Matthew 26:26

Verse 26. Jesus took bread] This is the first institution of what is termed the LORD's SUPPER. To every part of this ceremony, as here mentioned, the utmost attention should be paid.

To do this, in the most effectual manner, I think it necessary to set down the text of the three evangelists who have transmitted the whole account, collated with that part of St. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians which speaks of the same subject, and which, he assures us, he received by Divine revelation. It may seem strange that, although John (Joh 13:1-38) mentions all the circumstances preceding the holy supper, and, from 14:1-31 the circumstances which succeeded the breaking of the bread, and in chapters 15, 16, and 17, the discourse which followed the administration of the cup; yet he takes no notice of the Divine institution at all. This is generally accounted for on his knowledge of what the other three evangelists had written; and on his conviction that their relation was true, and needed no additional confirmation, as the matter was amply established by the conjoint testimony of three such respectable witnesses.

MATT. XXVI.

V. 26. And as they were eating, Jesus took bread and blessed it (ευλογησας and blessed God) and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat, this is my body.

MARK XIV.

V. 22. And as they did eat, Jesus took bread and blessed (ευλογησας, blessed God) and brake it, and to them, and said, Take, eat, this is my body.

LUKE XXII.

V. 19. And he took bread and gave thanks, (ευχαριστησας, i.e. to God,) and gave brake it, and gave unto them, saying:

This is my body which is given for you: This do in remembrance of me.

1 COR. XI.

V. 23. The Lord Jesus, the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread;

V. 24. And when he had given thanks (και ευχαριστησος, i.e. to God) he brake it, and said, Take, eat, this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me.

After giving the bread, the discourse related, Joh 14:1-31, inclusive, is supposed by Bishop Newcome to have been delivered by our Lord, for the comfort and support of his disciples under their present and approaching trials.

MATT. XXVI.

V. 27. And he took the cup, and gave thanks (ευχαριστησας,) and gave it to them, saying: Drink ye all of it.

V. 28. For this is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many or the remission of sins.

V. 29. But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom.

MARK XIV.

V. 23. And he took the cup; and when he had given thanks, (ευχαριστησας,) he gave it to them; and they all drank of it.

V. 24. And he said unto them, This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many.

V. 25. Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God.

LUKE XXII.

V. 20. Likewise also the cup, after supper, saying: This cup is the New Testament in my blood, which is shed for you.

1 COR XI.

V. 25. After the same manner also, he took the cup, when he had supped, saying: This cup is the New Testament in my blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me.

After this, our Lord resumes that discourse which is found in the 15th, 16th, and 17th chapters of John, beginning with the last verse of chap. 14, Arise, let us go hence. Then succeed the following words, which conclude the whole ceremony.

MATT XXVI.

V. 30. And when they had sung a hymn, they went out into the Mount of Olives.

MARK XIV.

V. 26. And when they had sung a hymn, they went out into the Mount of Olives.

LUKE XXII.

V. 39. And he came out, and went as he was wont to the Mount of Olives. And his disciples also followed him.

JOHN XVII.

V. 1. When Jesus had spoken these words, he went forth with his disciples over the brook Kedron.

From the preceding harmonized view of this important transaction, as described by three EVANGELISTS and one APOSTLE, we see the first institution, nature, and design of what has been since called THE LORD'S SUPPER. To every circumstance, as set down here, and the mode of expression by which such circumstances are described, we should pay the deepest attention.

Verse 26. As they were eating] Either an ordinary supper, or the paschal lamb, as some think. See the observations at the end of this chapter.

Jesus took bread] Of what kind? Unleavened bread, certainly, because there was no other kind to be had in all Judea at this time; for this was the first day of unleavened bread, (Mt 26:17), i.e. the 14th of the month Nisan, when the Jews, according to the command of God, (Ex 12:15-20; Ex 23:15; Ex 34:25), were to purge away all leaven from their houses; for he who sacrificed the passover, having leaven in his dwelling, was considered to be such a transgressor of the Divine law as could no longer be tolerated among the people of God; and therefore was to be cut off from the congregation of Israel. Leo of Modena, who has written a very sensible treatise on the customs of the Jews, observes, "That so strictly do some of the Jews observe the precept concerning the removal of all leaven from their houses, during the celebration of the paschal solemnity, that they either provide vessels entirely new for baking, or else have a set for the purpose, which are dedicated solely to the service of the passover, and never brought out on any other occasion."

To this divinely instituted custom of removing all leaven previously to the paschal solemnity, St. Paul evidently alludes, 1Co 5:6-8. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ, our passover, is sacrificed for us; therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the UNLEAVENED bread of sincerity and truth.

Now, if any respect should be paid to the primitive institution, in the celebration of this Divine ordinance, then, unleavened, unyeasted bread should be used. In every sign, or type, the thing signifying or pointing out that which is beyond itself should either have certain properties, or be accompanied with certain circumstances, as expressive as possible of the thing signified. Bread, simply considered in itself, may be an emblem apt enough of the body of our Lord Jesus, which was given for us; but the design of God was evidently that it should not only point out this, but also the disposition required in those who should celebrate both the antetype and the type; and this the apostle explains to be sincerity and truth, the reverse of malice and wickedness. The very taste of the bread was instructive: it pointed out to every communicant, that he who came to the table of God with malice or ill-will against any soul of man, or with wickedness, a profligate or sinful life, might expect to eat and drink judgment to himself, as not discerning that the Lord's body was sacrificed for this very purpose, that all sin might be destroyed; and that sincerity, ειλικρινεια, such purity as the clearest light can discern no stain in, might be diffused through the whole soul; and that truth, the law of righteousness and true holiness, might regulate and guide all the actions of life. Had the bread used on these occasions been of the common kind, it would have been perfectly unfit, or improper, to have communicated these uncommon significations; and, as it was seldom used, its rare occurrence would make the emblematical representation more deeply impressive; and the sign, and the thing signified, have their due correspondence and influence.

These circumstances considered, will it not appear that the use of common bread in the sacrament of the Lord's Supper is highly improper? He who can say, "This is a matter of no importance," may say with equal propriety, the bread itself is of no importance; and another may say, the wine is of no importance; and a third may say, "neither the bread nor wine is any thing, but as they lead to spiritual references; and, the spiritual reference being once understood, the signs are useless." Thus we may, through affected spirituality, refine away the whole ordinance of God; and, with the letter and form of religion, abolish religion itself. Many have already acted in this way, not only to their loss, but to their ruin, by showing how profoundly wise they are above what is written. Let those, therefore, who consider that man shall live by every word which proceeds from the mouth of God, and who are conscientiously solicitous that each Divine institution be not only preserved, but observed in all its original integrity, attend to this circumstance. The Lutheran Church makes use of unleavened bread to the present day.

And blessed it] Both St. Matthew and St. Mark use the word ευλογησας, blessed, instead of ευχαριστησας, gave thanks, which is the word used by St. Luke and St. Paul. But instead of ευλογησας, blessed, ευχαριστησας, gave thanks, is the reading of ten MSS. in uncial characters, of the Dublin Codex rescriptus, published by Dr. Barrett, and of more than one hundred others, of the greatest respectability. This is the reading also of the Syriac and Arabic, and is confirmed by several of the primitive fathers. The terms, in this case, are nearly of the same import, as both blessing and giving thanks were used on these occasions. But what was it that our Lord blessed? Not the bread, though many think the contrary, being deceived by the word IT, which is improperly supplied in our version. In all the four places referred to above, whether the word blessed or gave thanks is used, it refers not to the bread, but to God, the dispenser of every good. Our Lord here conforms himself to that constant Jewish custom, viz. of acknowledging God as the author of every good and perfect gift, by giving thanks on taking the bread and taking the cup at their ordinary meals. For every Jew was forbidden to eat, drink, or use any of God's creatures without rendering him thanks; and he who acted contrary to this command was considered as a person who was guilty of sacrilege.

From this custom we have derived the decent and laudable one of saying grace (gratas thanks) before and after meat. The Jewish form of blessing, probably that which our Lord used on this occasion, none of my readers will be displeased to find here, though it has been mentioned once before. On taking the bread they say: -

ברוך אתה אלהינו מלך העולם המוצא לחם מן הארץ

Baruch atta Elohinoo, Melech, haolam, ha motse Lechem min haarets.

Blessed be thou, our God, King of the universe, who bringest forth bread out of the earth!

Likewise, on taking the cup, they say: -

ברוך אלהינו מלך העולם בורא פרי הגף

Baruch Elohinoo, Melech, haolam, Bore perey haggephen.

Blessed be our God, the King of the universe, the Creator of the fruit it of the vine!

The Mohammedans copy their example, constantly saying before and after meat: -

[-Arabic-]

Bismillahi arahmani arraheemi.

In the name of God, the most merciful, the most compassionate.

No blessing, therefore, of the elements is here intended; they were already blessed, in being sent as a gift of mercy from the bountiful Lord; but God the sender is blessed, because of the liberal provision he has made for his worthless creatures. Blessing and touching the bread are merely Popish ceremonies, unauthorized either by Scripture or the practice of the pure Church of God; necessary of course to those who pretend to transmute, by a kind of spiritual incantation, the bread and wine into the real body and blood of Jesus Christ; a measure the grossest in folly, and most stupid in nonsense, to which God in judgment ever abandoned the fallen spirit of man.

And brake it] We often read in the Scriptures of breaking bread, but never of cutting it. The Jewish people had nothing similar to our high-raised loaf: their bread was made broad and thin, and was consequently very brittle, and, to divide it, there was no need of a knife.

The breaking of the bread I consider essential to the proper performance of this solemn and significant ceremony: because this act was designed by our Lord to shadow forth the wounding, piercing, and breaking of his body upon the cross; and, as all this was essentially necessary to the making a full atonement for the sin of the world, so it is of vast importance that this apparently little circumstance, the breaking of the bread, should be carefully attended to, that the godly communicant may have every necessary assistance to enable him to discern the Lord's body, while engaged in this most important and Divine of all God's ordinances. But who does not see that one small cube of fermented, i.e. leavened bread, previously divided from the mass with a knife, and separated by the fingers of the minister, can never answer the end of the institution, either as to the matter of the bread, or the mode of dividing it? Man is naturally a dull and heedless creature, especially in spiritual things, and has need of the utmost assistance of his senses, in union with those expressive rites and ceremonies which the Holy Scripture, not tradition, has sanctioned, in order to enable him to arrive at spiritual things, through the medium of earthly similitudes.

And gave it to the disciples] Not only the breaking, but also the DISTRIBUTION, of the bread are necessary parts of this rite. In the Romish Church, the bread is not broken nor delivered to the people, that THEY may take and eat; but the consecrated wafer is put upon their tongue by the priest; and it is generally understood by the communicants, that they should not masticate, but swallow it whole.

"That the breaking of this bread to be distributed," says Dr. Whitby, "is a necessary part of this rite is evident, first, by the continual mention of it by St. Paul and all the evangelists, when they speak of the institution of this sacrament, which shows it to be a necessary part of it. 2dly, Christ says, Take, eat, this is my body, BROKEN for you, 1Co 11:24. But when the elements are not broken, it can be no more said, This is my body broken for you, than where the elements are not given. 3dly, Our Lord said, Do this in remembrance of me: i.e. 'Eat this bread, broken in remembrance of my body broken on the cross:' now, where no body broken is distributed, there, nothing can be eaten in memorial of his broken body. Lastly, The apostle, by saying, The bread which we BREAK, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? sufficiently informs us that the eating of his broken body is necessary to that end, 1Co 10:10. Hence it was that this rite, of distributing bread broken, continued for a thousand years, and was, as Humbertus testifies, observed in the Roman Church in the eleventh century." WHITBY in loco. At present, the opposite is as boldly practised as if the real Scriptural rite had never been observed in the Church of Christ.

This is my body.] Here it must be observed that Christ had nothing in his hands, at this time, but part of that unleavened bread which he and his disciples had been eating at supper, and therefore he could mean no more than this, viz. that the bread which he was now breaking represented his body, which, in the course of a few hours, was to be crucified for them. Common sense, unsophisticated with superstition and erroneous creeds,-and reason, unawed by the secular sword of sovereign authority, could not possibly take any other meaning than this plain, consistent, and rational one, out of these words. "But," says a false and absurd creed, "Jesus meant, when he said, HOC EST CORPUS MEUM, This is my body, and HIC EST CALIX SANGUINIS MEI, This is the chalice of my blood, that the bread and wine were substantially changed into his body, including flesh, blood, bones, yea, the whole Christ, in his immaculate humanity and adorable divinity!" And, for denying this, what rivers of righteous blood have been shed by state persecutions and by religious wars! Well it may be asked, "Can any man of sense believe, that, when Christ took up that bread and broke it, it was his own body which he held in his own hands, and which himself broke to pieces, and which he and his disciples ate?" He who can believe such a congeries of absurdities, cannot be said to be a volunteer in faith; for it is evident, the man can neither have faith nor reason, as to this subject.

Let it be observed, if any thing farther is necessary on this point, that the paschal lamb, is called the passover, because it represented the destroying angel's passing over the children of Israel, while he slew the firstborn of the Egyptians; and our Lord and his disciples call this lamb the passover, several times in this chapter; by which it is demonstrably evident, that they could mean no more than that the lamb sacrificed on this occasion was a memorial of, and Represented, the means used for the preservation of the Israelites from the blast of the destroying angel.

Besides, our Lord did not say, hoc est corpus meum, (this is my body), as he did not speak in the Latin tongue; though as much stress has been laid upon this quotation from the Vulgate as if the original of the three evangelists had been written in the Latin language. Had he spoken in Latin, following the idiom of the Vulgate, he would have said, Panis hic corpus meum signficat, or, Symbolum est corporis mei: - hoc poculum sanguinem meum representat, or, symbolum est sanguinis mei: - this bread signifies my body; this cup represents my blood. But let it be observed that, in the Hebrew, Chaldee, and Chaldeo-Syriac languages, as used in the Bible, there is no term which expresses to mean, signify, denote, though both the Greek and Latin abound with them: hence the Hebrews use a figure, and say, it is, for, it signifies. So Gen 41:26, Gen 41:27. The seven kine Are (i.e. represent) seven years. This Is (represents) the bread of affliction which our fathers ate in the land of Egypt. Dan 7:24. The ten horns Are (i.e. signify) ten kings. They drank of the spiritual Rock which followed them, and the Rock Was (represented) Christ. 1Co 10:4. And following this Hebrew idiom, though the work is written in Greek, we find in Rev 1:20, The seven stars Are (represent) the angels of the seven Churches: and the seven candlesticks Are (represent) the seven Churches. The same form of speech is used in a variety of places in the New Testament, where this sense must necessarily be given to the word. Mat 13:38, Mat 13:39. The field IS (represents) the world: the good seed Are (represent or signify) the children of the kingdom: the tares Are (signify) the children of the wicked one. The enemy Is (signifies) the devil: the harvest Is (represents) the end of the world: the reapers Are (i.e. signify) the angels. Luk 8:9. What might this parable Be? Τις ΕΙΗ η παραβολη αυτη: - What does this parable Signify? Joh 7:36. Τις ΕΣΤΙΝ αυτος ο λογος: What is the Signification of this saying? Joh 10:6. They understood not what things they Were, τινα ΗΝ, what was the Signification of the things he had spoken to them. Act 10:17. Τι αν ΕΙΗ οραμα, what this vision Might Be; properly rendered by our translators, what this vision should Mean. Gal 4:24. For these Are the two covenants, αυται γαρ ΕΙΣΙΝ αι δυο διαθηκαι, these Signify the two covenants. Luk 15:26. He asked, τι ΕΙΗ ταυτα, what these things Meant. See also Luk 18:36. After such unequivocal testimony from the Sacred writings, can any person doubt that, This bread is my body, has any other meaning than, This bread Represents my body?

The Latins use the verb, sum, in all its forms, with a similar latitude of meaning. So, Esse oneri ferendo, he is Able to bear the burthen: bene Esse, to Live sumptuously: male Esse, to Live miserably: recte Esse, to Enjoy good health: Est mihi fistula, I Possess a flute: EST hodie in rebus, he now Enjoys a plentiful fortune: Est mihi namque domi pater, I Have a father at home, etc.: Esse solvendo, to be Able to pay: Fuimus Troes, Fuit Ilium; the Trojans are Extinct, Troy is No More.

In Greek also, and Hebrew, it often signifies to live, to die, to be killed. Ουκ ΕΙΜΙ, I am Dead, or a dead man. Mat 2:18 : Rachel weeping for her children, οτι ουκ ΕΙΣΙ, because they Were Murdered. Gen 42:36 : Joseph is not, יוסף איננו Yoseph einennu, Ιωσηφ ουκ ΕΣΤΙΝ, Sept., Joseph is Devoured by a Wild Beast. Rom 4:17 : Calling the things that Are not, as if they were Alive. So Plutarch in Laconicis: "This shield thy father always preserved; preserve thou it, or may thou not Be," Η μη ΕΣΟ, may thou Perish. ΟΥΚ ΟΝΤΕΣ νομοι, Abrogated laws. ΕΙΜΙ εν εμοι, I Possess a sound understanding. Εις πατερα υμιν ΕΣΟΜΑΙ, I will Perform the Part of a father to you. ΕΙΜΙ της πολεως της δε, I Am an Inhabitant of that city. 1Ti 1:7 : Desiring to Be teachers of the law, θελοντες ΕΙΝΑΙ νομοδιδασκαλοι, desiring to be Reputed teachers of the law, i.e. Able divines. Τα ΟΝΤΑ, the things that Are, i.e. Noble and Honorable men: τα μη ΟΝΤΑ, the things that are not, viz. the Vulgar, or those of Ignoble Birth.

Tertullian seems to have had a correct notion of those words of our Lord,

Acceptum panem et distributum discipulis, corpus illum suum fecit, Hoc Est Corpus Meum dicendo, id est, Figura corporis mei.

Advers. Marc. l. v. c. 40.

"Having taken the bread, and distributed that body to his disciples, he made it his body by saying, This is my body, i.e. a Figure of my body."

That our Lord neither spoke in Greek nor Latin, on this occasion, needs no proof. It was, most probably, in what was formerly called the Chaldaic, now the Syriac, that our Lord conversed with his disciples. Through the providence of God, we have complete versions of the Gospels in this language, and in them it is likely we have the precise words spoken by our Lord on this occasion. In Mt 26:26-27, the words in the Syriac version are, hanau pagree, This is my body, hanau demee, This is my blood, of which forms of speech the Greek is a verbal translation; nor would any man, even in the present day, speaking in the same language, use, among the people to whom it was vernacular, other terms than the above to express, This represents my body, and this represents my blood.

