A controversy of a different kind from that originated by the writings of Amalarius arose in consequence of a treatise by Paschasius Radbert. Paschasius was a monk of the Abbey of Corbey, who, after being master of the monastic school, was elected abbot in 844. He resigned that office in 851, and died in 865. About 831 Paschasius composed a treatise on the Eucharist for the instruction of some of the younger monks in one of the daughter houses of the Abbey of Corbey; and in 844 he presented a revised edition of this treatise under the title On the Lord’s Body and Blood to the King, afterwards the Emperor, Charles the Bald. In this treatise and also in a letter written at a later time Paschasius, like Florus, it careful to emphasise the spiritual character of the presence of our Lord in the Eucharist, thus still preserving the mark made on Western theology by this element in the teaching of St. Augustine.
“These mysteries are not carnal, though they are flesh and blood, but are rightly understood as spiritual.… It is foolish … to speculate about … the mixture of this food with other food in the process of digestion. When spiritual food and drink are taken, and through them the Holy Ghost works in man, so that anything still carnal in us is made spiritual and man becomes spiritual, where can such mixture come in at all? As far as the life of eternity is from this present mortal life, so far does this food surpass that common food which we share with the beasts.”
“Wrong is the thought of those who have carnal ideas about this mystery.”
While thus maintaining the spiritual character of the presence of our Lord, Paschasius follows the general tradition of the Church in regarding the consecrated elements at Christ’s body and blood, and deduces from the idea that the elements are changed at the consecration—which, though found at various times in the West, is most characteristic of the East—the notion that they are wholly and substantially converted into the body and blood of Christ, so that after consecration they do not truly and properly continue to exist as bread and wine. Further, the consecration is effected at the recital of the words of institution by the power of Christ and the operation of the Holy Ghost; and the body thus present is that very body which was born of the Virgin, which suffered on the cross and rose from the tomb. That so marvellous a work is accomplished is due, like creation itself, to the exercise of the almighty power of God.
“Since nothing is beyond the power of God, therefore He can do all things. For God, the Maker of the universe, did not create the natures of things in such a way as to remove from them His own will, because the existence of all created things depends on the same will and power of God in which it had its origin, not only that it should be whatever it is but also that it be in such a way as the will of God itself decreed, which is the cause of all created things.… As often as the nature of a created thing is changed or increased or lessened, it is not diverted from Him in whom it is, because it so is and so becomes as He in whom it is decrees. It is plain therefore that nothing is beyond or contrary to the will of God, but all things are altogether subject to Him. Let not any one then be disturbed concerning this body and blood of Christ, that in the mystery there is real flesh and real blood, so long as He who created has so willed; … and, because He has willed, though the figure of bread and wine remain, yet these are altogether a figure, and after consecration we must believe that there is nothing else than the flesh and blood of Christ.… And that I may speak more wonderfully, this certainly is no other flesh than that which was born of Mary and suffered on the cross and rose from the tomb.… God is truth; and, if God is truth, whatever Christ promised in this mystery, that certainly is true; and therefore it is the real flesh and blood of Christ, which He who eats and drinks worthily has eternal life abiding in him; but to bodily sight and taste they are not changed for this reason that faith may be exercised to righteousness, and that because of the merit of faith the reward of righteousness may ensue.”
“Because it is not right that Christ should be torn by the teeth, He has willed that in the mystery this bread and wine be potentially created by the consecration of the Holy Ghost really His flesh and blood, and in being so created be daily mystically sacrificed for the life of the world, that, as real flesh was created from the Virgin without paternal generation by the operation of the Spirit, so by the operation of the same Spirit the same body and blood of Christ be mystically consecrated from the substance of the bread and wine.… He speaks of no other than real flesh and real blood, though mystically; whence, because the Sacrament is mystic, we cannot deny that it is a figure. But, if it is a figure, we must ask how it can be a reality.… It is reality then in that the body and blood of Christ are made by the power of the Spirit at His word from the substance of bread and wine; it is a figure in that the priest as it were performs some outward action for the memorial at the altar of the sacred passion so that, while this was once for all accomplished, there is the daily offering of the Lamb.”
