CUP (iroT-^piov). — The Eucharistic cup is called by St. Paul ' the cup of blessing ' (t6 iror-qpiov rrjs €u\oyLa^, 1 Co 10^^). Various shades of meaning have been found in the jilirase : (1) the cup which Christ blessed, making it for ever a cup of bless- ing ; (2) the cup which has been consecrated by a prayer of thanksgiving for use in the Lord's Supper ; (3) the cup which brings blessing to the communi-
cant. The sacramental cup is usually, and very naturally, supposed to have been connected in Jesus' mind with the third and most sacred of the cups which, in the cei'emonial of later Judaism, were handed round at the Passover. That third cup was known as ' the cup of blessing' (np-i^ Di3), and St. Paul, who had often received it, also appears to be tacitly comparing and contrasting with it ' the cup of blessing which we (Christians) bless.' The identification of the Lord's Supper with the Passover is, it is true, a much-disputed point, but even if the institution of the Eucharist took place at an ordinary meal, the cup used by our Lord may well have been signalized, both at the time and ever afterwards, as the new cup of blessing. Another name for it was ' tlie cup of the Lord' (1 Co 10-'), i.e. the cup received from His hand, signifying fellowship with Him and devotion to Him, to drink from which made it morally impos- sible for the communicant to share in the riot and debauch of heathen banquets — to drink ' the cup of demons.'
By a Semitic figure of speech, one's lot or experi- ence, joyful or sorrowful, regarded as a Divine appointment, is compared with a cup which God presents to one to drink. Thus the writer of Rev., saturated with prophetic ideas and imagery, speaks of Divine retribution as ' the wine of the wrath of God, which is prepared unmixed in the cup of his anger' (W ; cf. W^). James Strahan.
CURSE. — Traces of the early belief that curses rightly pronounced had an inherent power can harc^y be found in the NT. The principal force of the word is either as an expletive provoked by passion from an undisciplined mind, or as a serious and strong assertion of the connexion between evil- doing and woe. Sometimes the imprecation of Divine wrath is present, with sternness or mere rage in the appeal ; sometimes religious sanctions are implicit, and part of the connotation of the Heb. herem or ban is preserved ; and in one passage (Gal 3i""i3) the word recurs in various forms four times in as many verses, and its suggestions relate to one of the deepest mysteries of the Cross.
In Ac 23'-- "• ^^ and Rev 22^ the Gr. word used is a form or compound of anathema {q.v.)', and in each case the form is in the NT peculiar to the passage, though not unknown in later ecclesiastical usage. The curse or oath was the invocation upon themselves of the judgments of God if the conspira- tors failed to do as they had covenanted with one another. It was a religious bond such as fanatical hatred has always been disposed to resort to, and superstitious terrors were called in to ensure the common purpose. In the passage from Rev. the word is strengthened by a prefix, and made equiva- lent to our 'execration.' The phraseology is at least reminiscent of Zee 14'^, and includes, but goes beyond, the reversal of the doom of Gn 3". In the Iloly Citj% as in the Jerusalem of the pro- phet, will be found no more any person or thing, execrated or execrable, and there will be no need for the incidence of any Divine judgment. It is an anticipation of a condition of moral purity Avithout any breach of right relationship among the residents or between them and God ; but the prophetic parallel suggests that the primary idea is that of security, the people dwelling safely in the absence of any influence that would involve moral peril.
Another root occurs in the rest of the passages, its usage passing from the general idea of prayer through that of the effect of praj^er in securing ill to an enemy and ending with a partial personifica- tion in which Ara becomes a goddess of destruction and revenge. Almost without exception the thought is that of a Divine visitation upon an ofi'ender, in-
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volving grievous, though not necessarily permanent, suffering. Tlie simplest form is found in Ro S''*, which is a free rendering from the LXX of Ps 10''. In Ro 12''* also the meaning does not go much be- yond ordinary blasphemy (of. Mt 5"*^). James (3^^-) makes the curse of an individual a wrong done to mankind, and thus protests against the Pharisaic temper of Jn 7"'^ and traces the sin back to its actual source, a defect in love for man being an effect of the absence of love for God. ' Children of cursing' (2 P 2") is a Hebraism (cf. Eph 2», Lk 10®) ; it may denote nothing more than the extreme wickedness of the men referred to, though one is disposed to see an allusion to the wrath of God, as in Ps 95'^ 'Nigh unto a curse' (He 6®) recalls Gn 3'''- ; such land looks like that described in the original curse, and therefore rejection and ' to be burned' are its natural fate. The burning is ap- parently final, or at least like the destruction of a land by volcanic eruption (Dt 29'-^), for the thought of purification by the burning up of noxious growths is foreign to the context.