Eucharist Archives · All Saints of North America Orthodox Church

How Serious Are Orthodox Bishops About The Eucharist?

May 14, 2018 By Fr. John Peck

GREEK ORTHODOX METROPOLIS OF DENVER

May 1, 2018

Teleturgical Encyclical 29
The Pious Priests
The Faithful Parish Members
Holy Metropolis of Denver

Beloved in the Lord,

It has come to my attention that there are an increasing number of parishioners in some of our parishes who come forth to receive Holy Communion, but insist that the priest not give to them of the Body of Christ but only of His Blood. Those parishioners explain to their priests that their doctors — obviously not Orthodox Christians — tell them not to eat any kind of bread because it will harm them.

If there are Orthodox Christians in our parishes who believe that, after the Holy Spirit consecrates the Bread and the Wine during the Divine Liturgy, the gifts are still bread and wine, they should never again receive the divine Body and Blood again, until they believe that the holy sacrament of our Lord Himself is His spiritual presence, that is, both His Body and His Blood.

It is truly a great blessing from Saint Paul, the holy apostle to the nations, that he explains the dangers of receiving the holy Body and sacred Blood of our Lord, for very different reasons than medical science does. Saint Paul says

“whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, for he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgement to himself… For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep (die).” Corinthians 11:27, 29, 30

In regard to these powerful words of Saint Paul, are there parishioners who are ill, possibly because they have not prepared themselves to receive the divine gifts of our Lord’s spiritual Body and Blood? And, if the doctor’s instructions to them about not eating the Body (bread) because of the doctor’s medical knowledge are considered more important than the Holy Eucharist, then they should not receive the Holy Eucharist of the Lord, unless or until they believe that the Creator of all has more knowledge regarding eternal life than all the medical science of this fallen world.

This serious matter is proof enough that the secular world is developing into the false philosophy that it is self-created, in relationship to the theory that all creation is incidental and accidental. Consequently, the world, which is based in materialism, is more and more identifying itself, especially humanity, as it pleases, since it does not acknowledge a divine Creator.

If any parishioner does not fully believe that the Lord Jesus Christ is our Creator, and that He came into the world, taking on our human body, but His Body being perfect, and offering Himself up on the Holy Cross for our eternal salvation, please help such persons to realize their error, if they wish to listen. Of course, it is up to them to exercise their free will to accept our Lord as we know Him, or to take the only other direction, that is, turn away. from Him. We pray that the Holy Spirit will give to them the only direction to eternal life, and that is to know and to love our Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior and Redeemer.

With Paternal Blessings,

Metropolitan Isaiah of Denver

This letter is to be disseminated to all parishioners and published in all parish bulletins of the Metropolis of Denver.

Sacrament or Symbol?

March 10, 2018 By Fr. John Peck

What is the Lord’s Supper? What is the Eucharist? Was it always understood as a Sacrament? Throughout the history of Christianity, the overwhelming majority of Christians have consistently believed that Jesus Christ, in a mystery, imparts His Body and Blood to His people though the vehicle of the Lord’s Supper. Bypassing all the Biblical references, here is a small, non-exhaustive sampling of what they’ve had to say in every generation. If you’re going to read any of them, please read them all.

Ignatius of Antioch AD 35-107

“Mark ye those who hold strange doctrines touch the grace of Jesus which came to us, how they are contrary to the mind of God… They abstain from Eucharist and prayer, because they allow not that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, which flesh suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up.”

“Assemble yourselves together in common… breaking the bread, which the medicine of immortality and the antidote that we should not die but live forever in Jesus Christ.”

Ignatius to the Smyrnaens, 6.2; Ignatius to the Ephesians 20.2

Justin Martyr AD 100-165

“We do not receive these as common bread or common drink. But juest as our Savior Jesus Christ was made flesh through the Word of God and had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so also we have been taught that the food which has been Eucharized by the word of prayer from Him is the flesh and blood of the Incarnate Jesus.”

First Apology 66.2

Irenaeus of Lyons AD 130-200

“For as the bread, which is produced from the earth, when it receives the invocation of God, is no longer common bread, but the Eucharist, consisting of two realities, earthly and heavenly; so also our bodies, when they receive the Eucharist are no longer corruptible, having the hope of resurrection to eternity.:

“When, therefore, the mixed cup and baked bread receives the Word of God and becomes the Eucharist, the Body of Christ, and from these the substance of our flesh is increased and supported, how can they say that the flesh is not capable of receiving the gift of God, which is eternal life – flesh is nourished by the Body and Blood of the Lord, and is in fact, a member of Him?”

Against Heresies 4.18; 5.2,3

Cyprian of Carthage AD 200-258

“We may not arouse and exhort those to battle unarmed and naked, but may fortify them with the protection of Christ’s Body and Blood. The Eucharist is designate for this very purpose, that it may be a safeguard to those who receive it.”

Epistle 54

Athanasius of Alexandria AD 296-373

“You will see the Levites (deacons) bringing loaves and a cup of wine, and placing them on the Table. So long as the prayers and invocations have not yet been made, it is mere bread and a mere cup. But when the great and wondrous prayers have been recited, then the bread becomes the Body, and the cup becomes the Blood of Jesus Christ… When the great prayers and holy supplications are sent up, the Word descends on the bread and cup, and it becomes His Body.”

Sermon to the Baptized, quoted in Early Christian Doctrine by J.N.D. Kelley

Hilary of Poitiers AD 315-367

“He Himself declares: ‘For My Flesh is real food, and My Blood is real drink. He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood abides in Me and I in him.’ It is no longer permitted us to raise doubts about the nature of the Body and the Blood, for, according to the statement of the Lord Himself, as well as our faith, this is indeed Flesh and Blood. And these things that we receive bring it about that we are in Christ and Christ in us… How deeply we are in Him through the sacrament fo the Flesh and Blood.”

The Trinity 8.14

Cyril of Jerusalem AD 315-386

“Since then He Himself declared and said of the Bread, ‘this is my Body’, who shall dare to doubt any longer? And since He Himself affirmed and said, ‘this is My Blood’, who shall ever hesitate, saying that it is not His Blood? He once, in Cana of Galilee turned water into wine, akin to blood, and is it incredible that He should have turned wine into Blood?