As to the ancient Syrian Church on the Malabar coast, it is a fact that it never held the doctrine of transubstantiation, nor does it appear that it was ever heard of in that Church till the year 1599, when Don Alexis Menezes, Archbishop of Goa, and the Jesuit Fransic Rez, invaded that Church, and by tricks, impostures, and the assistance of the heathen governors of Cochin, and other places, whom they gained over by bribes and presents, overthrew the whole of this ancient Church, and gave the oppressed people the rites, creeds, etc., of the papal Catholic Church in its place. Vid. La Croz. Hist. du Ch. des Indes.

This was done at the Synod of Diamper, which began its sessions at Agomale, June 20, 1599. The tricks of this unprincipled prelate, the tool of Pope Clement VIII., and Philip II., King of Portugal, are amply detailed by Mr. La Croze, in the work already quoted.

But this form of speech is common, even in our own language, though we have terms enow to fill up the ellipsis. Suppose a man entering into a museum, enriched with the remains of ancient Greek sculpture: his eyes are attracted by a number of curious busts; and, on inquiring what they are, he learns, this is Socrates, that Plato, a third Homer; others Hesiod, Horace, Virgil, Demosthenes, Cicero, Herodotus, Livy, Caesar, Nero, Vespasian, etc. Is he deceived by this information? Not at all: he knows well that the busts he sees are not the identical persons of those ancient philosophers, poets, orators, historians, and emperors, but only Representations of their persons in sculpture, between which and the originals there is as essential a difference as between a human body, instinct with all the principles of rational vitality, and a block of marble. When, therefore, Christ took up a piece of bread, brake it, and said, This IS my body, who, but the most stupid of mortals, could imagine that he was, at the same time, handling and breaking his own body! Would not any person, of plain common sense, see as great a difference between the man Christ Jesus, and the piece of bread, as between the block of marble and the philosopher it represented, in the case referred to above? The truth is, there is scarcely a more common form of speech in any language than, This IS, for, This Represents or Signifies. And as our Lord refers, in the whole of this transaction, to the ordinance of the passover, we may consider him as saying: "This bread is now my body, in that sense in which the paschal lamb has been my body hitherto; and this cup is my blood of the New Testament, in the same sense as the blood of bulls and goats has been my blood under the Old: Exodus 24; Hebrews 9. That is, the paschal lamb and the sprinkling of blood represented my sacrifice to the present time this bread and this wine shall represent my body and blood through all future ages; therefore, Do this in remembrance of me."

St. Luke and St. Paul add a circumstance here which is not noticed either by St. Matthew or St. Mark. After, this is my body, the former adds, which is given for you; the latter, which is broken for you; the sense of which is: "As God has in his bountiful providence given you bread for the sustenance of your lives, so in his infinite grace he has given you my body to save your souls unto life eternal. But as this bread must be broken and masticated, in order to its becoming proper nourishment, so my body must be broken, i.e. crucified, for you, before it can be the bread of life to your souls. As, therefore, your life depends on the bread which God's bounty has provided for your bodies, so your eternal life depends on the sacrifice of my body on the cross for your souls." Besides, there is here an allusion to the offering of sacrifice - an innocent creature was brought to the altar of God, and its blood (the life of the beast) was poured out for, or in behalf of, the person who brought it. Thus Christ says, alluding to the sacrifice of the paschal lamb, This is my body, το υπερ υμων διδομενον, which Is Given in your stead, or in your behalf; a free Gift, from God's endless mercy, for the salvation of your souls. This is my body, το υπερ υμων κλωμενον, (1Co 11:24), which is broken - sacrificed in your stead; as without the breaking (piercing) of the body, and spilling of the blood, there was no remission.

In this solemn transaction we must weigh every word, as there is none without its appropriate and deeply emphatic meaning. So it is written, Eph 5:2. Christ hath loved us, and given himself, υπερ ημων, on our account, or in our stead, an offering and a Sacrifice (θυσια) to God for a sweet-smelling savor; that, as in the sacrifice offered by Noah, Gen 8:21, (to which the apostle evidently alludes), from which it is said, The Lord smelled a sweet savor, ריח הניחח riach hanichoach, a savor of rest, so that he became appeased towards the earth, and determined that there should no more be a flood to destroy it; in like manner, in the offering and sacrifice of Christ for us, God is appeased towards the human race, and has in consequence decreed that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

See also Mar 14:22-26; Luk 22:15-20; 1Co 11:23-25.

Mat 26:26

As they were eating - As they were eating the paschal supper, near the close of the meal.

Luke adds that he said, just before instituting the sacramental supper, “With desire have I desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer.” This is a Hebrew manner of expression, signifying “I have greatly desired.” He had desired it, doubtless:

(1)That he might institute the Lord’s Supper, to be a perpetual memorial of him;

(2)That he might strengthen them for their approaching trials;

(3) That he might explain to them the true nature of the Passover; and,

(4) That he might spend another season with them in the duties of religion. Every “Christian, about to die will also seek opportunities of drawing specially near to God, and of holding communion with him and with his people.

Jesus took bread - That is, the unleavened bread which they used at the celebration of the Passover, made into thin cakes, easily broken and distributed.

And blessed it - Or sought a blessing on it; or “gave thanks” to God for it. The word rendered “blessed” not unfrequently means “to give thanks.” Compare Luk 9:16 and Joh 6:11. It is also to be remarked that some manuscripts have the word rendered “gave thanks,” instead of the one translated “blessed.” It appears from the writings of Philo and the Rabbis that the Jews were never accustomed to eat without giving thanks to God and seeking his blessing. This was especially the case in both the bread and the wine used at the Passover.

And brake it - This “breaking” of the bread represented the sufferings of Jesus about to take place - his body “broken” or wounded for sin. Hence, Paul 1Co 11:24 adds, “This is my body which is broken for you;” that is, which is about to be broken for you by death, or wounded, pierced, bruised, to make atonement for your sins.

This is my body - This represents my body. This broken bread shows the manner in which my body will be broken; or this will serve to recall my dying sufferings to your remembrance. It is not meant that his body would be literally “broken” as the bread was, but that the bread would be a significant emblem or symbol to recall to their recollection his sufferings. It is not improbable that our Lord pointed to the broken bread, or laid his hands on it, as if he had said, “Lo, my body!” or, “Behold my body! - that which “represents” my broken body to you.” This “could not” be intended to mean that that bread was literally his body. It was not. His body was then before them “living.” And there is no greater absurdity than to imagine his “living body” there changed at once to a “dead body,” and then the bread to be changed into that dead body, and that all the while the “living” body of Jesus was before them.

Yet this is the absurd and impossible doctrine of the Roman Catholics, holding that the “bread” and “wine” were literally changed into the “body and blood” of our Lord. The language employed by the Saviour was in accordance with a common mode of speaking among the Jews, and exactly similar to that used by Moses at the institution of the Passover Exo 12:11; “It” - that is, the lamb - “is the Lord’s Passover.” That is, the lamb and the feast “represent” the Lord’s “passing over” the houses of the Israelites. It serves to remind you of it. It surely cannot be meant that that lamb was the literal “passing over” their houses - a palpable absurdity - but that it represented it. So Paul and Luke say of the bread, “This is my body broken for you: this do in remembrance of me.” This expresses the whole design of the sacramental bread. It is to call to “remembrance,” in a vivid manner, the dying sufferings of our Lord. The sacred writers, moreover, often denote that one thing is represented by another by using the word is. See Mat 13:37; “He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man” - that is, represents the Son of man. Gen 41:26; “the seven good kine are seven years” - that is, “represent” or signify seven years. See also Joh 15:1, Joh 15:5; Gen 17:10. The meaning of this important passage may be thus expressed: “As I give this broken bread to you to eat, so will I deliver my body to be afflicted and slain for your sins.”

Mat 26:27

And he took the cup - That is, the cup of wine which was used at the feast of the Passover, called the cup of “Hallel,” or praise, because they commenced then repeating the “Psalms” with which they closed the Passover.

See Mat 26:30. This cup, Luke says, he took “after supper” - that is, after they had finished the ordinary celebration of “eating” the Passover. The “bread” was taken “while” they were eating, the cup after they had done eating.

And gave thanks - See the notes at Mat 26:26.

Drink ye all of it - That is, “all of you, disciples, drink of it;” not, “drink all the wine.”

Mat 26:28

For this is my blood - This “represents” my blood, as the bread does my body.

Luke and Paul vary the expression, adding what Matthew and Mark have omitted. “This cup is the new testament in my blood.” By this cup he meant the wine in the cup, and not the cup itself. Pointing to it, probably, he said, “This - ‘wine’ - represents my blood about to be, shed.” The phrase “new testament” should have been rendered “new covenant,” referring to the “covenant or compact” that God was about to make with people through a Redeemer. The “old” covenant was that which was made with the Jews by the sprinkling of the blood of sacrifices. See Exo 24:8; “And Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant which the Lord hath made with you,” etc. In allusion to that, Jesus says, this cup is the new “covenant” in my blood; that is, which is “ratified, sealed, or sanctioned by my blood.” In ancient times, covenants or contracts were ratified by slaying an animal; by the shedding of its blood, imprecating similar vengeance if either party failed in the compact. See the notes at Heb 9:16. So Jesus says the covenant which God is about to form with people the new covenant, or the gospel economy is sealed or ratified with my blood.

Which is shed for many for the remission of sins - In order that sins may be remitted, or forgiven. That is, this is the appointed way by which God will pardon transgressions. That blood is efficacious for the pardon of sin:

1. Because it is “the life” of Jesus, the “blood” being used by the sacred writers as representing “life itself,” or as containing the elements of life, Gen 9:4; Lev 17:14. It was forbidden, therefore, to eat blood, because it contained the life, or was the life, of the animal. When, therefore, Jesus says that his blood was shed for many, it is the same as saying that His life was given for many. See the notes at Rom 3:25.

2. His life was given for sinners, or he died in the place of sinners as their substitute. By his death on the cross, the death or punishment due to them in hell may be removed and their souls be saved. He endured so much suffering, bore so much agony, that God was pleased to accept it in the place of the eternal torments of all the redeemed. The interests of justice, the honor and stability of his government, would be as secure in saving them in this manner as if the suffering were inflicted on them personally in hell. God, by giving his Son to die for sinners, has shown his infinite abhorrence of sin; since, according to his view, and therefore according to truth, nothing else would show its evil nature but the awful sufferings of his own Son. That he died “in the stead or place” of sinners is abundantly clear from the following passages of Scripture: Joh 1:29; Eph 5:2; Heb 7:27; 1Jo 2:2; 1Jo 4:10; Isa 53:10; Rom 8:32; 2Co 5:15.

Mat 26:29

But I say unto you ... - That is, the observance of the Passover, and of the rites shadowing forth future things, here end.

I am about to die. The design of all these types and shadows is about to be accomplished. This is the last time that I shall partake of them with you. Hereafter, when my Father’s kingdom is established in heaven, we will partake together of the thing represented by these types and ceremonial observances - the blessings and triumphs of redemption.

Fruit of the vine - “Wine, the fruit or produce” of the vine made of the grapes of the vine.

Until that day - Probably the time when they should be received to heaven. It does not mean here on earth, further than that they would partake with him in the happiness of spreading the gospel and the triumphs of his kingdom.

When I drink it new with you - Not that he would partake with them of literal wine there, but in the thing represented by it. Wine was an important part of the feast of the Passover, and of all feasts. The kingdom of heaven is often represented under the image of a feast. It means that he will partake of joy with them in heaven; that they will share together the honors and happiness of the heavenly world.

New - In a new manner, or perhaps “afresh.”

In my Father’s kingdom - In heaven. The place where God shall reign in a kingdom fully established and pure.

Mat 26:30

And when they had sung a hymn - The Passover was observed by the Jews by singing or “chanting” Ps. 113–118. These they divided into two parts. They sung Ps. 113–114 during the observance of the Passover, and the others at the close. There can be no doubt that our Saviour, and the apostles also, used the same psalms in their observance of the Passover. The word rendered “sung a hymn” is a participle, literally meaning “hymning” - not confined to a single hymn, but admitting many.

Mount of Olives - See the notes at Mat 20:1.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Mat_26:26-29

And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it.

Relation of the Holy Communion to Christ

The bread and cup are His body and blood, because they are causes instrumental, upon the receipt whereof the participation of His body and blood ensueth. Every cause is in the effect which groweth from it. Our souls and bodies quickened to eternal life are effects, the cause whereof is the person of Christ; His body and blood are the true well-spring out of which this life floweth What merit, force, or virtue soever there is in His sacrificed body and blood we freely, fully, and wholly have by this sacrament; and because the sacrament itself, being but a corruptible and earthly creature, must needs be thought an unlikely instrument to work so admirable effects in men, we are therefore to rest ourselves altogether upon the strength of His glorious power, who is able and will bring to pass that the bread and cup which He giveth us shall be truly the thing He promiseth. (R. Hooker, D. D.)

The Eucharist the great feast of the Church

I. A true feast-for the nourishment of the spiritual life.

II. A sacred feast-sanctifying from all carnal enjoyment.

III. A covenant feast-sealing redemption.

IV. A love feast-uniting the redeemed.

V. A supper feastforefestival of death, of the end of all things, of the coming of Christ. (J. P. Lange, D. D.)

Sacrificial aspect of Christs death shown in the Lords Supper

This rite shows us what Christ thought, and would have us think, of His death. By it He points out the moment of His whole career which He desires that men should remember. Not His words of tenderness and wisdom; not His miracles, amazing and gracious as these were; not the flawless beauty of His character, though it touches all hearts, and wins the most rugged to love and the most degraded to hope; but the moment in which He gave His life is that which He would imprint for ever on the memory of the world. And not only so, but in the rite He distinctly tells us in what aspect He would have that death remembered. Not as the tragic end of a noble career which might be hallowed by tears such as are shed over a martyrs ashes; not as the crowning proof of love; not as the supreme act of patient forgiveness; but as a death for us, in which, as by the blood of the sacrifice, is secured the remission of sins. And not only so, but the double symbol in the Lords Supper-whilst in some respects the bread and wine speak the same truths, and certainly point to the same cross-has in each of its parts special lessons entrusted to it, and special truths to proclaim. The bread and the wine both say, Remember Me and My death. Taken in conjunction they point to the death as violent; taken separately they each suggest various aspects of it, and of the blessings that will flow to us therefrom.

I. A Divine treaty or covenant.

II. The forgiveness of sins.

III. A life infused.

IV. A festal gladness. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)

The New Testament

Gods covenants with His people:-Ancient Israel had lived for nearly 2000 years under the charter of their national existence, which was given on Sinai amidst thunderings and lightnings (Exo_19:5, etc.). And that covenant, or agreement, or treaty, on the part of God was ratified by a solemn act, in which the blood of the sacrifice, divided into two portions, was sprinkled, half upon the altar, and the other half, after their acceptance of the conditions and obligations of the covenant, on the people who had pledged themselves to obedience. And now here is a Galilean peasant, in a borrowed upper room, within four-and-twenty hours of His ignominious death, which might seem to blast all His work, who steps forward and says, I put away that ancient covenant which knits this nation to God. It is antiquated. I am the true offering and sacrifice, by the blood of which, sprinkled on altar and on people, a new covenant, built upon better promises, shall henceforth be. What a tremendous piece of audacity, except on the one hypothesis that He who spake was indeed the Word of God, and that He was making that which Himself had established of old to give way to that which He establishes now. The new covenant, which Christ seals in His blood, is the charter, the better charter, under the conditions of which the whole world may find a salvation which dwarfs all the deliverances of the past. Between us and the infinite Divine nature there is established a firm and unmoveable agreement. He has limited Himself by the utterance of a faithful word, and we can now come to Him with His own promise, and cast it down before Him, and say, Thou hast spoken, and Thou art bound to fulfil it. We have a covenant; God has shown us what He is going to do, and has thereby pledged Himself to the performance. (Ibid.)

The Lords Supper

I. The nature of the institution. It is a supper-strictly and essentially in its own particular nature it is nothing else. Was apparently in connection with another supper, and it seemed to be almost a part of that other supper. The supper was significant and emblematic-a representation of something else.

II. The object and design. The death of Christ is brought before us. The death of Christ as an offering for sin is brought before us. The death of Christ as the seal of the everlasting covenant between the Father and the Son is brought before us.

III. The observance of the rite. Just as simple as its nature and object. The frequency of reception is left open. The posture may he considered indifferent. The positive directions and the actual practice of our Lord. (C. Molyneux.)

The last supper

I. The time of the institution.

1. During the feast of the Passover. Christ the true Passover (Exo_12:3; Exo_12:6-7, and others; with Joh_1:29; Rev_5:6).

2. On the eve of His being offered. The meaning and purpose of the Passover lamb transferred to Jesus, and the sense widened. That for the Jews only, this for the true Israel of God, etc.

II. The method of the institution.

1. With thanksgiving.

2. The bread-broken, distributed, eaten. Christ the bread of life. Received by faith.

3. The wine. All were to drink it. The blood of Christ shed for the remission of sin.

4. They sung a hymn-left the table with joy and thankfulness.

III. The purpose of the institution.

1. To supersede the Jewish Passover.

2. A memorial feast. No less binding upon Christians than any other law of Christ. A dying command. Sacredness of last words.

3. A bond of union among Christians, and public acknowledgment of indebtedness to and faith in Christ. (J. C. Gray.)

The Passover feast

Relate the history of this feast.

I. The passover feast commemorated a great deliverance.

1. A deliverance from what? From Egyptian bondage-the destroying angel-Gods judgment upon sin.

2. How was this deliverance effected?

3. Why was this deliverance commemorated every year?

II. The passover feast pointed to a greater deliverance.

1. A deliverance from what? From a worse bondage than that of Egypt, etc. (Joh_8:34; Pe 2:19). And from a judgment more terrible than came upon the first-born (Romans if. 3, 5, 8; Mat_25:41).

2. How was this greater deliverance to be effected? Also by the blood of the Lamb (1Pe_1:18-19; Rev_5:8-9). Who is this Lamb? (Joh_1:29; Col_1:13-14; Heb_9:12; Heb_9:14). We must come to Christ and have heart sprinkled (Heb_10:19; Heb_10:22; 1Pe_1:2). Each must have his own sin put away, etc.

3. How did the yearly feast point to this greater deliverance? Would show how deliverance from death could only be by death of another (1Co_5:7).

III. Christ instituted the Lords supper to commemorate this greater deliverance. In the Lords Supper two things done-

1. We commemorate Christs death for us.

2. We feed upon Him by faith. (E. Stock.)

The Lords Supper

Nature and design.

I. A commemoration. Includes-

(1) Adoration. Adoration due to God in fashion of a man. It is this that makes Him the central point of the universe, to whom all eyes are turned.

