ASIA PACIFIC THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

EUCHARIST AND CHRISTOLOGY IN CALVIN’S THOUGHT

A PAPER SUBMITTED TO
DR. GREGORY J. MILLER
IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF
THE REQUIREMENTS OF
THE/HIS 643 REFORMATION THEOLOGY

BY
ARLANO R. AQUINO

BAGUIO CITY, PHILIPPINES

SEPTEMBER 2010
 CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………………...1

CALVIN’S EUCHARISTIC THOUGHT ……...………………………………………………...3

The Father’s Bounty.……………………………………………………………………...3

Christ Is Ours……………………………………………………………………………...3

The Spirit’s Bounty………………………………………………………………………..6

CHRISTOLOGY AND THE EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSIES…..………………………....9

Against “Popish Errors”…………………………………………………………………...9

Resolving Reformation Issues…………………………………………………………...12

CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………………………………..17

BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………………………………..21
 INTRODUCTION

John Calvin (1509-1564) was a second generation Reformer. The reforming activities of

Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli and their colleagues were already in full swing when Calvin was

in his early teens. His preface to his Psalms commentary suggests that Calvin must have read the

writings of the Reformers, especially Luther’s, and was converted as a result. In 1536, very much

earlier than the publication of his commentary on the Psalms, Calvin put out the first edition of

the Institute of the Christian Religion to defend persecuted Protestants.1 Providence raised him

up to help clarify Reformation doctrines and fortify the Reformation cause.2 As things will turn

out, Calvin would be identified in one of the major streams of Protestantism, the Reformed

tradition, particularly as that tradition would define itself against the Eucharistic understanding

of the Lutheran stream.

In 1540, Calvin published his Short Treatise on the Lord’s Supper.3 The treatise shows

that Calvin had already studied the controversies surrounding the Eucharist and held to a definite

view about it. Comparing this 1540 treatise with his definitive 1559 Institutes edition, we see no

variation in his view.4 There was elaboration and deepening of ideas, but there was no change.

1
David Curtis Steinmetz, Calvin in Context (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), 10.
2
Timothy George, Theology of the Reformers (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1988), 166.
3
The treatise is available on the internet at http://www.the-highway.com/supper1_Calvin.html. Citations
from this document will be denoted by Shorter Treatise, followed by the article number.
4
We agree with John T. McNeill that “in actual teaching” that Calvin’s two works are “in accord.” See
footnote 1 in John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, The Library of Christian classics v. 20-21, Trans.
Ford Lewis Battles, Ed. John T. McNeill (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960), 1359. Citations from this work
are denoted by Institutes (Battles).

1
 2
In the Short Treatise, Calvin shared the Protestant view of the sacrament against the

Roman understanding, using the fourth section of the treatise to point out Roman church errors

and superstitions. In the fifth and last section, Calvin briefly touched on the views of Luther and

Zwingli. He affirmed that they were servants of God, and that their differences were meant by

the Lord to humble His people. With Luther he affirmed the presence of the Lord in the Supper,

though (as will be seen in awhile) he disagreed with him on the mode of that presence. With

Zwingli he affirmed that Christ bodily ascended to the right hand of God, though he opined that

Zwingli should have emphasized the presence of Christ in the Supper. (Calvin appeared to have

deeply disliked Zwingli’s “memorial” teaching and Luther’s “ubiquitous” doctrine.)

This paper is a foray into Calvin’s Eucharistic thought. In the first part of the paper, we

will summarize his doctrine of the Lord’s Supper using a Trinitarian framework. The framework

is not an imposition. It is explicitly there in his teaching. This should alert us to the fact that

Calvin’s Eucharistic thought cannot be reduced to Christology, although, as will become obvious

later, Calvin’s views on the person and work of Christ shaped his views on the Lord’s Supper.5

The connection of Christology and Eucharist in the mind of Calvin will already be evident in our

summary. Nevertheless, that connection will be better appreciated when we look at, in the

second part of the paper, how Calvin uses his Christological understanding to distance himself

from opposing views of the Supper.

We shall conclude this paper by pointing out the possible value and applications of

Calvin’s thought today.

5
Calvin also uses his understanding of the definition of sacraments to make his views distinct from others.
See Institutes 4.17.1, 10, 16, 21, 23, 34.
 CALVIN’S EUCHARISTIC THOUGHT

The Father’s Bounty

Calvin’s Eucharistic thought, like his over-all theology, exhibits warm piety, not cold

rationalism. He starts with the Father’s gracious adoption of sinners to be His sons and

daughters.6 Having adopted sinners into His family, the Father wants to show His liberality

towards them. Having begotten them to life with Him, the Father now will feed them until they

attain fullness of eternal life. Calvin calls the Father’s table a “spiritual banquet.” There the

children can feast to their soul’s full delight. There the children are supplied full salvation,

complete in all its parts and wonderfully put together.

Christ Is Ours

The banquet the Father has prepared is no other than Christ Himself. The Father shows

His bounteous love for His children through the sacrament of the Body and Blood of our Lord,

His Son. For Calvin, the “whole Christ” is the “Bread of Life” given for the life of the world. His

body is food indeed for the soul and his blood is drink indeed for the soul. The Father’s, and the

Son’s, pleasure in giving the banquet to sinners is powerfully expressed in the words “given for

you.”7 By this phrase, the spiritual feast is truly meant for us. It is ours, and it is ours to be

embraced by faith, nourishing us unto immortal life.