“Consider therefore the bread and wine not as bare elements, for they are, according to the Lord’s declaration, the Body and Blood of Christ; for even though sense suggest this to you, yetlet faith establish you. Judge not the matter from the taste, but from faith be fully assured without misgiving, that the Body and Blood of Christ have been granted to you.”

Catechetical Lectures XXII 1.2; XXII 6

Basil the Great AD 330-379

“It is beneficial and good to communicate every day, to partake of the Holy Body and Blood of Christ, for He distinctly says, ‘He that eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood h as eternal life.”

Epistle 93 ad Caesariam

Gregory of Nyssa AD 335-395

“Rightly then do we believe that now also the bread which is consecrated by the Word of God is changed into the Body of God the Word… by dispensation of His grace, He disseminates Himself in every believer through that Flesh, whose substance comes from bread and wine, blending Himself with the bodies of the believers, to secure that, by this union with the immortal, man, too, may be a sharer in incorruption. He gives these gifts by virtue of the benediction through which is trans-elements the natural quality of these visibile signs to that immortal thing.”

The Great Catechism XXXVII

Ambrose of Milan AD 339-397

“We, as often as we receive the Sacramental Elements, which by the mysterious efficacy of holy prayer are transformed into the Flesh and Blood, ‘do show the Lord’s death’.”

The Faith, 4.124

John Chrysostom AD 345-407

“This which is in the cup is that which flowed from His side, and of that we do we partake… What is the bread? The Body of Christ.”

Homily 24 on First Corinthians; 1,2

Augustine of Hippo AD 354-430

“That Bread which you see on the altar, having been sanctified by the Word of God, is the Body of Christ. That chalice, or rather, what is in that chalice, having been sanctified by the Word of God, is the Blood of Christ. Through that bread and wine the Lord Christ willed to commend His Body and Blood, which He poured out for us unto the forgiveness of sins.”

“What you see is the bread and the chalice; that is what your own eyes report to you. But what your faith obliges you to accept is that the bread is the Body of Christ, and the chalice is the Blood of Christ… How is the bread His Body? And the chalice, or what is in the chalice, how is it His Blood? Those elements, brethren, are called Sacraments, because in them one thing is seen, but anoterh is understood. What is seen is the corporeal species; but what is understood is the spiritual fruit.”

Sermon 227; Sermon 272

Cyril of Alexandria AD 375-444

“He states demonstratively: ‘This is My Body’ and ‘This is my Blood,’ lest you might suppose the things that are seen are a figure. Rather, by some secret of the all-powerful God thethings seen are transformed into the Body and Blood of Christ, truly offered ina sacrifice in whic we, as particpants, receive the life-giving and sanctifying power of Christ.”

Commentary on Matthew 26,27

Leo the Great AD 400-461

“When the Lord says: ‘Unless you shall have eaten the Flesh of the Son of Man and shall have drunk His Blood, you shall not have life in you,’ you ought to so communicate at the Sacred Table that you have no doubt whatsoever of the truth of the Body and Blood of Christ. For that which is taken in the mouth si what is believed in faith; and in vain do those respond, ‘Amen’ who argue against that which is received.”

Sermon 91:3

Gelasius I of Rome d. AD 496

“The substance or nature of the bread and wine does not cease to exist, although the elements, the Holy Spirit, perfecting them, pass over into a divine substance, as was the case with Christ Himself. And certainly the image and likeness are honored in the observance of the Mysteries.”

Concerning the Two Natures of Christ, Thiel. Ep. Pontiff, p. 541 f.

John of Damascus AD 675-749

“…not that the Body which was taken up comes back down from heaven, but that the bread itself and the wine are made over into the Body and Blood of God. If you inquire into the way in which this happens, let it suffice for you to hear that it is through the Holy Spirit… Mmore than this we do not know, except that the Word of God is true and effective and all-powerful; but the manner is inscrutable… the Bread and the Wine are not a type of the Body and Blood of Christ – perish the thought! – but the deified Body itself of the Lord.”

The Source of Knowledge, 3,4,13

Paschasius Radbertus AD 790-865

“Let no man be moved from this Body and Blood of Christ which in a mystery are true Flesh and Blood since the Creator so willed it… Because the sacrament is mystical, we cannot deny that it is a figure, but if it is a figure, we must inquire how it can be truth. For every figure is a figure of another thing and is always referred to that other thing as being the real thing of which it is a figure.”

The Body and Blood of the Lord I.2; IV.1

Ratramnus of Corbie d, AD 868

“If, indeed, it is bread in appearance, in the sacrament it is the true Body of Christ, even as the Lord Jesus proclaims, ‘This is my Body,’… they are figures according to he visible form; but according to the invisible substances, i.d. the power of the Divine Word, the true Body and Blood of Christ truly exist.”

Letters to Charles the Bald, 57;49

Thomas Aquinas AD 1225-1274

“Two things may be considered in the sacrament of the Eucharist. One is the fact that it is a sacrament, and in this respect it is like the other effects of sanctifying grace. The other is that Christ’s Body is miraculously contained therein, and thus, it is included under God’s ominpotence, like all other miracles which are ascribed to God’s almighty power.”

Summa Theologica, Section XV, Question 1, article 9, reply to objection 6

John Wycliffe AD 1330-1384

“That change does not destroy the nature of bread, nor alter the nature of the Body… but it effects the presence of the Body of Christ and destroys thte preeminence of the bread, so that the whole attention of the worshipper is concentrated upon the Body of Christ… Not that the bread has been destroyed, but that it signifies the Body of the Lord there present in the Sacrament.”

The Eucharist, p. 100,101

John Huss AD 1375-1415

“The humble priest does not… say that he is the creator of Christ, but that the Lord Christ by His power and Word, through him, causes that which is bread to be His Body; not that at that time it began to be His, but that there on the altar begins to be sacramentally in the form of bread what was previously was not there and therein.”

John Huss, by David Schaff, 1915

Martin Luther AD 1483-1543

“What is the Sacrament of the Altar? It is the true Body and Blood of Christ, under the bread and wine, given unto us Chrisitans to eat and to drink, as it was instituted by Christ Himself… What is the benefit of such eating and drinking? It is pointed out in these words: Given and shed for you for the remission of sins.”

