I AM THAT I AM
Orthodox
Christian Mission Church
2544
West Summer AVE Athol
Idaho 83801.
The
Old Testament and The
New Testament
Doctrine
of the Eucharist
The doctrine of the
Eucharist has been held from the very earliest days of the
Church. For the first 800 years of Christianity, there was
no doubt regarding the Real Presence of Christ in the
Eucharist. Here is a sample of writings from the fathers of
the early Church illustrating this.
Paul
writing in 1 Cor 10:15-16
“I speak to sensible
people; judge for yourselves what I say. Is not the cup of
thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the
blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a
participation in the body of Christ?”
Paul
writing in 1 Cor 11:23-30
“For I received from
the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on
the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given
thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for
you; do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way, after
supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new
covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in
remembrance of me.” For whenever you eat this bread and
drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he
comes. Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup
of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning
against the body and blood of the Lord. A man ought to
examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of
the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing
the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself.”
Ignatius of Antioch,
110 AD
“They
abstain from the
Eucharist
and from prayer, because they do not confess
that the
Eucharist
is the
flesh of our savior Jesus Christ, flesh which suffered for
our sins and which the Father, in his goodness, raised up
again… Let that be considered a valid Eucharist, which is
celebrated by the bishop, or by one whom he appoints.
Wherever the bishop appears, let the people be there; just
as wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the catholic church.”
(Epistle
to the Smyreans)
“Take heed,
then, to have but one Eucharist. For there is one flesh of
our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup to [show forth] the unity
of His blood; one altar; as there is one bishop, along with
the presbytery and deacons, my fellow-servants: that so,
whatsoever you do, you may do it according to
[the will
of] God.”
(Epistle
to the Philadelphians)
Justin Martyr,
150 AD
“We call this food
Eucharist,
and no one else is permitted to partake of it, except one
who believes our teaching to be true and who has been washed
in the washing which is for the remission of sins and for
regeneration and is thereby living as Christ has enjoined.
For not as common bread nor common drink do we receive
these; but since Jesus Christ our Savior was made incarnate
by the word of God and had both flesh and blood for our
salvation, so too, as we have been taught, the food which
has been made into the Eucharist by the Eucharistic prayer
set down by him, and by the change of which our blood and
flesh is nourished, is both the flesh and the blood of that
incarnated Jesus.” (First Apology of Justin) renaeus of
Lyons,
190 AD
“Christ has declared the cup… to be his own Blood, from
which he causes our blood to flow; and the bread, a part of
creation, he has established as his own Body, from which he
gives increase to our bodies. If the Lord were from other
than the Father, how could he rightly take bread, which is
of the same creation as our own, and confess it to be his
body and affirm that the mixture in the cup is his blood?”
(Against Heresies Book V)
“Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and
blessed, and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and
said, ’Take, eat; this is my body.’ And he took a cup, and
when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, ’Drink
of it, all of you; for this is my blood of the covenant,
which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.’”
(Mt. 26:26-28)
The Old Testament
Tabernacle Sacrifice Bread of the Presence
The Bread of the Presence, in the ancient
Tabernacle and later in the Temple,
1 Kgs 7:48
prefigured Jesus in the Holy Eucharist.
In the Tabernacle God commanded Moses,
Ex 25:8
”Let them make me a sanctuary,
that I may dwell in their midst.” In the sanctuary, in the
ark of the covenant, God told Moses,
Ex 25:22
”There I will meet with you, and
from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim
that are upon the ark of the testimony, I will speak with
you…”
God added,
Ex 25:30 ”You
shall set the bread of the Presence on the table before me
always.” Jesus told us, Mt 28:20 ”I am with you always.”
Abimelech the priest gave David this sacred
bread.
1 Sam 21:6
”So the priest gave him the holy
bread; for there was no bread there but the bread of the
Presence.” Jesus taught us that it was for all His
disciples.
Mt 12:1
”At that time Jesus went through the grain fields
on the Sabbath; his disciples were hungry, and they began to
pluck ears of grain and to eat. … [Jesus] said to them,
‘Have you not read what David did, when he was hungry, and
those who who were with him: how he entered the house of God
and ate the bread of the Presence … I tell you, something
greater than the temple is here.” Jesus showed us what was
greater than the Temple.
