Scripture as Real Presence: Sacramental Exegesis in the Early Church

by Hans Boersma

This work argues that the heart of patristic exegesis is the attempt to find the sacramental reality (real presence) of Christ in the Old Testament Scriptures. Leading theologian Hans Boersma discusses numerous sermons and commentaries of the church fathers to show how they regarded Christ as the treasure hidden in the field of the Old Testament and explains that the church today can and should retrieve the sacramental reading of the early church. Combining detailed scholarly insight with clear, compelling prose, this book makes a unique contribution to contemporary interest in theological interpretation.

Genres: Theology, Christian, History, Christianity, Spirituality, Scripture

316 pages, Hardcover

Published March 14, 2017

About the author

I serve in the Saint Benedict Servants of Christ Chair in Ascetical Theology at Nashotah House in Wisconsin—a community of formation marked by the fullness of Anglican faith and practice, Benedictine spirituality, and classical Christian thought and teaching. (If you’re interested in studying at Nashotah House, contact me: hboersma@nashotah.edu). I am a Priest in the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA).

Before coming to Nashotah House in 2019, I taught for fourteen years at Regent College in Vancouver, BC and for six years at Trinity Western University in Langley, BC. I also served several years as a pastor in a Reformed church. I grew up in the Netherlands and have been in Canada since 1983.

My interests range across a variety of areas: patristic theology, twentieth-century Catholic thought, and spiritual interpretation of Scripture. In each of these areas, I am driven by a desire to retrieve the ‘sacramental ontology’ of the pre-modern tradition. So, much of my work looks to the past in hopes of recovering a sacramental mindset. I suppose this makes me a ressourcement (retrieval) theologian of sorts. Retrieval of the Great Tradition’s sacramental ontology has been at the heart of almost all my publications over the past twenty years or so.

Reviews

[Jacob Aitken · Rating 4 out of 5]

Any book by Hans Boersma can function as a master’s level course in whatever subject it addresses. That’s not to say I agree with everything he says. That only highlights his skill as a teacher: he forces you to think through the implications of an issue.

This book isn’t simply about allegorical exegesis. It isn’t about typology, either. In fact, Boersma strongly resists the urge to conflate the two. Rather, it is about seeing the mystery of Christ is already present in the Old Testament (Boersma xv).

While I certainly hold to a Patristic metaphysics, such as it is, I am uncomfortable with some of their interpretive moves. Very few of them had any working knowledge of Hebrew. Still, the thrust of it is true. Christ is present in the OT. Unless we want that to be a cliche, we need to see how.

Case study: Would Paul’s exegesis in Galatians pass a seminary exam?

Metaphysics and Hermeneutics

Boersma notes that one’s metaphysics and one’s interpretation are linked.

Origen: the earthly scene contains patterns (exemplaria) of the heavenly things. They teach us to mount up (ascendere). “We contemplate heavenly things by means of their forms and likenesses as they appear in visible things. It is by means of actual things and copies (rebus ipsis et exemplis) that we can move on to heaven itself” (10).

We can ascend precisely because heavenly realities are related to particulars. We always brings a metaphysics to our hermeneutics. In this chapter Boersma contrasts the metaphysics of Origen (and most of the fathers) with those of Hobbes and Spinoza.

Some notes on Typology

Type and archetype are anchored in God’s eternal providence. Both participate in God’s foreknowledge (24).

Chapter 2 explores how Gregory of Nyssa and Augustine interpreted Genesis with an eye towards a literal interpretation. It’s important in the sense that those who don’t know Patristics will say the Fathers (or Boersma) shunned a literal reading. They didn’t. Still, some of their conclusions are….odd. I am only going to highlight some key aspects of Gregory’s reading as they relate to his overall metaphysics.

On the Making of Man

Genesis 1:27. The first part of the verse refers to the universal essence of man (which Boersma elsewhere argued that “man” is God’s foreknowledge of the fullness of all human beings at the end time (Boersma 32). This culminates in the eschaton. This lets Gregory take Galatians 3:28 in the following: since there is no male or female in Christ, and Christ is the universal, the prototype, the image of God, then the universal man is neither male or female.