6
Institutes, 4.17.1. This whole paragraph relies on this section.
7
Ibid., 4.17.3.

3
 4
Calvin sees the sacrament as signifying Christ’s union with believers and believers’ union

with Christ. This life of union, for Calvin, is deeply personal, not magical or mechanical. One

cannot have the blessings of Christ apart from personally embracing His person. “I see not,”

writes Calvin, “how any one can expect to have redemption and righteousness in the cross of

Christ, and life in his death, without trusting first of all to true communion with Christ himself.”8

All that Christ has is for believers and all that they have is His. He is their Head and they

are members of His body. Life flows from Him to them. How does it flow? Through His flesh,

through His body and blood. In Calvin’s thought, Christ’s humanity is a kind of “channel” or

“fountain” through which life from the divine Word comes to believing sinners. We humans

have no life in ourselves. Worse, we have cut ourselves off from God. To enjoy true life, we

must be restored to the Word of life who came near in our flesh:

But ever since that fountain of life began to dwell in our nature, he no longer lies
hid at a distance from us, but exhibits himself openly for our participation. Nay,
the very flesh in which he resides he makes vivifying to us, that by partaking of it
we may feed for immortality. "I," says he, "am that bread of life;" "I am the living
bread which came down from heaven;" "And the bread that I will give is my
flesh, which I will give for the life of the world," (John 6: 48, 51.) By these words
he declares, not only that he is life, inasmuch as he is the eternal Word of God
who came down to us from heaven, but, by coming down, gave vigour to the flesh
which he assumed, that a communication of life to us might thence emanate.
Hence, too, he adds, that his flesh is meat indeed, and that his blood is drink
indeed: by this food believers are reared to eternal life.9

Calvin finds it comforting that we have easy access to life, life in Jesus’ flesh, especially

as it is set forth now in the sacrament. “Let [people] only throw open the door of their hearts,”

Calvin encourages, “that they may take it into their embrace, and they will obtain it.”10

8
Ibid., 4.17.11.
9
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Trans. Henry Beveridge (Grand Rapids, Mich: Wm.B.
Eerdmans, 1989), 4.17.8. Citation from this book is indicated by Institutes (Beveridge).
10
Ibid.
 5
When Calvin affirms that the Word of Life gave vitality or vigor to the mortal flesh

Christ assumed, he does not exclude both the complete, righteous obedient life Christ lived in

that flesh and the activity of the Spirit in Christ. Indeed, Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, His

ascension and the Spirit play crucial roles in Calvin’s Eucharistic theology, as we will see later.

But Calvin explains his doctrine more clearly in his commentary on the Gospel of John. How is

it that Christ’s flesh is the “bread of life” seeing that His flesh is mortal, having no life in itself

even in its resurrected, glorified state? Calvin’s answer has two components. First, the Divine

life of the Word flows through it. Second, life flows through it because in it is righteousness.

For as the eternal Word of God is the fountain of life, so His flesh is a channel to
pour out to us the life which resides intrinsically…in His divinity. In this sense
[the flesh] is called life-giving because it communicates to us a life that it borrows
from elsewhere. This will not be at all obscure if we consider what is the reason
for life, namely, righteousness. Although righteousness flows from God alone, we
shall not have the full manifestation of it anywhere else than in Christ’s flesh. For
in His flesh was accomplished man’s redemption; in it a sacrifice was offered to
atone for sins, and an obedience yielded to God to reconcile Himself to us; and it
was also filled with the sanctification of the Spirit; finally, having overcome
death, it was received into heavenly glory. Therefore it follows that in it are
placed all the parts of life…11

Consequently, Calvin does not separate the Word of life from Christ’s flesh and

emphasizes the centrality of the Christ’s flesh. Indeed, we cannot have life apart from

communion in Christ’s flesh:

As water is at one time drunk out of the fountain, at another drawn, at another led
away by conduits to irrigate the fields, and yet does not flow forth of itself for all
these uses, but is taken from its source, which, with perennial flow, ever and anon
sends forth a new and sufficient supply; so the flesh of Christ is like a rich and
inexhaustible fountain, which transfuses into us the life flowing forth from the
Godhead into itself. Now, who sees not that the communion of the flesh and blood
of Christ is necessary to all who aspire to the heavenly life?12
11
John Calvin, The Gospel According to St. John: Part One, 1-10, Trans. T.H.L. Parker, Calvin’s New
Testament Commentaries, Ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans
Publishing Company, 1961), 167-8.
12
Institutes (Beveridge), 4.17.8. Emphasis is ours.
 6
Calvin stresses the necessity of participation in Christ’s flesh and blood for eternal life

because he believes Paul’s teaching requires it. The Apostle calls the church the “body” of Christ

and believers (their bodies) are “members of Christ.” Christ is “the head” from which believers

find unity and growth. “We perceive,” comments Calvin, “that all these things cannot possibly

take place unless he adheres to us wholly in body and spirit.”13 Calvin says it is “madness” to

deny the communion of believers in the body and blood of Christ. It is by that sacred communion

that “Christ pours his life into us, as if it penetrated into our bones and marrow.”14

