELF IDENTIFIED THE EUCHARIST ELEMENTS WITH CHRIST’S ACTUAL BODY AND BLOOD
Even more decisively, on p. 198, Kelly states:
“Justin actually refers TO THE CHANGE”.
Kelly then cites First Apology 66, where Justin declares that the consecrated food is not ordinary bread and drink but “the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh.”
This is an extraordinarily important admission.
Kelly does not merely argue that Justin’s commemorative language is compatible with Eucharistic realism. He explicitly recognizes both the identification of the Eucharistic elements with Christ’s flesh and blood and Justin’s reference to a change.
Furthermore, Kelly explains that Justin understands the Eucharistic bread and wine as a sacrificial offering associated with Christ’s Passion (Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 196–197).
Thus, Busenitz’s appeal to remembrance does not establish memorialism. The very scholar whose historical analysis we are examining explicitly rejects reducing Justin’s Eucharistic memorial to spiritual recollection and proves that Justin had very much a very realistic understanding of the Blessed Sacrament.
Busenitz has demonstrated that Justin believed in Eucharistic remembrance. Kelly demonstrates that this remembrance involved much more: the identification of the consecrated elements with Christ’s flesh and blood and an apparent change associated with their consecration.
Sources: Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 196–198 , Justin Martyr, First Apology 66, Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 707.
7 The Didache: Kelly’s Evidence Directly Challenges the Memorialist Reading
Busenitz appeals to the Didache’s reference to “spiritual food and drink” as evidence for a symbolic Eucharist.
But J. N. D. Kelly’s historical analysis points in a substantially different direction. In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 197, Kelly describes the Eucharistic elements in the Didache as: “spiritual food and drink communicating immortal life.” This is crucial. Kelly does not describe ordinary bread serving merely as a reminder of Christ. He identifies sacred Eucharistic nourishment that communicates immortal life. Moreover, on p. 196, Kelly explicitly states:“The Didache indeed actually applies the term θυσία, or sacrifice, to the eucharist.”
Kelly places this testimony within the emergence of the Eucharist as the distinctively Christian sacrifice from the end of the first century. Thus, the earliest Eucharistic evidence is not simply commemorative language. It includes sacred nourishment communicating immortal life and an explicitly sacrificial understanding of Christian worship. And this is why Busenitz cannot legitimately present the Didache as positive evidence for modern memorialism. Because it is evidence for the opposite. Kelly’s evidence establishes a sacred, life-communicating and sacrificial Eucharist.
Sources: Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 196–197; Didache 9:5; 10:3; 14:1–3.
8 Clement of Alexandria: Kelly’s Evidence Directly refutes Busenitz’s Symbolic Interpretation
Busenitz quotes Clement’s statement that wine symbolizes Christ’s blood, suggesting a merely symbolic Eucharistic theology.
But J. N. D. Kelly’s analysis of Clement tells a substantially different story.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 213, Kelly explicitly states:
“Clement frequently writes in terms of the equivalence of the elements with Christ’s body and blood.”
Kelly further explains that Clement presents Christ as identifying the Eucharistic elements with Himself.
More importantly, Kelly observes that Clement understands Eucharistic wine as a mingling of the Logos with material substance, through which believers participate in Christ’s incorruptibility and receive sanctification of body and soul.
This interpretation is grounded in The Instructor II, 2, where Clement explicitly connects drinking Christ’s blood with participation in divine immortality.
Thus, the very chapter Busenitz quotes to establish symbolism also contains Clement’s positive account of Eucharistic participation in Christ.
Kelly acknowledges that Clement frequently interprets Eucharistic language allegorically, emphasizing spiritual knowledge of the Logos. Nevertheless, this does not justify reducing his Eucharistic teaching to ordinary wine serving as a mere reminder.
Busenitz quotes Clement’s symbolic language. Kelly recognizes his identification of the Eucharistic elements with Christ’s body and blood, their participation in the Logos, and their sanctifying significance.
The historical evidence is considerably richer—and more realistic—than Busenitz’s willingly selective quotation allows.
Sources: Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 213–214; Clement, The Instructor II, 2.
Origen: The Evidence Busenitz Omits Directly REFUTES His Interpretation
Busenitz quotes Against Celsus VIII, 57, where Origen describes the Eucharistic bread as a symbol of gratitude to God.
But this selective quotation becomes seriously misleading when compared with Origen’s actual Eucharistic teaching and J. N. D. Kelly’s historical analysis.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 213, Kelly explicitly observes: “He is prepared to speak of Christ giving His body and blood to Christians.”
Kelly then cites Against Celsus VIII, 33, where Origen declares: “This bread becomes by prayer a sacred body, which sanctifies those who sincerely partake of it.”
This is not merely ordinary bread reminding believers of an absent Christ. Origen attributes a consecrating effect to prayer and a sanctifying function to the resulting sacred body.
Even more significantly, Kelly notes that Origen insists upon reverence for the consecrated elements (Homilies on ExodusXIII, 3).
In that passage, Origen reminds Christians of their extraordinary care when receiving the Lord’s body, lest even a small fragment of the consecrated gift fall to the ground.
Why does Busenitz quote Origen’s reference to a symbol of gratitude while omitting his descriptions of consecrated bread as a sacred body, its sanctifying efficacy, and the reverence owed to it, if not to pursue his own agenda and defend a view that the texts themselves shatter in a thousand pieces?
Kelly certainly recognizes Origen’s strongly allegorical theology and his distinction between the sacramental body and the deeper spiritual nourishment received from the Logos (Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 213–214).
But that complexity is precisely what makes Busenitz’s simplistic appeal to the word symbol historically inadequate.
Origen’s Eucharistic teaching cannot be reduced to a merely commemorative ceremony simply because he employs symbolic language.
Busenitz quotes Origen’s symbolism. Kelly documents his sacramental realism, his language of Christ’s body and blood, and his reverence for the consecrated elements.
The burden is therefore on Busenitz to demonstrate that these affirmations are even remotely compatible with modern memorialism. He has not done so.
Sources: Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 211, 213–214 , Origen, Against Celsus VIII, 33 and , Homilies on Exodus 13.1–13.7 · Sophia Scriptura
10 Cyprian: Kelly Explicitly Rejects the Very Interpretation Busenitz Attempts to Defend
Busenitz quotes Cyprian’s Letter 63, emphasizing that wine represents Christ’s blood, and uses this language to support a symbolic interpretation of the Eucharist.
But J. N. D. Kelly explicitly rejects precisely this inference.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 212, Kelly states that Cyprian’s accounts of Eucharistic profanation confirm that he understood the Real Presence literally.
