James Black wrote: :There are several facts which demonstrate that Jesus was :speaking literally, not figuratively, in John 6. Let's see. :First, his hearers understood him to be speaking literally. And what? So did they when He was speaking about "destroying the Temple" and "I will depart and you can't follow me there where I go" and "you have to be born again" etc. "Literally" then didn't necessarily mean "properly" or "according to the Lord's intention". Why should it be so only here? :They asked themselves, "How can this man give us his flesh :to eat?" (v. 52). After Jesus explained himself further, they :still understood him to be speaking literally, and some of his :disciples said, "This is a hard saying. Who can accept it?" :(v. 60). Jesus replied, "Does this shock you?" (v. 61), and he :allowed those who couldn't accept his teaching to leave him. "Allowed"? Rather "suffered". The fact is that these men didn't leave Him for His insistence on the literal interpretation but because of He introduced it, saying "I am the bread which descended from heaven", and it was the main reason for which they stumbled in Him. :He didn't call them back and tell them they had misunderstood :him (which was his custom to do when his listeners didn't grasp :his true meaning [e.g. Matt. 13:36-43, Matt. 16:5-12, Mark :8:14-21]). No. It was His custom to explain things to His disciples clearly, while He used to speak in parables to the multitude. (Mt 13:10-16, 34, Jn 16:29). Not "calling them back". The emphasis on this difference is characteristic of the post-resurrection Church which soon began to react to the fact that the Jews didn't believe in Jesus, and made this circumstance one of the emphatic points of the written gospels. From here originates this distinction between those who are given just parables and those who are predestined to understand the gospel. :By the way, John 6 is the only example in the Bible :of disciples abandoning the Lord over a doctrinal issue. And what does it prove? That the doctrine what they didn't understand according to the intended meaning was intended to mean what you are voicing? Note, the Pharisees were filled with fury because of parables, too! Not listening to Jesus doesn't in any way imply that He was speaking literally. Even taking into account the verse "This is the heavenly bread of whom whoever partakes shall not die" - was it literal? To answer to folly with folly, to prooftexting with prooftexting, I can imitate the transsubstantiation doctrine by the "never-dying" doctrine: my body, which has eaten once from that heavenly bread, shall never die physically, despite all contrary evidence of decomposition. The "real body" of Christ in the Eucharist is alleged to contain Him fully. Likewise, "not to die" has to be taken in an absolute sense, as not to die even physically. Is someone so circumspect to find the refutation of this wilful heresy in 6:54, where resurrection is promised for the body? I won't accept it until he accepts that Paul's words mean what they mean in 1Cor 11:28, viz. that what we eat with our teeth is bread, and what we drink with our throat is wine. Also that Jesus, whan He dared to call His blood "this fruit of the vine" (Mt 16:29), meant that what was allegedly "transsubstantiated", remained bread and wine. :Second, we know that Jesus was speaking literally, not :figuratively, because to the Jews of his day "eating :someone's flesh and drinking his blood" was the idiomatic :phrase synonymous with persecution, violence, betrayal, :and murder. This is clear from such passages as Micah 3:3, :Psalm 27:2, Isaiah 9:20, and Isaiah 49:26. So you determine what the meaning of His words would have been, based on the imagined reactions of the audience. But imagine the opposite: a literal interpretation, which the listeners employed, doesn't seem to have made any sense to them (6:52). On the other hand, we have a curious passage from the OT where your ridiculous argument falls flat on the face. In 1Chron 11:15-19: "And three of the thirty heads go down on the rock unto David, unto the "cave of Adullam, and the host of the Philistines is encamping in the "valley of Rephaim, and David [is] then in the fortress, and the station "of the Philistines [is] then in Beth-Lehem, and David longeth, and saith, "`Who doth give me to drink water from the well of Beth-Lehem, that [is] "at the gate!' And the three break through the camp of the Philistines, "and draw water from the well of Beth-Lehem, that [is] at the gate, and "bear and bring in unto David, and David hath not been willing to drink "it, and poureth it out to Jehovah, and saith, `Far be it from me, by my "God, to do this; the blood of these men do I drink with their lives? "for with their lives they have brought it;' and he was not willing to "drink it; these [things] did the three