“What is that which men eat? Behold, all without distinction often receive the Sacraments of the altar. Clearly they so receive; but one spiritually eats the flesh of Christ, and drinks His blood, while another does not, although he is seen to receive a morsel from the hand of the priest. And what does he receive, since there is one consecration, if he does not receive the body and blood of Christ? Truly, because being guilty he receives unworthily, as Paul the Apostle says, ‘He eats and drinks judgment to himself, not first examining himself, and not discerning the Lord’s body’. Behold, what does the sinner eat, and what does he drink? In truth, he does not eat and drink the flesh and blood usefully to himself, but judgment, though be is seen to receive with the rest the Sacrament of the altar.… He does not believe or understand of what kind or how great judgment he takes, because he sees all alike visibly eating of one food and does not sufficiently know by reason of faith whether there is any further virtue in it. Wherefore the virtue of the Sacrament is withdrawn from him, and moreover the judgment on his guilt is doubled on account of his presumption.”
“Up to this point are the words of the evangelists; then follow the words of God, full of power and all effectiveness, ‘Take and eat ye all of this: for this is My body’.… Believe, my son, that this is so, since He has said, and you cannot doubt that it is done; He has commanded, and it has been created.… ‘This is the cup of My blood, of the new and eternal covenant.’ By this word that which before was wine and water is made blood.… As often as you drink this cup or eat this bread, think not that you drink any other blood than that which was poured out for you and for all for the remission of sins, or that you eat any other flesh than that which for you and for all was betrayed and hung on the cross.… That this mystery, although it is real flesh, can be called bread the Apostle proves, when he says, ‘Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of the cup’; for it is the flesh of Christ and real flesh, and yet is rightly called the living Bread which came down from heaven, flesh indeed by grace but bread by effect, because, as this earthly bread supplies temporal life, so that heavenly Bread affords eternal and heavenly life, because it is life eternal.”
“When He brake and gave to them the bread, He did not say, This is, or there is in this mystery, a kind of virtue or figure of My body, but He said plainly, ‘This is My body’. And therefore it is what He said, and not what any one pretends.… Wherefore I marvel that there are some now who want to sap that in the Sacrament there is not in fact the reality of the flesh and blood of Christ, but a kind of virtue of the flesh and not the flesh itself, a virtue of the blood and not the blood itself, a figure not a reality, a shadow not a body.”
The teaching of Paschasius in regard to the Eucharistic sacrifice is of great interest. He regards the Eucharist as unquestionably a sacrifice. In it the Church on earth offers gifts and prayer through the instrumentality of the ministering priest. When at the consecration the bread and wine are made to be the body and blood of Christ by the power of the Lord and of the Holy Ghost, they are uplifted into the heavenly sphere, presented on the heavenly altar of the body of Christ, offered by Christ as His own sacrifice, and given back by Him to the communicants on earth as supernatural food.
“When the priest begins to offer this sacrifice, he adds to the other prayers, ‘Command these to be borne by the hands of Thy holy Angel to Thy altar on high, in the presence of Thy divine majesty’. And do you think, O man, to receive the gift from any other place than from that altar, to which on high it has been translated, and where it is consecrated? But perhaps blind reasoning may object, How is it so suddenly offered in heaven in the presence of the divine majesty, while here, though it is called either bread or flesh, it is always visibly held in the hand of the priest.… Learn, O man, that you taste something else than that which is perceived by the fleshly mouth, that you behold something else than that which is shown to the eyes of the flesh. Learn that God is spirit and is everywhere without the limitations of restrictions of space (illocaliter ubique est). Understand that these things are spiritual, and as no question of space enters in (sicut nec localiter) so neither are they borne on high in carnal fashion into the presence of the divine majesty. Think then if anything corporeal can be on high, when the substance of the bread and wine is effectually made by an inner change (efficaciter interius commutatur) into the flesh and blood of Christ, so that after the consecration it is now believed actually to be the real flesh and blood of Christ, and is regarded be believers as nothing else than Christ the Bread from heaven. Do you think there is any other altar where Christ the High Priest stands than His own body, by means of which and on which He offers to God the Father the offerings of the faithful and the faith of believers? And, if that heavenly altar is believed to be actually the body of Christ, you will no longer think that you receive His flesh and blood from any other source than from Christ’s body itself.”