Even more decisively, on p. 213, Kelly directly addresses Cyprian’s statement that Christ’s blood is shown in the wine and explicitly denies that this implies a merely symbolic understanding.
Kelly is not merely allowing a realistic interpretation. He is expressly rejecting the symbolic reduction upon which Busenitz’s argument depends.
The primary sources reinforce Kelly’s conclusion.
In On the Lapsed 16, Cyprian declares that unworthy communicants do violence to Christ’s body and blood.
In Letter 63, §14, he states that the priest offers a “true and full sacrifice” when following Christ’s institution.
And in §17 he declares: “the Lord’s passion is the sacrifice which we offer.”
Furthermore, Kelly explains (Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 215–216) that Cyprian understood the Eucharistic sacrifice as possessing objective efficacy and the priest as sacramentally re-enacting Christ’s sacrificial offering.
This is not the theology of a merely symbolic remembrance. It is a realistic and sacrificial Eucharistic theology.
The problem for Busenitz is therefore considerably more serious than selective quotation: Kelly explicitly rejects the memorialist inference drawn from the very words of Cyprian that Busenitz cites.
To deny that Cyprian already formulated medieval transubstantiation is legitimate (just like pre-nicene fathers certainly had not developed the trinitarian framework)
To enlist him as evidence for a merely symbolic Eucharist, while ignoring his literal understanding of the Real Presence and his doctrine of an objectively efficacious sacrifice, is historically indefensible and deliberately misleading.
Sources: , J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 211–213, 215–216 , Cyprian, Letter 63, §§13–17 (Epistle 62 in this translation) , Cyprian, On the Lapsed, §§16, 25–26
The first ten problems reveal a consistent methodological weakness.
Busenitz correctly observes that patristic authors use symbolic, spiritual, and commemorative language.
But he repeatedly moves from that observation to conclusions that have not been adequately established and actually refuted by the very texts he misquotes.
He does not consistently demonstrate that symbolic language excludes sacramental presence.
He does not adequately distinguish later theological terminology from earlier sacramental belief.
And he does not consistently confront evidence that refutes his interpretation.
An argument built upon deliberate selective quotations and unproven exclusions doesn’t become sound simply because the quotations are ancient.
To be continued…
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No.
You are asserting and repeating your assertion so that it must be true, and in the same breath insulting me personally.(and, as yet no one has come to your aid.)
Many early Fathers would disagree, including some who considered denial of the Real Presence to be denial of the Incarnation.
Except for Lutherans, Anglicans/Episcopalians, and some others who agree that the priest stands in loco Christi.
I wouldn’t consider that a real Lord’s Supper for one simple reason: it leaves out the words “This is” – it drops that important part of what Jesus said (and said to do).
The author engages in equivocation, treating Tertullian’s use of “symbol” as having the modern sense of a representation. Back then, a symbol was something that conveyed what it portrayed. That would seem to be consubstantiation, thus affirming the Real Presence, but does stand contrary to transubstantiation – as do all the other citations.
Similarly the word “represent” back then meant “re-present”, i.e. “present again” (or even “make present again”). I don’t know if the author is aware of this or not. OTOH, he ought to be aware that he is cherry-picking citations that do not support his thesis!
How about because Jesus gave a promise that the Holy Spirit would lead the Apostles into all truth, which to have much meaning has to apply to their successors? And the statement by Paul that the Holy Spirit gives the church teachers?
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Ok let’s proceed with part II.
11. Eusebius: Kelly’s Historical Analysis Exposes the Fundamental Flaw in Busenitz’s Argument
Busenitz quotes Eusebius’s Proof of the Gospel VIII, 1, emphasizing his description of the Eucharistic elements as symbols of Christ’s body and blood.
He presents this as evidence that Eusebius understood the Eucharist in symbolic rather than realistic terms.
But this argument runs directly into the historical analysis of J. N. D. Kelly, who explicitly warns against precisely this confusion between sacramental symbolism and the absence of sacramental reality.
In Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 440–442, Kelly explains that fourth-century Eucharistic teaching was generally realistic, even though theologians continued to employ figurative and symbolic language.
On p. 441, Kelly explicitly includes Eusebius among these theologians, citing his declaration that: “we are continually fed with the Saviour’s body”
Kelly notes that Eusebius simultaneously describes the Eucharistic elements as symbols of Christ’s body and blood.
And here comes the crucial point that Busenitz’s argument fails to address.
On p. 442, Kelly explains that this symbolic language did not imply a merely absent reality. Rather, the elements were understood as: “signs of realities which were somehow actually present”
Read that carefully. Kelly explicitly rejects the assumption that Eucharistic symbolism means the absence of what is signified.
This is precisely the distinction Busenitz’s argument needs to establish but never adequately demonstrates.
And the evidence becomes even more damaging when we turn to W. J. Ferrar, the translator of Eusebius’s Proof of the Gospel.
In §7 of his introduction, Ferrar examines Eusebius’s Eucharistic language and concludes that the Eucharistic symbol “EMBRACES REALITY “
He immediately clarifies: “it includes what it represents.”
Ferrar distinguishes the Eucharistic memorial from the anticipatory symbols of the Mosaic sacrifices. In his interpretation, the Christian Eucharist belongs to the fulfillment of those earlier figures and is not reducible to their merely anticipatory function.
Thus, the very scholar responsible for the translation Busenitz uses interprets Eusebius’s Eucharistic symbolism in a way that directly challenges its reduction to commemoration.
Admittedly, Kelly also recognizes that Eusebius interprets Christ’s language about eating His flesh in John 6 spiritually, relating it to receiving His teachin, that evidence must be acknowledged, but it does NOT establish that every reference to Eucharistic symbols in Eusebius amounts to a denial of sacramental presence. Nor does Kelly identify Eusebius’s symbolic theology with modern memorialism.
The issue is not whether Eusebius uses symbolic language, the issue is whether such language proves that the Eucharist contains nothing beyond a symbolic reminder of Christ’s absent body. Neither Kelly nor Ferrar provides Busenitz with that conclusion. Ferrar expressly argues against reducing the symbol in that way.
And no appeal to the absence of medieval transubstantiation can repair the inference.
The absence of a scholastic explanation of Eucharistic conversion is not evidence that the Eucharist was understood as an empty memorial.
Busenitz has identified symbols, he has not demonstrated the absence of sacramental reality, and that is not a minor gap in his argument. It is the very distinction on which his appeal to Eusebius depends.
Sources : J. N. D. Kelly, Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 440–442 , W. J. Ferrar, Introduction to The Proof of the Gospel (1920), §7 , Eusebius, Proof of the Gospel I, 10 , Eusebius, Proof of the Gospel VIII, 1 , Eusebius, De solemnitate paschali 7, quoted by Kelly a p. 441.
