Corporis et Sanguinis Christi and Buddhist Teaching of Alobha

Following the Trinity Sunday, which comes after the Pentecost Sunday, we celebrate the feast of Corpus Christi. In fact, we celebrate not only Corpus Christi (the Body of Christ) but also Sanguinis Christi (the Blood of Christ – Corporis et Sanguinis Christi.

Corpus Christi Sunday really focuses on the Sacrament of the Eucharist, as Eucharistic adoration marks an important part of this celebration.

For Cycle B year, the Liturgy of the Word for Corpus Christi Sunday takes us back to the Last Supper, as the Gospel reading (Mark 14:12-16, 22-26) describes Jesus instituting the Sacrament of the Eucharist.

 Though the Sacrament of the Eucharist was instituted by Jesus during the Last Supper, which is remembered on Holy Thursday, the Gospel reading (John 13:1-15 for Cycles A,B,C) for Holy Thursday is about Jesus washing the disciple’s feet.  There is no mentioning about the bread and the wine Jesus shared with the disciples in this Gospel narrative from John.

John’s Gospel does not describe how Jesus and the disciples ate the supper, while the Synoptic Gospels  (Matthew, Mark, Luke) do not describe feet washing and Jesus’ discourse. In fact, John’s Gospel does not even connect the Last Supper to Passover, while the Synoptic Gospels do, because the death of Jesus on Friday took place before the Passover sundown.  In contrast, the Synaptic Gospel narratives describe the Last Supper as Passover Seder dinner, and Jesus died after Passover, as the Feast of the Unleavened Bread already started.

This difference resulted from the different focuses of John’s Gospel and the Synoptic Gospels in regard to the Last Supper and the death of Jesus.  John’s Gospel treats the death of Jesus as the Passover sacrifice lamb and emphasized on Jesus washing the disciples feet and giving the lengthy discourse to the disciples.  The Last Supper discourse of Jesus includes Mandatum Novum (the New Commandment) to love one another (i.e. John 13:34). On the other hand,  the Synoptic Gospels solely focus on how Jesus broke the bread, described it as his body, and commanded to eat in his memory – then, how Jesus pass the chalice of wine, identified the wine as his blood of the new covenant and asked the disciples to drink it in his memory.  Both Matthew’s Gospel and Mark’s Gospel describe that Jesus asked the disciples to eat the bread as his body and drink the wine from the chalice as his blood in his memory until the eschatological time of his reunion with them in the new Kingdom (Matthew 26:29,Mark 14:25).

My thought is that Corpus Christi Sunday Gospel reading for Cycle B (Mark 14:12-16, 22-26) compliments the Gospel reading for Holy Thursday (Maundy Thursday) (John 13:1-15).  Because  the Gospel reading for Corpus Christi Sunday is taken from Jesus’ bread discourse in John 6 (John 6:51-58) for Cycle A and from Luke’s narrative of Jesus feeding hungry five thousand (Luke 9:11-17) for Cycle C, these Gospel narratives further compliment the Gospel reading for Holy Thursday and Cycle B’s Corpus Christi Gospel reading on the institution of the Eucharist.

If you read the Gospel reading for Corpus Christi Sunday for Cycle B (Mark 14:12-16, 22-26), together with Corpus Christi Sunday Gospel readings for Cycle A (John 6:51-58) and for Cycle C (Luke 9:10-17), as well as the Gospel reading for Holy Thursday (John 13:1-15), you  can have a more comprehensive view on Corpus Christi – only  the Gospel readings for Cycle B (Mark 14:12-16, 22-26)  and for Cycle A (John 6:51-58) mention Sanguinis Christi . Only Cycle B Gospel reading for Corpus Christi Sunday (Mark 14:12-16, 22-26) reflects the Last Supper.

In fact, the Corpus Christi Sunday Gospel reading for Cycle A (John 6:51-58) alludes to Jesus’ institution of the Sacrament of the Eucharist, as read in the Gospel reading for Corpus Christi Sunday in Cycle B (Mark 14:12-16, 22-26).

It is also helpful and interesting to note that Jesus’ bread discourse (John 6:25-59), which includes the Cycle A Corpus Christi Sunday Gospel reading (John 6:51-58), took place shortly after feeding the hungry five thousand on the other side of the Sea of Galilee (John 6:1-15). Not to mention, Luke’s description of the same event (Luke 9:10-17) is used for the Gospel reading for Cycle C Corpus Christi Sunday.  So, it is important to connect Jesus’ miraculous feeding of hungry five thousand men (Luke 10:10-17; John 6:1-15; Matthew 14:31-21 (cf. Matthew 15:32-38); Mark 6:32-44) to the Last Supper (Mark 14:12-26; Matthew 26:17-30; Luke 22:7-23; John 13:1-17:26) and Jesus’ bread of life discourse (John 6:25-59).