The Spirit’s Power

Sacred communion and union with Christ, for Calvin, is effected by Spirit-born human

faith. The “Calvinist” Christian life is one of growing and maturing in every aspect of life in this

union, defined and comprehended in Christ. The primary posture of believers is to rest in Christ

and receive all benefits from Him. Thus, the Calvinist Christian life is one of faith and Calvin

sees faith in Christ as the prime work of the Spirit. Everything else flows from this great work of

the Spirit. Faith unites one to Christ, and it is by faith that one receives all the blessings (as

promised by God in His Word) that come from being united to Christ. This is how Christ’s

benefits in the Supper become ours: by the Spirit through faith.15

Christ is truly offered in the Eucharist. The reality of participation in His body and blood

is truly presented and offered there in the symbol of bread and wine. God does not deceive us by

giving us empty symbols. “For why does the Lord put the symbol of his body into your hands,

13
Ibid.
14
Ibid., 4.17.10.
15
John Calvin, 1 Corinthians, Calvin's New Testament Commentaries, Ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas
F. Torrance (Grand Rapids, Mich: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co, 1963), 251.
 7
16
but just to assure you that you truly partake of him?” God does not deceive. He truly is

generous. Those who come in faith and with grateful hearts do feed on Christ. His life and

vitality truly become theirs. Christ testifies and seals this reality in the Supper.17 Our souls are

truly fed by Christ’s flesh and blood “just as bread and wine maintain and support our corporeal

life.”18 How does the believer on earth feed on Christ who is in heaven? By the Spirit’s power:

But though it seems an incredible thing that the flesh of Christ, while at such a
distance from us in respect of place, should be food to us, let us remember how
far the secret virtue of the Holy Spirit surpasses all our conceptions, and how
foolish it is to wish to measure its immensity by our feeble capacity. Therefore,
what our mind does not comprehend let faith conceive, viz., that the Spirit truly
unites things separated by space.19

The Spirit is not hindered by “spatial distance.” He is also not hindered by time. The

efficacy of Christ’s life, death and resurrection offered in the Supper was somehow tasted and

experienced by believers in the Old Covenant period. This is how Calvin explains the apostle

Paul who, in 1 Corinthians 10:1-5, said that Israel who came out from Egypt ate the same

spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink that Christians now eat and drink:

[H]ow were the Jews partakers of the same spiritual meat and drink, when the
flesh of Christ was not yet in existence for them to eat? To that I reply that
although the flesh did not yet exist, it was food for them all the same. And that is
not a piece of useless sophistry; for their salvation depended on the benefit of the
death and resurrection, and for that reason on the flesh and blood, of Christ.
Therefore it was necessary for them to receive the flesh and blood of Christ, so
that they might share in the blessing of redemption. The receiving of it was the
secret work of the Holy Spirit, who was active in such a way that the flesh of
Christ, even if it was not yet created, might be efficacious in them. He means,
however, that they ate in their own way, which was different from ours, and, as I
have said already, that Christ is now conveyed to us more fully, because of the

16
Institutes (Beveridge), 4.17.10. This is Calvin’s definition of the sacrament: the sign and the reality
signified are joined together but distinguished. In this sacramental way God shows He does not deceive.
17
Ibid.
18
Ibid.
19
Ibid.
 8
greater degree of revelation. For in our day the eating is substantial (substantialis
est manducatio), something which was not yet possible in their time. In other
words, Christ feeds us with His flesh, which was sacrificed for us, and which was
appointed to be our food, and from this we draw our life.20

It is axiomatic for Calvin (from which he will not budge) that “Christ cannot be separated

from His Spirit.”21 Calvin looks to the Spirit of Christ to “resolve” the mysterious reach of the

Supper over space and time.22 The Spirit makes effective, not remove, the role of Christ’s flesh

in the Supper. Faith is our mouth and Christ’s flesh is the food. By the Spirit’s grace and power,

the life of Christ becomes ours: nourishment for our soul, joy in our heart. This is the Spiritual,

Eucharistic eating for Calvin. It encourages brother love:

[T]he Lord [in the sacrament] communicates his body so that he may become
altogether one with us, and we with him…by this participation, all become one
body. This unity is represented by the bread...As it is composed of many grains,
so mingled together, that one cannot be distinguished from another; so ought our
minds to be so cordially united, as not to allow of any dissension or
division.…We shall have profited admirably in the sacrament, if the thought shall
have been impressed and engraven on our minds, that none of our brethren is hurt,
despised, rejected, injured, or in any way offended, without our, at the same time,
hurting, despising, and injuring Christ; that we cannot have dissension with our
brethren, without at the same time dissenting from Christ; that we cannot love
Christ without loving our brethren; that the same care we take of our own body
we ought to take of that of our brethren, who are members of our body; that as no
part of our body suffers pain without extending to the other parts, so every evil
which our brother suffers ought to excite our compassion. Wherefore Augustine
not inappropriately often terms this sacrament the bond of charity. What stronger
stimulus could be employed to excite mutual charity, than when Christ, presenting
himself to us, not only invites us by his example to give and devote ourselves
mutually to each other, but inasmuch as he makes himself common to all, also
makes us all to be one in him.23