“This offering is daily repeated—though Christ suffered once for all in the flesh, and by one and the same passion of His death once for all saved the world, and death shall no more have dominion over Him in His rising to life from this death—because in truth the wisdom of God the Father foresaw this as necessary for many reasons, chiefly because we daily sin, at least with those sins without which mortal weakness cannot live, because, though all sins were forgiven in Baptism, yet the weakness of sin still remains in the flesh.… And therefore, because we daily fall, daily is Christ mystically offered on our behalf, and the passion of Christ is daily presented (traditur) in the mystery, so that He who by once dying conquered death may daily forgive the sins of repeated offences by means of these Sacraments of His body and blood.… Not only did He wash us from our sins in His blood when He gave His blood for us on the cross, or when any one of us was washed in the mystery of His most holy passion and in the Baptism of water; but also He daily takes away the sins of the world, and daily washes us from our sins in His blood, when the commemoration of His blessed passion is reproduced on the altar, when the creature of bread and wine is translated into the Sacrament of His flesh and blood by the ineffable sanctification of the Spirit.… That our Redeemer still to this day celebrates by the daily memorial of His blessed passion all which He did once for all at the time of His passion is, I think, the chief reason why we continually reproduce the memory of His most holy death by daily offering the sacrifice of His most sacred body and blood on the altar.”
“If you give heed to the priest, give heed to Christ the Word of the Father, who is flesh, and doubt not that what was once for all done is daily performed in the mystery, when by means of it flesh and blood are made our eternal food, for this purpose indeed that we also may be His body. Wherefore the priest does not say of himself that he himself can be the creator of body and blood, because if this could be, which is absurd, he would be the creator of the Creator; but he beseeches the Father through the Son, through whom we have access to Him.… Before the body of Christ comes to be by consecration there is the offering of the priest, as he himself confesses, or the joint offering of the family of those who offer it, but by the word and power of the Holy Ghost there is a new creation in the body of the Creator for our restoration and salvation. Wherefore it is proved, as Scripture shows, that He ever stands at the altar on high, so that from His offering of His sacrifice we may receive the body and blood.”
In view of the teaching of Paschasius some incidental expressions in a liturgical work by his contemporary Walafrid Strabo, who was born in 806, became a monk at Reichenau in 821 and abbot there in 842, and died in 849, are of interest. The sentences are:—
“In the Last Supper, which He held with His disciples before His betrayal, after the rites of the ancient Passover, Christ gave to the same disciples the Sacraments of His body and blood in the substance of bread and wine, and taught them to celebrate these for the commemoration of His most sacred passion.”
“We must so understand that the same mysteries of our redemption are really the body and blood of the Lord that we ought to believe them to be pledges of that complete unity which we now have with our Head by hope and shall have hereafter in fact.… He who eats and drinks the body and blood of the Lord worthily shows that he is in God and that God is in him.”
