Here are some notes on a fascinating book our resident historian, Dr. Vito C. Caiati, recommended to me: Carlos Eire, They Flew: A History of the Impossible (Yale UP, 2023, xviii + 492 pp. ). The book is about such phenomena as levitation and bilocation. It is meticulous, well-written, and utterly fascinating.
1) Eire tells us that a fundamental difference between Roman Catholics and Protestants is that, while both accept the distinction between the natural and the supernatural, and the reality of both realms, Protestants reject the “intermingling” of the two. (p. 17) The natural world is the material or physical world. It is the realm of space-time-matter. The supernatural realm is that of spirit. Both Catholics and Protestants accept the reality of both realms or orders, and the subordinate status of the natural order. Both also accept that the supernatural realm is God’s alone. This by way of contrast to the predominant view of modernity which we can call metaphysical naturalism. This is the view that reality is exhausted by space-time-matter. If that is the case, then of course there is no God, and the supernatural category is empty.
To put it in my own way, there is a major and a minor opposition. The major opposition is that between supernaturalism and naturalism. The minor opposition is one within supernaturalism between a view that allows the irruption of the supernatural into the natural, and one that does not. So I will say, glossing Eire, that Catholics are ‘irruptionists’ and Protestants ‘non-irruptionists.’ But this simple schematization needs qualification which I will provide in sections (3) and (4) below. But first:
2) An example of what I am calling the irruption of the supernatural into the natural, and what Eire calls the “intermingling” of the supernatural and the natural, is what is supposed to occur in the traditional Catholic mass, namely, the transformation of bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus Christ. The technical theological term for this is ‘transubstantiation.’ The idea is that in the mass at the moment of consecration, Christ himself becomes really present, literally not figuratively present, in the consecrated elements, bread and wine. This is an irruption that no Protestant countenances.
3) But if there had never been any irruptions of the supernatural into the natural, would any religions ever have arisen? Presumably not, as Eire suggests: “. . .all encounters with a supernatural reality are the bedrock upon which religions have been built.” (xiv) He goes on to refer to these encounters as “theophanies,” “hierophanies,” and “irruptions of the sacred.” Given that an irruption of the supernatural is a miracle (miraculum, prodigium) as Eire points out (p. 15), and given that Protestantism is a religion or a family of religions, it follows that there had to have been some miracles that Protestants countenance. Which?
4) Protestants countenance only those that occurred before the first century anno domini. This is the doctrine of the “cessation of mysteries” or the “cessation of charismata.” Eire tells us that this doctrine was accepted by Protestants of all stripes. (p. 17) The miracles related in the Bible really occurred but “became unnecessary after the birth of the early church and would never, ever happen again.” (ibid.)
5) It follows from (4) that levitations, bilocations, stigmata, supernatural hyperosmia (a heightened sense of smell that allows the mystic to detect the sins of others), and many other bizarre phenomena, including supernatural insomnia, the power to get by with little or no sleep [Trump?] — all of them listed by Eire on p. 13 — could not be the work of God. Curiously, however, their occurrence is not deemed impossible by Protestants, but held actually to have occurred.
6) It follows from (4) & (5) that all of the above miraculous occurrences that occurred after the first century A. D. are diabolical in origin! Now whether this is really the Protestant line, one that Protestants of every stripe adhere to, is not for me to say, given my limited familiarity with Protestantism. I am simply reporting what Eire says. But it sounds right.
7) If Eire is right, then “miracles became a marker of difference between Catholics and Protestants . . . .” (p. 18) For the Protestants, all supposed miracles after the first century were either fraudulent or diabolical in origin. Not so for Catholics, who, while not denying that many supposed miracles are either fraudulent or diabolical in origin, held also that there are genuine miracles whose origin is divine. Enter the need for what is called “discernment” as between diabolical and divine etiology of presumptive miracles. As I read Eire, he is telling us that for Protestants, there are exactly two disjoint classes of presumptive miracles after the first century A. D., the fraudulent ones and the diabolical ones. For the ‘Romanists’ as Protestants sometimes call them, there are exactly three disjoint classes of presumptive miracles: the fraudulent, the diabolical, and the divine.
Perhaps we can say (and this is my formulation): for the traditional Catholic, miracles are presumed either fraudulent or diabolical unless proven divine. Now in the Anglo-American system of positive law, if a person is presumed innocent it does not follow that he is innocent, nor does it follow that he is not. Similarly with respect to miracles: the presumption of fraud or deviltry does not entail either, not does it not entail either. Hence the need for inquiry, trial, inquisition, The Inquisition. Either defeat the presumption or uphold it.
