Introduction
The accounts of the Last Supper in the New Testament have many dissimilarities. Whether trying to determine the day that the event occurred with respect to the Jewish Passover, the exact order of elements in the event, or even the presence or omission of elements in the event, it is improbable it can ever be accurately reconstructed (Kodell 57). Although the fact that the precise chronology and nature of such an important event is lost to history might warrant a degree of sadness, this sadness needs to be balanced with the fact that each of the accounts still served their authors’ original purpose, which manifestly was not to produce a history book in the modern sense of the word. Rather, each of the accounts is a work 1) by one or more authors in a specific community with a specific history, 2) addressed to people in the same or a different community with a specific history, 3) for the purpose of addressing specific contemporary (and oftentimes now only vaguely identifiable) concerns, 4) by means of referring to events in the life of Jesus. Given these facts, the lack of consistency is neither surprising nor particularly disturbing. This paper will look at two aspects of the Last Supper narratives: 1) the origin of the accounts and their discrepancies and 2) the fact that the authors of the synoptic Gospels and Paul actually addressed their concerns through their skillful selection of details.
The Origin of the Accounts and Their Discrepancies
Originally, the expectation of the imminent Second Coming of Christ cancelled out any felt need to reduce to writing the events of the Last Supper. Rather, the incipient memories of the Last Supper were passed on by word of mouth from disciple to disciple. Not surprisingly details varied with each telling, distinct oral traditions developed, and different communities adopted different versions of the tradition (20). First Thessalonians, the first New Testament document, was written a whole 20 years after the resurrection of Jesus. And it was another 30 or more years before the rest of the New Testament was written down. By this time, no one knew the details of the Last Supper with exactitude. At the same time, this was not looked upon as a deficiency. Each community had long encoded their oral tradition and their understanding of its significance into their own liturgy and had been using it with little change for decades. Thus, the biblical narratives as we have them now are less reports of a historical event and more a record from different segments of the Church of their deepening understanding of the Last Supper under the inspiration the Holy Spirit (21). All of the accounts are ultimately traceable to the first decade of the Church. Generally speaking, Mark and Matthew came through a Palestinian liturgical tradition, and that of Luke and Paul through an Antiochian liturgical tradition (67).The Distinctives of Paul’s Narrative
Around the mid-50’s, Paul deals with the Lord’s Supper in two places in 1 Corinthians: He first interprets its significance in chapter 10:14-22, and then in chapter 11:17-34, he recounts the institution within the context of even more interpretation. In each place, he is addressing different problems that the Corinthian church is facing. We will look exclusively at the second passage since that is what parallels the synoptic Gospels. In the second passage, Paul rebukes the Corinthians for turning the Lord’s Supper into a sacrament of division. At this time in history in Corinth the Lord’s Supper followed after an agape feast; however, the feast was hardly an expression of agape love since societal distinctions were being reflected in the feast and the poor being marginalized and humiliated (Kodell 75). It was so bad that Paul even disputes the validity of their Eucharist (1 Cor 11:20).The distinctive aspects of Paul’s narrative are the position of the betrayal, the covenant’s being new, and the double remembrance. All the institution narratives take place within the context of a betrayal. In Mark (14:17-21) and Matthew (26:17-25), Jesus predicts his betrayal before the institution; in Luke the prediction immediately follows the institution (22:21-23). With Paul, however, the betrayal is part of the institution itself: “[T]he Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread …” (1 Corinthians 11:23). According to Kodell, the inclusion of the betrayal into the institution itself served to draw attention to the fact that the Corinthians were betraying their fellow believers through their selfish Eucharistic behavior (76). Along with Luke (22:20), Paul speaks of the cup as the “new covenant in my blood” (11:25). This is in contrast to Mark (14:24) and Matthew (26:28), who speak of “my blood of the covenant”. The new covenant refers to Jeremiah 31:31-34 where there is social equality in knowing the Lord as well as an internal inscribing of God’s law, both of which the Corinthians needed desperately.
In Mark and Matthew, Jesus does not tell His disciples to repeat the Lord’s Supper in the future whereas in Luke, Jesus does say “do this in remembrance of me” with respect to the bread (22:19). In contrast to them all, Paul quotes Jesus as saying “do this in remembrance of me” twice, with respect to each of the bread and the cup. According to Kodell, this remembrance is two-way: reminding God to fulfill His covenant promises in Jesus and reminding the disciples to imitate Jesus’ self-gift in life and death (80). Apparently the Corinthians needed to be doubly reminded to remember Jesus’ example of humility and self-sacrifice. Immediately following the second remembrance word, Paul adds this commentary: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes” (11:26). This sentence also is pregnant with implication. Those in Corinth who considered themselves “spiritual” (2:15) had adopted a mindset that despised human weakness in others. These needed reminder that it was only through death that the Lord achieved His glory and that they needed to “proclaim this death” by imitating the Lord’s humility--especially when they celebrated the Lord’s Supper (Kodell 78-79).
