The Priesthood of Christ, Part 2: A Priest for Others, a Priest Forever, and the Order of Melchizedek (Articles 4-6)

Orientation #

He picks up in the middle of the question on Christ’s priesthood, beginning with article 4 and running through articles 5 and 6 (verified: ST III, q. 22, aa. 4–6). He refers back to article 2 (“everything which is offered to God… can be called a sacrifice”) and forward once, “as will be said below,” on priests partaking as sinners. The previous class had already worked through the earlier articles on Christ’s priesthood.

The class, in order #

1. Article 4, the three objections (“also for himself”) #

Whether the effect of Christ’s priesthood pertains also to himself.

1. It belongs to the priest’s office to pray for the people (2 Maccabees: the priests pray while the sacrifice is consumed); but Christ prayed also for himself — Hebrews 5, “in the days of his flesh he offered prayers and supplications with strong clamour and tears to him who could save him from death.”
2. Christ offered himself in his passion, and by the passion merited not only for others but for himself — his glory, his resurrection.
3. The Old Law priesthood figures Christ’s; but that priest entered the holy place to pray “for himself and for his house and for the whole assembly of the sons of Israel” (Leviticus 16). He adds: all the more of our priesthood.

2. Sed contra and corpus: the fountain of the whole priesthood (“Christ is the fountain of the whole priesthood”) #

Sed contra from the Synod of Ephesus: anathema on anyone saying Christ offered for himself and not for us only, since he needed no sacrifice, knowing no sin. He stresses what the text shows: sacrifice is first of all thought of as for sin — Christ had none, so why offer for himself?

Corpus: a priest is a middle between God and the people, needed by one who cannot of himself approach God; such a one is subject to the priest and partakes of the effect. This does not fit Christ, who “accedes of himself to God, always living to intercede for us.” Reason: the first agent in any genus is outflowing and not receiving in that genus — the sun illuminates but is not illuminated, fire heats but is not heated. “Christ is the fountain of the whole priesthood. That’s a nice expression.” The legal priesthood was its figure, and the priest of the new law acts in persona Christi (2 Corinthians: “if I have given anything, I have done so in the person of Christ”).

Aside: that verse is often translated “in the presence of Christ,” used by Protestants to get rid of the expression that pertains to Catholic priesthood.

3. Reply to the first: prayer is not the priest’s private office (“not, however, their private office”) #

Thomas first offers: prayer, though it belongs to priests, is not their private office — each prays for himself and for others (James 5, “pray for one another that you may be saved”); so Christ’s prayer for himself was not an act of his priesthood. Thomas then seems to exclude that reply, since Hebrews 5 joins “a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek” immediately to “who in the days of his flesh offered prayers.” So instead: other priests partake of the effect not as priests but as sinners. Christ simply had no sin, but had the likeness of sin in the flesh, having the flesh a sinner deserved; so he partook of the effect not simply but secundum quid — hence “to him who was able to save him from death.”

Student: I didn’t get the distinction; it sounds as if he goes back to the first reply. His answer: it doesn’t altogether resolve that, he doesn’t think, but Thomas does hold that prayer is not peculiar to the priest the way offering sacrifice is — a layman (and a woman) cannot offer the Mass, but a layman prays as well as a priest.

4. Digression: in what sense the layman offers sacrifice (“offer sacrifice” — Fatima) #

A student cites article 2: whatever is offered to God so that man’s spirit may be borne into God can be called a sacrifice. Applied to Fatima: the angel told the children to make whatever they do a sacrifice; and Lucia, asked whether Our Lady told them to pray for sinners, said no — she told them to pray for an end of the war, but for sinners she told us to offer sacrifice. His point: sacrifice is something more than prayer. Exchange on the laity at Mass: they really are supposed to offer (offering is an action, not just a petition), but they cannot confect the sacrifice or make it present; they partake of the offering without offering in the same way. Augustine’s “invisible sacrifice” and the Divine Mercy Chaplet (“we offer you the body”) are mentioned, the latter also taught by the angel. Also: Christ instituted the priesthood at the Last Supper, “do this in memory of me” — what makes a priest is that he can offer that. The priest’s further power of judging sins is in view of preparing people for the Eucharist; so is his instructing of the laity.

5. Reply to the second: devotion, not the force of the sacrifice (“from his devotion”) #

In a priest’s offering two things: the sacrifice offered, and the devotion of the one offering. The proper effect of priesthood follows from the sacrifice itself. Christ obtained his own glory not as from the force of the sacrifice offered by way of satisfaction, but from his devotion, by which he humbly sustained the passion out of charity. He recalls that in the treatment of religion the fundamental act is devotion, prayer and sacrifice following. Illustration from another article of Thomas on miracles and faith: charity is the universal principle of merit, but by some other virtue informed by charity you merit this particular thing — the poor in spirit inherit. Hence the Magnificat: not Mary’s charity but “the lowliness of his handmaid,” because humility informed by charity merits exaltation. So here: the humility of the passion merits glorification as particular cause, charity as universal cause.