It just now occurs to me that in Protestantism there is no need for such an institution as the Inquisition because there is no need to discern between diabolical and divine causation of miracles. Why not? Because for the Protestants, no presumptive miracles are of divine origin. Protestants burned plenty of witches, but not after an inquiry into whether a given witch was a good witch or a bad witch: which type of witch is this witch is a question not posed. All were presumed bad, and the presumption was non-defeasible. Correct me if I am wrong about this.
8) Now we are getting in deep, where an historian of ideas such as Carlos Eire will not go. His history of the impossible is a history of the presumptively impossible, not the impossible an sich. He is clear about this, even though he doesn’t put it in quite the way I am putting it. Obviously, there cannot be a history of the impossible sensu stricto. For the impossible is that which cannot occur in any sense of ‘cannot’ whether logical, metaphysical, nomologically . . . . What cannot occur never occurred, whence it follows that there cannot be any history of it. So Eire is using ‘impossible’ sensu lato, to refer to ideas and views about occurrences such as levitations and bilocations according to which these putative occurences are regarded as impossible in the strict sense. That is his factual basis: views and opinions as attested by testimonies and documents in archives. Eire could rightly claim the title Archivarius Maximus given the load of lore he has laid before us in his 500 page tome.
9) The philosopher of religion wants to know, not just what various people at various times have opined about, say, the difference between religion and magic, or the difference between religion and superstition, but what these differences are, and whether they really obtain. If he is a Christian, he wants to know whether characteristic Christian doctrines such as Trinity and Incarnation are or are not superstitious nonsense. If he is a traditional Roman Catholic Christian, he wants to know whether or not the words of consecration in the mass Hoc est enim corpus meum are hocus pocus.
Bill,
Thank you for this excellent overview of Eire’s distinction regarding the natural and supernatural in Catholicism and Protestantism.
I think that his general position holds up, if we take Protestant to refer to the beliefs of the Reformers (Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, etc.), traditional evangelicals, and the historic confessions of faith, all of which adhere to cessationism. However, we should be aware that Charismatics, Pentecostals and many other evangelicals affirm the reality miracles beyond the Apostolic Age, i.e. in continuationism.
There is another aspect of this that troubles me. Specifically, Luther rejected transubstantiation in favor of consubstantiation, the position that the bread and wine remain bread and wine but that Christ’s body and blood are really and substantially present, “in, with, and under,” these consecrated elements. And, according to him, it is the power of Christ’s own words, said at the moment of consecration (“This is my body…This is my blood”) that bring about this change, rather than the celebrant’s personal power (the priest acting in persona Christi), and that it does not involve any alteration in the two earthly elements’ substances. Now, if this is so, something miraculous occurs at the communion table, for Christ is really present along with ordinary bread and wine; thus, Luther cannot be regarded as a cessationist in all things.
So, I think that Eire’s take on the natural and supernatural in the two branches of Christianity, while essentially correct, needs to be tweaked a bit.
Thanks, Vito. It is always more complicated than it appears at first. I will have to look up continuationism.
And thanks for reminding me of Luther’s consubstantiation. So now we have two counterexamples to Eire’s broad assertion. It remains true, however, that the Catholics are more ‘irruptionist’ than the Protestants.
Yes, definitely.
Bill,
It should be noted that the term “consubstantiation” is not found in Luther’s writings and that it is rejected by Lutherans because it, like transubstantiation, suggests a philosophic explanation–the co-existence of two local, separate substances, i.e. , bread-body, wine-blood)–of the real presence in favor of “sacramental union,” which is a divine mystery. However, we are still dealing here with some “intermingling” of the supernatural and the natural.
Yet, although miraculous, what is proposed here is, in support of Eire, a real stepping back from the radical penetration of the supernatural into the natural that is assumed by the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation: for Luther the material (natural) elements of the sacrament, the bread and wine are left undisturbed; for the Catholic, in comparison, they forfeit their substantial natures, becoming Christ’s body and blood, and retain only the appearance of what they once were. Thus, the natural is eclipsed by the supernatural.
Vito,
Time to dive back into the topic of miracles. How much of Eire’s book have you read so far?
I read all of it and am now reading some of it a second time. I spent early this morning looking again the subchapters “Early Modern Mayhem: The Protestant Attack” and “Miracles as Polemic” (58-71), which I find of great value in understanding the Catholic/Protestant divide on the sacred and the profane. I agree that the book is “utterly fascinating.”
Vito,
How long did it take you to plough through the 500 pages? We should continues with this since we both have a keen interest in these topics and have a text to focus on. You will have noticed that the author is Cuban. The Jesuit-educated Fidel must be rolling around in his grave.
It took me a bit more than a week to finish the book.
