When was the first time a memorialist only view was held by a Christian group?

[gtsecc]

Does anyone know when this tradition started and what group started it?

[SumTinWong]

I think it was in the Upper room. Just kidding ;)

[No Swansong]

Good question Glen I have never heard anyone even ask it before. Does anyone know of any pre-reformation groups?

[TomUK]

I don't know, but i would be interested in the answer.

[CSMR]

What is a memorialist only view?

[Tomoz]

I've just done a wee bit of research for you Glenn! It was apparently a big point of controversy in the middle of the 9th century in the monastery of Corbie. Two monks there, one named Radbertus and the other named Ratramnus, each wrote a treatise on the Eucharist. Confusingly, both works have the same title - De corpore et sanguine Christi. Anyway, Radbertus stated that Christ was truly present in the Eucharist in some way (though he didn't attempt to explain it). Ratramnus, however, wrote that the sacrament was more a symbol of the body and blood of Christ.

Flitting somewhere in the back of my mind is also the possibility that the Cathars or Albigenses or some group like that took a memorialist view, but I couldn't tell you where I'm getting that from - I could be way off.

[Tomoz]

What is a memorialist only view?

Hi CSMR!

A memorialist view of the Eucharist is that the bread and wine aren't changed into the body and blood of Christ, and Christ isn't present in the sacrament, but rather the bread and wine are symbolic of Christ's body and blood, and the Eucharist is a memorial meal.

[Aymn27]

I've just done a wee bit of research for you Glenn! It was apparently a big point of controversy in the middle of the 9th century in the monastery of Corbie. Two monks there, one named Radbertus and the other named Ratramnus, each wrote a treatise on the Eucharist. Confusingly, both works have the same title - De corpore et sanguine Christi. Anyway, Radbertus stated that Christ was truly present in the Eucharist in some way (though he didn't attempt to explain it). Ratramnus, however, wrote that the sacrament was more a symbol of the body and blood of Christ.

Flitting somewhere in the back of my mind is also the possibility that the Cathars or Albigenses or some group like that took a memorialist view, but I couldn't tell you where I'm getting that from - I could be way off.
Tom - I believe you're spot on here. AND I think it should be noted that in the event there was such thinking prior - they probably would have been put to death quickly and in all likelihood - all traces of writings, etc lost.

[Groce]

I know hes not the first but he is the one that always pops in to my mind. Ulrich Zwingli.

[gtsecc]

any more?

[gtsecc]

What I am getting at is a memorial only view isn't reconcilable with historic Christianity.
I am not saying someone isn't Christian - I am saying the memorialist view isn't.
Please note the difference.

[SumTinWong]

I hear you Glenn, of course you are correct that a memorilist view is not historically a Christian view. But I still at times if it was the right stance to take from the start considering what a stumbling block it is

[gtsecc]

I don't think that is ever the stumbling block.
That there is a God is the first one, and that He revealed himself to us as Jesus is the second.
Once you accept those 2, everything else falls in place.

[SumTinWong]

I aqccept the first two without any hesitation. What I stumbled on and to be honest still do the idea of eating flesh and drinking blood. Divine or not, it is an unpleasant image in my head.

So I guess I would disagree, and so would I think many others that do not hold the view.

[Aymn27]

I aqccept the first two without any hesitation. What I stumbled on and to be honest still do the idea of eating flesh and drinking blood. Divine or not, it is an unpleasant image in my head.

So I guess I would disagree, and so would I think many others that do not hold the view.
I think it would be much more agreeable if it were defined as his sacramental presence - equally as "real" as his body and blood - but mystically present not physically as in type AB+ or whatever.

[Tomoz]

Well the idea of Christ being substantially present in the bread and wine, rather than spiritually present in an mysterious and inexplicable way, is a pretty late development as well, isn't it? I thought that transubstantiation relies on an aristotelian understanding of 'substance' and 'species', and so must have come out of the scholasticism of the 12th/13th centuries.

[gtsecc]

Well the idea of Christ being substantially present in the bread and wine, rather than spiritually present in an mysterious and inexplicable way, is a pretty late development as well, isn't it? I thought that transubstantiation relies on an aristotelian understanding of 'substance' and 'species', and so must have come out of the scholasticism of the 12th/13th centuries.
I think it comes from the 4th Council, where Jesus was declared to be full God and Fully man and inseparably so, specifically in icons where the debate was weather the picture depicted only his humanity or both. So, basically if Christ is some where, the Eucharist, your heart, he is declared to be there fully. Now, obviously we don’t have a 6 foot tall human living in our heart. But, none the less, we have to understand the 2nd person of the trinity as He revealed himself to us, fully man and fully God.

[contriteheart]

I think it would be much more agreeable if it were defined as his sacramental presence - equally as "real" as his body and blood - but mystically present not physically as in type AB+ or whatever.

You've just pretty much described the Methodist view.

-Grace

[ContraMundum]

Does anyone know when this tradition started and what group started it?
Memorialism is rooted in Judaism, whereas transubstiation/corporeal digestion of God is rooted in paganism. Compare a Pesach to the rites/ceremonies of some pagan deities like Dionysus and Attica and you'll see the difference. This is where the irony begins. If Jesus truly taught transubstantiation in John 6, then no wonder the orthodox Jews walked away. However, tell a follower of Dionysus that you can eat Jesus as God and they'd probably have no trouble with it. I find this ironic, and yet it also casts serious doubts on the origin of modern Roman dogma and paints Christ as more of a Messiah for the pagans than for the Jews. Hard to get my head around that.

This is why I think the proper Christian understanding of the presence of Christ in the Eucharist is a mystery and should remain so. Like a Pesach, the lamb is actually eaten but the occasion is in remembrance (anamnesis). It's a paradox. I leave it at that.

In response to the OP I think that the history of the Church after the divorce from the Jewish believers is open to suspicion. I believe, for example, that the early Christians were happy to leave the matter undefined but regarding it as actual true communion with Christ's Body and Blood in memory of Him just the same. However, things changed after the divorce and there is much dogma formed by politics rather than prayerful study. It's easy to find plenty of precedence for the literalist position in the history of the church, but what influenced that position in the early centuries? I say the pagans. So, memorialism is merely a counter position to transubstantiation, one which came about as a Newtonian pendulum swing against a heresy rather than one which itself was orthodox. We have memorialism because the eucharist is a memorial. It arrived properly at the time of the Reformation because that was when people had more access to information as well as countless other reasons. Although this is late, it is a delayed reaction to a previous precedent filled with excessive errors. However we should always state that because the eucharist is so much more, memorialism is not enough.

[ChessCastle]

Memorialism is rooted in Judaism, whereas transubstiation/corporeal digestion of God is rooted in paganism.


Transubstantiation/corporeal digestion is rooted in the words of Christ as recorded in scripture.

[ContraMundum]

Transubstantiation/corporeal digestion is rooted in the words of Christ as recorded in scripture.
If that was unanimously held then there would be no debate. The issue is not what the words of Christ are, but how they are interpreted. It's somewhat simplistic to say that the Bible supports one view and think the matter is decided. I reject transubstantiation on the basis of scripture, and I reject memorialism on the same basis as well.

However, of the two, it is easy to see that the idea that God would be edible on an altar is not found in Hebraic theology, but it is found in paganism- I think that is indisputable.