06 — Eucharist and Incarnation
Ignatius’s eucharistic theology — the Eucharist as “the medicine of immortality” and as the true flesh and blood of the Lord — and its inseparable bond to the reality of the Incarnation. Because the flesh of Christ truly suffered and truly rose, the eucharistic flesh is real and life-giving; the two doctrines are one.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Apostolic Father)
The most famous of Ignatius’s phrases, “the medicine of immortality, the antidote that we should not die but live for ever in Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 20.2), gathers his eucharistic vision: the food of the Church is the food of incorruption. His realist language — the Eucharist is “the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which flesh suffered for our sins” (Smyrnaeans 7.1) — is at once a confession of the Incarnation and a weapon against Docetism. This section treats both the “medicine of immortality” and the eucharistic realism, with scholarly caution about reading later doctrine into vivid early images.
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| Medicine of Immortality | φάρμακον ἀθανασίας, the “antidote that we should not die” (Eph. 20.2); Christ the one physician “of flesh and of spirit” (Eph. 7); the eschatological and medical imagery; the trajectory toward incorruption and theosis; the caution against over-reading vivid images as a developed sacramentology. |
| Eucharistic Realism | The Eucharist as “the flesh of our Saviour… which flesh suffered for our sins” (Smyrn. 7.1); “one flesh… one cup” (Phld. 4); “the bread of God, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ” (Rom. 7.3); the anti-docetic logic; the debate over realist vs. realist-symbolic readings (Kelly). |
See Also
- Against Docetism — the heresy answered by eucharistic realism
- Unity Around the Eucharist — the one Eucharist under the one bishop
- Wheat of God — the wheat-bread-flesh imagery carried into martyrdom
- Theosis — the deification and incorruption the Eucharist serves
References
- Lightfoot, J. B. The Apostolic Fathers, Part II: S. Ignatius, S. Polycarp. 2 vols. London: Macmillan, 1885.
- Kelly, J. N. D. Early Christian Doctrines. Rev. ed. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1978.
- Holmes, Michael W. The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations. 3rd ed. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007.