Small Catechism Section VI

John Calvin AD 1509-1564

“It is a spiritual mystery which cannot be seen by the eye, nor be comprehended by human understanding. Therefore, it is represented for us by means of visible signs, according to the need of our weaknesses. Nevertheless, it is not a naked figure, but one joined to its truth and substance. With good reason, then, the bread is called Body, because it not only represents it, but also presents it.”

Short Treatise on the Lord’s Supper

John Wesley AD 1703-1791

“All who desire an increase of the grace of God are to wait for it in partaking of the Lord’s Supper: for this also is a direction He Himself has given… is not the eating of the bread, and the drinking of that cup, the outward, visible means, whereby God conveys into our souls all that spiritual grace, that righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost which were purchased by the Body of Christ, once broken and the Blood of Christ once shed for us? Let all, therefore, who truly desire the grace of God, eat of that bread, and drink of that cup.”

Sermon 16, The Means of Grace, points 11,12

Andrew Murray AD 1828-1917

“In the Supper, Christ would take possession of the whole man – body and soul – to renew and sanctify it by the power of His holy Body and Blood. even His Body is communicated by the Holy Spirit. Even our body is fed with His holy Body and renewed by the working of the Holy Spirit… ‘He that eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood, let him abide in Me, and I in him.”

The New Life, p. 205, 2-7

F.F. Bruce 20th Century

“In the Biblical sense, ‘remembrance’ is more than a mental exercise; it involves a realization of what is remembered. At the Passover feast the participants are one with their ancestors of the Exodus; at the Eucharist, Christians experience the Real Presence of their Lord.”

1st and 2nd Corinthians, Oliphants, 1971; p. 111

R.C.H. Lenski 20th Century

“‘My Body means exactly what the words say: in truth and reality My Body… We refuse to answer the question regarding the how because the Lord withholds the answer. We ould probably not have understood the real answer if it had ben given because of the giving of His Body in the Sacrament is a Divine act of omnipotence and grace which is beyond mortal comprehension. The Lord declares the fact: ‘This is My Body,’ and we take Him at His word.”

The Interpretation of St. Paul’s 1st and 2nd Epistles to the Corinthians, Augsburg, 1963

G.M.A. Jansen 20th Century

“This is the mystery: The Body and blood of Christ are there and He offers them to us a food and drink, because He said so. If you believe in the Mystery of the Incarnation and in that of the Redemption, you can also believe in the Mystery of the Holy Eucharist, in the Real Presence.”

The Sacramental We, Bruce Publishing, co. 1968, p. 52

And finally one who didn’t.

Influenced by the rationalistic spirit of the Renaissance and reacting to abuses in the Roman Church, a small segment of Reformation churchmen, centered around Ulrich Zwingli, began to view the Lord’s Supper as an empty symbol, a Real Absence of Christ, instead of a vehicle of grace.

Ulrich Zwingli AD 1484-1531

“If He has gone away, if He has left this world, if He is no longer with us, then either the Creed is unfaithful to the words of Christ, which is impossible, or else the Body and Blood of Christ cannot be present in the Sacrament. The flesh may fume but the words of Christ stand firm. He sits at the right hand of the Father, He has left the world, He is no longer present with us. And if these words are true, it is impossible to maintain that His Flesh and Blood are present in the Sacrament.”

“The Fathers held exactly the same view as we do. And they use exactly the same speech as we do, for they call the bread and wine the Body and Blood of Christ, although what they really mean is that they are the representation and memorial of His Body and Blood…”

Zwingli and Bullinger, The Westminster Press, p. 214-234

“And just as I have no doubt that this God created heaven and earth, and that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, so I know that it is not possible that the Body of Christ is in the Sacrament.”

Huldrych Zwingli, G.R. Potter, Edward Arnold Pub. 1978; p. 100

Much of modern American Evangelicalism has taken its view of the Lord’s Supper from the Gnostic Zwinglian tradition, rather than from the mainstream of historic Incarnational Christianity. Althought a multitude of examples could be quoted, Zwingli has stated the case most succinctly, and substantially speaks for them all.

The Orthodox Church, as the historic Church of Christ, has maintained the Lord’s command, and the Apostolic teaching, often at great cost, for the last 2,000+ years.

Sacrament or Symbol?

Eucharistic Bread: Leavened or Unleavened?

January 18, 2018 By Fr. John Peck

In the Bible, unleavened bread is called “unleavened bread,” whereas leavened bread is simply called “bread.” The Jews at that time would have understood this as would have the early Christians. It says that “He took bread,” meaning leavened bread; and the Christians, being first instructed by the Apostles and then reading in the Gospels some time later, implemented this.

At the Mystical Supper, it is obvious that our Lord was changing things, to tie the Passover meal with its fulfillment, the Eucharist. One of those changes, obviously, was using leavened bread instead of unleavened, or at least leavened in addition to unleavened. The world was empty and devoid of grace before Christ, as is symbolized by the flatness of the unleavened bread, but later filled with the glory of His Resurrection, as is symbolized by the leavened bread. Christ made the change, and the Church followed through on it.

The word for unleavened bread in Greek is AZYMOS it is used in the Greek New Testament nine times: Mt.26:17; Mk.14:1,12; Lk.22:1,7;Ac.12:3; 20:6; 1Cor.5:7,8.

The word for leavened bread is ARTOS it is used 97 times in the Greek New Testament.

The passages where they are relevant for the Mystical Supper are;

Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said,

“Take, eat; this is my body.”

– Mt. 26:26; Mk.14:22; Lk.22:19;24:30,35; 1 Cor.10:16,17 (twice);11:26,27,28.

In all these places, the writers never say Jesus took AZYMOS and blessed it, they write that Jesus took ARTOS, common ordinary leavened bread.

Here is a quote from the book Bread and Liturgy by George Galavaris:

The same baking method and ovens were used by the Christians for both their daily bread and that which was to be used in worship. It must be made clear that (contrary to practices today in the West) in the Early Christian centuries and in all eastern rites through the ages, except in the Armenian church, the bread used for the Church did not differ from ordinary bread in substance. From the beginning leavened bread was used. Even the Armenians before the seventh century and the Maronites before their union with Rome in the twelfth century used leavened bread. The practice of using unleavened bread for the Eucharist was introduced to the West much later. Among the earliest written accounts is that given by Alcuin (A.D. 798) and his disciple Rabanus Maurus. After this the altar bread took the light, wafer like form, achieved with pressing irons, so common today. (Galavaris, Bread and Liturgy, p. 54).