mighty ones. First, you are grievously mistaken in pertinaciously asserting that :to the Jews of his day "eating someone's flesh and drinking his blood" :was the idiomatic phrase synonymous with persecution, violence, betrayal, :and murder for in this case David didn't want to say "I don't want to persecute these people" but "how could I drink of this water which is so precious as if it were their blood?" Blood, according to the OT, was a quasi- synonym for "life"; indeed, in the sacrificial system they were plainly identified. Blood meant the life of the animal. Blood contained it. For this reason was it prohibited ritually to drink it - because it was the part ritually consecrated for God's exclusive disposal. In this case David used, based on this ritual identification, a figure of speech expressing that he didn't want to exploit the three men's self-sacrifice by drinking of the water. That it was figurative speech, is clear from the precepts of the Law according to which God forbade human sacrifice. So did David when he identified the water with the lives of those brave men - but by no means with their literal physical blood. And if you seek a foreshadowing event of the transsubstantiation in this story, let you realize that the very way you had to face this passage was via asserting that in the OT "drinking of blood" meant "persecution". I showed you an example where it didn't. Then it would be futile to change the weapons so conspicuously, because in answer I could claim literal interpretation for all the remaining passages in the OT where drinking blood indeed means persecution. Which could be called a "reductio ad absurdum" method. Now we have a precedent where the figurative meaning of "drinking his blood" is "exploiting one's self-sacrifice". The same may be the case with our Lord, with the difference that He directly ordered His people to partake of His blood. And as David didn't need the water to have become (even not "sacramentally") the literal blood of the soldiers to face the dilemma of drinking their blood, so we Christians don't need the wine to change into Christ's literal blood to partake of it, that is, to partake of the blessings of His sacrifice. :That's why, if Jesus had been speaking figuratively, his words :would have made no sense at all. He would have been saying, :"I solemnly assure you that unless you persecute and betray :me you have no life within you. He who does violence to me has :eternal life and I will raise him up on the last day." That :makes no sense at all, but that's exactly what he would have :been saying if his words were symbolic. So you restrict figurative interpretation to Judaistic interpretation. In fact His whole teaching didn't make any sense to the Jews, thus it's quite futile to ascribe this to some linguistical reason. :The third way we can know that Jesus was speaking literally is :that the apostles believed and taught that he spoke literally :(see 1 Cor. 10:16, It is said to be "Our communion with the body of Christ" :11:29). You, in order to achieve that it's literal body, have to interpret "bread" and "cup" figuratively in 11:27. :The same is true of the Christians of the first, second, third, :and fourth centuries. Their writings show them to have understood :and taught that Jesus' words in John 6 were not symbolic. They weren't inspired, so their great name won't intimidate anyone, even if their testimony were unanimous, which is not the case. :And from the Catechism of the Catholic Church: :The presence of Christ by the power of his word and the Holy Spirit :1373 "Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised from the dead, :who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us," :is present in many ways to his Church:[195] in his word, in his :Church's prayer, "where two or three are gathered in my name," :[196] in the poor, the sick, and the imprisoned,[197] in the :sacraments of which he is the author, in the sacrifice of the :Mass, and in the person of the minister. But "he is present :. . . most especially in the Eucharistic species."[198] "Most especially"? Is "THIS IS MY FLESH" more emphatic than "I AM between them" or "I WAS poor, sick and imprisoned"? The Eucharist is not Christ according to the Bible, but only His blood and flesh. And then comes the interpretation. Mt 18:20 "Where two or three are gathered together unto my name, "THERE AM I in the midst of them. Jn 14:23 "If any one love me, he will keep my word, and my Father will "love him, and we will come to him and MAKE OUR ABODE WITH HIM. 1Cor 10:4 ...they all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they drank of the spiritual rock, which followed them, (now the rock WAS the Christ). Gal 2:20 "I am crucified with Christ, and no longer live I, "but Christ LIVES IN ME... The Roman Catholic Church teaches that Christ't