(2) Gratitude. The benefits-deliverance from hell, power of Satan, and sin; restoration to the favour and fellowship of God; fellowship with Christ, including participation with His life and glory. The cost at which these benefits were secured-Christs humiliation and suffering.

II. A communion.

1. An act and means of participation. We participate in His body and blood, i.e., of their sacrificial virtue.

2. The effect of this makes us one with Him; one body. Illustration from the Jewish rites. In this ordinance our union with Christ and with each other is far more intimate.

III. Consecration. We cannot commemorate Christ as our Saviour without thereby acknowledging ourselves to be His-the purchase of His blood, and devoted to His service. (C. Hodge, D. D.)

The institution and observance of the Lords Supper

I. A remembrance of the atonement of Christ.

1. How much He suffered.

2. How well He suffered.

3. How patiently -He suffered.

II. A proclamation of the atonement of Christ.

III. A participation in the atonement of Christ.

1. Great facilities granted.

2. A direct communication from Christ to His people. (B. Noel, M. A.)

The new wine of the kingdom

I. The words of the saviour as they regard the act in which himself and his followers were then engaged. They were drinking of the fruit, or, more properly, the product of the vine. Not a mere ordinary social communion, but in direct connection with the Passover. Christ did not design to honour a Jewish rite as commemorating a national deliverance, but as typical, holding a relationship to Him and the economy of which He was the head.

1. That the Lord Jesus led His followers to regard the Passover as being representative of His mediatorial sufferings and death.

2. The Saviour led His followers to consider the Passover as originating an ordinance to be perpetuated for important purposes throughout all the ages of the Christian Church.

II. The words of the Saviour as they regard the events he taught his followers to anticipate,

1. An event of approaching separation-I will not henceforth drink of the fruit of the vine until a certain period afterwards-named; He and His disciples were bound to part.

2. An event of ultimate re-union-When I drink it new with you in My Fathers kingdom.

3. All the followers of the Saviour shall be brought to the Fathers kingdom.

4. The mediation of Jesus Christ, of which the Paschal rite is to be regarded as a:permanent and symbolical pledge, is of such a nature as to secure that all those who have possessed a personal interest in that mediatorial work shall be brought into a state of glorious redemption in the bright worlds which lie beyond the grave.

5. The followers of the Saviour shall possess unspeakable and everlasting joy. The drinking of wine indicates the fruition of all delight.

6. The pleasures which are to be enjoyed by the followers of the Saviour in the Fathers kingdom are especially to be regarded as associated with His presence. How pre-eminently in the New Testament is the presence of Christ set forth as constituting the happiness of the celestial world (Joh_12:26). Learn

(1) How vast and wonderful is the love of Christ to man.

(2) The vast importance of being numbered amongst the followers of Christ ourselves. (J. Parsons.)

The new covenant

I. The new covenant of forgiveness and life. On Gods side is pledged forgiveness, remission of sins, sustained acceptance. On mans side is pledged the obedience of faith. Christ, as mediator for man, receives Gods pledge; and, as mediator for God, He receives mans pledge. As representative for man, He offers to God the perfect obedience, and pledges us to a like obedience; as representative for God, He brings and gives to us forgiveness and life, pledging God therein.

II. The blood which seals the covenant. The blood represents the yielding or taking of life.

1. In surrendering His life, Christ sealed our pledge that we will give our life to God in all holy obedience.

2. In giving His blood, His life, for us, as it were, to eat, He gives us the strength to keep our pledge.

III. The wine that recalls to mind and renews the covenant. God does not need to be reminded of His pledge, but frail, forgetful, busy-minded man does. (Selected.)

Christs own account of His blood-shedding

I. Whose blood was this? My blood. It is a man, who sits at that table with others, not an angel. But He is also the living God.

II. By whom was this blood shed?

1. Himself, to speak with deepest reverence. Jesus shed His own blood-was the offerer as well as the sacrifice. He freely laid down His life.

2. In some respects the principal party in this mysterious blood-shedding, even the holy loving Father, as it is written, God spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all; … This commandment have I received of My Father; The cup which My Father hath given Me.

3. We, believers in Jesus. Our sins were the guilty cause.

III. To what end and issue was this blood-shedding? For the remission of sins. Our Lord singles out from all the benefits of redemption the remission of sins, not only because it is that which stands most intimately related to His blood-shedding, but because it is the foundation of all, carrying the others along with it by necessary consequence (Jer_31:33-34). To what effect as well as design? A sure salvation for a great multitude whom no man can number. (C. J. Brown, D. D.)

Substitution

Let me mention here a circumstance in the last days of the distinguished Lord Chancellor Lyndhurst, who, at an extreme age, but in full possession of all his rare mental powers, was brought to know the Saviour. He said, I never used to be able to understand what these good people meant when they spoke of so much blood, the blood. But I understand it now; its just substitution. Ay, that it is, in one word, substitution; My blood shed for many for the remission of sins; Christs blood instead of ours; Christs death for our eternal death; Christ made a curse, that we might be redeemed from the curse of the law. Once, in conversation, my beloved friend, Dr. Duncan, expressed it thus in his terse way, A religion of blood is Gods appointed religion for a sinner, for the wages of sin is death. (C. J. Brown, D. D.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat 26:26. And as they were eating, Jesus took bread — The bread, or cake, which the master of the family used to divide among them, after they had eaten the passover. This custom our Lord now transferred to a nobler use. This bread is, that is, signifies or represents, my body, according to the style of the sacred writers. Thus Gen 40:12, The three branches are three days. Thus Gal 4:24, St. Paul, speaking of Sarah and Hagar, says, These are the two covenants. Thus in the grand type of our Lord, Exo 12:11, God says of the paschal lamb, This is the Lord’s passover. Now Christ, substituting the holy communion for the passover, follows the style of the Old Testament, and uses the same expressions the Jews were wont to use in celebrating the passover. “When I consider,” says Dr. Doddridge, “that, on the same foundation on which the Papists argue for transubstantiation from these words, they might prove from Eze 5:1-5, that the prophet’s hair was the city of Jerusalem; from Joh 10:9; Joh 15:1, that Christ was literally a door and a vine; from Mat 26:27-28, and 1Co 11:25, that the cup was his blood, and that Christ commanded his disciples to drink and swallow the cup; I cannot but be astonished at the inference they would deduce from hence. Had Irenæus or Epiphanius reported such a thing of any sect of ancient heretics, now extinct, one would have been so candid to human nature as to suppose the historian misinformed. As it is, one is almost tempted to suspect it to be the effect of arrogance rather than error; and to consider it as a mere insolent attempt to show the world, in the strongest instance they could invent, what monstrous things the clergy should dare to say, which the wretched laity should not dare to contradict; nay, which they should be forced to pretend they believed. In this view the thought is admirable, and worthy the most malicious wit that ever lorded it over the heritage of God. But it may deserve some serious reflection, whether it be not an instance of infatuation to which God has given them up, that it may be a plain mark to all, that will use common sense, of the grossest error in a church which claims infallibility; and may not be intended by Providence as a kind of antidote against the rest of its poison.”

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

§§ 126, 128. — INSTITUTION OF THE LORD’S SUPPER, Mat_26:26-29

We come now to words which have sounded forth through the Church through all ages since our Lord’s departure, and which are to sound forth until he comes again. The nature of the Lord’s Supper is best understood when we recollect that it is, under the Christian dispensation, the continuance in a modified form of the passover of the Old Testament. As baptism is the modified ordinance of circumcision, as the Lord’s day is a modified continuance of the Sabbath, so is the Lord’s Supper a modified continuance of the paschal supper of the Old Testament Church. We may first remark that the passover was a true sacrifice; for the victim was a true substitute for the sinner, dying in his stead, and showing by his death that the sinner ought to die. Israel was as true a sinner as Egypt, and as truly deserving the stroke of the destroying angel; but God, as he passed over, accepted the blood presented by Israel’s faith, (which blood was a confession, on Israel’s part, that he deserved the death the victim suffered in his stead) as a substitute. And as this shed blood was typical of the shed blood of the Saviour, so the lamb itself was typical of the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. Hence it was, by anticipation, a representation of that same reality, which is set forth by the communion of the Lord’s Supper. Both are typical of the same thing, and therefore correspondent to each other. The Lord’s Supper is in a proper sense the bloodless sacrifice of the new dispensation.

And the very fact that our Lord instituted his supper on the same evening as the paschal supper, shows that it is a continuance in a modified form. It simply drops off the bloody elements; so that it is in fact true that our sacramental ordinance has been continued from the departure of Israel to the present time, and will be continued until the full redemption and departure of the spiritual Israel under the greater Moses to the full fruition of the heavenly Canaan.

We have then the following typical parallels:

The Redeemed.The Victim.The DeliveranceThe Result.Israel.The paschal lamb. From Egypt.Canaan.The communicant. The broken bread. From spiritual bondage. The spiritual emancipation.The believer.The crucified Jesus.From hell.Heaven.The prophecies of the Old Testament more commonly predicted a glorious and triumphant Messiah; the sacrifices predicted the Messiah as dying and atoning.

26. As they were eating — When in the course of the paschal supper they arrived at the breaking of bread, as we have above described. The bread was in the form of cakes. The breaking, under the old dispensation, represented the breaking which Israel suffered in Egypt; but in the new, the breaking is transferred to the victim, who assumes our sins and sufferings in his own body. The breaking was the customary mode of separating bread into parts; yet it was none the less a significant part of the rite. Paul clearly intimates that the breaking symbolized the violence by which our Lord’s body was put to death. 1Co_11:24. Breaking and not cutting, seems the proper mode of severing the sacramental portions. Blessed it — To bless is to implore the divine blessing upon it, that is, to pray solemnly that God would graciously make it effective of its beneficent purpose. The blessing on the bread was the Redeemer’s prayer that the bread might be of a blessed effect to the partaker.

This is my body — A customary mode in Scripture, as in common language, of expressing that a symbol is or stands for its original. It is perfectly natural to say that a sign IS the thing it signifies. This is usually done in explaining some symbolical representations. So Joseph in explaining a dream says: “The three branches are three days.” Gen_11:12. So at this very supper our Lord says: “This cup is the new testament.” 1Co_11:25. If the phrase “This [bread] is my body,” really means that the bread is our Lord’s literal material body then the phrase “This cup is the new testament” means that the material vessel (not the wine in it) was an actual “new testament.” Common sense ought to show that our Lord is now explaining the import of certain symbols, and in so doing he uses the ordinary phrase of saying that the symbol is the thing symbolized.

Our readers perceive that we are here refuting the strange doctrine of the Church of Rome, which affirms that the bread is transubstantiated, that is, changed in substance, into the very body of our Lord. And as it implies that the bread is Christ’s present body, it is also called the doctrine of real presence. This doctrine bears marks of dishonesty, for,

1. It doctrinally places the material person of God in the hands of a priest. It makes the salvation of the layman’s soul dependent upon the priest’s consent to give him the flesh of God. It thus places the man at the mercy of the priest. Hence the doctrine of transubstantiation is the basis of the most abject subjection of the laity to the priesthood in the Church of Rome.

2. It is a most absurd doctrine. It makes Christ to have held his own body between his own thumb and fingers. While his body was reclining, they were holding it in their hand, chewing it with their teeth, digesting it in their stomachs. Thus were they cannibals, eating human flesh! All this is founded upon a forced interpretation of language which, according to ordinary idiom, means something else.

3. The doctrine violates the very nature of the institution. From the time of the first paschal lamb downward, the purpose of the slain victim was to represent the body of the true victim instead of presenting the body itself. The slain lamb represented that true body until He came. The broken bread must represent it until he come again. What makes this plain, is the fact that at the old Jewish passover the master of the table was accustomed to say as he took the bread, “This is [that is, this represents] the bread of affliction, which our fathers did eat in the land of Egypt.” But in the place of this formula our Lord substitutes, “This is [that is, represents] my body.” From being the representative of Israel in suffering, it becomes now the representative of the suffering substitute of the sinner. To make it not a representative, but the thing itself, is, therefore, to violate the congruity of the typical system.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL NOTES

Mat_26:28. New.—Omitted in R.V., on the authority of the best MSS. Testament.—Covenant (R.V.). The term διαθήκη is here of peculiar importance. It does not mean either a covenant in the sense of contract or agreement, or a testament in the sense of a will, but it has a meaning which combines ideas distinctive of both. In διαθήκη there are the conditional elements necessary to a covenant, and the absolute elements necessary to a testament: the first, so far as it denotes conditions, revealed and established by God, which man must accept and obey before he can stand in right relation with Him; the second, so far as it denotes these conditions as the direct and independent and absolute expressions of the Divine will. We may define the καινὴ διαθήκη (“new covenant”) as the revelation of a new relation on God’s part, with the conditions necessary to the realisation of a new and correspondent relation on man’s. The founding of the old διαθήκη had been ratified by blood (Exo_24:6-8): the founding of the new must be the same (A. M. Fairbairn). For the remission of sins.—Unto remission of sins (R.V.). I.e. with a view to remission of sins. “Remission of sins” is a condensed way of expressing remission of the penalty of sin (Morison).

Mat_26:29. Until that day.—In the kingdom of God, completed and perfected, He would be with them once again, and then Master and disciples would be alike sharers in that joy in the Holy Ghost, of which wine—new wine—was the appropriate symbol (Plumptre).

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Mat_26:26-30

Sacrifice and thanksgiving.—“As they were eating.” The Passover meal had been interrupted before (Mat_26:21) for the announcement of the betrayal. It is now interrupted for another announcement. Taking of the bread and wine that were then on the table—breaking the one and pouring out the other—declaring them also to be identified respectively with His own body and blood—the Saviour commanded all His disciples to partake in common of both. Much was meant by these actions and words—much, on the one hand, in the way of institution and doctrine; much, on the other, in the way of prediction and hope.

I. In the way of institution and doctrine.—These things were, in the first place, a symbolical rehearsal of the Saviour’s then imminent death. As had now been done with that bread and wine, so was to be done almost immediately with His body and blood. The way in which He had just united these things in thought, could mean nothing else. The use He had made of these elements—as the Apostle afterwards said of it (1Co_11:26)—had “shewed forth” His own “death”: its near approach, its exact manner, its inevitable certainty also. In a similar manner, in the next place, these words and actions were meant to set forth the purpose of His death. That death was intended, for example, to put away guilt. It was “for the remission of sins.” It was to do this, also, for “many”; even as many as willed. Once more, it was able to do all this, partly because of its preciousness—blood-shedding doing away with “blood-guiltiness” (Psa_51:14; Genesis 4); life being given for life; and that, His life, most precious of all. And partly because it had been so agreed on, in the mercy of God, from of old: that blood being here spoken of, therefore, as the “blood of the covenant” (Mat_26:28), and as having, in consequence, a power of its own. Further, these symbols set forth, in the last place, how and in what manner the immense advantage spoken of could effectually be made ours. Just, in short, as we do always with bread and wine for our natural life, so exactly must we do for our spiritual life with that which they represent here. Even bread “broken” and ready for eating does not sustain us of itself; even wine “poured out” and ready for drinking does not cheer life of itself. Both must be actually partaken of if they are to tell indeed on our lives. Just so of that priceless blessing spoken of here. We must make it ours by our faith. In other words, that bread of heaven, that wine of agony, must be “eaten” and “drunk” (Joh_6:53, etc.). All this, in figure, but with deepest significance, did this “institution” proclaim.

II. In the way of prediction.—There is a nearer horizon, and a farther one—much sadness and more gladness—in the words which come next. They seem intended to teach the disciples—in connection with the Ordinance just appointed—what to expect in the future. You are to expect, in the first place—so the Saviour seems to say to them—both separation and union; being without Me at first, being with Me at last. While we are separated you will need something to remind you of Me; something also to be a kind of pledge of our being united again. Let the repetition of this ordinance answer these ends (cf. 1 Corinthians 11., end of Mat_26:24; Mat_26:26, which express exactly the spirit of what our Saviour says here). You must expect, next, in consequence of things being thus, both imperfection and perfection—the one first, the other to follow. Much as these symbols will do for you if rightly employed, they must not be supposed capable of obliterating the difference between separation and union. They will not do so to Myself. I shall be only as the master of a feast, who, because of the absence of certain much-honoured and much-beloved guests, will not permit himself to taste yet of the wine of the feast (Mat_26:29). And you will be as those guests who cannot do so, because they are not present as yet. Not so, however, is it to be at all when the time of separation is over. The very best of the wine, then—even wine “new” indeed, and such as never before—shall be our common delight: delightful most on that ground! You must expect, lastly, in the future before you, both trial and triumph. Trial, at first, and not a little of it. Triumph afterwards, and very much more. Until then, though kings and priests in reality, and proved to be such by being guests at My table, the fact will be hidden from most. After then it will be hidden from none (cf. Mat_13:43; Rom_8:19; 1Jn_3:2, etc.). How, indeed, should it be when this feast of “remembrance” has given place to that “marriage supper” itself (Rev_19:7-9), and you sit there as guests?

Our prevailing feeling, as we look back on this beginning, should be the feeling of praise. It appears from the story that this beginning itself was followed by praise (Mat_26:30). Even in the gloom of that most solemn occasion the Saviour and His disciples joined in a “hymn.” As we think of the ordinance of that night of betrayal; of the love it displays; of the blessings it seals; of the hopes it predicts; of the comfort it assures; of the strength it has given; we may well do the same thing. Practically, where we observe it rightly, we do so in effect. We always sing a “hymn”—we always sing the “hymn”—when we thus show forth the Lord’s death.” It is the Eucharist—the giving of thanks.

HOMILIES ON THE VERSES

Mat_26:26-30. The Lord’s Supper.—

I. The Author.—Jesus took bread, etc.

II. The time of the institution. The night before He was betrayed.

III. The sacramental elements.—Bread and wine.

IV. The ministerial action.—The breaking of the bread and the blessing of the cup.

V. The object.—“Do this in remembrance of Me,” etc.

VI. Thanksgiving after communion.—W. Burkitt.

Mat_26:26-29. The Lords Supper.—

I. The nature of the Lord’s Supper as seen in its reference to the past.—It is a memorial or commemoration of the death of Christ. The greatness of the fact, of which it is the commemoration, invests it with unspeakable dignity.

II. The nature of the Lord’s Supper as seen in its reference to the present.—We regard it as, perhaps, the most efficacious of all the means of grace, designed to nourish religion in our souls, and to promote brotherly love toward our fellow-believers.

III. The nature of the Lord’s Supper as seen in its reference to the future.—

1. We are reminded of the second coming of Christ (1Co_11:26.)

2. The Lord’s Supper also anticipates the eternal communion which believers will enjoy with Christ in heaven (Mat_26:29). P. J. Gloag, D.D.

