Memorialists, Baptists and American Evangelicals always FAIL at identifying what the
specific name of the Figure of Speech (FOS) is employed for our Lord's words to be taken figuratively.
There are hundreds of different figures of speech (FOS) in the English language and each have a name....which one is it? When you stated our Lord's words are
a simple literary figure....what is it's name if it so simple to understand? Should all figures of speech to be taken non literally? Hardly. And all who believe all FOS are to be taken non-literally are manifesting ignorance.
Some FOS or literary devices are purely
ornamental which HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH THE NON-LITERALNESS of a statement. Examples would be parallelism, repetition, redundancy, alliteration, etc. Ornamentation also could be rhyming words, words with similar sound but difference sense. These are
structural FOS in order for the listener to understand the emphasis of the reader. In no way, shape or form, do these figures of speech change meaning into something non-literal.
Other FOS expand meaning of a word...some examples would be metaphor, simile, synecdoche, analogy, allegory, metonymy, etc.
In order to properly identity the name a FOS in a sentence, it is essential to understand the grammatical construction of the sentence. The simple sentence "This is my body" is called a copula. A copula construction has the verb "to be" separating the subject from the predicate nominative or predicate adjective.
By far the most abused FOS which Memorialist use is the metaphor. They say our Lord's words, "This is my body" is a METAPHOR and should be taken non-literally or figuratively. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Metaphors within a copula construction are easy to identify....it is always, always, always found in the predication nominative.
- The seed is the Word.
- I am the door.
- The Lord is my shephard.
- The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hid in a field.
- You are the salt of the earth.
- I am the vine and you are the branches.
- Herod is a fox.
Metaphors EXPAND meaning in language. When Jesus said, "I am the door" our human reasoning understand this...and our creativity takes over and intuitively expands the meaning of the door as millions and millions and millions of sermons have illustrated.
"This is my body" can not be a metaphor, for what does the expanded meaning of the body intuitively mean? It is nonsensical.
"This is my body" is a figure of speech. But what kind of figure of speech is it? The correct figure of speech Jesus is using is a
synecdoche (substituting a part of the whole). The bread which is a part, is substituted for the whole body of Christ. When Jesus said, “This is my body” he is using a copula-predicate nominative construction. The “body” renames the personal pronoun “this” for bread. However, this is not a metaphor as Jesus is not trying to expand the meaning of the word “body.’
A synecdoche is the correct literary device here, for it preserves within the copula construction the literalness of Jesus' words.
If a person truely wanted to change the meaning of "This is my body" it is simple. Change the verb! Substitute "represents" for "is." Of course this is adding to Scripture, but that doesn't bother Rick Warren. At Saddleback church....he always says during Holy Communion...this REPRESENTS MY BODY.