A text commonly produced against us by the Romanists for the doctrine of their Mass is from the prophet Malachi 1:11, which reads “For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the LORD of hosts.” (ESV)
The Council of Trent has officially interpreted this text as speaking of the Roman Mass, when it says “And this is indeed that clean oblation which cannot be defiled by any unworthiness or malice on the part of those who offer it; which the Lord foretold by Malachias was to be great among the Gentiles” (Session 22, Chapter 1)
This text is celebrated by the Romanists as proof for their Mass. In this section, I will give a brief explanation of this passage and I will respond to the arguments of Cardinal Bellarmine, with the help of the Anti-Romanorum tracts published at Oxford in the 19th century which also answered the arguments of Bellarmine.
First, incense is to be understood of the prayers of Christians, not material incense. We know according to the ancient writers, that there were many churches that did not have an altar and that did not have incense either. This is shown by a comparison of Psalm 141:2 with Luke 1:9-13, which views incense as a type (or foreshadowing) of prayer. The Romanist implicitly admit this when they cite Revelation 5:8 against us for proof for invocation of the saints in heaven, which says “...full of incense, which are the prayers of the people of God.”
Secondly, a pure offering does not in this text signify a sacrifice, at least not in the sense which the Romanists mean. It more likely means a gift or something of that sort. The same word (מִנְחַת) is used in Isaiah 66:20, which says “And they shall bring all your brothers from all the nations as an offering (מִנְחָ֣ה) to the LORD, on horses and in chariots and in litters and on mules and on dromedaries, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, says the LORD, just as the Israelites bring their grain offering in a clean vessel to the house of the LORD.”
This pure offering is that mentioned by Paul in Romans 15:16 (also in 1 Timothy 2:8) and by the apostle Peter in 1 Peter 2:5.
It makes perfect sense for the Jewish prophets to prophesy to the Jews the “oblation of the Gentiles'' in a way suitable to their understanding of sacrifice, the worship of God, etc. This is common among the OT writers (cf. Isaiah 2:2; Jeremiah 33:18; Zechariah 6:12; Hosea 3:5).
All of these things alone constitute a strong blow to the Romanist argument.
I want to be fair to our Roman Catholic friends, and hear the best arguments that they have against us. Therefore, I will examine each of the arguments used by Cardinal Bellarmine concerning this point of controversy (over Malachi 1:11) in De Missa, book I, Chapter 10.
Argument #1 - “The first argument is taken from the term which the Prophet uses. For he says מנחח minchah without regard to any circumstance, where there are two considerations. Firstly, Scripture does not usually absolutely place a term when it speaks about what is improperly called a sacrifice, but when it is joined to something, such as sacrifice of praise, sacrifice of justice, sacrifice of jubilation, etc., whereas in this passage clean oblation is placed absolutely. Next, this Hebrew term מנחח minchah properly means a certain species of outward sacrifice, which from similar things, was confected with oil and frankincense, as is clear from Leviticus 2:2” (Bellarmine)
I respond by appealing to my points I made above, namely that Isaiah 66:20 speaks of minchah as “offerings'' which do not bear the properties of a “proper sacrifice” (the phrase Bellarmine uses), but rather of a gift or improper spiritual sacrifice. I also noted that the prophets often prophesied about the nature of the New Covenant people of God (their beliefs, worship, etc.) in ways that were familiar to the Jews at that time period.