The adjectival form Azymite was used as a term of abuse by Orthodox Christians against Latin Rite Christians. The Orthodox Church has continued the ancient Eastern practice of using leavened bread for the Lamb (Hostia ‘victim’ in Latin) in the Eucharist. After serious theological disputes between Rome and the churches of the East, Latin use of unleavened bread, azymes, for the Eucharist—a point of liturgical difference—became also a point of theological difference between the two, and was one of several disputes which led eventually to the Great Schism between Eastern and Western Christianity in 1054.

Here is a quote from a Latin priest and professor of theology at the university of Vienna named Johannes H. Emminghaus:

In the Latin Rite, the bread for the Eucharist has been unleavened since the eighth century; that is, it is baked of flour and water without yeast. At the Last Supper, Christ probably took this kind of bread (mazzah), which was interpreted in the Passover memorial as a “bread of affliction,” the bread of nomadic shepherds who had no homeland of their own.

During the first millennium of Church history, however, it was the general custom in both East and West to use normal “daily bread,” that is, leavened bread, for the Eucharist; the Eastern Churches still use it and usually have strict prohibitions against the use of unleavened bread (or “azymes”).

The Latin Church, for its part, regards the question as of little importance, since at the Council of Florence, which sought to reunite East and West (1439), the difference in custom was simply acknowledged and accepted. (Rev. Johannes H. Emminghaus, The Eucharist: Essence, Form, Celebration, p. 161).

Here is a quote from a Jesuit priest and professor of Theology at the University of Innsbruck:

In the West, various ordinances appeared from the ninth century on, all demanding the exclusive use of unleavened bread for the Eucharist. A growing solicitude for the Blessed Sacrament and a desire to employonly the best and whitest bread, along with various scriptural considerations—all favored this development.

Still, the new custom did not come into exclusive vogue until the middle of the eleventh century. Particularly in Rome it was not universally accepted till after the general infiltration of various usages from the North. In the Orient there were few objections to this usage during olden times. Not till the discussions that led to the schism of 1054 did it become one of the chief objections against the Latins.

At the Council of Florence (1439), however, it was definitely established that the Sacrament could be confected in azymo sive fermentato pane. Therefore, as we well know, the various groups of Orientals who are united with Rome continue to use the type of bread traditional among them. (Rev. Joseph A. Jungmann, SJ., The Mass of the Roman Rite, vol. II, p. 34).

In other words, the use of unleavened bread with the round host-style bread came from the forests of Germany. In the ninth century the use of unleavened bread had become obligatory in the West, while the Orthodox continued the exclusive offering of leavened bread. The issue became divisive when the provinces of Byzantine Italy which were under the authority of the Patriarch of Constantinople were forcibly incorporated into the Church of Rome following their invasion by the Norman armies. At this time the use of unleavened bread was forced upon the Orthodox of southern Italy.

HT: Preachers Institute

Source

Eucharistic Bread: Leavened or Unleavened?

Why the Seder?

November 11, 2017 By All Saints of North America

Part three of our republishing of ‘The Contemporary Protestant Seder: Anachronistic Revisionism?’ by the Rev. Dr. Dcn. Timothy J. Wilkinson

Why the Seder?

Given the clear linkage between the Passover, the Seder meal, and the Eucharist – and the apparent lack of understanding of, or interest in this linkage – motives for participation in the Seder meal appear to fall into two categories. The first revolves around the well-known philo-Semitic evangelical desire for rootedness and connection with the early Church and its predecessor, the Jewish religion. Since the publication of Richard Foster’s Celebration of Discipline in 1978, ancient source literature, particularly as it relates to individual spirituality, has become attractive to many evangelicals.xxxiii In addition, in contemporary evangelicalism

“practices that used to be associated with a particular church tradition are [now] freely assimilated into other traditions.”xxxiv

For example, the emerging church movement is an attempt to create churches to be communities that

“practice the way of Jesus within postmodern cultures.”xxxv

Because they are unaware of or not interested in the history of the Church, the movement has tended toward “do-it-yourself tradition” that aims to reinvent the church, but without historical context. In his critique of the emerging church, author Simon Chan states what could easily be applied to many evangelicals:

“They seem to think of tradition as essentially a matter of beliefs or ideas rather than a history. They tend to retrieve selectively useful things from the Christian tradition…”

and their

“appropriation of tradition tends to be eclectic and consequently their worship is reinvented with bits and pieces pillaged from the Christian tradition.” xxxvi The disconnect from Church history and tradition is not limited to new church movements.

President David S. Dockery of Union University in Tennessee complained that Baptists were no longer of one mind on first-order issues,

“such as the authority and truthfulness of the Bible, the deity and humanity of Christ, the Holy Trinity and the exclusivity of the Gospel.”

Further, he stated that

“our historical amnesia creates theological and biblical problems.”xxxvii

The historical amnesia present in evangelicalism can be characterized through a conceptual tool suggested by German Egyptologist Jan Assmann, which distinguishes between communicative and cultural memory. The former is shared and communicated through social groups defined by common memories (memory communities), actualized through verbal communications within a time span of 100 years. Communicative memory is unstructured, and

“has the character of private interpretation of the past; it is a group’s unofficial, every-day memory.”xxxviii

In contrast cultural memory is much less egalitarian in terms of who has the power to define and interpret the past. Cultural memory,

“is a group’s official memory and is intrinsically related to power and tradition.”xxxix

Assmann explains the content of cultural memory as all sign complexes, that is, not just texts, but also dances, rites, symbols, and the rest, that possess a particular normative and formative authority in the establishment of meaning and identity. Cultural texts lay claim to an authority that embraces society as a whole; they determine its identity and coherence. They structure the world of meaning in which society makes itself understood, and also the sense of unity, belonging, and individuality that can be handed down through the generations, thus enabling a society to reproduce itself as a recognizable group.xl

To the extent that American Christianity now reflects American culture, as opposed to embodying historically-based differences, it reflects communicative memory. It should therefore be expected that the evangelical practice of the Seder is part of today’s fashionable, popular culture. In contrast, the fact that the contemporary Seder is perceived to be based on ancient Jewish and Christian practices indicates that evangelicals involved in the Seder desire to connect with their Jewish and Christian roots. The Christian Seder may, therefore, constitute an effort to connect to the cultural memory of the Church, religious tradition, or/and the Jewish context of Christianity.

