The Lord’s Supper

“Oh, look to his death for life!”

John ‘Rabbi’ Duncan

Subsections

Frequency
Supper Only in Evening?
Communion Seasons
Preparation
Administration: Preparation, Common Cup, Wine, Common Bread,
. Sitting at the Table, Intinction, etc.
Paedocommunion
Mass & Transubstantiation
Consubstantiation
Westminster Divines
Reformed vs. Aquinas

Order of Contents

Books & Articles
Quote
Historical 3
. Zwingli 1
Lutheran 1
Biblio 1
Latin 5

Qualifications

Baptized Adults may not Automatically take Supper
Sufficient Profession of Faith for Supper
Examined by Session for Admission
Doubting Conscience
Admitting Other Denominations to Table
Mentally Handicapped
Ecclesiastical Conviction Necessary to Withhold

Nature & Necessity

Supper’s Higher Reverence than Preaching
Supper Works by Faith
Spiritual Grace in Supper: Same in Preaching
Not a Converting Ordinance
Supper: Not Necessary to Essence of a Worship Service
Supper: a Form of Covenant Renewal
How Christ’s Flesh gives Life
Withholding the Cup 6+
Elements Not Holy After Time of Use

Communion with Others in

Barring from the Table
Ought to take Supper though Scandalous Persons do

Books & Articles

The Early Church

Ussher, James – ‘Of the Real Presence’ in Answers to a Jesuit: with other Tracts on Popery, pp. 41-73

Ussher (p. 41):

“…in the receiving of the blessed Sacrament we are to distinguish between the outward and the inward action of the communicant. In the outward, with our bodily mouth we receive really the visible elements of bread and wine;

in the inward, we do by faith really receive the body and blood of our Lord; that is to say, we are truly and indeed made partakers of Christ crucified, to the spiritual strengthening of our inward man.”

To this effect, and other points, Ussher quotes: Augustine, Tertullian, Basil, Athanasius, Origen, Fulgentius, Clement, Eusebius, Ambrose, Macarius, Prosper, the Gloss upon Gratian, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Cyprian, Theophilus, Tatianus, Acacius, Jerome, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Gelasius, Ephraemius, the Council of Constantinople of 754 and even the Romanists: Alexander of Hales, Bellarmine, Salmeron & Kellison.

Ussher also shows in extended detail how the more orthodox notions in the early church gradually, during the Middle Ages, came to develop into the carnal doctrine of Transubstantiation. The first rise of this transition, Ussher documents, stemmed from those who defended images of Christ at the Second Council of Nicea, 787.

The Middle Ages

Ratramnus – The Book of Bertram the Priest: Concerning the Body and Blood of Christ in the Sacrament † c. 868 96 pp.

Dr. R. Scott Clark:

“In the eighth century, Carolingian theologians at the Abbey of Corbie [France], Paschasius Radbertus (ca. 790-ca. 860) and Ratramnus (d. ca. 868) each wrote treatises on the Lord’s Supper. Both were titled ‘On the Body and Blood of the Lord’. They first debated what is ‘true’ and what is a ‘figure’ in the Lord’s Supper.

Radbertus argued that the sign becomes the thing signified. In response, Ratramnus argued that if the sign becomes the thing signified, then we have no sacrament since Christ is received by faith, not sight; we would have no need of faith. If we have no faith, we have no Christ and no salvation.

In the early sixteenth century, that debate was renewed by the Reformed and Lutheran theologians, with Lutherans republishing Radbertus and the Reformed, Ratramnus.” – ‘Foreward’, p. ix in Theodore Beza, A Clear & Simple Treatise on the Lord’s Supper (RHB, 2016)

Some other 9th century theologians who denied that Christ’s body and blood were materially eaten in the Eucharist during the Carolingian Eucharistic Controversy were: Gottschalk of Orbais, Alcuin of York & Florus Magister.

The same men were involved in a controversy over predestination. Generally speaking, the Carolingian theologians had a high view of predestination and took a spiritual view of the Lord’s Supper. Ratramnus took the central role in the Eucharistic controversy; Gottschalk took the central role in the predestinarian controversy.

Post-Reformation

Anthology of

Heppe, Heinrich – ch. 26, ‘The Lord’s Supper’ in Reformed Dogmatics ed. Ernst Bizer, tr. G.T. Thomson (1861; Wipf & Stock, 2007), pp. 627-57

Heppe (1820–1879) was a German reformed theologian.

1500’s Works

Melanchthon, Philip

ch. 27. ‘On Participation in the Table of the Lord’ in The Loci Communes of Philip Melanchthon… tr. Charles L. Hill (1521; Boston: Meador Publishing, 1944), pp. 258-60

Though Melanchthon (1497–1560) was a Lutheran, this work of his was the first ‘systematic theology’ of the Reformation, and, as it was very influential on reformed systematic theologies following shortly thereafter.

Article 10, Of the Holy Supper in The Apology of the Augsburg Confession tr: F. Bente & W. H. T. Dau (1531)

ch. 22. ‘Of the Supper of Christ the Lord’ in Melanchthon on Christian Doctrine, Loci Communes, 1555 tr. Clyde L. Manschreck (1555; NY: Oxford Univ. Press, 1965), pp. 217-23

Zwingli, Ulrich – ‘The Eucharist’ in Commentary on True & False Religion eds. Jackson & Heller (1525; Labyrinth Press, 1981), pp. 198-253

Calvin, John

ch. 29. ‘The Supper of the Lord’ in Instruction in Faith (1537) tr. Paul T. Fuhrman (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1949), pp. 70-72

Short Treatise on the Lord’s Supper (1541) in Tracts 2.163-198

Martin Klauber: “Joachim Westphal (1510-1574) represented the so-called true or Gnesio-Lutheran movement that attempted to preserve the purity of Luther’s thought against the alleged compromises of the Philippists, those who followed the lead of Philip Melancthon. As the superintendent of the state church in Hamburg, Westphal was well positioned to enter the fray of theological disputes…

For the Gnesio-Lutherans the issue of Christ’s physical presence in the Lord’s Supper was of paramount importance. The formula borrowed from Luther was that the body and blood of Christ are truly and substantially present ‘in, with and under’ the consecrated elements. Those who partake, believers and unbelievers alike, receive the true body and blood of Christ Himself… This so called [sacramental] union is often referred to as ‘consubstantiation’, although Luther did not use the term…

Calvin[‘s]… view [was] that although Christ is not present physically in the bread and in the wine, He is present spiritually. The sacrament would not, therefore, be an empty sign. Calvin followed Augustine closely… If, as the Lutherans believed, Christ is physically present… both believers and unbelievers who participate in the Eucharist partake of the body and blood of Christ… Calvin argued, by contrast, that only believers truly partake of the body and blood of the Lord. He posited this position in the Institutes as well as in his Petit traicte de la saincte cene (1541).” – ‘Introduction’ in Beza, Clear & Simple Treatise on the Lord’s Supper

A Treatise on the Sacraments of Baptism & the Lord’s Supper (Edinburgh, 1837) 190 pp. no ToC

12. ‘Of the Lord’s Supper’ in Institutes of the Christian Religion: 1541 French Edition tr. Elsie A. McKee (1541; Eerdmans, 2009), pp. 546-84

‘Essay on the Lord’s Supper’ from The Form of Prayers (1542 & 1545) trans. Benjamin W. Farley in Calvin Studies II: Presented at a Colloquium on Calvin Studies at Davidson College Presbyterian Church and Davidson College, Davidson, North Carolina, January 13–14, 1984, pp. 119–123

‘On [2] Excommunication, [3-4]Separation, the Lord’s Supper & [5] Pastors’ in A Short Instruction for to Arm All Good Christian People against the Pestiferous Errors of the Common Sect of Anabaptists (London: Daye, 1549), no page numbers

‘Mutual Consent in Regard to the Sacraments Between the Ministers of the Church of Zurich & John Calvin’ (1554) in Tracts 2:199-244

Defense of the Sound & Orthodox Doctrine of the Sacraments (1555)

Klauber: “Seizing on the publication of the Consensus [Tigurinus of Zurich and Geneva, 1549], Westphal began to criticize it publicly, which initiated the so-called second sacramental war between the Lutherans and the Reformed… Westphal initially composed three treatises [in 1552, 1553 & 1555] critical of the Consensus… Westphal spared no words in his attack on his ‘godless’ opponents and their ‘satanic blasphemies.’…

Calvin did not become aware of Westphal’s criticism until 1554, when Bullinger brought it to his attention. He was otherwise occupied with a host of issues including the Servetus affair, but he told Bullinger that he would respond. He did so in 1555, although he believed that Westphal’s Farrago was a ‘light-weight book’ and not worthy of a personal response…

But Calvin decided to take the matter upon himself in his Defense of the Sound and Orthodox Doctrine of the Sacraments… and the literary war was on… He did not mention Westphal by name, hoping for peace with the Lutherans, especially since he had garnered Melanchthon’s support.” – Ibid.

‘Second Defense of the Sacraments in Answer to the Calumnies of Joachim Westphal’ (1556) in Tracts 2:245-345

Klauber: “Westphal responded [to Calvin’s Defense of the Sound and Orthodox Doctrine of the Sacraments, 1555] with his Just Defense Against the False Accusations of a Certain Sacramentarian… Calvin responded in 1556 with his Second Defense… This work was much more vituperative and personal than the first, and Calvin denied that he had made the sacrament an empty sign, saying that he was in agreement with the [Lutheran] Augsburg Confession [Article X, 1530]. Although he asserted his admiration of Zwingli, Calvin made it clear that there were significant distinctions between their views of Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper.” – Ibid.

Last Admonition to Joachim Westphal (1557) in Tracts 2:346

Klauber: “Westphal in turn responded [to Calvin’s Second Defense…] in 1557 with his Confession of Faith on the Sacrament of the Eucharist… Calvin then answered in 1557 with The Last Admonition of John Calvin to Joachim Westphal Who if He Heeds It Not Must Henceforth Be Treated in the Way Which Paul Prescribed for Obstinate Heretics… Any real attempt at accord was lost when Calvin accused Westphal of stupidity and impudence. It would have to be left to Calvin’s colleagues, such as Beza, to attempt to repair the rupture.

In true form Westphal responded in 1558 with two works, including his Defense of the Lord’s Supper against the Errors and Calumnies of John Calvin. This is a lengthy volume covering a host of topics including infant baptism, private absolution, and festival days, but the Eucharist figures by far the most prominently…”

‘Clear Explanation of Sound Doctrine Concerning the True Partaking of the Flesh and Blood of Christ in the Holy Supper in Order to Disipate the Mists of Tileman Heshusius in Tracts 2:495-572 no date

Heshusius (1527-1588) was a prolific Lutheran professor.

The Best Method of Obtaining Concord on the Sacraments in Tracts 2:573-79 no date

ch. 17, ‘Of the Lord’s Supper & the Benefits Conferred by it’ in The Institutes of the Christian Religion, bk. 4 (1559)

Klauber: “…Calvin, who had clearly had his fill of Westphal after composing three rebuttals, decided not to continue the literary battle. Calvin did, however, strengthen his section on the sacraments in the revised editions of the Institutes as a result of his debates with Westphal.” – Ibid.

Bullinger, Henry

9^th Sermon, ‘Of the Lord’s Holy Supper; what it is, by whom, when and for whom it was instituted; after what sort, when and how oft it is to be celebrated, and of the ends thereof; of the true meaning of the words of the Supper, ‘This is my body’; of the presence of Christ in the Supper; of the true eating of Christ’s body; of the worthy and unworthy eaters thereof; and how every man ought to prepare himself unto the Lord’s Supper’ in The Decades ed. Thomas Harding (1549; Cambridge: Parker Society, 1850), vol. 4, 5^th Decade, pp. 401-78

11. ‘Of the Lord’s Supper & Receiving Thereof’ in Questions of Religion Cast Abroad in Helvetia [Switzerland] by the Adversaries of the Same, & Answered… tr. John Coxe (1560; London, 1572), pp. 88-103

Ridley, Nicholas – ‘A Determination Concerning the Sacrament’ (1549) in Works of Nicholas Ridley (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1841), pp. 167-79

Knox, John – ‘A Summary according to the Holy Scriptures of the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper’ (1550) in The Works of John Knox, ed. David Laing, 3:371-76

Vermigli, Peter Martyr

A Discourse or Tract Concerning the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper (1550) 226 pp. This Discourse is the same as the Treatise on the subject in his Common Paces.

The Common Places… (d. 1562; London: Henrie Denham et al., 1583), Discourses

’An Exhortation to the Mystical Supper of the Lord’ 137-138

’The Confession or Opinion of… Vermigli, as touching the Supper of the Lord, exhibited unto the most noble Senate of Strasbourg, when he was called to Zurich, in the year of the Lord, 155?’ 138-41

’The Opinion of… Vermigli as touching the presence of the body of Christ in the Eucharist, propounded by him in the communication that was had at Poissy’ 141

Questions set down to be disputed of. 175

The disputers were these.
The disputation of the first day… between D. Peter Martyr and D. William Tresham…’
The disputation of the second day… between Dr. Peter Martyr and D. William Chadse’
The third act was between Mr. Morgan and Dr. Tresham on the one part and Doctor Martyr…’
The disputation of the fourth day, made between Dr. William Chadse, wherein he opposed Dr. Peter Martyr the first day of June’ 228-250

Becon, Thomas – 6. ‘Of the Lord’s Supper’ in Prayers & Other Pieces by Thomas Becon (d. 1567; Cambridge: Parker Society, 1844), The Principles of Christian Religion, pp. 508-11

Becon (c. 1511-1567) was an Anglican reformer, clergyman and a chaplain to Thomas Cranmer. He was initially significantly influenced by Luther, and then Zwingli.