6. Reply to the third, and the Borromeo aside (“the figure is not able to equal the truth”) #

The figure cannot equal the truth: the legal priest could not reach the perfection of not himself needing a satisfying sacrifice, but Christ did not need one; hence no parity. Hebrews 7: the law constituted men priests having infirmity, but the word of the oath, which is after the law, constitutes a Son perfect forever. Asides on Charles Borromeo (feast recently, November 4), of whose life he says “what a life,” and a letter of Pius X on a centenary of Borromeo. Story: Borromeo wanted a vow of poverty in his institute of parish priests; Philip Neri disagreed and proposed asking a humble friar, who said there should be no such vow. And from the life of Peter Canisius: asked about Borromeo as mediator among bishops and princes, Canisius said he is a very holy man but a little too rough, too harsh for most people.

7. Article 5, objections: does the priesthood remain forever (“the priesthood of Christ is not forever”) #

1. Only those needing expiation need the effect; in eternity there will be none — Isaiah 60, “all my people are just” — and the sinners’ infirmity cannot be expiated, “for in hell there is no redemption” (he quotes Dante’s “abandon all hope, you who enter here”). “That’s a good argument.”
2. Christ’s priesthood is most manifest in his passion and death, entering the holy of holies by his own blood (Hebrews 9); but Romans 6, “Christ rising from the dead dies no more.”
3. Christ is priest as man, but was not man during the three days of his death. Sed contra: Psalm 109, “You are a priest forever.”

8. Corpus and replies of article 5 (“the consummation of the sacrifice”) #

Two things in the office of priesthood: the offering of the sacrifice, and the consummation of the sacrifice, i.e. that those for whom it is offered arrive at its end. The end of Christ’s sacrifice was not temporal goods but eternal ones; hence Hebrews 9 calls him high priest of the good things to come, and by reason of this end the priesthood is called eternal. Prefigured: the legal high priest once a year with the blood of goat and calf entered the holy of holies, though the animals were killed outside; so Christ entered heaven itself and prepared our way by the power of the blood shed on earth. Aside: “There won’t be sacrifices in heaven.” Reply 1: the saints in the fatherland need no further expiation, but being already expiated need to be consummated in Christ, on whom their glory depends — Apocalypse 21, the clarity of God enlightens that city and the Lamb is its lamp. Reply 2: though the passion and death are not repeated, the power of that victim remains forever — Hebrews 10, “by one offering he perfected forever those who are sanctified.” Reply 3 (“through which also is clear the response to the third”): the unity of the offering is figured in the once-a-year entrance; the figure falls short because those victims had no eternal power, and so were repeated yearly.

Student exchange: does Thomas ever continue the argument in the replies like this, dividing the body of the article among them? He has never seen Thomas put an end like it; the passage recurs almost word for word from the corpus; he grants it looks as if the reply explains part of the answer, and says he must think about it more.

9. Digression: is he still my teacher? (“is he anymore my teacher”) #

Prompted by the claim that the priesthood is eternal by reason of its end, he says the argument from authority here is stronger with me, and tests the idea: if I teach you and you now know it, am I still your teacher? He imagines sitting in a course again after getting his A, until the professor says he has nothing more to teach him. Is Monsignor Dionne still his teacher? A student answers by the maxim that the disciple should be like his teacher, and that the effect remains by virtue of the knowledge given. His own parallel: Victor Burke [Berquist’s father — ASR unclear] is no longer generating him, yet remains his father, and the effect of the generation remains. Applied: it is not the sacrifice that continues in heaven — where no Mass is said — but the effect of the sacrifice. Other teachers named: De Koninck, Kasurik [unclear in recording], Sister Aquinas (“Sister Consequence”).

10. Article 6, objections: why “according to the order of Melchizedek” (“Who’s he to be setting the pace for Christ?”) #

1. Christ is the fountain of the whole priesthood and the chief priest; what is chief does not follow another’s order but others follow his.
2. The Old Law priesthood is nearer to Christ’s than what was before the law, and sacraments signify Christ more expressly as they come closer to him; so his priesthood should be named from the legal one.
3. Hebrews 7: king of peace, without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life — which belong only to the Son of God; so he should be called priest of his own order. Sed contra, Psalm 109. He remarks: the strongest argument in theology is the argument from authority — “Scripture has spoken.”

11. Corpus and replies of article 6 (“who offered bread and wine”) #

Corpus: the legal priesthood was a figure far short of Christ’s, since it did not cleanse sins and was not eternal — “not as powerful, and not as long lasting.” The excellence of Christ’s priesthood over the Levitical was figured in Melchizedek’s, who took tithes from Abraham, in whose loins the legal priesthood was itself in a way tithed; hence “according to the order of Melchizedek” names the excellence of the true priesthood over the figurative priesthood of the law. Reply 1: not as to a more chief priest, but as prefiguring the excellence of Christ’s priesthood over the Levites’; Scripture gives Melchizedek no genealogy, no beginning or end, so he stands for the eternal in Christ’s priesthood. Reply 2: two things in Christ’s priesthood — the offering itself, and the partaking of it. As regards the offering, the legal priesthood figured it more expressly by the pouring out of blood, which Melchizedek’s lacked; but as regards partaking of the sacrifice and its effect — where the excellence over the legal priesthood chiefly shows — Melchizedek, who offered bread and wine, figures it more expressly, signifying, as Augustine says, the ecclesiastical unity that partaking of Christ’s sacrifice constitutes. Hence in the new law the true sacrifice is communicated under the species of bread and wine. Illustration he recalls being used: the hard grain rubbed, given the water of baptism, heated with charity, made into one loaf — that is the unity. Reply 3: Melchizedek is said to be without father, mother, genealogy, beginning or end, not because he lacked these but because Scripture does not read them of him; so he is likened to the Son of God, who on earth is without father, in heaven without mother, and without genealogy — “who shall declare his generation?” (Isaiah) — and according to divinity has neither beginning nor end of days.

