Richard Hooker on The Holy Eucharist
In Eucharist, God encounters his people, speaking and appearing before them. It is often the case, however, that before God acts and speaks, he announces his coming. One can think, for example, of God sending Moses to announce the Exodus, or Amos prophesying a coming invasion, or John the Baptist crying out, "Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight" (Matt. 3:3, RSV). Likewise, the church, through her teaching and preaching, must prepare her people to meet the Lord in the Eucharist. Otherwise, communicants may fail to meet him and thereby miss the highest form of life on earth.
This essay will do two things. It will set forth Richard Hooker's doctrine of the Eucharist. Once that is in place, certain biblical ideas will be advanced in the light of Hooker's theological perspective.
Before speaking of Hooker's doctrine of the Eucharist, one comment is in order. By Eucharist, it is meant the entire worship service, normally composed to two parts, the Word of God followed by the Holy Communion, the receiving of the bread and wine. In Hooker's day, how the bread and wine became the body and blood of Jesus was highly contested, with Calvinists, Lutherans, and Rome, setting forth their respective positions. Hooker defined his position as well, and this essay will describe his point of view. Once that is done, however, I shall return to the Eucharist as a whole, with emphasis on communion with God in the bread and wine. The next step is to give a brief overview of Hooker's theology in order to set his Eucharistic teaching in context.
As the title suggests, the central concept in Hooker's Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity is law. Hooker defines law as follows,
That which doth assign unto each thing the kind, that which doth moderate the force and power, that which doth appoint the form and measure, of working, the same we term a Law.(1)
A law therefore generally taken, is a directive rule unto goodness of operation (I.viii.4).
The two key words here are "working" and "operation." For Hooker, all things operate according to law and each according to laws appropriate to their nature. God operates according to his own law, humans operate according to laws given them by God (desire directed by intellect), and inanimate objects unthinkingly operate according to their laws of motion.
As all things operate according to law, they interact with each other as a dynamic, hierarchically arranged, and interactive, organism whose final goal is God.(2) At the bottom of the hierarchy are natural agents (our physical objects), followed by vegetative life, animal life, human beings, political and ecclesiastical life, angels, and then God.(3) Apart from God, all these dynamically go from potential into act (Aristotle, Aquinas), driven forward by the hope of their final perfection (I.v.1). For human beings, God is their perfect end, the perception of God's final and complete truth, goodness, and love.
Complete union with him must be according unto every power and faculty of our minds apt to receive so glorious an object. Capable we are of God both by understanding and will: by understanding, as He is that sovereign Truth which comprehendeth the rich treasures of all wisdom; by will, as He is that sea of Goodness whereof whoso tasteth shall thirst no more. As the will doth now work upon that object by desire, which is as it were a motion towards the end as yet unobtained; so likewise upon the same hereafter received it shall work also by love (I.xi.3).
Further, Hooker understands all things in the historical context of the biblical narrative. He begins with Adam who originally lived in the perfection of his human nature. By his reason, Adam knew the moral law, and beyond the power of his reason, he received the command of God not to eat of the tree. Adam broke the moral law and disobeyed the express command of God. As a result, his nature was corrupted unto death. This corruption spread to the whole of humanity, but God acted to redeem the human race by revealing his laws and graces to sinful humanity. This revelation, culminating in Jesus Christ, was given in Scripture which, for Hooker, is the final norm of faith. In Jesus Christ, sinners are justified before God by faith, and by participation in Christ, become a new creation and thereby enter into eternal life.
Adam is in us as an original cause of our nature, and of that corruption of nature which causeth death, Christ as the cause original of restoration to life; the person of Adam is not in us, but his nature, and the corruption of his nature derived unto all men by propagation; Christ having Adam's nature as we have, but incorrupt, deriveth not nature but incorruption and that immediately from his own person into all that belong unto him. As therefore we are really partakers of the body of sin and death received from Adam, so except we be truly partakers of Christ, and as really possessed of his Spirit, all we speak of eternal life is but a dream (V.lvi.7).