First, Jesus miraculously fed the hungry five thousand men out of five loaves of bread and two fish out of his compassion.  The bread and fish were offered to Jesus to do this miraculous act of compassion.  This echoes the offering of bread and wine for consecration at the altar during the Liturgy of the Eucharist at Mass.  Furthermore, the fact that Jesus looked up to heaven, gave thanks and broke the bread to distribute it to the five thousand men parallels how Jesus took the bread, gave thanks, and broke it to distribute to the disciples at the Last Supper, is reflected on  the way the presiding priest takes the offered bread at the altar, raises it as he looks up, and gives thanks in proclaiming as Jesus did, “Take this, all of you, and eat of it, for this is my body, which is given up for you”, during the Eucharistic prayer at Mass.  In the Liturgy of the Eucharist, following the epiclesis, the offered bread on the altar has become transubstantiated through epiclesis by the time the priest fishes citing Jesus’ words of proclaiming it as his body.  This is ex opere operato for the bread and the wine to become the Body and the Blood of Christ, as the Sacrament of the Eucharist.

When Jesus miraculously fed the hungry five thousand, there was no indication to connect the bread to his body. The crowd had no idea what their miraculous experience with Jesus would entail to. But, they thought Jesus was a prophet to have demonstrated such a miraculous sign as feeding the five thousand out of only five loaves of bread and two fish. Furthermore, they were thinking to force Jesus to become their king, and Jesus had to withdraw himself from them because of this situation with the crowd he fed (John 6:15).

Later that evening, the disciple got on a boat, while Jesus was still on the mountain, where he withdraw from the crowd, and began to cross the Sea of Galilee to Capernaum. It was when the weather became stormy and terrified the disciples. Then, they saw Jesus walking on the water toward their boat. Next day, the crowds fed by Jesus chased him all the way to Capernaum and found him.

It was to this crowd, who kept chasing Jesus upon being miraculously fed, that Jesus addressed the bread of life discourse and began it with these words:

I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval (John 6:26-27).

Through his bread of life discourse (John 6:25-59), Jesus wanted the crowds to focus on the spiritual aspects of the bread given by him, rather than its material quality. As this opening statement of Jesus’ bread of life discourse shows, Jesus had to teach, what is understood as the spiritual discipline of detachment in Buddhism, to this crowds, who seemed obsessed with Jesus, who feeds miraculously.

Jesus knew that the crowds would go through vicious cycle of hunger, if their focus remains on physical or material aspects of the bread. Clearly, Jesus’ messianic and salvific mission on earth is not to keep feeding the hungry in this vicious cycle of hunger. In fact, his mission is to liberate us all from this vicious cycle of hunger, as well as the cycle of thirst, which is due to our attachment to material or physical aspect of the source of our sustenance.  The bread and the wine, consecrated and transubstantiated as Corporis et Sanguinis Christi and as the Sacrament of the Eucharist, are Jesus’ way to help us fee ourselves from our tendency to sustain ourselves only materialistically and earthly. This way, we can break free from the vicious cycle of hunger by attaining non-attachment to material and earthly matters.

So, here, we can see a common thread between Jesus’ teaching of focusing on spiritual factors and Shakamuni’s teaching of alobha (無貧) in terms of detachment from the material and physical matter.

As Jesus and the crowd moved from one side of the Sea of Galilee to the other side, to Capernaum, after being miraculously fed, there is a shift on focus: from material and earthy matters to a spiritual aspect, in order to guide us to the concept of the Eucharist and its institution by Jesus at the Last Supper. In this regard, the crossing the Sea of Galilee can be symbolically understood as a threshold to move from the realm of solely materialistic and earthly realm toward the more spiritual realm, where alobha-like non-attachment is practiced.

What Jesus meant by “miraculous signs” (John 6:25) in the above opening statement of his living bread discourse is the divine spiritual power that enabled scant amount of bread of fish to satisfy five thousand hungry men.