Strong stuff, and we will take issue with it later. The main problem is that Genesis 1:28 implies that sexual activity will take place regardless of the fall.

Ancient readers relished verbal associations in the text (39). Phrases like “tree of Life” or “Wisdom” were “trigger-loaded.” This is like a non-Satanic version of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (how it should have been, before it was corrupted by the Deep State).

A Harmonious Reading of the Psalms

The church fathers saw a direct, almost physical analogy between the harmony of music, which represented an almost mathematical metaphysics, and the harmony of the Psalms. As Boersma notes, “Music, therefore, has the ability to make one grow in virtue and heal the emotions; music tunes people and makes them more harmonious” (132).

Ancient man knew that music was based on objective laws. Musical pitches are related by simple mathematical ratios of whole numbers (136). Plato noted “that God created the intellectual reality of the world soul with proportions of double intervals (1, 2, 4, 8) and of triple intervals (1, 3, 9, 27)….separating a portion of the whole and then doubling and tripling it, so as to arrive at a series of seven terms (1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 9, 27)” (136). This means the cosmos was created at harmonious intervals.

Music, therefore, participates in this cosmic order. The church fathers were keen on this. The Word of God even recapitulated the great musician himself: “The Word of God introduces something altogether new; he is the New Song, whose music, like that of David, chases the demons and heals us of our wickedness” (140).

If the Psalms are true music, and if music represents a rational cosmic order, then singing (chanting) and living these psalms puts us “in line with the order of the universe” (142).

Gregory of Nyssa and the Skopos of the Psalter

The aim of the Psalter is the blessedness of the virtuous life (154). From here Gregory traces an ascent (anabasis) to that goal. This blessedness will imitate the harmony of the universe. Psalm 42:1 forms the second part of the Psalter and it mentions the soul that thirsts for God. Psalm 73 describes the one who is now able to discern justice and “participate in divine judgment” (155). In Psalm 90 we approach the boundary between divine and human natures. The climax arrives on a mountain peak in Psalm 107. It is the recapitulation of human salvation.

Boersma suggests that a sacramental reading of the text (Proverbs 8) allows us to overcome the impasse between Nicene and Arian readings of the text. When Wisdom said “God created me at the beginning of all his works,” does this mean that Christ was created? That seems to be what the text says, but that can’t be right.

A huge portion of the problem is the lack of Hebrew knowledge, since qana doesn’t mean creation ex nihilo. Gregory of Nyssa was aware of this but he really didn’t utilize it (not that anyone would have cared). Of course I side with the Nicenes, but neither side did a great job in this debate. More to the point, however, are the moves that Boersma makes that allows us to participate in a sacramental reading.

Athanasius in reading a text seeks three elements: time, person, and purpose. This allows him to make distinctions between economy and Trinity. Therefore, Christ’s creation is linked in the economy of salvation (172).

Song of Songs

Of course the Fathers read it in a non-literal sense, but not for the reasons you think. The material sexuality in the Song is very real. If it weren’t, it could function as a participatory link to the spiritual realities. You have to have both. And unlike some “spiritualizing” or “allegorizing” tendencies, the Fathers took their starting point in the nuptial passages from God’s dealing with Israel (190).

That’s a really good approach to the book. Granted, some of the details are a bit fancy (but no less arbitrary than how we explain away the literal in biblical prophecy).

[Joey Rasmussen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Boersma maintains that patristic allegorical exegesis is still vital for the church today. He masterfully showed through the presentation of many homilies and writings of the church fathers, primarily in the Old Testament, that the sacramental presence of Christ ought to be seen throughout the whole Bible. He makes a very convincing case against the modern historical-grammatical exegesis and points us to exegete christologically and allegorically because of the reality of Christ’s resurrection. When we get so caught up in determining what the “authorial intent” was of a passage, we miss the real presence of Jesus.