Sacraments are a way of partaking of Christ, and there are only two of them, baptism and Eucharist.(4) By Word, Scripture and preaching, and by Sacrament, baptism and Eucharist, believers are justified by faith and sanctified by the ever-active Spirit. They receive a measure of "that sovereign Truth which comprehendeth the rich treasures of all wisdom." They catch glimpses of "that Goodness whereof whoso tasteth shall thirst no more," and their hearts are inflamed for God, "so likewise upon the same hereafter received it shall work also by love." This is the glorious destiny of those who participate in Christ and Eucharist is a means of that participation. It carries believers into the very life of God and fills the soul with the greatest happiness. How then, does Hooker understand the Eucharist?
Prior to speaking directly of the Eucharist, however, Hooker lays a proper theological foundation. He begins with a succinct statement of the doctrine of the Trinity (V.li.1). This statement is the distillation of the trinitarian teaching of the church. The three persons of the Trinity share a single, common, divine nature, and the persons are distinguished by their unequal internal relations, the eternal begetting of the Son by the Father, and the procession of the Spirit from both.
Having summarized trinitarian dogma, Hooker next describes how one and only one of the persons, the Son, became incarnate in Jesus Christ. In this event, God the Son, the second person of the Trinity, was the personal element of the incarnate Lord while the human element was the "impersonal" human nature, the seed of Abraham.(5)
Since each person of the Trinity is God, the Son was God, and therefore, Jesus Christ was God. Since he possessed a full human nature, he was both God and man. In this union the human nature was indivisibly joined to the divine nature, but in such a way that each nature was preserved whole without mixing. Hooker summarizes orthodox christological teaching with these words,
To gather therefore into one sum all that hitherto hath been spoken touching this point, there are but four things which concur to make complete the whole state of our Lord Jesus Christ: his Deity, his manhood, the conjunction of both, and the distinction of the one from the other being joined in one (V.liv.10).
This union of the human and divine nature is further defined by what Hooker calls "cross and circulatory" speech. By this he means that in the person of Jesus Christ, and not as a general property of creation, it is proper and necessary to attribute divine properties to the human nature and human properties to the divine nature. "Howbeit, as oft as we attribute to God what the manhood of Christ claimeth, or to man what his Deity hath right unto, we understand by the name of God and the name of Man neither the one nor the other nature, but the whole person of Christ in whom both natures are" (V.liii.4).
This is the doctrine of the communicatio idiomatum which would then say that Mary is the mother of God, or to quote Hooker, that the "Son of God [did] die to save the world" (V.liii.4). As will become clearer, this implies that it is necessary to say that God is personally present and active in the Eucharist.
Since the human nature of Jesus Christ is indivisibly joined to the divine nature, it receives from that nature the graces that flow from divinity. Hooker describes three of them, generation, union, and unction (V.liv.1). By "eternal generation," he refers to the inner-Trinitarian generation of the Son by the Father which eternally grants the divine substance of the Father to the Son so that the Son is eternally God. By "union" is meant that the human nature of Jesus receives the exalted status of his divine nature. As such, the one person, Jesus Christ, is the supreme power of heaven and earth. He is wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and the peace of the world (V.liv.4). The graces of unction were manifested in the perfection of Jesus' human nature, as well as his conquest of death and corruption. According to Hooker, the whole of Jesus Christ, including his body, was given "everlasting immunity from death, passion, and dissolution, till God which gave it to be slain for sin had for righteousness' sake restored it to life with certainty of endless continuance"(V.liv.8). In this way the very life of God was forever bound to the whole person of Jesus, who after the resurrection, exists bodily in heaven. For Hooker this existence, since it is bodily, has some form of heavenly, local habitation and measurable form (V.lv.6-7).
Further, for Hooker, the resurrected and ascended Jesus who acts in Eucharist is the same Jesus Christ that lived on earth, the one set forth in Scripture. His heavenly human nature is his earthly human nature transformed beyond the power of death. Therefore, Hooker will say, "Yea, in this respect the very glorified body of Christ retained in it the scars and marks of former mortality" (V.liv.8). Or again, when he takes Eucharist, he will claim that "in the wounds of our Redeemer we there dip our tongues, ..." (V.lxvii.12). In other words, there is not, for Hooker, a celestial Christ distinct or different from the person who lived, died, and rose again in Palestine. For this reason, when Hooker speaks of the presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist, he refers to the one who is revealed in Scripture, the one who spoke the Eucharistic words, the actual one who died on the cross, the one who gives grace from his bleeding side.(6)
Hooker next observes that God is infinite, but created things finite. Since God is infinite, God the Word is everywhere. The human nature of Jesus, however, is not everywhere but finitely located in heaven. Nevertheless, since the human nature of Jesus is indivisibly joined to God the divine Word, and since the Word is present to all things, the human nature of Jesus is present to all things "after a sort." "Yet because this substance [the human nature] is inseparably joined to that personal Word which by his very divine essence is present with all things, the nature which cannot have in itself universal presence hath it after a sort by being no where severed from that which is everywhere present" (V.lv.7).