Mat_26:26. The New Testament Passover.—“As they were eating.” The Lord’s institution of His supper was in connection with the Passover which He kept with His disciples, before concluding it with the “hallel.” By this means He intimated that He would have His Supper regarded as the New Testament Passover. What, then, was the Passover?

I. The Passover was a feast, not a sacrifice.—The sacrifice was presupposed in the feast. So with the Lord’s Supper. He offered the sacrifice: we keep the feast.

II. The Passover was the feast of a sacrifice.—So with the Lord’s Supper. He sacrificed His body and blood. This sacrifice we receive and enjoy in the Lord’s Supper.

III. In the Passover Israel celebrated its present saving fellowship with Jehovah, and looked forward to its future consummation.—So in the Lord’s Supper we celebrate not merely the memory of a past fact, but that salvation of the present in the fellowship of which we stand, and which looks forward to its future consummation.—C. E. Luthardt, D.D.

Absurdities of the dogmas of transubstantiation and consubstantiation.—“This is My body.” Almost a worldful of super-refined absurdities has, unhappily, been heaped on this simple affirmation. And if Christianity had not been really Divine, its life would have long ago been utterly crushed out of it under the immensity of the load. Rhetoric, as Selden remarks, has been mistaken for logic; and the “is” has been insisted upon as demonstration that the thing given by the Lord into the hands of His disciples was not bread at all, but—literally—His own body. Hence the doctrine of transubstantiation. Others have insisted that if the thing given was really bread, it was also, at one and the same time, the literal body of the Lord. This is the doctrine of consubstantiation. The substantive verb “is,” it has been contended, must be taken as the copula of substantive existence. All this is sad; for it would hence follow:—

1. That one substance is another.

2. That a thing is not itself—Christ’s body, for instance. At the time that He uttered the words of the institution, He was in His body; and therefore He did not hand it, in His hand, to His disciples. It would follow:—

3. That a part of the whole is yet the whole of which it is a part.—If the whole cake is the body, and the broken cake is the broken body, and if yet every morsel of the broken cake is also the body, then a part of the body is the whole of the body. It would follow:—

4. That a thing which is one, and but one, is yet more than one; for if the cake be the one body, and yet each morsel of the cake be also the one body, then Christ’s one body is many bodies. It would follow:—

5. That a thing which is, by its very essence, limited to a certain spot in space, is yet not limited to that spot—Christ’s body, for instance, when with His own hand He gave it into the hands of His disciples, while yet it remained where it was before, at an appreciable distance from His disciples’ hands. It would follow:—

6. That the percipiency of the soul, operating through the senses of the body, while these senses are perfectly awake, and perfectly sound, may yet be absolutely and hopelessly deceived.—If the percipiency of the soul, operating through sight, touch, and taste, and equipped with all the adjuncts of scientific analysis, finds bread, and bread only, in the morsel of the sacramental cake, and if yet that morsel be physically transubstantiated into, or consubstantiated with, the living body of Christ, then all the senses appealed to must be liars, and everything that we see and hear and touch and taste, may be a lie. The culminating act of religion would thus be the copestone of universal and inseparable scepticism. But this will not do. We must take a different view of the words of the institution. The “is,” in the expression “is My body,” must be understood, not as the copula of substantive existence, but as the copula of symbolical or representative relationship. Why not? Compare, for instance, Mat_13:38-39, “The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom,” etc. Parabolism, or symbolism, or representativism of some kind must be admitted (cf. Gen_40:12; Gen_40:18; Eze_37:11; Dan_2:38; Dan_7:17; Dan_7:24; Dan_8:21; Mat_13:37; Luk_15:26; Luk_20:17; Act_10:17; Gal_4:24-25; Eph_5:9; Heb_7:2; Rev_1:20). Indeed, the parabolic element in the Lord’s Supper is the true key to its interpretation. The supper is a parable to the eye, the touch, the taste. And when our Saviour said of the morsel of bread, “This is My body,” He but interpreted the figurative or representative significance of one of the elements of the parable. If we would get the spiritual blessing, when we communicate, we must mentally transfigure the figure.—J. Morison, D.D.

Mat_26:29. Christ a Fellow-banqueter.—

1. Our Lord, beside all other relations which He hath to the sacrament, as the Instituter thereof, the End thereof, the Thing signified thereby, the Minister in the first celebration thereof, is also a Fellow-banqueter, and communicant with us in His own way; for He did drink of the sacramental wine, as it signified communion of life and joy with us in heaven.

2. Whatsoever change is put upon the wine in the sacrament, by instituting that it should signify and seal up spiritual life and joy, yet after the sanctifying of it, and in the time of drinking of it by the communicants, it remaineth wine, in its own natural properties, without being transubstantiate.

3. The drinking of the sacramental wine is a sign and pledge of our spiritual and new communion in life and joy in the kingdom of heaven, for Christ expoundeth it, saying, “Until the day that I shall drink it new,” etc.

4. Christ will not be content to be without His disciples in heaven. “I will drink it new with you.”—David Dickson.

Mat_26:30. Spiritual song.—Observe:—

I. On the threshold of suffering Christ with men sings a triumphant psalm.—Teaches entire consecration to God, creates calm trustfulness and fortitude in trial. To sing thus we must have unbroken fellowship with God. Illustrated in the lives of Paul, Luther, Wesley.

II. Christ’s kinship and sympathy with the disciples.—Hymn used to cheer, strengthen, and inspire confidence in God.

III. Teaches simplicity of Christian worship.—No robed choristers. No mystical chanting. This service parallel with Christ’s prayer-meeting—two or three met in His name. Thus possible for all to worship (accessories not forbidden). God the Author of music. The harp and psaltery not to be broken or destroyed. Convert the player, and the music will be heavenly.

Practical lessons.—Spiritual song should be used to bring men nearer to God. Kingsley says that in heaven “all speech will be song.”—J. E. Douglas.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

THE LORD’S SUPPER

Mar 14:22-25; Luk 22:19-20; 1Co 11:23-25; Mat 26:26-29. “And while they were eating, Jesus taking bread and blessing it, broke it, and gave it to His disciples, and said, This is My body;” i. e., our Lord’s body in symbol, there being no argument here either for the Romish transubstantiation or the Lutheran consubstantiation. Joseph said, in the interpretation of the dreams of Pharaoh’s chief baker and chief butler, “The three vines are three days,” “The three baskets are three days,” simply signifying that they represent three days. “And taking the cup, and blessing it, He gave to them, saying, Drink you all from this; for this is My blood of the New Covenant, which is poured out for many unto the remission of sins. And I say unto you, that I shall no more drink of this fruit of the vine, until that day when I may drink it new with you in the kingdom of My Father.” Here you see that the Eucharist, on this occasion instituted by our Lord, was prospective as well as retrospective, looking forward to our Lord’s return in His glorious kingdom, when it will actually be celebrated through all the millennial centuries down to the end of time, our glorified Lord being here with us. Hence you see the deep and thrilling interest of this institution, which our Savior established at this memorable epoch, the very night of His betrayal and arrest; not only retrospecting the tragical scene of Calvary, when He gave His body and His blood a vicarious offering to redeem the whole world, and sustain the spiritual life of the saints by faith drinking His blood — i. e., appropriating perpetually its cleansing and sanctifying efficacy, and feeding on His body each fleeting moment — and by faith apprehending and appropriating the wonderful promises of the resurrection, translation, transfiguration, and assimilation of our mortal bodies to His glorious body; but sweeping on beyond His second advent into the happy centuries of the glorious Millennial Theocracy, when our Lord will again abide with His saints on the earth, enveloping the globe with the glory of His kingdom, Satan having been ejected and imprisoned, and will, as He here says, again celebrate this wonderful Eucharist with His disciples, this memorial institution running on down to the end of time. Now, you must not confound the Passover meal, which they all ate while Judas was with them, with the Eucharist, which our Lord instituted after the supper, Judas having gone away and joined His enemies, — the former being the closing out of the memorable Passover, which they had celebrated fifteen hundred years, now normally evanescing, as all the emblematic lambs are verified in the great Antitype the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world; the latter being a new institution, vividly commemorative of bloody Calvary, and equally and lucidly pointing down to our Lord’s glorious return to this world, when, as He here says, He will again join with His saints in the celebration of this institution, a perpetual and vivid reminder of the stupendous redemption of the whole human race.

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

26:26-29 The Last Supper derives its significance in part from the Jewish Passover (see Exod 12). The phases of the Jewish liturgy for Passover are as follows: (1) Festal blessing; (2) first cup (see Luke 22:17-18); (3) eating bitter herbs (see Matt 26:23 and corresponding study note); (4) eating unleavened bread (26:26; Mark 14:22); (5) second cup is mixed; (6) the Passover haggadah (reading) is given (Exod 12); (7) first part of the hallel (Pss 113–114; see study note on Pss 113–118); (8) second cup is taken; (9) blessing and eating of unleavened bread (Matt 26:26; Mark 14:22; Luke 22:19); (10) the Passover lamb is eaten; (11) third cup (Matt 26:27-28; Mark 14:23-24; Luke 22:20); (12) fourth cup (see Matt 26:29[?]; Mark 14:25[?]); (13) time of fellowship; (14) second part of the hallel (Pss 115–118; see Matt 26:30). None of the New Testament accounts of the Last Supper includes every aspect of a typical Jewish Passover. However, the most important aspects of the Passover that gave meaning to the early Christian celebration of the Lord’s Supper are included (see 1 Cor 11:23-25). Jesus, the Lamb of God, is the ultimate Passover lamb and the perfect sacrifice for sin. • this is my body . . . my blood: Ever since the Reformation, there have been three dominant interpretations of Jesus’ statements concerning the bread and the wine: (1) that the bread and wine change into the actual body and blood of Jesus Christ (transubstantiation); (2) that Christ is mysteriously present in the sacrament either spiritually (real presence) or “in, with, and under” the bread and wine (consubstantiation); (3) that the bread and wine symbolize the body and blood of Christ, benefiting the recipient through the Spirit by faith (symbolism).

26:26 The unleavened bread of the Passover (Exod 12:18) is also described as the “bread of suffering” (Deut 16:3), referring to hardships in Egypt. • The customary blessing over the bread in the Passover meal was “Blessed are you, O Lord our God, King of the universe, who brings forth bread from the earth.”

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Mat 26:26. Ἐσθιόντων δὲ αὐτῶν, And as they were eating) As in Mat 26:21. Judas[1128] therefore was present;[1129] cf. the πάντες, κ.τ.λ. (all, etc.) in Mar 14:23, and πλὴν, κ.τ.λ. (but, etc.) in Luk 22:21.—λαβὼν, taking) sc. in His hand. This implies the supreme dignity of the holy supper; cf. Joh 4:2.[1130]—τὸν ἄρτον, the bread) which was at hand.—εὐλογήσας, having blessed) In the next verse we find εὐχαριστήσας, having given thanks (corresponding to the Hebrew ברך). Each verb explains the other. He gave thanks to the Father, and at the same time blessed the bread and also the wine by the act of giving of thanks and by prayer; cf. Luk 9:16; Joh 6:11; 1Co 14:16-17.—ἜΚΛΑΣΕ, brake) after blessing it (post benedictionem): which is inconsistent with the notion of transubstantiation. For an accident, as the Romanists declare the bread to be after it has been blessed (post benedictionem, cannot be broken.—ΚΑῚ ἘΔΊΔΟΥ, and gave) Our Lord is not said Himself to have eaten and drunk on this occasion: since not for Himself was His body being given, nor His blood being shed.—Λάβετε, Take) Who could have taken (“received”) if the Lord had not instituted it? Cf. Joh 3:27.—τοῦτο, This) sc. in opposition to the shadows of the Old Dispensation; as much as to say, you have Me, My actual self; This, sc. which I command you to take: for it is immediately followed by My blood, which is of the New Testament—ΣῶΜΑ, Body, must be taken as literally as Αἶμα, blood. The separate distribution, however, of His body and blood represents the actual death[1131] of our Lord, in which His blood was drawn forth from His body. The benediction preceded and precedes the utterance of the words, This is My body. We readily allow that there is an allusion to the formula of the Jews, who, in celebrating the Passover, when asked by their children, What is this? replied, זה גוף של פסח וגו, This is the body of the Lamb which our fathers ate in Egypt.—τὸ σῶμά Μου, My body) understand here “ΤῸ ὙΠῈΡ ὙΜῶΝ ΔΙΔΌΜΕΝΟΝ,” which is given for you, words implied in Mat 26:28, and expressed in Luk 22:19.—The Evangelist describes the matter briefly, as being well known by the practice of those for whom he writes. The expression, “This do in remembrance of Me” (which is recorded by St Luke), is implied in Mat 26:29.

[1128] i.e. In Mat 26:21 it is said, “AND AS THEY WERE EATING, He said, “Verily, I say unto you that one of you (sc. of those who were then at table) shall betray Me.” The repetition of the expression, And as they were eatiny, implies, in Bengel’s opinion, that the act was continuous, and that those spoken of in Mat 26:21, concerning whom it was said that one of them should betray our Lord, were all, including the traitor, still present.—(I. B.)

[1129] I will state, in a summary form, the arguments, independent of the one given above, on which this proposition which I maintain, rests:—

[1130] It is there said,” JESUS Himself baptized NOT.” It is here said, “JESUS TOOK BREAD,” etc.—(I. B.)

[1131] The memory of which ought to be perpetuated till His coming again.—B. G. V., Mat 26:29.

In the very moment of death Christ approached that state which is different from the life that He lived before His death and after His resurrection, and thenceforward for ever.—Harm., p. 510.

1. If Judas had departed before the singing of the hymn, he would have been doing the same as if one in the present day were to depart before the offering of the grace and prayers at the close of a banquet, and would have thereby the more disclosed his atrocious design.

2. During the continuance of our Lord’s supplications on the Mount of Olives, Judas had no lack of time sufficient for bringing the cohort to effect his purpose.

3. Luke, ch. Mat 22:21, immediately subjoins after the words of the Institution, these words, BUT, NEVERTHELESS (πλὴν), behold the hand of him that betrayeth Me is with Me on the table; and as this very complaint is placed before the Lord’s Supper by Matthew and Mark, these speeches [that as to Judas, and that in which the Institution took place] cannot be severed from one another.

4. To explain our Lord’s words (Luk 22:21) of the table, in the sense, the counting-board [of the chief priests] on which Judas’ hand was laid, with Jesus as the merchandize which he offered for sale, is out of place; for (1) It is not the seller that is said to be with the merchandize, but the merchandize with the seller [whereas Jesus says that Judas is with Him]; (2) Thirty pieces of silver was not so large a sum as to suggest the idea of a counting-board or banking-table; (3) The money had been already reckoned out to Judas, Mat 26:15; (4) The ἰδοὺ, Behold, Luk 22:21, implies, in fact, the presence of the traitor, as reclining at the same banqueting table with Jesus (comp. Luk 22:30; Luk 16:21), and dipping his hand in the dish.

5. The words πλὴν ἰδοὺ, But, nevertheless, behold, being taken in their usual sense, are we to say that the traitor was driven away from the bread and the cup after these had been blessed? But Mark, after having made mention of the twelve, ch. Mat 14:17, immediately subjoins the statement, that they ALL drank of the cup, Mat 26:23, with which comp. Mat 26:27.

6. If you say, the traitor was known to John or even to Peter already, on the preceding day, how, then, is it that they, not till now, one by one, are represented as having said, Is it I? For, in fact, when John, in a covert way, made enquiry, it was in a secret manner that the traitor was disclosed to him: and as to his having informed Peter of the fact, it is easier to suspect than to affirm this. The remaining nine disciples did not even observe the nod of Peter [beckoning to John to ask the Lord]: therefore both the question of John and the reply of the Lord escaped their notice, Joh 13:28.

7. That the traitor should have been vouchsafed the washing of feet, is a circumstance almost as astonishing as his being admitted to the Lord’s Supper: nor does even the permission of the kiss, given for the purposes of treachery, move us to less astonishment. As to the rest, we are here treating only of a question of historical truth: nor is it our intention ever to uphold the cause of unfair adapters of facts to their own aims (perfidorum œconomorum.)—Harm., p. 511, etc.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat_26:26.[24] The mealhaving been, naturally enough, interrupted by the discussion regarding Judaswould now be resumed; hence the repetition of the ἐσθιόντων αὐτῶν of Mat_26:21 with the continuative ΔΈ, which latter is so often used in a similar way after parentheses and other digressions, especially in cases where previous expressions are repeated; comp. on 2Co_5:8; Eph_2:4.

ΛΑΒῺΝ Ὁ ἸΗς. Τ. ἌΡΤΟΝ] According to the Rabbis, the order of the Passover meal was as follows (see Tr. Pesach. c. 10; Otho, Lex. Rabb. p. 448 ff.; Lightfoot, p. 474 ff.; Lund, Jüd. Heiligth., ed. Wolf, p. 1125 ff.; Wichelhaus, p. 248 ff.; Vaihinger in Herzogs Encykl. XI. p. 141 ff.):(1) It began with drinking wine, before partaking of which, however, the head of the family offered up thanks for the wine and the return of that sacred day (according to the school of Sammai, for the day and for the wine). Poculum ebibit, et postea benedicit de lotione manuum, et lavat, Maimonides. (2) Then bitter herbs (מרורים, intended to represent the bitter life of their forefathers in Egypt) were put upon the table, some of which being dipped in a sour or brinish liquid, were eaten amid thanksgivings. (3) The unleavened bread, the broth charoset (see on Mat_26:23), the lamb and the flesh of the chagiga (see on Joh_18:28), were now presented. (4) Thereupon the head of the family, after a Benedictus, qui creavit fructum terrae, took as much of the bitter herbs as might be equal to the size of an olive, dipped it in the broth charoset, and then ate it, all the other guests following his example. (5) The second cup of wine was now mixed, and at this stage the father, at the request of his son, or whether requested by him or not, was expected to explain to him the peculiarities of the several parts of this meal. (6) This did not take place till the Passover viands had been put a second time upon the table; then came the singing of the first part of the Hallel (Psalms 113, 114), another short thanksgiving by the father, and the drinking of the second cup. (7) The father then washed his hands, took two pieces of bread, broke one of them, laid the broken pieces upon that which remained whole, repeated the Benedictus sit ille, qui producit panem e terra, rolled a piece of the broken bread in bitter herbs, dipped this into the broth charoset, and ate, after having given thanks; he then took some of the chagiga, after another thanksgiving, and so also with regard to the lamb. (8) The feast was now continued by the guests partaking as they felt inclined, concluding, however, with the father eating the last bit of the lamb, which was not to be less than an olive in size, after which no one was at liberty to eat anything more. The father now washed his hands, and, praise having been offered, the third cup (כסא הברכה) was drunk. Then came the singing of the second part of the Hallel (Psalms 115-118) and the drinking of the fourth cup, which was, in some instances, followed by a fifth, with the final singing of Psalms 120-137 (Bartolocc. Bibl. Rabb. II. p. 736 ff.).

