LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2001, Page 373

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THEOLOGICAL DOCUMENTS—COMMISSION ON THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS 373

23. Gordon Fee notes that the participle “not discerning” may
have either a conditional (‘if he does not discern”) or a causal (“be-
cause he does not discern”) relationship to the main verb.
1 Corinthians, 562.

24. Were the Corinthians explicitly denying the doctrine of the
real presence? There is no evidence that they were doing so. Yet
even if they were correctly confessing the doctrine, their divisions
revealed them to be practically rejecting the Eucharist’s character
and purpose.

25. Andrew Das has recently emphasized the need to describe
the rhetorical structure of Paul’s argument. “Revisited,” 199-201.

26. Pau! uses this phrase “on account of this” (51a todto) 22
times in his epistles. The “this” does refer forward to a purpose
about to be articulated at | Tim. 1:16; 2 Tim. 2:10; Phm. 15. But in
all other uses “on account of this” refers back to a section of Paul’s
argument or narration (cf. Rom. 1:26; 4:16; 5:12; 13:6; 15:9; 1 Cor.
4:17; 11:10, 30; 2 Cor. 4:1; 7:13; 13:10; Eph. 1:15; 5:17; 6:13; Col.
1:9; | Thess. 2:13; 3:5, 7; 2 Thess. 2:11.

27. This is, of course, the direction in which most of the later
manuscript tradition looks. The phrase “body of the Lord” is found
in the vast majority of Greek manuscripts (X C3 DFG (W, 12415)
1881¢ Majority it vg! sy; Ambst.).

28. Das comments on | Cor. 10:17: “The words ’we, who are
many’ and ’we all’ clearly indicate that Paul is talking about the
people who have come together in the Sacrament. He is shifting
the discussion from the Sacrament, the one loaf, to its effects in the
body, the church (the ’we who are many’). The same contextual
indicators are used also in | Corinthians (2 (for example, 12:27:
*Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of
it’).” “Revisiting,” 198.

29. Cf. footnote 5 above. As a further example of one sacra-
mental element used to refer to the entire Eucharist, one can note
St. Luke’s phrase, “breaking of the bread” (Acts 2:42).

In an interesting parallel, Philip Melanchthon in the Apology of
the Augsburg Confession allows that passages that refer only to
“the breaking of the bread” [cf. Acts 2:42, 46; 20:7] may refer to
the Lord’s Supper. However, against the Roman practice of com-
muning the laity with only one kind, he insists that “it does not fol-
low that only one part was given; for by the ordinary usage of lan-
guage, naming one part also signifies the other” (Ap XXII, 7:
Tappert, 237). As an illustration of how easily this idiom may
occur, note the phenomenon earlier in the Apology: “When we are
baptized, when we eat the Lord’s body, when we are absolved. . . .”
(Ap XIII, 4; Tappert, 211). The Smalcald Articles also states:
“we have no regard for the subtle sophistry of those who teach
that bread and wine surrender or lose their natural substance and
retain only the appearance and shape of bread without any longer
being real bread... .” (SA III, VI, 5: Tappert, 311; emphasis
added).

30. At 11:27 Paul writes: “whoever eats the bread or drinks the
cup of the Lord unworthily. .. .” A few manuscripts (X D2 L 326.
1505 al sy; Ambst) offer a clarification and insert the phrase
“bread of the Lord” to clarify. Again, when Paul at 11:29 writes
‘For the one who eats and drinks, eats and drinks a judgment
against himself. . .” the vast majority of the manuscript tradition
x2 C3 DFG ¥ 1881 Majority latt sy) felt a need to make explicit
what was implicit by adding the adverb “For the one who eats and
drinks unworthily. ...”

31. The phrase is from Andrew Das, who notes the possibility
of such an allusion. “Revisiting,” 201.

32. As the English translations make clear, 11:31 is a “contrary
to fact” conditional sentence in Greek. Paul knows that the
Corinthians have not, in fact, been discerning themselves.

33. It may seem curious that Paul, in addressing a serious prob-
lem among the Corinthians, now writes, “If we were discerning
ourselves. ...” As Leon Morris notes, Paul “has a habit of classing
himself with those he is writing about, quite irrespective of whether
the activity in question is one he would engage in or not. Indeed,
quite often it is impossible to envisage Paul as engaging in the ac-
tivity of which he writes.” New Testament Theology (Grand

Rapids: Zondervan, 1986), 88-9. Morris gives several excellent ex-
amples, including | Cor. 6:15 and 10:22.