Lk 22:19
”He took bread, and when he had given thanks he broke it and
gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body which is given for
you. Do this in remembrance of me.’”
Blood of the Lamb
During Moses’ time the priests sacrificed in the
Tabernacle, a portable house of God in the wilderness. After
Solomon built the First Temple, it became the place of
sacrifice. The highest form of Hebrew worship was sacrifice,
not prayer alone, just as the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is
the highest form of Orthodox worship. A priest is one who
offers sacrifice. The Orthodox priest is the counterpart not
of the rabbi, but of the ancient Jewish priest who offered
bloody sacrifices. The deacon, who reads the Gospel, is the
rabbi’s counterpart.
The Old Testament sacrifice
of a lamb, as opposed to any other animal, was important.
The lamb did not resist, run away, or even cry out. Isaiah
had foretold that the Lamb of God would do the same,
Is 53:7 ”He
was oppressed, and he was afflicted yet he opened not his
mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a
sheep that before its shearers is dumb, so he opened not his
mouth.”
The Jewish priests, before sacrificing the lamb,
always asked, “Do you love this lamb?” If the family didn’t
love the lamb there would be no sacrifice. Jesus three times
asked Peter,
Jn 21:15
”Do you love Me?” Jesus allowed Peter to replace his triple
denial with a triple affirmation that he did indeed love the
Sacrificed Lamb.
The family would place the lamb into the hands
of the priest. When we give something to God we place it in
His hands. Jesus’ last words on the Cross were,
Lk 23:46″Father,
into Thy hands I commit My spirit!”
The priest and the head of the family then
prayed together that God would accept the blood of the
innocent lamb for the sins of that family for the entire
year, just as the Lamb of God shed His Blood to redeem the
sins of all His human family. In our Liturgy the priest
says, “Pray, brethren, that my sacrifice and yours may be
acceptable to God, the almighty Father.”
The head of household then
cut the lamb’s throat with a sharp bronze knife while the
priest caught the lamb’s blood in a large bronze bowl. The
priest then made seven complete trips around the altar,
sprinkling the blood from the lamb on each of the four
“horns.” Then he took the lamb’s body and placed it on the
altar and started the ritual fire. With a big fire and a
small lamb, the sacrifice was over quickly. The smoke rose
from the altar. If the wind blew the smoke away and
dispersed it, the priest told the family that its offer was
rejected, and that it should repent and come back the
following year. But if the smoke drifted upward, higher and
higher until it disappeared from view, the priest told the
family that God had accepted the sacrifice. Before the great
tabernacle sacrifice, Jewish priests washed their hands in a
bronze laver, or basin.
Ps 26:6
”I wash my hands in innocence, and go about Thy
altar, O Lord.” Today the Catholic priest washes his hands
saying inaudibly,
Ps 51:2
”Lord, wash away my iniquity; cleanse me from my sin.” The
first priest attended at a great golden lamp stand with
seven oil lamps, called a menorah. It was dark in the
tabernacle, and the menorah gave light. The second priest
attended at the table of showbread. God had commanded
Lv 24:5that
the Jewish priests, from Aaron forward, place twelve loaves
of bread on a golden table “before the Lord.” On each
sabbath, the priests ate the bread which had been set in
place on the preceding sabbath.
This bread was to be eaten by the priests in a sacred place
since it was
Lv 24:9
”most holy” among the offerings to the Lord. God
had said,
Ex 23:18
”You shall not offer the blood of My sacrifice with leavened
bread.” During the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass the Orthodox
priest consecrates unleavened bread on the altar which
becomes Christ’s Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, and is
consumed by the royal priesthood as the most holy offering
in the New and Everlasting Covenant.
The third
priest served at the altar of incense. It looked like a
small altar of sacrifice, with the same four horns. On it
was a bronze laver. The priest would take a red-hot burning
ember from the fire in which the lamb had been sacrificed,
put it in the basin, and pour some incense on it, that his
prayers might have a fragrant scent and go straight up to
God. Orthodox Priests and Bishops spread incense about the
altar as an act of reverence and purification. The smoke
rising to heaven represents our own desire to have our
prayers ascend heavenward in God’s sight.
