(8 votes, average: 4.75 out of 5)
Loading...Among the most fascinating elements of the Didache are the prayers it records, one (the Lord’s Prayer) which it presents in a form more familiar to people today than the forms found in the New Testament (!), and others connected with the Eucharist – that is, the “Lord’s Supper” as celebrated in church. These prayers are nothing like most churches say today.
I start with the Lord’s Prayer.
The Lord’s Prayer is not found
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What does Maranatha Mean?
“Our Lord, Come!”
Re: The eucharistic words in Paul and the Gospels are reasonably similar…
What is your response to Robyn Faith Walsh’s opinion that the simplest explanation for this is that the gospel writers (or at least Mark, I suppose) knew Paul’s letters?
I completely disagree! 🙂 (These were words spoken in a variety of churches during the meal. It’s like’s the Lord’s prayer. You don’t need to have read Matthew’s Gospel to know the words)
“These are not, therefore, competing versions of the Christian ritual”
Really?
Is it not the same ritual involving bread and wine just because in the Didache version it is not Jesus who is speaking?
Why would the author of the Didache have omitted the “detail” that those were Jesus’s words?
Maybe putting those words in Jesus’s mouth was a Pauline embellishment, or Paul was following someone who had done so.
What is interesting is that 1 Cor. 11:23–26 is the only passage in Paul’s letters that explicitly recalls Jesus’ alleged words.
I agree with those scholars who “have argued that these prayers in the Didache are the original form of the Eucharistic service, older than even Paul’s version in 1 Corinthians”.
Historical-literary scholars sometimes get locked into certain methods and apply them mechanically without “feeling” the texture of the text. They therefore assume Luke’s version must be earlier because it’s shorter, following the rule that shorter forms precede longer/expanded ones.
But if you immerse yourself in Jewish literature and read the prayer through that lens, Matthew’s version feels more original. It’s built around classic Hebrew parallelism: “Your will be done” is mirrored by “on earth as in heaven.” “Do not lead us into temptation” is paired with “deliver us from evil.” And the Jewish eschatological hope of a final Jubilee is echoed in the language of debts being forgiven.
Rather than Matthew embellishing Q, it seems more plausible that Luke pared down Matthew’s Jewish/poetic structure.
I agree with Goodacre that Luke knew Matthew, and wonder if Luke was also familiar with teachings that fed into the Didache. If so, his cup-bread-cup pattern might reflect an attempt to harmonize Matthew/Didache. If true then the source behind the Didache carried significant authority, since Luke echoes its cup-first sequence.
My sense is that any early concern about “order” at the Last Supper had more to do with seating hierarchy than sequence of Eucharistic elements.
Yes, that sometimes happens. But usually the decisions about priority are not based simply on length. E. P. Sanders dissertatoin on the Synopitics showed who criteria such as “shorter is older” simpoly did’t work.
My sense is that if two texts have similar views about something, that in itself is not evidence of a literary relationship. (When my students say similar things on their final exams I don’t assume one of them got it from the other, if you see what I mean)
I don’t think there was an ‘original form’ of the Eucharistic service. Paul’s version in Corinthians is the version they were using there/then. I think the Didache version is related to, or maybe descended from, the form they used in the early Jerusalem church, prior to the revolt. That is not to say the same exact format was used everywhere and every-when. What is clear, however, is that it was intended to be a commemorative meal, not just a brief service. The gospel accounts are similar but different enough to possibly reflect some variation in the practice. But there is nothing to suggest that, prior to the concretization of the orthodoxy, any particular format was considered standard. In fact, in those early gentile churches that evolved from synagogue Jews I suspect the eucharist looked very like a typical seder, perhaps with different prayers. This would have been especially likely in the churches where Jewish Christians were successful in pulling the congregations back toward more strict Jewish observances (the so-called ‘Judaizers’ from Paul’s verb in Galatians).
Bart: My question will take 2 comments to provide 1st my background understanding and then the question based on my understanding.
Background Understanding.
Regarding the Eucharistic prayer order of cup-bread, bread-cup and cup-bread-cup seems to represent the conversion of what was a traditional Jewish Thanksgiving (festivals and sabbath) meal prayers of bread/meal first then followed by prayer for cup/wine) into a Christian Eucharistic ritual of cup (blood) then bread (body). It seems that Pauls church in Corinth continued to hold traditional Jewish Thanksgiving meals (1 Cor. 11:20-23), and Paul then introduces the Body and Blood anology into the meal but does not create a ritual. Then the gospels separate the body and blood ritual as separate events but within the confines of the Traditional Thankgiving meal (Last Supper) passages separating the Eucharist ritual from withing the Traditional Thanksgiving meal setting. They insert a Eucharist within the meal with separate cup and bread blessings which litterly would play out as
1. Bless the Meal. then eat the meal
2. After Meal Bless the Bread/Body and eat a bite of bread
3. Followed by Bless the Cup/Blood
4. Followed by Bless the wine after Meal.
Continued next comment.
(continued)
As you can see, the Eucharist event in the setting comes across like possibly a toast at a dinner event, but in this case, it is Jesus toasting himself. The Didache does the exact same thing. Even though the setting seems to be a meal, the Eucharist calls for just a sliver of bread separate from the meal itself.
The prayer order of cup and bread is telling, as Paul, Mark and Mathew still follow the prayer order of the Traditional Jewish Meal maintaining the tie to Judism of Bread – Cup. However, Luke and Didache completely sever Judism tradition by reversing the order to Cup – Bread. Intestingly John keeps the traditional order of bread/flesh – cup/blood in John 6:54 making Luke and Didache unique in that separation.
Questions…
1. Is there any way that the historical Jesus would have made such statements even though multiply attessted to written into all 4 gospels and by Paul? Leviticus 17:10–12 forbids drinking of blood and I cannot fathom a Jew instructing a Jew to drink blood metaphor or not.
2. What does the severance from Judism of Luke and Didache suggest about the dating of the Eucharist portion of the Didache?
One very big problem is that we do not have records that provide details about how Jews celebrated their special meals at the time of Jesus. Our detailed knowledge of Jewish liturgy comes to us only from centuries later.
with that said, I don’t think Jesus talks about drinking his blood in these accounts but drinking the cup; and I don’t think there’s any good way to verify it is something he said at the meal. 2. I don’t think the Jewish parallels in some acocunts more than others gives us any clear indications of when the accounts were written in relation to one another.
We do have documented traditional Jewish Food and Wine”Berakhot” (Blessings) in the Mishna. The best known Blessing is the “Birkat Hamotzi” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birkat_Hamotzi) which is performed prior to partaking of Bread. Also the “Borei Pri HaGafen” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borei_Pri_HaGafen) as a benediction/Blessing prior to partaking of Wine. Paul, Mark, Mathew and Luke all describe Jesus performing these two Berakhots in the proper order, so I would consider such as pretty well documented to 1st Century. The fact that the Didache reverses the order indicates to me, that by the time the Didache was written, Chrisitianity had pretty much completely severed Christianity from Judism. Theophilus of Antioch’s letters still held tight the Jewish root of Christianity, thus questioned the dating of the Didache prior to 150ce. That is, of course, if Eusebius got the order of Bishops correct in Antioch. It seems Ignatius was much more separated from Judism than Theophilus to me. There are several confusing aspects of Ignatius and Theophilus that have me questioning who proceeded who rising doubts about Eusebius’s accounts.