12. Athanasius: Busenitz Misquotes the Reference, Infuriatingly omits the Crucial Context, and Ignores the Evidence Recognized by Kelly
Busenitz quotes Athanasius as supposedly demonstrating that the Eucharist must be understood spiritually rather than realistically.
But his argument suffers from a bibliographical error, a selective quotation, and a conclusion that the historical evidence simply does not establish.
First, the citation is incorrect.
The passage does not come from Festal Letter 4.19, as Busenitz claims, but from Letter to Serapion IV, 19.
More importantly, Busenitz omits the very continuation that complicates his interpretation.
After explaining that Christ’s flesh must be received spiritually rather than through ordinary bodily consumption, Athanasius declares that Christ’s flesh and blood will be given spiritually as nourishment, communicating a gift directed toward resurrection and eternal life.
Athanasius is rejecting a crude, corporeal misunderstanding of eating Christ’s flesh. He is not explicitly denying the reality of the Eucharistic gift.
And this distinction is not merely a Catholic objection.
Johannes Quasten, in Patrology, vol. III, p. 79, directly examines Letter to Serapion IV, 19 and concludes: “Thus there is no idea of a symbolical interpretation in the sense of Zwingli.”
Quasten explicitly warns that interpreting Athanasius’s statement as a denial of Christ’s real body and blood is unjustified when the entire passage is considered.
But the evidence becomes even more striking when we turn to J. N. D. Kelly.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 442, Kelly discusses the fourth-century development of Eucharistic teaching in terms of the: “elements as being converted into the Lord’s body and blood.”
As an example, Kelly cites a fragment attributed to Athanasius, preserved in PG 26, 1325, in which the Eucharistic bread and wine are distinguished from the consecrated gifts.
The fragment declares that after the prayers of consecration, the bread becomes Christ’s body and the cup His blood.
This is a remarkably explicit affirmation of Eucharistic conversion—precisely the kind of evidence that Busenitz’s sweeping conclusion fails to accommodate.
An important textual qualification must be acknowledged: Kelly carefully describes this as a fragment attributed to Athanasius, and its authenticity remains disputed. It cannot therefore be treated as an unquestionably authentic statement of Athanasius himself.
Nevertheless, Kelly’s treatment establishes that an explicitly realistic theology of Eucharistic consecration was present in the fourth-century patristic evidence.
Nor is the fragment the only obstacle to Busenitz’s interpretation.
In the authentic Festal Letter IV, 4, Athanasius contrasts the Jewish Passover lamb with Christ’s own flesh, identifying the Christian celebration with the nourishment instituted by Christ Himself.
And the historical editors of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, discussing Athanasius’s Eucharistic theology, explicitly observe: “The reality of the Eucharistic gift is insisted on as strongly as its spirituality.”
This is the distinction Busenitz’s interpretation repeatedly overlooks.
Spiritual reception does not logically entail an absent Christ. The rejection of ordinary physical consumption does not establish the rejection of sacramental presence. And the absence of medieval scholastic terminology is not evidence of modern memorialism.
Busenitz has demonstrated that Athanasius rejected a crude, bodily interpretation of John 6. He has not demonstrated that Athanasius rejected the reality of the Eucharistic gift.
Quasten explicitly challenges the memorialist interpretation of the very passage Busenitz cites. The historical editors of Athanasius’s works insist upon the reality as well as the spirituality of the Eucharistic gift. And Kelly documents an explicitly realistic fourth-century testimony transmitted under Athanasius’s name, while properly qualifying its attribution.
His citation is incorrect. His quotation is incomplete. And his conclusion reaches substantially further than the evidence permits.
Sources
-
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, vol. IV, introductory discussion of Athanasius’s Eucharistic theology
-
Pseudo-Athanasian or disputed fragment, Sermon to the Newly Baptized, PG 26, 1325.
13. Augustine: Kelly’s Explicit Conclusions Directly Contradict Busenitz’s Memorialist Interpretation
Busenitz quotes Augustine’s descriptions of the Eucharist as a figure, symbol, and spiritual nourishment, suggesting that these statements clarify his understanding of the Lord’s Supper in a merely symbolic direction.
But this interpretation encounters a devastating problem: J. N. D. Kelly explicitly examines these very tensions and concludes that Augustine accepted Eucharistic realism.
In Early Christian Doctrines, pp. 446–447, Kelly acknowledges that some scholars have interpreted Augustine’s theology as purely symbolic or receptionist.
He rejects those interpretations as inadequate to Augustine’s teaching as a whole.
Kelly’s conclusion is unequivocal: Augustine shared the Eucharistic realism of his contemporaries and predecessors.
And Kelly provides substantial evidence for this judgment.
In Sermon 227, Augustine identifies the consecrated bread and wine as Christ’s body and blood. In his exposition of Psalm 98, he connects the flesh of Christ given as nourishment with the obligation of adoration.
Kelly explicitly interprets this latter passage as referring to the Eucharistic body that demands adoration.
This is not merely the language of remembering an absent Christ.
But Kelly goes considerably further.
On p. 448, he explains that Augustine’s distinction between sacramental sign and signified reality is entirely consistent with his acknowledgment of Christ’s actual Eucharistic presence.
On p. 449, Kelly affirms that Augustine understood the faithful truly to receive Christ’s body and blood, although sacramentally rather than through the physical consumption of human tissue.
Thus, what Busenitz misleadingly presents as evidence against Eucharistic realism is precisely the kind of spiritual and figurative language that Kelly explicitly reconciles with it.
And the evidence becomes even stronger when we examine something Busenitz’s discussion leaves unexplored: Augustine’s doctrine of the Eucharistic sacrifice.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 454, Kelly explains that Augustine understood the Eucharist as a genuine sacramental offering of Christ’s body and blood.
He further interprets Augustine’s teaching as affirming that Christ’s once-for-all sacrifice is sacramentally renewed in the Eucharistic celebration.
This is an extraordinary difficulty for any attempt to present Augustine as a straightforward witness to modern memorialism.
According to Kelly, Augustine affirmed not only the actual presence of Christ’s Eucharistic body and blood, but also their genuine sacramental reception and sacrificial offering.
Of course, Kelly distinguishes Augustine’s spiritualizing realism from Ambrose’s theory of Eucharistic conversion. Augustine did not articulate the later scholastic doctrine of transubstantiation.
But this qualification does not rescue Busenitz’s inference. It exposes the very distinction his argument repeatedly fails to maintain.
The absence of a particular theory of Eucharistic conversion does not establish the absence of Real Presence.
Busenitz quotes Augustine’s symbolic language. Kelly examines that language, weighs the competing interpretations, and positively attributes Eucharistic realism to Augustine.