[Collin Lewis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow. Thought provoking! Though I did not agree with everything the church fathers do with patristic exegesis, this book and Carters book on the great tradition have helped shaped my view of biblical interpretation that culminates in Christ. It was so fascinating to analyze how the church fathers did their exegesis and see the conclusions they came to. They capture an interpretation of Scripture that I feel like I have been slowly crawling towards.

I want to read more Boersma now

[Josh Oliver · Rating 4 out of 5]

this was a recommendation for patristic exegetical exposure alongside Danielou’s “From Shadows to Reality.” Both are excellent. FSTR , as far as I can recall, was less concerned with showing a pattern to follow. It was more a walk through of key types from different Fathers and the way they interpreted each. Boersma does this as well, but his steady concern is to show how a Christian Platonist Metaphysics and Ontology can successfully undergird a retrieval of a Patristic hermeneutic. In other words, Boersma is more polemically charger— which I found helpful as someone somewhat new to this way of engaging Scripture.

That said, this is readable, interesting , and most importantly a strong case for reading scripture with the Fathers. Recommend !

[Dan Glover · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a text for a course I took on Patristic Exegesis with Hans Boersma. It is a very good study on the way many of the church fathers handled scriptural interpretation. If one reads this book on its own it may sound like Boersma agrees entirely with their handling of Scripture. This is because this is not so much a book of judgement and criticism as observation, understanding and sympathy. While Boersma does not personally agree with the every instance of the Fathers' handling of Scripture, he does help the reader understand that their interpretation is not arbitrary, nor is not done out of a lack of care for what the text actually says. Rather, they read Scripture in a participatory and sacramental frame of understanding, something which Boersma unpacks and helps the modern reader understand. Highly recommended.

[Ted · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked the book very much in its presentation of how the Fathers approached Scripture. If one knows a little bit about the Bible and about Church history, this is a great exploration of how the Fathers used the scriptures and interpreted them.

[Clayton Hashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great introduction to patristic and sacramental readings of the Bible. I was most struck by the book’s argument for spiritual interpretation and exegesis rather than scientific/historical methods. It is not the singular authorial intent that we must strive to find. Rather, we can expect to find Christological sacraments in every passage we read because of DIVINE authorial intent. Most of all, this book made me want to read Origen, Augustine, Gregory etc on their own terms, which I’m sure the author would agree is a valid conclusion to draw from his book.