How, then, is the person of Jesus Christ present in the Holy Eucharist? To address that question, Hooker notes that all causes are present as effects in that which they cause. And further, all things which are affected are antecedently present in the cause which affects them. In Hooker's words, "that every original cause imparteth itself into those things which come of it," and "whatsoever taketh being from any other, the same is after a sort in that which giveth it being" (V.lvi.1). In other words, wherever Christ is present, he is present as a cause which has effects.
In general, there are two principal ways in which Christ is present and active. First, he is the Wisdom by which God created the world. In this regard he has a form of presence in all created things. This form of presence, however, does not necessarily convey salvation. Second, he is present by way of salvation to believers who receive his saving work.
So that all things which God hath made are in that respect the offspring of God, they are in him as effects in their highest cause, he likewise actually is in them, the assistance and influence of his Deity is their life. ... Let hereunto saving efficacy be added, and it bringeth forth a special offspring amongst men, containing them to whom God hath himself given the gracious and amiable name of sons. ... These were in God as in their Saviour, and not as in their Creator only (V.lvi.5-6).
These two forms are different, or to put it another way, it is not the case that the new, redeemed life in Christ is the same life that is given by general creation. In Hooker's words, "It is too cold an interpretation, whereby some men expound our being in Christ to import nothing else, but only that the selfsame nature which maketh us to be men, is in him, and maketh him man as we are" (V.lvi.7).
The foregoing can be summarized as follows: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. After sin and corruption had entered the world, God the Son assumed human nature by incarnation. That human nature was and is forever bound to God the Son, the second person of the Trinity. The one person, Jesus Christ of two natures, saves sinners from death, and by his resurrection and exaltation exists locally in heaven. Since God the Son or Word is everywhere, he is active everywhere, and this present activity involves both his human and divine natures as one person. In this action the human nature is present "after a sort." For those being saved, the risen and exalted Jesus Christ has effects on them, specifically, the graces that flowed from Christ's divine nature to his human nature are now imparted to the human natures of those who receive him in faith.(7) These graces flow as causes to effects to those who, by faith in Christ, have believed unto salvation. This grace is given by Word and Sacrament, including the Eucharist.
This summary can be placed in a wider context. God operates by law where law means his actions, operations, and workings. All things go from possibility to actuality, and for those being saved, this means a final life in God, a life which includes all aspects of their being, social as in the life of the church and individually as body and soul. This movement toward God is historical, given by the biblical narrative, from an original goodness, to sin, corruption, and the restoration of human nature in Jesus Christ. In Hooker's words, "... we must note that in a Christian man there is, first, Nature; secondly, Corruption, perverting Nature; thirdly, Grace correcting, and amending Corruption."(8)
It is significant that although Hooker uses nouns such as "substance," as in the divine substance or the human substance of Jesus Christ, the heart of his theological perspective is verbal. God operates, works, and is active, while law is the form of his working. From this it follows that the term "presence," in relation to God, means the effects of his acts, his workings, and operations, effects which, for the believer, are given in Jesus Christ. The next step is Hooker’s specific teaching on the Eucharist.
The Eucharist is a sacrament, and, for Hooker, sacraments are composed of three parts, the elements, the grace of God, and the words said over the elements which "infallibly teach what the other do most assuredly bring to pass" (V.lviii.1). Baptism is the sacrament of rebirth, the establishment of a covenant between the baptized, God, and the church. Eucharist is the sacrament of continued growth in Christ. The Eucharistic elements are the bread and wine while the words are "this is my body," "this is my blood." These words signify that the life of the body of Christ, the human nature, is present and active as grace in the Eucharist. This grace flows from the Deity of Christ into his human nature, and from there, by the presence of the person of the risen Christ in his human and divine natures, the one fully present, the other present "after a sort." This grace is then conveyed, as effects, to the bodies and souls of those who receive the bread and wine in faith.