fullness is contained in the Eucharist after the consecration. And the above scriptures mean that this same presence is created by two Christians meeting in order to worship God. They say that by loving the Lord and keeping His commandments one can effect the same transsubstantiation in himself which the priest can do in the bread and wine. They testify that whoever denies himself and takes up the cross can say that Christ is present in him in a true and proper sense. Also that there is a rock somewhere in the desert which ought to be in a sanctuary by now. The words used by the sacred writers are also remarkable. They say "I AM" or "CHRIST IS" - thus the wording is at least so powerful to mean what it means as the utterance "THIS IS MY FLESH". The Roman Catholic Church teaches that Christ's divinity is undissolubly joint with His manhood, therefore when the Scripture says "Behold, my body" I have to bow down before the presence of God. So the same thing is to be done with regard to the meetings and the individual brethren who love Christ, keep His word and take up their crosses. Yes, I have to kneel down before them and say "My Lord and my God!" Also, as God dwells among the praises of His people, the hymnals are transsubstantiated into Christ. :1374 The mode of Christ's presence under the Eucharistic species :is unique. It raises the Eucharist above all the sacraments as :"the perfection of the spiritual life and the end to which all :the sacraments tend."[199] In the most blessed sacrament of the :Eucharist "the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, What? Where do you take this heresy from? Do you pay heed to the text of the Scripture while it seems to confirm you, and abandon it without hesitation in the very moment when it ceases to speak according to your dogmas? I know the usual subterfuge: "Christ is inseparable from His body." There is one thing I still long for: chapter and verse for this conceited statement. Only God has the right of deciding the mode of His existence. When did He decide so that He will always cling to His body? And why did He act against this solemn revelation (which is probably printed in white in my Bible) when He rashly chose to "give up his spirit" on the cross? :of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, :really, and substantially contained."[200] "This presence is called :'real' - by which is not intended to exclude the other types of :presence as if they could not be 'real' too, but because it is :presence in the fullest sense: that is to say, it is a substantial :presence by which Christ, God and man, makes himself wholly and :entirely present."[201] Most solemnly, I believe that the "fullest sense" in which the Lord dwelt among us, was His earthly period of mission. And I suspect that the theologians who issued the Catechism know about this mode of presence as well. By this statement they gave away their real conviction that the Incarnation wasn't a unique event, and what was accomplished by the Holy Spirit in the womb of the Virgin is accomplished by the priests every day. Yet they haven't drawn all the necessary conclusions from their premises yet: that the priests who by the moving of their lips effect the very same event what was effected in Mary's womb by the Holy Spirit - in fact a richer and more august event - are, if not the Mothers of God then the Creators of God. It could be objected, though vainly, that the so-called priests who say the Mass only call God to dwell under the species of bread and wine - indeed, Mary did nothing but called Him to dwell in her womb ("be it according to thy will"). And as Mary is alleged to be the Mother of God which serves as a pretext of giving her mountains of new titles and prerogatives, these very Creators of God should get at least the same amount of hyperveneration. :1375 It is by the conversion of the bread and wine into Christ's :body and blood that Christ becomes present in this sacrament. :The Church Fathers strongly affirmed the faith of the Church :in the efficacy of the Word of Christ and of the action of the :Holy Spirit to bring about this conversion. Thus St. John :Chrysostom declares: It is not man that causes the things :offered to become the Body and Blood of Christ, but he who :was crucified for us, Christ himself. Just as it was the Holy Spirit who overshadowed Mary, yet Mary was later called the Mother of God, and not the Holy Spirit. :The priest, in the role of Christ, pronounces these words, :but their power and grace are God's. This is my body, he says. :This word transforms the things offered.