Quotes:
- the christological reality of the sacrament displays the very character of God, we may expect biblical meaning to be infinite in its possibilities. To retrieve the sacramental exegesis of the church fathers, therefore, is to open ourselves to the infinite mystery of meaning that God invites us to explore in Christ.”
- “Origen beautifully highlights the importance of the contemplative life, of the vision of God as the sacramental aim of Abraham's hospitality, and Chrysostom rightly emphasizes that we dare not circumvent the embodied, sacramental grounding of the active life.”
- “We often think of biblical exegesis as lying within the purview of the academy and of liturgy as the domain of the church; not so the church fathers. For them, the way we read the Bible has everything to do with how it functions in the church. Exodus 12, for Melito and Origen, speaks not just of historical realities of long ago; it speaks of the liturgical gathering of the church as well as of the confession that the church holds dear.”
- “they read the text on a literal level only and by doing so fall into the trap of a carnal reading of the Old Testament Scriptures. Both problems with which Origen struggles-that of an overly literal reading of the text and that of religious violence are issues we face today as well. Historical readings of Scripture, when they are solely concerned with authorial intent, are unable to overcome the postmodern accusation against the Christian faith, namely, that it has served and continues to serve as an instrument of violence. Modern exegetes who advocate a strictly literal reading of the text are faced with a stark choice: to justify the violence inherent in the Old Testament or to abandon the Old Testament as Christian Scripture. Since either option seems to me detrimental to the church, I suggest that a serious look at the third-century exegesis of Origen is well worth our while.”
- “But if we ask which neglect is more serious, the nearly wholesale neglect of spiritual levels of interpretation in a great deal of modern historical exegesis or the occasional neglect of history in Origen and other practitioners of allegorical exegesis, the answer seems to me fairly evident.”
- “The modern restriction of exegesis to a search for the intent of the human author tends to limit our horizons of interpretation to this-worldly realities. In such an interpretive context, it is difficult to draw out the Spirit's overarching intentions within the text. My hunch is that if we were to expand our attention beyond this-worldly realities and acknowledge the Spirit's providential guidance in the authorship and the interpretation of Holy Scripture, we would likely also regain confidence in identifying the presence of Christ in the Old Testament.”
- “When early Christians sang their psalms, they enjoyed the beauty of Christ. When early Christians read their psalms, they learned the truth of Christ. And when early Christians lived their psalms, they participated in the virtue of Christ. In each of these ways, they joined the perfect harmony of a new song.”
- “If any hermeneutical rule can be deduced from the fourth-century battles over the meaning of Proverbs 8, it would seem to be that Ockham's razor is a dangerous tool in exegesis: by excising the sacramental depth from the treasure of the biblical text, it can sever its devotees from the Old Testament roots of trinitarian orthodoxy and ultimately from the theological foundations of the Nicene church.”
- “Then again, perhaps this is how Luke wants us to understand exegesis: not as a historical reconstruction of the precise original intent of the biblical author but as an uncovering of the God-given christological contents of the "good news about Jesus" in any given biblical passage that we're trying to understand.”
- “prophecy is more than just an advance announcement of a future event. They believed instead that the future event was Christ himself and that this climactic historical event retroactively shaped every event in sacred history that preceded it.

[Ben Smitthimedhin · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Since the christological reality of the sacrament displays the very character of God, we may expect biblical meaning to be infinite in its possibilities. To retrieve the sacramental exegesis of the church fathers, therefore, is to open ourselves to the infinite mystery of the meaning that God invites us to explore."

I've never understood allegorical reading since I took a bunch of Bible & theology classes from a fundamentalist-baptist university. We were taught that the text had one meaning: whatever the original audience heard in their original context. Any other interpretation was a form of eisegesis, deviating us from the true meaning of the text.
Greek, Hebrew, and other books on ancient near eastern culture and the Greco-Roman world are primary tools for mining this one true meaning.

So you could imagine my skepticism with Boersma's project: ressourcement theology, a retrieval of what he calls a "sacramental" reading of scripture, drawing from the church fathers and their allerogical exegesis. I was already learning about the authority of church tradition in interpreting Scripture, how sola scriptura doesn't actually work in real life and all that, which left me as crippled protestant. But the Church Fathers seriously believed that the Bible was the church's book, that this meant that the "meaning of the text" needed to be transformed (it doesn't matter what it meant for Israel because it's about the church), that they used the creed and confessions about Christ as the starting point-- their theology directed the text! Shamelessly eisegeting! Essentially, they could do whatever they want with it as long as it matched what the apostles taught about Christ. Reading Proverbs christologically? Who does that?

And the book is so convincing. It makes sense. But I can't take these church fathers seriously because intuitively, I feel they are "twisting" the text, being disrespectful to the text, etc. And at the same time, I get that the church owns the Scriptures -- they have every right to do this. But the cognitive dissonance remains.

My only complaint is that Boersma focuses so much on Gregory of Nyssa & Origen's interpretations of the text rather than drawing from a range of patristic exegetes. I understand that Origen's interpretations are really out there and provides a good contrast to historical-critical exegetes. Gregory is also pretty esoteric himself. But they're featured in almost every chapter and I wish I could've read more of Anselm, Ambrose, Tertullian, Polycarp, etc.

