Consubstantiation (as opposed to Transubstantiation): Con means with, therefore bread, wine, body, and blood all are present and real. It is not the case that the bread and wine cease to exist (as in the RC belief). No substance is changed into a different one..
IF we strip the entire philosophical construct of Consubstantiation of all its meaning, all its history, all the theory it contains and conveys.... yes, simply looking at the
word (and ignoring how the word has been used for nearly 1000 years in Christian theology) it is possible to use it simply to mean that Christ's Body and Blood are really present and so are the bread and wine - a view
Lutherans would accept since
Lutherans accept what Jesus said and Paul penned. However, that ignores and evades all the word means. It was a theory invented at the same time and by the same people who invented Transubstantiation and is yet another philosophical theory to explain the HOW and WHERE of real presence, which
Lutherans do not discuss (preferring to believed and accept the words Jesus said and Paul penned). Luther stressed we
accept all this as
MYSTERY and embrace NO pagan philosophical or pre-science theories (of which Consubstantiation is one, one that along with Transubstantiation was originally rejected and mocked but unlike Transubstantiation eventually fell from use... it is associated only with Catholics).
Yes, on 4 occasions in his life,
Luther used the words "in" or "with" or "under" (including in the Small Catechism) however Luther and the Lutheran Confessions and Fathers all boldly rejected Consubstantiation, Transubstantiation and all the other attempts to replace Christian mystery with secular philosophy and prescience theories. He simply was forced to distance himself from the pop Catholic theory of the day (not yet official, certainly not yet dogma - that happened suddenly at Trent, a bit after Luther's death).
Luther gives no significance to the bread and wine but unlike the medieval Roman Catholic "Scholastic" theory of Transubstantiation, did not deny their full reality and did not declare that Jesus and Paul are wrong to mention them (more often after the Consecration than before, according to St. Paul).
Luther places ALL the emphasis on the Body and Blood - which are present because the meaning of is is is and what comes after the is is. This he accepts just as stated (NO subjecting to wrong, pagan philosophies or wrong pre-science concepts) without any denials of any of the words, any limitations of any of the words, no corrections of any of the words BUT Luther needs to distance the
Real Presence view from the Transubstantiation theory which of course argues that "is" doesn't mean is and that what comes after the "is" isn't necessarily, and is based on the mandate that we accept a certain understanding of HOW all this happens (alchemy's whole point of Transubstantiation) and why Jesus and Paul didn't mean to say "bread" and "wine" after the Consecration but rather "an Aristotelian Accident of bread and wine." There are Lutherans (including me) who regret Luther 4 times in his life used one or more of those words to distance himself from the pagan, prescience of theories of Alchemy and Aristotle (he should have done what he did the zillions of other times he spoke of this - simply affirm Real Presence) but he did. Four times in his life.... clearly not t support the Catholic theory of Consubstantiation (which he condemned) but to distance himself from the then theory (not yet official teaching) often found in Catholicism, Transubstantiation.
Again,
Luther's position is that what Jesus said and Paul penned is TRUE and not to be denied or corrected. It's ALL accepted - as MYSTERY, with no subjecting to wrong, pagan, secular philosophical or prescience ideas. IS = is. Body = body. Blood = blood. Forgiveness = forgiveness. And there's no reason to accuse Jesus and Paul of error (and correct them) for simply saying that bread and wine mean bread and wine. No,
Lutherans don't "explain" the HOW of this, the PHYSICS of all of this (by dogmatizing wrong, pagan, secular theories or otherwise), they just accept and believe. It's called "
Real Presence." Luther was opposed to dogmatizing the central alchemic view of Transubstantiation or the Aristotlian idea of accidents (and this was not the case until after his death), rather he held we should rather accept and believe what Jesus said and Paul penned... even though we don't understand the physics involved but have a miracle and mystery here, one hearts should believe rather than doubt and correct.
Luther considered the pop THEORY (in his day) of Transubstantiation not only unnecessary but dangerous: it is founded on the view that "is" doesn't mean "is" (Present, existing, real) but rather CHANGED from one reality into another via the precise, technical physics mechanism of an alchemic Transubstantiation) , and that what follows the "is" therefore isn't necessarily - we have to pick and choose when something "is" and "isn't" and this employ's Aristotle's very weird theory about accidents to deny half of what comes after the "is." Of course,
Zwingli would soon do the exact same thing as the RC denomination - deny that "is" means "is" (he'd change it not to "change...." but to "symbolizes") and following the lead of the RCC, also would reject the full meaning of half of what follows the "is" (in his case, he denies the body and blood as REALLY, fully being there whereas the RCC denied the bread and wine REALLY, fully being there - same/same). Luther feared the approach here... and Zwingli proves he had good reason to. In the words of my Greek Orthodox friend, "The Roman Church would not leave well enough alone" and "The Roman Church insists on messing things up."
- Josiah
.
.