[202] An indeed miraculous miracle, where nothing at all happens. As if the Jews had to swim across the Red Sea. :And St. Ambrose says about this conversion: Be convinced that :this is not what nature has formed, but what the blessing has :consecrated. The power of the blessing prevails over that of :nature, because by the blessing nature itself is changed.... In vain did the blessing "prevail" over the "nature", if the material later decays all the same. From here do spring those staggering attempts at explaining what exactly happens with the true, real and substantial presence of Christ in the absence of the bread and wine. :Could not Christ's word, which can make from nothing what did :not exist, change existing things into what they were not before? :It is no less a feat to give things their original nature than :to change their nature.[203] It could, without any doubt. The question is only whether it does. :1376 The Council of Trent summarizes the Catholic faith by :declaring: :"Because Christ our Redeemer said that it was truly his :body that he was offering under the species of bread, From which false "gospel" did the Trent bishops obtain the word "truly"? And some people still call Luther a forger of the Bible because his addition "sola" fide... And where did these bishops read that Christ was "offering" anything on the Last Supper? From a missal? :it has always been the conviction of the Church of God, Of course they meant their denomination by this name. :and this holy Council now declares again, that by the consecration :of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole :substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ :our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance :of his blood. This change the holy Catholic Church has fittingly :and properly called transubstantiation."[204] A problem occurred when I read my Bible. I read everywhere that the CUP is the thing of which the Lord said "This is my blood". So the Trent fathers must have asserted that the substance of the cup changes into the substance of the blood of Christ. :1377 The Eucharistic presence of Christ begins at the moment :of the consecration and endures as long as the Eucharistic :species subsist. As you may know, under normal circumstances matter doesn't disappear but is transformed into another matter. Does the "presence" live on despite this? Then no further Masses are necessary, but it's enough to keep the first transsubstanti- ated species in a ciborium forever, despite their bad smell. Or do you maintain that the change of the matter causes the disappearance of the "substance"? Then I still don't understand why the Roman Catholic Church doesn't oblige her members to take communion every day, for digestional reasons. Instead of this, she exposes them to the loss of life within them. (Jn 6:53). :Christ is present whole and entire in each of the species :and whole and entire in each of their parts, in such a way :that the breaking of the bread does not divide Christ.[205] As if without reason did the Lord make a distinction between the blood and the flesh! Lifting the bread, He said, "This is my body", and lifting the cup, "This is my blood". And the audacity of human mind roars that the bread is His blood and the wine is His body! This is the result when our unbridled thoughts abandon the Word of God, and begin to sport and wanton against the truth. (These are the words of the good old heretic Jehan Cauvin - exact quote is not found.) :1380 It is highly fitting that Christ should have wanted to :remain present to his Church in this unique way. Since Christ :was about to take his departure from his own in his visible :form, he wanted to give us his sacramental presence; An invisible one! What we see is still bread and wine. :since he was about to offer himself on the cross to save us, :he wanted us to have the memorial of the love with which he :loved us "to the end,"[207] even to the giving of his life. Yes. A means of communicating to us the blessings of His broken body and His shed blood. This is what Paul expounds very clearly in 1Cor 10:16. But not Himself again, in order to suffer again. :In his Eucharistic presence he remains mysteriously in our :midst as the one who loved us and gave himself up for us, :[208] and he remains under signs that express and communicate :this love: Yet these signs because their very nature of a sign, aren't the same as the thing signified. :The Church and the world have a great need for Eucharistic worship. In the age of the apostles there was no "Eucharistic worship", so the world seems to have been cruelly forsaken then. :Jesus awaits us in this sacrament of love. Let us not refuse the :time to go to meet him in adoration, in contemplation full of faith, :and open to making amends for the serious offenses and crimes of the :world. Let our adoration never cease.[209] Towards God, amen! Towards the bread and wine which we eat and drink, (1Cor 10:16, 11:28) no worship is needed nor commanded. Eating and drinking is commanded. [Further unconvincing patristic panegyrics are deleted]