Tuesday, August 23, 2022

Excerpts from The Libellus of Mark of Ephesus (1439)

  

We [Orthodox] have inherited the customary exposition of the sacramental liturgy from the holy Apostles and their successors, the Doctors of the Church. We shall discover, with respect to none of the aforesaid loci, that the gift of the Eucharist is hallowed and fructified/perfected (τελειουσθαι) by purely dominical phrases and those words alone. Furthermore, [we shall discover] also that [the gift] is altered (μεταποιεισθαι) into the Lord’s body and blood. . . . And we beseech you to look graciously upon these gifts set before you, O God who needs nothing, to accept them both in honor of your Christ and to send down (καταπεμψοις) your Holy Spirit upon this sacrifice (θυσια), the witness of the sufferings of the Lord Jesus, that he may reveal (αποφηνοι) this bread as body of your Christ, and this cup as blood of your Christ. . . . Have mercy on us, O God, according to your great mercy and send out (εξαποστειλον) upon us and upon these holy gifts set before you your all-Holy Spirit . . . that he may dwell in them, and by his holy and good and glorious coming, may sanctify (αγιαση) them, and make (ποιηση) this bread the holy body of your Christ . . . and this cup the precious blood of your Christ. (The Libellus of Mark of Ephesus and the Eucharistic Consecration [scripsit June 17-19, 1439], taken from Louis Petit, ed., Marci Eugenici Metropoliae Ephesi opera anti-unionistica, CFDS Series A, vol. 10, bk. 1, 2nd printing [Rome: PIOS, 1977], 118-26 in Christiaan Kappes, The Epiclesis Debate at the Council of Florence [Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2019], 236, 237-39)