Our receiving of him harms him in no way. Thus there is simply no relationship to cannibalism. It is true that we partake of the body and blood of the Lord, but we must recall that he is glorified.
He cannot be killed, dismembered, roasted and eaten. Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died; this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. When the Jews object, like your Christian friend does, Jesus does not back down — he doubles down. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. Thus it is pretty hard to insist on a merely symbolic presence as your friend does.
She has to ignore a lot of Scripture to do so. Add to that the consistent teaching of the early Church Fathers and her position is also novel. In accepting the flesh and blood of the God-Man, we implicitly renounce adherence to the Old Covenant, which forbid cannibalism. Christ took upon Himself the curse of the Old Covenant, and we too must accept that "cutting off" from the Old Covenant to be truly accepted into the New.
Therefore, we take upon ourselves the reprobation of the Old Covenant which was reserved to those who ate and drank blood by doing the very thing which God prohibited under the Old Law. This we accomplish when we partake of our Lord's sacrifice by receiving His true Body and Blood in the Eucharist. This act definitively "cuts us off" from the Old Covenant and incorporates us into the New.
Well, I guess it makes sense a little bit, but it is novel way of understanding the question. To me this argument is not entirely satisfactory. I prefer the older, more precise Scholastic explanation. This brings us to our second defense, which I think is more sound and begins with the definition of what cannibalism entails, exactly. According to our second defense, cannibalism is defined as eating the flesh of one's own species under the form of flesh.
What do I mean "under the form of flesh? This is what we usually think of when we speak of cannibalism. But, let's posit another scenario: Say that a shark eats a man. The unfortunate fellow is digested and becomes part of the shark. Then, a week later, some fishermen catch the shark, kill it and turn it into shark steaks.
My source on this was a Bible dictionary which I own. It has a slight bias towards a mainstream evangelical belief, as you can tell by the subtle shot they take at transubstantiation in their definition of the "Memorial" view. Please don't contrue that particular statement as me assaulting the transubstantiation view.
My personal belief regarding communion falls under the memorial view. I guess my view doesn't fit any of those- though memorial comes the closest i think. My view comes from observing Passover with my family, and reading the passover story, and then reading the Last Supper story. OT references to unleavened bread during passover are to remind the festival goer that his ancestors had to leave Egypt in a hurry.
There is no notion of sin with relation to leavening that I can see. The closest thing I can find to that is a short passage in Amos and that doesn't have anything to do with the celebration of Passover, but is a general condemnation. In fact, the whole celebration of Passover is a celebration of freedom from bondage. To remember that your people were once slaves, that BY God they were freed, and that they can recline and eat and have the festival of Passover at all because of their freedom granted by God.
It is a festival of thanksgiving and rememberance, and not, as you suggest, having anything to do with sin or redemption. Now, Christianity has subsumed the passover celebration though Communion but that is a different story all together. One can view sin as "binding" and that through God, that bondage is released. Perfectly legitimate, but that is not the main point of Passover. In Catholicism, the host and wine is viewed as the actual body and blood of Christ for the very reasons resedit illustrated in his first couple of paragraphs before going off on why Catholics are misguided and wrong.
The biblical context for this is in the last supper during which time Jesus says, "This is my body, eat it. Supposedly the origin of this belief dates back to CE at which time the idea was first suggested by a French monk by the name of Paschasius Radbertus or so the only references I seem to turn up suggest. I know the idea was declared infallibly true but I can't seem to find by whom and under what context. At the Council of Trent in it was declared heresy, punishable by death, to suggest the eucharist was only symbolic.
From a point of view, you could call this cannabalism. From the Catholic perspective, Jesus was more than a man and gave himself up as the final sacrifice for humanity so the matter is one of differing perspectives. Catholics view communion differently than Christians do then.
In Christianity, it is as outlined in my posts at least in my experience in the church. I should have stated the religion I was basing my points off of. Catholicism is a form of Christianity. You're speaking from the perspective of some Protestant faiths. I put forth as interesting: My wife left the Catholic faith for this very reason among others. Sin and Leaven are linked. A Jewish Link- quote: The flat, unleavened nature of matzah symbolizes the finer side of the personality represented by modesty; in contrast, leavened bread represents the inflated nature of individuals, pride and haughtiness.
There is no mention of "sin". A pious person should not be prideful. This is one of the points of rememberance. Be humble because once you were a slave and God gave you your freedom. For the record I have had the honor to have attended an actual Jewish Passover. While different folks do it slightly differently, the emphasis definitely seems to be on rememberance, thanksgiving, and freedom. If you want to put the whole thing into a Christian perspective, then things become a bit more murky.
The Pesach rituals that Jews follow today come through the Rabbinic tradition which has differences between 1st century practices that gave rise to Christian tradition no temp le or priesthood means big differences! Also, be careful about throwing around terms like "sin" when referencing Judaism, 1st century or modern. Other than those of the Christain ethos particpate in this sort of thing, there is an islander tribe who used to eat the brains of their dead as well as other another islander tribe that sucks their elders wangs' to get that bit of spirit passed along.
Anyhow, i think calling it symbolic canabalism isn't too far out of there. You can't say that you take part of the body and blood of Jesus and not call it symbolic canabalism.
Tho I think some peopel don't want to even admit to calling it symbolic because it seems some Christians here are a bit protective of sullying Christianity by association with such "barbaric" act. Splitting hairs.. Anyway, I don't think Christianity has much of any foundation in real canabilism definition: eating people for nutritional purposes..
Third, digesting flesh results in physical nourishment, protein included. In the banquet of the Eucharist, however, Jesus is not dead but is a living sacrifice. Second, his substance is not diminished by consuming the Eucharist.
To the contrary, Jesus is bodily in heaven, seated at the right hand of the Father, though his body becomes miraculously present wherever the Eucharist is celebrated.
Third, the eating of his Body and Blood does not result in practical physical nourishment on a natural level, although some have miraculously subsisted solely on the Eucharist.
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