Documentation for Pope Gelasius' Denial of Transubstantiation

(I would like to acknowledge that Evangelical Answers has provided much of this material)

Here is an interesting quote from Pope Gelasius concerning the nature of the elements of the bread and wine in the Eucharist:

"The sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, which we receive, is a divine thing, because by it we are made partakers of the divine-nature. Yet the substance or nature of the bread and wine does not cease. And assuredly the image and the similitude of the body and blood of Christ are celebrated in the performance of the mysteries." (De duabus naturis in Christo Adv. Eutychen et Nestorium, this quote from Gelasius is attested in a few different sources: [1] [2] [3] [4])

Latin Text: Quod mysterium a beatae conceptionis exordio sic coepisse sacra scriptura testatur dicendo: Sapientia aedificavit sibi domum, septiformis Spiritus soliditate subnixam, quae incarnationis Christi, per quam efcimur divinae consortes naturae, ministraret alimoniam. Certe sacramenta, quae sumimus, corporis et sanguinis ti divina res est, propter quod et per eadem divinae efficimur consortes naturae; et tamen non desinit substantia vel natura panis et vini.  Et certe imago et similitudo corporis et sanguinis Christi in actione mysteriorum [Schwartz: mystical] celebrantur. Satis ergo nobis evidenter ostenditur hoc nobis in ipso Christo Domino sentiendum, quod in ejus imagine profitemur, celebramus et sumimus: =ut sicut in hanc, scilicet in divinam, transeant sancto Spiritu perficiente substantiam permanentes tamen in suae proprietate naturae; [Schwartz: ut sicut haec licet in diuinam transeant sancto spiritu perficiente substantiam, permanent tamen in suae proprietate naturae] sic illud ipsum mysterium principale, cujus nobis efficientiam virtutemque veraciter repraesentant, ex quibus constat proprie permanentibus, unum Christum, quia integrum verumque, permanere demonstrant. 

This contradicts the definition of transubstantiation given by Rome:

"But in the Eucharist-a supernatural transformation-substantial change occurs without accidental alteration. Thus, the properties of bread and wine continue after consecration, but their essence and substance cease to exist, replaced by the substance of the true and actual Body and Blood of Christ." (Dave Armstrong, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism [Sophia Institute Press; Manchester, NH, 2003], pg. 81)

"If anyone says that in the sacred and holy sacrament of the Eucharist the substance of the bread and wine remains conjointly with the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, and denies that wonderful and singular change of the whole substance of the bread into the body and the whole substance of the wine into the blood, the appearances only of bread and wine remaining, which change the Catholic Church most aptly calls transubstantiation, let him be anathema.” (Council of Trent, Session 13, Canon 2)."

Some Roman Catholic apologists have responded to this clear qutoe from Pope Gelasius by insisting that he is speaking only of the accidents, or outward appearance of the bread and wine. Yet the clear reading of Gelasius is his plain assertion that the substance does not change, which is explicitly contradictory to what the Roman Catholic church teaches today concerning the doctrine of transubstantiation. I yet again commend Evangelical Answers for his extensive research on this issue. He says the following:

"Gelasius is combatting the Monophysite heresy, which asserts that the incarnate Christ has only one nature (divine), not two (one divine and one human). See, for example, the title given to this treatise: De duabus naturis in Christo adversus Eutychem et Nestorium, note that the word nature is a reference to Christ's internal essence or being not His external appearance. Gelasius' refutation of Monophysitism is predicated on the comparison of the bread and wine of the Lord's supper to the incarnate Christ. According to Gelasius, just as the consecrated bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ while still remaining bread and wine (two natures, one divine one earthly), so also the incarnate Christ possesses two natures one divine and one human. If Gelasius is intending the terms "substantia" and "natura" to refer to external appearance rather than internal essence or being then his entire argument is meaningless (the Monophysites did not deny that Christ appeared outwardly as a man)." (https://evangelicalanswers.blogspot.com/2020/12/gelasius-and-transubstantiation.html)

Here are some quotes from patristic scholars, church historians, etc. regarding this quote from Pope Gelasius:

(I give credit once again to Evangelical Answers for pointing out the following quotations)

"Pope St. Gelasius, who, in his treatise De duabus naturis in Christo adversus Eutychen et Nestorium, attempts to prove against the Monophysites that Christ’s human and divine natures preserve their proper essence in the hypostatic union, and in proof of his assertion appeals to the Eucharist. He argues as follows: The sacraments of Christ’s body and blood, which we receive, are certainly a divine thing (divina res est); et tamen esse non desinit substantia vel natura panis et vini. The Eucharist is an image of the Incarnation; now, in the sacred mysteries the eucharistic elements in hanc, scilicet in divinam transeunt, sancto Spiritu perficiente, substantiam, permanentes tamen in suae proprietate naturae; hence, in that chief mystery, of which the Eucharist is the image, and “of which it truly represents to us the efficacy and virtue,” both the human and divine natures preserve their own proper being in the one Christ. In order that this argument may be conclusive, it evidently does not suffice that the minor affirms that the accidents, species and appearances, are preserved in the Eucharist — for the Monophysites did not deny that Jesus Christ appeared externally as a man — it must also be affirmed that the eucharistic elements, once they have been consecrated, even when “they pass into a divine substance,” preserve their proper nature of bread and wine, and that is apparently what Gelasius says: “esse non desinit substantia vel natura panis et vini . . . permanentes tamen in suae proprietate naturae.”" (Joseph Tixeront, History of Dogmas, Volume 3, pgs. 365-66, source) 

"…his identification of the two sacraments, i.e. of the body and of the blood, as one symbolical reality, indicates how far Gelasius’s thought is from what became traditional Western scholastic theology. …Not surprisingly, it has significant points of contact with Augustine’s theology of eucharistic consecration, for, in important matters, Gelasius tends to borrow from the doctrinal expositions of the bishop of Hippo. But in the matter of the sacraments of the body and blood, his teaching is more closely related to that of the Antiochene branch of Eastern eucharistic theology as it had evolved in the context of the fifth century Christological controversies’. It is remarkably similar to that of the orthodox partner in the dialogue of Theodoret’s Eranistes; although there are enough differences to exclude arguing decisively for or against a direct borrowing. (Edward J. Kilmartin, “The Eucharistic Theology of Pope Gelasius I,” Studia Patristica, Vol. XXIX, ed. Elizabeth A. Livingstone, pp. 283-284. Here)

"In his treatise On the Two Natures in Christ a comparison is made between the Incarnation and the Eucharist. Pope Gelasius is there defending against the Eutychians the doctrine of the abiding reality of the human nature of Christ affirmed by the Council of Chalcedon; and he introduces an argument from the Eucharist in much the same way as the Catholic theologian in the Dialogue of Theodoret and the writer of the letter ascribed to St. Chrysostom. The one Person of Christ, he maintains, is abidingly in the two unimpaired natures of manhood and Godhead. In like manner there are in the Eucharist both the body and blood of Christ and the substance and nature of bread and wine." (Darwell Stone, A History of the Doctrine of the Holy Eucharist [London: Longman’s, Green, 1909], pgs. 101-102, source)