# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1847 10 13_S29
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

...in a manner be in heaven at the same time. Now if Christ, according to his humanity, in the state of humiliation, was at the same time on earth and in heaven, how can we take offense when we hear that Christ, while he still bore the form of a servant, sat at the table with his body in a natural way, and yet at the same time was present in the Sacrament in an incomprehensible way and imparted himself to his disciples? Could the man Christ Jesus indeed be in heaven at the same time, but not likewise be in the Sacrament at the same time? Indeed, we ask: was it possible for Christ, with five loaves and two fishes present, to feed five thousand men, not counting women and children, and to have twelve baskets full of bread left over (Matt. 14:15–21) — as no one can deny — is it not, then, incomprehensible that a person could still doubt whether Christ could remain sitting at the table and yet feed his disciples with his divine flesh and give them his divine blood to drink, without being consumed? To be sure, this miracle, like others, cannot be grasped by our blind reason, but faith lays hold of this mystery, into which the angels long to look, in childlike trust in the almighty power and truthfulness of Christ, the Son of God, and falls down in deep wonder and humble adoration, and praises the Son of God, who by the wonders of his eternal love toward us sinners moves all the heavens to holy astonishment.

We now come to the last, the sixth reason which Mr. Nast adduces against the correctness of the literal sense of the words of institution. It is this: that the assumption that one partakes of the real, living body of Christ contradicts, first, the concept of a sacrificial meal, and second, "the manifest sense and purpose of the Holy Supper, in the crudest manner." To this we must reply, first, that Mr. Nast is in error if he has hitherto held the opinion that the Holy Supper is understood by the Lutherans in the sense of a sacrificial meal. No one, indeed, will deny that the Holy Supper has some resemblance to a sacrificial meal, in that in this holy Sacrament, as in sacrificial meals, one also partakes of the very offering that was presented to God, and enters into the fellowship of the faith and worship of one's fellow communicants, just as one entered into the "fellowship of the altar" through participation in the sacrificial meals, as St. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 10:18. But who does not see at first glance that the New Testament Holy Supper is something essentially different from, and far more glorious than, an Old Testament sacrificial meal? What, then, could be more foolish than to depart from the words of institution of a divine ordinance merely because something we might compare with it, or with which it does in fact have some resemblance, would not entirely fit? Mr. Nast, to be sure, exclaims: "Who has ever heard of guests partaking of the living flesh of the sacrifice?" But we cannot marvel enough at such talk. For — apart from the fact that the Holy Supper is nowhere presented in Holy Scripture as a sacrificial meal — what does it matter to the case whether anyone has ever heard of anything similar or not? Must not the only question for a Christian be: What does God's Word say about it? Would it not have been within God's power and will to ordain, in the New Testament, such a sacrificial meal at which one should partake of the living flesh of the sacrifice? Indeed, are Christians not in fact exhorted in God's Word to present their bodies as a sacrifice which, in contrast to those of the Old Testament, is "living"? (Rom. 12:1.) With the same right with which Mr. Nast poses the above question, he could also ask this one: Who has ever heard that what was sacrificed was nailed to a cross? and the like.

As for the second point with which Mr. Nast seeks to support his sixth reason, matters stand just as poorly there as with the first; for it is indeed true that "our Savior, in the words of institution, speaks of a body given up to death for us and of blood that was shed," but where does he speak of a dead body? Or do the body and blood of Christ — both of which were living at the time of the first celebration of the Holy Supper and are living now — not remain, really and for all eternity, the body given up to death for us and the blood shed for us? Does Mr. Nast not see that the addition, "which is given for you and shed for you," is not meant to describe the condition in which the body and blood presently are, but only to identify precisely the object of which Christ speaks? In seeking out his sixth reason, Mr. Nast has evidently fallen into the same error he fell into in finding his fourth: namely, he has confused the What with the How (the quod with the quale, the object with the mode, as the logician says); for Christ does indeed say that in the Holy Supper he gives no other body than the one which was given up, though not in the condition in which it was given up, and no other blood than that which was shed, though not in the condition in which it was shed. This addition is meant, and can only be meant, to indicate that in the Holy Supper it is not some spiritual body and spiritual blood, nor a mere sign of the body, that is present, but the real body and the real blood of Christ — for only this body and this blood were given up to death and shed. Or does Mr. Nast perhaps think that one can celebrate Christ's death in the Holy Supper only if his corpse (and not his living body) is either present, or, since that is impossible, at least represented by a sign? He may think so, but that is merely his opinion; he will never be able to prove it, still less thereby move any Christian to believe that Christ's words, "This is my body; this is my blood," must mean as much as: "This is not my body; this is not my blood."

Before we conclude for this time, we mention only further that Mr. Nast has also completely misinterpreted the words, "This cup is the New Testament (or covenant) in my blood" (1 Cor. 11:25). He, namely, relates the words "in my blood" to the word "Testament." That this is inadmissible is evident from the Greek original text. According to the rules of Greek grammar, the article standing before the words "New Testament" would have to be repeated before the words "in my blood" if the latter words were to be connected with the former; but no such repetition occurs in the original text, and therefore the words "in my blood" must necessarily be connected with "This cup," so that the sense of the whole sentence can be none other than this: "This cup is the New Testament by virtue of my blood," which, namely, this cup contains — as Christ himself interprets these words in the parallel passages: "This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many," etc. (Matt. 26:28; Mark 14:24). Anyone at all familiar with the Greek language, moreover, will not find it strange that the little word "in" should mean as much as "on account of"; to cite just one example, it is used, among other places, in the very same sense in Matthew 6:7, where the original text reads: "For they think they will be heard for their much speaking [literally: in much-speaking]," that is, on account of their much speaking. To this may be added that Christ, according to the Greek original of Luke 22:20, remarkably says of the cup that it is shed for us — which of course could not be said if the blessed cup did not really contain the blood of Christ shed for us. Far from the words, "This cup is the New Testament in my blood," supporting Mr. Nast's opinion of mere signs of the body and blood of Christ in the Holy Supper, these words are rather themselves irrefutable witnesses to the true and essential presence of the body and blood of Christ in this most holy Sacrament.

With this we conclude the first part of our refutation, in which we have followed the apologist step by step, with the wish that Mr. Nast may receive our observations — made without any bitterness or vehemence — with the same charity and examine them just as calmly, and that readers not immediately concerned with this matter may excuse the dryness which such a refutation necessarily had to suffer. We believe that whoever does not shrink from the hard and rough shell of this presentation will not go away empty of the sweet kernel of important truths within it. We also hope that, as we continue in the coming issues, our dear readers will breathe more freely along with us.

(To be continued.)