Viret, Pierre

A Christian Instruction… (d. 1571; London: Veale, 1573)

The Sum of the Principal Points of the Christian Faith

39. Of the Supper of our Lord, and of the true use thereof 38-39
40. Of the signification of the signs of bread and wine in the Supper, and of the agreement and difference of them, with the things that they signify, and of the error of the popish transubstantiation 39-41
41. Of the commemoration of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ in the Supper 41

The Summary of the Christian Doctrine, set forth in Form of Dialogue & of Catechism

Of the Supper
Of the Conjunction of the Signs in the Supper with the things that they signify
Of the Presence of the Body & Blood of Jesus Christ in the Supper

A Familiar Exposition of the Principal Points of the Catechism, and of the Christian Doctrine, made in Form of Dialogue

15^th Dialogue: Of the Sacraments of Baptism & of the Lord’s Supper

Of the Agreement and difference that is between Baptism and the Supper
Of the Supper, and why Jesus Christ did ordain two signs for the same
Of that which is Special in the Supper, wherein it differs from baptism, and how that all that is very well represented in the bread and the wine
How we must Eat the body and flesh of Jesus Christ, and drink his blood in the Supper
Of the True spiritual eating and drinking

17^th Dialogue: Of the Communication of Jesus Christ as well in Baptism as in the Supper

What Greater Reason there is to communicate corporally of the body and of the blood of Jesus Christ in the Supper, than in Baptism
How the Corporal & Carnal Presence of the body and of the blood of Jesus Christ in the Supper agrees not with the true nature of them
How the Glorifying of the body of Jesus Christ, does not change at all the substantial nature & proper substance of the same
Of the Contrariety that is between the corporal presence of Jesus Christ in the Supper, and his ascension into heaven

18^th Dialogue: Of the Presence of Jesus Christ in Heaven, & in the Supper & in his Church

Whether the Ascension of Jesus Christ be a true ascension or no, or else if he made himself only invisible
How that the Presence corporal of Jesus Christ in the Supper may have no place except he have an infinite body, or many
Of the Invisible coming of the body of Jesus Christ
Of the Spiritual coming of Jesus Christ
How that the Corporal presence of Jesus Christ in the Supper is contrary to the divine virtue that is in him to communicate his gifts and graces to his Church
Of the Spiritual & Divine presence of Jesus Christ in his Church, and of the virtue of the same
How that the Corporal presence of the body and of the blood of Jesus Christ is contrary to the true communion of them in the Supper
Whether a man may conclude of the words of Saint Paul, that a man may receive the body and the blood of Jesus Christ in the Supper to condemnation
Of the Principal difference that may be between the transubstantiation of the bread and of the wine into the body and the blood of Jesus Christ and the bodily conjunction of them together
Of the Union that is between Jesus Christ and his members, signified by the bread and the wine in the Supper
How the Supper is the Sacrament of union and of charity, and of the admonition that we have in the same

del Corro, Antonio – ‘An Epistle written to the ministers of Antwerp [Belgium], which are called of the Confession of Augsburg, concerning the Supper’ in A Supplication exhibited to… Prince Philip, King of Spain, etc. wherin is contained the sum of our Christian Religion, for the profession whereof the Protestants in the Low Countries of Flaunders, etc. do suffer persecution… There is annexed an Epistle… (London: Coldocke, 1577) separately paginated

Corro (1527-1591) was a Spanish monk who became a noted Calvinist preacher and theologian; he taught at the University of Oxford and wrote the first Spanish grammar in English. This is a conciliatory epistle designed to effect consensus and cooperation.

“To my most dearly beloved in our Lord Jesus Christ… my brother ministers and pastors in the Church of Antwerp, naming themselves of the Church of Augsburg, grace and peace from God… to the end that by the bond of his Holy Spirit we may all be knit in the unity and confession of the Gospel of Christ…” – p. 1

“My meaning (dear brethren) in al this discourse has not been to other purpose than to declare the small occasion we have as well one as another to make gods, or (to say more truly) idols, of our doctors, and for their occasions to maintain partialities, dissensions and debates upon the matter of our doctrine, to the great slander of the poor and weak consciences, and notable hindrance of the propagation of the Church: wherein if the Corinthians have been rebuked because they made partialities to maintain the renown of saint Paul… a man endued with most singular and excellent gifts, how may God lay it against us, who contend, quarrel, make continual war, and (as a man would say) devour one another as dogs and cats, breaking always the bond of charity, which Jesus Christ has left of such estimation.

When the Lord would mark his disciples and children of his Father, He willed them not to follow the confession of Augsburg, nor the Catechism of Martin [Luther], or of John [Calvin], but He says: ‘In this men shall know you are my disciples, if ye love one another’ (Jn. 13): Alas most blind and miserable that we are, whilst we dispute of the true and false interpretation of the words of the sacrament of unity, we break the very unity itself: in contending whether the wicked, infidel and unworthy receive as well the body of Christ in the Supper, as the children of God we rob ourselves of the very Christ and make ourselves of the number of them that receive Him not at all: in searching whether Christ come in flesh, in Spirit, or in sacrament, we do deprive ourselves of the true communion of Christ: for he that hates his brother, Christ dwells not in him: in sifting curiously whether the body of Christ be given to us in the bread, under the bread, or with the bread, we cut ourselves off from the true body of Christ, and make us members of Satan, the father of dissensions, quarels, contentions and debates.

And for my opinion upon the matter of the holy Supper, I will say in few words (good brethren) what I understand, leaving to everyone his liberty to follow that which God shall teach him…

The fruit and Tree of Life which we ought to eat is even very He which brings us such happy news, who with his virtue and power unspeakable, is so tied and joined with us by the means of faith and bond of his Holy Spirit that He maintains our souls in spiritual and heavenly life, even as the bread and wine nourishes our bodies in corporal life.

Using this similitude the Lord says in the sixth of St. John that He Himself is the bread of life and giving life which is descended from heaven, and that who eats of this bread shall live eternally: That is to say, he shall escape the curse procured by eating of the fruit defended. He says also that his flesh is the true meat and his blood the true drink: and he that eats his flesh and drinks his blood dwells in Christ, and Christ in him, who is our second and heavenly Adam, within whose body is necessary that we be incorporated, that He incorporate Himself in us, to the end that we may be able to appear before God, covered with the mantle of his most innocent flesh full of all justice.

And because our nature is most dull and far from the true understanding of these mysteries, our Redeemer Jesus is not only content to propound unto us the conjunction which we ought to have with Him by these similitudes and comparisons of eating and drinking, but also has sought to show us by some visible ceremony the very same thing that He has taught us by Word, to the end that not only our ears might receive the instruction of his preaching, but also our eyes feed of some visible representation of that which we ought to be in Christ, and Christ in us, that is to say that we be members of Him, nourished with his proper virtue and that He Himself be our food.” – pp. 12-14

“if in all things that Christ our Lord has propounded to manifest the necessity that we have to be in Him and be in us, we should search a presence corporal and fleshly, it should be (as who say) never to come to end, for in the Old Testament Christ has been propounded to us in diverse creatures as a lamb, manna, water, stone, table, meat, bread, feasts and other things, as may be seen by such as read the holy Scripture. He himself in his preachings does call Him a way, a door, bread of children, a vine, with other like things.” – pp. 16-17

“For when we eat of every other meat, the body of him that eats proves only the presence of the meat. But in such as eat Christ, the true fruit of the Tree of Life, is discerned such an example in their persons, such joy and patience in afflictions, such care to mortify the old Adam, such a renunciation of the things of the world, with affection to the life eternal, that their neighbors and frends accompanying them, may see that they eat other meat than the devourers of ceremonies do.

When they have truly, essentially, and really participated of the body and blood of Christ (by faith as is said) of Jesus Christ, all entier, true God, and true man, they assure themselues of such a conjunction with Him, that they have no need to go to search Him, either in the armory of priests or between the hands of men, to receive Him either with the bread, or with the water, as being fully assured that Jesus Christ dwells in them, and that they be flesh of his flesh, and bones of his bones.” – pp. 18-19

“First you utter the sum of your confession of the Supper in these wordes…

‘We believe in Christ who assures us that his body and blood be truly and really in the sacred Supper, and that it is given us in taking it outwardly with the bread and wine, not only with faith and spiritually: the which body is eaten as well of the unworthy as of those that be worthy: And those that shall teach the contrary, we (sticking to the confession of Augbpurg) do condemn them.’

See here (my brethren) you’re goodly entry of the article of your Supper, which we may, not improperly, liken to that of the new inquisitors, who condemn, anathematize, excommunicate and call heretics, and cut off from the communion of the Church, all those which receive not their confession, which me think you do also as of purpose to maintain yours of Augsburg, as though it were a fifth Gospel, or new article of the [Apostles’] Creed. What shall we say (brethren) to these matters? Have you no shame that men of good judgment and understanding should reade such arrogant and rash words?… and yet your doings are nothing inferior to his [Antichrist’s] cruelty, in pronouncing condemnation, not only against your enemies, but also against such as you receive for your brethren and companions in the work of the Lord, and w•o no less for the duty of Christians, than to take away the slander from the Church of Christ, do search by all their possible means to live in love and friendship with you.

My brother, my friend, what art thou that condemns the servants of another? [Rom. 14] Who has given thee such power? Art thou his redeemer? Art thou his judge? Art thou he in the name of whom he has been baptized? Has he not a master, who, if he fall will raise him again, and has the power to do it?” – pp. 25-26

“Let us mark and consider what miserable issues our preachings, confessions, writings, and commentaries, bring forth: Let us also behold what fruits are brought to our audience by our words, what reformation of life in our churches, wherein reign still wantonness, lubricities, gluttonies, drunkenness, usury, deceits, with a thousand such like vices, which we let pass, making ourselves many times (by winking) companions to those that commit them, swallowing (as our Savior Christ says) the camels, and straining the little gnats, whiche means that we pronounce condemnation against such who pierce not the subtilties of our interpretations in Christ’s Supper, making small reckoning of the crimes and dissolutions which are committed daily afore our eyes. I pray you what may mean so many sorts of communications of Christ, the one physical, and the other mystical, another spiritual, and another sacramental, together also with those which you put in your confession, the one common both to the good and to the evil, when they say, ‘This is my body,’ etc., the other when they say: ‘Do this in remembrance of Me.’…

but we know that both He Himself and his apostle teaches us the contrary, saying that the unbelieving and unworthy cannot possess Christ, nor be members of Him, seeing they have not a mouth of faith to receive Him…

Besides, I see that your very confession does not accord at all, with that of Augsburg, whereof you make so great a buckler, no less to maintain you in the good opinion of the world, than to bring yourselves in, under the protection of princes and potentates, who at the beginning, used very wisely and Christianly the presentation of this confession. For the words of the author [of the Augsburg Confession, 1530] be these, Article 10: De Coena Domini docent, quod cum pane et vino vere exhibeantur corpus et sanguis Christi, vescentibus in coenae domini, that is to say:

‘Touching the Supper of the Lord, they teach, that with the bread and wine be exhibited the body and blood of Christ, to those that eat the Supper of the Lord.’

In these words the Confession of Augsburg make no mention to receive the body of Christ really and exteriorly, as you say in yours, neither make they mention at all that the worthy and unworthy do receive it…

Now (brethren) I pray you show me where it is that you find here your realities and ubiquities, or that the unworthy do eat the body of Christ, with other sorts of doctrines which you have preferred, and would authorize them with the confession of Augsburg, which notwithstanding, we will not receive as the rule of our Christianity, and much less the confession of any other man that is upon earth.

We will be Christians, and so be called, we will folow the confession of faith which our God the Father, and Jesus Christ his Son have left unto us: that is to say, the divine word in the Old and New Testament the sum of our religion: We receive the symbols of faith received of old time in the Church: we have not been baptized in the names of Martin, Zwingli or Calvin, but in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost: by which means we detest and abhor all those names and surnames of partialities, that is to say, Martinists, Zwinglians and Calvinists, with other like, knowing very well that God is greatly displeased with such separations and partialities in the doctrine of religion.” – pp. 26-30

Viret, Pierre – The Principal Points which are at this Day in Controversy concerning the Holy Supper & of the Mass (London, 1579) 170 pp. ToC

Beza, Theodore

A Clear & Simple Treatise on the Lord’s Supper Pre (1559; RHB, 2016)

Klauber: “[The Lutheran] Westphal’s Defense of the Lord’s Supper served as the subject of Beza’s treatise. The responsibility fell upon Beza primarily because Calvin, who had clearly had his fill of Westphal after composing three rebuttals, decided not to continue the literary battle… Beza, whose predisposition was to soften the hostility between the two sides… Some of Beza’s biographers have argued that this work was less harsh in its attacks on Westphal than one might have expected… Beza… complained that Westphal had been far too personal in his attacks on Calvin, insinuating that he was a drunkard and a glutton and that his mother had been the mistress of a parish priest.

As one reads Beza’s treatise, several emphases are apparent.

First, Beza responded chapter and verse to specific arguments and chapters of Westphal’s work.

Second, Beza was tireless and unapologetic in defense of Calvin, especially in his assertion that the Lord’s Supper is not a bare symbol and that in it we have true communion with the risen Christ.

Third, Beza made great use of the concept of metonymy, or a figure of speech, in his interpretation of the words of institution. Scripture, he argued, was full of such expressions, such as when the lamb is called the Passover meal or when Christ called the cup the covenant in His blood. He asked how the wine can be wine and blood at the same time without a figure of speech.

Fourth, like Calvin, Beza referred extensively to the church fathers, especially Augustine, in defense of his position.

Finally, at the end of the treatise, Beza pled for some degree of accord between the two sides by showing all the areas they had in common compared to few topics of disagreement. Ultimately his attempt at reconciliation would fall short as the gap between the Lutheran and Reformed views of the Eucharist was simply too vast.” – Ibid.