Rabanus Maurus was a monk of Fulda, who became abbot of that monastery in 825 and Archbishop of Mentz in 847. He died in 856. A noticeable feature in his Eucharistic teaching was his explicit rejection of the contention of Paschasius Radbert that the body present in the Eucharist is the same body as that which was born of the Virgin and suffered and rose. Yet it may be doubted whether the difference on this point was really deep. Paschasius was at pains, as has been seen, to emphasise the spiritual character of the presence. Rabanus Maurus taught clearly that the presence is that of the real flesh and blood of the Lord. If it was the belief of Paschasius that the bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ which He took and used in the Incarnation, being so made in spiritual fashion by the power of the Holy Ghost, and if it was the belief of Rabanus that the elements are really changed at consecration into Christ’s flesh and blood by an actual spiritual transformation, only in some different state and mode of presence from His state in His life on earth and His mode of presence in the glory of His heavenly life, the difference of their points of view does not appear to have been greater than might have been removed by a more accurate understanding of the real meaning in the mind of each.
The rejection by Rabanus Maurus of the assertion of Paschasius Radbert is contained in the following passages:—
“The Sacrament of the body and blood is made from visible and bodily things; but it effects the invisible sanctification and salvation both of body and of soul.… Certain people lately, having wrong ideas about the Sacrament of the body and blood of the Lord, have said that this is the body itself and blood of the Lord which was born of the Virgin Mary, and in which the Lord Himself suffered on the cross and rose from the tomb, in reply to which error, writing as fully as we could to Egilus the abbot, we have explained what is rightly to be believed about the body itself.”
“How is it right for this flesh of Christ to be eaten, if it was born of Mary and suffered on the cross and rose from the tomb, especially since that flesh of Christ rising from the tomb was so glorified that it could no longer in any way be eaten?”
The assertions that the consecrated elements are really the body and blood of Christ are as follows:—
“Who would ever have believed that bread could be converted into flesh, or wine into blood, unless the Saviour Himself had said so, who created bread and wine and made all things out of nothing? It is easier to make something out of something than to create all things out of nothing. The Saviour Himself willed to take a human body and to unite man to God so that there should be one Mediator of God and men, the Man Christ Jesus. And He Himself willed that by us bread and wine should be offered to Him and should be divinely consecrated by Him, and that the faithful people should believe that the mystery which He delivered to His disciples is real.”
“That the body and blood of the Lord are real flesh and real blood, each Christian ought to believe, to know, to hold, and also to acknowledge and unhesitatingly assert.”
On the different effects of the reception of the Sacrament in different cases Rabanus Maurus writes:—
“Our Lord gave His body and blood in those things which are gathered together into some one thing, as from many grains or unleavened cakes, in order that He might show the unity of the love of the saints and might allow the unity of His body and His members to be understood, that is, the holy Church in those who are predestined and called and justified and glorified, His saints and faithful ones. Of these things the first has already happened, that is, in predestination; the second and third have happened and are happening and will happen, that is, the calling and justifying; the fourth is in fact yet to come, that is, the glorifying. Of this thing the Sacrament, that is, the unity of the body and blood of Christ, is taken from the Table of the Lord, by some to life, by others to destruction, but the thing itself is to every man for life, to no one for destruction, whoever shall have been partaker of it, that is, shall have been made a member of Christ the Head in the heavenly kingdom, because the Sacrament is one thing, the virtue of the Sacrament is another, for the Sacrament is received by the mouth, by the virtue of the Sacrament the inner man is fed. For the Sacrament goes to the nourishment of the body, but by the virtue of the Sacrament the honour of eternal life is obtained. In the Sacrament all the faithful who communicate enter the bond of unity and peace. For in the virtue of the Sacrament all the members joined to their Head and united together will rejoice in eternal glory. As then this [i.e. the Sacrament, in the sense of the outward part] is converted into us when we eat and drink it, so also we are converted into the body of Christ when we live obediently and devoutly. But yet, as we have said above, so great is the dignity and the power of the Sacrament itself that whoever shall have received it unworthily brings on himself condemnation rather than salvation.… Then do we really and healthfully receive the body and blood of Christ, if we not only wish that we may eat the flesh and blood of Christ in the Sacrament but also that we may eat and drink even for the participation of the Spirit, so that we may abide as members in the body of the Lord and may be quickened by His Spirit.”