The miraculous sign of feeding the five thousands in Galilee is the divine spiritual power prototypical for the transubstantiation that turns the bread and the wine into Corporis et Sanguinis Christi. Unless we understand this, we sure do not understand why Jesus said, “This is My body which is given for you; do this in remembrance of me”(Luke 22:19, cf. Mark 14:22; Matthew 26:26), holding the broken bread, why he said, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many” ( Mark 14:24, cf. Matthew 26:28; Luke 22:20), holding the challis filled with wine, during the Last Supper .

Unless we truly understand what Jesus meant by the “miraculous signs”(John 6:26), we really cannot understand what Jesus meant by saying,  “I am the bread that came down from heaven”(John 6:41), “I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world”(John 6:51), “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him”(John 6:53-56), in his living bread discourse in Capernaum.  Unless we really understand this, we remain unable to see the consecrated bread and wine at Mass being transubstantiated into true Corporis et Sanguinis Christi.  Also, unless our heart is in the state of grace, because of our inability to the alobha-like non-attachment to the material and earthly matters, we remain too ignorant to see the consecrated bread and wine as true Corporis et Sanguinis Christi in our eyes of the heart.

This aspect of Jesus’ bread of life discourse is similar to what Jesus said to the Samaritan woman by the Jacob’s well (John 4:4-26) and Jesus’ teaching on heavenly treasure vs. earthly treasure from his sermon on the mount (Matthew 6:19-24).  Interestingly, what follows Jesus’ teaching on non-attachment to earthly treasure (Matthew 9:19-24) leads to his teaching on overcoming anxiety (Matthew 6:25-34). In fact, this echoes Buddhism’s teaching on anxiety and attachment to material matter, as Buddhism teaches that anxiety is rooted in our attachment.  What Jesus wanted the hungry crowds to understand that the very purpose of his feeding miracle on the other side of the Sea of Galilee was not simply to feed the hungry but to teach them to overcome their anxiety from hunger by practicing non-attachment or alobha. 

In both Christianity and Buddhism, we are encouraged to detach ourselves from worldly and earthly objects. It is not only because these objects come and go but really because such earthly impermanent objects often mislead us into greed and addictive attachment. One form of this psychospiritual problem is idolatry. As repeatedly reminded throughout the Old Testament, idolatry has deadly consequences, for it is a reflection of our impure heart.

In Theravada Buddhism, to counter impure heart, which leads to addictive attachment and idolatry, the spiritual principle of alobha is addressed in Visuddhimagga (清浄道論), which means the path of purification. Thus, non-attachment, alobha, in Buddhist sense, means to attain pure heart, free from kleshas (煩悩), defilements.  The spiritual teaching of alobha in Visuddhimagga is certainly echoes in Jesus’ spiritual teaching that underlines Corporis et Sanguinis Christi, reflected in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, the Living Bread Discourse, and the Last Supper Discourse.

Let us understand that we must have the alobha-like non-attachment in order for us to receive the consecrated bread and wine as Corporis et Sanguinis Christi in the form of the Sacrament of the Eucharist.  This is why we must be in the state of sanctifying grace to receive the Sacrament of the Eucharist (CCC *1415).

In Buddhism these are understood in terms of impermanence (無常). In Christianity, out of these impermanent worldly reality, God the Elohim, whom Jesus has called “Abba” (Mark 14:36), delivers us into the new transcendent reality, like what Jean Piaget’s psychological development concept calls “object permanence” , with Him by the Ascension of Christ (Luke 24:50-53; Mark 16:19-20), upon making Logos , who is God, flesh to dwell among us (John 1:1-14). For the Ascension to take place, the  Death and the Resurrection of Jesus had to take place.

The disciples had thought that the physical presence of Jesus was gone with his death and burial, because they did not understand the Resurrection (John 20:9), though Jesus had already taught about it (i.e. John 2:18-22, 10:17-18; Matthew 16:21, 27:62-63). So, they were quite anxious in encountering the Resurrection.  So, the risen Jesus helped the disciples understand all of his teaching in retrospect, and they came to terms with the meaning of Jesus’ death and resurrection.  Unbeknownst to them, however, Jesus’ repeated appearances to help the disciples better understand his teaching after his resurrection was to prepare them psychologically and spiritually for his departure, Ascension, and for them to receive the Holy Spirit, so that they can be commissioned to go and proclaim the Good News in building the Kingdom of God on earth.