The conclusion is unavoidable: Busenitz has demonstrated that Augustine believed in Eucharistic symbolism. He has not demonstrated that Augustine’s symbolism excluded the real sacramental presence, reception, and offering of Christ’s body and blood.
Indeed, Kelly’s explicit historical assessment points in the opposite direction.
Sources
14. Cyril of Jerusalem and Ambrose: Kelly Explicitly Identifies Their Teaching as Eucharistic Conversion
Here the historical evidence becomes particularly devastating for any attempt to equate patristic symbolism with mere memorialism.
Busenitz repeatedly appeals to figurative Eucharistic language as evidence against Catholic Eucharistic realism.
But J. N. D. Kelly explicitly identifies two major fourth-century Fathers who not only affirmed the reality of Christ’s Eucharistic body and blood, but also developed a doctrine of the actual conversion of the elements.
Cyril of Jerusalem: An Explicit Doctrine of Eucharistic Conversion
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 441, Kelly describes Cyril of Jerusalem as:
“the pioneer of the conversion doctrine”
This is an extraordinarily significant historical judgment.
Kelly acknowledges that Cyril continued to describe the elements as figures or antitypes of Christ’s body and blood.
But precisely the same author explicitly taught that the consecrated elements truly become Christ’s body and blood.
In Mystagogical Catechesis IV, 9, Cyril declares that what appears to the senses as bread and wine is actually Christ’s body and blood.
Even more decisively, Kelly explains on pp. 442–443 that Cyril employs the Greek language of change or conversion (μεταβάλλειν) and appeals to Christ’s transformation of water into wine at Cana to explain Eucharistic consecration.
Kelly further observes that, for Cyril, the Holy Spirit transforms the offerings into Christ’s body and blood through the Eucharistic prayer.
This is confirmed in Mystagogical Catechesis V, 7, where Cyril explicitly describes the invocation of the Holy Spirit to effect that transformation.
Cyril is not merely repeating Christ’s words of institution. He is explaining how the Eucharistic elements become what Christ declared them to be.
And here lies the fundamental problem for Busenitz’s method.
Cyril uses figurative language while simultaneously affirming Eucharistic conversion. Therefore, figurative language cannot, by itself, establish the absence of conversion.
Ambrose: Kelly Explicitly Affirms an Actual Change of the Elements
The evidence becomes even more explicit with Ambrose of Milan.
In Early Christian Doctrines, p. 446, Kelly states:
“It is the conversion idea, however, which is most characteristic of his teaching.”
Kelly explains that Ambrose understood consecration as a miraculous act of divine power producing an actual change in the Eucharistic elements.
The primary evidence is unmistakable.
In On the Mysteries IX, 50–54, Ambrose directly confronts the apparent contradiction between the visible bread and Christ’s Eucharistic body.
His answer is that divine consecration changes nature itself.
He appeals to biblical miracles, the Virgin Birth, and the creative power of God’s word to explain why the elements can become something they were not before.
Ambrose is not describing a change in the believer’s subjective attitude toward ordinary bread. He is describing a change accomplished in the elements by divine power.
Yet Kelly also observes that Ambrose continues to employ expressions such as significatur and similitudo.
This is the crucial historical fact: Ambrose’s language of signification coexists with his explicit doctrine of Eucharistic conversion.
The very distinction between symbolism and reality on which Busenitz repeatedly relies is therefore inadequate to explain Ambrose’s theology.
The Historical Implication
Kelly’s evidence establishes something that cannot be explained away by repeatedly invoking the word “symbol.”
Cyril of Jerusalem explicitly connects Eucharistic consecration with transformation.
Ambrose explicitly teaches that consecration changes the elements through divine power.
And both retain traditional sacramental and figurative language.
These are not modern Catholic interpretations being imposed upon otherwise ambiguous patristic texts. They are theological positions explicitly identified by J. N. D. Kelly in his historical analysis.
Of course, neither author formulated the entire medieval scholastic explanation of transubstantiation.
But this distinction must not be abused.
The absence of a later philosophical formulation does not erase the explicit fourth-century teaching that consecration effects a genuine change of bread and wine into Christ’s body and blood.
Busenitz may legitimately argue that medieval transubstantiation represents a later doctrinal development.
What he cannot establish merely by collecting symbolic expressions is that patristic Eucharistic theology was therefore memorialist.
Cyril and Ambrose demonstrate why that inference fails: both employ sacramental language while affirming the reality of Eucharistic conversion.
The problem is no longer simply that symbolism might be compatible with Real Presence.
The historical evidence shows that these Fathers actually combined symbolic terminology with an explicit theology of Eucharistic transformation.
That is not a hypothetical objection to Busenitz’s interpretive method. It is a documented counterexample to the assumption on which that method repeatedly depends.
Sources
15. The Trinity and Transubstantiation: A Historian of Theology Should Know MUCH BETTER
There is something particularly astonishing about Busenitz’s argument: a scholar of historical theology repeatedly fails to maintain one of the most elementary distinctions in the history of doctrine—the distinction between the development of theological terminology and THE EXISTENCE OF THE BELIEF THAT TERMINOLOGY EXPRESSES!
He asks whether the early Fathers articulated transubstantiation as later defined by Catholic theology.
A legitimate question (and I think I have provided substantial evidence that their understanding was compatible with ours).
But he then uses symbolic language to suggest that these same Fathers understood the Eucharist as essentially commemorative.
That conclusion doesn’t follow.
The historical development of Trinitarian doctrine should make this OBVIOUS. Christians believed in the divinity of Christ before Nicaea formulated its doctrine using homoousios, the subsequent clarification of ousia and hypostasis didn’t automatically amount to the invention of an entirely new faith (although the dogmatization of the doctrine required the use of a non biblical term).
Similarly, the absence of medieval Eucharistic terminology cannot, by itself, establish the absence of ancient Eucharistic realism.
Newman discusses the conceptual difficulties surrounding both the Trinity and transubstantiation in Apologia Pro Vita Sua, chapter V. Frans Jozef van Beeck likewise compares the historical functions of homoousios and transubstantiation in Oral Tradition 2/1 (1987), pp. 330–333.
Both comparisons expose why Busenitz must demonstrate historical discontinuity rather than merely presume it.
And here is something even more embarrassing for his argument, something that makes it laughable, genuinely laughable: the Council of Trent itself describes the Eucharist as “a symbol of a sacred thing” (Session XIII, chapter III), while explicitly affirming Christ’s real and substantial presence (which is also entirely compatible with the faith of the fathers of the early Church).