The teaching of Rabanus Maurus on the subject of the Eucharistic sacrifice is less vividly expressed than that of Paschasius Radbert, but does not substantially differ from it. The following passages show that he regarded the Eucharist as a sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ offered by priest and people and presented in the worship of the heavenly sanctuary.
“They are offerings which are voluntarily given; they are gifts which are offered for the sake of some kindness or reward, as we offer to God in order that our sins may be forgiven; they are sacrifices which are consecrated together with prayers.… This offering must be made to God alone.… It ought to be offered on behalf of the Holy Catholic Church.… The priest has prayed for all those who have come to hear Mass. The he prays for those who bring their offerings, ‘Who offer to Thee this sacrifice of praise’. He calls it a sacrifice of praise because they offer it in the first place for the praise of God. Afterwards he adds, ‘For themselves and for all their own, for the redemption of their souls, for the hope of their salvation and safety, they pay their vows to Thee, the eternal, living, and true God’.… The priests themselves … ought to be mindful that they celebrate the Mass and offer the sacrifice instructed by the example of Christ; and they ought to know what they celebrate, because a request is foolish if a man does not know what he asks. The holy people ought also to remember that Christ suffered not only for the priests but also for the people.… ‘We offer to Thy excellent majesty of Thy gifts and bounties a pure offering, a holy offering, a stainless offering, the holy bread of eternal life, and the cup of everlasting salvation.’ O Lord, mindful of all Thy good gifts which we have mentioned, we offer to Thy majesty ‘a pure offering,’ that is, with a pure heart, because Thy body is pure, which we believe is made to be from this bread. We offer ‘a holy offering,’ because Thou didst sanctify Thy body when Thou didst unite man to God; and now sanctify this bread that it may become Thy body. We offer ‘a stainless offering,’ because Thou without stain of sin didst suffer for us. We offer ‘the holy bread of eternal life,’ because Thou art the living Bread which came down from heaven, and Thou hast willed us to receive Thy body in this bread which has been consecrated by Thee, and Thou hast willed us to take Thy blood through the cup of Thy passion. Do Thou sanctify this offering, that it may become to us Thy body and Thy blood.… As Melchizedek offered bread and wine, so Christ in His passion offered His body and blood to God the Father on our behalf. And in bread and wine He willed us to imitate the mystery of His passion.… Humbly we pray that our gifts, uttered upon this altar which can be seen, the heavenly Father will command to be borne by the hands of His holy Angel to that altar un high which is before His divine majesty, which we cannot see with our eyes because it is not bodily but spiritual.”
The treatise of Ratramn entitled On the body and blood of the Lord is of great importance in connection with the controversy which surrounded the teaching of Paschasius Radbert. Ratramn was born early in the ninth century, was a monk and priest at Corbey, the monastery of Paschasius himself, and afterwards became Abbot of Orbais. He is known to have been alive in 870. As has been mentioned, about 844 Paschasius presented his treatise On the body and blood of the Lord to Charles the Bald. It was possible in consequence that Charles addressed two questions in regard to the doctrine of the Eucharist to Ratramn. These two questions are thus described by Ratramn:—
“Your excellent majesty inquires whether the body and blood of Christ, which in the Church is taken by the mouth of the faithful is made such in mystery or in external reality (in veritate), that is, whether it contains anything hidden, which is open only to the eyes of faith, or whether without the veil of any mystery the sight of the body outwardly sees that which the vision of the mind inwardly beholds, so that all that is done is clearly manifested and seen; and whether it is that body itself which was born of Mary and suffered and died and was buried, which rose again and ascended into heaven and sitteth at the right hand of the Father.”