20
Calvin, 1 Corinthians, 205.
21
Ibid., 251.
22
The emphasis on the role and power of the Spirit is a characteristic of the Reformed conception of the
Eucharist and distinguishes it from their Lutheran brothers. See Jaroslav Pelikan, Reformation of Church and
Dogma (1300-1700) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983), 200-2.
23
Institutes (Beveridge), 4.17.38.
 CHRISTOLOGY AND THE EUCHARISTIC CONTROVERSIES

Against “Popish Errors”

Calvin’s discussion of the Eucharist is peppered with polemics against what he

considered false and dangerous teachings of the papal church.24 Calvin sees two untrue teachings

from which other errors flow: the Eucharist as a present sacrifice, and transubstantiation.

Calvin believes that Jesus’ death on the cross was all and the only sacrifice we need to

reconcile us to God and remove our sins. Deny this one sacrifice and we deny its virtue. We

should not offer additional sacrifices for sins. The Lord is also the only priest through whose

intercession we are put right with the Father. Deny this and we dishonor Him. We should not

appoint priests to offer sacrifices anymore. Now the Roman church in Calvin’s time25 denies both

truths. It teaches that the Lord’s Supper is a sacrifice offered through the mediation of a priest.

Calvin uses strong language to denounce the Roman belief:

The opinion that the Supper is a sacrifice derogates from that of Christ, and must
therefore be condemned as devilish. That it does so derogate is notorious. For
how can we reconcile the two things, that Jesus Christ in dying offered a sacrifice
to his Father by which he has once for all purchased forgiveness and pardon for
all our faults, and that it is every day necessary to sacrifice in order to obtain that
which we ought to seek in his death only?26

24
See his commentaries on John 6, 1 Corinthians 10-11, his fourth section (points 33-52) of Short Treatise
and 4.17.14-17, 35-37, 46-50 and 4.17.8 of the Institutes.
25
It seems to us that neither teaching is repudiated in more recent Roman Catholic teaching. For
transubstantiation, see 1374-77 of The Celebration of the Christian Mystery: The Seven Sacraments of the Church in
Catechism of the Catholic Church (Liguori, MO: Liguori Publications, 1994). For sacrifice, see article 3.V.1356,
1362, and 1367; there are nuances, but we continue to hear the echo that Christ is in some sense offered again,
though without blood (3.V.1367). It is Christ who offers the Eucharistic sacrifice who is himself (1410).
26
Short Treatise, Article 35.
9
 10
For Calvin, the sacrifice of the only Mediator-Priest was “once for all” offered on the

cross at Calvary. To consider the Eucharist a sacrifice (offered every day by priests) calls into

question the efficacy and completeness of Christ’s sacrificial death. Calvin uses Hebrews 10:1-

18 as weapon: Christ offers Himself, not other (priestly) hands; Christ offered the one sacrifice

that abolished the Old Covenant sacrifices, the papal teaching leads us back to those figures,

making the cross ineffective; biblical sacrifices require blood-shedding, but the priests offer

bloodless sacrifices.27

Important for Calvin against the notion of sacrifice is that the Lord gave us a “Table at

which to feast, not an altar by which to offer a victim.”28 Christ offers to us the result or benefit

of His sacrifice. He does not ask us to offer him again via the Supper but to eat the Supper.

The second error Calvin attacks is transubstantiation. This theory, approved as dogma in

the Fourth Lateran Council, states that upon the priest’s prayer of consecration the bread and

wine “become” in substance the very body and blood of Jesus Christ, while yet retaining their

“accident” features (color, size, taste, etc.).29 Christ is now there present in the bread and wine –

locally, truly, really, bodily.30 In this “venerable sacrament…the whole Christ is contained under

each form and under every part of each form,” says the Council of Trent.31 Consequently, the

pious may and should offer worship to the consecrated elements. Christ in the elements is “to be

27
John Calvin, Hebrews and I and II Peter, Trans. W.B. Johnston, Calvin's New Testament Commentaries,
Ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance (Grand Rapids, Mich: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co, 1963), 139.
28
Institutes (Battles), 4.18.12.
29
Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, 2nd ed., Baker reference library (Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker
Academic, 2001), 653-4.
30
Transubstantiation is Thomas Aquinas’ way of affirming that God does not deceive. See Anthony C.
Thiselton, The Hermeneutics of Doctrine (Grand Rapids, Mich: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co, 2007), 530.
31
Denis Janz, A Reformation Reader: Primary Texts with Introductions (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press,
2002), 360. See Canon 3, “Canons on the Eucharist.”
 11
adored with the worship of latria,…venerated with a special festive solemnity,…borne about in

procession…to be set publicly before the people to be adored…”32

In questioning the theory of transubstantiation, Calvin asks, “When Jesus Christ, pointing

to the bread, calls it his body, is it not a very forced construction to say, that the substance of the

bread is annihilated, and the body of Christ substituted in its stead?”33 He further argues that

transubstantiation destroys the definition of a sacrament. He writes, “It is a general rule in all

sacraments that the signs which we see must have some correspondence with the spiritual thing

which is figured.”34 Water has the property to wash and cleanse things. Water is therefore a fit

sign for the washing and cleansing of our souls from sin. We are thus assured that in water

baptism God fulfills His promise to wash away our sins from us. The same applies to the Supper:

