A Good and Joyful Thing: The Evolution of the Eucharistic Prayer
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A Good and Joyful Thing: The Evolution of the Eucharistic Prayer
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| ISBN-13: | 9780898697230 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Church Publishing Inc. |
| Publication date: | 01/01/2000 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 192 |
| File size: | 2 MB |
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A Good and Joyful Thing
THE EVOLUTION OF THE EUCHARISTIC PRAYER
By Byron D. Stuhlman
Church Publishing Incorporated
Copyright © 2000 Byron D. StuhlmanAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-89869-338-6
CHAPTER 1
From Jewish Blessings to the Christian Eucharistic Prayer
* * *
The Berakoth Used at the Last Supper
On the evening that he was betrayed, Jesus shared his final meal with his disciples. It remains a matter of unresolved dispute whether that meal was a passover seder or not, but in either case Jesus no doubt used the customary Jewish blessings (berakoth) as he presided at the supper. Two blessings figure in the biblical accounts of that supper given by Mark, Matthew, and Paul, who tell us that Jesus "blessed" the bread and "gave thanks" over the cup. Paul and Luke vary the wording slightly, reporting that Jesus "gave thanks" over the bread. Luke (in the longer version of his text) gives a fuller account: he reports that Jesus gave thanks over a cup, then over the bread, and after supper over a final cup. As he distributed the bread and the cup he said, "This is my body" and "This is my blood of the covenant." And he commanded his followers to do this in remembrance of him.
Dom Gregory Dix, following the position taken by many Anglican scholars in the first half of the twentieth century, forcefully argued in the Shape of the Liturgy that the prayers which Jesus would have used for the bread and the cup at the last supper were the berakoth which have come down to us in Jewish tradition for this purpose. Subsequent scholars have generally concurred, although—as we shall see—they have nuanced his claim somewhat. Jewish tradition knows two types of berakoth: first, short berakoth such as those recited over wine and bread at a meal, and, second, longer berakoth such as the one recited at the end of a meal. The texts for the blessings of the wine and the bread are as follows:
Over the Cup of Wine:
Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the universe, who createst the fruit of the vine.
Over the Bread
Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the universe, who bringest forth bread from the earth.
The text of the blessing at the end of the meal, known as the Birkat ha-Mazon, is a longer text consisting of three strophes (a final strophe was added later). The initial strophe begins in the form customary with the short berakoth (Blessed art thou ...). The second strophe takes another common prayer form in Judaism, beginning, "We give thanks to thee ..." The final strophe is a petition or supplication. But each is concluded with a final short berakah as a "seal" or, as we might term it, a doxology. This is a translation of the text of the three strophes as found in the earliest manuscript:
Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the universe, who feedest us and the whole world with goodness, kindness, and mercy. Blessed art thou, who dost nourish all.
We give thanks to thee, O Lord our God, because thou hast given us for our inheritance a desirable land, good and wide, the covenant and the law, life and food. And for all these things we give thee thanks and bless thy name for ever and ever. Blessed art thou, O Lord, for the land and for the food.
Have mercy, O Lord our God, on us thy people and on thy city Jerusalem, on thy sanctuary and thy dwelling-place, on Zion, the habitation of thy glory, and on the great and holy house over which thy Name is invoked. Restore the kingdom of the house of David to its place in our days, and speedily build Jerusalem. Blessed art thou, Lord, who buildest Jerusalem.
Of this final series of berakoth, Dix has this to say:
The petitions of the last paragraph must have been recast ... after the destruction of the Temple in A. D. 70. But all Jewish scholars seem to be agreed that at least the first two paragraphs in substantially their present form were in use in Palestine in our Lord's time.
These berakoth were prescribed for any meal. The final Birkat ha-Mazon was customarily said over a cup of wine, which would first have been blessed with the standard blessing. If the last supper was a passover meal, the blessing over a cup of wine at the beginning would have been coupled with a blessing to sanctify the feast (the Kiddush). The blessing of the bread would likewise have been coupled at the last supper with a blessing of unleavened bread if this were a passover meal. Finally, rabbinic prescriptions prescribe an opening dialogue for the Birkat ha-Mazon, which varies according to the number present for the meal.
Various scholars have nuanced Dix's claims somewhat, as we shall see later. As Dix himself admits, at the time of Jesus the berakoth were passed down in oral tradition, and the wording might vary somewhat, following a fixed thematic outline. It has been argued that in the longer berakoth the final seal or doxology was later than the body of the text. We also need to remember that before the emergence of rabbinic Judaism (the heir of the Pharisaic Judaism of Jesus' time) after the destruction of the temple, there were various parties of Judaism (such as the Essenes) whose euchological tradition may have had variant texts for meal blessings. It remains likely, however, that the present tradition, first codified in written form about 200 C.E., preserves texts quite close to those that Jesus would have used at the last supper and to those that his followers would have used for the sacramental meal that they celebrated in remembrance of him.