Yes, THE VERY COUNCIL THAT DOGMATICALLY DEFINED TRANSUBSTANTIATION USES SYMBOLIC LANGUAGE.
By Busenitz’s apparent logic, even the Council of Trent could be made to sound memorialist through a sufficiently selective quotation.
That alone should demonstrate how UNRELIABLE AND MISLEADING AND INACCURATE his interpretive shortcut is.
A symbol is not necessarily an empty sign. And a professor of historical theology should not need this distinction explained to him. BUT I SUSPECT HE KNEW THAT FAIRLY WELL ALREADY.
16. Kelly’s Historical Evidence Makes Busenitz’s Generalization Untenable
The problem becomes considerably worse when Busenitz’s presentation is compared with J. N. D. Kelly’s Early Christian Doctrines.
Kelly does not merely acknowledge that the Fathers occasionally used realistic language, he positively identifies Eucharistic realism in several of the very authors Busenitz recruits for his argument.
Consider the evidence:
-
Ignatius: Kelly recognizes his strict Eucharistic realism precisely in the anti-Docetic context Busenitz invokes to reinterpret him.
-
Justin: Kelly understands Eucharistic remembrance as more than spiritual recollection and recognizes his reference to consecratory change.
-
Irenaeus: Kelly explicitly concludes that the bread and wine really are Christ’s body and blood.
-
Tertullian: Kelly recognizes the realism underlying his Eucharistic theology, despite his use of figura.
-
Cyprian: Kelly affirms that he understood the Real Presence literally and explicitly rejects reducing his Eucharistic wine to a mere symbol of Christ’s blood.
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Augustine: Kelly concludes that Augustine accepted the Eucharistic realism of his period and understood Christ’s body and blood as truly received sacramentally.
These are not desperate reinterpretations manufactured by Catholic apologists. They are historical judgments made by a major Anglican patristic scholar.
And the evidence does not stop there: Kelly identifies Cyril of Jerusalem as a pioneer of Eucharistic conversion doctrine and explains that Ambrose understood consecration as effecting a genuine change in the elements.
Both authors could retain sacramental or figurative language while affirming Eucharistic transformation.
This is a particularly serious problem for Busenitz.
His method repeatedly assumes that figurative language clarifies realistic language in a merely symbolic direction.
But Cyril and Ambrose demonstrate that the very same theological tradition could employ figurative terminology while explicitly teaching conversion.
How does Busenitz’s method account for that?
It does not.
And that is not the only difficulty.
Origen’s spiritualizing theology, Clement’s allegorical tendencies, and Eusebius’s symbolic language certainly require careful analysis. Their testimony should not be exaggerated into uniform agreement with later Catholic formulations, but neither can their symbolism simply be appropriated as evidence for modern memorialism and, as shown, there is evidence that their theollogy was anything but memorialist in the modern sense.
17. The Most Damaging Problem: Busenitz’s Selective Presentation of Evidence
Let us be perfectly clear.
I’m not accusing Busenitz of consciously falsifying historical evidence, although I absolutely suspect he did. I have no basis for claiming to know his intentions.
But the quality of the argument he published deserves severe acriticism His handling of the sources reveals a recurring and deeply problematic pattern:
- He quotes Justin’s language of remembrance without adequately confronting First Apology 66.
- He invokes Tertullian’s figura without establishing that it excludes the sacramental realism recognized by Kelly.
- He quotes Origen’s symbol of thanksgiving from Against Celsus VIII, 57 without addressing VIII, 33, where Eucharistic bread becomes a sacred body through prayer and sanctifies worthy recipients.
- He invokes Cyprian’s language of representation without adequately accounting for his sacrificial theology or Kelly’s explicitly realistic interpretation.
- He quotes Augustine’s figurative statements while failing to reconcile them convincingly with his Eucharistic sermons and the realism recognized by Kelly.
- He uses Tertullian’s later terminology to interpret Ignatius and Irenaeus without establishing why it should govern their earlier testimony.
And then there are the elementary referencing problems:
- He attributes the Didache’s reference to spiritual food and drink to chapter 9, when it occurs in 10:3.
- He attributes the passage from Athanasius’s Letter to Serapion IV, 19 to Festal Letter 4.19.
These errors do not, by themselves, invalidate his theological position, but they certainly do destroy confidence in an article that asks readers to trust its handling of complicated patristic texts.
The deeper issue is more troubling.
Busenitz presents realistic statements, then introduces symbolic statements as though the latter automatically explain away the former.
And he repeatedly treats his preferred interpretation as though it were the obvious meaning of the evidence.
This is not the careful historical contextualization he claims to be performing. It is a recurring interpretive assumption masquerading as a historical conclusion.
And repeating that assumption across multiple authors does not make it stronger.
Ten quotations containing the word “symbol” do not amount to ten arguments against Real Presence if none establishes that symbolism excludes sacramental reality.
The number of quotations cannot compensate for the missing logical step.
19. Busenitz’s Argument Fails at the Very Point Where It Needs to Succeed
The central problem with this article is not that Busenitz has failed to demonstrate the existence of medieval scholasticism in the second century.
Nobody should expect him to demonstrate something so obviously anachronistic (although this is very far from saying that the fathers believed in something substantially different from what the later dogma defined; they clearly did not and their very words demonstrate this assertion).
The problem is that he repeatedly moves from the absence of later doctrinal formulations to conclusions about the supposedly merely symbolic character of earlier Eucharistic belief.
That is a much larger claim, and his evidence does not establish it.
So I would ask Busenitz directly:
- Why does Tertullian’s figurative language supposedly settle the question when Kelly explicitly recognizes his Eucharistic realism?
- Why does the anti-Docetic context supposedly diminish Ignatius’s testimony when Kelly considers that very context evidence of how seriously his realism should be taken?
- Why reinterpret Irenaeus’s Eucharistic nourishment symbolically when Kelly explicitly concludes that he believed the bread and wine really were Christ’s body and blood?
- Why present Cyprian’s representation language as evidence against realism when Kelly expressly rejects a merely symbolic reading?
- Why invoke Augustine against Real Presence when Kelly concludes that Augustine accepted Eucharistic realism?
- Why ignore the implications of Cyril and Ambrose, whose symbolic terminology coexists with explicit teaching about Eucharistic conversion?
And, above all: why should the word “symbol” refute Catholic Eucharistic realism WHEN THE COUNCIL OF TRENT ITSELF USES THAT WORD WHILE DEFINING THE REAL PRESENCE?
That final question exposes just how inadequate the underlying assumption is.
Busenitz has shown that the Fathers used symbols.
He has not shown that their symbols excluded Christ’s Real Presence.
He has shown that early Christians did not formulate Eucharistic doctrine in the full terminology of medieval scholasticism.