The Distinctives of Mark’s Narrative
When Christ’s Second Coming was delayed and the early great leaders of the Church like Peter, Paul, and James began dying during the 60’s AD, people started to realize that a written record of the life and teaching of Jesus would be valuable to preventing its loss when all the eyewitnesses died. The Gospel of Mark is the first extent attempt to fill this need by recording the mission and message of Jesus in light of the current developments of the Church around 70 AD. Mark’s and Paul’s approaches to the institution of the Eucharist are reversed. Paul parenthetically refers to the Eucharist while addressing the contemporary situation at Corinth. Mark presents the origin of the Eucharist in the context of Jesus’ life and subtly refers to his own contemporary situation (Kodell 84). The word choice and context of Mark’s Eucharistic narrative continue and enhance the themes of unity, sacrificial love, and reconciliation that he presents throughout his Gospel.Unity that transcends ethnic divisions is an important theme of Mark since the tensions between Jewish and Gentile believers were still high. He includes two feeding stories, one of the 5,000 using five loaves (6:32-44), and one of the 4,000 using seven loaves (8:1-10). His word choice in Greek as well as the contexts for the two stories would have communicated to his readers that God’s provision is for both Jews and the Gentiles, respectively (Kodell 85 - 88). Later, in the institution narrative, Mark uses a construct parallel to the feeding stories: “took … bless … broke … gave” (14:22) that would have communicated strongly that God’s provision for Jews and Gentiles includes a single Eucharist shared by both of them (Kodell 85).
Sacrificial love is another theme in Mark. In 10:35-45 Jesus predicts that John and James will drink the same cup that Jesus drinks--even though they scarcely understood the implication at that point. Later, Jesus knowing full well the implication of the drinking the cup, begs the Father to permit Him not to drink it if possible (14:32-36). At the time of Mark’s writing, Peter, James, and Paul had already drunk the cup of martyrdom. In the institution narrative, Mark says of the disciples with respect to the Cup that “they all drank of it” (14:23), as a clear reminder to his readers that all those who partake of the Eucharistic cup must be willing to lay down their lives. And this is not just in martyrdom, but also in sacrificial service to others in imitation of Jesus who said “my blood … poured out for many” (14:24).
Reconciliation is another theme in Mark’s institution narrative. Mark places the prediction of the betrayal before the account (Mark 14:10-11) and the prediction of Peter’s denial following the account (Mark 14:29-31). According to Kodell, when Mark quotes Jesus in 14:25 saying of the fruit of the vine that he will “drink it new in the kingdom of God”, the readers would have understood it as a challenge to be reconciled with those who had lapsed during persecution and be restored to Eucharistic unity (91).
The Distinctives of Matthew’s Narrative
According to Kodell, the Gospel of Matthew was written in the mid-80’s AD from Syria to a church with a strong Jewish identity. Its writing was precipitated by a number of challenges Christians of Jewish heritage were facing. With the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD, Jewish religious life refocused in the remaining scattered synagogues, under a de facto Pharisee leadership. These Pharisees demanded strict uniformity with their own beliefs and practices and did not tolerate Jewish followers of the Christian sect. As a result, Jewish Christians had been expelled from synagogues and forced to fellowship with Gentiles who lacked appreciation of and sensitivity to their Jewish heritage. The Jewish Christians acutely felt their loss and were uncertain about their future. Both in his Gospel generally, and in the institution narratives particularly, Matthew attempts to communicate a message of obedience and forgiveness of sins to these Jewish Christians (93-94).Matthew highlights the importance of a disciple obeying his Lord. In the scene of preparation for the Last Supper, unlike in Mark where only two disciples are sent (14:12-16), in Matthew all the disciples go (26:17-19). Also, in Mark the disciples inquire of the owner about the room whereas in Matthew, Jesus through his disciples tell the owner, “I will keep the Passover at your house with my disciples.” In the prediction of the betrayal immediately before the institution, Judas addresses Jesus with the Jewish title Rabbi, an unpopular term in Matthew’s church because it was the rabbis who had expelled them; the other disciples address him as Lord (26:20-25), emphasizing acceptance to obey Jesus’ divine authority. In the institution narrative itself, Matthew uses the word disciples (26:26) rather than Mark’s pronoun them (14:22). Also, Matthew adds the imperatives to eat and drink (26:26-27) that Mark lacks. All of these points emphasize Jesus’ authority to require obedience from His disciples (Kodell 99).