In thus stating the questions, it will be seen that Ratramn explains the phrase “in mystery” to mean that the body and blood of Christ are really present but cannot be discerned be the senses and are cognizable only by faith, and the phrase “in external reality (in veritate)” to mean that they are not only really present but also to be discerned by the outward faculties. So explained, it is obvious that there could only be one answer to the first question. After defining “figure” as “a certain outshadowing which exhibits its meaning by certain veils,” such as the word “bread” or “vine” to denote our Lord; and “external reality (veritas)” as “a plain setting forth of a matter which is veiled by no shadowy images but conveyed by clear and open and natural significations,” “an uncovered and open signification.” such as the statement that Christ was born of the Virgin, suffered, was crucified, dead, and buried,—Ratramn proceeds:—
“Now let us return to that subject for the sake of which this has been said, namely the body and blood of Christ. For, if that mystery be celebrated under no figure, then it is not rightly called a mystery, since that cannot be called a mystery in which there is nothing hidden, nothing removed from the bodily senses, nothing concealed under any veil. But that bread which by the ministry of the priest is made the body of Christ, show one thing outwardly to the human senses, and proclaims another thing inwardly to the minds of the faithful. Outwardly indeed the form of bread, which it was before, is presented, the colour is exhibited, the taste is perceived; but inwardly a far different and much more precious and much more excellent thing is signified, because what is heavenly and divine, that is, the body of Christ, is shown forth, which is perceived and taken and eaten, not by the fleshly senses but by the gaze of the faithful soul. Likewise the wine, when by the consecration of the priest is made the Sacrament of the blood of Christ, shows one thing on the surface and contains another thing within. For what else is seen on the surface but the substance of wine? Taste it, there is the savour of wine; smell it, there is the scent of wine; look at it, there you see the colour of wine. But, if you consider it within, no longer the liquid of wine but the liquid of the blood of Christ is the savour when it is tasted, and is recognized when it is beheld, and is acknowledged when it is smelt, to the minds of believers. Since no one can deny that this is so, it is plain that the bread and wine are by way of figure the body and blood of Christ. For according to sight, neither is the nature (species) of flesh recognised in that bread nor is the fluid of blood manifested in that wine; yet after the mystic consecration they are no longer called bread and wine but the body and blood of Christ.”
So far it does not appear that there is any difference between the teaching of Ratramn and that of Paschasius. To both alike the inner unseen spiritual reality is the body and blood of Christ; to both alike that which is apparent to the bodily senses is bread and wine. According to Ratramn’s own definition of his terms, that the body and blood of Christ are present by way of figure does not in his terminology mean that they are not present as a matter of fact but they are present in such a way that they cannot be discerned by the bodily senses; and a denial of “external reality (veritas)” does not imply that they are not spiritually real. But, as Ratramn goes on to develop his own way of regarding the mystery, a difference between him and Paschasius appears to emerge. Ratramn is further than Paschasius from any idea of actual change in the elements themselves, and he makes a clear distinction between that body of Christ which is in the Sacrament and the flesh which was born, crucified, and buried.
“How is that called the body of Christ, in which no change is perceived to have been made? For every change is either from not being to being, or from being to not being, or from being one thing to being another thing. But in this Sacrament, if it is considered simply as a matter of external reality (in veritatis simplicitate), and if nothing else is believed than that which is seen, no change is perceived to have been made. For it has not passed from not being to being, as is the change in things that are born, since before they were not, and in order to be they have passed from not being to being. But in this case the bread and the wine existed before they passed into the Sacrament of the body and blood of Christ. Nor again is there the change from being to not being, as is the change in the case of things which suffer failure or annihilation; for whatever perishes first existed, and that which has never been cannot be destroyed; and in this case this change is perceived not to have been made, since according to external reality (secundum veritatem) the nature (species) of the creature is perceived to have remained what it was before. Further, neither is there here perceived to have been made that change which is from being one thing to being another, which is seen in things which undergo change of quality, as for instance when what before was black is changed so as to be white; for in this case no change is detected in taste or colour or smell. If then no change has taken place, it is not different from what it was before. Yet it is something different, since the bread has been made the body, and the wine the blood, of Christ.… Since they confess that they are the body and blood of God, and that this could not be except by a change being made for the better, and since this change is made not corporally but spiritually, it must be said that it has been made by way of figure, since under the veil of bodily bread and bodily wine the spiritual body and spiritual blood exist. Not that two things different from one another exist, namely body and spirit but that one and the same thing is in one respect the nature (species) of bread and wine, and in another respect the body and blood of Christ. So far as they are corporally handled, their nature (species) is that of corporal creatures; but according to their power, and as they have been spiritually made, they are the mysteries of the body and blood of Christ.”