Seeing that, according to this order, the feasting, strictly speaking, did not begin till No. 8, for all that preceded had the character of a ceremonial introduction to it; seeing, further, that it is in itself improbable that Jesus would interrupt or alter the peculiarly ceremonial part of the feast by an act or utterance in any way foreign to it; and considering, in the last place, that when Judas retired, which he did immediately after he was announced as the betrayer, and therefore previous to the institution of the last supper,the Passover meal had already extended pretty far on into the night (Joh_13:30),we must assume that the ἘΣΘΙΌΝΤΩΝ ΑὐΤῶΝ of Mat_26:21, as well as the similar expression in Mat_26:26, should come in after No. 7, and that the eating under No. 8 is the stage at which the Lords supper was instituted; so that the bread which Jesus took and brake would not be that mentioned under No. 7 (Fritzsche), but the ἄρτον (with the article, see the critical remarks), the particular bread with which, as they all knew, He had just instituted the supper. He would have violated the Passover itself if He had proclaimed any new and peculiar symbolism in connection with the bread before conforming, in the first place, to the popular ceremonial observed at this feast, and before the less formal and peculiarly festive part of the proceedings was reached. Again, had the breaking and distributing of the bread been that referred to under No. 7, one cannot see why he should not have availed Himself of the bitter herbs as well, furnishing, as they would have done, so appropriate a symbol of the suffering inseparable from His death.

καὶ εὐλογήσας] after having repeated a blessingwhether the Benedictus ille, qui producit panem e terra (comp. No. 7 above), or some other more appropriate to the particular act about to be performed, it is impossible to say. The latter, however, is the more probable, as it would be more in accordance with the very special nature of Christs feelings and intention on this occasion. Now that the meal was drawing to a close (before the second part of the Hallel was sung, Mat_26:30), He felt a desire to introduce at the end a special repast of significance so profound as never to be forgotten. The idea that His ΕὐΛΟΓΕῖΝ, as being the expression of His omnipotent will (Philippi, p. 467 ff.), possessed creative power, so that the body and blood became realized in the giving of bread and wine, may no doubt accord with the orthodox view of the sacrament, but can be as little justified, on exegetical grounds, as that orthodox view itself; even in 1Co_10:16 nothing more is implied than a eucharistical consecration prayer for the purpose of setting apart bread and wine to a sacred use.

It is, further, impossible to determine whether by καὶ ἐδίδου τοῖς μαθητ. we are to understand the handing of the bread piece by piece, or simply the presenting of it all at once upon a plate. Considering, however, that the guests were reclining, the latter is the more probable view, and is quite in keeping with the ΛΆΒΕΤΕ. This ΛΆΒΕΤΕ denotes simply a taking with the hand, which then conveys to the mouth the thing so taken, not also a taking in a spiritual sense (Ebrard). Further, it must not be inferred from the words before us, nor from our Lords interpretation (my body) of the bread which He presents, that He Himself had not eaten of it. See on Mat_26:29. He must, however, be regarded as having done so before handing it to the disciples, and before uttering the following words.

τοῦτό ἐστι τὸ σῶμά μου] There can be no doubt that τοῦτο is the subject, and (avoiding the Lutheran synecdoche) can only refer to the bread that was being handed to them, and not to the living body of Christ (Carlstadt), nor to the predicate which first follows (Ströbel), while it is equally certain that no emphasis of any kind is to be laid upon the enclitic ΜΟΥ (in opposition to Olshausen and Stier). But seeing, moreover, that the body of Jesus was still unbroken (still living), and that, as yet, His blood had not been shed, none of the guests can have supposed what, on the occasion of the first celebration of the supper, was, accordingly, a plain impossibility, viz., that they were in reality eating and drinking the very body and blood of the Lord,[25] and seeing also that, for the reason just stated, Jesus Himself could not have intended His simple words to be understood in a sense which they did not then admit of,for to suppose any essential difference between the first and every subsequent observance of the supper (Schmid, Bibl. Theol. I. p. 341; Thomasius, Chr. Pers. u. Werk, III. 2, p. 62; Stier; Gess, I. p. 167) is to have recourse to an expedient that is not only unwarrantable, but extremely questionable (see, on the other hand, Tholuck in the Stud. u. Krit. 1869, p. 126 f.), and because, so long as the idea of the κρέας is not taken into account, any substantial partaking of the ΣῶΜΑ alone and by itself, without the ΑἿΜΑ, appears utterly inconceivable;[26] for here, again, the idea of a spiritual body, which it is supposed Jesus might even then have communicated (Olshausen; Rodatz in the Luther. Zeitschr. 1843, 3, p. 56; Kahnis, Abendm. p. 453; Hofmann; Schoeberlein, üb. d. heil. Abendm. 1869, p. 66), belongs entirely to the region of non-exegetical and docetic fancies, for which even the transfiguration furnishes no support whatever (see on 1Co_10:16), and is inconsistent with the αἷμα (1Co_15:50; Php_3:21): it follows that ἘΣΤΊ is neither more nor less than the copula of the symbolic statement:[27] This, which ye are to take and eat, this broken bread,[28] is, symbolically speaking, my body,the body, namely, which is on the point of being put to death as a λύτρον ἀντὶ πολλῶν (Mat_20:28). The symbolical interpretation has also been correctly adhered to by David Schulz, de Wette, Julius Müller, Bleek, Rückert, Keim, Weizsäcker; comp. Ewald, Morison, Weiss on Mark, and others. According to Matthew, as also according to Paul (1Co_11:24, where κλώμενον is spurious), Jesus omits entirely the tertium comparationis,an omission, however, which in itself is more in keeping with the vivid symbolism of the passage and the deep emotion of our Lord. The symbolical act of breaking, which cannot possibly have anything to do with the glorified body, but which refers solely to that which was about to be put to death, was sufficient to enable us to perceive in this breaking what the point of comparison was; for the breaking of the bread and the putting to death of the body resemble each other in so far as the connection of the whole is violently destroyed, so that the bread in fragments can no longer be said to be the bread, nor the body when put to death to be any longer a living being.[29] The eating (and the drinking), on the other hand, is a symbol of the reception and appropriation, in saving faith (Joh_6:51 ff.), of the atoning and redeeming virtue inherent in the death of the body (Paul as above: τὸ ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν) and in the shedding of the blood of Jesus; so that the act of receiving the elements in the consciousness of this, establishes a κοινωνία with the body and blood that is spiritually living and active, and therefore, in all ethical respects, genuine and real (see on 1Co_10:16),a fellowship in which the believing communicant realizes in his inward experience that the divine-human life of the crucified Redeemer is being imparted to him with saving efficacy, and in which he acquires a full assurance of eternal life. With regard to the divers views that have prevailed upon this point in the church, and of which the two held by Protestants do not admit of being harmonized without sacrificing their distinctive peculiarities (in opposition to Ebrard, Lange), it may be said that those of the Catholics and Lutherans are exegetically at one in so far as their interpretation of the ἐστί is concerned, for they agree in regarding it as the copula of actual being; it is only when they attempt a more precise dogmatic definition of the mode of this actual being that the divergence begins to show itself. Similarly, there is no difference of an exegetical nature (Rodatz in Rudelbachs Zeitschr. 1843, 4, p. 11) between the interpretation of Zwingli (and Oecolampadius) and that of Calvin (externum signum dicitur id esse, quod figurat, Calvin). On the relation of Luthers doctrine to that of Calvin, see Julius Müllers dogmat. Abh. p. 404 ff. For ἐστί (which, however, Jesus would not express in Aramaic, His words probably being הָא גוּשְׁמִי) as a copula of symbolical or allegorical being, comp. Mat_13:38 f.; Luk_12:1; Joh_10:6; Joh_14:6; Gal_4:24; Heb_10:20; Rev_1:20.

That Jesus might also have used σάρξ instead of σῶμα (comp. John 6) is clear; in that case prominence would have been given to the material of which the σῶμα is composed (comp. Col_1:22). Comp. Rückert, p. 69. But it would not have been proper to use κρέας (dead flesh, the flesh of what has been slain, Rom_14:21; 1Co_8:13; see Schulz, Abendm. p. 94).

[24] On ver. 26 ff. and the parallel passages, see Ebrard (Dogma vom heil. Abendm. I. p. 97 ff.), who also (II. p. 751 ff.) mentions the earlier literature of the subject; see besides, the controversy between Ströbel and Rodatz in the Luther. Zeitschr. 1842 ff.; Rückert, d. Abendm., Lpz. 1856, p. 58 ff.; Keim in the Jahrb. f. D. Theol. 1859, p. 63 ff.; of modern dogmatic writers, consult, in particular, Kahnis and Philippi. Comp. on Mar_14:22 f.; Luk_22:19 f.; 1Co_11:24 f.

[25] Wetstein well observes: Non quaerebant utrum panis, quem videbant, panis esset, vel utrum aliud corpus inconspicuum in interstitiis, panis delitesceret, sed quid haec actio significaret, cujus rei esset repraesentatio aut memoriale. Thomasius, however, as above, p. 61, finds no other way of disposing of the simple impossibility referred to, but by maintaining that this giving of Himself on the part of the Lord was of the nature of a miracle. Comp. Hofmann, Schriftbew. II. 2, p. 215, also Philippi, p. 433 f., who is at the same time disposed to assume that the Spirit illuminated the minds of the disciples as with lightning flash. The supposition of a miracle is certainly the last resort, and this on exegetical grounds is wholly unjustifiable in a case in which neither the narrative itself nor the thing narrated implies a miracle.

[26] In reply to the question why Jesus distributes the body and blood separately, Thomasius, p. 68, has no answer but this: I do not know. We are accordingly met on the one hand with the assertion of a miracle, on the other with a non liquet. This is the way difficulties are supposed to be got over, but they remain, and continue to assert themselves all the same. There ought to be no hesitation in conceding that the separate participation, namely, of the body without the blood, and then of the blood by itself, is not to be understood as an actual eating and drinking of them, but as due to the symbolism based upon the circumstance of the body being put to death and the blood shed.

[27] In the case of Luke and Paul, the necessity of adopting the symbolical interpretation of ἐστί shows itself above all (1) in the words used with reference to the cup (ἡ καινὴ διαθήκη). The new covenant has been made in and through the actual blood of Christ. This blood, inasmuch as it has been shed, is the essential objective causa effectiva of the covenant. It is so in virtue of the historical fact of the shedding, while it is this same fact that justifies its being designated a new covenant (Joh_11:25). The wine poured into the cup can be said to be the blood of Christ as it actually was after being shed on the cross, only in so far as it represents that real covenant-blood as it was previous to its being shed, and with the near prospect of its shedding fully in view; it is this blood, but only in the sense warranted by a profound vivid symbolism. (2) It is on the strength of this symbolical interpretation that Luke and Paul would appear to have added the expression εἰς τ. ἐμὴν ἀνάμνησιν to the words of the institution. See on Luk_22:19 f. The ἀνάμνησις denotes a realizing of that as present which is no longer so in bodily form.

[28] Not: that which I here hand to you in the form of bread (the Catholic view), nor: that which I here hand to you in, with, and under the covenant (the synecdoche of Lutheran orthodoxy). The doctrine of the omnipresence of Christs body is inconsistent with the essential idea of a body, as was pointed out as early as the time of the Fathers, especially by Augustine: Cavendum enim est, ne ita divinitatem adstruamus hominis, ut veritatem corporis auferamus, Augustine, ep. 57, ad Dardan.; they understood the body of Christ to be in heaven, where it always remained.

[29] Philippi, p. 422 ff., is wrong in refusing to admit that the point of comparison lies in the breaking. The ἔκλασε is the circumstance above all which the whole four evangelists agree in recording, making it appear, too, from the terms they employ, that it was regarded as a special act. Moreover, the fact that at a very early period the spurious κλώμενον of 1Co_11:24 had come to be extensively adopted, may be regarded as affording evidence in favour of the correctness of the churchs interpretation of this symbolical act. The same view is implied in the reading θρυπτόμενον; comp. Constitt. Ap. viii. 12, 13.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat 26:26-29 . The Lord’s Supper (Mar 14:22-25 ; Luk 22:19-20 ).

Mat 26:26 . ἐσθ . δὲ αὐτῶν : same phrase as in Mat 26:21 , with δὲ added to introduce another memorable incident of the paschal supper. No details are given regarding that meal, so that we do not know how far our Lord followed the usual routine, for which consult Lightfoot, Hor. Heb. , or Smith’s Dictionary , article Passover . Neither can we with certainty fix the place of the Holy Supper in the paschal meal, or in relation to the announcement of the traitor. The evangelists did not concern themselves about such subordinate matters. λαβὼν , etc., having taken a cake of bread and given thanks He broke it. The benediction may have been an old form put to a new use, or original. εὐλογήσας has not ἄρτον for its object, which would in that case have been placed after it. δοὺς , etc., giving to the disciples; the cake broken into as many morsels, either in the act of giving or before the distribution began. λάβετε φάγετε , take, eat. λάβετε only in Mk. (W. and H [138] ). φάγετε probably an interpretative addition, true but unnecessary, by our evangelist. τοῦτό ἐστιν τὸ σῶμά μου , this is my body. The ἐστι is the copula of symbolic significance. Jesus at this sacred moment uses a beautifully simple, pathetic, and poetic symbol of His death. But this symbol has had the fate of all religious symbolism, which is to run into fetish worship; in view of which the question is raising itself in some thoughtful minds whether discontinuance, at least for a time, of the use of sacraments would not be a benefit to the religion of the spirit and more in harmony with the mind of Christ than their obligatory observance.

[138] Westcott and Hort.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Christ minding forthwith to fulfill the promises of the old covenant, instituteth a new covenant with new figures.

This is a figurative speech, which is called Metonymy: that is to say, the putting of one name for another—so calling the bread his body, which is the sign and sacrament of his body: and yet notwithstanding, it is so a figurative and changed kind of speech, that the faithful do receive Christ indeed with all his gifts (though by a spiritual means) and become one with him.

Mark saith, Had given thanks: and therefore blessing is not a consecrating, with a conjuring kind of murmuring and force of words: and yet the bread and the wine are changed, not in nature, but in quality, for they become undoubted tokens of the body and blood of Christ, not of their own nature or force of words, but by Christ his institution, which must be recited and laid forth, that faith may find what to lay hold on, both in the word and in the elements.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

(26) As they were eating.—Again we must represent to ourselves an interval of silence, broken by the act or words that followed. The usual “grace” or blessing had been spoken at the beginning of the feast. Now, taking one of the cakes of unleavened bread, He again utters a solemn formula of blessing, and gives it to them with the words, “Take, eat, this is my body;” or, as in St. Luke’s fuller report (Luk_22:19; comp. also 1Co_11:24), “This is My body that is given for you” (literally, that is in the act of being given); “do this in remembrance of Me” (better, as a memorial of Me). It would be an endless and profitless task to enter into the labyrinth of subtle speculations to which these words have given rise. Did the bread which He thus gave them contain at that moment the substance of His body, taking the place of its own substance or united with it? In what way is He present when those words are repeated and the faithful receive the “sacrament of the body and blood of Christ?” Questions such as these, theories of Transubstantiation, Consubstantiation, and the like, are, we may venture to say, alien to the mind of Christ, and outside the range of any true interpretation. As pointing to the true path through that labyrinth, it will be enough to remember (1) that our Lord’s later teaching had accustomed the disciples to language of like figurative boldness. He was “the door of the sheep-fold” (Joh_10:7). What they would understand at the time and afterwards was, that He spoke of His body as being as truly given for them as that bread which He had broken was given to them. (2) That the words could scarcely fail to recall what had once seemed a “hard saying which they could not hear” (Joh_6:60). They had been told that they could only enter into eternal life by eating His flesh and drinking His blood—i.e., by sharing His life, and the spirit of sacrifice which led Him to offer it up for the life of the world. Now they were taught that what had appeared impossible was to become possible, through the outward symbol of the bread thus broken. They were to “do this” as a memorial of Him, and so to keep fresh in their remembrance that sacrifice which He had offered. To see in these words, as some have seen, the command, “Offer this as a sacrifice,” is to do violence to their natural meaning by reading into them the after-thoughts of theology. (See Notes on Luk_22:19.) But, on the other hand, the word rendered “remembrance” or “memorial” was one not without a sacrificial aspect of its own. Every “sacrifice” was a “remembrance” of man’s sins (Heb_10:3). Every Paschal Feast was a “memorial” of the first great Passover (Exo_12:9; Num_10:10). So every act such as He now commanded would be a “memorial” at once of the sins which made a sacrifice necessary, and of the one great sacrifice which He had offered. (3) It seems something like a descent to a lower region of thought, but it ought to be noted that the time at which the memorial was thus instituted, “while they were eating,” is not without its significance in the controversies which have been raised as to fasting or non-fasting communion. Rules on such a subject, so far as any Church adopts them, or any individual Christian finds them expedient, may have their authority and their value, but the facts of the original institution witness that they rest on no divine authority, and that the Church acts wisely when it leaves the question to every individual Christian to decide as he is “fully persuaded in his own mind” (Rom_14:5).

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

26. this is my body] The exact Greek is “this is the body of me;” St Luke adds, “which is being given for you;” St Paul, “which is being broken for you;” the sacrifice had begun, the body of Christ was already being offered. The expression may be paraphrased: “This—the bread—and not the paschal lamb, represents—is to the faithful—the body of Me, who am even now being offered a sacrifice for you.” Without entering on the great controversy of which these four words have been the centre, we may note that; (1) the thought is not presented now for the first time to the disciples. It was the “hard saying” which had turned many from Christ, see Joh_6:51-57; Joh_6:66. (2) The special form of the controversy is due to a mediæval philosophy which has passed away leaving “the dispute of the sacraments” as a legacy. St Luke and St Paul have the addition, “this do in remembrance of me”—now, as a memorial of Me, not of the Passover deliverance.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And he took the cup and gave thanks,.... For the Jews blessed, or gave thanks for their wine, as well as for their food, and generally did it in this form (w):

"Blessed art thou, O Lord, our God, the king of the world, who hast created the "fruit of the vine".

