would b;ui' 1 11 as follows : 'He brake the bread
and saiil : Tliis is my body; and he gave it to them and said, Take,"' and similarly with the cup.
As the record stands, the pouring out of the wine is not iiiciitioncil at all. It seems that Jesus took a cup which bad already been filled. If He had iuteiuk'd to give a parabolic representation of the event of His death, He would liave taken pains to fill one before their eyes. The fact that with both elements the giving to eat and to drink precedes the declaration of what the bread and the wine stand for, favours the view that this declaration deals primarily with the symbolism of the .sacrificial meal. The words, 'This is my body,' then obtain the meaning : To partake of this "bread signifies the partaking of My sacrificed body in a sacrificial meal ; the words, ' This is my blood,' the meaning : To partake of this wine signifies tlie partaking of My sacrificial blood in a sacrificial meal. Thus we ^^•ould reach the conclusion that the phrase ' blood of the covenant ' has for its primary import : blood through the partaking of which participation in the covenant is assured. The Pauline- Lukan ver- sion, 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood,' cannot be quoted with conclusiveness in favour of either view. This version may either mean : tliis cup is by the blood it contains the new covenant, or : this cup is the new covenant, which new cove- nant consists in My blood. Each of these two renderings leaves open the two possibilities, that the shedding of the blood is represented as the source of the new covenant, or that the drinking of the blood is represented as the participation in the new covenant. To prevent misunderstanding, however, it should be stated once more, that the sacramental interpretation of the words has for its background the symbolic significance of bread and wine as exponents of the expiatory death of Jesus itself.
In conclusion, we must endeavour to define the place of the covenant conception thus interpreted within the teaching of Jesus as a whole, and its correlation with other important conceptions. Like the Kingdom of God, the Messiahship, and the Church, the Covenant idea is one of the great generalizing ideas of the OT, the use of wliich enables Jesus to gather up in Himself the main lines of the historic movement of OT redemption and revelation. From the Kingdom the Covenant is distinguished in several respects. The Kingdom conception is more comprehensive, since it em- braces tlie eschatological realization of the OT promises as well as their provisional fulfilment in the present life, being on the whole, however, eschatologically conceived, the present Kingdom- powers and blessings appearing as so many antici- pations of the final Kingdom. The Kingdom is also comprehensive in this other respect, that it covers indiscriminately the entire content of the consummate state, the external as well as the internal, the judgment- as well as the salvation- aspect. Over against this the Covenant idea, while by no means pointedly excluding the es- chatological state (in Hebrews the idea is used eschatologically, the new covenant coinciding with the aiuiv (nAXwi/), yet is more characteristic as a designation of the blessings of believers in the present intermediate period. And among the manifold contents of salvation it pre-eminently designates the internal ones of forgiveness of sin and fellowship with God, as is already the ease in the passage of Jeremiah.
If the word rendered by dtaS-fiKv had in our Lord s mind the associations of the word 'testament, and if the statement found in the context of Luke (22"'- ^o), ' I appoint nnto you (5iori9€M<" I'/u"), even as my Father appointed nnto me a kingdom, that ye liiay eat and drink at my table in my kingdom,' liiay be understood as liavmg been suggested to Him by this testamental sense of ' Siath'p.T,. tlien this would bring the Covenant idea
COVENANT
COVETOTJSNESS
luucli nearer to the Kingdom idea, inasmuch as in the latter saying the full content of the blessed- ness of the final state is the object of the SiaTWcaBat It is not certain, however, that the sequence of the narrative here in Luke is chronological, and that, therefore, these words were uttered im mediately after the reference to the covenant blood in the Supper. In Mt 19-"--' words in part identical occur in a dirterent connexion. In the Supper Uod is the SiadifjKvos, whereas here it would be Jesus It is better, therefore, not to introduce the testi nientary idea into the words of the Supper and to adhere to tlie distinction between the Kingdom and the-Covenant from the point of view alieady indi eated. According to the Pauline interpretation the Supper, and with it the Covenant belon^ to the pre-eschatologioal state, in which belie\eis aie during the present life, for the Supper is a pio elamatiou of the death of Jesus ' until he come (1 Co lI-«). The sayings in Mk 14=° Mt 26 " Lk 2.711!. 18 ^\^Q mark the Supper and the participation in the Covenant as belonging to a state distinct from the final Kingdom of God. Oui Loid ho« ever, does not place this second stage of the covenant-life of the people of God in contrast with tlie former stage from the point of view that it involves the abrogation of the OT legal forms of life, as St. Paul does in 2 Co 3 and Gal 3. If it is a new covenant, it is new simply for the positive reason that it brings greater assurance of the forgiveness of sin and closer fellowship with God. From the idea of the Kingdom that of the Covenant is still further distinguished, in that it appears in much closer dependence than the former on the Messianic person and work of Jesus. In our Lord's preaching of the Kingdom, His Messianic person and work remain almost entirely in the background, at least so far as the verbal disclosure^ on tliis subject are concerned, wliile tlie niattn!- conn"; to stand somewhat differently if the -■li.r,.\rl;itii)n contained in Jesus' Messianic acts lie c'.iii^idercd. The Covenant is explicitly declared to be founded on His expiatory death, and to be received by the partaking of His body and blood. This importance of the person and work of Jesus, both for tlie inauguration and the reception of the Covenant, agrees with the view that the Covenant designates the present, pro- visional blessedness of believers, for this stage is specifically controlled and determined by the activity of Christ, so that St. Paul calls it the Kingdom of Christ in distinction from the King- dom of God, which is the final state. The Cove- nant idea shares with the idea of the Church this reference to the present earthly form of possession of the Messianic blessings, and this dependence on the person and work of the Messiah (cf. Mt 16'* 18'"). The ditl'erence is that in the conception of the Church, the organization of believers into one body outwardly, as well as tlieir spiritual union inwardly, and the communication of a higher life through the Spirit, stand in the foreground, neither of which is refiected upon in the idea of the Cove- nant. The Covenant stands for tliat central, God- ward aspect of the state of salvation, in which it means the atonement of sin and the full enjoyment of fellowship with God through the appropriation of this atonement in Christ.