“Let us consider the font of Holy Baptism.… In that font, if one considers only what the bodily senses see, there is seen the element of water, which is subject to corruption and is not capable of washing anything but the body; but through the consecration of the priest the power of the Holy Ghost is added, and it is made able to wash not only bodies but also souls, and by spiritual efficacy to remove spiritual stains.”
“The sea and the cloud [i.e., those referred to in 1 Cor. 10:1–4] conveyed the cleansing of sanctification not in respect of their outward bodily nature but in respect of that sanctification of the Holy Ghost which they invisibly contained. For there was in them a visible form, apparent to the bodily senses not in image but in external reality (in veritate); and there was also a spiritual power which was shining within, which was discernible not to the sight of the flesh but to the eyes of the mind.… In those bodily substances [i.e., the manna and the water from the rock] the spiritual power of the Word was present, which gave food and drink to the minds rather than the bodies of believers.… One and the same Christ at that time gave to the people in the desert, who were baptized in the cloud and in the sea, His flesh for food and His blood for drink, and now in the Church gives to the people of believers as food the bread of His body and as drink the stream of His blood.… He who now in the Church by almighty power spiritually converts bread and wine into the flesh of His body and the stream of His own blood at that time also wrought invisibly in making the manna which was given from heaven His body, and the water which flowed from the rock His own blood.… As a little before He suffered He was able to convert the substance of bread and the creature of wine into His own body which was about to suffer and into His blood which was afterwards to be poured out, so even in the desert He was able to convert the manna and the water from the rock into His flesh and blood, although long time was to elapse before His flesh was to hang for us on the cross, and before His blood was to be poured out to cleanse us.”
“Christ said to His disciples, who received His words not with unbelief but in faith, though they did not grasp how to understand them, ‘Does this make you stumble? What then if ye should see the Son of Man ascending where He was before,’ as though to say, Think not that My flesh or My blood is to be corporally eaten or drunk by you, or that it has been divided or is to be divided into pieces, for after My resurrection ye shall see Me ascend into heaven with the completeness of My whole body and blood. Then shall ye understand that My flesh is not to be eaten by believers as faithless people think, but that bread and wine really converted in mystery into the substance of My body and blood are to be taken by believers.”
“From all which has so far been said it has been shown that the body and blood of Christ, which are received by the mouth of the faithful in the Church, are figures in respect of visible nature (speciem); but in respect of invisible substance, that is, the power of the divine Word, they are really the body and blood of Christ.”
“Now we must examine the second question propounded, and see whether that body itself which was born of Mary and suffered and died and was buried, which sits at the right hand of the Father, is that which is daily taken by the mouth of the faithful in the Church in the mystery of the Sacraments.… St. Ambrose says that in that mystery of the blood and body of Christ a change is made, and that it is made wonderfully because it is divine, and ineffably because it is incomprehensible. Let those who wish to take nothing here according to power hidden within but to weigh everything according to what visibly appears sad in what respect the change is here made. For as regards the substance of the creatures, they are after consecration what they were before. Bread and wine they were before, and after they have been consecrated, they are seen to remain in the same nature (specie). There has been then an inner change be the mighty power of the Holy Ghost; and it is this which faith beholds, which feeds the soul; which supplies the substance of eternal life.… Those things which are seen are not in nature (specie) but in power the body and of Christ.… St. Ambrose … distinguishes between the Sacrament of the flesh and the external reality (veritate) of the flesh, inasmuch as he says that He was crucified and buried in the external reality (veritate) of the flesh which He took of the Virgin, but that the mystery which is now celebrated in the Church is the Sacrament of that real flesh in which He was crucified; he openly teaches the faithful that that flesh in respect of which Christ was crucified and buried is not a mystery but an external reality of nature (veritas naturæ), but that this flesh which now contains the likeness of that flesh in mystery is not flesh be nature (specie) but sacramentally (sacramento), since indeed as to nature (in specie) it is bread but by way of Sacrament (in sacramento) it is the real body of Christ.… The difference is great which distinguishes the body in which Christ suffered and the blood which He shed from His side when hanging on the cross from this body which is daily cerebrated be the faithful in the mystery of the passion of Christ and the blood which is taken by the mouth of the faithful, so that it may be a mystery of that blood by which the world was redeemed.”