The bread and cup are his body and blood because they are causes instrumental upon the receipt whereof the participation of his body and blood ensueth. For that which produceth any certain effect is not vainly nor improperly said to be that very effect whereunto it tendeth. Every cause is in the effect which groweth from it. Our souls and bodies quickened to eternal life are effects the cause whereof is the Person of Christ, his body and blood are the true wellspring out of which this life floweth (V.lxvii.5).
From this it follows that the change that takes place in Eucharist is not in the elements themselves, but rather, in the believer that receives the elements. "The real presence of Christ's most blessed body and blood is not therefore to be sought for in the sacrament, but in the worthy receiver of the sacrament" (V.lxvii.6). This is due to the fact that even in this life the believer is "quickened to eternal life." Being "quickened to eternal life" is distinct from the life of creation since created life does not overcome sin and death.(9)
Given this perspective, Hooker will affirm neither consubstantiation nor transubstantiation. The former claims that the humanity of the exalted Christ is fully present with the elements of the Eucharist, while Hooker maintains that his humanity is in heaven though present in Eucharist "after a sort." This sort of presence, however, conveys all the graces that reside in the exalted humanity when Christ is received in faith. Secondly, he will not affirm transubstantiation since there is "no sentence of Holy Scripture which saith that we cannot by this sacrament be made partakers of his body and blood except they be first contained in the sacrament, or the sacrament converted into them" (V.lxvii.6). Further, he will say that none of the Holy Fathers ever taught either transubstantiation or consubstantiation (V.lxvii.11). In other words, there is no scriptural or traditional warrant for transubstantiation or consubstantiation.
As is clear from the foregoing, Hooker cannot believe that the sacraments are bare memorials, or merely remembrances of Christ. Hooker believed the sacraments actually conveyed effects whose cause was the risen Christ.
For we take not baptism nor the eucharist for bare resemblances or memorials of things absent, neither for naked signs and testimonies assuring us of grace received before, but (as they are indeed and in verity) for means effectual whereby God when we take the sacraments delivereth into our hands that grace available unto eternal life, which grace the sacraments represent or signify (V.lvii.5).
Having rejected aspects of the Roman, Reformed, and Lutheran views, Hooker then observes that all parties agree on certain fundamental realities. They agree on what God does in the Eucharist, though they disagree on how God does it. The critical point, for Hooker, is what God does and not so much the how of God's action. These points of agreement on what God does are so important that they merit an extended quotation.
It is on all sides plainly confessed, first that this sacrament is a true and a real participation of Christ, who thereby imparteth himself even his whole Person as a mystical Head unto every soul that receiveth him, and that every such receiver doth thereby incorporate or unite himself unto Christ as a mystical member of him, yea of them also whom he acknowledgeth to be his own; secondly that to whom the person of Christ is thus communicated, to them he giveth by the same sacrament his Holy Spirit to sanctify them as it sanctifieth him which is their head; thirdly that what merit, force or virtue soever there is in his sacrificed body and blood, we freely fully and wholly have it by this sacrament; fourthly that the effect thereof in us is a real transmutation of our souls and bodies from sin to righteousness, from death and corruption to immortality and life; fifthly that because the sacrament being of itself but a corruptible and earthly creature must needs be thought an unlikely instrument to work so admirable effects in man, we are therefore to rest ourselves altogether upon the strength of his glorious power who is able and will bring to pass that the bread and cup which he giveth us shall be truly the thing he promiseth (V.lxvii.7).
This quotation in its theological context can be summarized as follows: 1. In Eucharist, Christ in his full human and divine nature, becomes personally present and active as one person. This makes a person a member of Christ in the sense that effects are antecedently in their causes. This also makes a person a member of the community of believers, for the whole community is of Christ's bleeding side as Eve was of the side of Adam (V.lvi.7). 2. This is the work of the Spirit, so that the holiness found in Jesus Christ is imparted to believers as from cause to effect. 3. There are many merits, forces and virtues in Christ given in the Eucharist. As a child of the Reformation, Hooker believed in the Protestant doctrine of justification by grace through faith. This implies that by the merits of Christ's atoning sacrifice believers are reckoned justified by a righteous and holy God as received in Eucharist.(10) 4. The transmutation of our souls and bodies means sanctification which includes the healing of both body and soul, begun in this life and completed in the life to come. 5. These changes in the recipient of Holy Communion are so profound, changing body, soul, and community, that they can only be ascribed to the "glorious power" of Christ himself fulfilling the promise that the bread and wine are indeed his body and blood communicating the very life inherent in that body as received from the deity of God.