The Second Oration of Master Theodore de Beze… [on the Lord’s Supper] Made & Pronounced at Poussy, in the Open Assembly of [the] Prelates of France in the Presence of the Queen, Mother, & Princes of the Blood Royal, the 26th Day of September, Anno 1561 (London [1562?]) 12 pp. ToC

A Brief & Pithy Sum of the Christian Faith made in Form of a Confession (London, 1565)

Ch. 4, 49. Application of all that goes before of the Sacrament of the Supper and the right use thereof

These places following be alleged by the Fathers touching this exposition

Ch. 7, 11. Of the Supper

1. ‘On the Lord’s Supper’ in Lutheranism vs. Calvinism: The Classic Debate at the Colloquy of Montbeliard 1586 (Concordia Publishing House, 2017), pp. 23-234

The debate at the Colloquy of Montbeliard (1586) was principally between Jakob Andreas (the Lutherans calling for it) and Beza. The chapter contains their interchanged speeches on the topic.

Two Very Learned Sermons of Mr. Beza, Together with a Short Sum of the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper: Whereunto is Added a Treatise of the Substance of the Lord’s Supper, wherein is Briefly & Soundly Discussed the Principal Points in Controversy Concerning that Question (London, 1588) 250 pp. ToC

The first sermon is on the Person and natures of Christ; the second is on that in relation to the Lord’s Supper.

Musculus, Wolfgang – Common Places of the Christian Religion (1560; London, 1563)

‘Lord’s Supper’ 294.b

What the Lord’s supper is  295.a
What is the institution of the Lord’s Supper  297.b
Who did institute it  297.b
What the Lord did institute  298.a
What is the reason and profit of the shedding of the blood of Christ  312.b
What the Lord commanded us to do in the matter of the Supper  313.a
What is the right disposing and administration of the Lord’s Supper  316.b
By whom the Lord’s Supper ought to be ministered  316.b
To whom the Lord’s Supper is to be ministered, and to whom not  317.a
When the Lord’s Supper ought to be ministered  320.a
How the Lord’s Supper ought to be celebrated 320.b
What is the true and lawful use of the Lord’s Supper  323.b

de Brès, Guy – ‘Of the Holy Supper’ in The Staff of Christian Faith… for to Know the Antiquity of our Holy Faith… gathered out of the Works of the Ancient Doctors of the Church… (London, 1577), pp. 1-25

de Bres (1522-1567) was a Walloon pastor, Protestant reformer and theologian, a student of Calvin and Beza in Geneva.

Prime, John – ‘Of the Supper’ in A Short Treatise of the Sacraments Generally, & in Special of Baptism & of the Supper (London: 1582) no page numbers

Prime (c.1549-1596) was a reformed Anglican clergyman and Oxford scholar.

Zanchi, Girolamo

Confession of the Christian Religion… (1586; Cambridge, 1599), pp. 121-36 & 316-26

ch. 16, ’Of the Lord’s Supper’
. On Aphorism 9
. On Aphorism 10

On the Discord of the Lord’s Supper which arises among the Reformed Churches, where they agree and disagree among themselves tr. by AI by WesternCatholike (Mylob: Peter Fabricius, 1564; 2024) 10 pp. Latin

Olevian, Caspar – ‘Of the Holy Supper’ in A Catechism, or Brief Instruction in the Principles & Grounds of the True Christian Religion… (d. 1587; London, 1617), pp. 23-27

Olevian (1536–1587) was a significant German reformed theologian, and has been said to be a co-author of the Heidelberg Catechism along with Zacharias Ursinus (though this has been questioned).

Ursinus, Zachary

The Sum of Christian Religion: Delivered… in his Lectures upon the Catechism… tr. Henrie Parrie (Oxford, 1587)

Of the Lord’s Supper

1. What the Supper of the Lord is
. Now let us come to define the Lord’s Supper
2. What are the ends of the Lord’s Supper
3. What the Supper differs from Baptism
4. What is the sense or meaning of the words of the institution of our Lord’s Supper

1^st Arguments, taken from the nature of the sacraments
2^nd Arguments, deduced from the analogy of faith
3^rd Arguments, drawn from like places of Scripture, where the same thing is delivered in words, whereof there is no controversy
. Against the Transubstantiation of the Papists
A refutation of objections framed to confirm Consubstantiation

5. What is the difference between the Lord’s Supper & the Popish Mass
6. What is the right and lawful use of the Supper
7. What the wicked receive in the Lord’s Supper
8. Who ought to approach and be admitted unto the Supper

Who ought to be admitted unto the Lord’s Supper
Certain Conclusions of the Supper

Appendix unto the Former Treatise of the Supper

Certain principal arguments of the Consubstantiaries against the sincere doctrine of the Lord’s Supper, & the Sacramentaries, as they call them: together with a refutation of them

Certain arguments of the Consubstantiaries, whereby they go about to overthrow our doctrine of the Lord’s Supper: together with the refutations of them

The shifts of Consubstantiaries whereby they go about to elude & shift off certain of our objections, not all: for more are objected against them

Certain reasons whereby is proved that the body of Christ is not present either ‘in’ or ‘under’, or ‘at’ the bread of the Lord’s Supper, neither is corporally eaten ‘under’, ‘with’, ‘in’ or ‘at’ the bread

2^nd Appendix: Arguments whereby the opinion of Ubiquitaries is refelled and the truth of sound doctrine confirmed

1^st Argument
2^nd Argument
3^rd Argument
General points wherein Gospel professing Churches agree or disagree about the Supper. They agree in these points
. They disagree in these points

A Collection of Certain Learned Discourses… (Oxford, 1600)

Short Introduction to the Controversy of the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper…
Rules & Axions of Certain Chief Points of Christianity, 25. Of the Lord’s Supper

Beza, Theodore, Anthony Faius & Students – 60. ‘Of the Lord’s Supper’ in Propositions & Principles of Divinity Propounded & Disputed in the University of Geneva by Certain Students of Divinity there, under Mr. Theodore Beza & Mr. Anthony Faius… (Edinburgh: Waldegrave, 1591), pp. 180-86

Virel, Matthew – 4. Of the Supper of the Lord, by the which God witnesses that his covenant is most certain toward us, forasmuch as by it He makes us more and more partakers of Christ and his benefits in A Learned & Excellent Treatise Containing All the Principal Grounds of Christian Religion (London, 1594), bk. 3

Virel (1561-1595)

Perkins, William

34. Of the Lord’s Supper in A Golden Chain (Cambridge: Legat, 1600)

A Reformed Catholic… ([Cambridge] 1598)

10. Of Real Presence

An Advertisement to all favorers of the Roman Religion, showing that the said religion is against the catholic principles and grounds of the Catechism [Apostles’ Creed, Ten Commandments, Lord’s Prayer, Lord’s Supper]

The Whole Treatise of the Cases of Conscience… (Cambridge: Legat, 1606), bk. 2, ch. 10

Question 1, How far forth men have liberty to use or not use the Lord’s Supper?

Question 2, How may a man rightly use the Lord’s Supper to his comfort and salvation?

Sect. 1, Preparation is Needful
Sect. 2, The Right Receiving of it
Sect. 3, After the Receiving of the Sacraments

1600’s Works

Bucanus, William – 48. ‘Of the Lord’s Supper’ in Institutions of Christian Religion... (London: Snowdon, 1606), pp. 741

Bruce, Robert – Sermons on the Sacrament (1617) 318 pp. Being 5 sermons, with a biographical introduction by John Laidlaw. Both Bruce and Laidlaw were Scottish.

Alsted, Johann H. – Polemical Theology, exhibiting the Principal Eternal Things of Religion in Navigating Controversies, pt. 2, 4-6 (Partial) tr. by AI by Onku (Hanau, 1620; 1627)

pt. 2, A catholic Symphony

5. ‘On the Lord’s Supper’ 7-12 Latin

pt. 5, Controversies between Lutherans & Calvinists

class 7, Controversies on the Holy Supper 97-111 Latin

Ames, William – ch. 40, ‘Baptism & the Lord’s Supper’ in The Marrow of Theology tr. John D. Eusden (1623; Baker, 1997), bk. 1, pp. 210-14

Ames (1576-1633) was an English, puritan, congregationalist, minister, philosopher and controversialist. He spent much time in the Netherlands, and is noted for his involvement in the controversy between the reformed and the Arminians. Voet highly commended Ames’s Marrow for learning theology.

Thysius, Anthony – 45. ‘On the Lord’s Supper’ in Synopsis of a Purer Theology: Latin Text & English Translation Buy (1625; Brill, 2016), vol. 3, pp. 172-254

Wolleb, Johannes – 24. ‘The Lord’s Supper’ in Abridgment of Christian Divinity (1626) in ed. John Beardslee, Reformed Dogmatics: J. Wollebius, G. Voetius & F. Turretin (Oxford Univ. Press, 1965), bk. 1, pp. 132-35

Wolleb (1589–1629) was a Swiss reformed theologian. He was a student of Amandus Polanus.

All the Works of the Westminster Divines on the Lord’s Supper

Leigh, Edward – ch. 9. Of the Lord’s Supper in A System or Body of Divinity… (London, A.M., 1654), bk. 8, pp. 678-700

Patrick, Simon

Mensa Mystica, or a Discourse Concerning the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper (1676) 504 pp.

Simon was an Arminian, Latitudinarian Anglican, but Joel Beeke has recommended these two works as ‘some of the best works on the Lord’s Supper’.

The Christian Sacrifice: a Treatise showing the Necessity, End & Manner of Receiving the Holy Communion (London, 1671)

Heidegger, Johann H. – ‘Presence of the Lord’s Body & Blood in the Eucharist’ (1675) in Various Disputations tr. by AI by Onku (d. 1698), pp. 40-104 Latin

Turretin, Francis – Institutes of Elenctic Theology, tr. George M. Giger, ed. James Dennison Jr. (1679–1685; P&R, 1994), vol. 3, 19^th Topic

21. ‘What is the holy Supper and by what names is it specially distinguished in the Scriptures as well as among the ancients?’ 421

22. ‘Why was the holy Supper instituted by our Lord and of how many parts does it consist?’ 428

23. ‘Is the consecration made in the Eucharist by the utterance of the words Hoc est enim corpus meum? And ought they to be secretly uttered? We deny against the Romanists.’ 436

24. ‘Is the rite of breaking bread necessary in the administration of the Supper? We affirm.’ 442

25. ‘Ought both symbols of the Eucharist to be administered according to the command of God to each and every adult believer? Or is the use of the cup to be forbidden to the people? The former we affirm; the latter we deny against the Romanists.’ 447

26. ‘Are the words of the Supper to be understood properly and literally (kata to rheton), or figuratively and sacramentally? The former we deny; the latter we affirm against the Romanists and Lutherans.’ 465

van Mastricht, Peter – ch. 5, ‘The Sacraments of Nourishment’ in Theoretical Practical Theology (2nd ed. 1698; RHB), vol. 5, pt. 1, bk. 7

1700’s Works

à Brakel, Wilhelmus – The Christian’s Reasonable Service, vol. 2 ed. Joel Beeke, trans. Bartel Elshout Buy (1700; RHB, 1992/1999)

40. ‘The Lord’s Supper’, pp. 525-69
41. ‘The Practice of the Lord’s Supper, Consisting in Preparation, Celebration & Reflection’, pp. 569-601

a Brakel (1635-1711) was a contemporary of Voet and Witsius and a major representative of the Dutch Further Reformation.

Turretin, Jean-Alphonse – ch. 9. “A difference not fundamental with Lutherans (on the Supper, Christ’s Person and Predestination)” in A Discourse concerning Fundamental Articles in Religion, in which a Method is laid down for the more effectual uniting of Protestants and promoting a more general toleration amongst them… (1720)

Fleetwood, William – The Reasonable Communicant, or An Explanation of the Doctrine of the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper in all its Parts from the Communion Service, in a Discourse between a Minister & One of his Parishoners (d. 1723) in Works 3:1-40

Fleetwood was an Anglican. Joel Beeke included this in ‘some of the best works on the Lord’s Supper’.

Willison, John d. 1750

A Lecture on 1 Cor. 11:17 to the end concerning the Lord’s Supper in Works, 3:402-13

A Sacramental Catechism, or, a Familiar Instructor for Young Communicants, Plainly unfolding the Nature of the Covenant of Grace, with the Two Seals thereof, Baptism & the Lord’s Supper, wherein especially the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper is fully & distinctly Handled 269 pp.

1800’s Works

Bannerman, James – The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper in The Church of Christ 2:128-85

Bannerman, Douglass

The Special Meaning of the Lord’s Supper; Christ’s Presence in the Ordinance to the Believer in The Scripture Doctrine of the Church, pp. 237-39

The Lord’s Supper; its Significance for the First Disciples; how Observed in The Scripture Doctrine of the Church, pp. 375-78

D. Bannerman was James Bannerman’s son.

Hodge, Charles – The Doctrine of the Reformed Church on the Lord’s Supper (1857) in Essays & Reviews, pp. 341-92, being a review of John Nevin’s The Mystical Presence. A Vindication of the Reformed or Calvinistic Doctrine of the Holy Eucharist (1846)

Houston, Thomas – The Lord’s Supper: its Nature, Ends & Obligations, & Mode of Administration (1878) 380 pp.

Houston (1803-1882) was a Reformed Presbyterian.

Vos, Geerhardus – ch. 5, ‘The Lord’s Supper’ in Reformed Dogmatics tr: Richard Gaffin 1 vol. ed. (1896; Lexham Press, 2020), vol. 5, ‘Ecclesiology, the Means of Grace, Eschatology’, pt. 2, ‘Means of Grace’, pp. 1046-1095

1900’s Works

Berkhof, Louis – ‘The Lord’s Supper’ in Systematic Theology (1950) 32 paragraphs

Quote

Martin Bucer

Adversus axioma catholicum in Nicholas Thompson, Eucharistic Sacrifice Pre (Brill, 2005), p. 185

“Aquinas affirms that the celebration of the Eucharist is called the immolation of Christ for two reasons: because it is, ‘a kind of representative image of the passion of Christ,’ and because the, ‘effects of the passion of Christ’ are received in it. This no one on our side contradicts.”

