Institutes of Christian religion - Calvin - LXXV - Chapter 17 of Book 4 continued

Required reading
Institutes of Christian religion by John Calvin (Available from Amazon or free here) - Continue Chapter 17 of Book 4 by reading sections 20 to 32.

My summary
Today Calvin continues teaching us about the Lord's supper.

Firstly Calvin argues further against an invisible presence of Christ's physical body in the blood and wine.  This includes discussion of the Bible's use of symbolism and the Biblical evidence that Christ said he would not remain physically on earth.

Calvin nevertheless maintains that he is not arguing that there is no presence of the flesh of Christ in the Supper unless it be placed in the bread.  Rather he says such people 'leave nothing for the secret operation of the Spirit, which unites Christ himself to us.'

Calvin also admits that concerning the mode, 'I will not be ashamed to confess that it is too high a mystery either for my mind to comprehend or my words to express; and to speak more plainly, I rather feel than understand it.'

What grabbed me
I enjoyed Calvin's explanation of the place of symbolism in the Lord's Supper: ' It remains, therefore, to hold, that on account of the affinity which the things signified have with their signs, the name of the thing itself is given to the sign figuratively, indeed, but very appropriately. I say nothing of allegories and parables, lest it should be alleged that I am seeking subterfuges, and slipping out of the present question. I say that the expression which is uniformly used in Scripture, when the sacred mysteries are treated of, is metonymical. For you cannot otherwise understand the expressions, that circumcision is a “covenant”—that the lamb is the Lord’s “passover”—that the sacrifices of the law are expiations—that the rock from which the water flowed in the desert was Christ,—unless you interpret them metonymically.” Nor is the name merely transferred from the superior to the inferior, but, on the contrary, the name of the visible sign is given to the thing signified, as when God is said to have appeared to Moses in the bush; the ark of the covenant is called God, and the face of God, and the dove is called the Holy Spirit.  For although the sign differs essentially from the thing signified, the latter being spiritual and heavenly, the former corporeal and visible,—yet, as it not only figures the thing which it is employed to represent as a naked and empty badge, but also truly exhibits it, why should not its name be justly applied to the thing? But if symbols humanly devised, which are rather the images of absent than the marks of present things, and of which they are very often most fallacious types, are sometimes honoured with their names,—with much greater reason do the institutions of God borrow the names of things, of which they always bear a sure, and by no means fallacious signification, and have the reality annexed to them. So great, then, is the similarity, and so close the connection between the two, that it is easy to pass from the one to the other. Let our opponents, therefore, cease to indulge their mirth in calling us Tropists, when we explain the sacramental mode of expression according to the common use of Scripture. For, while the sacraments agree in many things, there is also, in this metonymy, a certain community in all respects between them. As, therefore, the apostle says that the rock from which spiritual water flowed forth to the Israelites was Christ (1 Cor. 10:4), and was thus a visible symbol under which, that spiritual drink was truly perceived, though not by the eye, so the body of Christ is now called bread, inasmuch as it is a symbol under which our Lord offers us the true eating of his body. Lest any one should despise this as a novel invention, the view which Augustine took and expressed was the same: “Had not the sacraments a certain resemblance to the things of which they are sacraments, they would not be sacraments at all. And from this resemblance, they generally have the names of the things themselves. This, as the sacrament of the body of Christ, is, after a certain manner, the body of Christ, and the sacrament of Christ is the blood of Christ; so the sacrament of faith is faith” (August. Ep. 23, ad Bonifac.).'

Just because Jesus said the bread is his body, doesn't mean we should take him literally.

Next week's reading
Conclude Chapter 17 of Book 4.

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.