AQUINAS ON THE EUCHARIST

QUESTION 73   INTRODUCTION Hey patreons of the Catholic Man Show, Karlo Broussard here. I’d like to welcome you to this course on Aquinas and the Eucharist where we’ll be looking at what Aquinas says about the Eucharist in his Summa Theologiae, tertia pars, questions 73-83. I’d like to thank Adam and David for this opportunity to share the course with you, which is a token of their appreciation for your support of the show—a support that I would strongly encourage you to continue in. I think you’re going to enjoy going through this course on the Eucharist because Aquinas has some great things to say about it. And, of course, it’s always to geek out on this stuff. I hope that you have as much fun as I will have teaching it. Aquinas divides his treatment of the Eucharist into seven major themes or aspects of the Sacrament and treats each with one or several different “Questions,” which are basically further subpoints to make about those major aspects. And each of these Questions are further divided into articles, or what Aquinas calls, “points of inquiry.” Each of the lessons for this course will ordinarily deal with a single question. But there will be times when we have to divide a question into two lessons in order to do justice to it. For example, Question 75 is so packed and dense that we’ll need two lessons to do it justice. The methodology that I’ll use is simpe: read the text and offer commentary as we go. Some things can be received upon an initial reading. Others, however, not so much. Sometimes there is a need for further commentary. And I’ll do my best to provide that for you. Also, my goal is to outline Aquinas’s thought in a way that easily digestible, giving summaries of the various arguments with premises and conclusions. I know it helps me to keep track of exactly what Aquinas is saying because it makes explicit what Aquinas often is saying implicitly. Now, before we begin diving into Question 73 in this lesson, it’s important that we look at Aquinas’s outline of the material that he will be going through on the Eucharist. Aquinas says there are seven major aspects of the Eucharist to consider:

• The sacrament itself (Question 73)
• Its matter (Questions 74-77)
• Its form (Question 78)
• Its effects (Question 79)
• The use or receiving of the sacrament (Questions 80-81)
• The minister (Question 82)
• The rite of the sacrament (Question 83)

In this lesson, we’ll start with Question 73, which deals with the sacrament itself. It’s divided up into 6 articles, or as Aquinas puts it, “six points of inquiry.”

1. ARTICLE 1: Is the Eucharist a sacrament?

  Commentary:   What is a sacrament?   A sense perceptible sign that effects what it signifies.   So the question here is: Does the bread effect what it signifies, namely, the body and blood of Jesus?  

1. Aquinas’s Answer: Yes

  [An appeal to authority] “On the contrary, It is said in the Collect [*Postcommunion "pro vivis et defunctis"]: "May this Thy Sacrament not make us deserving of punishment."   [Aquinas’s own reasoning] “I answer that, The Church's sacraments are ordained for helping man in the spiritual life. But the spiritual life is analogous to the corporeal, since corporeal things bear a resemblance to spiritual. Now it is clear that just as generation is required for corporeal life, since thereby man receives life; and growth, whereby man is brought to maturity: so likewise food is required for the preservation of life. Consequently, just as for the spiritual life there had to be Baptism, which is spiritual generation; and Confirmation, which is spiritual growth: so there needed to be the sacrament of the Eucharist, which is spiritual food.”   Summary:   Is the Eucharist a sacrament?   Yes!   What is the reason why the Eucharist is a sacrament?   There is a need for the preservation of the spiritual life.   A summary of Aquinas’s argument?   P1:  The purpose of the sacraments is to help man in the spiritual life. P2:  The spiritual life patterns the corporeal life in generation, growth, and preservation of such life. C1:  Therefore, there should be sacraments that correspond with generation, growth, and the preservation of such life. P3:  There are sacraments that correspond to generation and growth—baptism and Confirmation respectively. C2:  Therefore, there must be a sacrament that corresponds to the preservation of life—i.e., the Eucharist.  

1. Reasons Given for Why the Eucharist is Not a Sacrament (Objections and Replies)

  Intro  

• Each of the objections provides a reason why the Eucharist is thought not to be sacrament.
• Each of the objections basically takes the form of a modus tollens argument:
  • “If the Eucharist were a sacrament, then X. But not X. Therefore, the Eucharist is not a sacrament.”
    • g., If raining, then wet; not wet; therefore, not raining.
    
    
  
  

 

1. Reason #1: Confirmation and the Eucharist would be ordained to the same end of perfection, which can’t be.

  “Objection 1.

• It seems that the Eucharist is not a sacrament. For two sacraments ought not to be ordained for the same end, because every sacrament is efficacious in producing its effect.
• Therefore, since both Confirmation and the Eucharist are ordained for perfection, as Dionysius says (Eccl. Hier. iv), it seems that the Eucharist is not a sacrament, since Confirmation is one, as stated above (III:65:1; III:72:1).”

  Summary: P1:  If the Eucharist were a sacrament, then it wouldn’t be ordained to the same end as Confirmation, i.e., perfection. P2:  But the Eucharist is ordained to the same end as Confirmation, i.e., perfection. C1:  Therefore, the Eucharist is not a sacrament.   Reply: The objection runs on a vague understanding of “perfection”   Reply to Objection 1. “Perfection is twofold . . .

• The first lies within manhimself; and he attains it by growth: such perfection belongs to Confirmation.
• The other is the perfection which comes to manfrom the addition of food, or clothing, or something of the kind; and such is the perfection befitting the Eucharist, which is the spiritual”

  Summary: P1:  The Eucharist would have the same identical end as Confirmation, and thus not be distinct from Confirmation, if and only if the perfection that the Eucharist achieves is identical to the perfection that Confirmation achieves. P2:  But the perfection that the Eucharist achieves is not identical to the perfection that Confirmation achieves.

• [Recall, perfection of Confirmation lies within man himself. The perfection of the Eucharist comes to man from the outside].

C1:  Therefore, the Eucharist doesn’t have the exact same end as Confirmation and thus is distinct from it.  

2. Reason #2: The species of bread and wine would produce Christ’s true body like water produces spiritual cleansing, which can’t be.

  Commentary:

• Note on “species”—The Latin word species means, “a seeing, view, look; a sight; an external appearance; a show or display.”
• It’s in this sense that he’s using it. He’s not using it in the Aristotelian sense of a species that divides up a genera.

  “Objection 2.

• Further, in every sacrament of the New Law, that which comes visibly under our senses causes the invisible effect of the sacrament, just as cleansing with water causes the baptismal character and spiritual cleansing, as stated above (III:63:6; III:66:1,3,7).
• But the species of bread and wine, which are the objects of our senses in this sacrament, neither produce Christ's true body, which is both reality and sacrament [res et sacramentum], nor His mystical body, which is the reality only in the Eucharist [res tantum].
  • Commentary: Aquinas is drawing on scholastic threefold dimension of each of the sacraments: sacramentum tantum [sign only], res et sacramentum [reality and sign], and res tantum [the reality only, which basically refers to the primary and secondary effects].
  • For the Eucharist, the sacramentum tantum [sign only] is the bread and win. The res et sacramentum [reality and sign] is the actual body and blood of Christ. The res tantum [reality only] is the union of members within the body of Christ, which is the primary effect. The secondary effect is spiritual refreshment.
  
  
• Therefore, it seems that the Eucharist is not a sacrament of the New Law.”

  Reply: The objection operates on a flawed assumption as to the nature of the sacrament of baptism and the cause of its spiritual efficacy ...