[T]here must be material bread to testify to us that the body of Christ is our food.
For otherwise how could the mere colour of white give us such, a figure? We thus
clearly see how the whole representation, which the Lord was pleased to give us
in condescension to our weakness, would be lost if the bread did not truly remain.
The words which our Lord uses imply as much as if he had said: Just as man is
supported and maintained in his body by eating bread, so my flesh is the spiritual
nourishment by which souls are vivified.35

Calvin adds that transubstantiation destroys the analogy Paul uses for unity. The bread is

one yet of many grains; so we are one in Christ though many. “If there were whiteness only

without the substance, would it not be mockery to speak thus?”36

Calvin’s last argument is Christological. If Christ is locally present in the Supper, His

physical body becomes present everywhere whenever the Eucharist is observed. This makes

32
Ibid., Canon 6.
33
Calvin, Short Treatise, article 40.
34
Ibid.
35
Ibid.
36
Ibid.
 12
37
Christ a “mere phantom,” not a real human. For Calvin, to be human is to be finite, to be

“contained” at a specific place at a time. The body Christ has when He ascended is still finite.38

Calvin remarks, “We have two things to consider when we speak of our Lord’s humanity. We

must neither destroy the reality of the nature, nor derogate in any respect from his state of glory.

To do so we must always raise our thoughts on high, and there seek our Redeemer.”39

Resolving Reformation Issues

In the Marburg Colloquy held in 1529 (some three to five years before Calvin was

converted to the Protestant faith), Luther and Zwingli were able to agree on 15 essential

Reformation doctrines, on all but one: the Eucharist.40 The issue between them turned on the

“presence of Christ.” Luther affirmed a “real presence” while Zwingli did not. Three crucial

questions surfaced.41 First, what did Christ mean in the word of institution when he said “This is

my body”? Second, what do we mean when Christ ascended to the right hand of God? Third,

how do we understand Christ’s saying when He said, “The flesh profits nothing” (John 6:63)?

Zwingli took “This is my body” to be figurative or metaphorical. Luther affirmed that the

Scriptures use figurative language at times, but not on this point of contention.42 For him, to deny

the real presence is to deny the incarnation. David Steinmetz’s summary is illuminating:

37
Ibid., Article 41.
38
Ibid.
39
Ibid., Article 42.
40
Harold O. J Brown, Heresies: The Image of Christ in the Mirror of Heresy and Orthodoxy from the
Apostles to the Present (Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Book House, 1988), 319.
41
The three questions are based on Theology of the Reformation class lecture given by Dr. Greg Miller,
Asia-Pacific Theological Seminary, July 2010.
42
David Curtis Steinmetz, Luther in Context, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2002), 75.
 13
The central message of the Bible is that God is found in dust…God always comes
to men and women in creaturely elements that they can see, touch and handle.
That does not mean that his saving presence is self-evident to human reason or
that his glory is visible. Just as the flesh of Jesus Christ is the figura or form under
which the divine nature is hidden, so too are the bread and wine are figurae or
forms under which the body and blood are hidden…In that sense, the incarnation
and the eucharist are exactly parallel. No objection can be alleged against the
doctrine of the real presence which cannot be alleged equally well against the
incarnation itself. To say “this signifies my body” is to obscure the reality of the
incarnation principle.43

Zwingli denied the bodily presence because of his understanding of the ascension and

Christ’s human nature. Christ’s body, like ours, is finite. His humanity was not divinized by the

Second Person of the Trinity. “Unless human nature remains finite in the hypostatic union…the

redemptive significance of the incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and perpetual intercession at

the right hand of God will be undermined.”44 The implication for the Eucharist is obvious: Christ

cannot be physically present in the elements for He is at God’s right hand in heaven.

Luther countered that the resurrected Christ is no longer limited by time and space.45 In

addition, God’s right hand does not mean a fixed location but a “metaphorical expression for the

place of favor from which God rules.”46 If God’s Word says that Christ is present, then He is.

Christ is still in human space and time. The ascension did not mean He went away and became

inaccessible to us. He is still present with us but in a different way. The ascension “celebrates the

ubiquitous presence of the God-man, Jesus Christ, and the universal accessibility of that saving

presence through preaching and the sacraments.”47

43
Ibid.
44
Ibid., 78.
45
Ibid., 79-80.
46
Ibid., 80.
47
Ibid., 81.
 14
The third point of contention focuses on the “flesh of Christ.” Zwingli believes that man

is sprit and body. The Spirit nourishes the spirit of man. Man’s spirit is not nourished for eternal

life by physical food that nourishes the physical body. In this sense the “flesh profits nothing.”48

What counts is the work of the Spirit. “When the human soul has been quickened and nourished

by the Holy Spirit, then it is appropriate for the human being to eat the bread and drink the wine

as a eucharist or act of thanksgiving for an invisible work of grace already completed.”49 Luther

agreed that the Spirit communicates life, but that does not stop the Spirit from using physical

means. In the disputed verse from John, the flesh refers to human self-centeredness, not to Jesus’

flesh, that cannot make a bridge back to God.50

Calvin sought to transcend the differences between Luther and Zwingli by formulating a

Eucharistic doctrine that can unite the camps. Calvin affirmed the best, that is, biblical insights of

both and forged a Eucharistic theology that he hoped would help unify the Reformation. With

respect to the three issues above, he put forward a (1) sacramental presence of Christ, (2) where

pious believers truly partake of the true human flesh (body and blood) of (3) the bodily ascended

Christ through the powerful, uniting activity of the Spirit.