[Santiago Fajardo · Rating 3 out of 5]

An enjoyable read (although it seems to lag a bit toward chapters 4 and 5), and a valuable resource that gives introductory exposure to patristic exegesis and foundational insight into its reasonings and methods. In short, it clears the path for us to understand why sacramental (or allegorical) interpretation of Scripture is not an ancient practice of our forefathers and mothers of which to be afraid or ashamed but a exercise of baptismal vision and prophetic witness. Recommended as a starting place for one interested in understanding patristic exegesis or someone dissatisfied with modern, historical biblical hermeneutics.

[Ben Taylor · Rating 3 out of 5]

A formative book for me no doubt, my first forray into sacramental exegisis of Scripture. Undeniable witness of the church fathers' consistent and unashamed interpretation of the OT as containing the very presence of Jesus. I have a lot to think about moving forward, not the least of which is the weight of the earliest Christian voices upon my own interpretational process.

[Donnie DeBord · Rating 4 out of 5]

Christologically Metaphysics in hermeneutics.

Boersma gives a good presentation of the philosophical background in Patristic exegesis and theological interpretation of Scripture. He then moves to specific areas in which this philosophy is examined in the Patristic works.

[JP · Rating 4 out of 5]

I start my review with a quote from the book "it is possible to point to a growing conviction, not only among dogmatic theologians but also among biblical scholars, that exegesis is not primarily historical endeavour and that it first of all asks about the subject of the text - that is to say, about God and our relationship to him." p.277.

I would highly recommend this book to someone who has either a background in Biblical studies or has done exegesis extensively. This book makes the case compellingly that the grammatical-historical method need not be our only method for doing exegesis. The book makes a strong case for theological interpretation of Scripture that sees Christ as the treasure hidden in the field which we are to find through a sacramental reading of Scripture. The author believes sacramental reading can bring new life into the Church again and I find myself agreeing with him. I look forward to learning more about theological interpretation and how I can incorporate it into my own life and discipleship.

[Matthias · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was awesome; I could learn so much. Hans Boersma tries – and I think successfully – to prove that the Church Fathers read the Old Testament sacramentally. That means Christ is the focal point. With a Neo-Platonic perspective (everything in this world has its image in the ideal world, which is Christ), they are reading the Old Testament entirely through Christ. The accusation that they do not read the Bible historically is also a subject of the book – and the conclusion is that this is not true. I profited a lot from the book and can recommend it.

[Jordan Combs · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once again, Boersma challenged and changed my perspective on an important issue. This book has caused me to read scripture entirely differently. His task of resourcing the ontology, theology, and hermeneutics of the patristics is not an easy one, but his work has been incredibly important to me. I highly suggest this book and anything he writes!

[Jeff · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a tough book to read, partially because of its academic nature, but also because it wasn't quite the book I was expecting. Even so, I've come away from this book with a good understanding of a sacramental reading of Scripture and an appreciation for its place in hermeneutics.

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best book I’ve read on biblical exegesis and explains, in part, my puzzlement with much contemporary exegesis. Highly recommend for those interested in exegesis and/or the recovery of the Church Fathers.

[Jarrod Dillon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mostly good

The first three chapters changed how I looked at Scripture. The rest of the chapters bored me to tears. Worth getting.

[Christopher Hall · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great introduction on how the Church Fathers read Scripture and how Christ is present in the reading.

[Tynan Brooks]

Interesting approach to patristic exegesis as fundamentally sacramental.

[Richard Lawrence · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent book, though it upset my reformed sensibilities in places... I am convinced by the basic premise that as moderns we should learn from the Early Church impulse to see Christ in all of scriptures and in fact to see our encounter with scripture as a metaphysically Real encounter with Christ.

2nd read through: it's really helpful seeing a wide range of patristic exegetes trying to do the same basic thing - find Christ in all the scriptures and treat scripture as a real encounter with God not a mere historical artefact. I think Boersma is also right to argue that modern "historical" exegesis is fundamentally MORE subjective and less consistent than pre-modern approaches.

PS Origin doesn't deserve his bad reputation.