Eire and his brother sent here as a young boy by his parents to escape the hell that Castro had created in Cuba. They were later joined by their mother, with their father remaining behind in Cuba, where he died. The three of them faced hard times in their new country, and Eire’s rise to the top of the historical profession with a professorship at Yale is a real American success story.
I wonder how Jesus could say of the elements “this is my body…”(referring to the bread and wine), when he himself was bodily present. Those elements then could not have been his actual body.
Here is a Reformed view of the Lord’s Supper:
Calvin, and those coming from his direction are the ones I do find to be the most biblical, clear, and helpful. While denying that the elements themselves are in any way changed, he argued strongly that Christ was truly present by his/the Spirit in such a way that we can and should believe that Christ is truly, “really” present. In other words, the “real” presence of Christ, is a uniquely spiritual presence. The Supper, according to Calvin and the Reformed tradition, is truly a unique meeting with the resurrected Christ who promises to nourish the souls of his people as they feed upon him by faith. The language of “feeding upon him” should not be misunderstood. I cannot say it any better than the Westminster Confession, so I’ll quote chapter 29, section 7:
Worthy receivers, outwardly partaking of the visible elements, in this sacrament, do then also, inwardly by faith, really and indeed, yet not carnally and corporally but spiritually, receive, and feed upon, Christ crucified, and all benefits of his death: the body and blood of Christ being then, not corporally or carnally, in, with, or under the bread and wine; yet, as really, but spiritually, present to the faith of believers in that ordinance, as the elements themselves are to their outward senses.
Trudy,
I am happy that you dropped by. Your opening paragraph points to a genuine problem for the ‘Romanists.’
On your account, based on the Westminster Confession, Calvin is telling us that there is no transubstantiation, but that nevertheless Christ is really and truly present in the elements in a spiritual way. Spiritually as opposed to carnally. Christ is “present to the faith of believers” assuming they are “worthy receivers.”
Question: Is this spiritual presence of Christ in the elements (bread and wine) a literal presence or a metaphorical/figurative presence? I take it that Calvin is saying more than that the elements consumed at the Lord’s Supper today merely represent and memorialize Christ’s sacrifice of his physical body and blood 2000 years ago.
I take it that Christ’s presence is literal albeit spiritual. But it is present only to the believer. Right? Should we conclude that it is the act of faith on the part of the believer that makes Christ present in the bread and the wine? If so, there would be no need for some authorized individual (e.g. a Catholic priest) to being it about that Christ is present in the elements. Any believer could bring it about. Is that the idea?
Or is rather that Christ himself brings its about that He is present in the elements on the occasion of a worthy receiver’s believing that Christ is present?
Present IN because present TO the believer? There is an ontic-epistemic ambiguity here that concerns me.
I would say present TO because present IN. And yes, for believers, for their spiritual nourishment to draw us closer to Christ and each other, and made effectual by the work of the Holy Spirit. We see the Lord’s Supper as one of the means of grace whereby we continue in Christ — the others being the preaching of the Word and prayer and baptism. Because we are physical people, the physical elements that we taste and smell make the work of Christ real to us truly yet sacramentally. They are called by the things they represent.
This is my understanding, but I’ll ask my pastor. These things are mysteries!
Trudy and Vito: https://afkimel.wordpress.com/2019/05/14/real-presence-vs-really-real-presence-calvin-and-luther-on-the-supper/
Great article and pretty much what my pastor explains.
Bill,
Thanks you for linking to this article, which clearly explains the differences in the positions of Luther and Calvin on the Eucharist.
Here is what my pastor wrote in response:
Calvin is doing something more careful than either of the two poles presented by your friend. His instinct is basically right, with one important correction on the causal order.
Start with what Calvin is rejecting. Against Zwingli (and against the “bare memorial” reading many people assume is “the Protestant view”), Calvin insists the Supper isn’t just a mental exercise where the believer recalls Calvary while chewing bread. The elements aren’t merely a visual aid pointing backward at a past event. Against Rome, he rejects transubstantiation — no change of substance in the bread and wine. And against Luther, he rejects the idea that Christ’s glorified body is now ubiquitous and thus locally present in, with, or under the elements wherever they’re consecrated. Calvin’s alternative: Christ’s actual body and blood remain in heaven, at the Father’s right hand, but the Holy Spirit really unites the communicant to that same Christ, so that the believer truly feeds on him — not a memory of him, not a symbol of him, but him. Calvin calls this “spiritual” not to mean “merely figurative” but to mean “accomplished by the Spirit rather than by local, physical relocation.” So: literal, in the sense of a real, substantial communication of the whole Christ, not a metaphor for one. Not literal, in the sense that nothing happens to the bread and wine themselves, and Christ’s body doesn’t travel to or lodge in them. The traffic runs the other way — the Spirit lifts the believer up to Christ (this is what “sursum corda,” “lift up your hearts,” in the liturgy is doing), rather than pulling Christ down into the elements.