Closing remark: Thomas, faced with Psalm 109, must defend both the eternity of Christ’s priesthood and its being according to the order of Melchizedek, against all objectors and potential heretics.

Aside (contemporary): the chalice has been withdrawn from the laity because of swine flu, by the bishop’s order; one receives both species by intention; the sign of peace handshake dropped, and hand sanitizer used by priests — “it’s no good for viruses”; in Canada it was customary to have it on the altar before the distribution of communion.

His words #

• “the effect of the priesthood” — what those subject to a priest receive; here, expiation of sin.
• “middle between God and the people” — his rendering of the priest’s definition.
• “the first agent in any genus is outflowing and not receiving in that genus” — the principle grounding Christ’s not receiving priestly effect.
• “Christ is the fountain of the whole priesthood” — flagged by him as “a nice expression”; repeated in a. 6.
• in persona Christi — the new-law priest operates in the person of Christ, not merely “in the presence of.”
• “likeness of sin in the flesh” — Christ had the flesh a sinner deserved, without sin.
• secundum quid — “in a qualified way,” how Christ partook of his priesthood’s effect.
• “devotion” — the fundamental act of religion, distinguished from the force of the sacrifice offered.
• “universal principle of merit” (charity) vs. the particular virtue informed by it (humility).
• “the figure is not able to equal the truth” — the rule governing all Old Law priesthood.
• “consummation of the sacrifice” — those for whom it is offered reaching its end.
• “the good things to come” — Hebrews’ title for Christ as high priest, the eternal end.
• “the power of that victim remains forever” — how the unrepeated passion grounds eternal priesthood.
• decimas / “tithes” — Abraham’s tithe to Melchizedek, in whose loins the legal priesthood was tithed.
• “ecclesiastical unity” — what bread and wine signify, per Augustine.

Texts #

Read in class

• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 22, a. 4 (objections, sed contra from the Synod of Ephesus, corpus, three replies)
• Summa Theologiae III, q. 22, a. 5 (objections, sed contra Ps 109, corpus, replies)
• Summa Theologiae III, q. 22, a. 6 (objections, sed contra, corpus, replies)
• Within these, quoted at length: Hebrews 5, 7, 9, 10; Leviticus 16; Psalm 109:4; Isaiah 60; Romans 6; James 5; 2 Corinthians; Apocalypse 21.

Mentioned

• Summa Theologiae III, q. 22, a. 2 (cited by a student: what can be called a sacrifice)
• Thomas on the virtue of religion (devotion as its fundamental act) (inferred: ST II-II)
• Thomas’s article on miracles and faith
• 2 Maccabees; Luke 1 (Magnificat) (inferred); Matthew 5 (poor in spirit) (inferred)
• Augustine, on the invisible sacrifice and on bread and wine as ecclesiastical unity
• Dante, Inferno (“abandon all hope”) (inferred)
• Pius X, letter for a Borromeo centenary; lives of Charles Borromeo, Philip Neri, Peter Canisius; apparitions at Fatima; the Divine Mercy Chaplet

His questions #

• Christ had no sins — so why would he offer sacrifice for himself? He did not, simply speaking; he partakes of the effect only secundum quid, as having flesh subject to death, which he overcame, meriting resurrection and glorification.
• Does prayer constitute priesthood? No — prayer belongs to everyone; offering the sacrifice of the Mass is what the layman cannot do. (He grants Thomas’s text does not altogether resolve this.)
• When did Christ institute the priesthood? At the Last Supper: “do this in memory of me.”
• Does the layman offer sacrifice at Mass? Yes, he truly offers and offering is an action, but he cannot confect it or make it present; he partakes of the offering without offering in the same way.
• Why does the Magnificat name Mary’s lowliness rather than her charity? Because humility informed by charity is the proper particular cause meriting exaltation; charity is the universal principle of merit.
• Is the priesthood of Christ forever, if the passion is not repeated? Yes: its end is eternal goods, and the power of the one victim remains forever.
• Does Thomas ever continue the body of the article through the replies, as here? Left open — he says he has never seen it and must think about it more.
• Is a man still my teacher when he has nothing more to teach me? He hesitates to deny it: as a father remains father though no longer generating, the effect remains — so in heaven not the sacrifice but its effect endures.
• Why “according to the order of Melchizedek” rather than the legal priesthood? Because Melchizedek figures the excellence of Christ’s priesthood over the Levitical — the tithe, and above all bread and wine, signifying ecclesiastical unity.