It has been said that the various doctrines concerning the Lord's Supper are only the results of different "interpretations" of the words of institution. Properly speaking, however, the Lutheran doctrine is not an "interpretation" of the words of institution, but merely the simple and plain presentation of the Scripture doctrine set forth in these words.
The papists indeed require much "interpretation" to demonstrate that the bread is transubstantiated into the body, that the cup must be withheld from the laity (concomitance), and that the whole sacramental act must be performed as an unbloody sacrifics for the sins of the living a.nd the dead. It certainly requires a good deal of misinterpretation a.nd "eisegesis" to prove these gross perversions from clear Scripture-passages which teach quite the opposite, 1 Cor. 10, 16; Luke 22, 19. 20; Heb. 9, 11-15.
Similarly the Reformed have proved by their many divergent views that it is indeed "labor and sorrow" for them to establish their error on the basis of Scripture. They must show by much painful "interpretation" that the words "This is My body, given for you; this is My blood, shed for you" do not mean what they say, but rather what the rebellious reason of doubting Zwinglians wants them to say, namely, that the faith of the believer must elevate itself to heaven and there unite spiritually with Christ, whose human nature, they say, is enclosed in heaven.
In particular they must explain away 1 Cor. 10, 16 and 11, 27-29. They must furthermore explain why Christ did not say in the words of institution what according to their view He should have said. Then they must explain why the Lord's Supper is at all necessary if it is no more than a symbol of a faith-union, which takes place also outside the Sacrament. In short, they are confronted with the impossible task of proving the absence of Christ's body when Scripture so emphatically teaches and proves the real presence.
The Lutherans, on the contrary, take the words in their simple meaning, just as they read, and trust that Christ, who has made the promise, is able also to fulfil it. In this they follow the timehonored hermeneutic rule that we must not depart from the literal meaning of the text unless the text itself compels us to do so. The Lutheran doctrine therefore rests on Scriptural ground and is in agreement not only with the words of institution, but also with every other passage of Scripture that treats of the Holy Supper.
Against the claim of the Lutherans that their doctrine rests upon the literal sense of the words of institution, the Reformed (including Hodge, Syst. Theol., III, 662) have set up the counterclaim that the Lutherans, too, "have given up the literal sense" of the words. This accusation is based upon the fact that the Lutherans admit that "the cup is used metonymically for the wine in the cup." To this we reply that we indeed admit this metonymy (synecdoche), the container ("this cup") being named for the thing therein contained; for Scripture itself tells us: "And they all drank of it," Mark 14, 23. What the disciples drank was not the goblet, but the wine in the cup. In other words, Scripture itself establishes the metonymy in this case. But that point is beside the question, since the literal interpretation, upon which the Lutherans insist, does not apply to the expression cup, but rather to the statements : "This is My body"; "this is My blood." The bread is indeed Christ's body, and the wine is His blood, yet not, as the papists teach, because of transubstantiation, but on account of the saaamental union (propter unionem sacramentalem).
Again, the Reformed seek to substantiate their indictment against the Lutherans ("They have given up the literal sense") by referring to their explanation "in, with, and under." But the use of this expression does not involve a departure from the literal sense of the words of institution; it is but an amplification of the literal sense of the words. Hodge does the same thing when he amplifies the words "who is in the bosom of the Father," John 1, 18, thus: "who is, was, and ever shall be in the bosom of the Father." What Hodge here writes is correct, and neither a Reformed nor a Lutheran theologian would charge him at this place with using "figurative language." The phrase "in, with, and under" fittingly serves the purpose of repudiating the papistic error of transubstantiation and of affirming, in opposition to the error of the Reformed, the Scriptural doctrine of the sacramental union.
However, Hodge bases his charge on yet another point. He writes: "If the words of Christ are to be taken literally, they teach the doctrine of transubstantiation. . . . If the bread is literally the body of Christ, it is no longer bread; for no one asserts that the same thing can be bread and flesh (or rather, the body of Christ) at the same time." This argument we already considered when we spoke of the locutio exhibitiva; for there we showed that not even Hodge is willing to concede in another point (Luke 1, 35: "The Holy Thing shall be called the Son of God") what he here demands. But Hodge's argument: "If the bread is the body of Christ, it is no longer bread, but only body" does not follow; for St. Paul, by divine inspiration, assures us that the bread remains bread even after consecration, 1 Cor. 10, 16. The argument of Hodge therefore directs itself not against Luther, but against Scripture. To the charge that it is a blasphemy to say that "the bread is Christ's body" we answer that Christ Himself makes this statement, so that the decision in thi-s matter rests with Him. Holy Scripture never blasphemes God, but always glorifies Him.
It is a common charge that the Lutheran doctrine of the real presence rests not on the words of institution, but rather on the doctrine of the person of Christ. This charge is absurd, for the very opposite is true. The Lutherans would never have drawn into the discussion of the doctrine of the Holy Supper that of the person of Christ had not their opponents compelled them to prove that the body of Christ can really be present in the Lord's Supper.
Because the Reformed predicated of the body of Christ only a local and visible presence, the Lutherans were forced to show that Scripture ascribes to the Son of Man not only a local (praesentia local is, circumscriptiva), but also an illocal (praesentia illocalis, invisibilis, definitiva) and a peculiar divine presence (praesentia divina et repletiva). The first is predicated of Christ in John 4, 4; the second, in John 20, 19; the third, in Eph. 4, 10 (to name only a few Scripture-passages). When Lutherans therefore read Matt. 28, 20, they do not think of Christ's presence according to His divine nature only, as do the Calvinists, but also of the presence of His human nature by reason of its communicated praesentia illocalis, divina, repletiva. The whole divine-human Christ is present with His Church to the end of time.