On the second point: yes, this benefit is received only by the believer. This is actually one of Calvin’s sharpest disagreements with Luther, who held (however reluctantly) that even unworthy or unbelieving communicants receive Christ’s body, just to their judgment rather than their benefit (the manducatio impiorum, “eating by the impious”). Calvin denies this outright. The unbeliever who partakes eats real bread and drinks real wine, and eats and drinks judgment on himself for profaning the sign, but he does not receive Christ. The reality and the sign can come apart for such a person. Sacraments, for Calvin, are not automatic dispensers of grace irrespective of the recipient (that’s the ex opere operato logic he’s opposing in Rome); their efficacy is tied to faith.
Now the correction. Bill asked whether it’s the believer’s act of faith that “makes” Christ present — such that any believer could bring this about, with no need for an authorized minister. Calvin would resist that phrasing, and Bill’s third formulation is the one closer to his actual position: Christ himself (by his Spirit) is the agent who effects this union, and he does so on the occasion of, or in conjunction with, the believer’s faith — but faith is the instrument or means of receiving, not the efficient cause of Christ’s presence. This distinction matters a lot to Calvin. If faith caused the presence, we’d have relocated the “power” from Christ’s institution and promise onto the psychological or spiritual act of the human recipient — a kind of Protestant version of the very mechanism he’s trying to avoid, just moved from priestly words to the believer’s faith. Instead, his order is: Christ instituted the sacrament and attached a promise to it; the Spirit sovereignly makes good on that promise to those who come in true faith; faith is the empty hand that receives, not the hand that produces. The Westminster Confession’s language captures this precisely — worthy receivers “really and indeed, yet not carnally and corporeally but spiritually, receive and feed upon Christ crucified” — the receiving is real, but it’s Christ being given, not conjured.
That’s also why Calvin doesn’t conclude “any believer could do this without a minister.” His reasons for retaining an ordained, called minister to administer the Supper aren’t Rome’s reasons — he doesn’t think ordination confers a power to effect Christ’s presence through consecration, the way an in persona Christi priest does in the Roman rite. Rather, for Calvin the sacrament is inseparably bound to the ministry of the Word (Word and sacrament belong together as one ministry), and Christ instituted an ordered, public administration in and through his church rather than a private act any believer performs at will. So the minister’s role is about the divinely instituted order of the visible church and the proper, public administration of Word-and-sacrament together, not about the minister possessing a causal power that a layperson lacks. The presence itself is Christ’s own gift by his Spirit; the ministry is Christ’s own ordained means of publicly administering that gift.
I hope this helps! Great work-out for the mind this morning! Love it.
Blessings,
Pastor Dale
Bill,
I’m coming into this late as usual these days but the topic is so fascinating I’ll have to throw in a few thoughts. I just received my copy of Eire’s book and it will be a while before I can really dig into it so my comments are based on your and Vito’s discussion. I’m a “churchless” Protestant and maybe a bit syncretic in my approach to thinking and talking about life in Christ but I think the Protestant approach to miracles is a little more nuanced than Eire seems to say. Certainly intercessory prayer, which is enthusiastically practiced by many Protestants, strongly implies an expectation that God can, will, and does intervene in the natural world in miraculous ways. What did not survive the apostolic period is people performing miracles in the name of Christ, as the apostles did. This includes prophesying, speaking in tongues, general wonder-working, and most prominently claiming revelations in the name of Christ beyond those found in the New Testament. Some dispensationalists in particular claim speaking in tongues, popular in Pentecostal circles, is demonic–the work of so-called εγγαστρίμυθος or demonic ventriloquists. But this is not a denial of the supernatural; rather it’s a caution that supernatural phenomena can be deceitful while being entirely real. This is to emphasize that the real supernatural center of Christian life must be the Holy Spirit and not “signs and wonders” of questionable origin, especially when interest in such extends to a desire to perform them and is obscurely motivated by pride and ambition–clearly a segue to the demonic. Has this didactic caution solidified into a dogmatic Protestant position that all post-Apostolic “miracles” are demonic? I’m not enough of a historian to say, especially since at last count there are roughly 23,000 Protestant sects. Speaking for myself, I do not doubt that God answers prayer but in general does not interfere with human freedom nor the inevitability of pain and physical death, though the consequences of these can be tempered by God’s grace and our cultivation of it as opposed to pursuing more ambiguous “miracles.” But miracles, whether Godly or demonic in origin, do happen and exist in spite of secular attempts to write them off or explain them away.