Ps 141:2
”Let my prayer be counted as incense before Thee, and the
lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice.” God told
Moses to place the Torah in the Ark of the Covenant, which
in turn was placed within a tabernacle. God commanded,
Ex 27:20
”You shall command the people of Israel that they
bring to you pure beaten olive oil for the light, that a
lamp may be set up to burn continually.” All was placed
within the tabernacle. By night, there was always a fire
over the tabernacle,
Ex 40:38
This began the idea of an eternal lamp beside the
Jewish tabernacle. A thousand years later the Temple lamp
miraculously continued to shine for eight days with only one
day’s supply of oil. The Celtic and Irish Orthodox Churches
continue this ancient Israelite tradition by placing a
lighted candle beside the tabernacle in which the
consecrated Hosts repose. in the center of the tabernacle
was a room called the Holy of Holies. Once a year the cohen
gadol, the high priest, alone would enter that room. In it
was the Ark of the Covenant. Inside the ark were the two
stone tablets with the Ten Commandments, a golden bowl of
manna, and the five Torah scrolls. The Torah was a witness
against the Israelites,
Dt 31:26
but above it all was God’s solid gold mercy seat, with a
crown and two cherubim kneeling in prayer. Above the mercy
seat, between the two cherubim, was a brilliant light, the
shining glory of God.
Ex 25:22
”From above the mercy seat, from between the two
cherubim that are upon the ark of the testimony, I will
speak with you.” When the priest saw that light he took a
huge cup of blood and sprinkled it until it was empty.
Jewish tradition holds that not one drop of the blood of
sacrifice ever touched the mercy seat or the cherubim; it
all went into the bright light of God’s glory. Jesus said,
Jn 8:12
”I am the light of the world.” Jesus’ covenant
family gave Him their imperfect sacrifices, and He gave them
His perfect sacrifice.
The Todah Sacrifice
The ancient Jews had a special ritual meal
called the Todah (Hebrew: thanks) (pronounce: Taw-DAH).
Although the Todah sacrificed an animal, it was greater than
other animal sacrifices because it added the suffering of
one’s own life. David wrote,
Ps 40:6,8
”Burnt offering and sin offering Thou hast not
required. … I delight to do Thy will, O my God; Thy law is
within my heart.” Again, David wrote,
Ps 51:17
”The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit.” And
again, Ps 69:30 ”I will praise the name of God with a song;
I will magnify Him with thanksgiving. This will please the
Lord more than an ox or a bull with horns and hoofs.” Isaiah
spoke the words of God,
Is 1:11
”I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams.”
God called instead for a baptism:
Is 1:16 ”Wash
yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your
doings from My eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good.
”The seventy elders who went up with Moses to see God
offered the Todah:
Ex 24:11″They
beheld God, and ate and drank.” Twelve centuries later,
twelve apostles beheld God, and ate and drank as Jesus
prepared to offer His Todah sacrifice:
Lk 22:19
”He took bread, and when He had given thanks He broke it…”
From the beginning, Christ’s Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity
has been called Holy Eucharist (Greek: eucharistia,
thanksgiving).
The ancient rabbis believed that when the
Messiah would come all sacrifices except the Todah would
cease, but the Todah would continue for all eternity. In 70
AD the Temple fell to earth and all of the bloody animal
sacrifices stopped. Only the Todah remains, the eucharistia,
the Final Sacrifice at which the last words spoken are Todah
l’Adonai, “Thanks be to God.” Passover
Jesus was pre-figured in the original Passover,
when God commanded that Moses tell the Israelites,
Ex 12:5-6
”Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male … the
congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs in the
evening,” as Jesus the Lamb of God was crucified in dim
light.
Mt 27:45
God commanded,
Ex 12:8
”They shall eat the flesh that night,” and told
Moses, Ex 12:12 ”I will smite all the first-born in the land
of Egypt.” But He promised,
Ex 12:13
”The blood shall be a sign for you … when I see the blood, I
will pass over you.” Most of us know that the original
Passover pre-figured the Body and Blood of the crucified
Lamb. But there is more to the Passover story.
Pharaoh commanded the death of every Hebrew male
infant in Egypt,
Ex 1:22
but death passed over Moses.