That is Hooker's theological description grasped by the mind. Here is Hooker, from the heart.
... the very letter of the word of Christ giveth plain security that these mysteries do as nails fasten us to his very Cross, that by them we draw out, as touching efficacy, force, and virtue, even the blood of his gored side, in the wounds of our Redeemer we there dip our tongues, we are dyed red both within and without, our hunger is satisfied and our thirst for ever quenched; they are things wonderful which he feeleth, great which he seeth and unheard of which he uttereth, whose soul is possessed of this Paschal Lamb and made joyful in the strength of this new wine, this bread hath in it more than the substance which our eyes behold, this cup hallowed with solemn benediction availeth to the endless life and welfare both of soul and body, in that it serveth as well for medicine to heal our infirmities and purge our sins as for a sacrifice of thanksgiving; with touching it sanctifieth, it enligheneth with belief, it truly conformeth us unto the image of Jesus Christ; what these elements are in themselves it skilleth not, it is enough that to me which take them they are the body and blood of Christ, his promise in witness hereof sufficeth, his word he knoweth which way to accomplish; why should any cogitation possess the mind of a faithful communicant but this, O my God thou art true, O my Soul thou art happy (V.lxvii.12).
Consider the following:
Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, "Take eat, this is my body." And then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, "Drink of it, all of you; for this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you I shall not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom." (Matt. 26:26-29, RSV)
First, and of supreme importance, Eucharist is a personal encounter with Jesus Christ in the fullness of his human and divine nature, and through him, an encounter with the living God. Personal encounters take place when persons are bodily present to each other, as they speak, hear, touch, and see each other.(11) The words, "this is my body," "this is my blood," represent by synecdoche the entire person of Jesus Christ. In the event of Eucharist, Jesus Christ is bodily present, efficaciously actualized by the bread and wine as effects flow from Christ's heavenly body to faithful recipients of Holy Communion. In this event, believers encounter the whole person of Christ, his humanity, his divinity, and through Jesus Christ, God himself. Believers receive his humanity as "nails fasten us to his very Cross," as "in the wounds of our Redeemer we there dip our tongues, we are dyed red both within and without." This encounter with the human nature is forever bound to the divine nature so that "our hunger is satisfied and our thirst for ever quenched," meaning that one recognizes, receives, and participates in the divine life itself through its effects objectively mediated.
Further, as believers encounter the person of Christ, they meet the living God because, for Hooker, the divine nature that became incarnate in Jesus is God in the person of the Son. This encounter with God is personal, God personally speaking, acting, and bodily present in the person of the Son. God speaks his love in the broken body and poured out blood. He becomes visible as the "unseen" yet visible presence of the celebrant, the ministers, and the congregation gathered before the throne. God speaks and is visible in a concrete, objective, and miraculous fashion because he is present as effects, effects which flow from the very body of Christ as conveyed by the visible, tangible, empirical realities of bread and wine, indeed, by all the verbal, tactile, and auditory realities of the Eucharist and the gathered congregation.(12)
This encounter with the living God has an intensely poignant quality which makes God utterly compelling. It combines moments such as the sanctus, reflecting the absolute transcendence and holiness of God as given in Isaiah's vision, with the awful humility of God revealed in the broken body and spilt blood, an event that breaks the heart and exalts the soul. As one comes before the living God, stricken by his words, transfigured by the sight of his face, believers, with Hooker, may well cry out to God, "O my God thou art true, O my Soul thou art happy."
Further, this encounter with the living God is not simply an individual encounter. It takes place in the church. Hooker has a very strong doctrine of the social nature of human life and consequently, a high doctrine of the church (III.i.1f). When God saves a person, he or she is saved in the church. Therefore, the taking of Holy Communion is a corporate action strengthening the faithful in all the manifold relations of church life. In the biblical passage cited above, the term "you," as Jesus speaks to his disciples, is second person plural. Hooker affirms the corporate nature of Eucharist by the use of such terms as "us," "we," or "our," as he describes our participation in the Eucharistic feast.
