It would seem that some controversy has arisen with regard to the mode of Christ's presence
in the Supper.
Now those who are engaging in this controversy, and in this case I mean stoking it, starting
the controversy where there is none, are doing so in bad faith.
On top of doing it in bad faith, they are doing it foolishly, twice over, once because
it is foolish to engage in such a controversy in the way they are, and twice because they
do not understand the terms they are employing, because they do not have access to the original
language of the Book of Concord to see what those terms actually are, or the original
language of the philosophical and theological terms being employed.
Now of course you do not have to know the languages to employ the terms, but it would
behoove you to actually know what the terms mean, which is very clearly not the case here.
At any rate, the quote that comes up is not actually in Article 7, but in Article 8 of
the Epitome of the Formula of Concord, it is paragraph 17, so here it is.
The German, actually I will just read the entire paragraph.
Daher er auch, vermag und ihm ganz leicht ist, Seinen wahrhaftigen Leib und Blut im
heiligen Abendmahl gegenwärtig mitzuteilen, nicht nach der Art oder Eigenschaft der menschlichen
Natur, sondern nach Art und Eigenschaft göttlicher Rechte, sagt Dr. Luther aus unserem christlichen
Kinderglauben, welcher gegenwärtigkeit nicht irdisch, noch gepehniatanisch, gleichwohl
wahrhaftig und wesentlich ist, wie die Worte seines Testaments lauten, das ist, ist, ist
mein Leib, und so weiter.
Now the part of that that is relevant for this issue here is the bit that says nicht
irdisch.
irdisch is the term that is being mistranslated as physical.
irdisch, auf Deutsch, does not mean physical, it means earthly, mundane, terrestrial.
Now that is a polemic against the reformed, that is what's actually happening in this
paragraph, it is a polemic against the polemic the reformed often leverage against Lutherans,
which is their accusation that we are cannibals of course.
Now that term irdisch, as I said, does not mean physical, if we wanted physical that
would be kürpelisch, or leipelisch since you've got the word leip there in the quote
from Luther.
The other term that comes up is the latin term lokaliter, that is one of the terms over
which we fought with the reformed and still do to this day, although often the fights
now are not in latin, lokaliter also does not mean physical, it means local or locally.
When we say that we do not hold to a lokaliter understanding of Christ's presence in the
supper, what we are saying is that we reject the accusation of the reformed that we are
cannibals, because their accusation is blasphemous, they are calling Christ a liar, they are insulting
the sacrament, and it should terrify them to speak those words, to even think those words.
Now what the actual Lutheran position is, is this.
Christ is physically, substantially, sacramentally present in with and under the bread and the
wine in the supper, and he is so because he promises to be so, that is the Lutheran position.
To say that Lutherans do not hold that Christ is physically present is a lie.
At the absolute best, it is a reckless misunderstanding of the meaning of the terms being used in
the book of Concord, in our dogmaticians, in our theologians.
It is too deliberately, quite frankly, because there is a point at which recklessness, negligence
rises to such a level that it is in fact intentional, it is in fact deliberate, and that is the
case here, because it is trivial to look up what the word irdish means, or what the word
lokaliter means, just drop them into any of the various places online where you can translate
from one language to another, and it will spit out the accurate meaning of these terms
for you.
And that is clearly not been done by certain individuals who are engaging in this controversy.
So again, this is the Lutheran position.
Christ is physically, substantially, sacramentally present in with and under the bread and the
wine in the supper as he promises.