From Full Meal to Sacramental Meal: the Witness of the New Testament
The New Testament accounts of the last supper are all to some extent shaped by the liturgical usage of the early church: they report only those details of the supper itself that would be replicated in the meal which the church came to know as the Lord's Supper. A shift is already apparent in Paul's correspondence with the Corinthians: unseemly behavior at the Lord's Supper led Paul to instruct the congregation to take their ordinary meals at home, so that the church's sacramental meal would involve only that food and drink to which Jesus gave special significance—the bread and the wine. The other foods taken between the blessing of the bread at the beginning of the meal and the thanksgiving over the cup of blessing at the end of the meal were no longer part of the rite. That is why the accounts of the last supper in Matthew and Mark no longer report that the thanksgiving over the cup came "after supper"—a detail still found in the accounts of Paul and Luke.
Other differences in the accounts also merit our attention. Luke reports a thanksgiving over an initial cup of wine. This obviously represents the Kiddush, the customary sanctification of the feast at the beginning of the passover meal. The rite was also observed on the sabbath, and it is possible that the first Christians adapted it to a meal on the Lord's Day. Matthew and Mark distinguish between the blessing over the bread at the last supper and the thanksgiving over the cup at the end of the meal. This may reflect a terminological distinction between the short berakah customary for the bread and the extended berakah (or series of berakoth) at the end of a meal. We may remember that the second strophe of the Birkat ha-Mazon begins, "We give thanks to thee" rather than "Blessed art thou."
The Eucharistic Blessings of the Didache
The Didache first came to public attention when it was discovered by Philotheos Bryennios, Greek Metropolitan of Nicomedia, in the library of the Monastery of the Holy Sepulcher in Constantinople in 1875 and was published in 1883. It had the impact of a bombshell on the customary account of the history of Christian worship. This is the earliest of a genre of early Christian literature known as church orders. It begins with catechetical material (the "two ways") and also contains directions for fasting, daily prayer, the administration of baptism, the eucharist, and regulations on local ministers (bishops and deacons), itinerant ministers (apostles and prophets) and disciplinary matters. It is a compilation of material from various sources and represents a form of early Jewish Christianity. It is now generally dated at about 100. Syria is most frequently suggested as its place of origin.
The material related to the eucharist is found in chapters 9 and 10. What we find is a thanksgiving over the cup (a single strophe) and a thanksgiving over bread (two strophes) in chapter 9 and a thanksgiving (three strophes) after partaking in chapter 10. Further directions are given in chapter 14. The material in chapters 9 and 10 is so different from later eucharistic rites that scholars have been perplexed as to what to make of it: even Gregory Dix was disposed to treat it as a fellowship meal (agape) rather than a Christian eucharist, despite the opening heading of these chapters, "About the Eucharist."
This is the text of the prayers and their introductory rubrics in these chapters:
About the Eucharist: Give thanks thus: First, about the cup:
We give thanks to thee, our Father, for the holy vine of thy servant [or "child," pais] David, which thou hast revealed through thy servant [pais] Jesus. Glory to thee for evermore.
And about the broken bread:
We give thanks to thee, our Father, for the life and knowledge which thou hast made known to us through thy servant [pais] Jesus Glory to thee for evermore.
As this broken bread was scattered over the mountains, and when brought together became one, so let thy Church be brought together from the ends of the earth into thy kingdom. For thine is the glory and the power through Jesus Christ for evermore.
But let no one eat or drink of your eucharist but those who have been baptized in the name of the Lord. For about this also the Lord has said, "Do not give what is holy to dogs."
After you have had your fill, give thanks thus:
We give thanks to thee, holy Father, for thy holy Name which thou hast enshrined in our hearts, and for the knowledge and faith and immortality which thou hast made known through thy servant [pais] Jesus. Glory to thee for evermore.
Almighty Master, thou didst create all things for the sake of thy Name, and didst give food and drink to humankind for their enjoyment, that they might give thee thanks. But to us thou hast granted spiritual food and drink and eternal life through thy servant [pais] Jesus. Above all we give thee thanks because thou art mighty. Glory to thee for evermore.
Remember, Lord, thy Church, to deliver it from all evil and to perfect it in thy love. Bring it together from the four winds, now sanctified, into thy kingdom which thou hast prepared for it. For thine is the power and the glory forever.
