Friday, April 29, 2022

Esther Chung-Kim on the Eucharist and Calvin’s Interpretation of John 6

  

Despite his rejection of a sacramental meaning for this passage, one cannot deny that Calvin’s exegesis of John 6 has eucharistic overtones. In fact, in explaining verse 55, Calvin says, “For when Christ expressly mentions food and drink, Christ declares that the life which he bestows is complete in every respect . . . provided that we eat his flesh and drink his blood. Thus also in the Lord’s Supper, which corresponds to this doctrine, not satisfied with the symbol of the bread, he adds also the cup” (CO 25:155). Finding it hard to resist the connections o the Eucharist, he explains that the doctrine that is taught in this passage is sealed in the Lord’s Supper (CO 25:156). It is noteworthy that, immediately after his rejection of an eucharistic interpretation of the passage in John 6, Calvin writes, “At the same time, I confess that there is nothing said here that is not figured and actually presented to believers in the Lord’s Supper” (CO 25:155). By the time of the Institutio in 1559, Calvin explicitly relates John 6 with the Lord’s supper. (Esther Chung-Kim, Inventing Authority: The use of the Church Fathers in Reformation Debates over the Eucharist [Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 2011], 52)