The Eucharistic Sacrifice

Product Description
This first English translation represents Sergius Bulgakov’s final, fully developed word on the Eucharist.
The debate around the controversial doctrine of the Eucharist as sacrifice has dogged relations between Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant churches since the Reformation. In The Eucharistic Sacrifice, the famous Russian theologian Sergius Bulgakov cuts through long-standing polemics surrounding the notion of the Eucharist as sacrifice and offers a stunningly original intervention rooted in his distinctive theological vision. This work, written in 1940, belongs to Bulgakov’s late period and is his last, and most discerning, word on eucharistic theology. His primary thesis is that the Eucharist is an extension of the sacrificial, self-giving love of God in the Trinity, or what he famously refers to as kenosis. Throughout the book, Bulgakov points to the fact that, although the eucharistic sacrifice at the Last Supper took place in time before the actual crucifixion of Christ, both events are part of a single act that occurs outside of time.
This is Bulgakov’s concluding volume of three works on the Eucharist. The other two, The Eucharistic Dogma and The Holy Grail, were translated and published together in 1997. This third volume was only first published in the original Russian version in 2005 and has remained unavailable in English until now. The introduction provides a brief history of Bulgakov’s theological career and a description of the structure of The Eucharistic Sacrifice. This clear and accessible translation will appeal to scholars and students of theology, ecumenism, and Russian religious thought.
Review
“There simply is nothing like The Eucharistic Sacrifice available in English.” ―John Behr, author of John the Theologian and His Paschal Gospel
About the Author
Sergius Bulgakov (1871–1944) was one of the most prolific and original Eastern Orthodox theologians of the twentieth century, whose works continue to generate great scholarly interest among Orthodox and other Christians alike.
Mark Roosien is a lecturer in liturgical studies at the Yale Institute of Sacred Music and Yale Divinity School.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
The fullness and power of Christ’s sacrifice, the essence of which is the Incarnation, is revealed in the coming of Christ in glory. The Incarnation, for its part, is the final act of the creation of the world, as the revelation of the Divine Sophia in the creaturely Sophia. The eucharistic sacrifice is not only a symbol, but also the ontology of the being of the world as the being of God. This is not a ransom or even simply redemption: it is the love of God for His Image, just as It is in the Holy Trinity, so is it also for Its likeness in creation, whose perfect union is the Godman. In it is the power of the creation of the world and the human being, the incarnation and in-humanization of the Logos, the salvation and glorification of creation, the true life both in the coming age and all ages to come. All juridical explanations of the Eucharist, as an atoning sacrifice or merely as communion, fall short because of the same deficiency: the power and significance of this sacrifice is limited and confined merely to one aspect. As a result, it is considered to be a miracle with regard to its occurring in time; but the effluence that it has eventually must come to an end. Or, its aims are limited, calibrated to the salvation of only a portion of creation out of brazen disregard for the apokatastasis of all things, when “God will be all in all” (cf. 1 Cor 15:28). The eucharistic sacrifice begins with the creation of the world by the Father through the Hypostatic Word in the Holy Spirit: “All things came into being through him” (John 1:3). It is at the creation of the world, as the world-man, that Godmotherhood and Incarnation begin. The “Bride,” which, despite contracting the corruption of the fall, is nevert