“It is further to be considered that in the bread there is a figure not only of the body of Christ but also of the body of the people believing in Him.… As that bread is taken to be the body of Christ in mystery, so also in mystery the members of the people believing in Christ are signified. And as that bread is called the body of believers not corporally but spiritually, so also it must be understood to be the body of Christ not corporally but spiritually. So also water is ordered to be mixed with the wine which is called the blood of Christ, and one is not allowed to be offered without the other.… The water in the Sacrament bears the image of the people. If then the wine when consecrated by the office of the ministers is corporally concerted into the blood of Christ, the water also which is mixed with it must be corporally converted into the blood of the believing people.… Whatever signification there is of the body of the people in the water is taken spiritually; whatever therefore is indicated of the blood of Christ in the wine must be taken spiritually.”
“This body and blood are the pledge and image of a future thing, so that what is now shown by way of likeness shall in the future be revealed by way of manifestation. Since they will hereafter manifest that which they now signify, that which is now celebrated is one thing, that which will be hereafter manifested is another. Wherefore that which the Church celebrates is both the body and the blood of Christ, but as a pledge, as an image. But the manifested reality (veritas) will be when there is no longer pledge or image but when the reality of the thing itself will be outwardly shown (ipsius rei veritas apparebit).”
“Let it not be thought that in the mystery of the Sacrament the body and blood of the Lord Himself are not taken by the faithful, for faith receives what it believes, not what the eye sees. It is spiritual food and spiritual drink, spiritually feeding the soul and bestowing the life of eternal satisfaction.”
The allusions to the Eucharistic sacrifice in the treatise of Ratramn are incidental only. In the course of his argument he contrasts it with the sacrifices of the Jews by saying that “they had a figure of things to come,” while “this sacrifice is a figure of things past”; he says that the Eucharistic body of Christ is “for the commemoration of His passion and death,” and that “the bread and wine, which are called and are the body and blood of Christ, represent the memory of the Lord’s passion and death”; and he adds that “they are placed on the altar for a figure or memorial of the Lord’s death, that they may recall to our present recollection that which was done in time past”.
This book of Ratramn on the Eucharist is of great importance not only in its bearing on the beliefs and controversies of the ninth century, but also because of the influence exercised by it in later times. The use of it in England in the tenth century may be seen from the reproduction of much of the teaching contained in it by Aelfric. It is probably the book which, in the belief that it was the work of John the Scot, otherwise known as Scotus Erigena, played a part in the Berengarian controversy in the eleventh century. The estimation in which it was held by Ridley in the sixteenth century was a fact of most momentous consequence to the Church in England. It is tantalising to be baffled by the problem of Ratramn’s meaning. The present writer has read the book many times in the hope of being able to form some clear idea on this subject, and can only confess his failure to reach a conclusion which seems to him to satisfy all the elements in Ratramn’s teaching, and to solve the problem whether he regarded the inner spiritual gift which the elements are made to be and convey as simply a mysterious power of effecting a spiritual union with Christ or as Christ Himself present in those elements and to the communicant in spiritual fashion.