Historical Theology

On the 1500’s

Article

Carr, Kevin – ‘Robert Bruce on the Nature of the Lord’s Supper, & Preparation for its Observance’ (2010) 42 pp.

Robert Bruce’s sermons on the Lord’s Supper, 1590, are a Scottish classic. Here is an article giving a bit of the life of Bruce, putting the sermons in their historical context, and summarizing their theology and significance.

Book

Thompson, Nicholas – Eucharistic Sacrifice & Patristic Tradition in the Theology of Martin Bucer, 1534-1546 in Studies in the History of Christian Traditions Pre (Brill, 2005) 300 pp. ToC

On the 1600’s

ed. Foxgrover, David – Calvin, Beza & Later Calvinism: Papers Presented at the 15th Colloquium of the Calvin Studies Society April 7-9, 2006 (Calvin Studies Society, 2006)

Raitt, Jill P. – ‘A Matter of Substance: Theodore Beza to Renee Descartes’, pp. 165-78

Selles, Otto H. – ‘A Response’, pp. 179-80

On Zwingli’s View

Exposition of the Christian Faith, 37.2, tr. Charles Johnson

“We assert that the body of Christ is not so carnally and crassly chewed upon in the Supper as they claim; but we believe that the true body of Christ is eaten sacramentally and spiritually, with a religious, faithful, and holy mind, as Chrysostom also judged.”

[“Adserimus non sic carnaliter & crasse manducari corpus Christi in coena ut isti perhibent, sed verum Christi corpus credimus in coena sacramentaliter & spiritualiter edi, a religiosa, fideli, et sancta mente, quomodo & Chrysostomus sentit.”]

Lutheran Writings

Book

1600’s

Calov, Abraham – On the Eucharist contra Johann Bergius Autokatakritos: a Twofold Tract… A Defense of Lutheranism on the Sacred Eucharist tr. by AI by Onku (Wittenberg: Johann Haken, 1658) 96 pp. Latin

Calov (1612–1686) was a professor of theology at Konigsberg and Wittenberg and one of the champions of Lutheran orthodoxy in the 17th century.

Bergius (1587-1658) was a German reformed professor of theology at Frankfurt.

Preface 1
1. On the changed genus of predication 5
2. Another response about four or more terms 6
3. Third response about more terms in the sense of the Lutherans 10
4. Fourth Response scrutinizing the subject ‘This’ 16
5. Fifth response concerning the copula ‘Is’ 27
6. Sixth response on the fallacy of composition and division 47
7. Seventh response on the fallacy of division 59
8. Eighth response from the collation of the other promise: ‘This cup is the New Testament in my blood’ 71
9. Ninth response from the breaking of bread 81
10. Examining the tenth response about the fallacy from something said in a certain respect 91
11. Eleventh response about pure particulars 93
12. On the twelfth response about the redundant conclusion 94
13. A crown about the Sacramentarian [reformed] heresy 94

A Bibliography

Houston, Thomas – ‘Works on the Lord’s Supper’ (1878) 8 pp. being 40 works on the Supper from the Early Church to the 1800’s, in The Lord’s Supper: its Nature, Ends & Obligations & Mode of Administration, pp. 343-50

Latin

1600’s

Alsted, Henry

ch. 28, ‘Lord’s Supper’ in Distinctions through Universal Theology, taken out of the Canon of the Sacred Letters & Classical Theologians (Frankfurt: 1626), pp. 130-34

ch. 26, ‘On the Lord’s Supper’ in Theological Common Places Illustrated by Perpetual Similitudes (Frankfurt, 1630), pp. 148-56

Wendelin, Marcus Friedrich – ch. 23, ‘Of the Supper of the Lord’ in Christian Theology (Hanau, 1634; 2nd ed., Amsterdam, 1657), bk. 1, ‘Knowledge of God’, pp. 379-448

Voet, Gisbert

5. On the Lord’s Supper in Syllabus of Theological Problems (Utrecht, 1643), pt. 1, section 2, tract 5 Abbr.

Ecclesiastical Politics (Amsterdam: Waesberge, 1663), vol. 1, pt. 1, bk. 2, tract 2, section 4, ‘On the Administration of the Lord’s Supper’

1. Of the Symbols, or Elements (as they’ve been Called) 731

2. Of the Consecration of the Symbols 741

3. Of the Persons who Distribute & of Communicants 746

4. Of the Utensils or Instruments, and also of Certain Adjuncts & Circumstances 789

5. Of the Rites of Breaking, Receiving, Genuflection & Elevation 803

Wettstein, Gernler & Buxtorf – 14. Sacred Supper in A Syllabus of Controversies in Religion which come between the Orthodox Churches & whatever other Adversaries, for material for the regular disputations… customarily held in the theological school of the academy at Basil (Basil, 1662), pp. 48-54

Qualifications to the Supper

May All Adults who are Baptized Automatically Come to the Table? No

Articles

1600’s

Rutherford, Samuel

‘II. Who Should be Admitted to the Lord’s Table? Second Conclusion’ in On the Baptism of the Children of Adherents, pp. 27-31 being ch. 12 of A Peaceable and Temperate Plea for Paul’s Presbytery in Scotland (1642)

Question 3, ‘Whether or no there be a true Church communion with ordinary hearers of the Word who cannot be admitted to the Lord’s Supper, and what union excommunicated persons who do hear the Word have with the visible Church? and how the preaching of the Gospel is an essential note of the visible Church?’ in pt. 1, ch. 9, section 9, pp. 268-288 of The Due Right of Presbyteries (1644)

1800’s

Kennedy of Dingwall, John – pp. 131-54 of The Days of the Fathers in Ross-shire (1861), ch. 4, ‘The Religion of Ross-shire’

Latin Article

Voetius, Gisbert – Question 19 in Ecclesiastical Politics, vol. 1, Book 2, tract 3, section 3, ch. 2, p. 670 See also 1. Question in Book 2, tract 2, section 4, ch. 3, p. 751

What Constitutes a Sufficient Profession of Faith to Come to the Table?

Order of Contents

Article 1
Quotes 4
Latin 1

Article

1600’s

Westminster Assembly – ‘On the Conditions for Partaking of the Lord’s Supper’ April 17, 1645

Quotes

Order of

Rutherford
Baillie
London Presbyterians
Presbyterians & Independents

1600’s

Samuel Rutherford

p. 28 of ‘On the Baptism of the Children of Adherents’ being ch. 12 of his A Peaceable and Temperate Plea for Paul’s Presbytery in Scotland… (1642)

“II. Who Should be Admitted to the Lord’s Table?

Second Conclusion: These only are to be admitted to the Supper of the Lord, whom in charity we judge, can and do try and examine themselves, rightly discern the Lord’s body, and who in faith can enunciate the Lord’s death unto his second coming again.

And therefore children, infants, ignorants, scandalously flagitious persons, and mad [mentally insane] persons are to be debarred.”

Robert Baillie

A Dissuasive from the Errors of the Time, wherein the Tenets of the Principal Sects, Especially of the Independents, are Drawn Together in One Map (1645), p. 105

“…yet in formal terms, they [the congregationalists] do deny the most gracious of their brethren to live beside them in New-England in the presbyterial way of the old non-conformists: yea, in print they avow that whoever refuses their tenet of Independency, were they otherwise never so orthodox and pious, they ought not to be admitted to the sacraments, nor enjoy any church privileges: as people who cannot be wholly, but at most are in part only converted: Yea, as such who must be taken for antichristian spirits, for enemies to Christ and his kingdom:

Neither have I heard that any of them now for many years have either celebrated to others or received themselves the sacraments in any English church.”

London (Presbyterian) Provincial Assembly

A Vindication of the Presbyterial-Government & the Ministry… (London, 1650), pt. 2

p. 105

“2. You must reject all such doctrines as hold forth a strictness above what is written…. Devout people are much taken with doctrines that carry a show of strictness and of much purity; but you must not be wise above what is written… And therefore when you are taught that whosoever will enter into Church-fellowship, must first take a Church-covenant; and that whosoever will be admitted unto the Lord’s Supper, must not only be free from ignorance and scandal, but he must have other and more strict qualifications, you must enquire what word they have for these assertions and where God has not a mouth to speak, you must not have an ear to hear, nor a heart to believe.”

pp. 143-44

“The questions to be propounded by the eldership to [adult] persons before they come to the Lord’s Table are for the substance of them contained in the ordinance of parliament, of the 20th of October, 1643, the particulars thereof being the fundamentals of religion, contained usually in most catechisms, which persons of the meanest capacity ought to understand.

2. We doubt not but the ministers with the elders will make it their serious endeavors to deal with all persons in all prudence, meekness, tenderness and love, as the condition of those that come before them shall require. They being not insensible of their own weakness, will take heed of discouraging the meanest, or quenching the smoking flax, well knowing that they are not to Lord it over God’s heritage but to promote their growth and to be helpers of their joy.
…

We have formerly declared that the presbyterial government does not precisely require of those that come to the sacrament that they should first be examined by questions and answers: But if any man shall make a good profession of his Faith in a continued discourse, without being asked any questions, it will be accepted as well as if they were examined by particular questions.

2. We have likewise showed the reason why ancient [old] men and women that have formerly been admitted are required to submit to examination before they can be again admitted, etc. We have entreated you to distinguish between a Church-reforming in discipline and reformed: When a Church is once reformed and members admitted by examination of the eldership, there will never be any necessity of coming afterwards to ministers and elders for readmission (unless it be in case of excommunication). But in a Church-reforming, as ours is, when all sorts have formerly been admitted without any distinction, then old men must be willing to give an account as well as young men, and rich men as well as poor, because:

1. Old men and rich men are found to be ignorant and to profane the sacrament, as well as young men and poor men.

2. In Gospel-administrations God is no respecter of persons; neither must his officers be, if they would be found faithful in their places; It is not gray hairs, nor silken coats; but knowledge, faith, repentance, love and thankfulness will qualify a man for the sacrament.

3. If old men and rich men are more gracious and knowing than others, their good examples will be mighty encouragements to draw on the younger and poorer sort. And wherein can noblemen and rich men express their thankfulness to God for his distinguishing mercies towards them better than in becoming patterns and precedents to others in their ready obedience to the will of Christ in this particular?”

Leading English Presbyterian & Independent Ministers at the Savoy Conference (1661)

The Grand Debate between the most reverend Bishops & the Presbyterian Divines appointed by His Sacred Majesty as Commissioners for the Review & Alteration of the Book of Common Prayer... (London, 1661), ‘Exceptions’, pp. 14-15

“We desire the minister’s power both to admit and keep from the Lord’s Table, may be according to his Majesty’s Declaration of the 25^th October, 1660, in these words, ‘The minister shall admit none to the Lord’s Supper till they have made a credible profession of their faith and promised obedience to the will of God,’ according as is expressed in the consideration of the rubric before the Catechism; and that all possible diligence be used as is for the instruction and reformation of scandalous offenders, whom the minister shall not suffer to partake of the Lord’s Table, until they have openly declared themselves to have truly repented and amended their former naughty lives, as is partly expressed in the rubric, and more fully in the cannons.”

Latin Article

1600’s

Voetius, Gisbert – 5. Question in Ecclesiastical Politics, vol. 1, book 2, tract 2, section 4, ch. 3, pp. 756-57

On being Examined by the Session of Elders to be Admitted to the Supper

Quote

1600’s

London (Presbyterian) Provincial Assembly

A Vindication of the Presbyterial-Government & the Ministry… (London, 1650), pp. 48-65

“The second grand objection against the presbyterial-government is that it requires all, of all sorts, to come to the minister and elders to be examined before they can be admitted to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, which is (as some ignorantly say) to bring in auricular confession again into the Church, to bring the people of God into a spiritual slavery and bondage unto the eldership and which is an usurpation more than prelatical and a tyrannical domineering over men’s consciences, and has no footing in the Word; for the Scripture says, ‘Let a man examine himself and so let him eat, etc.’ It is not said, ‘Let him first be examined by the ministers and elders.’ The Scripture adds, ‘He that eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks damnation to himself,’ not to the eldership. And why then must a man submit himself unto the examination of the eldership? and how come the eldership [is] to be guilty of another man’s unworthy receiving?

It is further added by some that for their parts they will willingly come before the minister and submit to his examination, but they will rather forever be without the sacrament than submit to come before the lay-elder, for whom they see no warrant in the Word of God. Others say that they will freely yield that the younger sort that never have received the sacrament should present themselves to the eldership to be catechized and instructed and fitted for the sacrament, but they will never yield that old men and women that heretofore have diverse times received should now in their old age be required to come to be examined not only by their minister, but by the elders also, who oftentimes are very unfit for that office. Others add that though some ministers rigidly keep all from the sacrament that will not come before the elderships, yet there are others that are presbyterians and have elders chosen that act without them and will receive us to the sacrament without coming before them.

These and such like objections are brought against this way of examination that is so happily begun amongst us. Now that we might satisfy these objections and make good our practice out of the Word of God, we shall briefly do these four things:

1. We will declare what our practice is in this particular.
2. We will prove that he that will come to the sacrament ought first to submit to examination.
3. That the power to examine belongs not to the minister alone, nor to the minister with the whole Church, but to the minister and elders.
4. We will answer the objections that are brought against this way of examination by the minister and elders.