Ex 2:5-10
Twelve centuries later, before Herod commanded the
death of every Hebrew male infant in Bethlehem,
Mt 2:13
death passed also over Jesus.
The Jewish celebration of Passover has from the
beginning been an experience of exile and return, as its
participants re-live the experience of the desert and
encounter with God. After Jesus was crucified the apostles
also experienced a sense of exile in the desert followed by
a transforming encounter with God. In this way Jesus is
spiritually present in the entire Seder
The Seder table is different in many ways from the
Jewish table setting on all other nights, as the ma nishtano
acknowledges. God chose a young Jewish girl, a virgin who
lived in Nazareth, to begin the rest of the story. Mary
began her own Seder each year as Jews have since time
immemorial, by lighting candles to give festive light to the
table. Mary also gave us Jesus, the
Jn 8:12
light of the world. Jesus has been at every Seder
from the first one to this very day, spiritually present in
the bread, wine, and lamb. John, chapter 6: Sermon of
the Bread of Life: 53- “Let me solemnly assure you, unless
you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you
have no life in you. 54- Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my
blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last
day.
55-For my flesh is true food, and my blood
is true drink…”
(John 6:53-55)
Chapter 6 of St. John
has the sixth treasure of the Gospel, the Sermon of the
Bread of Life, where Jesus promises us our daily bread, to
live on earth this beautiful life in Christ as a wedding
feast, to have eternal life, and to help others to do so.
This Sermon was the announcement of the
Eucharist, we have to eat his flesh and drink his own blood,
the most substantial Sermon of Jesus… but it was the
greatest scandal in the life of Jesus, the multitudes and
the 72 disciples left him thinking he was crazy, to eat his
flesh and drink his blood?!… and not only that, here Jesus
signed his death sentence, because ”after this Jesus went
about in Galilee; he did not wish to go about in Judea
because the Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill
him” (7:1)… and the next time he went to Judea they killed
him!… on a Cross!.. they were not bluffing.
The chapter starts with two of the seven
miracles of the Gospel: The multiplication of the seven
barley loaves and two fish, to feed 5,000 people
(6:1-14),
and Jesus walking on water
(6:18:21)…
both of them show us the power of Jesus on nature,
preparing us for the announcement of the greatest miracle on
nature, the Eucharist, the Bread of Life.
The multitudes were so impressed with the
multiplication of the bread and fishes that they wanted to
make him a king!, but Jesus withdrew again to the mountain
by himself
(6:15).
The next day, when they found him, they asked him: ”What
must we do to perform the the works of God? Jesus answered
to them: This is the work of God, that you believe in him
whom he has sent” (6:28)…
and he will repeat it four times in this
chapter, ”This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who
see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life; and I
will raise them up on the last day”
(6:40, 28, 35, 47)…
four times repeats it, to prepare us for the great
announcement we have to believe and do, to eat his flesh and
drink his blood!… as hard as it sounds!… just as Jesus will
repeat it 8 times!.
Now they ask Jesus for a “sign”, as the “manna”
was a sign for their ancestors, for 40 years in the
wilderness. Jesus tells them that it is the Father who gives
the bread from heaven, or the bread of life. So they said to
Jesus: ”
Sir, give us this Bread of Heaven always”
(6:30-34).
And here it comes, the Sermon of the Bread
of Life, or the Bread of Heaven, in
John 6:35-69:
“Jesus said to them: I am the bread of of life. Whoever
comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me
will never be thirsty”
(6:35).
Then the Jews murmured about him because he said “I am the
bread of life”, and they said, “”Is not this Jesus, the son
of Joseph?… and then the Jews quarreled among themselves,
saying, ”How can this man give us his flesh to eat?
(6:35-2)…
it is for real!… we have to eat his flesh!… he is crazy!…
and the multitudes of 5000 men went away taking Jesus for a
mad-man…
… And when the multitudes were disputing this
and going away, Jesus did not take a word out of it, rather,
he repeats 6 times to them: ”Very truly, I say to you,
unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his
blood, you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and
drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up
on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is
true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide
in me, and I in them…”, read it by yourself in full in
6:52-58,
repeats it 6 times in
different ways!… it is real… really real!…
|