He has not shown that this terminology therefore describes a belief invented in the Middle Ages (quite the contrary, the belief was substantially identical although not yet defined in precise terms).
These distinctions are fundamental.
The most devastating criticism of Busenitz’s article is therefore not that every quotation is false. It is that even when the quotations are genuine, they repeatedly fail to prove what he wants his readers to believe and are used in a deceptive way, whether deliberately or because the one using them doesn’t know what he is taking about.
Busenitz’s article demonstrates just how much historical complexity can be lost when an author mistakes his preferred interpretation of selectively chosen texts for the actual meaning of the texts themselves. It also offers a rather unfortunate illustration of what happens when someone who might have enjoyed a distinguished career flipping burgers at McDonald’s (a profession for which he would arguably have been far better suited) decides instead to pursue a career as a historian of theology.
It is not consubstantiation at all. Read the actual quotations from the Church Fathers that I have provided, rather than the selectively distorted mess served up by a burger flipper masquerading (with remarkably little success) as a historian of theology.
He is either a liar or an ignorant (his stable pattern of quote mining and misrepresentations suggests the former) and he deserved to be humiliated accordingly, I’m even willing to confront him publicly on this forum if someone contacts him.
ZERO PROBLEMS FOR ME. Clowns should like this one shouldn’t be able to call themselves historians of theology without being ridiculed like they deserve.
That is reasoning, not Scripture. (and it matches @1Cor15.54 which is not good for me)
All the “conflict” revolves around a view of
Truth - whether it is Black & white or not.
The Revelation of God and how it has been received.
The “ideal” that the Apostles got it all right and were able to pass it on.
The assumption that anything else must be at least a tangent, and probaby a heresy.
And although this will probably be denied
The Cessationist view that everything has been revealed and therefore nothing new will be of value.
Resulting in everything, including the Reformation must be heretical and against the teaching of the Apostolic tradition
On this basis there is nothing to discuss, only assert or counter assert.
And people like me who do not follow that tradition?
Must be shouted down and discredited.
Richard
I very much agree with your criticism of Busenitz’s revolting misuse of patristic symbolism, but I strongly disagree with your claim that the Fathers’ teaching points toward consubstantiation and stands contrary to transubstantiation.
The fact that a sacramental symbol conveys the reality it signifies doesn’t establish that the substance of bread remains alongside Christ’s body after consecration, and the evidence becomes considerably more interesting when we examine Fathers who explicitly discuss Eucharistic conversion.
1. Ambrose of Milan — On the Mysteries IX, 50–54
Ambrose explicitly states:
“because by blessing nature itself is changed.”
He further explains that Christ’s words have the power to change existing things into what they were not before.
Notice that Ambrose is not merely affirming Christ’s presence alongside unchanged bread. He is describing a change in the nature of the elements themselves, while acknowledging that their outward appearance creates a difficulty for the senses.
Primary source — Ambrose, On the Mysteries IX, 50–54
2. Cyril of Jerusalem — Mystagogical Catecheses IV, 9 and V, 7
In IV, 9, the catechesis declares: “the seeming bread is not bread, though sensible to taste, but the Body of Christ.”
In V, 7, it explains that the Holy Spirit is invoked upon the offerings to make the bread Christ’s body and the wine His blood.
Here we have a striking distinction between what the senses perceive and what the consecrated elements actually are.
This is remarkably compatible with transubstantiation: the Eucharistic reality changes while the sensible appearances remain.
The precise authorship of the Mystagogical Catecheses is debated, but their testimony to fourth-century Eucharistic theology remains significant.
Primary source — Mystagogical Catechesis IV
Primary source — Mystagogical Catechesis V
3. Cyril of Alexandria — Commentary on Matthew 26:26–28
Cyril explicitly rejects reducing the Eucharistic offerings to mere figures, declaring that what is offered is truly changed into Christ’s body and blood through divine power.
Again, the language concerns an objective transformation of the offerings, not simply Christ’s presence alongside unchanged elements.
Primary source — Cyril of Alexandria, Fragments on Matthew, fragment 289
4. John Chrysostom — Homily on the Betrayal of Judas I, 6
Chrysostom declares:
“These words transform the elements set forth.”
Once again, consecration is presented as effecting a genuine change in the Eucharistic gifts.
Primary source — Chrysostom, On the Betrayal of Judas
Now, none of this means that these Fathers had already articulated the complete scholastic distinction between substance and accidents, but my point is that their teaching is compatible with the later doctrine of transubstantiation and provides substantial historical precedents for Eucharistic conversion.
Neither their use of symbolic language nor their affirmation of Real Presence establishes that the underlying substance of bread continues to exist and some of their statements about transformation, change of nature, and the distinction between sensory appearances and Eucharistic reality are particularly congenial to the later more clear definition.
And here is an important fact that should settle this terminological misunderstanding once and for all: as I already pointed out in my refutation of the burger flipper masquerading as a historian of theology, the Council of Trent itself describes the Eucharist as “a symbol of a sacred thing” in Session XIII, Chapter III, while explicitly defining transubstantiation in the very next chapter. Council of Trent — Session XIII, chapters III–IV
Therefore, symbolic language cannot, by itself, be evidence against transubstantiation, because the doctrine explicitly accommodates sacramental symbolism.
Of course, these patristic passages do not independently demonstrate that the Fathers had already excluded every possible account involving the continued substance of bread. That would require a more specific metaphysical argument.
But this cuts both ways. If you want to claim that the Fathers taught consubstantiation and that their teaching contradicts transubstantiation, you must provide positive evidence for the continued existence of the substance of bread, not merely evidence that the Eucharist was understood symbolically and realistically.
The existence of patristic symbolism does not establish consubstantiation, and the existence of patristic conversion language certainly does not establish opposition to transubstantiation.
So while I agree that Busenitz’s interpretation of the Fathers is seriously inadequate, I think your conclusion risks repeating his methodological mistake in a different form: you are (apparently; maybe I’m wrong) inferring a specific Eucharistic metaphysics from language that does not, by itself, establish it.
The historical evidence is entirely consistent with a significant development (which doesn’t mean contradiction, you are very different now compared to your 13 years old self, but you are still yourself) from early Eucharistic realism and conversion theology toward the later dogmatic formulation.
And I just want to add something else.
Even if we granted that certain Church Fathers (certainly not the ones I have cited in the previous post) expressed Eucharistic views genuinely incompatible with transubstantiation, that would not, by itself, establish that transubstantiation is false.
Why? Because EXACTLY the same reasoning could be applied to the development of Trinitarian doctrine.