34. It is crucial to note that in these verses Paul distinguishes
between divine judgment and divine condemnation. The Corinthi-
ans have been receiving God’s judgment (xptnpa, 11:29, 34); God
has been judging (Kptvopevot, 11:32) them. But the purpose for
this judgment has been a disciplinary one (“we are being disci-
plined,” matdev6pne0a) in order that the Christians might nor be
condemned with the unbelieving world (iva pn obv ta” KdoLo
Katakp10@ pev, 11:32).

This distinction, of course, does not lessen the fearful truth that
the Corinthians’ divisive eucharistic assemblies were, in fact,
bringing God’s judgment upon them and their assemblies!

35. The Corinthian Christians clearly did have divisions of a
doctrinal character that included following after different teachings
(1 Cor. 1:10), rejecting apostolic teaching regarding morality
(J Corinthians 5), abuses in the context of worship (1 Corinthians
12-14), different views on the resurrection (1 Corinthians 15). etc.

36. See footnote 19 on the question of “to whom are the
Corinthians proclaiming the death of the Lord?” It seems more
likely that the proclamation is to one’s fellow communicants (cf.
the use of the verb “to proclaim” [katayyéAAetv] at 1 Cor. 2:1;
9:14; Col. 1:28). If this is true, it sharpens the contradiction be-
tween the divisiveness of the Corinthians and the content of their
mutual], eucharistic proclamation. Fee writes, “Thus the focus of
Paul’s concern is on this meal as a means of proclaiming Christ’s
death, a point the Corinthians’ action is obviously bypassing.”
I Corinthians, 557.

37. DEUP was rightly faulted by 1998 synodical Resolution 3-
05 for its silence on the issue of pastoral oversight.

38. An important distinction, then, exists between “heterodoxy”
and “heresy.” Dr. Francis Pieper writes that “properly called a her-
erodox church (ecclesia heterodoxa impura)” is a congregation or
church body that “in spite of the divine order, tolerates false doc-
trine in its midst.” Christian Dogmatics (St. Louis: Concordia Pub-
lishing House, 1953), 3:422. Heresy is the persistent advocacy of
false, unscriptural teaching. See the summary of Luther’s under-
standing of heresy as “stubborn error in an article of faith in oppo-
sition to Scripture” in the Lutheran Cyclopedia, ed. Erwin L.
Lueker (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1975), 375. See
also the CTCR’s discussion of “heresy” in its 1965 report on The-
ology of Fellowship, 13-15.

39. The thorough study of Robert George Hoerber, A Gram-
matical Study of Romans 16,17 (no publisher; no date) is well
known in LCMS circles. Hoerber shows that the phrase “contrary
to the doctrine” (napa thy dtdaxnv) may modify either the partici-
ple “making” or the substantives “dissensions and stumbling
blocks” (4-11). He goes on to present a strong case that “contrary
to the doctrine” modifies “dissensions and stumbling blocks”
(12-23). For other views, one may survey the standard commen-
taries on Romans.

40. That the phrase “the breaking of the bread” here refers to
the Lord’s Supper is noted even by scholars with no particularly
high sacramental theology of their own. See F. F. Bruce, Commen-
tary on the Book of the Acts: The English Text with Introduction,
Exposition, and Notes (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1979),
79; Henry Alford notes that a eucharistic reference in 2:42 has been
“both in ancient and modern times, the prevalent one.” Alford’s
Greek Testament: An Exegetical and Critical Commentary, Vol-
ume II, Acts—II Corinthians (Grand Rapids: Guardian Press, 1976),
29. Alford himself nuances the view by understanding “the break-
ing of the bread” as a reference to the Christians’ community
meals, “accompanied as they were at this time by the celebration of
the Lord’s Supper” (29).

41. Cautious support for this is offered by Joseph A. Fitzmyer,
S.J., The Anchor Bible. Romans: A New Translation with Intro-
duction and Commentary (New York: Doubleday, 1993), 742; C.
E. B. Cranfield, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the
Epistle to the Romans (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1979), 796. Some
commentators, however, reject this possibility. See, e.g., Leon Mor-

2001 Convention Workbook