The foregoing discussion suggests two major motives for evangelical use of the Seder. The Seder may be simply a “neat” thing to do; a religious ritual that fits into the syncretic zeitgeist of contemporary American Christian practice. To the extent that this is the case it would be similar to the aforementioned ecological, gay rights, or Latin American Solidarity “Seders” of the past. The second possibility is that the evangelical Seder is an attempt to somehow bring forward an ancient practice in order to help participants feel connected to what has gone on before. Here proponents are attempting to foster continuity with the ancient Jewish/Christian tradition, however misguided or clumsy that attempt might be.

Observance of the Seder by Christians lends itself to two additional problems.

First, it is syncretic practice which subtracts from the religious integrity of the actual Jewish Seder. In his article, “Don’t Try This at Home,” Rabbi Gary M. Bretton-Granatoor makes this point in the following statement:

Of late, I still hear of Seders held by Christian groups – some even try a form of religious syncretism – applying new meanings to Jewish symbols (Why are there three matzos? Why are the matzos scored with holes? Why is the middle matzo broken?). Imagine how a faithful Christian would feel to see the intensely meaningful Eucharist appropriated by another religious group and changed by new explanations of the essential symbolic elements.xli

An atheistic Jew approximated this sentiment when I told her about the use of the Seder in evangelical churches. She asked with indignation,

“Why are they stealing my holiday?”

Especially given the unknown nature of the Seder at the time of Christ and widespread disagreement over what kind of meal was celebrated in the upper room, contemporary Christian appropriation of the Seder exhibits anachronistic revisionism.

In instances where the Seder is practiced in such a way that its integrity as a Jewish ceremony is left intact, the Christian element is likely to be incompletely addressed. After all, the entire point of Christianity is that “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). Omitting the belief that Christ is God incarnate from a “Christianized” Seder would necessarily comprise the Christian content of the ceremony.

The second problem is that the early Church – the one that many contemporary Christians talk about but few actually study – was strikingly clear when it came to Christians participating in Jewish rituals. Christians who practiced Judaism were excommunicated.xlii

Sadly, the fact that the Early Church prohibited participation in Jewish rituals is both unknown to contemporary American Christians and, if it were known, would likely be of little importance. While such prohibitions may be unpleasant given our contemporary, pluralistic, and friendly approach to religion, there is no way to walk back from the stern prohibitions of the Fathers of the Early Church.

Conclusion

This paper began with an overview of how the Seder has been used and abused by a wide variety of groups over the decades. While the educational aspect of the Seder is hopeful, ignorance of Church history, doctrine, and liturgical theology mean that evangelical approbation of the Seder is doomed to be, at the very best, a poorly conducted lesson. In the theoretical terms of the aforementioned Egyptologist Jan Assmann, evangelicals drawn into the world of the Seder appear to be connecting with the cultural memory (official memory related to power and tradition) through a process of communicative memory (private interpretation of the past). This creates an artificial understanding of both ancient Jewish and Christian worship practices.xliii

While the attempt to connect with the Old Testament and our Jewish forebears is laudable, it would make a lot more sense for evangelicals to do so in the context of the historic Christian Church. It is sad that the emphasis on Sola Scriptura, and the subconscious anti-Catholicism that goes with it, has so dissuaded people from understanding where Christianity came from and how it developed. Chronocentrism is the disease of our age, and it finds no greater expression than in the contemporary, market-driven, nondenominational, mega- church movement. In this context the Seder is just another fad, like texting sermons or movie theatre seating for congregants. Once again, Rabbi Bretton-Granatoor’s article, “Don’t Try This at Home,” has an important message for evangelical Christians:

Therefore, those well-meaning folks who want to understand the vital Jewish community from which Jesus and his followers sprang would do well to study the history of the time and the literature of the intertestamental period, as well as the early rabbis and early church fathers. It is through that examination that a clearer and more accurate understanding of the foundational culture of the followers of Jesus might be divined.xliv

Amen to that, Rabbi!

†After the publication of this article I came across the following insightful observations in the commentary, The Gospel According to LUKE , where Professor Edwards states that the Lukan Last Supper was a Jewish Passover meal and then makes the following observations:

In representing the Passover, the Last Supper becomes the new covenant (v. 20). Jesus’ disciples are now not to remember the exodus, but Jesus himself. The presumption of Jesus to substitute himself for the exodus, the foundational event of Israel’s existence, is a clue to his messianic self –consciousness. That the meal now recalls Jesus rather than the exodus is powerfully illustrated in the Emmaus story, where “Jesus was made known to [Cleopas and his companion] in the breaking of the bread” (24:30, 35). …
“In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you’” (v. 20). Since the cup of v. 20 is given “after the supper,” it must be either the third or fourth Passover cup. If, as Nolland suggests, Jesus shares his own personal cup with the Twelve in v. 20, then that cup is a concrete illustration of the disciples’ participation in Jesus’ self-sacrifice. … Like the old covenant at Mount Sinai, the new covenant must also be ratified by blood. In Hebrew thought the life of a creature resided in its blood; Jesus’ reference to the cup as “my blood” thus implies his very life … The new covenant instituted by Jesus is not ratified by the blood of a surrogate sacrificial animal, but by Jesus’ blood, which is not thrown onto believers as in Exod 24:8 but received into believers. In both the bread and wine

“the whole Jesus is present: his person in the bread, and his life in the cup” (Wolter, Michael. Das Lukasevangelim. HNT 5. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008)

Source: James R. Edwards. The Gospel According to LUKE. The Pillar New Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids, Michigan: William Be. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2015, p. 629-630.

