A church dictionary

by Walter Farquhar Hook

As to the manner of this eternal existence, it is manifest it herein infinitely transcends the manner of the existence of all created beings, even of such as shall exist for ever; that whereas it is not possible for their finite minds to comprehend all that is past, or to understand perfectly all things that are present, much less to know all that is future, or to have entirely in their power anything that is to come, but their thoughts, and knowledge, and power, must, of necessity, have degrees and periods, and be successive and transient as the things themselves: the eternal, supreme cause, on the contrary, must of necessity have such a perfect, independent, unchangeable comprehension of all things, that there can be no one point or instant of his eternal duration, wherein all things that are past, present, and to come, will not be as entirely known and represented to him in one single thought or view, and all things present and future be as equally and entirely in his power and direction, as if there was really no succession at all, but all things were actually present at once.

This is, in reality, the most incomprehensible of the Divine attributes. God is without beginning; the Father, always a Father, without beginning; the Son, always the only begotten of the Father, without beginning; the Holy Ghost, always proceeding from the Father and the Son, without beginning; the one God, always existing in the Trinity of his persons, without beginning.

“There is but one living and true God, everlasting, without body, parts, or passions; of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness; the maker and preserver of all things visible and invisible; and in the unity of this Godhead, there be Three Persons, of one substance, power, and eternity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.”—Article I.

EUCHARIST. (From εὐχαριστία, giving of thanks.) (See Communion, Lord’s Supper, Elements, Consecration of the Elements, Sacrament, Sacrifice, Real Presence.) Sacramentum eucharistiæ is the name given to the Lord’s supper in our Latin articles, signifying, properly, thanksgiving or blessing, and fitly denoting this holy service as a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. It occurs in Ignatius, Irenæus, Clemens of Alexandria, Origen, and others; and was adopted into the Latin language, as may be seen from Tertullian and Cyprian in many places.—Waterland. We have, however, an earlier allusion to the liturgy, under the title of eucharistia, or thanksgiving, in the First Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians; where, in forbidding and reasoning against the practice of some persons, who used the miraculous gift of tongues in an improper manner, namely, by celebrating the liturgy in an unknown language, he says, “When thou shalt bless with the Spirit, how shall he that occupieth the room of the unlearned say Amen at thy giving of thanks, seeing he understandeth not what thou sayest?” (1 Cor. xiv. 16.) ἐπεὶ, εἂν εὐλογήσῃς τῷ πνεύματι, ὁ ἀναπληρῶν τὸν τόπον τοῦ ἰδιώτου πῶς ἐρεῖ τὸ ἀμὴν ἐπὶ τῇ σῇ εὐχαριστιᾳ; ἐπειδὴ, τί λέγεις, οὐκ οἶδε. The meaning of this passage is obvious: “If thou shalt bless the bread and wine in an unknown language, which has been given to thee by the Holy Spirit, how shall the layman say Amen, ‘so be it,’ at the end of thy thanksgiving or liturgy, seeing he understandeth not what thou sayest?” It is undeniable that St. Paul in this place uses exactly the same expressions to describe the supposed action as he has employed a short time before in designating the sacraments of Christ’s body and blood, and describing our Lord’s consecration at the last supper. Τὸ ποτήριον τῆς εὐλογίας ὃ εὐλογοῦμεν, οὐχὶ κοινωνία τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ Χοιστοῦ ἐστι; “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ?” (1 Cor. x. 16.) Ὁ Κύριος Ἰησοῦς ἐν τῇ νυκτὶ ᾖ παρεδίδοτο, ἔλαβεν ἄρτον, καὶ εὐχαριστήσας ἔκλασε. (1 Cor. xi. 23.) “The Lord Jesus, in the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he brake it.” The language of St. Paul also in the passage under consideration, as well as the action which he describes, is perfectly conformable to the description given by Justin Martyr of the celebration of the eucharist. “Then bread and a cup of water and wine is offered to the president of the brethren; and he, taking them, sends up praise and glory to the Father of all, in the name of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, and makes a very long thanksgiving, because God has thought us worthy of these things. And when he has ended the prayers and thanksgiving, all the people that are present signify their approbation, saying, Amen. For Amen in the Hebrew language signifies ‘so be it.’” Here we observe the “president” corresponding to the person who “blesses,” according to St. Paul, and performs the “thanksgiving.” The “people” corresponding to the “unlearned person” (or layman, as Chrysostom and Theodoret interpret the word) of St. Paul, and replying Amen, “so be it,” at the end of the thanksgiving in both passages. If we refer to all the ancient and primitive liturgies of the East and of Greece, the peculiar applicability of St. Paul’s argument to the Christian liturgy will appear still more. In the liturgy of Constantinople or Greece, which has probably been always used at Corinth, the bishop or priest takes bread, and “blesses” it in the course of a very long “thanksgiving,” at the end of which all the people answer, “Amen.” The same may be said of the liturgies of Antioch and Cæsarea, and, in fine, of all the countries of the East and Greece through which St. Paul bare rule or founded Churches. It may be added, that there is, we believe, no instance in the writings of the most primitive fathers, in which the Amen is ever said to have been repeated at the end of an office containing both blessing and thanksgiving, except in the liturgy of the eucharist.