For the first of these we say:

First, that the presbyterial-government does not precisely and peremptorily require of those that come to the sacrament that they should first be examined by questions and answers, but if any man or woman shall make a good profession of their faith in a continued discourse without being asked any questions, it will be as well accepted, as if they were examined by particular questions.

Secondly, that this examination or profession is not required every time men come to the sacrament, but only at their first admission.

Thirdly, that he that is duly admitted into complete Church-fellowship in the presbyterian way is not only by virtue of his first admission freed from all after-examination (unless it be when he falls into any scandalous transgression) in the congregation to which he belongs, but he is enabled by a certificate from his eldership, to receive the sacrament in any Church of the Christian world of the same constitution, without any new examination.

Fourthly, that the reason why ancient men and women, and others that have formerly under the prelatical government been admitted to the sacrament are now required to submit to examination before they can be again admitted does not proceed from the nature of the presbyterian government, but chiefly from the neglect of the prelatical: For it is so evident that it cannot be denied that under the former government men and women of all sorts, though never so ignorant or scandalous, were in most places admitted promiscuously to the sacrament without any examination.

Now this grievous disorder and great iniquity in the prelatical government is the principal cause of all the trouble we meet withal in ours; and we desire earnestly our people to distinguish with us between a Church deformed and reformed. If the Churches of God in England were once so reformed that there were an orderly admission by examination or profession unto the Lord’s Table by the eldership, then we should require none to come to examination but such only as never yet communicated, whom we would endeavor to train up in knowledge by catechizing and by God’s blessing make fit in time to be partakers of such heavenly mysteries.

But now, because our Churches through want of discipline are deformed and all sorts have been sinfully admitted without trial: Hence it is that we are forced, even out of tender regard to the souls of old people and to free ourselves from the guilt of their sins, and out of desire to keep the sacrament from profanation, to examine even aged people (many of whom we find very ignorant) and all sorts as have been formerly admitted (many of whom we find to be very unworthy), that so we may bring our Congregations into Gospel-order. This we say, we are absolutely necessitated to do upon conscientious grounds which we cannot recede from, though we find it very prejudicial to ourselves and to our government. But in the meantime, we desire our respective congregations to consider that this is a necessity that the iniquity of former times has brought upon us; and that it does not flow from the principles of our government, but only from the negligence and sinfulness of prelatical governors.

The second thing propounded is to prove that he that will come to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper ought first to submit to examination and trial as it has been formerly explained. For this purpose we will lay down these three propositions:

1. It is the will of Jesus Christ that no grossly ignorant or scandalous person should come to the sacrament.

2. That it is the will of Jesus Christ that those who are grossly ignorant or scandalous should be kept from the sacrament (if they offer to come) by the officers of the Church.

3. That it is the will of Jesus Christ that Church-governors have some sufficient way to find out who are such ignorant and scandalous persons, that they may be kept away.

1st Proposition: That it is the will of Jesus Christ that no grossly ignorant or scandalous person should come to the sacrament.

1. No grossly ignorant person, because the Scripture says that a man must first examine himself and so eat of that bread and drink of that cup; and it likewise says that he that will come to the sacrament must be one that discerns the Lord’s body, otherwise he eats and drinks damnation to himself; and it adds that we are to do this in remembrance of Christ and thereby to show forth the Lord’s death till he come. And therefore a man that is grossly ignorant and is not able to examine himself, nor to discern the Lord’s body, nor to remember Christ, nor understands what it is to show forth the Lord’s death ought not to come to the sacrament, no more than a baptized infant who is therefore not to partake of this ordinance because of his want of knowledge.

2. No scandalous person: This is evidenced from the words of the apostle, ‘Let a man examine himself and so let him eat, etc.,’ from which words we gather two things:

1. That he that would come to the sacrament must examine himself, which examination ought to be according to the nature of the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper, viz.:

[1.]

1. In general; whether he be worthy to come or no (not with a worthiness of merit, but of evangelical suitableness).

2. In particular:

1. Whether he have true faith in Christ, without which he cannot worthily eat this bread and drink this cup.

2. Whether he truly repent for sin and from sin. For he that comes in any sin unrepented of, comes unclean and so pollutes the ordinance.

3. Whether he be truly united by love to Jesus Christ and his members, without which he cannot enjoy communion with them in that ordinance (1 Cor. 10:16-17).

2. That he who upon due examination can find none of these qualifications, should not presume to come, which appears:

1. By the apostolical command, ‘But let a man examine himself and so let him eat;’ so and not otherwise.

2. By the sin which he commits in being guilty of the body and blood of Christ, verse 27.

3. By the danger he incurs to himself in eating and drinking his own damnation, verse 29.

2. From the nature of the sacrament:

1. It is the table of the Lord and the Lord’s Supper, and consequently the friends and not the enemies of Christ are thereto invited.

2. It is an ordinance wherein we publicly profess communion with Christ and his mystical body, and if he that comes be by sin disjoined from Christ, he is guilty of a sacrilegious lie against him and his Church whilst he professes himself to be a friend and is really an enemy.

3. It is (according to the nature of all sacraments) a sealing ordinance (Rom. 4:11), as is intimated in those remarkable sacramental phrases, ‘This is my body,’ ‘this is my blood,’ denoting not only a bare sacramental signification, but also a spiritual obsignation and exhibition of Christ’s body and blood to a worthy receiver. Now a seal supposes a writing to which it is annexed or else it is a mere nullity; and certainly Christ never intended to have his seal put to a blank or counterfeit writing.

4. It is an ordinance appointed for the nourishment of those who are spiritually alive, Christ’s body and blood being therein conveyed under the elements of bread and wine, which they only can eat and drink, who are alive by faith, and not they that are dead in trespasses and sins (Jn. 6:63).

5. It is the New Testament in the blood of Christ, that is, a confirmation of the New Testament and of all the promises and privileges thereof in the blood of Christ, which belong not at all to wicked men, godliness having the promises of this life and that which is to come (1 Tim. 4:8).

By all which it appears that it is the will of Christ that no scandalous person should come to the Lord’s Table.

2nd Proposition: That it is the will of Jesus Christ that those who are grossly ignorant or scandalously wicked should be kept from the sacrament (if they offer to come) by Church-officers. And this is evident:

1. From the power given to Church-officers for that purpose.
2. From the evil consequents that will otherwise ensue.

1. That such a power is given to Church-officers appears not only from the proportionable practice of Church-officers under the Old Testament, who kept the charge of the holy things of God and were appointed to see that none who were unclean in anything or uncircumcised in flesh or in heart should enter into the Temple to partake of the holy things of God (2 Chr. 23:19; Eze. 44:7-8), and had a power to put difference between holy and unholy, which power was not merely doctrinal or declarative, but decisive, binding and juridical, so far as, that according to their sentence men were to be admitted or excluded (Lev. 10:10; Eze. 22:26). That there was a power in the Old Testament to keep men from the sacrament of the Passover for moral wickedness, vide [see Gillespie] Aaron’s Rod Blossoming, bk. 1, chs. 9-10, etc.;

But also from that power of government and key of discipline committed by Jesus Christ to Church-officers under the New Testament. For Christ has given to them the keys of the kingdom of heaven, which imply not only a key of doctrine but of discipline, and that both to keep out such as Christ would not have received in and to shut out such as Christ would not have to continue in, the use of a key being for both these purposes. For shutting out those that should not be continued in, as is granted on all hands from diverse Scriptures (1 Cor. 5:13; Rev. 2:14-15, 20; Tit. 3:10), and consequently for keeping out those that should not be received in, there being the same reason of both. For to what purpose should such be received in, as are by Christ’s command immediately to be cast out again?

2. That diverse ill consequences will otherwise ensue if grossly ignorant and scandalous persons be not kept away, is plain:

1. Church-governors should be very unfaithful stewards of the mysteries of Christ and perverters of his ordinance if a Steward to whom his Lord has committed his goods to be carefully distributed to such as are honest, faithful and diligent in his field or vineyard shall not only admit of loiterers and such as by their evil example discourage others, but also shall give to such the bread and wages which belongs to them who are faithful and industrious: should He not be accounted a very unjust and unfaithful steward and an abuser of his trust?

2. They should be guilty of polluting and profaning the sacrament. If a minister should give this sacrament to an infant or to a madman, or to a mere fool, or to a swine or a dog, would not all men say this were a horrible profanation thereof? Shall it then seem a small profanation to give it unto one who is as ignorant as an infant and wallows as a swine in the mire of sin and uncleanness?

3. They should express a great deal of cruelty and inhumanity to the soul of him to whom they give the sacrament, because they give it to one who will eat and drink his own damnation.

4. They will hereby make themselves accessary to his sin of unworthy receiving, for it is a certain rule in divinity, he that suffers a man to commit sin when it is in his power to hinder him, is accessory to the sin that that man commits (Lev. 19:17), as appears by the example of Eli (1 Sam. 2): And therefore, if the officers of the Church that are deputed by Christ to keep grossly ignorant or scandalous from the sacrament shall yet notwithstanding suffer them to come, and can hinder them, but will not, they themselves become guilty of his sin.

5. They do hereby grieve the godly that are members of the same congregation, and as much as in them lies they pollute and defile the whole congregation: ‘For know you not,’ says the apostle, ‘that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?’

6. Add lastly that hereby they bring down the judgments of God upon the congregation according to that text, 1 Cor. 11:30, ‘For this cause many are sick…’

From all this we argue thus: If Church-officers under the Old Testament had an authoritative power to separate between the holy and profane, and if under the New Testament they have a power to keep out from the sacrament such as are grossly ignorant or scandalously wicked, and if it be the will of Christ that the officers of the Church should be faithful stewards of the mysteries of Christ that they should not pervert, nor pollute his ordinance, that they should not be cruel to the souls of their brethren or be partakers of other men’s sins, that they should not grieve the godly, nor bring guilt and judgment upon the congregation of which they are officers, then it is the will of Christ that they should not give the sacrament to such who are grossly ignorant and scandalously wicked.

3rd Proposition: That it is the will of Christ that Church-governors have some sufficient way to discover who are such ignorant and scandalous persons that they may be kept away.

This follows clearly from the two former proportions. For if it be the will of Christ that no grossly ignorant or scandalous person should come to the sacrament, and if they offer to come, should be kept back by Church-officers, then it follows that they must have sufficient way to detect who are ignorant and scandalous. For Christ never wills any end but He wills also all necessary and sufficient means conducing to that end.

Now what sufficient means can be propounded or imagined for detection of ignorant or scandalous persons but by examination before these Church-officers; examination, we say, of the persons themselves in case of ignorance and of witnesses also in the case of scandal. For though in some particular cases for private satisfaction, private conference with the minister alone may sufficiently discover the knowledge or ignorance of persons, yet in this common case for public satisfaction touching the fitness of persons for the Lord’s Supper, no less than a public and judicial examination before the eldership can be sufficient; inasmuch as an authoritative act of admitting or refusing the persons so examined depends thereupon.

To illustrate this: If a man by his last will and testament should leave unto the master and fellows of a college in trust a sum of money to be distributed to hopeful poor scholars such as were well versed in the learned arts and tongues, would it not hence follow:

1. That those trustees have a power granted them by the will to examine those that come to desire that legacy.

2. That if any refuse to be examined, or upon examination be found insufficiently qualified, they have authority to refuse them.

3. That the most sufficient, proper and satisfactory way is not to trust to reports or testimonials, but to examine the persons themselves that sue for such a legacy: So in the present case, Jesus Christ has left as a legacy the sacrament of his body and blood and has left the Church-officers in trust with it, and has said in his will that no grossly ignorant or scandalous person ought to come to partake thereof; and if any come, that he be debarred from it by those Church-officers.

Hence it follows inevitably:

1. That those in trust have power to examine such as desire to partake of this legacy, whether they be of sufficient knowledge and of good conversation [conduct] or no.

2. That they have power to refuse all such as either refuse to be examined, or upon examination are found insufficient.

3. That if the Church officers would give up their account with joy at the great day of Judgment, they ought not to rest satisfied with private reports or informations of others, but to examine the persons themselves, that thereby they may faithfully discharge their trust in a matter of so great concernment; and that they that will have the sacrament according to the will of Christ ought first to submit themselves to such examination.

Besides this that has been said to prove that those that would come to the sacrament ought first to submit to examination, we shall further offer these following arguments:

1. We argue from that general exhortation of the apostle, 1 Pet. 3:15, ‘But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear.’

Now if Christians are bound to give an account of their faith and hope to everyone that asks them, yea even to heathen persecutors: how much more ought they to do it to the officers of the Church? especially at such a time when they desire to be admitted to an ordinance that is not common to all sorts of Christians, but peculiar to such as are indued with knowledge and of an unblameable life and conversation.

2. From that power that Jesus Christ has seated in his Church of examining such as are by the will of Christ to be excommunicated from the sacrament.

That there is a power of examining in order to excommunication appears from Mt. 18:16-17 and from Rev. 2:2, where Christ commends the angel of the Church of Ephesus because he could not bear them which were evil and had tried them who said they were apostles and were not, and had found them liars.¹ This trying was not only charitative and fraternal, but authoritative and judicial. For it was an act of the angel of the Church, which angel is not to be understood individually, but collectively, for all the angels in Ephesus (see Smectymnus). And that there were more angels than one in Ephesus appears from Acts 20:17 (the like may be said of the angel of the Church of Smyrna, Pergamus, Thyatira, etc. for Christ speaks unto each angel in the plural number, Rev. 2:10, 13-14).