Calvin affirmed with Zwingli that the resurrected human body of Christ is not

ubiquitous.51 Yet he affirmed with Luther that Christ is truly present and offered at the

Eucharistic table. The promise of life in Jesus’ flesh is annexed to the elements. God does not

deceive. He is trustworthy, giving what he offers. When believers embrace the divine promise by

48
Ibid., 76.
49
Ibid.
50
Ibid.
51
Calvin followed Luther closely in almost everything. It is in the question of the ubiquity that they
disagree sharply. See François Wendel, Calvin: the Origins and Development of His Religious Thought (London:
Collins, 1963), 331.
 15
faith – here Calvin echoes Luther – however shaky and wavering and immature that faith is, they

truly partake of Christ’s flesh – denied by Zwingli – and are made to grow into greater oneness

with Him as members of His body. This is more than signifying the unity Christians have with

Christ. Something really happens in the Eucharist. God really does feed His children. The life in

Christ’s flesh is truly communicated by the Spirit. This is more than remembering what

happened at the cross. It is more than signifying a work of grace that was already completed.

Calvin agreed with Luther that Christ is present to save in the means God has appointed

to communicate His saving grace: in the preaching of the Word and the sacraments. He too

wanted to make Christ accessible to everyone, everywhere and all the time. As we saw above,

Luther believed this universal presence of Christ to be bodily, as God-man in the unity of His

person. Calvin parted from Luther here. For Calvin, the whole Christ is present in the fullness of

His divine majesty but not in His bodily fullness. Here is Calvin:

[W]hen Paul says of the princes of this world that they "crucified the Lord of
glory," (1 Cor. 2: 8) he means not that he suffered anything in his divinity, but
that Christ, who was rejected and despised, and suffered in the flesh, was likewise
God and the Lord of glory. In this way, both the Son of man was in heaven
because he was also Christ; and he who, according to the flesh, dwelt as the Son
of man on earth, was also God in heaven. For this reason, he is said to have
descended from heaven in respect of his divinity, not that his divinity quitted
heaven to conceal itself in the prison of the body, but because, although he filled
all things, it yet resided in the humanity of Christ corporeally, that is, naturally,
and in an ineffable manner. There is a trite distinction in the schools which I
hesitate not to quote. Although the whole Christ is everywhere, yet everything
which is in him is not everywhere. I wish the Schoolmen had duly weighed the
force of this sentence, as it would have obviated their absurd fiction of the
corporeal presence of Christ. Therefore, while our whole Mediator is everywhere,
he is always present with his people, and in the Supper exhibits his presence in a
special manner; yet so, that while he is wholly present, not everything which is in
him is present, because, as has been said, in his flesh he will remain in heaven till
he come to judgment.52

52
Institutes (Beveridge), 4.17.30.
 16
In Calvin’s judgment, the Lutheran view that Christ’s body is ubiquitously present under

the bread commits the Eutychesian heresy of mingling the divine and human natures of Christ

into a third compound.53 Meanwhile, Calvin’s opponents charged him of overly separating the

two natures of Christ, coining the extra Calvinisticum.

We conclude that Calvin affirms the presence of Christ in two ways. First, the whole

Eucharistic activity is conducted before His personal presence. Second, Christ’s flesh is

sacramentally present in the elements in that communion and life in His body and blood are truly

offered and given by the Spirit through the elements.

This debate involves the intersection of Chalcedonian orthodoxy and created

cosmological reality.54 The present author lacks the requisite knowledge (biblical, patristic,

theological and scientific) to weigh in on this. Our provisional take here is that Christ indeed is

bodily absent from His people. His physical absence is one big reason Christians feel acute pain.

Divine love is love incarnate. Love’s joy, from the human side, is never complete unless it sees

and touches and embraces bodily the person it loves. In this sense, Christ is near and yet so far.

When the church gathers before the table of the Lord, the minister and the Eucharistic elements

powerfully show both the wonderful (majestic; sacramental) presence and painful (bodily)

absence of Christ. The Lord is here and not here at the same time. That is why the Word of

promise in the Eucharist is important: in the Supper the Father welcomes us into His presence;

through the sacrament, the Spirit imparts life from Christ’s flesh to us; through the bread and

wine, we truly receive and commune in His body and blood. That promise is not empty.