Hence the phrase, "the fruit of the vine", in Mat 26:29, not that we are to suppose, that Christ used or confined himself to this form of words: and it is to be observed, that they not only gave thanks for their wine before food, and whilst they were eating (x), but also after meat; and as this relates to the blessing of the cup after eating, or as the Apostle Paul says, "when he had supped",

Co1 11:25. I shall only transcribe what the Jews say (y) concerning that:

"When wine is brought to them after food, if there is but that cup there, the house of Shammai say, , "he blesses", or gives thanks "for the wine", and after that gives thanks for the food: the house of Hillell say, he gives thanks for the food, and after that gives thanks for the wine.

And as this was usual at ordinary meals, to bless or give thanks for the wine, so at the passover; and which our Lord continued in his supper, and is to be practised by us. It should be further known, that the wine at the passover, and so what Christ used at his supper, was red,

"Says R. Jeremiah (z) it is commanded to perform this duty,

"with red wine".

And elsewhere it is said (a),

"that it is necessary, that there should be in it (the wine) taste and look.

The gloss on it is, , "that it should be red": and which, as it most fitly represented the blood sprinkled on the door posts of the Israelites, when the Lord passed over their houses; so the blood of Christ, shed for the remission of the sins of his people. It is scarcely worth observing the measure of one of the cups, that was used at such a time: they say (b), that the four cups which were drank at this feast, held an, Italian quart of wine, so that one cup contained half a pint. More particularly, they ask how much is the measure of a cup? the answer is, two fingers square, and a finger and a half and the third part of a finger deep; or as it is elsewhere (c), the fifth part of a finger:

and gave it to them, saying, drink ye all of it; for this is not to be restrained from one sort of communicants, and only partook of by another; but all are to drink of the cup, as well as eat of the bread: whether here is not an allusion to the custom of the Jews at the passover, when they obliged all to drink four cups of wine, men, women, and children, and even the poorest man in Israel, who was maintained out of the alms dish (d), may be considered,

(w) Haggadah Shel Pesach. fol. 241. 1. (x) Vid. Misn. Beracot, c. 6. sect. 1. 6. (y) Ib. c. 8. sect. 8. (z) T. Hieros. Pesach. fol. 37. 3. & Sabbat, fol. 11. 1. (a) T. Bab. Pesach. fol. 108. 2. & R. Samuel ben Meir in ib. (b) T. Hieros. Sabbat, fol. 11. 1. (c) T. Bab. Pesach. fol. 109. 1. (d) Misn. Pesach. c. 10. sect. 1. T. Bab. Pesach. fol. 108. 1. Mitzvot Torah, pr. affirm. 41.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

26 And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.

Ver. 26. Jesus took bread] From bread and wine used by the Jews at the eating of the paschal lamb, without all command of Moses, but resting upon the common reason given by the Creator, Christ authorizeth a seal of his very flesh and blood. And as the householder, at the end of that solemn supper, blessed God, first, taking bread, and again, taking wine; so that we should not turn his seal into superstition, he followeth that plainness: ne miseri mortales, in istorum mysteriorum usu, in rebus terrestribus haereant et obstupescant, as Beza gives the reason. For which cause also, saith he, even in the old Liturgy they used to cry out to the people at the Lord’s table, Sursum corda, Lift up your hearts; that is, Look not so much to the outward signs in the sacraments, but use them as ladders to mount you up to Christ in heaven. Ut in coelum usque ad Christum penetrarent. (Beza.)

This is my body] "This is" referred to bread by an anomaly of the gender (the like whereof we find, Eph 5:6), and so the apostle interpreteth it, 1Co 10:16; 1Co 11:26. The sense then is, This bread is my true essential body, which is given for you: that is, by an ordinary metonymy, {a} {b} This bread is the sign of my body, as circumcision is called "the covenant," that is, the sign of the covenant, and seal of the righteousness of faith, Rom 4:11. And as Homer calls the sacrifices, covenants; {c} because thereby the covenants were confirmed. Virgil calleth it fallere dextras, to deceive the right hands, for to break the oath that was taken, by the taking of right hands, &c. Transubstantiation is a mere fiction; and the most learned Papists are not yet agreed whether the substance of the bread in this sacrament be turned into the substance of Christ’s body productive, as one thing is made of another; or whether the bread goes away, and Christ’s body comes into the room of it adductive, as one thing succeeds into the place of another, the first being voided. Suarez is for the first, Bellarmine for the latter sense. And yet because Luther and Calvin agree not upon the meaning of these words, "This is my body," the Jesuits cry out, Spiritus sanctus a seipso non discordat, Hoc interpretationes discordant, Ergo: for Luther interpreteth the words synecdochically, {d} Calvin metonymically, after Tertullian and Augustine; "This is my body," for this is a sign or figure of my body, a seal also to every faithful receiver, that Christ is his, with all his benefits.

{a} A figure of speech which consists in substituting for the name of a thing the name of an attribute of it or of something closely related. ŒD

{b} Τουτο refertur ad αρτος anomalia generis. Pasor.

{c} αυταρ κηρυκες αγαυοι ορκια πιστα θεων συναγον.

{d} A figure by which a more comprehensive term is used for a less comprehensive or vice versa; as whole for part or part for whole, genus for species or species for genus, etc. ŒD

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And whilst they were at supper. Jesus Christ proceeds to the institution of the blessed Eucharist, that the truth or reality may succeed to the figure in one and the same banquet; and to impress more deeply upon our minds the remembrance of so singular a favour, his last and best gift to man. He would not institute it at the beginning of his ministry; he first prepares his disciples for the belief of it, by changing water into wine, and by the miraculous multiplication of the loaves. --- Whilst they were, &c. before they parted: for by St. Luke (xxii. 20.) and 1 Corinthians (xi. 25.) the blessed sacrament was not instituted till after supper. --- Jesus took bread, and blessed it. St. Luke and St. Paul say, he gave thanks. This blessing and giving thanks, was not the consecration itself, but went before it. See the Council of Trent, session xiii. canon i. (Witham) --- This is my body. He does not say, this is the figure of my body --- but, this is my body. (2d Council of Nice. Act. vi.) Neither does he say in this, or with this is my body, but absolutely this is my body; which plainly implies transubstantiation. (Challoner) --- Catholics maintain, after the express words of Scripture, and the universal tradition of the Church, that Christ in the blessed sacrament is corporally and substantially present; but not carnally; not in that gross, natural, and sensible manner, in which our separated brethren misrepresent the Catholic doctrine, as the Capharnaites did of old; (John vi. 61, 62.) who were scandalized with it. ... If Protestants, in opposition to the primitive Fathers, deny the connection of the sixth chapter of John with the institution, it is from the fear of giving advantage to the doctrine of transubstantiation, says Dr. Clever, Protestant bishop of Bangor. --- This is my body. By these words, and his divine power, Christ changed that which before was bread into his own body; not in that visible and bloody manner as the Capharnaites imagined. (John vi.) Yet so, that the elements of bread and wine were truly, really, and substantially changed into the substance of Christ’s body and blood. Christ, whose divine power cannot be questioned, could not make us of plainer words than these set down by St. Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke, and St. Paul to the Corinthians: this is my body; this is my blood: and that the bread and wine, at the words of consecration are changed into the body and blood of Christ, has been the constant doctrine and belief of the Catholic Church, in all ages, both in the east and west, both in the Greek and Latin churches; as may be seen in our controvertists, and particularly in the author of the books of the Perpetuity of the Faith. The first and fundamental truths of the Christian faith, by which we profess to believe the mystery of the holy Trinity, i.e. one God and three divine Persons, and of the incarnation, i.e. that the true Son of God was made man, was born, suffered and died upon the cross for our salvation, are no less obscure and mysterious, no less above the reach of human capacity, than this of the real presence: nor are they more clearly expressed in the sacred text. This change the Church has thought proper to express by the word, transubstantiation: and it is as frivolous to reject this word, and to ask where it is found in the holy Scriptures, as to demand where we read in the Scriptures, the words, trinity, incarnation, consubstantial to the Father, &c. --- Luther fairly owned that he wanted not an inclination to deny Christ’s real presence in the sacrament, by which he should vex and contradict the Pope; but this, said he, is a truth that cannot be denied:[3] The words of the gospel are too clear. He and his followers hold, what is called impanation, or consubstantiation; i.e. that there is really present, both the substance of the bread and wine, and also the substance of Christ’s body and blood. --- Zuinglius, the Sacramentarians, and Calvinists deny the real presence; and hold that the word is, (est) importeth no more, than it signifieth, or is a figure of Christ’s body; as it hath been lately translated, this represents my body, in a late translation, or rather paraphrase, 1729. I shall only produce here the words and reasoning of Luther: which may deserve the attention of the later reformers. [4]"Who," saith Luther, (tom. vii. Edit. Wittemb. p. 391) "but the devil, hath granted such a license of wresting the words of the holy Scripture? Who ever read in the Scriptures, that my body is the same as the sign of my body? or, that is is the same as it signifies? What language in the world ever spoke so? It is only then the devil, that imposeth upon us by these fanatical men. ... Not one of the Fathers, though so numerous, ever spoke as the Sacramentarians: not one of them ever said, It is only bread and wine; or, the body and blood of Christ is not there present. Surely it is not credible, nor possible, since they often speak, and repeat their sentiments, that they should never (if they thought so) not so much as once, say, or let slip these words: It is bread only; or the body of Christ is not there, especially it being of great importance, that men should not be deceived. Certainly in so many Fathers, and in so many writings, the negative might at least be found in one of them, had they thought the body and blood of Christ were not really present: but they are all of them unanimous." Thus far Luther; who, in another place, in his usual manner of writing, hesitates not to call the Sacramentarians, men possessed, prepossessed, and transpossessed by the devil.[5] --- My body. In St. Luke is added, which is given for you. Granted these words, which is given, may bear this sense, which shall be given, or offered on the cross; yet as it was the true body which Christ gave to his apostles, at his last supper, though in a different manner. --- The holy Eucharist is not only a sacrament, but also a sacrifice, succeeding to all the sacrifices of the ancient law, which Christ commanded all the priests of the new law to offer up. Luther was forced to own, that divers Fathers, taught this doctrine; as Irenæus, Cyprian, Augustine: and in his answer to Henry VIII. of England: the king, says he, brings the testimonies of the Fathers, to prove the sacrifice of the mass, for my part, I care not, if a thousand Augustines, a thousand Cyprians, a thousand Churches, like that of Henry, stand against me. The Centurists of Magdeburg own the same to have been the doctrine of Cyprian, Tertullian, and also of Irenæus, in the end of the second age; and that St. Gregory of Nazianzen, in the fourth age, calls it an unbloody sacrifice; incruenti sacrificii. (Witham)

This is my body.

To shew how these words have been interpreted by the primitive Church, we shall here subjoin some few extracts from the works of some of the most eminent writers of the first five centuries.

First Century.

St. Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, who was a disciple and contemporary with some of the apostles, and died a martyr, at Rome, in a very advanced age, An. 107, speaking of certain heretics of those times, says: "They abstain from the Eucharist and from oblations, because they do not confess the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who suffered for our sins." See epis. genuin. ad Smyrnæos. --- He calls the Eucharist the medicine of immortality, the antidote against death, by which we always live in Christ. --- In another part he writes: "I desire the bread of God, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, and for drink, his blood." Again: "use one Eucharist; for the flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ is one, and the cup is one in the unity of his blood. There is one altar, as there is one bishop with the college of the priesthood," &c.

Second Century.

St. Justin, the philosopher, in an apology for the Christians, which he addressed to the emperor and senate of Rome, about the year 150, says of the blessed Eucharist: "No one is allowed to partake of this food, but he that believes our doctrines are true, and who has been baptized in the laver of regeneration for remission of sins, and lives up to what Christ has taught. For we take not these as common bread, and common drink, but in the same manner as Jesus Christ, our Saviour, being incarnate by the word of God, hath both flesh and blood for our salvation; so we are taught that this food, by which our flesh and blood are nourished, over which thanks have been given by the prayers in his own words, is the flesh and blood of the incarnate Jesus." Apology ii. in fin. he calls it, Panem eucharistisatum Greek: ton arton eucharistethenta, the bread blessed by giving thanks, as he blessed and miraculously multiplied the loaves, Greek: eulogsen autous.

Third Century.

St. Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, who suffered martyrdom in 258, says: "the bread which our Lord delivered to his disciples, was changed not in appearance, but in nature, being made flesh by the Almighty power of the divine word."

Fourth Century.

St. Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem, who was born in the commencement of the 4th century, and died in 386, explaining the mystery of the blessed Eucharist to the newly baptized, says: "Do not look upon the bread and wine as bare and common elements, for they are the body and blood of Christ; as our Lord assures us. Although thy senses suggest this to thee, let faith make thee firm and sure. Judge not of the thing by the taste, but be certain from faith that thou has been honoured with the gift of Christ’s body and blood. When he has pronounced and said of the bread, this is my body, who will after this dare to doubt? And when he has assured, and said, this is my blood, who can ever hesitate, saying it in not his blood? He changed water into wine at Cana; and shall we not him worthy of our belief, when he changed wine into blood? Wherefore, let us receive them with an entire belief, as Christ’s body and blood; for under the figure of bread, is given to thee his body, and under the figure of wine, his blood; that when thou hast received Christ’s body and blood, thou be made one body and blood with him; for so we carry him about in us, his body and blood being distributed though our bodies." (St. Cyril, cathech.) --- St. Ambrose, one of the greatest doctors of the Latin Church, and bishop of Milan, who died in 396, proving that the change of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, is really possible to God, and really take place in the blessed Eucharist, uses these words: "Will not the words of Christ have power enough to change the species of the elements? Shall not the words of Christ, which could make out of nothing things which did not exist, be able to change that, which already exists, into what it was not? It is not a less exertion of power to give a new nature to things, than to change their natures. Let us propose examples from himself and assert the truth of this mystery from the incarnation. Was it according to the course of nature, that our Lord Jesus Christ should be born of the Virgin Mary? It is evident that it was contrary to the course of nature for a virgin to bring forth. Not this body, which we produce, was born of the virgin. Who dost thou seek for the order of nature in the body of Christ, when our Lord Jesus Christ was born of a virgin. (St. Ambrose, lib. de initiandis, chap. ix)

Fifth Century.

St. John Chrysostom, bishop of Constantinople, who died in 407, does not speak less clearly on this subject. "He," (i.e. Jesus Christ,) says the holy doctor, hom. l. in Matt. "has given us himself to eat, and has set himself in the place of a victim sacrificed for us." And in hom. lxxxiii.: "How many now say they could wish to see his form, his garments, &c.; you wish to see his garments, but he gives you himself not only to be seen, but to be touched, to be eaten, to be received within you. Than what beam of the sun ought not that hand to be purer, which divides this flesh! That mouth, which is filled with this spiritual fire! That tongue, which is purpled with this adorable blood! The angels beholding it tremble, and dare not look thereon through awe and fear, on account of the rays, which dart from that, wherewith we are nourished, with which we are mingled, being made one body, one flesh with Christ. What shepherd ever fed his sheep with his own limbs? Nay, many mothers turn over their children to mercenary nurses; whereas he feeds us with his own blood!" --- On another occasion, to inspire us with a dread of profaning the sacred body of Christ, he says: "When you see Him exposed before you, say to yourself: this body was pierced with nails; this body which was scourged, death did not destroy; this body was nailed to a cross, at which spectacle the sun withdrew his rays; this body the Magi venerated." --- "There is as much difference between the loaves of proposition and the body of Christ, as between a shadow and a body, between a picture and the reality." Thus St. Jerome upon the epistle to Titus, chap. i. See more authorities in the notes on St. Mark’s Gospel, chap. xiv, ver. 22, on the real presence, and also in the following verses and alibi passim.

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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

Luther. Verum ego me captum video. ... Textus enim Evangelii nimium apertus est.

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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

See Luther, tom. 7. Ed. Witttemb. p. 391.

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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

See Hospinianus, 2. part. Hist. Sacram. p. 187. He says the Sacramentarians have a heart, according to a French translastion, endiabole, perdiabole, transdiabole.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Mark relates this with no considerable difference, Mar 14:22-26; only he saith, they all drank of it, and, shed for many for the remission of sins. Luke saith, our Saviour upon his giving the bread, said, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me. Likewise also the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you. Luk 22:24-30 gives us some further discourses of our Saviour with Peter, and to his disciples; but no other evangelist mentioning them in this place, and Luke no where saying that they were spoken in the guest chamber, I shall not consider them till I come to that chapter in Luke.

And as they were eating, that is, while they were yet in the guest chamber, where they had eaten the paschal lamb, (for we must not think that our Saviour interrupted them in their very act of eating the paschal lamb, with these words, and another institution), Jesus took bread; without doubt unleavened bread, for this night there was no other to be found in the house of any Jew, nor yet for seven days which began from the sunset of this night. But it will not from hence follow, that the Lord’s supper must be eaten with unleavened bread. For though our Saviour be to be imitated in his actions relating to gospel worship; yet not in such of them which had a plain reference to the Jewish worship, and were there instituted for a special reason, as unleavened bread was, to put them in mind of the haste in which they came out of Egypt. Our Saviour at this time could use no other than unleavened bread, for no other was to be had.

And blessed it: he did not only give thanks to God for it, and beg his blessing upon it, which (as we have before observed) was our Saviour’s constant practice where he did eat bread, but he set it apart, and consecrated it for a part of his last supper. It seemeth very probable that this is to be understood here in the word blessed it. For although the Jews, and our Saviour, ordinarily used a short prayer and thanksgiving before they did eat meat, thereby showing that they owned God as the Giver of those things, and depended upon him for a blessing upon them, yet we no where read, that they did so during the same meal, as often as they put bread into their mouths. Luke (as we heard before) made a particular mention of our Saviour’s blessing the paschal supper. The mentioning of our Saviour’s blessing of this bread manifestly leadeth us to a new notion and institution; and the repeating of it again, Mat 26:27, upon his taking the cup, doth yet further confirm it: That our Saviour’s blessing both the one and the other signifieth to us not only his giving thanks to God, and begging of God’s blessing, as upon ordinary food, but his sanctifying the one and the other to be used as a new gospel institution, for the remembrance of his death.

And brake it, and gave it to the disciples. Whether (as some say) the master of the Jewish feasts was wont, after begging of a blessing, thus to break bread and to give it to all the guests, I cannot tell, I know no scripture we have to assure us of it; certain it is our Saviour brake it, and did give it to his disciples. That he gave it into their mouths, they not touching it with their hands, or that he gave it into every one of their particular hands, the Scripture saith not, nor is it very probable, except we will admit that he changed the posture he was in; for let any judge how probable it is that one sitting upon his legs, leaning or not leaning, (the constant posture they used in eating, whether the paschal supper or any other meals), keeping his posture, could reach it to eleven persons in the same posture, to put it into their several mouths, or give it particularly into every one of their hands; it is therefore more probable, that he put the dish or vessel in which the bread was from him to him that sat next to him, and so it was conveyed from hand to hand till all had taken it, after he had first spoke as followeth. Those who can think otherwise, must presume that our Lord changed his posture, which I am sure is not to be proved from any place of holy writ.