In light of the foregoing it must be said that Eucharist is the highest form of fellowship on earth because it reveals the transcendent, holy, living God who stoops to humble himself to feed the ones he loves. He does this in the company of the faithful, gathered proleptically before the throne, seated at the Marriage Feast of the Lamb. This language, language that describes God doing things that properly belong to finite human beings, feeding, speaking, appearing, becoming tactile, is vitally necessary since God does these things in Jesus Christ. To deny this is to deny the orthodox doctrine of the communicatio idiomatum, or what Hooker calls "cross and circulatory speech." Further, as the whole of Hooker's Eucharistic doctrine makes clear, God does these things, physically and efficaciously, in Eucharist.
Secondly, the Eucharist is a covenant renewal ceremony. In the words of Jesus, "Drink of it, all of you; for this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins." This emphasis does not appear in Hooker, but it is implicit in his thinking. According to Hooker believers make a covenant with God and the church in baptism (V.lxii.15, V.lxiii.3). Eucharist is a renewal of the baptismal covenant, and it reflects the ancient covenant renewal ceremonies of Israel seen in such passages as Exodus 19-24 or Joshua 24.
What happens in a covenant renewal ceremony? First, the parties present themselves before each other so that each can be seen and heard (Ex. 19:10-11, Josh. 24:1). Second, God proclaims his great saving deeds, which for Christians, culminates in the passion and resurrection of Jesus, heralding the resurrection of the Last Day. Third, these saving deeds are followed by his commands, above all, absolute obedience and trust in the Word of God. Anglican Eucharistic services also include confession and absolution, preparing the way to an even more profound encounter with God. This constitutes the first part of the Eucharist, the ministry of the Word, up to the Eucharistic prayer.
The covenant is then sealed with a sacred meal and/or the shedding of blood, the Holy Communion proper. The solemn, binding nature of this covenant is heightened by the fact that God is personally present as a partner to the covenant, and further, that it is ratified and sealed by the blood of his Son. Nothing is more holy, solemn, or sublime that this covenant in which God personally binds himself to believers in love, a love that goes to the end, even death upon the cross.
Third, the Eucharist is healing, and healing in all dimensions, body, mind, and soul, and the healing of all relationships, with God and other persons. This reconciliation is only possible because Jesus bore the wrath of God and made atonement for our sins upon the cross.(13) Eucharist proclaims this, seen in the absolution and actualized in the broken body and spilt blood. Reconciled, forgiven, at peace with God and each other, believers then enter into the very presence of God where he wipes away "every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away" (Rev. 21:4, RSV). This is healing, always.(14) In Hooker's words, the Eucharist "availeth to the endless life and welfare both of soul and body, in that it serveth as well for medicine to heal our infirmities and purge our sins as for a sacrifice of thanksgiving; with touching it sanctifieth, it enligheneth with belief, it truly conformeth us unto the image of Jesus Christ; ..." All dimensions of healing are included in this passage, and since effects flow from the resurrected and ascended body of the Lord Jesus, these effects extend even to the bodies of believers.(15)
This amazing reality is the fulfillment of Isaiah 53. "Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed" (Isa. 53:4-5, RSV) It is vital that the church restore the healing ministry with its center in the Holy Eucharist.