Read the entire series from the beginning by clicking HERE

Dr. Timothy J. Wilkinson is a deacon in the Orthodox Church of America, and is Professor and the Charles L. Boppell Dean of the School of Business & Management at Whitworth University. He earned a Ph.D. from the University of Utah, with a doctoral dissertation that examined subnational export promotion policy. Before coming to Whitworth, Professor Wilkinson taught at Montana State University Billings, The University of Akron, and Boise State University. Wilkinson’s has published seven books or edited volumes and 35 research studies, including Strategic Management in the 21st Century and International Business in the 21st Century. Articles for business people have been published in Business Horizons, MIT Sloan Management Review, and the Wall Street Journal. He is the author of The Customer Trap: How to Avoid the Biggest Mistake in Business.

Re-printed from Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies 56 (2015), published by the Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky Institute of Eastern Christian Studies

Endnotes

1 C.I.K. Story, “The Bearing of Old Testament Terminology on the Johannine Chronology of the Final Passover of Jesus,” Novum Testamentum XXXI, no. 4 (1989), 316-324.

2 Jonathan Klawans, “Was Jesus’ Last Supper a Seder?” Biblical Archaeology Review, n.d. http://www.bib-arch.org/e-features/jesus-last-supper.asp.

3 Baruch M. Bokser, “Ritualizing the Seder,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 56, no. 3 (1988), 443-471.

4 Ibid., 443-444.

5 Ibid 443-444.

6 Rabbi Moshe Lazarus, “The History of the Haggadah.” http://ohr.edu/835.

7 Jerome Kodell, The Eucharist in the New Testament. (Collegeville, Minnesota, The Liturgical Press, 1991), 44.

8 Ben Eisen, “Cornell Hosts Seder Supper,” Cornell Daily Sun, April 3, 2007.

9 Michael Medved, “The Preposterous Politics of Passover,” Commentary, (April 2011), 38-44.

10 Jodi Kanter, “Next Year in the White House: A Seder Tradition,” New York Times, March 27, 2010.

11 Michael Medved, “The Preposterous Politics of Passover,” Commentary, (April 2011), 38-44.

12 Solomon Zeitlin, “The Liturgy of the First Night of Passover,” The Jewish Quarterly Review, (n.s.) 38 (1948): 445.

13 Ibid,

14 James A. Walther, “The Chronology of Passion Week,” The Society of Biblical Literature 77, (1958): 121.

15 Cullen I.K. Story, “The Bearing of Old Testament Terminology on the Johannine Chronology of the Final Passover of Jesus,” Novum Testamentum XXXI, no. 4 (1989), 320.

16 Justin Martyr. Ante-Nicene Fathers. Vol. II chapter XL. http://st-takla.org/books/en/ecf/001/0010501.html .

17 Justin, Martyr Dialogue with Trypho, 254.

18 Barker, Margaret. Temple Themes in Christian Worship (New York: T&T Clark International 2007) 28.

19 Massey J. Shepherd, “Are Both the Synoptics and John Correct about the Date of Jesus’ Death?” Journal of Biblical Literature 80, no. 2 (1961), 124.

20 Ibid., 125.

21 C.I.K. Story, “The Bearing of Old Testament Terminology,”319.

22 Jerome Kodell, The Eucharist in the New Testament (Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press) (1991), 42.

23 Jonathan Klawans, “Was Jesus’ Last Supper a Seder?” Biblical Archaeology Review, n.d. http://www.bib-arch.org/e-features/jesus-last-supper.asp.

24 F.F. Bruce, New Testament History. New York: Doubleday, (1969), 192.

25 B. Williams and H. Anstall, Orthodox Worship: A Living Continuity with the Synagogue, the Temple and the Early Church (Minneapolis: Light and Life Publishing, 1990), 29.

26 Timothy Ware, The Orthodox Church, (London: Penguin, 1997), 287.

27 Alexander Schmemann, Introduction to Liturgical Theology (Crestwood, New York: St. Vladimir’s SemeinaryPress, 1996), 58.

28 Ibid, 63.

29 Plekon, Michael. “Always Everyone and Always Together”: The Eucharistic Ecclesiology of Nicolas Afanasiev’s The Lord’s Supper Revisited.” St. Vladimir’s Tehological Quarterly 41, (1997): 141-174.

30 Hugh Wybrew, The Orthodox Liturgy. (Crestwood, New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press 1990), 14.

31 St. John Chrysostom, The Divine Liturgy, (South Canaan, Pennslyvania: St. Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1977), 81.

32 The Sisters of the Order of St. Basil the Great, Pentecostarion, (Uniontown, Pennsylvania, 1986), 11.

33 Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline (New York: HarperCollins, 1978).

34 Simon Chan, “New Directions in Evangelical Spirituality,” Journal of Spiritual Formation & Soul Care 2, (2009), 220.

35 Eddie Gibbs, and Ryan K. Bolger, Emergin Churches: Creating Christian Community in Postmodern Cultures(Grand Rapids: Baker, 2005), 45.

36 Simon Chan, “New Directions in Evangelical Spirituality.” Journal of Spiritual Formation & Soul Care 2, no. 2 (2009), 224, 232.

37 “Evangelical Life,” Touchstone: A Journal of Mere Christianity, (March 2007), 57.

38 Jan Assmann, “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity,” New German Critique, 65, Spring-Summer ( 1995),128-129; Jens Bruun Kofoed, “Saul and Cultural Memory,” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 25 (2011), 126.

39 Ibid, 126.

40 Jan Assmann, Religion and Cultural Memory: Ten Studies (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press 2006), 123-124.

41 Rabbi Gary Bretton-Granatoor, “Don’t Try this at Home.” America: The National Catholic Weekly, 2006, 21. Also availble here: http://americamagazine.org/issue/569/article/dont-try-home.

42 Ignatius To the Magnesians 8-10.

43 Jan Assmann, “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity,”128-129; Jens Bruun Kofoed, “Saul and Cultural Memory,” 126.44 Rabbi Gary Bretton-Granatoor, “Don’t Try this at Home,” America: The National Catholic Weekly, 2006, 21.

Why the Seder?

The Early Church, the Seder and the Eucharist

November 11, 2017 By All Saints of North America

Part two of our republishing of ‘The Contemporary Protestant Seder: Anachronistic Revisionism?’ by the Rev. Dr. Dcn. Timothy J. Wilkinson.