Argument #2 - “The second argument is taken from the term clean. For the Prophet opposes the clean oblation of the Church to the unclean oblations of the priests of the Jews. This argument can be concluded in two ways. Firstly, from the opinion of our adversaries, that good works which proceed from us are all unclean, since they are sins, and by their nature mortal sins. Therefore, through the oblation which the Holy Spirit calls clean, we should not understand our works, that is, sacrifices improperly so called, but a sacrifice instituted by God, which has its force from God himself and not from us.” (Bellarmine)
Bellarmine misunderstands the Reformed position on the good works of God’s people. While it is true that all outwardly moral actions of unregenerate men are “filthy rags”, the same is not entirely true of the works of believers. Though I want to be clear that even the works of believers do not merit anything before God. Here is what the Westminster Confession of Faith says on this matter:
“Notwithstanding, the persons of believers being accepted through Christ, their good works also are accepted in Him, not as though they were in this life wholly unblamable and unreproveable in God’s sight; but that He, looking upon them in His Son, is pleased to accept and reward that which is sincere, although accompanied with many weaknesses and imperfections.” (Westminster Confession of Faith, 16.6, emphasis mine)
Argument #3 - “The third argument is taken from those words of verse 10, “I shall not receive the offering from your hands, etc.” From here it is gathered that the oblation of the Church is not only clean, but also new, and did not exist before. That clean oblation succeeds the oblations of the Jews which are rejected under the pretext of pollution. Moreover, it would not succeed the old if it was in use together with them; so, it should be a new oblation. And besides, the Prophet distinguishes the sacrifice of the gentiles from the sacrifice of the Jews, and hence speaks about a new sacrifice, and one which was not in use among the Jews. Moreover, it is certain that spiritual sacrifices of prayers, psalms and similar things were all used by the Jews. Consequently, Malachi does not speak about a spiritual sacrifice, but about a sacrifice properly speaking. A sacrifice like this would not exist in the Church if the Eucharist is not a sacrifice properly speaking.” (Bellarmine)
I answer, that the thing which made the sacrifices of the Church distinct from those of the Jews, is that the former are offered up in thanksgiving to God through the merits of the once for all sacrifice of Christ on the cross. This is spoken of in Hebrews 13:15 - “Through Jesus then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.”
Argument #4 - “The fourth argument is taken from the antithesis between contempt and the glory of God, which the Prophet describes in this passage. St. Malachi says that through the Hebrew priests the name of God was scorned and despised; but by the oblation of the gentiles it is glorified. For the Hebrew priests offended God in the public and visible sacrifice, thus the glory of God should come into being among the gentiles even from the public and visible sacrifice. Otherwise there was greater contempt inflicted upon the name of God in the sacrifices of the Jews than glory in the sacrifice of the gentiles, for in the former the contempt would have been inward and outward, private and public; moreover, in the latter glory would only be private and, for the most part, inward” (Bellarmine)
I answer that with all due respect to Bellarmine, this argument is quite ridiculous. I answer with the same response I gave to his second argument, namely that the spiritual sacrifices of Christians are purer than those of the Jews due to their being offered through Christ (Hebrews 13:15).
Argument #5 - “The fifth argument is taken from the antithesis of the priests. Malachi does not oppose all of the people to all Christians, but merely the priests of the Old Law to certain men who properly succeed those priests. Therefore, he does not speak about a spiritual sacrifice; all Christians customarily offer them, rather, about a sacrifice properly speaking, which can be offered only by true priests. Now, the fact that he is speaking only about the priests, and not about all the people, is clear from the words in verse 6, “To you, O priests, who despise my name, etc.” Moreover, the fact that he only opposes the priests to them, but not all the people is clear from the same Prophet. After he says in 1:11, “a clean oblation offered to my name, etc.” he explains in 3:3 who will offer this clean oblation: “He will cleanse the sons of Levi and shall refine them as gold and silver, and they shall offer sacrifices to the Lord in justice.” There, for the sons of Levi, the Levites of the Old Testament cannot be understood, because the Prophet is clearly speaking about the sacrifice of the Christian Church, and the Levitical priests had already been cast out. Next, from the beginning of the chapter, verse 1, we read: “Behold, I send my angel.” The Lord himself explains these words on John the Baptist in Matt. 11:10, and from there we are compelled to understand this whole passage on the arrival of the Lord and the time of the New testament. Nor can all Christians be understood by the sons of Levi, because the sons of Levi were only one part of the people of God, not the whole people; this is why a certain part of the Christian people corresponds to them, not the whole people. And it is confirmed from Isaiah 66:21, where we previously showed the priests are distinguished from the Christian people, when he says, “I shall take priests from them.” So not all the Christian people are properly priests, but certain men taken from them, and hence, there should be a sacrifice, properly speaking, which they alone offer, and not the whole people.”
I answer that the “sons of Levi” mentioned in Malachi 3:3 (the parallel also in Isaiah 66:21, which Bellarmine mentions) may reasonably be interpreted as a reference to those Jewish priests who became Christians, as mentioned in Acts 6:7 or of the ministers of the gospel, who in OT language are called priests. Plus, Bellarmine’s assertion that only a select portion of the Christian people are priests (or “sons of Levi”) is false, in light of 1 Peter 2:5.
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