All this shows plainly that the argument of St. Paul applies immediately and directly to the celebration of this sacrament. Whether we regard his own previous expressions, the language and the words of the earliest fathers, or the customs of the primitive Church exhibited in the ancient liturgies, we see the accurate coincidence between the case which he refers to, and the celebration of the eucharist.—Palmer’s Origines Liturgicæ, p. 114. We virtually adopt this word, when in the prayer after communion, we pray to God to accept this our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving.

EUCHARISTIC. Belonging to the service of the holy eucharist; or, in a larger sense, having the character of thanksgiving.

EUCHELAION. (Gr.) The oil of prayer. To such penitents (in the Greek Church) as are conscious of the guilt of any mortal sin, as adultery, fornication, or pride, is administered the sacrament of τὸ εὐχέλαιον, Euchelaion, which is performed by the bishop, or archbishop, assisted by seven priests, and begins with this prayer, “O Lord, who with the oil of thy mercies hast healed the wounds of our souls, do thou sanctify this oil, that those who are anointed therewith may be freed from their infirmities, and from all corporeal and spiritual evils.” This oil of prayer is pure and unmixed oil, without any other composition; a quantity whereof, sufficient to serve for the whole year, is consecrated, on Wednesday in the Holy Week, by the archbishop, or bishop. The Euchelaion of the Greek answers to the Extreme Unction of the Romanists.

In the administration of this oil of prayer, the priest dips some cotton at the end of a stick, and therewith anoints the penitent, in the form of a cross, on the forehead, on the chin, on each cheek, and on the backs and palms of the hands: after which he repeats this prayer—“Holy Father, physician of souls and bodies, who hast sent thine only Son Jesus Christ, healing infirmities and sins, to free us from death; heal this thy servant of corporeal and spiritual infirmities, and give him salvation and the grace of thy Christ, through the prayers of our more than holy lady, the mother of God, the eternal Virgin, through the assistance of the glorious, celestial, and incorporeal powers, through the virtue of the holy and life-giving cross, of the holy and glorious prophet, the forerunner, John the Baptist, and of the holy and glorious apostles.”—Ricaut.

EUCHOLOGION. (From εὐχὴ, preces, and λόγος, sermo.) The name of a liturgical book of the Greek Church, containing a collection of Divine services for the administration of the sacraments, conferring of orders, and other religious offices: it is properly their ritual, containing everything relating to religious ceremonies. Father Simon observes, that several of the most considerable divines of that Church, in Europe, met at Rome under Pope Urban VIII., to examine the Euchologion: Morinus, who was one of the congregation, mentions this ritual in his book De Congregationibus: the greatest part of the divines, being influenced by the sentiments of the schoolmen, were willing to reform this Greek ritual by that of the Church of Rome, as if there had been some heresies in it, or rather some passages which made the administration of the sacraments invalid; but some, who more perfectly understood the controversy, opposed the censure of the Euchologion: they proved this ritual was agreeable to the practice of the Greek Church before the schism of Photius, and that for this reason it could not be condemned, without condemning all the old Eastern communion.

EUDOXIANS. Certain heretics in the fourth century, whose founder was Eudoxius, bishop of Antioch, and afterwards of Constantinople. They adhered to the errors of the Aëtians and Eunomians, affirming the Son to be differently affected in his will from the Father, and made of nothing.