Matthew has another theme of salvation through forgiveness of sins. At the beginning of his Gospel, Matthew interprets Jesus’ name: “you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins” (1:21), and throughout his Gospel he shows a greater predilection over Mark to explicitly use the name Jesus instead of pronoun. According to Kodell, Matthew uses the name Jesus 154 times in comparison to Mark’s 80 times (99). In the preparation account, Matthews uses the name Jesus twice whereas Mark uses a pronoun, and in the institution narrative itself, he uses the name once whereas Mark uses a pronoun. The use of the name Jesus highlights the salvation from sins available to His disciples. This becomes very explicit in the institution narrative. Whereas Mark merely says of the blood of the covenant that it is “poured out for many” (14:24), Matthew says that it is “poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (26:28). With respect to the preposition for in “for many”, in some manuscripts, Mark uses the preposition ὑπέρ whereas Matthew uses περί, which matches the pronoun in the LXX of Isaiah 53:4 “he suffers for us”. According to Kodell this highlights the fact that Jesus’ death is an expiatory sacrifice for sin (101).
The Distinctives of Luke’s Narrative
Luke’s presentation of the Last Supper is the last in a series of fellowship meals that Jesus attends in Luke’s Gospel. It is the climax of all those meals, and needs to be interpreted in the context of what those other meals teach about Jesus and the Eucharist. Taken as a whole, Luke shows throughout his Gospel that Jesus’ open table fellowship represents God’s offer of salvation to all, including outcasts, the disillusioned, the conspicuous sinner, the betrayer, and the self-righteous (Kodell 117). Through the institution narrative, Luke shows the intensity of Jesus’ desire to be with his disciples and his provision of the Eucharist to fulfill that desire in the interim between his Ascension and Second coming.In Luke’s series of fellowship meals, the Last Supper is the only one where Jesus is the host. Not surprisingly, the narrative is longer than in the other gospels and Paul. The setting parallels the well-established Jewish pattern of a leader’s farewell speech, in which he predicts the future and gives final instructions (Kodell 114). In Mark (14:12) and Matthew (26:17), it is the disciples who initiate the the Passover preparation by asking a question. In Luke, however, Jesus initiates: “Go and prepare the Passover for us, that we may eat it” (22:8). Then Jesus begins the institution narrative with an expression of intense desire to share this meal with his disciples and intimates his approaching death: “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer” (22:15). And then to intensify the gravity of the moment, Luke transfers the “I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God” (22:16) to this point as opposed to Matthew and Mark who have it after the sharing of bread and wine. According to Kodell, Luke’s readers would have understood this as a dual promise of His presence both in their celebration of Eucharist in the life of the Church as well as in the Heavenly Banquet at the consummation of the age. Unlike Mark who explicitly has the disciples drink the wine before hearing its explanation (14:23-24), Luke (along with Matthew and Paul) has an ambiguous order. In any case, they all use a figure of speech called prolepsis because Jesus shares His body and blood with the disciples even before they are broken and spilled (115). Lastly, in Luke the prediction of the betrayal is after the institution narrative as opposed to its preceding the institution in Mark and Matthew. In this case, the disciples are unaware that a betrayer is in their midst when they share this meal with Jesus. According to Kodell, this serves a dual purpose: 1) to emphasize Jesus’ hospitality even toward betrayers and 2) to warn against complacency since anyone could become a betrayer (116).
Conclusion
The Gospels and epistles were written to address specific needs in the lives of their specific audience. At the beginning when people anticipated Jesus to return imminently, there was no compelling reason to record in writing His life and words. When His return was delayed and the eyewitness were dying off, a compelling reason was found. Given these facts, it is not surprising that the narratives about the institution of the Lord’s Supper have contradictions. The details included in each narrative inform us about the nature of the message the author is trying to communicate. Paul desires to rectify the divisions in Corinth that threatened even the validity of their sacrament. Mark wants to encourage sacramental unity between Jews and Gentiles and between the faithful and those who had lapsed. Matthew endeavors to encourage Jewish Christians who have been disenfranchised by other Jews and now need to worship with Gentiles. Luke vividly shows that Jesus offers open hospitality to all both now in the Eucharist and ultimately in the age to come. The discrepancies between the accounts, in fact, enrich rather than complicate our understanding of the one time Last Supper and the often celebrated Eucharist.Works Cited
English Standard Version Bible. London: Crossway, 2010. Print.
Kodell, Jerome. The Eucharist in the New Testament. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1991.
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