And I’m not talking merely about the absence of Nicene terminology in earlier Christian writings. I am talking about actual statements by important early Christian theologians that directly conflict with propositions subsequently defined by the Church.
1. Eusebius of Caesarea: The Father Existed Before the Son
In his Letter to Euphration, usually dated to around AD 323, Eusebius explicitly maintains that: “the Father existed before the Son.”
In the same letter, he distinguishes the Son’s divinity from that of the Father, reserving true divinity in the fullest sense for the Father.
These are not merely expressions of personal distinction within the Trinity, they conflict with the Nicene affirmation of the Son’s coeternity and full divinity.
The Council of Nicaea in AD 325 explicitly condemned the proposition that there was a time when the Son did not exist and proclaimed Him true God from true God.
Yet Eusebius subsequently signed the Nicene Creed.
His earlier letter survives in fragments preserved in the acts of the Second Council of Nicaea in 787, and the relevant Greek text is available in modern critical editions.
Primary source — Eusebius, Letter to Euphration
Does the existence of Eusebius’s earlier teaching demonstrate that Nicene Trinitarianism was an illegitimate invention? Of course not.
But it does demonstrate that important Christian theologians could express views incompatible with a subsequent dogmatic definition.
2. Origen: The Holy Spirit Among the Things Made Through Christ
The evidence becomes even more striking with Origen.
In Commentary on John II, 6, he writes: “we believe nothing to be uncreated but the Father.”
He proceeds to place the Holy Spirit among the realities brought into existence by the Father through Christ, describing the Spirit as foremost among them.
Taken in its direct sense, this is incompatible with the later Nicene-Constantinopolitan doctrine that the Holy Spirit is uncreated and fully divine.
The distinction matters because Nicaea in 325 didn’t yet provide the fuller formulation concerning the Holy Spirit associated with Constantinople in 381.
And Origen’s own theology is more complicated, since On First Principles I, 3 also contains statements that resist identifying the Spirit straightforwardly as a creature.
But that is my point: an early Christian theologian could formulate propositions that conflict with later orthodoxy without the entire history of doctrinal development thereby becoming illegitimate.
Primary source — Origen, Commentary on John II, 6
3. Dionysius of Alexandria: The Son Described as a Creature
Consider another remarkable case.
In De sententia Dionysii 4, Athanasius acknowledges that Dionysius of Alexandria had written of the Son as: “ A CREATURE AND MADE”
He also reports language describing the Son as alien to the Father’s essence.
This directly conflicts with Nicaea’s declaration that the Son is begotten, not made, and consubstantial with the Father.
And Athanasius does not deny that Dionysius wrote those words.
Instead, he insists that they must be interpreted in light of Dionysius’s other writings, his anti-Sabellian context, and his subsequent clarification of the Son’s eternity.
In other words, Athanasius himself refuses to allow isolated formulations to determine the entirety of an earlier Father’s doctrine.
That is an especially instructive historical precedent for our present discussion.
Primary source — Athanasius, De sententia Dionysii
4. Gregory Nazianzen Explicitly Acknowledges Earlier Disagreement
And lest anyone think this is simply my reconstruction, Gregory Nazianzen himself acknowledges the existence of conflicting Christian views concerning the Holy Spirit.
In his Fifth Theological Oration (31, 5), he explains that some Christian thinkers regarded the Spirit as an activity, others as a creature, and others as God.
One of the most important architects of orthodox Trinitarian theology thus openly acknowledges that Christians had entertained mutually incompatible understandings of the Spirit’s nature.
Primary source — Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 31, 5
We have early Christian writers who described the Son in terms incompatible with Nicene coeternity and consubstantiality, and who described the Holy Spirit in terms incompatible with the later doctrine of His full divinity.
Yet their existence does not establish that the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity is false.
So why should the existence of some patristic formulations potentially problematic with transubstantiation invalidate that teaching?
It shouldn’t.
And in the case of the Eucharist, we possess something more than an argument from doctrinal development, as I have already demonstrated, Ambrose, the Mystagogical Catecheses attributed to Cyril of Jerusalem, Cyril of Alexandria, and John Chrysostom provide substantial positive evidence of an ancient doctrine of Eucharistic conversion compatible with the central claims of transubstantiation.
In short, the historical case is not simply that transubstantiation might be reconciled with the Fathers despite their disagreements, It is that we possess positive patristic precedents for Eucharistic conversion, while the existence of divergent patristic formulations does not logically establish the falsity of the later dogmatic definition, otherwise the same principle could and should be applied to the Trinity, because the later trinitarian formulation that was defined a Nicaea was by no means unanimous among the Fathers.
Truth is not black and white and can be very complex. There is one thing truth cannot be: CONTRADICTORY.
Complexity is NOT contradiction and the presence of shades of gray does NOT establish that God could genuinely reveal mutually contradictory truths to different people.
That’s quite important, isn’t it?
Scripture establishes that they passed it on.
And Jesus explicitly told His apostles, “Whoever listens to you listens to me” (Luke 10:16).
Moreover, addressing Peter specifically, He said:
“‘Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?’
‘Yes, Lord,’ he said, ‘you know that I love you.’
Jesus said, ‘Feed my lambs.’
Again Jesus said, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me?’
He answered, ‘Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.’
Jesus said, ‘Take care of my sheep.’” (John 21:15–16)
Now, how could Jesus explicitly declare that whoever listens to His apostles listens to Him, and personally entrust Peter with the responsibility of feeding and shepherding His flock, if the apostles could simply have misunderstood His teachings and passed those misunderstandings on to the very people they were commissioned to guide?
What sense would such a solemn delegation of teaching and pastoral authority make if Christ’s appointed shepherds could fundamentally mislead His flock about the faith He had entrusted to them?
Luke 11:11: “If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?”
Could Jesus really have commanded Peter to feed His lambs and shepherd His sheep, only to allow him to feed Christ’s own flock with scorpions and serpents instead?
That it contradicts the teaching of apostolic tradition is true. One could, of course, argue that the Reformers rediscovered a truth that had been obscured from the very beginning.
For instance, one could maintain that Luther understood the priesthood correctly, whereas Clement of Rome (a bishop, a martyr, and a saint who lived in the apostolic age and is traditionally believed to have known the apostles personally ) fundamentally misunderstood it.
Whether it is reasonable to believe that a bishop of Rome, martyr and saint, writing around AD 95, with direct connections to the apostles themselves, could have misunderstood something as fundamental as the nature of the priesthood, while Martin Luther finally got it right some fifteen centuries later, is ultimately a matter for each person to judge…
The Church does not teach cessationism. You are confusing the closure of public Revelation with the cessation of the Holy Spirit’s charismatic gifts. These are two entirely different theological claims.