¹ Zelum singularem laudat in tuenda disciplina Ecclesiæ, quod vitiis in cœtu grassantibus se fortiter opposuerit, scandalosos censuris debitis correxerit, vel Ecclesiæ communione ejecerit. Ita enim præcepit Christus & Apostolus, et viguerunt censuræ in primitiva Ecclesia magno bono. Pareus in loc

From hence we argue, if Jesus Christ has given power authoritatively to examine such as are to be cast out from the sacrament, then He has also given power to examine such as are to be received in. For there is the same reason of both. And as the power of excommunication would be wholly useless and frustraneous if there were not a power of examination precedent thereunto, so would the power of keeping such as are grossly ignorant or scandalous from the sacrament be utterly in vain and of no benefit to the Church of Christ if the power of examination should be denied unto it. And certainly, whosoever is an enemy to this power must be forced to grant that it is the will of Jesus Christ that all sorts of people, though never so wicked, though actually drunk, though fools, though Turks, Jews or heathen are to be admitted to the sacrament if they come unto it.

For if there be no divine right of examination or of rejection, how dare any Church or State assume a power of making rules for keeping any persons from the sacrament? Should they make rules for keeping ignorant and scandalous persons from the hearing of the Word, would it not be accounted a sin of a high nature? And is it not as great a sin to keep any from the sacrament if Christ has left no power for the doing of it? Is not this to be wise above what is written? And therefore let us either admit all sorts to the sacrament without any distinction of persons and thereby become guilty of the body and blood of Christ and accessary to the sins of those that come unworthily (as has been said and formerly proved), or else let us diligently and conscientiously examine all of all sorts that desire to be made partakers of this distinguishing ordinance.

3. From the titles that are given to the officers of the Church, and from the duty that God requires at their hands.

The officers of the Church are called rulers and governors, and such as are over their people in the Lord. And it is their duty to watch over the souls of their people as such as must give an account for them into God. Now it is all the reason in the world that they that must give an account to God for their people should take an account of their people, and that they that watch over their souls should know the state of their souls. And that they that are governors, rulers, and overseers should teach, instruct, try and examine those over whom they rule and govern (1 Cor. 12:28; 1 Tim. 5:17; 1 Thess. 5:12; Heb. 13:17).

3. Question: But you will say, ‘Who are these rulers and governors by whom we are to be examined?’ Answer: The answer to this will lead us to the third thing propounded, and that is to prove, the 3rd particular, that the power of examining those that desire to be admitted to the Lord’s Supper belongs not to the minister alone, nor to the minister with the whole Church, but to the minister and ruling elders.

1. Not to the minister alone. Indeed there is an examination which belongs only to the teaching-elder, and that is a catechizing of his people in public by questions and answers (Gal. 6:6, where the word κατηχουμενος properly signifies a teaching by questions and answers), and this is part of the key of doctrine.

But the examination that we are now treating of belongs to discipline and government, for it is not only a naked examination, but an authoritative determining whether the party examined shall be detained from the sacrament, or admitted, which is formally an act of Church-government, and therefore belongs not to the minister alone but to all those whom Christ has made Church-governors, also of which sort are the ruling-elders as has been sufficiently proved. The power of discipline is given Non uni, sed unitati by Christ, not to one elder, but to the united company of elders: and for one minister alone to assume this power unto himself, it is to make himself the Church; it is to make himself a congregational Pope; it is a bringing in of a power into the Church that would have some resemblance (as was objected) to auricular confession. Now there are two things we are very confident of:

1. That when the parliament gave their allowance to the presbyterial government, if they had put the whole juridical power of the Church into the hands of the minister alone, they that now seem so willing to come to be examined by the minister without his elders would have more bitterly declaimed against that way than now they do against this, for this indeed were to make every minister a prelate in his congregation and (as we now said) to bring in that which has some resemblance to auricular confession.

2. That it is as warrantable by the Word of God for one minister to assume the whole power unto himself alone of suspending persons from the sacrament who have been duly admitted thereunto (which is a gradual excommunication) as it is to assume the whole power of admitting unto the sacrament, for contrariorum eadem est ratio. And oh that our brethren in the ministry that take this power unto themselves would seriously consider what is here said.

2. The power cannot be placed in the whole Church collectively taken, for then it should be also in children and servants. The Scripture makes an exact distinction between rulers and ruled; and we are very well assured that if this power were seated in the minister and whole congregation, that they that are now so unwilling to come before the minister and elders would be much more unwilling to come before the minister and whole congregation. And therefore we conclude that this power of examining, and receiving unto the sacrament such are fit, and detaining such as are found to be grossly ignorant and visibly wicked, must needs belong to the minister assisted with the elders chosen out from amongst the rest of the congregation. For if the elders are rulers and governors seated by God in his Church (as has been abundantly proved), then it will undeniably follow that whatsoever is properly an act of government must belong to them as well as the minister. And who can deny but that the power of admitting unto or detaining from the sacrament is an act of government? and therefore it does by divine right belong to the elders as well as to the minister.

But yet here we must carefully distinguish between the act of examination and the judgment given upon the person examined. The managing of the examination is the proper act of the teaching elder; it is he that is to pray for a blessing; it is he that is for order’s sake to ask the questions. But as for the determining, whether the party examined be fit or no to receive, this is an act of power and government and belongs not to the minister alone, but to the eldership.

And it is a very great wonder unto us that people should profess so much dissatisfaction and dislike in coming before the ruling-elders, whereas they cannot but take notice:

1. That the elders are such as they themselves have, or might have chosen.

2. They are chosen for the relief and benefit of the congregation, that so the minister might not be sole judge of those that are to come to the sacrament, but might have others joined with him to see that he does nothing out of envy, malice, pride or partiality, but that all things be managed for the good and edification of them, for whose sake they are chosen: which two particulars, if our people did seriously consider, they would quickly be persuaded to a hearty and an unanimous submission unto this ordinance of Jesus Christ.

4. There remains the fourth thing yet behind, which is an answering of the objections that are brought against this way of examination by minister and elders. But this and diverse other considerable things which we shall propound to persuade people unto a cheerful obedience to this part of Church-reformation so comfortably begun in many congregations in this kingdom, we shall leave till we come to that part of this discourse which we call, The Exhortation, to which we refer the candid reader that desires further satisfaction.

And thus we have given you a short survey of the nature of the presbyterial government together with an answer to the most material objections against it, which we have done only for this end, that so (as we have said) we might undeceive those, who look upon it as lordly and tyrannical and by these bug-bears are scared from submitting to it. And we beseech our several congregations to judge of it as it is here represented and to be willing to come under the yoke of it, which is light and easy (being the yoke of Christ) and which will in a short time make our congregations (if received into them) glorious for their unity, verity and piety.

We are not ignorant that it has many adversaries. The obstinately ignorant hates it, because it will not suffer him to go blindfold to Hell. The profane person hates it, because it will not suffer him to eat and drink his own damnation by unworthy coming to the sacrament. The heretic hates it because after two or three admonitions, it rejects him. The Jesuit hates it, because it is an invincible bulwark to keep out Popery. The schismatic, because the main design of it is to make all the saints to be of one lip, one heart and one way. And above all, the Devil hates it because if rightly managed, it will in a short time blow up his kingdom.

But notwithstanding all these great and potent enemies, our comfort is that this government is the government of Jesus Christ who is the King of his Church and has given unto us the keys of his kingdom, has promised to be with us, to protect and defend us to the end of the world, upon whose shoulders the government is laid; and though we be utterly unable, yet He that was able to bear the wrath of God upon his shoulders is able to bear up this government against the wrath of man. For this end and purpose all power in heaven and earth is given unto Him; and He is now sitting at the right hand of God for the more effectual exercising thereof and will there remain till He has made all his enemies his footstool, whose privilege it is to rule in the midst of his enemies: and will one day say:

‘Those mine enemies which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither and slay them before me.’

‘Be wise now therefore, O ye kings, be instructed ye judges of the earth; serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son lest he be angry and ye perish from the way when his wrath is kindled but a little; blessed are all they that put their trust in Him.'”

May a Professed Christian with a Doubting Conscience Partake of the Lord’s Supper?

Order of Contents

Westminster
Quotes 2

Westminster Larger Catechism

“Q. 172. May one who doubteth of his being in Christ, or of his due preparation, come to the Lord’s supper?

A. One who doubteth of his being in Christ, or of his due preparation to the sacrament of the Lord’s supper, may have true interest in Christ, though he be not yet assured thereof;[a] and in God’s account hath it, if he be duly affected with the apprehension of the want of it,[b] and unfeignedly desires to be found in Christ,[c] and to depart from iniquity:[d] in which case (because promises are made, and this sacrament is appointed, for the relief even of weak and doubting Christians[e]) he is to bewail his unbelief,[f] and labour to have his doubts resolved;[g] and, so doing, he may and ought to come to the Lord’s supper, that he may be further strengthened.[h]

[a] Isa. 50:10. 1 John 5:13. Ps. 88. Ps. 77:1-12. Jonah 2:4,7.
[b] Isa. 54:7-10. Matt. 5:3,4. Ps. 31:22. Ps. 73:13,22,23.
[c] Phil. 3:8,9. Ps. 10:17. Ps. 42:1,2,5,11.
[d] 2 Tim. 2:19. Isa. 50:10. Ps. 66:18-20.
[e] Isa. 40:11,29,31. Matt. 11:28. Matt. 12:20. Matt. 26:28.
[f] Mark 9:24.
[g] Acts 2:37. Acts 16:30.
[h] Rom. 4:11. 1 Cor. 11:28“

Quotes

1600’s

Leading English Presbyterian & Independent Ministers

‘Exceptions’, p. 16

“[Anglican Book of Common Prayer:] ‘The way and means thereto is first to examine our lives and conversations [conduct], and if ye shall perceive your offences to be such as be not only against God, but also against our neighbors, then you shall reconcile yourselves unto them, and be ready to make restitution and satisfaction. And because it is requisite that no man should come to the holy communion but with a full trust in God’s mercy and with a quiet conscience.’

[Reply:] We fear this may discourage many from coming to the sacrament who lie under a doubting and troubled conscience.”

‘The Papers’, p. 55

“that ‘it is requisite that no man should come to the holy Communion, but with a full trust in God’s mercy and with a quiet conscience,’ though it be every man’s duty to be perfect pro statu viatoris [for the state of the wayfarer], yet it is not requisite that no man come till he be perfect. He that has but a weak faith (though not a full trust) must come to have it strengthened: And he that has an unquiet conscience must come to receive that mercy which may quiet it. “

On Admitting Persons of Other Denominations to the Table

Quote

French Reformed Churches

2nd Synod of Charenton (1631), ch. 22, ‘An Act in Favor of the Lutheran Brethren’, p. 297

“4. The province of Burgundy demanding, Whether the faithful of the [Lutheran] Augustane [Augsburg] Confession might be permitted to contract marriages in our churches, and to present children in our churches unto baptism, without a precedaneous abjuration of those opinions held by them, contrary to the Belief of our churches?

This synod declares that inasmuch as the churches of the confession of Augsburg do agree with the other Reformed churches in the principal and fundamental points of the True Religion, and that there is neither superstition nor idolatry in their worship, the faithful of the said confession, who with a spirit of love and peaceableness do join themselves to the communion of our churches in this kingdom, may be, without any abjuration at all made by them, admitted unto the Lord’s Table with us; and as sureties may present children unto baptism, they promising the consistory [local session], that they will never solicit them, either directly or indirectly, to transgress the doctrine believed and professed in our churches, but will be content to instruct and educate them in those points and articles which are in common between us and them, and wherein both the Lutherans and we are unanimously agreed.”

What About the Mentally Handicapped?

Articles

1500’s

The Discipline of the Reformed Churches of France – Ch. 12, ‘Of the Lord’s Supper’, Canon VI (1559) in ed. John Quick, Synodicon in Gallia Reformata (London, 1692), vol. 1, p. xlviii

1700’s

William Steuart of Pardovan – bk. 2, Title 4, ‘Of the Lord’s Supper’, section 2, p. 97 in Collections & Observations Concerning the Worship, Discipline & Government of the Church of Scotland… (Edinburgh, 1770)

Quote

1600’s

Rutherford, Samuel

p. 28 of ‘On the Baptism of the Children of Adherents’ 1642 being ch. 12 of his A Peaceable and Temperate Plea for Paul’s Presbytery in Scotland

“II. Who Should be Admitted to the Lord’s Table?

Second Conclusion

These only are to be admitted to the Supper of the Lord, whom in charity we judge, can and do try and examine themselves, rightly discern the Lord’s body, and who in faith can enunciate the Lord’s death unto his second coming again. And therefore children, infants, ignorants, scandalously flagitious persons, and mad [mentally insane] persons are to be debarred.”

Latin

Voet, Gisbert – 8. Question in Ecclesiastical Politics, vol. 1, book 2, tract 2, section 4, ch. 3, p. 767-71

Being Convicted by Church Courts is Necessary for a Minister to Withhold the Supper from a Scandalous Person

Order of Contents

Article 1
Quotes 4

Article

1600’s

Jeanes, Henry – pp. 54-67 of The Want of Church-Government… (London, 1650) See also beginning at p. 51.

Jeanes was an English presbyterian.

The Roman medievalists held that a minister, in some cases, may, by his private discretion, so hold the Supper back from an unconvicted scandalous person. The reformed at the Reformation reformed this practice, which tends to great abuses.

Quotes

Order of

Cartwright
Jeanes
Durham
Baxter

1500’s

Thomas Cartwright

eds. Peel & Carlson, Cartwrightiana (London: Halley Stewart, 1951), ‘Letter to Mrs. Stubbes his sister-in-law to persuade her from Brownism’, pp. 72-73

“…understanding that of the prayer and communion in the sacraments, it [communicating with infidels and unbelievers] does admit exception: for notwithstanding if it were in my choice to avoid them, I ought not to join with them, yet having no authority, or no strength and power to make good the authority of separating of them, I ought not therefore to cease the service of God which is commanded.
…

Howbeit there is here [in 1 Cor. 5] to be considered that one which avoids such a man’s company at the table ordained for the belly, shall not therefore be bound to abstain from the Lord’s table prepared for the spiritual nourishment. Because although it be in him to deprive him from his own table, yet is it not so in his power to put him from the table of the Lord.