The Early Church, the Seder and the Eucharist

What kind of meal was the Last Supper? At first blush it appears to be a Passover meal imbued with new meaning. In Matthew and Mark, Jesus specifically mentions the desire to eat the Passover meal with His disciples:

Now on the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying to Him, Where do You want us to prepare for You to eat the Passover? And He said, “Go into the city to a certain man, and say to him, ‘The Teacher says, “My time is at hand; I will keep the Passover at your house with My disciples (Matthew 26:17-18).

…“Where is the guest room in which I may eat the Passover with My disciples.” So His disciples went out, and came into the city, and found it just as He had said to them; and they prepared the Passover (Mark 14:14, 16).

The Gospel of Luke provides additional detail, using the word “Passover” in five of the nine verses from Luke 22:7-15. Clearly, the Synoptic gospels unambiguously identify the Last Supper with the Passover meal. Zeitlin states:

“The description of the Last Supper given in the gospels is undoubtedly a record of the Seder of the first night of Passover. The bread which Jesus ate was unleavened bread and the wine was that used by the Jews on the first night of Passover. The hymn sung by Jesus and the Apostles after the meal was the Hallel, which is still sung by the Jews on that night.”xii

At the same time Zeitlin points out that the Synoptics do not actually portray Jesus eating the Paschal lamb because He Himself

“was the paschal lamb that was to be sacrificed to redeem men.”xiii

By their identification of the supper shared with Jesus as the Passover, the synoptics appear to indicate that the Passover took place before the crucifixion, whereas the Gospel of John specifies Friday it as the “Preparation Day”, which would be the eve of the Passover. In this case the meal was not a Seder, but a common meal. John identifies Christ Himself as the Passover sacrifice and places the time of the supper before the Passover:

“Now before the Feast of the Passover…” (John 13:1).

John locates the sacrifice of Christ at the traditional time that the Passover lambs were sacrificed:

“Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, and about the sixth hour…” (John 19:14)

and

“Therefore, because it was the Preparation Day…” (John 19:31).

Christ is then crucified at

“about the sixth hour” (19:14),

which is when the lambs were sacrificed in the Temple.xiv

Patristic writers have also varied in their explanations of the whether or not the Lord’s Supper was a Passover meal. Clement of Alexandria (third century), Hippolytus (third c.), Eutyches (fourth-fifth c.) and Eusebius (fourth c.) argued that the supper was a Passover meal eaten early, before the actual Passover was to take place. In contrast, Irenaeus (second-third c.), Origen (third c.), and John of Damascus (eighth c.) believed that Jesus and his disciples ate the actual Passover meal.xv The chronological issue is important because it addresses the question of what type of meal that Jesus shared with His disciples as described in John 13:1-30.

However, as can be seen from the quotations above, the Father did not express a unanimous opinion on this question. Patristic writers were uniform in seeing a linkage between the Passover and the Passion and Person of Christ. Justin, using the typological exegesis common in the Early Church, compared the blood of Christ to the blood that delivered Israel in Egypt:

The mystery, then of the lamb which God enjoined to be sacrificed as the Passover, was a type of Christ; with whose blood, in proportion to their faith in Him, they anoint their houses, i.e., themselves, who believe on Him. … God does not permit the lamb of the Passover to be sacrificed in any other place than where His name was named; knowing that the days will come, after the suffering of Christ, when even the place in Jerusalem shall be given over to your enemies, and all of the offerings, in short, shall cease. … and that lamb which was commanded to be wholly roasted was a symbol of the suffering of the cross which Christ would undergo. For the lamb, which is roasted is roasted and dressed up in the form of the cross.xvi

In his dialogue with Trypho, he further stated:

For the Passover was Christ, who was afterwards sacrificed, as also Isaiah said, ‘He was led as a sheep to the slaughter.’ And it is written, that on the day of the Passover you seized Him, and that also during the Passover you crucified Him. And as the blood of the Passover saved those who were in Egypt, so also the blood of Christ will deliver from death those who have believed.xvii

In the mid-fourth century Ephrem wrote,

“Our Lord ate the Little Pascha (Passover) and became himself the great Pascha.”

Origen, noting John the Baptist’s declaration –

“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29)

– stated,

“Here you see the true lamb, the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world”,

and noting 1 Cor. 7:7 –

“Christ our Paschal lamb has been sacrificed,”

– added,

“Let the Jews eat the flesh of the lamb in a carnal way, but let us eat the flesh of the Word of God.’’xviii

As can be seen from these quotations, while the Church Fathers touched upon the question of whether or not the Last Supper was a Passover meal, they were much more interested in how the Lord in His death fulfilled the type of the paschal lamb.xix

In modern times arguments have been made attempting to reconcile the different Passover accounts, including the proposition that the discrepancy is due to the use of different calendars by Palestinian and Diaspora Jews.xx Scholar Bo Reicke posits that the meal eaten at the Last Supper was a quiddush, a “meal of consecration,” while C.C Torrey argues that the word “Passover” could refer to the Passover supper itself, the feast of unleavened bread, or to the entire week of Passover.xxi Perhaps the simplest and most likely explanation of John’s timeline is offered by Jerome Kodell, who argues convincingly that

“It was not a Passover meal as such but had Passover motifs because of the proximity of the feast; as today, a family Christmas meal may take place during the season rather than on the day itself.”xxii

Writing along similar lines, Jonathan Klawans argues

“that Christians celebrated the Eucharist on a daily or weekly basis (see Acts 2:46-47) underscores the fact that it was not viewed exclusively in a Passover context (otherwise, it would have been performed, like the Passover meal, on an annual basis).”