53
Institutes, 4.17.30.
54
Marilyn McCord Adams, “Biting and Chomping Our Salvation: Holy Eucharist, Radically Understood”
in Redemptive Transformation in Practical Theology: Essays in Honor of James E. Loder, Jr., Ed. Dana R. Wright
and John D. Kuentzel (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans Pub, 2004), 73, charges that Calvin's philosophy of
reality is narrow and simplistic.
 SUMMARY AND APPLICATION

Calvin’s Eucharistic system is undergirded by a Christology that includes the following:

Christ is God and man according to Chalcedon’s definition. In Christ, true Godhood and

manhood come together in one Person, without confusion and mixture. This implies that Christ’s

humanity was not divinized by His divinity. Christ’s ascension and glorification did not make

His finite, physical body universally present. This view cuts against both Roman Catholic

transubstantiation and Lutheran consubstantiation. It holds that Christ in His divine majesty is

personally, but not bodily, present in the Eucharistic event. Yet, Christ is sacramentally present

in the Eucharist. That is, life in His flesh is truly offered and exhibited in the bread and cup, and

it is truly given to all who partake in faith. Those who do not eat with the mouth of faith do not

commune in the life offered without deceit.

The divine Word is the source of eternal life with God and Christ’s flesh is the channel of

that life. This life, without ceasing to be the life of the Word, is truly human life, a life lived in

the flesh, the life of the God-man Jesus Christ, shaped by/in the Spirit from conception to full

maturity, offered up in the Spirit to the Father on the cross, and given immortality and glory in

the Spirit in the resurrection and ascension. This is the life offered by Christ in the eating of His

flesh through the Eucharist. This is the “extra,” the something more (we suggest) that separates

the Calvinist Eucharist from other doctrines of the Lord’s Supper.55 The believer is nurtured unto

eternal life by this life from Christ’s flesh. Christ’s flesh remains central in the Eucharistic event.

55
John Nevin accepted Calvin’s doctrine here to be biblical, while Charles Hodge rejected it. See B. A
Gerrish, Tradition and the Modern World: Reformed Theology in the Nineteenth Century (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1978), 60-5. 17
 18
Calvin does not dispense of it, unlike Zwingli. Here is Calvin’s analogy: “souls are fed with the

very flesh of Christ just as bread imparts vigour to our bodies.”56 Without Christ’s flesh, the

Spirit has nothing to draw from to give to believers who come in faith.

The Spirit of Christ is absolutely indispensable for spiritual feeding to take place. Indeed,

his role is deep and wide. It is by the Spirit that the Word became incarnate; the union of God

and man in the person of Christ was his work. He is the one responsible for uniting believers to

Christ through faith. The efficacy of the sacrament rests in him. Calvin does not separate Christ

from the Spirit. The Spirit is at the heart of Calvinian Christology.

Union with Christ is the precondition for partaking in Christ’s flesh. The Father truly

offers Christ in the Supper. Yet, only those united to Christ through faith receive the benefit.

Only members of the body receive nourishment from the Head of the body. We grant this enters

the application of the work of Christ. Still, Calvin does not conceive the person of Christ apart

from His body, the Church. We suggest therefore that the unity of Christ and His people can

never be peripheral but central in a Calvinian Christological-Eucharistic system.

Christ is the high priest who offered the one sacrifice for sins once for all. Spiritual

nourishment comes from that one priestly sacrifice, offered to believers at the Lord’s Table.

Calvin uses this doctrine to reinforce Reformation polemics against the papal teaching that the

Eucharist is a sacrifice offered to God by priests.

As far as we can see, the primary theological value of Calvin’s Eucharistic thought is that

its basic contour is faithful to Chalcedonian biblical Christology. Our present view is that the

56
John Calvin, A Harmony of the Gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke, vol. III, James and Jude, Trans. A.W.
Morrison, vol. 3 in Calvin’s New Testament Commentaries, Ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance
(Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1972), 136.
 19
distinctions made by Chalcedon, with all the mysteries involved, are better maintained in the

Calvinist proposal than in the Roman, Zwinglian and Lutheran hypotheses.

There is much that needs to be developed. Francois Wendel, for instance, asks: if the

whole of Christ is also offered in preaching, why do we need the sacraments?57 Why do we eat

the flesh of Christ at all? Calvin, we imagine, will begin with the immovable fact that Christ

Himself instituted the Supper. He might say next that it strengthens our faith when we see and

contemplate there God’s paternal love and generosity.58 But maybe Calvin needs to add that God

has so constituted man as one who lives by eating, not by seeing or contemplating alone. God

made man a hearing and eating being. Nothing is redundant or superfluous about that. Eating is

basic to our created humanity. Christ affirms it in that He “he came eating and drinking.” This

should also follow from Calvin’s insistence that Christ’s flesh gives vigor to our soul much in the

same way as food nourishes our body. Christians with Gnostic tendencies should realize this.

God’s Word in Genesis created physical, material reality. This Word entered that same reality.

The Reformation insight on the Word’s primacy should not lead to the devaluation of this

material reality. We believe Calvin’s Christology-Eucharist helps guard this truth.

Calvin’s term, “spiritual feast or banquet,” connotes joy and celebration. Alas, Calvin’s

bent for contemplation59 can go against what his Eucharistic expression tries to capture. Did he

not say that all the parts of our salvation are complete and comprehended in the en-fleshed

person of Christ? This is true, mighty and wonderful. We preach this, and let the people rejoice

and celebrate. This implies some changes in the way we conduct our Eucharistic service.