May grace come and may this world pass away.
Hosanna to the God of David.
If any is holy let him come; if any is not, let him repent. Marana tha. Amen.
The prayers given in these chapters mesh closely with the description of the last supper in Luke: a thanksgiving for a first cup, one for the bread, and a thanksgiving at the end of the meal (no longer associated with a cup in the Didache). Note that these prayers take the form of thanksgivings rather than the blessing of God that became standard in rabbinic tradition. But it was several other features that astonished most scholars:
1. The thanksgiving over the cup precedes that over the bread (unlike the accounts of the last supper in Matthew, Mark, and Corinthians).
2. The texts make no reference to the death or resurrection of Christ.
3. The bread and wine are not described as the body and blood of Christ.
Yet if we examine closely the accounts of the last supper, the provisions of the Didache are what we would expect if the church followed Jesus' command to do this in remembrance of him: they give a set of blessings for the meal, Jewish in character and transformed by their reference to Christ. The blessings over the bread and the wine are Jewish in their phraseology but bear no obvious resemblance in form to the short berakoth prescribed in Jewish tradition. Neither begins with the standard opening for such berakoth, "Blessed art thou." Instead, they open with the verb found in the second strophe of the Birkat ha-Mazon, "we give thanks to thee." They more closely resemble the longer berakoth which begin in this way and conclude with a short doxology or seal, although here the doxology takes the form of "Glory to thee." The blessing over the bread also has a second strophe, a petition, unlike the Jewish Birkat ha-Motzi. The rubrication of the text does not tell us whether the cup and the bread are distributed separately, each after its blessing, or together at the end of the two blessings. Nor are we told what words, if any, were used during their distribution. The biblical institution narratives might lead us to expect that the formulas found in later liturgical tradition—"The body of Christ" and "The blood of Christ"—were used to administer them. It was, after all, as he distributed the elements that Jesus identified them with himself according to these accounts. But the text of the Didache gives no information about this.
The blessing at the end of the meal, the "postcommunion prayer," as we would call it, more closely resembles the prayer after a meal in the Jewish tradition, the Birkat ha-Mazon. It is introduced by a rubric that specifies its recitation "after you have had your fill." This echoes the text of Deuteronomy 8:10, "You shall eat your fill and bless the Lord your God for the good land that he has given you." This is the verse that serves as the warrant or institution for the Birkat ha-Mazon: some forms of that prayer include this verse in the second strophe, and the text of that strophe given above echoes its wording. Like the Birkat ha-Mazon, the prayer in chapter 10 of the Didache consists of three strophes—in this case two thanksgivings and a supplication. There are differences as well as similarities, however. The first strophe of the Christian text resembles the second strophe of the Jewish one. Each of these two strophes is thematically a thanksgiving for God's work of redemption and revelation. The final strophe of both Jewish and Christian prayers is a supplication. The Jewish supplication is for the building of Jerusalem and the restoration of the Davidic kingdom. The Christian supplication is transformed into a petition for the gathering of the church and the establishment of the messianic kingdom. The first strophe of the Jewish prayer has parallels with the second strophe of the Christian text. Here, however, the thanksgiving is not just for the food which God provides to all, but also for the spiritual food and drink which God has given us (the baptized).
The significance which Christians gave to the bread and wine in this sacramental meal no doubt led to fuller blessings over these elements than was customary at a Jewish meal. A preference for beginning the blessings with thanksgiving rather than an initial blessing of God also is noteworthy. A desire to conform the prayers before receiving the elements to the fuller prayer after receiving them may also have led to the additional strophe in the thanksgiving over the bread, resulting in a total of three strophes in the prayers over the elements parallel to the three strophes of the postcommunion thanksgiving.
We have seen why, from the perspective of the accounts of the last supper, there is no reason to expect the prayer to identify the bread and wine as Christ's body and blood. There is also no compelling reason to expect the prayer to include the account of the institution. The biblical account is a warrant for the Christian celebration, not the text of its prayer. Paul's account of the last supper in 1 Corinthians (11:26) has led us to understand it as the means of proclaiming Christ's death. But this represents Paul's interpretation of the rite—an interpretation which will not necessarily be taken up into the prayers associated with the rite in every Christian tradition.
We should note, finally, the early tradition of freedom in the formulation of prayers for the eucharist. The compiler of the Didache presents a set of prayers, but at the end of chapter 10 he advises, "In the case of prophets, however, you should let them give thanks in their own way."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from A Good and Joyful Thing by Byron D. Stuhlman. Copyright © 2000 Byron D. Stuhlman. Excerpted by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated.
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