Fourth, Eucharist is an entrance into eschatological life. In the words of Jesus, "I tell you I shall not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom." John's gospel makes this especially clear, "... he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. ... He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him." (John 6:54,56, RSV). How would Hooker understand the phrase, "abides in me, and in him"? Hooker would believe that the eternal life which exists in Jesus is given as effects of Christ's resurrected body to the body and souls of believers as they receive the bread and wine. The result of this is, to quote Hooker, "a real transmutation of our souls and bodies from sin to righteousness, from death and corruption to immortality and life; ... " (V.lxvii.7). Just as Hooker believed that the past becomes present, "these mysteries do as nails fasten us to his very Cross," he also believed that the eschatological Last Day becomes a present reality, so that "our hunger is satisfied and our thirst for ever quenched; ... " Or again, he proclaims that the hand of God raises us up "even from the bottomles pitt to place in thrones of everlasting joye."(16)
From the foregoing, Eucharist not only enables believers to hear, see, touch, and taste God, it enables believers to see all things in relation to God. This is transformed sight, not only the vision of God, but the "seeing" of all finite things in relation to God. This follows from the fact that Hooker locates all things in the biblical context of Eden to eschaton as grace transforms the whole of creation. In this context, Eucharist is a modified Passover, and the Passover itself heralded the land of milk and honey, which itself was a form of Eden, a return to the beginning. The land of milk and honey, in turn, was a type of Eucharist, which in turn is a foretaste of the end, the eternal Marriage Feast of the Lamb.
Further, since Eucharist is a covenant renewal ceremony, and since the grace of Eucharist redeems all things, Eucharist entails a commitment to work for the Kingdom in all aspects of life, in the church and in the wider world, socially, politically, and economically. All these dimensions are represented in the Eucharist, and how they fit together, how they relate to God, is wisdom. For Hooker, wisdom is given by grace, but it also requires investigation, assiduous study, informed reason, and theological reflection. In his words, the "search for knowledge is a thing painful; ..." (I.vii.7). Hooker was especially critical of those who would believe that grace would grant insight apart from labor, "as if the way to be ripe in faith were to be raw in wit and judgment; as if Reason were an enemy unto Religion, childish Simplicity the mother of ghostly and divine Wisdom" (III.viii.4). In this connection, the whole of Hooker's Laws is an example of wisdom. All dimensions of life are found within it, and all aspects are coordinated in relation to God.
Finally, given that the profound graces of the Eucharist take place primarily in believers, it follows that believers must prepare themselves for Eucharist. This preparation belongs both to the church and to the individual. The church, through her teaching and practice, is called to educate the faithful in the meaning and glory of the Eucharist. Among other things, this requires an orthodox and adequate theology of the Eucharist. This, at present, is one of the greatest needs of the church.
Further, members need to be taught how to examine themselves prior to Eucharist. Only by the justifying action of Jesus Christ on the cross can believers encounter the supernatural realities described in this essay. At the same time, however, God reveals himself to those who prepare to meet the Lord in the Eucharist. To that end, seeing God face to face requires holiness of life. In the words of Hooker, "To be justified soe farre as remission of sinnes, it suffiseth if wee beleeve what another hath wrought for us, butt whosoever will see God face to face, lett him shew his faith by his workes, demonstrate his first justification by a second as Abraham did."(17) Among those works is preparation for Eucharist, for whoever would receive the vision of God must prepare for his appearing. The importance of this cannot be overstated and words can scarcely do the matter justice. No one, however, can speak more eloquently than Hooker, and with his words on self-examination before Eucharist, this essay comes to a close.
... therefore ere we put forth our hands to take this blessed sacrament, we are charged to examine and to try our hearts whether God be in us of a truth or no; and if by faith and love unfeigned we be found the temples of the Holy Ghost, ... that the Spirit which dwelleth in us hath no way been vexed, molested, and grieved: or if it have, as no doubt sometimes it hath by incredulity, sometimes by breach of charity, sometimes by want of zeal, sometimes by spots of life, even in the best and most perfect among us: (for who can say, his heart is clean?) O then, to fly unto God by unfeigned repentance, to fall down before him in the humility of our souls, begging of him whatsoever is needful to repair our decays, before we fall into that desolation whereof the Prophet speaketh, saying, "Thy breach is great like the sea, who can heal thee?"
Receiving the Sacrament of the Supper of the Lord after
this sort (you that are spiritual, judge what I speak) is not all other
wise like the water of Marah, being compared to the cup which we bless?
... Is there not a taste, a taste of Christ Jesus, in the heart of him
that eateth? Doth not he which drinketh behold plainly in thus cup,
that his soul is bathed in the blood of the Lamb? O beloved in our Lord
and Saviour Jesus Christ, if ye will taste how sweet the Lord is, if ye
will receive the King of Glory, "build yourselves."(18)
The Rev. Robert J. Sanders, Ph.D.
April,
2009
This essay appeared in the spring edition of the North American Anglican. See http://www.39articles.com/