And if the case were so that the person excommunicated were placed at your table by the prince whose authority in such a case you cannot avoid, and order taken that you should never eat but he should eat with you, I ask you herein whether you think that you should rather famish yourself than take of the same table with him. And if you esteem that you ought rather to eat of the same dish with him than pine to death, much more ought you to take at the Lord’s table with him rather than by abstaining run in danger of a spiritual famine.

So that when a Christian is forbidden to forbear to eat with an excommunicated person one way or other, it is with this caution, so far forth as by abstaining from his necessary nourishment inward or outward he become not a murderer of his own person, which is so often as for the presence of the wicked (whom he is not able to decline) he hinders the good estate of himself either bodily or ghostly [spiritually].

Where if you say that these are cases supposed and which never come to practice, it is sufficient answer that they may come to practice if they never did, and therefore have the same strength of reason as if they were of continual experience. Howbeit you may consider this more apparently in a faithful woman, whose husband being excommunicated commands her to bear him company at the table. And forasmuch as the Church discipline does not overthrow the authority of the husband in his house, which is of God as well as the other, the wife is to yield unto her husband, although it be not without testimony of grief in that behalf. How much more should she so do, if her husband would be so froward as not to let her have any nourishment but at his board [table].”

1600’s

Henry Jeanes

The Want [Lack] of Church-Government [is] No Warrant for a Total Omission of the Lord’s Supper… (London, 1650), p. 61

“Now if a minister give the sacrament [of the Supper] unto known unworthy persons, that are not such juridically [by Church courts], there is not hereby any transgression of the rule of Christ in regard of the sacrament itself, which notwithstanding this may fully and entirely be administred according to the command of Christ.

But there will follow a transgression of the rule of Christ hereby, in respect of the effect of the sacrament, and consequently the dispositions and qualifications required in receivers to make the sacrament effectual: but this is not a fault chargeable upon the minister if he do his best to prevent it.”

James Durham

Treatise on Scandal

Richard Baxter

A Second Admonition to Mr. Edward Bagshaw (London: Simmons, 1671), ‘To those Readers…’, p. 3

“3. By forgetting the difference between their private familiarity, where they are choosers of their company themselves, and their Church-communion, where the pastors are the rulers and judges of the fitness of the members. Or else not understanding that this use of the keys, and judging of the fitness of the members, is indeed the pastor’s office and not theirs.

4. By not considering that nothing must be done by discipline upon offenders but in a course of Church-justice, upon due accusations, summons, audience, proof and patient admonition: And not by casting out any irregularly upon the expectation of every one that will say that they are ungodly and scandalous.
…

8. By forgetting that God has not left the Church at arbitrary liberty to judge any godly or ungodly at their pleasure; But has given us a set test or rule to judge them by, which is their sober profession of consent to the baptismal Covenant, upon which the adult and their infants have right to baptism; and being baptized have right to Church-communion in all the acts which their age and understanding makes them capable of: And it is Church-tyranny to refuse such as show this title, till they are openly proved to forfeit it, by impenitency in gross sin after public admonition and due means. This is the truth, and the method of Christ’s discipline, and the rule of our communion.”

On the Nature & Necessity of the Supper

Why the Supper has a Higher Reverence Due to it than Simply the Preaching of the Word

Order of Quotes

Gillespie
Rutherford
Turretin
Anderson

1600’s

George Gillespie

English Popish Ceremonies (1637), 3rd Part, ‘Against the Lawfulness of the Ceremonies’, ch. 4, ‘That the Ceremonies are Idols among Formalists themselves; & that kneeling in the Lord’s Supper before the Bread & Wine in the act of receiving them is formally Idolatry’

pp. 62-63

“Those who speak out more plainly than bishop [David] Lindsay [d. 1641], do here (section 14) object to us that reverence is due to the sacrament, and that we ourselves do reverence it when we sit uncovered at the receiving of it.

But Didoclavius [a pseudonym for the Scottish presbyterian, David Calderwood] does well distinguish betwixt veneration and adoration (Altare Damascenum, 1623, p. 809), because in civility we use[d] to be uncovered, even to inferiors and equals for the regard which we bear to them, yet do we not worship them, as we worship the king on our knees. As, then, in civility there is a respect and reverence different from adoration, so it is in religion also. Yea [Cardinal Robert] Bellarmine himself [a papal apologist] distinguishes the reverence which is due to holy things from adoration. Paybody and Dr. Burgesse [Formalists] will by no means admit this distinction betwixt veneration and adoration. But since neither of them has alleged any reason against it, I hope they will be weighed down by the authority of the [Romanist] Archbishop of Spalato [d. 1624], and the bishop of Edinburgh [David Lindsay], both of which agree to this distinction.

So, then, we give no adoration at all to the sacrament, because neither by any outward nor inward action do we perform any worship for the honor of the same. Burgesse himself has noted to us that the first Nicene Council exhorts that men should not be humiliter intenti [basely stretched out] to the things before them. We neither submit our minds nor humble our bodies to the sacrament, yet do we render to it veneration, for as much as we esteem highly of it as a most holy thing, and meddle reverently with it, without all contempt or unworthy usage. Res profecto inanimatae [Surely inanimate things], says the Archbishop of Spalato, sint sacrae quantum placet, alium honorem a nobis non merentur, nisi in sensu negativo [may be sacred so far as it may be fitting, not being deserving of another honor from us except in a negative sense], as that they be not contemned, nor unworthily handled.

If it be said that we ought not to contemn the Word, yet has it not that respect given to it which the Sacrament has, at which we are uncovered, so that this veneration given to the sacrament must be somewhat more then non prophanatio [a non-profanation]; I answer: as honor in the positive sense, so also in the negative, has various degrees: and according to the more or less immediate manifestation of divine ordinances to us, so ought the degrees of our veneration to be intended or remitted; which is not so to be understood as if one part of God’s sacred worship were to be less contemned then another (for none of God’s most holy ordinances may be in any sort contemned), but that for the greater regard of those things which are more immediately divine, we are not in the usage of them to take to ourselves so much scope and liberty as otherwise we may lawfully allow to ourselves in meddling with such things as are not merely, but mixedly divine, and which are not from God so immediately as the other, but more by the intervention of means.

And thus a higher degree of veneration is due to the sacrament than to the Word preached, not by taking ought from the Word, but by adding more respect to the sacrament than the Word has. The reason hereof is given to be this, because when we come to the sacrament, nihil hic humanum, sed Divina omnia [nothing of this is of man, but is all divine], for Christ’s own Words are, or at least should be, spoken to us when we receive the sacrament, and the elements also are by Christ’s own institution holy symbols of his blessed body and blood. Whereas the Word preached to us is but mixedly and mediately divine, and because of this intervention of the ministry of men, and mixture of their conceptions with the holy Scriptures of God, we are bidden try the spirits [1 Jn. 4:1] and are required after the example of the Bereans to search the Scriptures daily whether these things which we hear preached be so or not.

Now we are not in like sort to try the elements and the words of the institution, whether they be of God or not, because this is sure to all who know out of Scripture the first principles of the oracles of God. The consideration hereof warns us that the sacrament given according to Christ’s institution is more merely and immediately divine than is the Word preached.”

p. 79

“As for the rest of the testimonies Dr. Burgess produces out of the Fathers for kneeling, I need not insist upon them for either they speak of the inward adoration of the heart, which we ought to direct unto Christ when we receive the Sacrament (and this none of us denies), or else they speak of adoring the sacrament: where by the word ‘adoration’ we may not understand any divine worship, inward or outward, but a reverence of another nature, called veneration.

That this (which we deny not neither) and no more is meant by the Fathers when they speak of the adoration of the sacrament, Antonius de Dominis shows more copiously (Rep. Eccl., bk. 5, ch. 6).”

Samuel Rutherford

The Divine Right of Church Government… (1646), p. 84

“…yea, reverencing of the ordinances of God, as the delighting in or trembling at the Word, are not properly acts of adoring God.”

Francis Turretin

Institutes 3.538-39

“The statement of the question is not: (1) whether proper reverence and honor are due to the bread and the cup, the symbols of the Lord’s body and blood, both on account of the majesty of the author and the divinity of the things they seal and the excellent and singular use they have in religion, such as is legitimately exhibited to baptism and other rites and signs of religion.
…

However, we, although not denying that a proper reverence should be paid to the sacred symbol, do deny that the adoration which is due to the supreme God (usually designated by the Romanists as the worship of latria) should be paid to them. And although in one and the same celebration of the sacrament, they are made once and at the same time, still we think that they ought to be distinct the one from the other and unconfounded that we may not receive the signs for the things themselves; but may pay reverence to the signs indeed, but adoration to Christ alone. As in baptism of adults, the adoration of Christ (into whom they are initiated) and the reverence towards the water (the sacred symbol of the mystery) remain widely distinct… But we deny that on this account the sacrament itself should be adored; nay, we reject this worship as a most foul and detestable idolatry and bread-worship (artolatreian).”

1800’s

John Anderson

‘Of Humiliation Days Before & Thanksgiving Days After the Administration of the Lord’s Supper’, pp. 302-305 in Vindiciae Cantus Dominici… (Philadelphia, 1800)

“The Lord’s Supper is justly considered as peculiarly solemn. All the ordinances of God are holy, as they have a holy God for their author, are to be observed in a holy manner, and are appointed means of promoting holiness.

Yet an ordinance may be said to be more solemn in respect of the more sensible manifestation which God makes therein of his glory, in respect of the peculiarly awful warning which He gives against a rash and inconsiderate manner of intermeddling with it, in respect of the variety of holy exercises which concur in the right observation of it, and, lastly, in respect of the more full and public representation of the communion which the people of God have with his whole Church.

That the Lord’s Supper has a greater solemnity in these respects than some other ordinances, seems to have been hitherto the sense of the whole New Testament Church. This is expressed by the judicious Mr. Durham, in the first of his communion sermons [The Unsearchable Riches of Christ (1685), A Preparation Sermon, pp. 4-5], where, speaking of the words of institution, he says:

‘Every circumstance speaks out a solemnity in this ordinance, as the night in which it was instituted, the same night in which He was betrayed, and his jealousy of and threatening for the abuse of this ordinance. The Lord’s Supper seems dignified with an eminence above all other gospel ordinances:

1st, in reference to what it exhibits. They all set forth love, but this sets forth love in an eminent degree, for it sets forth the Lord’s death, wherein the most eminent degree of his love shines. It sets forth the great masterpiece of his love, his actual dying.

2ndly, in respect of the excellent benefits communicated in it. It is true there is no other thing, on the matter, communicated in it, than in the Word and baptism; yet if ye look to the words, ‘Take, eat, this is my body’, they hold forth Christ Jesus not so much giving any particular gift, as actually conferring Himself in his death and suffering.

3rdly, in respect of the manner in which our Lord Jesus makes over Himself: For there is herein not only a most clear view of the slain Savior, and of covenanting with God, but also a clear glance of heaven upon earth, Jesus Christ and his people mixing (so to speak) and being familiar together; He condescending not only to keep company with them, but to be their food and refreshment, and giving not only the Word to their faith, but Himself (as it were) to their sense! Insofar as the mean, whereby He communicates Himself, is more sensible; it is by his Spirit that the mean is made effectual. There is not only a fixedness of faith on our part, but a sort of divineness in the ordinance itself, as it were, to the very senses of the believer. ‘I say unto you,’ says our Lord, ‘I will not drink henceforth of the fruit of the vine, until the day when I shall drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom,’ where He seems to point out, that in this ordinance, He has a more special way of keeping communion with his people, bearing a resemblance to that which He will have with them in Heaven.’

That there is a peculliar solemnity in the partaking of the Lord’s Supper, appears from the concurrence of duties requisite to the right performance of it. ‘If it be a great and difficult work,’ adds the same eminent divine:

‘to carry rightly on an ordinary Sabbath, or in prayer, or in meditation, how difficult must communicating be, in which we ought to have all these joined together/’

If all religious duties were equally solemn, then they would all alike require preparation. An ejaculatory prayer, for example, would require another duty to prepare for it; and that duty would require another, and so on without end. The Old Testament Church had more solemn days, such as that on which the children of Israel stood before the Lord in Horeb. And there were to be such days under the New Testament dispensation also. Hence, in the vision, which we have in the latter part of the prophecy of Ezekiel, and which judicious interpreters allow to be an emblematical representation of the New Testament Church, we have an account of the observation of such solemnities as the Passover and the Feast of Tabernacles, Eze. 45:21,25. And surely sacramental occasions may be said to be such times. A person that duly consideres these things, will not be easily persuaded, that there ought to be no more solemnity in the breaking of the sacramental bread, than in asking a blessing at our ordinary meals.”

[See also the footnote on p. 305, and the following pages on preparation.]

The Supper is made Effectual by, or Works by Faith

Articles

1500’s

Beza, Theodore – 46. The manner to communicate as well the signs of the Sacraments as the thing signified in A Brief & Pithy Sum of the Christian Faith made in Form of a Confession (London, 1565), ch. 4

Bruce, Robert –

That the Spiritual Grace Received in the Supper is the Same as that in Hearing & Receiving the Word Alone

Quote

George Gillespie

English-Popish Ceremonies… (Edinburgh, 1637), 3rd Part, ch. 4, pp. 61-62

“…in hearing the Gospel? for therein we receive spiritually the body and blood of Christ, and that as truly and really as in the sacrament.

Whereupon the Archbishop of Armagh [James Ussher] shows that the spiritual and inward feeding upon the body and blood of Christ is to be found out of the Sacrament, and that diverse of the Fathers do apply the sixth [chapter] of John to the hearing of the Word also, as Clemens Alexandrinus, Origen, Eusebius Caesariensis and others. Basilius Magnus likewise teaches plainly that we eat the flesh of Christ in his Word and Doctrine. This I am sure no man dare deny.”

