Jewel had already accomplished in this section some of his best
exegesis/eisegesis of the Fathers in ridding them of any notion of the real
presence. Harding brought quotes from Cyril of Alexandria and Hilary
of Poitiers, that, contra the Arian heretics, the Christian is joined
substantially and corporally to the body of Christ, as Christ has joined
his corporal humanity to the sacrament, and in this sacrament the
Christian partakes of Christ. As Harding quoted Hilary:
If indeed the Word is truly made flesh, and we assume the incarnate
Word in the appointed feast, how is it to be considered not to be in
us naturally, who, born a man, has now both assumed the
inseparable nature of our flesh to himself, and has mixed his
corporal nature to his eternal nature under the sacrament of his flesh
which is communicated to us.^60Jewel’s response? That St Hilary merely meant that Christ dwells
naturally in us, and not in the sacrament, for Christ is not truly under
the sacrament of his flesh, but, vere sub mysterio ... carnis. Jewel here
translated Hilary’s sacramentoby his latter use of the word mysterio,
and thus rendered Hilary’s sacramentoas merely ‘under a mystery’, that
is, that Christ dwells in the believer by a mystery. Here Jewel chose to
THE CATHOLIC REACTION TO JEWEL 143
executor John Garbrand, and as such really gives no systematic, but rather a hortatory
approach to the sacraments. His views such as they were, emerge in his contentions in
defending the English rite. In this, Jewel’s views, at least as regards the accidents of his
theology of communion and Eucharistic presence, unsurprisingly, approach the theology of
Peter Martyr. Corda shows that Martyr believed in three types of communion with Christ
(pp. 170–8). The first, a static ideal, arises from Christ being universally united with all
humanity by virtue of the Incarnation, and in this union there is no hope for the damned.
The next type of communion, an eschatological one, is a union of likeness realized in the
final state, but daily appropriated to the elect in regeneration by the power of the Spirit,
even though the faithful undergo no change of nature. Another communion that exists to
the benefit of the elect is logically prior to this second eschatological one (though not
necessarily chronologically) namely the mystical union of all the elect in that they are
united to Christ their head. Regeneration is tied to the first, justification to the second, and
thus logically anterior to the communion of eschatological likeness realized in
regeneration. Vermigli termed this mystical union a middle communion, whose benefits
come by faith, but also working in the sacraments and preaching. As such, Corda notes, it
is of necessity non-spatial, making such notions as the presence of the Incarnate flesh of
Christ in the Eucharist superfluous. Jewel’s theology of communion as it has emerged in
this study can be seen in Martyr’s distinctions, especially his notions of union with Christ,
what effected communion with both Christ and communion with other Christians, and the
dictum that union with Christ is not effected by the Incarnation per se, but is non-spatial,
non-corporal.
(^60) Hilary of Poitiers, De TrinitateVIII.13. ‘Si enim vere Verbum caro factum est, et nos
vere Verbum carnem cibo dominico sumimus, quomodo non naturaliter manere in nobis
existimandus est, qui et naturam carnis nostrae jam inseparabilem sibi homo natus
assumpsit, et naturam carnis suae ad naturam aeternitatis sub sarcamento nobis
communicandae carnis admiscuit.’ As quoted in Harding.