Why did Saint Paul prioritize the identity of Christ's body with the Church over the analogy of the scripture to the Word?

Question

This question comes from a deconstructionist and literary perspective, so it’s not about the transubstantiation of the bread into the Body of Christ by God, but that of the symbols into information by the author.

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Mark 14:22

And as they were eating, he took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body.”

Jesus isn’t a talking pitta bread so this is a symbol. On a basis that God’s symbols are real, not merely true.

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Saint Paul explains the symbol:-

1 Corinthians 12:27

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.

This produces a primary tautology: the body of Christ (the Church) is eating the body of Christ (the Eucharist)

The tautology is virtuous because it sets a boundary to and defines the reader’s inquiry. Which isn’t a rhetorical trick like in Matt Walsh’s ‘What is a Woman?’ or Theresa May’s ‘Brexit-is-Brexit’

What it’s circumscribing is a eucharist that organically bonds us into Christ, realizes our participation in Christian life, unites the Church, and wherein we sustain one another whilst ourselves being nourished by the covenant.

The (non-canonical) Gospel of Thomas put it more concisely:-

[Log.7] Jesus said, "Blessed is the lion that's eaten by a human and then becomes human, but how awful for the human who's eaten by a lion, and the lion becomes human."

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Saint John explains the symbol:-

John 1:14

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us

This produces a secondary analogy (via recursion): the body of Christ is the scripture (because the Word's words are the Word)

The analogy generates information:-

• the scripture is to the Word what our body is to our spirit
• reading the scripture is as vital as eating
• the scripture can’t contradict itself any more than we can swallow two bites at once
• the scripture is a reproducible, non-diminishing good
• the scripture is inspired by God’s breath like Adam is animated by God’s breath
• the scripture should be interpreted communally not in isolation
• the scripture survives dismemberment and deletion, through translation

Any exposition drawn from the analogy might need tidying up or be capable of misinterpretation, or be too hazardous to draw at all - but the analogy itself is virtuous and upheld in ancient and modern liturgy (note below).

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The tautology and the analogy aren’t in conflict or mutually-exclusive, neither is missing from either apostle, neither is the sole point of what Paul or John say, and both can be found in other passages including in the OT - it’s that these are their centres.

The question is from a structural-compositional perspective: why does Paul give the tautology priority over the analogy?

There is a type of answer that “it’s to prioritize the life-of-the-church over the study of the words”, which isn’t what I’m asking about. That’s redundant because the words say not to do it. A productive answer would be something like that the tautology was the best way to limit the analogy from a specific form of misinterpretation.

Was it to head-off contentions against the material world?

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NOTES

re. the analogy in ancient liturgy there is the verbum domini / deo gratias formula

The Apostolic Constitutions (375AD) take the word as including the written word:-

https://archive.org/details/constitutionesa00conggoog/page/n304/mode/2up

Nam quid tibi deest in verbo Dei?

https://archive.org/details/constitutionesa00conggoog/page/n304/mode/2up

μη ἀκουειν των ἀναγιγνωσκοντων - των διδασκοντων τον του Κυριου λογον

Answer 1

The Church as the body of Christ is symbolic in 1 Corinthians 12:12-31. Paul is illustrating the unity in diversity of the members of the Church.

While it is disputed how literal and how symbolic the bread in Eucharist is the actual body of Christ, it is not disputed that Christ in his death gave his literal body as a sacrifice for our sins (1 Cor. 15:3-4).

Your question is only a problem if you take the Church as the literal body of Christ, but the Church as the literal human body of Christ is symbolic and different from Jesus' body during his earthly ministry.

There are multiple symbols for the Church. The Church being the bride of Christ is much more prolific (Matt. 9:15; Mark 2:19-20; Luke 5:34-35; John 3:29; Eph. 5:25-27; Rev. 19-end).

So you only have the problem if you take the Church as the literal body of Christ. But if you do, the Church is not the same body the one Christ sacrificed.

Answer 2

The two tautologies should be placed in order.

John 1:14 (ESV)

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

1 Corinthians 12:27

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.

The first is ὁ λόγος σὰρξ ἐγένετο the Word flesh became. The verb ἐγένετο is in the middle voice, which "denotes that the subject is both an agent of an action and somehow concerned with the action." ¹

The second is ὑμεῖς δέ ἐστε σῶμα Χριστοῦ καὶ μέλη ἐκ μέρους you now are Christ's body and members of it individually. The verb ἐστε is in the active voice, indicating the subject is the doer of the action.

1. Flesh is different from body.
2. The Word becomes flesh and remains involved.
3. The individual believers act to become the body.

If one wants to compare the two, the example is straightforward. The body is made of flesh. The two are not identical: flesh is primary, body is secondary.

What qualifies individual believers who themselves act to become the body of Christ, is the Word who became and remains involved in being flesh.

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_{1. Middle voice.}