Article

1500’s

Beza, Theodore – 34. Which things be common to the preaching of the Word and to the sacraments in A Brief & Pithy Sum of the Christian Faith made in Form of a Confession (London, 1562), ch. 4

The Lord’s Supper is Not a Converting Ordinance

Articles

1600’s

Gillespie, George – Aaron’s Rod Blossoming… (1646; Edinburgh: 1844), bk. 3

ch. 12, ‘Whether the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper be a Converting or Regenerating Ordinance?’

ch. 13, ‘Twenty Arguments to Prove that the Lord’s Supper is Not a Converting Ordinance’

ch. 14, ‘Mr. Prynne’s Twelve Arguments, brought to Prove that the Lord’s Supper is a Converting Ordinance, Discussed & Answered’ 8 pp.

Quote

1600’s

London Provincial Assembly

A Vindication of the Presbyterial-Government & the Ministry… (London, 1650), pp. 135-37

“…such as… come to our [presbyterian] congregations and yet are wicked and profane, and such, as if they should come to be examined by the minister and elders, would not be received to the sacrament…

3. It renders a man utterly uncapable (as such) of the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ; for Christ ordained the sacrament for his friends, not for his enemies; to increase, not beget grace; for those that are visible saints, not for those that are visibly wicked.”

That the Lord’s Supper is Not Necessary to the Essence of a Worship Service

Quote

Thomas Burn

Old Scottish Communion Plate (Edinburgh, 1892), pp. 16-17

“…for the [Scottish] Church [in the late-1500’s], as we have seen, was extremely poor, and poverty had frequently been urged as an excuse for the non-observance of the sacred feast.”

The Supper is a Form of Covenant Renewal in a certain respect, though not in other respects

“Likewise also the cup after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you.'”

Lk. 22:20

Quote

Samuel Rutherford

The Due Right of Presbyteries… (London, 1644), pt. 1, p. 85

“2nd Distinction: There is a covenant of baptism, made by all, and a covenant virtual and implicit renewed when we are to receive the Lord’s Supper…”

How Christ’s Flesh gives Life & How it does Not

Bible Verses

Jn. 6:51 “I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”

Jn. 6:53-54 “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life;”

Jn. 6:63 “It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.”

Quotes

John Forbes

Instructiones Historico Theologicae (1645; Geneva: John Pictetum, 1680), pp. 590-91

“23. In the words just recited, observe these four assertions of Cyril of Alexandria:

1. The flesh of Christ in the participants of the Eucharist is life-giving. (For those who approach unworthily do not partake of the flesh of Christ.)

2. This occurs not by the virtue of the flesh, as it is flesh, but by the virtue of the Deity with which this flesh is united in hypostasis. And the preservation of us and the wondrous effects related to the flesh are to be attributed to the glory of the Deity.

3. For the accomplishment of these things, the bodily presence of the flesh is neither required nor desired.

4. Christ, by the power of His Deity, accomplishes these things, being present with us through His ineffable Deity even though He has departed from us in the flesh.

24. Indeed, the power of Deity accomplishes that we can hold onto Him even when absent, by imitating faith in heaven. We partake of Him when absent by believing, as Augustine teaches. And even when absent in the flesh, He spiritually nourishes us with that same flesh, and His flesh becomes for us life-giving bread, as Cyril teaches here. For this spiritual nourishment is the operation of Deity and is not the least part of that preservation and those miraculous works, which Cyril says should be attributed not to the bodily presence of the flesh but to the glory of the Deity.

Therefore, elsewhere, Cyril says the same: just as (he says) the root sends its quality to the branches, so the only-begotten Son of God, by giving the Spirit, bestows the affinity of the Father and His own nature (so to speak) on the saints connected to Him by faith and sanctity, nourishing them with piety and all kinds of virtue. He calls the Father the Farmer so that this might not seem to be the work of the Son alone, but rather a marvelous work of the entire Trinity. Therefore, He nourishes us with piety and faith through the Son in the Spirit, and the Farmer does the work, looking after and nurturing, and reducing everything to virtue, also through the Son in the Spirit.

In my judgment, we understand this more correctly. Nor is this from the Father, nor that from the Son, nor both separated from the Spirit. For all things are from the Father through the Son in the Spirit. Neither will the Father be separated from cultivating us, nor will the Son be estranged from His care. Therefore, Christ holds the place of the vine, and we, hanging from it, draw the power and grace of the Spirit for our nourishment and spiritual fruit. This is what Cyril says in book 10 of the Gospel of John, chapter 13. Namely, as the Lord speaks in John, chapter 6, ‘It is the Spirit that gives life; the flesh is of no avail.’

The flesh of Christ is not life-giving from itself but by the power of the Deity dwelling corporeally within it. It is substantially life, and from itself, it gives life. He gave to the body in which He dwells the power of giving life, not by the confusion of the two natures in Christ or the operation of natural properties but by the hypostatic union of natures. So that the flesh of the Word becomes life-giving, for it is the flesh of God; and being spiritually united to this flesh, we are connected to God, and thus, being already connected to Him, we are infallibly given life: as Cyril teaches in book 4 of his Commentary on the Gospel of John, chapter 14, and the following chapters until the end of chapter 25, and in book 1, chapter 21.

And the operation of Deity is so powerful that it unites us to His flesh by its consenting will, nourishes us, and allows us to draw from His fullness. Therefore, for the salutary eating of the flesh of Christ, the bodily presence of the flesh is not required with the one partaking, as we explained a little earlier from the same Cyril.

25. However, ignorantly or dishonestly, Bellarmine (in Book 2, On the Eucharist, chapter 25) abuses certain words of Cyril, attributing to them a meaning entirely alien to Cyril’s own mind, as if they favored transubstantiation and the bodily eating of the flesh of Christ. He first cites certain words from a letter of Cyril to Nestorius, intending to convey that Cyril meant nothing other than that the flesh of Christ, of which we are participants in the mysteries, is not common flesh, the mere flesh of a man or a sanctified man (as Nestorius deliriously claimed), but the proper flesh of the Word Himself.

Read that letter of Cyril that contains twelve anathemas, and you will find nothing else there, not even in those very words that Bellarmine excerpts. Having discussed this at length, he promises us clearer passages from Cyril and adduces some from Cyril’s books on the Gospel of John, from which he draws three arguments.”

Johannes Maccovius

Johannes Maccovius Revived, or Manuscripts of his… ed. Nicolaas Arnoldi (Amsterdam, 1659), ‘Anti-Eckhardus’, 6. Communication of Properties, 647 (rt col bot)

“Of Life Giving Power.

Question 14: Whether the flesh of Christ is life-giving?

In like manner a single distinction is taken up: The flesh of Christ is life-giving meritoriously, but not efficiently.”

Latin Article

1600’s

Alting, Henry – A Logical & Theological Exegesis of the Augsburg Confession… a Syllabus of Controversies which the Reformed currently have with the Lutheran is Appended (Amsterdam, 1647), A Syllabus of Controversies with the Lutherans, Part 1, Controversies About Doctrine

2. Of the Person of Christ 177

“The State of the controversy: The question is whether the essential properties of God, namely, omnipresence, omniscience, omnipotence and the life-giving power [vis vivicandi], are really communicated to Christ’s human nature, so that it is rightly said that the humanity, or human nature of Christ, is omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent and in itself life-giving? They affirm; we deny.’ 177

‘For a vivifying power’ 213

On Rome Withholding the Cup from the People

Articles

1500’s

Melanchthon, Philip – Article 22, Of Both Kinds in the Lord’s Supper in The Apology of the Augsburg Confession tr: F. Bente & W. H. T. Dau (1531)

Vermigli, Peter Martyr – 11. ‘Of the Communion under One Kind’ in The Common Places… (d. 1562; London: Henrie Denham et al., 1583), pt. 4, pp. 204-15

Musculus, Wolfgang – 320.b-322.b of ‘How the Lord’s Supper ought to be celebrated’ in Common Places of the Christian Religion (1560; London, 1563)m ‘Lord’s Supper’

1600’s

Bucanus, William – 48. ‘Of the Lord’s Supper’ in Institutions of Christian Religion... (London: Snowdon, 1606), pp. 750-63

Whether therefore do they sin which take away the cup from the eucharistical bread?

Whether or no, for the discommodities which Gerson does reckon up, as 1. the liquor by some chance may be spilt, 2. it cannot be carried about without danger. 3. in winter it soon waxes sour. 4. in summer, it purifies and has worms. 5. It brings a loathing to them which drink. 6. in some countries it is hardly gotten. 7. by this means, laymen touch the cup. 8. some of them have beards, 9. Some are taken with the palsy. 10. The dignity of the priest and of laymen is not alike: are these causes weighty enough and just, for which by good right one part of the sacrament could be taken away from the laics?

Ley, John – A Comparison of the Parliamentary Protestation with the Late Canonical Oath & the Difference between them… as also a further discussion of the case of conscience touching receiving the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper when either bread or wine is wanting [lacking] or when by antipathy or impotence the party that desires it cannot take it, wherein the impiety, injury & absurdity of the popish half-communion is more fully declared & confuted (1641) 59 pp.

Ley was a Westminster divine.

Turretin, Francis – 25. ‘Ought both symbols of the Eucharist to be administered according to the command of God to each and every adult believer? Or is the use of the cup to be forbidden to the people? The former we affirm; the latter we deny against the Romanists.’ in Institutes of Elenctic Theology, tr. George M. Giger, ed. James Dennison Jr. (1679–1685; P&R, 1994), vol. 3, 19^th Topic, pp. 447-65

Books

Featley, Daniel – The Grand Sacrilege of the Church of Rome in taking away the sacred cup from the laity at the Lord’s Table: detected and convinced by the evidence of holy Scripture and testimonies of all ages successively from the first propagation of the catholic Christian faith to this present, together with two conferences: the former at Paris with D. Smith, now styled by the Romanists B of Calcedon; the later at London with M Euerard, priest (1630) 306 pp.

Featley was a Westminster divine.

Whitby, Daniel – A Demonstration that the Church of Rome & her Councils have Erred by Showing that the Councils of Constance, Basil & Trent have, in all their Decrees Touching Communion in One Kind, Contradicted the Received Doctrine of the Church of Christ. With an appendix, in answer to the 21st Chapter of the Author of A Papist Misrepresented & Represented (London [1688]) 110 pp.

Whitby (c.1637-1726) was an Arminian Anglican minister.

The Bread & Wine are Not Holy After the Administration of the Supper is Over

Articles

1500’s

Beza, Theodore – 42. The sacraments be no sacraments without the use of them in A Brief & Pithy Sum of the Christian Faith made in Form of a Confession (London, 1565), ch. 4, p. 65

Bruce, Robert –

On Communion with Others in the Supper

On Barring from the Table, or Lesser Excommunication

Articles

1500’s

Viret, Pierre – A Christian Instruction… (London: Veale, 1573), A Familiar Exposition of the Principal Points of the Catechism, 21^st Dialogue

In what Sort the ministers may be faulty or no, of the pollution of the Sacraments, if they do administer them to the unworthy

1600’s

Gillespie, George – Aaron’s Rod Blossoming… (1646; Edinburgh: 1844), bk. 3

ch. 7, ‘That 1 Cor. 5 proves excommunication and (by a necessary consequence, even from the Erastian interpretation) suspension from the sacrament of a person unexcommunicated’ 6 pp.

ch. 10, ‘That if it could be proved that Judas received the Lord’s Supper, it makes nothing against the suspension of known wicked persons from the sacrament’ 4 pp.

ch. 11, ‘Whether it be a full discharge of duty to [only] admonish a scandalous person of the danger of unworthy communicating; and whether a minister, in giving him the sacrament, after such admonition [and not barring him from the Table], be in no way guilty?’ 6 pp.

ch. 15, ‘Whether the admission of scandalous and notorious sinners to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper be a pollution and profanation of that holy ordinance? And in what respects it may be so called.’ 6 pp.

ch. 16, ‘An argument of Erastus (drawn from the baptism of John), against the excluding of scandalous sinners from the Lord’s Supper, examined.’ 1 page

ch. 17, ‘The Antiquity for the suspension of all scandalous persons from the sacrament, even such as were admitted to other public ordinances’ 8 pp.

Palmer, Herbert – A Full Answer to a Printed Paper Entitled, ‘Four Serious Questions Concerning Excommunication & Suspension from the Sacrament, etc.’, Wherein the Several Arguments & Texts of Scripture Produced are Particularly & Distinctly Discussed: & the Debarring of Ignorant & Scandalous Persons from the Sacrament is Vindicated (London, 1645) 30 pp.

Palmer was a presbyterian minister and a Westminster divine.

Ought I to take the Supper if Scandalous Persons Also Do? Yes

Order of

Quote 1
Articles 1

Quote

1600’s

Samuel Rutherford

The Due Right of Presbyteries... (1644), pt. 2, ch. 4, section 5, pp. 193-94

“This toleration of drunkards and swearers in the Lord’s Church and at his Table infects and is apt to leaven all with their evil conversation, but does not leaven the worship to the fellow-worshippers, nor is the sin of private persons, yea nor of our ministers, who have not power to help it (but it is the fault of the Church), except you make no separation from a Church where a scandalous person is tolerated (for suffering more or fewer does not vary the species) to be a sin publicly to be repented, before any can be members of your Church, which is prodigious to us.”

Articles

1600’s

English Puritans – pp. 287-91 of A Refutation of the Errors of Separatists (1604; 1644; RBO, 2025), Conclusion, Answer 1

Jeanes, Henry – pp. 66-67 of The Want of Church Government… (London, 1650)

Jeanes was an English presbyterian.

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