It was his Ascension and Pentecost that remind us that even the physical presence of Jesus, the Son, in this world is impermanent. However, what is important in Christianity is that the presence of Christ, the Son, is permanent, as the Triune God is the permanent being.  That is why that Christ always remains with us through the Holy Spirit (cf. Matthew 28:20, John 14:26). Thus, the Triune God – One God in Trinity: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, is the permanent being, while everything else in the universe is impermanent. Because the reciprocity of God and the Word (Logos) (John 1:1), the Word of God through Jesus, especially in his kerygma , is permanent (Matthew 24:34-35). This permanence of God is very important to appreciate “object permanence” in our mature spiritual object relation with the Triune God so that we can truly appreciate transubstantiation from the bread of life into the Corpus Christi and from the chalice of wine into the chalice of Christ’s saving blood – the Sanguis Christi.

As reflected in the bread of life discourse (John  6:25-59), Jesus wanted us to really understand the spiritual aspect of his body and blood, so that we can overcome our tendency for attachment to their material aspects.  That was a problem that these five thousand people, who were miraculously fed, had, as they kept chasing Jesus and as they became hungry again. They could not overcome hunger because they did not see the bread Jesus gave was his body yet and did not yet approach the bread with the heart of alobha.

This spiritual teaching in the bread of life discourse (John 6:25-59) on non-attachment or alobha is also found in the last supper discourse (John 14:1-16:33), as the latter discourse of Jesus is essentially to prepare the disciples for non-attachment or alobha to the physical aspect of himself – to prepare them for his Ascension and for them to fully appreciate the coming of Parakletos on Pentecost. For this, Jesus said:

“Unless I go away, Parakletos will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him (Parakletos) to you…..I am going to the Father where you can see me no  longer…….I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth (Parakletos) comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will take what is mine and make it known to you”(John 16:7, 10, 12-15 ). 

“In a little while you will see me no more, and then after a little while you will see me”(John 16:16).

“Are you asking one another what I meant when I said, ‘In a little while you will see me no more and then after a little while you will see me’? I will tell you the truth, you will weep and mourn while the world rejoiced. You will grieve but your grief will turn to joy. A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world. So with you: Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy. In that day you will no longer ask me anything. I tell you the truth, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete”(John 16:19-24).

“Though I have been speaking figuratively, a time is coming when I no longer use this kind of language but will tell you plainly about my Father. In that day you will ask in my name. I am not saying that I will ask the Father on your behalf. No, the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father and entered the world; now I am leaving he world and going back to the Father” (John 16:25-29).

Now,  juxtapose the above words of Jesus from his Last Supper Discourse in John’s Gospel to the below narrative of Luke  on Jesus  instituting the Sacrament of the Eucharist at the Last Supper:

“I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.  For I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God. Take this and divide it among you. For I tell you I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” And he took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me.” 2In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you” (Luke 22:14-20).

You notice that the Institution of the Sacrament of the Eucharist, transubstantiating the bread and the wine into Corporis et Sanguinis Christi by the power of the Holy Spirit, as reflected in this Last Supper scene (Luke 22:14-20) and the aforementioned excerpt from Jesus’ Last Supper Discourse (John 16:7-20), as well as Jesus’ Bread of Life Discourse (John 6:25-59), is relevant to the departure of Jesus from this world, the Ascension. Because of the Ascension is the necessary condition for the Pentecostal Holy Spirit to be poured upon us and to the bread and the wine offered to the alter of God at Mass, we truly need to be in alobha , which enables us to appreciate our transcendental permanent object relationship with the Triune God, as in what Jean Piaget argues as “object permanence”.  Otherwise, we would have difficulty with the Sacrament of the Eucharist, as some of those who heard Jesus’ Bread of Life Discourse deserted Jesus (John 6:60-66), because of their inability to appreciate the bread of life as the body of Christ and the wine as the saving blood of Christ.

After all, Chinese and Japanese Buddhists describe alobha as “無貧“, which suggests “no poverty”. It indicates that the Chinese and the Japanese Buddhists view the concept of alobha, non-attachment, as a way to overcome poverty. Of course, poverty here is not about material poverty, but spiritual poverty. This echoes Jesus’ teaching: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:3), Jesus’ teaching on humility as the first and foremost factor for the beatitudes (blessedness, rather than “happiness”).  In following this statement in his Sermon on the Mount, it is clear that Jesus, like Shakamuni, teaches us that alobha is indispensable to live a blessed life, transcending anxieties and fear. 

This is what we must reflect and ponder every time we bring ourselves to the alter to receive Corporis et Sanguinis Christi. Amen.

*CCC - Catechism of the Catholic Church