# Scott Hahn: Understanding the Eucharist



## KMBorg

I've been a member here for five years but am finally coming out of the woodwork to post a question. I'm a pastor (well, pastor-elect) in Winchester, KS and have been making connections with some near-by communities. One of the communities has a strong RC presence and they're aggressive evangelists relying a lot on Scott Hahn's teaching of the Eucharist. I understand some of the major problems with him (e.g. conflating sign and the thing signified, a typology that terminates in the church and not Christ, etc). But I'm wondering if anyone has seen a direct response to Hahn's Eucharist theology from a Reformed perspective and, in particular, a BT response. If you're not familiar with his particular take on it, a link is posted below (be warned: there is a second commandment violation in the video). 

Understanding the Eucharist by Scott Hahn - YouTube


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## Craig.Scott

KMBorg said:


> I've been a member here for five years but am finally coming out of the woodwork to post a question. I'm a pastor (well, pastor-elect) in Winchester, KS and have been making connections with some near-by communities. One of the communities has a strong RC presence and they're aggressive evangelists relying a lot on Scott Hahn's teaching of the Eucharist. I understand some of the major problems with him (e.g. conflating sign and the thing signified, a typology that terminates in the church and not Christ, etc). But I'm wondering if anyone has seen a direct response to Hahn's Eucharist theology from a Reformed perspective and, in particular, a BT response. If you're not familiar with his particular take on it, a link is posted below (be warned: there is a second commandment violation in the video).
> 
> Understanding the Eucharist by Scott Hahn - YouTube



Good to have you Kyle.

I'm sure James White has answered this before. I will try checking out the library for some DL's.




In Christ


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## KMBorg

To my knowledge Scott Hahn has stayed above the fray...I don't think White has interacted with him.


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## Semper Fidelis

KMBorg said:


> To my knowledge Scott Hahn has stayed above the fray...I don't think White has interacted with him.



Not true. He's taken apart his theology along with others at what he aptly titles Called to Confusion. I'm sure some will weigh in here (and I'l try to take a look at it later but James would be a good person to call on this.

It should be noted that Hahn cannot put forth any new arguments. He has no magisterial authority. The standard objections to RCC theology within the Reformed tradition stand. The irony is that people like Hahn want to claim that the Pope and the teaching of the Magisterium is all we need but then try to make new, "Scriptural" or philosophical arguments from their own person. The individual approach to theology is what they claim Protestants ought to reject but then engage in it in order to establish the truth of their position.


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## RamistThomist

Semper Fidelis said:


> KMBorg said:
> 
> 
> 
> To my knowledge Scott Hahn has stayed above the fray...I don't think White has interacted with him.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Not true. He's taken apart his theology along with others at what he aptly titles Called to Confusion. I'm sure some will weigh in here (and I'l try to take a look at it later but James would be a good person to call on this.
> 
> It should be noted that Hahn cannot put forth any new arguments. He has no magisterial authority. The standard objections to RCC theology within the Reformed tradition stand. The irony is that people like Hahn want to claim that the Pope and the teaching of the Magisterium is all we need but then try to make new, "Scriptural" or philosophical arguments from their own person. The individual approach to theology is what they claim Protestants ought to reject but then engage in it in order to establish the truth of their position.
Click to expand...


To footnote what Mr L. said: At the end of the day Hahn has to be a good Catholic and accept Romanist teaching on the Supper. If the standard Protestatn responses to Rome are valid on this point, as I believe they are, and if Hahn, despite his "BT" arguments, concurs with this position, then they necessarily apply to Hahn as well.


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## Hamalas

Dummy question: what do y'all mean by "BT" here?


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## Rangerus

Hamalas said:


> Dummy question: what do y'all mean by "BT" here?



bacon-tomato


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## KevinInReno

I do know (not by reading it) his new teaching "the 4th cup" deals with sort of an invented perspective on Jesus words "It is finished".

I have heard some pretty orthodox Roman Catholics actually criticize it: Here he explains it in his own words: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzaiwqsDAm8

In an hour I will have listened to this link myself.


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## RamistThomist

"Biblical Theology"

Forming doctrines views based off of narrative and typological readings. Not all of it is wrong but a lot of it depends upon the imaginative powers of the individual in question.


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## Semper Fidelis

Cameronian said:


> "Biblical Theology"
> 
> Forming doctrines views based off of narrative and typological readings. Not all of it is wrong but a lot of it depends upon the imaginative powers of the individual in question.



The funny thing about Hahn (or even the most recent apostate Stellman). They criticize Protestant theology because it leads to division. The Pope solves the problem of disunity because the Magisterium defines doctrines with clarity so there is no longer any question as to what the Scriptures teach. Attempts by Protestant exegetes to go to the Bible to determine what it teaches based on the rules of exegesis cannot form the basis for doctrine - only the Magesterial interpretation of them.

Thus they leave the Protestant Church to the certainty of Rome. Then when they get there everyone hails them for their ability to handle the Scriptures. My what exegetical skills you have. Wow, look how he can read the Greek and the Hebrew. Look at his muscular Biblical Theology. Of course these are all skills taught them by Reformed Seminaries. They were instruments trained into them for the purpose of serving the Sovereign that have now been turned against the Lord in service of Rome.

The party spirit of those who are just happy to have these guys on their side blinds many from the irony that what these men have rejected (people outside the approved Magisterium coming to conclusions about the Scripture using the tools of exegesis and hermeneutics) is exactly what these men engage in.

At the end of the day, these men were never really Reformed and they're not really Roman Catholic. They're independent spirits. When they were Reformed, they appreciated the tools that the Reformed Church gave them because they could use them to develop their ideas in independent study. They didn't receive the Scriptures, together with the Church, by the illumination of the Spirit. Rather, they received academic instruction in techniques that they could employ to whatever end they desired. In fact, their criticism of the "independent spirit" of the Reformed faith is a canard but they see it as valid because it was their personal experience of the matter. It wasn't the Reformed faith but their own person that was independent and schismatic.

Now that they're in the Roman Catholic Church, they're not at cognitive rest simply to fade away into the rest that the RCC provides in having dogmatically defined everything. No, they're still enamored with their own abilities to think independently and to use the tools of their learning. They want to teach people how to arrive at Roman dogma through their Biblical-theological formulations. They want to, by their own authority, hang out a shingle to declare themselves "teacher". At the end of the day, however, they don't speak for Rome. They're not content with this, however, because theology is about their autonomous reason and Rome fits (for now) with what they believe. If their autonomous thinking on the matter shifts then they' maintain the personal right to claim that even the exalted RCC has left the roots of true Christianity. This is the trajectory that other apostates have taken where they personally decide what Scripture and tradition are and that the RCC is no longer in that stream. 

Thus, this species of apostate that goes to the RCC, is neither Reformed nor Roman Catholic. They are independents and schismatics whose views happen to align with Rome for the time being.


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