This perspective is supported by chapters 9 and 10 of the Didache, which includes eucharistic prayers that approximate the kind of prayers that would be said at any Jewish meal, including the Seder.xxiii

Perhaps the most satisfying explanation is offered by F.F. Bruce, who points out that the Last Supper took place at least 24 hours before the official celebration of Friday’s Passover. The fact that this would mean that the meal would occur without a Passover lamb, was not without precedent. All Passover meals, except for those in Jerusalem, were fashioned this way because the lambs had to be sacrificed in the vicinity of the Temple at the prescribed time on Friday. In this scenario, the meal celebrated by the disciples was a Passover meal but without the lamb, just like the meal celebrated by Jews in all places except in Jerusalem. This is a satisfying explanation considering the time-frame of John’s Gospel and given the lack of reference to an actual eating of the lamb in the Synoptics. Bruce’s explanation is simple,

“It may be that Jesus and his disciples celebrated the Passover according to another calendar than the official one; it may be that Jesus, knowing that he would be no longer alive on Friday evening, the official time for celebrating it, deliberately arranged to eat it with his disciples earlier in the week.”xxiv

The view of Orthodox theologians generally is that the meal shared by Jesus and the disciples in the upper room was decidedly not a Seder supper of the Passover. While allowing that it was a supper in a Passover context which included the breaking of bread and the drinking of the cup, the fact that it ostensibly took place on Thursday evening disallows it from being a Passover Seder. More importantly, unlike the Seder, the Eucharist transcends space and time. xxv Orthodox theologian Paul Evdokimov states:

“All the holy suppers of the Church are nothing else than one eternal and unique Supper, that of Christ in the Upper Room. The same divine act both takes place at a specific moment in history, and is offered always in the sacrament.”xxvi

Alexander Schmemann points out that Christian worship, specifically the synaxis or the Liturgy of the Catechumens, originated in the cultic ritual of the Hebrews. Far from rejecting the traditional worship of the Jews, Jesus and the disciples were regular participants in the services of the Temple and the Synagogue. The Book of Acts records that involvement by the Jerusalem Christians in the Hebrew Cult continued throughout the period of persecution by the leaders of Judaism, persisting up until the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD. Schmemann states,

“…considering the hostility expressed toward them by the official leaders of Judaism, it is remarkable that there is no mention in the charges brought against them of their infringement of the cultic law.”xxvii

He is making the point that the early Church did not make a clean break with Judaism and that it did not reject the liturgical form of worship practiced by the Jews.

Despite the faithfulness of the early Jewish Christians to their roots, the coming of Jesus the Messiah created a new relationship between His followers and the old traditional cult. Jesus had condemned the legalistic, external and ritualistic interpretation of the Haggadah, criticizing the rabbis for turning traditional ritual into an end-in-itself rather than a means through which people might be able to recognize Him as the Christ. While both Baptism and the Eucharist had their origins in the Jewish tradition, the content was completely new in that the liturgical acts pictured in the old cult were now exclusively and completely connected to his death and resurrection. In speaking of the Passover supper Schmemann states:

There can be no doubt that the new cult has its historical foundation in that “private” cult which united Christ and the little group of disciples whom He had chosen, in the prayer, the meal and the communion which He had with them. But precisely because Jesus was not just one of many teachers or prophets, but the Messiah Himself, this private cult becomes the cult of the messianic community, its central and so to speak “constitutive” act. In addition, because Christ Himself instituted this cult as a remembrance of Himself – “Do this in remembrance of me” – it has no content other than Himself, His coming, the work which he accomplished. xxviii

Schmemann further states that outside of faith in Christ, the communion meal that Christ instituted has no meaning whatsoever. Moreover, it is within the context of the Lord’s Supper that the Church becomes itself;

“There can be no eucharistic gather where there is no Church and there can be no Church without the Eucharist.”xxix

The Jewish ritual meal was transformed because it was given new meaning by Jesus as He celebrated it with His disciples.† Evidence indicates that it was not viewed by the early Christians as a memorial meal for the dead founder of the Christian Church. Rather, the Eucharist was seen as a foretaste of the Heavenly Kingdom in which Jesus is both the celebrant and the sacrifice,xxx offered to, and received by God outside of time. Clearly, the Eucharist of the Church has Passover themes and is purposefully connected through Christ’s actions in the Upper Room to a Seder-like meal. To say that the Seder is fulfilled in the Eucharist is a gross understatement. Rather, the Seder meal shared by Jews and others at Passover today can only be viewed by Christians as a shadow or “type” of the Eucharistic Body and Blood that Christ shares with his followers for

“remission of sins and unto life everlasting.”xxxi

To conclude, the Passover – and the Seder meal associated with it – is a type of the saving work of Christ, in which Christ becomes the Passover. This is made clear in the Paschal hymn, which states,

“Today a sacred Pascha is revealed to us, a new and holy Pascha, a mystical Pascha, a Pascha worthy of veneration, a Pascha which is Christ the Redeemer.”xxxii

Pascha is the Greek word for Passover, making this connection self-evident in most languages; the most obvious exception being the English designation of “Easter”.

Given the centrality of the Eucharist in the early Church and the lack of interest in the Seder meal throughout most of Christian history, the embrace of the Seder by evangelicals can be understood only outside of the context of historic, biblical, and traditional Christianity.

Part Three can be read by clicking HERE

Re-printed from Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies 56 (2015), published by the Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky Institute of Eastern Christian Studies

Ignatius of Antioch AD 35-107

Justin Martyr AD 100-165

Irenaeus of Lyons AD 130-200

Cyprian of Carthage AD 200-258

Athanasius of Alexandria AD 296-373

Hilary of Poitiers AD 315-367

Cyril of Jerusalem AD 315-386

Basil the Great AD 330-379

Gregory of Nyssa AD 335-395

Ambrose of Milan AD 339-397

John Chrysostom AD 345-407

Augustine of Hippo AD 354-430

Cyril of Alexandria AD 375-444

Leo the Great AD 400-461

Gelasius I of Rome d. AD 496

John of Damascus AD 675-749

Paschasius Radbertus AD 790-865

Ratramnus of Corbie d, AD 868

Thomas Aquinas AD 1225-1274

John Wycliffe AD 1330-1384

John Huss AD 1375-1415

Martin Luther AD 1483-1543

John Calvin AD 1509-1564

John Wesley AD 1703-1791

Andrew Murray AD 1828-1917

F.F. Bruce 20th Century

R.C.H. Lenski 20th Century

G.M.A. Jansen 20th Century

Ulrich Zwingli AD 1484-1531

Sacrament or Symbol?

Eucharistic Bread: Leavened or Unleavened?

Endnotes

Why the Seder?

The Early Church, the Seder and the Eucharist

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