And said, Take, eat; this is my body; Luke adds, which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me. Paul puts all together, 1Co 11:24, only for given he saith broken. What contests have been and yet are betwixt the papists, Lutherans, and Zuinglians (since called Calvinists) about the true sense of those words, This is my body, every one knows. The papists make the sense this; This bread, once consecrated by the priest, is presently turned into the very body and blood of Christ, which every communicant eateth. Hence are their adorations to it, their elevations of it, their carrying it about in solemn processions, &c. The Lutherans, though they see the gross absurdities of this sense, yet say, That the true and real body and blood of Christ, in its true substance, is present with the bread and wine in the sacrament, and eaten by every communicant. Both these opinions agree in this absurdity, that Christ’s body now must be no true human body; for we know that all true human bodies are subject to our senses, and so in one place that they cannot at the same time be in another, much less in a thousand or ten thousand places at the same time. But neither the papists nor the Lutherans will hear of any arguments from that head, but stick to the letter of our Saviour’s words. The Zuinglians say the meaning is; This signifieth my body. In the same sense as it is said, Christ is the way, a door, a vine, a shepherd; and as it is said of the lamb, Exo 12:11, It is the Lord’s passover: yet they are far from making this ordinance a bare empty sign, but do acknowledge it a sacred institution of Christ in the gospel, in the observation of which he doth vouchsafe his spiritual presence, so as every true believer worthily receiving, doth really and truly partake of the body and blood of Christ, that is, all the benefits of his blessed death and passion, which is undoubtedly all intended by our Saviour in these words: and when he saith, Take, eat, he means no more than that true believers should by the hand of their body take the bread, and with their bodily mouths eat it, and at the same time, by the hand and mouth of faith, receive and apply all the benefits of his blessed death and passion to their souls; and that they should do this in remembrance of him, that is, (as the apostle, 1Co 11:26, expounds it), showing forth the Lord’s death till he come.

It followeth, And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; for this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. Christ’s taking of the cup, and giving of thanks, were actions of the same nature with those which he used with a relation to the bread, of which I spoke before. Let the papists and Lutherans say what they can, here must be two figures acknowledged in these words. The cup here is put for the wine in the cup; and the meaning of these words, this is my blood of the new testament, must be, this wine is the sign of the new covenant. Why they should not as readily acknowledge a figure in those words, This is my body, I cannot understand; the pronoun this, in the Greek, is in the neuter gender, and applicable to the term cup, or to the term blood; but it is most reasonable to interpret it, This cup, that is, the wine in this cup, is the blood of the new covenant, or testament, that is, the blood by which the new covenant is confirmed and established. Thus the blood of the covenant signifieth in several texts, Exo 24:8; Zec 9:11; Heb 9:20; 10:29.

Which is shed for many for the remission of sins; to purchase remission of sins; and this lets us know, that by many here cannot be understood all individuals, unless we will say that Christ purchased a remission of sins for many who shall never obtain it, which how he could do, if he died in their stead, suffering the wrath of God due to them for sin, is very hard to understand.

But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine. I observed before, that Luke puts these words before the institution of the supper, and some think that they properly belong to that place; but I understand no reason for it, Matthew and Mark both placing it here; nor doth it seem probable, that after these words our Saviour should presently drink of it in the institution of his supper. Some here object our Saviour’s drinking after his resurrection; but besides that, it cannot be proved that he drank any wine; neither did he otherwise eat or drink at all, but to show that he was indeed risen, for he hungered and thirsted no more after his resurrection. Or else by this phrase our Saviour only meant, I will no more participate in this ordinance with you.

Until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom, that is, in heaven. Some will say, Shall there then be drinking of wine in heaven?

Answer. No; neither doth the particle until signify any such thing. But the joys and pleasures of heaven are often metaphorically set out under the notion of sitting down to banquet, Mat 8:11, supping, Rev 3:20, eating and drinking, Luk 22:30. Our Saviour calls this new wine, to signify that he did not by it mean such wine as men drink here: I will not henceforth drink of the fruit of the vine, but both you and I, in my Father’s glory, shall be satisfied with rivers of pleasures, which shall be far sweeter, and more excellent, than that which is but the juice of the grape, and the fruit of the vine.

And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the Mount of Olives. That the Jews were wont to close their passover supper with singing a hymn I do not doubt; nor that they had some particular psalms or hymns which they used at that time to sing: but whether it were any of these that our Saviour at this time praised God with I cannot tell, much less whether he designed this praising of God with particular relation to the paschal supper, or his supper, which he had now instituted, or both. The inquiries after these things are but insignificant curiosities, fit for such as have more mind to look into the skirts of holy writ, than to find out of it what may be of profit and advantage to them. Our Saviour doubtless intended by this to instruct us, that the ordinance of his supper is a eucharistical service, wherein our souls are most highly concerned to give thanks unto God; and as singing is an external action which God hath appointed to express the inward joy and thankfulness of our hearts, so it is very proper to be used at that holy institution.

They went out into the Mount of Olives. Our Lord knew that his time was now come when he must be actually delivered into the hands of his enemies. That he might not therefore cause any disturbance either to the master of the family wherein he was, or to the city, though it was now midnight, he goeth out of the city (the gates being either open, because of the multitude of people, very late, or else easily opened to him) to the Mount of Olives; a mountain in the way betwixt Jerusalem and Bethany, so called, as is thought, from the multitude of olive trees growing upon and about it. The evangelist as yet mentions nothing of Judas, who now was gone to plot his work, and will anon return to accomplish it. In the mean time let us follow our Saviour, attending to his discourses and actions.

See Poole on "Mar 6:41".

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Vers. 26-29. The institution of the Lord"s Supper. (Mar_14:22-25 Luk_22:15-20 1Co_11:23-25) The endless controversies which have gathered round the Holy Eucharist, for opposite views of the meaning and purpose of which men have fearlessly met death, render it a difficult matter to expound the text succinctly and yet with due regard to clearness and precision. If I do not expatiate upon the diverse opinions which have been held on this momentous subject, it is not because I have neglected to weigh and examine them, but because it is more conducive to edification to have a plain statement of what appears to the writer to be the truth, than to confuse a reader with a multitude of interpretations which in the end have virtually to be surrendered. The points to be specially remembered before trying to expound the section are these:

1. He who institutes the ordinance is Almighty God made man, who is able to set aside one observance and to substitute another in its place.

2. The new ordinance had an analogy with that which it superseded.

3. It was intended to be the one great service and means of grace for all Christians.

4. The interpretation is to he connected with the great discourse of Jesus in the sixth chapter of St. John, where Christ speaks of himself as the Bread of life that came down from heaven, and his flesh and blood as the nourishment of his people.

As they were eating. Before the supper was quite ended, and before the third cup of wine (see on ver. 21) was drunk. Jesus took bread (to , the bread, according to the Received Text). The special unleavened cake prepared for the Paschal meal. The four accounts agree in this detail, and seem to indicate a formal action or elevation, like the wave offering in the old Law. We see here the "High Priest after the order of Melchizedek" bringing forth bread and wine like his great prototype, (Psa_110:4) and by anticipation offering himself as victim. And blessed it. The Received Text here and in St. Mark has euloghsav , which in some manuscripts has been altered to eucasisthsav , in conformity with the wording in St. Luke"s and St. Paul"s accounts. We find a similar interchange of the words in the miracles of the loaves. (see Mat_14:19 Mat_15:36 Mar_8:6, etc.) Virtually, the two expressions are identical; the thanksgiving is a blessing, the blessing is a thanksgiving. The usual blessing uttered by the master over the unleavened cake is said to have been, "Blessed be he who giveth the bread of earth." From this benediction on the elements, and the thankful remembrance of Christ"s death and the benefits thereof herein connoted, the Holy Communion has from the earliest times been called the Holy Eucharist. And brake it. The fraction of the bread was so important and essential a part of the institution, that it gave its name to the whole rite, and "breaking of bread" represented the celebration of the Holy Eucharist, the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. (see Act_2:42, 46 1Co_10:16, etc.) Under the old Law the fraction represented the sufferings endured by the chosen people; in Christ"s new institution it symbolized his death, when his feet and hands were pierced with the nails and his side with the spear. Gave it (edidou , was giving) to the disciples. He gave to each of them a portion of the cake in their hand. If they had risen from their couches at the solemn benediction, as we may well suppose they did, they were still standing when the Lord distributed the consecrated bread. That they received it reclining in an easy posture seems unlikely. Take (ye), eat (ye). The two words are given only in our Gospel; St. Mark has "take ye" (fagete being there an interpolation). St. Luke and St. Paul omit them altogether. We should infer that Christ did not himself partake of the bread or wine (which would have confused the deep significance of the ordinance), but gave it to his apostles, that by such participation they might be identified with the sacrifice represented by the broken bread, thus transforming the Levitical rite into a new sacrament which did not merely commemorate his death, but conveyed its benefits to faithful receivers. This is my body. "This" in the Greek is neuter (touto), and therefore is not in agreement with "bread" (artov), which is masculine. It is to be explained as "This which I give you, this which ye receive." The copula "is" would not be expressed in the Aramaic, which Christ spoke; and yet what a world of controversy has hung on this esti ! Some take it as absolutely identifying subject and predicate; others regard it as equivalent to "represents;" others, again, would modify it in some manner, so that it should not logically express the agreement of the two terms of the proposition. It was doubtless a startling statement to those who then heard it for the first time, but it came upon them not wholly unprepared. In his momentous discourse on the Bread of life, after the feeding of the five thousand, Jesus had spoken of himself as the Food of his people, and then proceeded to make the amazing assertion, "Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you". (Joh_6:53) The meaning of this mysterious warning was not further explained. Now as the Lord distributed to the apostles the blessed morsels with those solemn words, they learned what he meant by eating his flesh and drinking his blood, how he put it in his servants" power to fulfil the injunction. In what sense could "this" be his body? He was there before their eyes in human form, perfect Man; and yet he gives something else, not that which was standing before them, as his body. Stupendous mystery, past finding out! There is no room here for metaphor or figure. He is not figuratively describing himself or his office or his work, as when he calls himself the good Shepherd, the Door, the Vine, the Way: he directs attention to one part of his nature, his body, and that as toed to be eaten. He shows the mode by which we may be participators of this his lower nature, that as, joined to Adam, we die, so thus united to Christ, we live. We must, as before observed, remember that he who said these words was God incarnate, and that he designed to give his Church a means of realizing and receiving those stupendous blessings set forth in his Eucharistic discourse as depending upon due reception of his body and blood. It is obvious that the apostles could not understand the terms literally, but, believing in his Godhead, believing that he could bring to pass that which he said, they apprehended them in a supernatural, mystical sense; they had faith to know that in these holy elements, blessed by their Lord, they received him, ate his flesh and blood, to their soul"s health. This was no mere commemorative rite, not simply a way of remembering Christ"s death and Passion, but it was a sacrament, an outward sign of an inward reality, something from without entering the recipients and imparting to them that which before they had not. How the outward and inward are joined together we cannot tell. It is, and will always remain, an unfathomable mystery. The presence of Christ"s humanity in the Holy Communion is beyond, above, the ordinary conditions of man"s nature; it is supernatural, miraculous, even as was his incarnation, which joined manhood and Deity. The substance, indeed, of the elements remains as before, their nature is not changed, but they have a new relation and use and office; they serve as a means of communicating Christ"s body and blood, and they are so called before reception, so that the receiver"s faith does not make them to. be such, but Christ"s own word with power. Attempts to explain this Divine matter hopelessly fail. Hence the Romanist with his transubstantiation, or change of substance; the Lutheran with his consubstantiation, or confusion of substance; the Zuinglian with his irreverent virtualism, alike fall into error and depart from pure doctrine. The only right attitude is to leave all such efforts alone, to believe Christ"s word simply but wholly, and to use the sacrament in full faith, that by and through it to the faithful recipient are imparted incalculable benefits. To the words, This is my body," St. Luke adds, "which is being given (didomenon) for you;" and St. Paul, "which is broken; ? genuine for you." Thus the Lord, before he actually suffered, offered himself as a Victim voluntarily undergoing death, and showed it forth by the broken bread and the poured wine. We are told that the master of the household, when he distributed the pieces of the lamb, said solemnly, "This is the body of the Paschal lamb." Christ transformed this formula to a new use, but in neither case did it introduce a mere symbol of something absent.

Vers. 26-29. The Lord"s Supper.

We must never forget that this central ordinance of our Christian worship was instituted by our Lord himself. It is an indication of his foresight and forbearance; for it shows first that he saw we should need to be repeatedly reminded of what he is to us, and then that he condescended to help the infirmity of our wandering natures by providing the most impressive means for continually presenting the great central facts of his work before our minds and hearts. He enlists the services of the three senses of sight, taste, and touch, to aid the sense of hearing in bringing before us the vital truths of his gospel.

I THE CHRISTIAN FEEDS UPON CHRIST.

1. Christ himself. These elements do not represent abstract doctrines or moral precepts; the theory of redemption or the ethics of the Sermon on the Mount. They represent Jesus. He is our Life.

2. Christ received as food. We eat the bread and drink the wine. Christ is the Bread of life. We must personally participate in Christ, and receive him into our lives, in order to profit by his grace.

3. Christ as every day food. Jesus chose the common bread and wine of the country, such as were always at hand. He does not wish to be a rare luxury for wedding feasts and kings" banquets. He will be the poor man"s bread, and his daily bread. Yet this is what is most essential. Some people look for rare delicacies in Christ, but they will not make him their daily Bread. Then they will starve. We must live upon Christ.

II CHRIST BECOMES AS FOOD TO OUR SOULS IS HIS INCARNATION. These elements do not represent the soul of Jesus. They stand for his body and his blood. Strange speculations have risen around this fact, and some have imagined that the properties of the spiritual, of the Divine nature itself, were transferred to the body of our Lord. It is straining the words of Jesus, and putting an unnatural meaning on his language, to suppose any such miraculous transformation of his body to have taken place. In a simpler way we may understand that it is through his incarnation that he becomes our food. Food must be in some way like what feeds on it in order that it may be fully assimilated and absorbed. Christ becomes one with us in his incarnation. We can come near to him in his earthly life. We can touch him, and sympathise with him, and understand him in some degree. Thus we feed on his body and blood, and so receive him.

III CHRIST GIVES HIMSELF TO US IN HIS DEATH. The bread is broken; the wine is poured out; and these two elements are taken separately. Thus our Lord sets before us the thought of his death. He could not be our Life if he had not given up his own life. It is not the body of Christ in his earthly ministry, it is the body on the cross, that feeds us. It is not the blood in the veins, it is the blood shed, that saves us. The Lord"s Supper was instituted on the night before Jesus was betrayed. It pointed on to the cross. It is now the great memorial of Christ in his sacrifice for us.

In conclusion, let us consider how we may approach this sacred feast. We cannot eat and drink "worthily" if we are to be worthy of Christ or free from all sin before we come. This is impossible, and it is not required of us; for Christ is himself the Saviour from sin. What we want is to recognize him as our Life, to trust in him as our Saviour, to surrender to him as our Lord. Then we can come to his table at his own invitation, and refresh our souls with his grace. W.F.A.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Jesus took the bread - the bread or cake, which the master of the family used to divide among them, after they had eaten the passover. The custom our Lord now transferred to a nobler use. This bread is, that is, signifies or represents my body, according to the style of the sacred writers. Thus Gen. xl, 12, The three branches are three days. Thus Gal. iv, 24, St. Paul speaking of Sarah and Hagar, says, These are the two covenants. Thus in the grand type of our Lord, Exod. xii, 11, God says of the paschal lamb, This is the Lord's passover. Now Christ substituting the holy communion for the passover, follows the style of the Old Testament, and uses the same expressions the Jews were wont to use in celebrating the passover.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

The institution of the Lord’s Supper:

v. 26. And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is My body.

v. 27. And He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it;

v. 28. for this is My blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.

v. 29. But I say unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom.

The sacrament of the Old Covenant had just been celebrated by Christ, for He did not come to change the essence of the old faith, which is the same for all times, but to bring the fulfillment of type and prophecy. But as the sacraments of the time before Christ themselves were only typical, it was necessary that they themselves be replaced by those of the New Testament, to point back to, and be based upon, Christ. While they were eating, probably immediately after Jesus had distributed the bread of affliction, He took bread, solemnly returned thanks over it, thus blessing it. The ancient Jewish prayer over the bread was: "Blessed be Thou, our God, King of the universe, who bringest forth bread out of the earth!" Then, after breaking it, He gave it to His disciples and said: "Take, eat; this is My body. " The words of command are plain. From His hand they should take and then eat what He gave them. But it was not mere bread which He gave them; for in referring to the pieces which He distributed, He uses the neuter demonstrative, while bread in the Greek is masculine. Here is a clear reference to the sacramental presence of the body of Christ in, with, and under the bread. This is brought out still more strongly in the parallel passages, especially 1Co 11:24. In the same way, after the supper proper was ended, when the cup of thanksgiving was about to be passed. He took the cup, returned thanks, thus blessing it and its contents, and gave it to them, letting it go around in the circle with the express command that they all should drink of it. For the wine which the cup contained was His blood of the New Covenant, of the new time of grace and peace with God through the efficacy of this blood, for it is shed for the forgiveness of sins unto all, and actually is given to many that receive it by faith. As for the contents of the cup, all attempts to interpret the expression "fruit of the vine" as though any product of the grapevine might be used, fresh grape-juice, unfermented grape-juice, grape-brandy, and other modern products, they cannot stand without a denial of the text. For if rules of exegesis apply at all, there cannot be the slightest doubt that the expression as it was used by Christ on the evening of the institution referred to the intoxicating wine of the Passover; for the expression "fruit of the vine" was the technical term of the Jews for the wine of the Passover.

"We Christians confess and believe that the Sacrament of the Altar is the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, under the bread and wine, for us Christians to eat and to drink, instituted by Christ Himself. All explanations of the sects, Reformed as well as Papist, as though the bread merely represents the body, and the wine the blood of Christ, or that bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ, come to naught in view of the clear text of Scriptures. Reason, indeed, must yield here; it cannot understand how Jesus at that time, while standing in visible form before His disciples, could give them His body, His blood to eat and to drink, nor how the exalted Christ, though in heaven, yet is present everywhere on earth with His body and blood, wherever this meal is celebrated according to His institution. But the word of Christ is clear and true, and we also know from Scriptures that the body of Christ, the vessel of His deity, had a higher, suprasensual form of being, even in the days of His humility, in addition to His limited form of existence, Joh 3:13, also that the exalted Christ now is not locked up in heaven, but as God and man fills all things also according to His body, Eph 1:23. Thus we take our reason captive under the obedience of Scripture and do not brood over it, but rather thank God for the great blessing of this His Sacrament. From it we gain ever anew the certainty of the forgiveness of our sins. In guaranteeing to us the grace of God, the Sacrament serves for the strengthening of our faith. As the first paschal meal strengthened the Israelites for the journey which lay before them, through the desert to Canaan, so the Lord’s Supper is for the children of the New Covenant food upon the way, for the time of their earthly journey. And it incidentally points forward, just like the Passover meal, to the end of the journey, to the meal of eternity, when the Lord will drink it with us in His Father’s kingdom."

