We take the view that the discourse in question does not relate directly to the Eucharist. But it does not do .so only because it expresses the larger idea of which the Kucharist is a particular ctm- crete embodiment, the one le.tding embodiment which Chri.sl has bequeathed to His Church. As there is a coinniunion with Hiiii which is wider than — though it culminates in — that which we call kot' ^Jox'i>', the Holy Communion, so is there a sen.se in which He is the Bread from heaven, which is wider than that in which He is given through the sacramental Bread, but it is that bread of which He .said, 'This is my Body, which is for you."
The iiarallelism betwciii .In 0^' and 1 Co U-* (cf. Mk 14-' ) is so close that we are certainly justified in interpreting the wortls of institution in Ihe manner in which the S.icraineiit itself is inter- j>ivted by both St, Paul and St. Joliu.
No writer hits brought out this aspect of the Sujiper lus signifying primarily the spiritual assinii- latitin of Christ motv forcibly than .Spitta. But
036
JESUS CHRIST
JESL'S CHKIST
when he goes on to niiiiiUaiii that the Kuchaiist has no relation to His ilialh, it is slieer paradox, whicli can be niaintaineJ only by the most arbi- trary methods.
'1 lu' assimilation of Christ does not exhaiLst the nu'auini; of the Sacramiiit. If wo take the words of institution ius they stand, another idea is even more prominent. We have seen that there is eoii- sideralile doubt as to how far the Last Supper is to be identitied with the I'asehal meal. St. Paul describes the Death of Christ as the Christian I'iissover (1 Co 6'), and not only he but nther NT writers apply ti) that Death the lani;uaj;e of Sac- riliee. But the particular sacriliee with which our Lord's own words most directly connect it is the sacrifice, or group of sacritices, which inaugurated the Covenant (ICx 24*-'<). As the siirinkling of the blood upon the altar of God and uiion the people ralilied the covenant between Israel and Israel's (iod, so (it was implied) by i)artaking of the con.se- craied symbol of the IJlood of Christ the Christian had brought home to him his share in the new Covenant — a covenant which had at once its ines- timable privileges and its obligations. It was the means of admission to the state of Divine favour, and it bounil over those who were admitted to that favour to a life of loyal service. Here, too, if we want a comment on the words of institution, we may seek it rii;htly in the later XT writings. For words coukl imt well be more strongly attested than those which accompany the giving of the bread and of the cup, and together they converge upon a root-idea which is expanded most directly in He '.|i'^-\ but is also illustrateil by Ko 3-*f- .Oif- giff, Eph 1', 1 1' li», 1 Jn 1' 2-, Hev 1'.
If we start from the idea of the death of Christ as a Sacrifice, then it lies near at hand to conceive of the .Sacrament as the sacred meal which follows the sacrifice. In this there would be combined the universal and immemorial significance of such meals as an act of comnmnion at once with the Deity worshipped and of the worshippers with each other. This double communion, under this aspect of the .sacrificial meal, seems clearly indi- cated in 1 Co ID"'-'- -', but it is also suggested by the words of institution, taken with the distribu- tion of the elements of bread and wine, and the stress which is laid upon the general participation ('Drink ye a(/,' ' they all drank').
(o) Critical Theories. — A common feature in recent critical theories respecting the La.st Supper is the denial that the command, -This do in re- membrance of me,' formed part of the original institution ; or, in other words, that the particular circumstances which marked this solemn parting meal were meant to be repeated in the form of a permanent Sacrament. This view was put forward abiiut the same time, and, it is probable, independ- ently, ill England by Dr. T. (Jardner ( I'lie Oriijin of the Lord's Snpiier, London, 1893), aud in Ger- many by Jvilicher in the vol. of essays in honour of Weizsiicker {Tlieol. Abhamll. etc., Freiburg i. B. 1892), and by Spitta {Znr Gesch. u. LU. d. Urchristenttim.i, Oottingen, 1893). The English w-riter is the most thoroughgoing. Assuming the correctness of the WII text of Lk 22i»- -'", St. Paul is left as the sole authority for the express command of repetition. It is then argued from the phrasing of 1 Co 11^ 'I received of the Lord," that the whole account belongs to one of St. Paul's ecstatic revelations, and has not a solid historical founda- tion. In default of this it is tliought that the apostle had been influenced during his stay at Corinth by the near proximity of the Eleusinian mysteries, the central point in which ' appears to have been a sacred repast of wliich the initiated partook, and by means of which they had com- munion with the gods' (p. 18).
How St. I'aid could confuse such subtle external infiuences with a revelation 'from the Lord,' and how he came to deliver as authoritative instruc- tions to the Corinthians what he had (upim the theory) only himself ac(iuired during his stay at Corinth, are only incidental iiucstions. We cannot tell precisely how St. Paul received his knowledge in such a sense that he could refer it to the Lord. But the solemn simiilicity of jihra.se reads like history, and, so far as other authorities exist, it is completely verified. In any case, it is incredible that a u.sage which is thus treated as practically the invention of St. Paul could have spread from an outlying Gentile Church over the whdle of Christendom. We cannot doubt that not only the Synoptic version of the Supper, but its repetition as a Sacrament, had their origin in the .Mother Church. The kXdtris toO iprov of Ac 2^-- *'^ is an indication of this, which is confirmed by the evi- dence of Ignatius, .Justin, and the Didnche. Spitta's theory, that the repeateil Sacrament w.as due, not to a command of Christ Himself, but to the spon- taneous in.stinct of affectionate recollection among His disciples, is more possible, but still gratuitous and hypercritical. We may not allege the witness of St. Luke himself in confirmation of .St. Paul, but. as we have already seen (p. (!3(> srip.). the famili.ar text of his (Jospel Ls no less valid evidence of the common belief and practice.