The Lord's Supper in the Theology of Martin Chemnitz Bjarne - Logia

0 | The Lord’s Supper
give heed to what someone before us thought should be done, but to
what He, who is before all, did’ “ (Ex 2, 312).
45 For Chemnitz this means that since every dogma of the church has
its own foundation in certain texts of Scripture where each is clearly
explained, we, to find the true meaning of each doctrine, should
diligently make an accurate study of these texts (LS 31). This means
that Scripture interprets Scripture. It is true that in some passages
the dogmas are not clearly set forth or only touched on in passing.
“Therefore, if we are to interpret passages of this kind correctly, we
must seek an analogy from other passages in which the dogmas have
their own proper foundation and deal with them according to this
explanation” (LS 32). In passages where “dogmas are set forth under
a kind of cover of rather obscure words or are presented in the polished
form of figures of speech,” Chemnitz holds that “in interpreting
such passages it is sufficient to hold to the meaning which is in
keeping with the other clear and appropriate passages of Scripture”
(LS 32). If we do not follow this rule, “all dogmas can be overturned
and destroyed” (LS 32).
46 This distorting of the clear texts and then going to obscure texts
for an entirely different doctrine has been the historic method of the
heterodox. Pelagius departed from the natural meanings of Rom.
5:12, where the dogma of original sin is treated in its own proper setting.
The Papalists, to justify their doctrine of justification, turn to
texts which seem to speak of works, but “try to evade the perfectly
clear passages in regard to justification in the Epistles to the Romans
and the Galatians, where the doctrine of justification has its foundation”
(LS 33). And at least one Sacramentarian, Victorinus, confesses
that with regard to the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper he is “with his
right eye looking at the religion of all times and with his left at the
words of the Supper” (LS 32).
47 The doctrine of the Lord’s Supper is to be sought in the Words
of Institution, for “it is beyond controversy that the correct belief
concerning the Lord’s Supper has its own particular foundation and
its own basis in the Words of Institution” (LS 31). This must be so
because “these are the words of the last will and testament not of a
mere man but of the very Son of God” (LS 26). The question in the
entire controversy that surrounds the sacrament “concerns the words
of the last will and testament of the Son of God” (LS 43). We should