The Church teaches that public Revelation reached its definitive fulfillment in Jesus Christ, she doesn’t teach that God therefore ceased granting extraordinary spiritual gifts, prophetic charisms, or private revelations.
Vatican II’s Lumen Gentium 12 teaches that the Holy Spirit distributes special graces among the faithful for the building up of the Church, including extraordinary gifts that must be properly discerned.
Even more explicitly, Catechism §67 acknowledges that private revelations have occurred throughout Christian history and that some have been recognized by ecclesiastical authority.
It is certainly true that the public revelation is closed and that “new” views that contradict apostolic tradition cannot be considered true, that’s for sure.
That’s true of the Incarnation, so that doesn’t mean the bread is no longer there.
As far as I’m concerned, transubstantiation means God is a deceiver.
“This is My Body” does not say that the bread goes away.
I’m too weary these days to dig back and find examples, but I reject trying to explain the Mystery using Aristotelian philosophy.
No it can’t, because the Trinity rests on Jewish thought, not on pagan philosophy.
But holding that it doesn’t is part of his system: he picks and chooses what to take from scripture, and invents new ways to read it, based on the presumption that the Apostles didn’t always get things right . . . despite the promise of Christ.
Words! I deal in principles.
The closure of public Revelation? Where in Scripture is that!
Pecisely.
Did you know that talking about someone instead of to them in public (where they are) is rude.
I do not pick and choose. I use all of it instead of picking individual verses.
Perhaps John was mistaken when he suggested that the whole world could not hold all the information about What Christ did, because if that is only abut Christ I wonder how much more there would be if we included the rest of God!
Humanity cannot hold the knowledge you and @1Cor15.54 claim the church has!
Richard
Yeah. PRECISELY (since you quoted that part to imply “I don’t care about what the Church teaches so it is useless to bring that up, it doesn’t matter to me”).
1 Timothy 3:15: “It is, remember, the Church of the living God, the pillar and the foundation of the truth”
According to Richard Gillett being the “Church of the living God” and the “pillar and foundation of the truth” is the same as being a “wholly and solely human institution, by no means divinely founded, by no means protected by the Holy Spirit and by no means authoritative for Christians, a merely human institution whose words mean diddly squat whenever her interpretation of the Scripture contradicts my personal, and far more authoritative, one”.
You view the Church in the exact same way an atheist does. Literally.
Scripture says that the Church is the pillar and foundation of the Truth. Scripture also says that when the apostles speak Jesus speaks (Luke 10:16) and Jesus Himself entrusts to Peter the duty to feed His lambs and take care of His sheeps (John 21:15-17 ) and Richard Gillet, in his own made up Gospel, concludes that she possesses no knowledge.
I will say it again: you view the Church in the exact same way an atheist does.
Revelation 22:18–19: “ For I testify to every one that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book: If any man shall add to these things, God shall add unto him the plagues written in this book. And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from these things that are written in this book”
Jude 3: “Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt compelled to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was ONCE FOR ALL entrusted to God’s holy people.”
The Greek text of Jude 3 contains the expression: τῇ ἅπαξ παραδοθείσῃ τοῖς ἁγίοις πίστει
The key word is ἅπαξ (hapax), which can mean “once” or, more emphatically, “once for all.”
In this context, the expression emphasizes the definitive and authoritative character of the faith entrusted to the believers.
Furthermore, the Greek word pistis (“faith”) here refers primarily to the objective content of the Christian faith (the body of beliefs and teachings handed down to the Church) rather than simply the subjective act of believing.
In other words, Jude is urging Christians to defend an already established and authoritative deposit of faith against those who would corrupt or distort it.
We do not have a fixed wording at the Lord’s Supper. Telling that ‘This is the body of Christ’ or ‘The body of Christ’ would mean practically the same in our context.
I agree that in this context, the word ‘remembrance’ has a deeper meaning than just the modern word ‘memorial’. It goes to subjective identification to what has happened in the past, like in the Pesah meal where the words still claim ‘when I left Egypt’, although the person telling that lives millennia after the event. The subjective identification in the remembrance brings up that when Christ was crucified and died, I was involved, I died ‘in him’.
That does not mean that the bread and wine would transform in any way, a possible transformation may happen in the mind and attitude of the participant (if needed). As in the first Lord’s Supper, Christ is at the table, not on the table.
When we interpret the words of the early Fathers, we are not neutral readers. We have our hermeneutical frame and our expectations. Unwittingly, we ‘see’ such interpretations in the words that were formulated much later. One ‘sees’ evidence for transsubstantiation, another for consubstantiation, a third for symbolic remembrance. The Fathers seldom tried to answer to our questions, so it is often an anachronism to input our interpretation into the words.
The study of the biblical scriptures has largely accepted the importance of context, that we should interpret the text within the context.
For some reason, the same principle is often forgotten when we read early Fathers. The early Fathers were not living in a modern world and they tried to respond to problems and questions that are not identical with our questions. To understand, we need to set aside our current thinking and try to understand what was written through the context.
Even after that, our differences in the interpretations are not likely to change because the interpretations are often based more on traditions of interpretation than early writings themselves. We may imagine that we interpret the early writings just as the early Fathers but that is largely an illusion that we maintain to protect our wor(l)dview.
We should also remember that what the early writers wrote reflects a diversity of interests and interpretations. They did not all think in an identical way.
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This argument falls flat when the realism of most of the Church Fathers can clearly be established by their own words, without importing an already existing framework into their work.
Here The logic or illogic of contradiction - #83 by 1Cor15.54 and here The logic or illogic of contradiction - #88 by 1Cor15.54, I have demonstrated the quote-mining and deliberate misrepresentation carried out by Busenitz. I have also demonstrated that the realism of many of the Church Fathers is unquestionable and that this assessment does NOT depend upon the importation of a later framework into their own words. And I have done that by quoting their own words and a very important historian (unlike the burger flipper Busenitz, who dwells in falsehoods and misrepresentations, as his work clearly demonstrates).
And this is work that took me six or seven hours of grueling research and effort to complete. So, coming up with the argument that I’m simply importing a later definition into the writings of the Church Fathers, while claiming that their views were allegedly compatible with memorialism, is completely disrespectful to the work I have done and the time and effort it cost me.
And if someone wants to contact Busenitz, like I have already said, they are more than welcome to do so. Confronting him publicly and exposing him for who he is even more than I already have would be a task that I would take enormous pleasure in. I have no tolerance for liars like him (and the fact that he is either a liar or a burger flipper who earned his degree in the field through a correspondence course —it has to be one or the other—can be demonstrated by the revoltingly blatant quote-mining and misrepresentation of the Church Fathers in his work), and I have no qualms about humiliating them either.
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