57
Wendel, Calvin: the Origins and Development of His Religious Thought, 353.
58
Institutes, 4.14.1, 3, 5, 7-11, 17.
59
Ibid., 4.14.5, 12, 16; 4.17.3.
 20
Without taking away reverence and sobriety, we should endeavor to add more music and joyful

singing when we partake of the bread and wine.

Calvin strives to preserve the integrity of Christ’s humanity in the Eucharistic event. For

Calvin, it is the Spirit who “gets” the life and virtue of Christ’s humanity and “gives” it to us for

the nourishment of our soul unto/in life eternal. Now this eternal life is true human life lived in

community. The Lord became an embodied human, lived in a human community of embodied

persons, and now lives in glorious incorruptible humanity. He is gathering a new humanity

around Himself. It is right that believers receive true life from Him in the Eucharist. All this is

the Spirit’s work for Calvin. Calvinist Eucharistic spirituality is, thus, embodied and communal

spirituality. We should stress and work out the implication of this for us and our churches.

Being human in the Calvinist perspective is participating in the life of Christ. This

means loving and thanking the Father, and loving and serving our brothers. That is the substance

and goal of Jesus’ life, the life He gives in the Eucharist. The glory of Christ in the forging of

that life is worth fighting for. That is why Calvin fought for the work of the Spirit of Christ in the

Eucharist, for the humanity of Christ unimpaired in heaven, for the true offer of that human life

in the Eucharist, and its true reception by believing communicants. We let him has the last word:

[T]he Sacrament [furnishes] a most powerful incitement to live holily, and

especially observe charity and brotherly love toward all. For seeing we have been
made members of Jesus Christ, being incorporated into him, and united with him
as our head, it is most reasonable that we should become conformable to him in
purity and innocence, and especially that we should cultivate charity and concord
together as becomes members of the same body. But to understand this advantage
properly, we must not suppose that our Lord warns, incites, and inflames our
hearts by the external sign merely; for the principal point is, that he operates in us
inwardly by his Holy Spirit, in order to give efficacy to his ordinance, which he
has destined for that purpose, as an instrument by which he wishes to do his work
in us. Wherefore, inasmuch as the virtue of the Holy Spirit is conjoined with the
sacraments when we duly receive them, we have reason to hope they will prove a
good mean and aid to make us grow and advance in holiness of life, and specially
in charity. (Short Treatise, Article 19)
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

A Reformation Reader: Primary Texts with Introductions. Augmented & improved [ed.].
Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2002.

Brown, Harold O. J. Heresies: The Image of Christ in the Mirror of Heresy and Orthodoxy from
the Apostles to the Present. Grand Rapids, Mi: Baker Book House, 1988.

Calvin, John. Institutes of the Christian Religion. Trans. Ford Lewis Battles. Ed. John T.
McNeill. The Library of Christian classics v. 20-21. Philadelphia: Westminster Press,
1960.

———. Institutes of the Christian Religion. Trans. Henry Beveridge. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm.B.
Eerdmans, 1989.

______. 1 Corinthians. Calvin's New Testament Commentaries. Grand Rapids, MI: William B.
Eerdmans Pub. Co, 1963.

______. A Harmony of the Gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke. Trans. A.W. Morrison. Calvin's
New Testament Commentaries, Ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance. Grand
Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co, 1978.

______. Hebrews and I and II Peter. Trans. W.B. Johnston. Calvin's New Testament
Commentaries, Ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance (Grand Rapids, Mich:
William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co, 1963.

______. Short Treatise on the Lord's Supper. Internet: http://www.the-

highway.com/supper1_Calvin.html. Accessed August, 2010.

______. The Gospel According to St. John: Part One, 1-10. Trans. T.H.L. Parker. Calvin’s New
Testament Commentaries. Ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance. Grand
Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1974.

Catechism of the Catholic Church. Liguori, MO: Liguori Publications, 1994.

Evangelical Dictionary of Theology. 2nd ed. Baker reference library. Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker
Academic, 2001.

George, Timothy. Theology of the Reformers. Nashville, Tenn: Broadman Press, 1988.

21
 22
Gerrish, B. A. Tradition and the Modern World: Reformed Theology in the Nineteenth Century.
The Andrew C. Zenos memorial lectures 1977. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1978.

Miller, Gregory. Reformation Theology Class Lectures. Asia-Pacific Theological Seminary,

2010.

Pelikan, Jaroslav, and Jaroslav Pelikan. Reformation of Church and Dogma (1300-1700).
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983.

Redemptive Transformation in Practical Theology: Essays in Honor of James E. Loder, Jr.

Grand Rapids, Mich: W.B. Eerdmans Pub, 2004.

Steinmetz, David Curtis. Calvin in Context. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.

———. Luther in Context. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Academic, 2002.

Thiselton, Anthony C. The Hermeneutics of Doctrine. Grand Rapids, Mich: W.B. Eerdmans Pub.
Co, 2007.

Wendel, Francois. Calvin; the Origins and Development of His Religious Thought. London:
Collins, 1963.