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Immediately after the celebration of the passover, follows the institution of the Lord’s supper.

In which observe, 1. The Author of this new sacrament, Jesus took bread.

Note thence, That to institute a sacrament is Christ’s sole prerogative; it is the church’s duty to celebrate the sacraments, but she has power to make none. This belongs only to Christ.

Observe, 2. The time of the institution, the night before his passion. The night before he was betrayed, Jesus took bread.

Learn thence, That it is very necessary, when sufferings are approaching, to have recourse to the table of the Lord, which affords both an antidote against fear, and is restorative to faith.

Observe here, 3. The sacramental elements, bread and wine: bread representing his body; and wine his blood.

Observe, 4. The ministerial actions, the breaking of the bread, and the blessing of the cup. As to the bread, Jesus took it; that is, set it apart from common use, and separated it for holy ends and purposes. He blessed it; that is, prayed for a blessing upon it; and brake it, thereby shadowing forth his body broken upon the cross. And he gave it to is disciples, saying, "This broken bread signifies my body suddenly to be broken upon the cross for your redemption and salvation; do this in remembrance of me, and of my death."

Thus the Scriptures constantly speak in sacramental matters. So circumcision is called the covenant, and the lamb the passover. In like manner, here, the bread is called Christ’s body, because instituted to represent to all future ages his body broken.

Moreover, how could the disciples think they had eaten Christ’s body, when they saw his body whole before them? And besides, to eat human flesh, and drink blood, was not only against the express letter of the law, but abhorred by all mankind. True it is, that the heathens laid it to the Christians’ charge, that they ate human flesh; but falsely, as it appears by the apology made for the primitive Christians; which apology had been false, had they daily eaten the flesh of Christ in sacrament. The very heathens owned it a thing more detestable than death to eat human flesh, and more to eat the God they worship, and to devour him whom they adore.

Again, as to the cup; Christ having set it apart by prayer and thanksgiving, he commands his disciples to drink all of it; and subjoins a reasons for it; for this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for the remission of sins; that is, the wine in this cup represents the shedding of my blood, by which the new covenant betwixt God and man was ratified and confirmed.

Whence we learn, That every communicant has as undoubted a right to the cup as to the bread, in the Lord’s supper; Drink ye all of it, says Christ; therefore to deny the cup to the laity is contrary to the institution of Christ. After the celebration was over, our Saviour and his disciples sang an hymn, as the Jews were wont to do at the passover the six eucharistical psalms, from the 113th to the 119th psalm.

Learn hence, How fit it is that God be glorified in his church, by singing of psalms, and in particular, when the sacrament of the Lord’s supper is celebrated. When they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [CXX. Lord's Supper Instituted].

CXX. THE LORD'S SUPPER INSTITUTED. (Jerusalem. Evening before the crucifixion.) aMATT. XXVI. 26-29; bMARK XIV. 22-25; cLUKE XXII. 19, 20; fI. COR. XI. 23-26.

a26 And as they were eating, fthe Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed took bread; 24 and when he had given thanks, bblessed, fhe brake it, aand he [657] gave to the disciples, and said, bTake ye: aTake, eat; this is my body. fwhich is cgiven ffor you: this do in remembrance of me. [As only unleavened bread was eaten during the paschal supper, that kind of bread must have been used by our Lord, and it is fitting that it should still be used by us in keeping the Lord's Supper, not only for propriety's sake, but because that bread which is emblematic of purity is most suitable to represent the body of the sinless Christ. The Catholics and some few others take our Lord's words literally when he says, "This is my body." On this they found the doctrine of transubstantiation, i. e., that the bread and the wine become literal body and blood when blessed by the priest. There are many weighty arguments against such a doctrine, but the main one for it is found in the words of our Lord. But Jesus could not have meant them literally, for his body was untouched and his blood unshed on this occasion when he spoke them. Moreover, in the Jer_31:31-34. It was the practice of Eastern [658] peoples to use blood in making any pact or covenant ( Exo_24:6-8). Christ represents himself as the victim from whence the blood was to be taken to ratify or seal the new covenant, and he makes the cup the symbol of that blood. A full discussion of the old and new covenants will be found in the Book of Hebrews. We may, however, sum them up by saying that the old covenant promised the land of Canaan and Christ in the flesh to the Israelites, while the new covenant promises heaven and Christ in glory to the Christian], bwhich is poured out for many. [It is explicitly stated elsewhere that Christ died for all ( Heb_2:9, 2Co_5:14, 2Co_5:15), and the word "many" is used, not to contradict, but to emphasize the fact. When the persons included are contemplated individually, the term many is employed on account of the vast number of them; for no man can number the individuals for whom Christ died. But when they are contemplated under the feebler conception of the whole, the term all is employed.] aunto remission of sins. ceven that which is poured out for you. [The prime object of Christ's death is here declared. It was to accomplish the forgiveness of sins. All other purposes which it served are subordinate to this, and all other blessings which it secures are consequent upon this-- Joh_1:29, Eph_5:2, Heb_7:27, 1Jo_2:2, 1Jo_4:10, Isa_53:10, Rom_8:2, 1Co_15:3.] fthis do, as often as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. [The word "remembrance" comes as a refrain after both the loaf and the cup. The central purpose of the supper is to bring the sacrifice of Christ and all its blessed results vividly to mind.] 26 For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink the cup, ye proclaim the Lord's death till he come. [This verse is a comment of Paul's upon the nature of the supper. In keeping the Lord's Supper we proclaim to our own souls and to the world our trust in the death of Christ, and our hope that he will return and fulfill the expectations begotten in us by it.] a29 But b25 Verily I say unto you, I shall no more drink ashall not drink henceforth bof the athis fruit of the vine, until that day when I drink it new in bthe kingdom of [659] God. amy Father's kingdom. band they all drank of it. [In speaking of this future drinking of the fruit of the vine Jesus does not mean literal wine, for he does not drink literal wine with his disciples in the kingdom as it now is, nor will he do so in the eternal kingdom. The term "drink," therefore, is used figuratively for that communion which Jesus has with his disciples while they are drinking the wine of the Lord's Supper. The term new is most naturally understood as modifying wine, but as the wine of the supper is not necessarily new wine, we think it rather indicates the new method of drinking wine just described.]

[FFG 657-660]

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

26. As they were eating. Before they had arisen from the paschal feast. Jesus took bread. That is, one of the unleavened cakes that had been placed before him as the celebrant or proclaimer of the feast. And blessed. As was the custom. Luke and Paul say, “gave thanks,” which is the same thing. This is my body. Not literally, as the Catholics and Luther contend, but “represents my body.” We interpret it as we do his other sayings: “The seed is the word,” “The field is the world,” “The reapers are the angels,” “The harvest is the end of the world,” “I am the door,” “I am the vine.” So, too, at this very feast, the Jew was wont to say of the paschal lamb, “This is the body of the lamb which our fathers ate in Egypt.” Not the same, but this is meant to represent and commemorate that. He could not have meant that the bread was his real body, because his body was present at the table breaking the loaf, and he was speaking and acting in person among them. The doctrine of the “Real Presence” is every way unreasonable.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

Connecting Statement:

Jesus institutes the Lord's Supper as he celebrates the Passover with his disciples.

took ... blessed ... broke

See how you translated these words in Matthew 14:19.

translationWords

Jesus

bread

bless

disciple

body

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

26. ἄρτον for τὸν ἄρτον on very strong evidence, though the article is found in A and several other uncials. The evidence is more evenly divided between ποτήριον and τὸ ποτήριον (Mat 26:27). The former has the support, among others, of א and B.

26. For ἐδίδου … καὶ the true reading is δούς.

26. τοῦτό ἐστιν κ.τ.λ. Accurately, ‘this is the body of me;’ St Luke adds, ‘which is in the act of being given for you’ (τὸ ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν διδόμενον); St Paul, ‘which is in the act of being broken for you’ (τὸ ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν κλώμενον. Lachmann and Tischendorf omit κλώμενον); the sacrifice had begun, the body of Christ was already being offered. The expression may be paraphrased: ‘This—the bread—and not the paschal lamb, represents—is to the faithful—the body of Me, who am even now being offered a sacrifice for you.’ Without entering on the great controversy of which these four words have been the centre, we may note that; (1) the thought is not presented now for the first time to the disciples. It was the ‘hard saying’ which had turned many from Christ, see Joh 6:51-57; Joh 6:66. (2) The special form of the controversy is due to a mediæval philosophy which has passed away leaving ‘the dispute of the sacraments’ as a legacy. St Luke and St Paul have the addition, ‘this do in remembrance of me’—now, as a memorial of Me, not of the Passover deliverance.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

26-29.] Institution of the Lord’s Supper. Mar 14:22-25.Luk 22:19Luk 22:19, Luk 22:20. 1Co 11:23-25. We may remark on this important part of our narrative, (1) That it was demonstrably our Lord’s intention to found an ordinance for those who should believe on Him; (2) that this ordinance had some analogy with that which He and the Apostles were then celebrating. The first of these assertions depends on the express word of the Apostle Paul; who in giving directions for the due celebration of the rite of the Lord’s Supper, states in relation to it that he had received from the Lord the account of its institution, which he then gives. He who can set this aside, must set aside with it all apostolic testimony whatever. The second is shewn by the fact, that what now took place was during the celebration of the Passover: that the same Paul states that Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us; thus identifying the body broken, and blood shed, of which the bread and wine here are symbolic, with the Paschal feast. (3) That the key to the right understanding of what took place must be found in our Lord’s discourse after the feeding of the five thousand in Joh_6, since He there, and there only, besides this place, speaks of His flesh and blood in the connexion found here. (4) It is impossible to assign to this event its precise place in the meal. St. Luke inserts it before the announcement of the treason of Judas: St. Matt. and St. Mark after it. It is doubtful whether the accounts found in the Talmud and elsewhere of the ceremonies in the Paschal feast (see Lightfoot ad loc. De Wette) are to be depended on:—they are exceedingly complicated. Thus much seems clear,—that our Lord blessed and passed round two cups, one before, the other after the supper,—and that He distributed the unleavened cake during the meal. More than this is conjecture. The dipping of the hand in the dish, and dipping and giving the sop, may also possibly correspond to parts of the Jewish ceremonial.

26.] While they were eating, during the meal,—as distinguished from the distribution of the cup, which was after it.

No especial stress must be laid on the article before ἄρτον, if read; it would be the bread which lay before Him: see below. The bread would be unleavened, as the day was ἡ πρώτη τῶν ἀζύμων (see Exo 12:8).

εὐλογήσας and εὐχαριστήσας amount to the same in practice. The looking up to heaven and giving thanks was a virtual ‘blessing’ of the meal or the bread.

εὐλογ. must be construed transitively (1Co 10:16).

ἄρτον is governed by all four verbs, λαβών, εὐλογήσας, ἔκλασεν, ἐδίδου (see also Luk 9:16, and the reff. to the text here). It was customary in the Paschal meal for the Master, in breaking the bread, to give thanks for the fruit of the earth. But our Lord did more than this: “Non pro veteri tantum creatione, sed et pro nova, cujus ergo in hunc orbem venerat, preces fudit, gratiasque Deo egit pro redemtione humani generis quasi jam peracta.” Grotius.

From this giving of thanks for and blessing the offering, the Holy Communion has been from the earliest times also called εὐχαριστία, viz. by Justin Martyr, Cyril of Jerusalem, Origen, , Chrysostom, &c. The passages may be seen in Suicer’s Thesaurus, under the word.

ἔκλασεν] It was a round cake of unleavened bread, which the Lord broke and divided: signifying thereby both the breaking of his body on the Cross, and the participation in the benefits of his death by all His. Hence the act of communion was known by the name ἡ κλάσις τοῦ ἄρτου, Act 2:42. See 1Co 10:16, also Isa 58:7: Lam 4:4.

ἐδίδου, imperf. He gave to each, distributed.

λάβετε φάγετε] Our Gospel alone has both words. φάγετε is spurious in Mark: both words, in 1Co 11:24. Here, they are undoubted: and seem to shew us (see note on Luke, ver. 17) that the Lord did not Himself partake of the bread or wine. It is thought by some however that He did: e.g. Chrysostom, Hom. lxxxii. 1, p. 783, τὸ ἑαυτοῦ αἷμα αὐτὸς ἔπιεν. But the analogy of the whole, as well as these words. and πίετε ἐξ αὐτοῦ πάντες below, lead us to a different conclusion. Our Lord’s non-participation is however no rule for the administrator of the rite in after times. Although in one sense he represents Christ, blessing, breaking, and distributing; in another, he is one of the disciples, examining himself, confessing, partaking. Throughout all Church ministrations this double capacity must be borne in mind. Olshausen (ii. 449) maintains the opposite view, and holds that the ministrant cannot unite in himself the two characters. But setting the inner verity of the matter for a moment aside, how, if so, should an unassisted minister ever communicate?

τοῦτό ἐστιν τὸ σῶμά μου] τοῦτο, this, which I now offer to you, this bread. The form of expression is important, not being οὗτος ὁ ἄρτος, or οὗτος ὁ οἶνος, but τοῦτο, in both cases, or τοῦτο τὸ ποτήριον, not the bread or wine itself, but the thing in each case;—precluding all idea of a substantial change.

ἐστιν] On this much controverted word itself no stress is to be laid. In the original tongue in which our Lord spoke, it would not be expressed: and as it now stands, it is merely the logical copula between the subject, this, and the predicate, my Body. The connexion of these two will require deeper consideration. First we may observe, as above of the subject, so here of the predicate, that it is not ἡ σάρξ μου (although that very expression is didactically used in its general sense in Joh 6:51, as applying to the bread), but τὸ σῶμά μου. The body is made up of flesh and blood; and although analogically the bread may represent one and the wine the other, the assertion here is not to be analogically taken merely: τοῦτο, this which I give you, (is) τὸ σῶμά μου. Under this is the mystery of my Body: the assertion has a literal, and has also a spiritual or symbolic meaning. And it is the literal meaning which gives to the spiritual and symbolic meaning its fitness and fulness. In the literal meaning then, this (is) my Body, we have bread, ‘the staff of life,’ identified with the Body of the Lord: not that particular ἄρτος with that particular σάρξ which at that moment constituted the Body before them, nor any particular ἄρτος with the present Body of the Lord in heaven: but τοῦτο, the food of man, with τὸ σῶμά μου. This is strikingly set forth in Joh 6:51, καὶ ὁ ἄρτος δὲ ὃν ἐγὼ δώσω ἡ σάρξ μου ἐστὶν ὑπὲρ τῆς τοῦ κόσμου ζωῆς. Now the mystery of the Lord’s Body is, that in and by it is all created being upheld: τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκεν, Col 1:17; ἐν αὐτῷ ζωὴ ἦν, Joh 1:4. And thus generally, and in the widest sense, is the Body of the Lord the sustenance and upholding of all living. Our very bodies are dependent upon his, and unless by his Body standing pure and accepted before the Father, could not exist nor be nourished. So that to all living things, in this largest sense, τὸ ζῇν, χριστός. And all our nourishment and means of upholding are Christ. In this sense his Body is the Life of the world. Thus the fitness of the symbol for the thing now to be signified is shewn, not merely by analogy, but by the deep verities of Redemption. And this general and lower sense, underlying, as it does, all the spiritual and higher senses in Joh_6, brings us to the symbolic meaning which the Lord now first and expressly attaches to this sacramental bread.

Rising into the higher region of spiritual things,—in and by the same Body of the Lord, standing before the Father in accepted righteousness, is all spiritual being upheld, but by the inward and spiritual process of feeding upon Him by faith: of making that Body our own, causing it to pass into and nourish our souls, even as the substance of the bread passes into and nourishes our bodies. Of this feeding upon Christ in the spirit by faith, is the sacramental bread the symbol to us. When the faithful in the Lord’s Supper press with their teeth that sustenance, which is, even to the animal life of their bodies, the Body of Christ, whereby alone all animated being is upheld,—they feed in their souls on that Body of righteousness and acceptance, by partaking of which alone the body and soul are nourished unto everlasting life. And as, in the more general and natural sense, all that nourishes the body is the Body of Christ given for all,—so to them, in the inner spiritual sense, is the sacramental bread symbolic of that Body given for them,—their standing in which, in the adoption of sons, is witnessed by the sending abroad of the Spirit in their hearts. This last leads us to the important addition in Luke and 1 Cor. (but omitted here and in Mark) τὸ ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν (διδόμενον, Luke,—omitted in 1 Cor.),—τοῦτο ποιεῖτε εἰς τὴν ἐμὴν ἀνάμνησιν. On these words we may remark (1) that the participle is present: and, rendered with reference to the time when it was spoken, would be which is being given. The Passion had already begun; in fact the whole life on earth was this giving and breaking, consummated by His death: (2) that the commemorative part of the rite here enjoined strictly depends upon the symbolic meaning, and that, for its fitness, upon the literal meaning. The commemoration is of Him, in so far as He has come down into Time, and enacted the great acts of Redemption on this our world,—and shewn himself to us as living and speaking Man, an object of our personal love and affectionate remembrance:—but the other and higher parts of the Sacrament have regard to the results of those same acts of Redemption, as they are eternized in the counsels of the Father,—as the Lamb is slain from the foundation of the world (Rev 13:8).

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

(M) 26. And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is My body.] Mk. has the same, omitting ὁ Ἰησοῦς and φάγετε: and with καὶ ἔδωκεν αὐτοῖς καί for καὶ δοὺς τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ.—δέ] for καί, as often.—ἄρτον] א B C D S1; τὸν ἄρτον, A al.—εὐλογήσας] i.e.“uttered a form of thanksgiving.”—τοῦτό ἐστιν τὸ σῶμά μου] The ἐστιν is quite unemphatic, and in Aramaic would be unexpressed. “This is My body,” i.e. “this broken bread, of which you all eat, represents My body.” The inference that in some sense the disciples were to partake of Christ’s body is unexpressed, but is implicit in the words τοῦτο = “this broken loaf”; the neuter is due to attraction to τὸ σῶμα.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.