Interpretation of the concept of “supracelestial altar” in St. Nicholas Kabasilas’ doctrine on the eucharist in the light of his polemics with the western view of the relationship between establishing words and epiclesis

In his treatise «The explanation of the divine liturgy», St. Nicholas Cabasilas compares the Western Christian and Eastern Christian view of the problem of the relationship between the instituting words and the epiclesis. Cabasilas actually draws the attention of contemporary Latin theologians of the XIV century to their centuries-old Western Christian tradition of understanding the prayer «Supplices Te rogamus». Cabasilas was apparently not familiar with this tradition through Latin sources. However, in his interpretation of the «Supplices Te rogamus» he follows it in many ways. Cabasilas confirms the veracity of his interpretation of «Supplices Te rogamus» by citing the Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. For Cabasilas, the prayer «Supplices Te rogamus» is nothing but an epiclesis, in which the prayer to God with a request for the sanctification of gifts is invested in a figurative, poetic form. According to Cabasilas, in the prayer «Supplices Te rogamus» the supracelestial altar is Christ himself; the angel is an intermediary between God and the earthly Church; the Church’s prayer to God about the ascension of the offered gifts (bread and wine) onto the supracelestial altar by the angel᾽s hand is a prayer of their sanctification.