What I see here is: The Cup contains the Holy Vine of David Thy Child -- The Blood or Christ -- Which thou madest known to us through Jesus your Child -- This seems refers to the Gospels or Paul's epistle as the main text because that his where we find what was made known of the cup.
I find the bread to be a departure -- This seems to be a reference from the OT.
Ezekiel 34:6 My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and upon every high hill: yea, my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them.
Nahum 3:18 Thy shepherds slumber, O king of Assyria: thy nobles shall dwell in the dust: thy people is scattered upon the mountains, and no man gathereth them.
Ezekiel 34:13 And I will bring them out from the people, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel by the rivers, and in all the inhabited places of the country.
4) As this broken bread was scattered upon the mountains, but was brought together and became one, so let thy Church be gathered together from the ends of the earth into thy Kingdom,
I can't quite grasp this. If the didache was written in 40 AD I do not see a scattering. If it was written after the Jews scattered the church from Jerusalem this could play into this thought. But this is a departure from what is taught in the Gospels and Paul concerning the bread.
The implication of the statement would seem to be that the bread has moved from being the body of Christ having had sin imparted to it being sacrificed and them being partaken of by the priests -- to the sheep being scattered as the offering in lieu of the second coming of Christ -- This is a departure (Now in fairness the document refers to what Christ has revealed to us -- the Gospels and this is a prayer that "Adds on top of that" This prayer is not doctrine and should not be treated as such -
1 But after you are satisfied with food, thus give thanks: This implies that the eucharist was more than a sip and a wafer -- Paul implies this in Corinthians that this was a time of communing with God so people were supping with each other and God.
and didst give food and drink to men for their enjoyment, that they might give thanks to thee, but us hast thou blessed with spiritual food and drink and eternal light through thy Child
I see in this fellowship and communion enjoying the communion with God and that the cup and bread are spiritual food -- communion is not just for the body but for the spirit or soul of man __ if any man eat of my flesh and drink my blood he shall have life within him and I shall raise him up on the last day.
In the writings from Justin Martyr 160 AD we see an emphasis of the communion and the body also in that Justin Martyr tells us that they had communion when they met once a week and that for all that could not attend that they carried portions to them -- This would lead us to conclude that there was a much greater emphasis on us being one bread and one loaf -- and that whatever the thoughts were on that at the time that aspect has wholly been lost to us. And that would seem to go along with the prayer offered over the bread as opposed to the doctrine of the bread.
Yes! Thank you for the quesition I can now see that this prayer was a request of God that the body be one day rejoined as one bread or one loaf unto him -- it is not a doctrinal statement. I did not see that before.
I would like to also remark that the life span of this document was only for 100-150 years because by the time or Origen 230 AD he says:
3. Subtitle of section: In the Spiritual Israel the High-Priests are Those Who Devote Themselves to the Study of Scripture.
ME: (In a way Origen is arguing that the priesthood below is the firstfruits – virgins without guile without blemish – these were made fleshly traits whereas they are spiritual traits for who is without sin? I must comment on the effect of plucking the firstfruits and making them priests stops their growth from the vine that they were to be left in place for the local church and community – this circumvents believers to minister in their local Jerusalem their local Samaria and as the grace and power grows in them unto the utter most parts of the earth. But instead the church has a continual drain on those within who are hungry for God, and thus the local church is deprived from any benefit and instead what is most precious is scattered and hid.)
Origin: But what is the bearing of all this for us? So you will ask when you read these words, Ambrosius, thou who art truly a man of God, a man in Christ. and who seekest to be not a man only, but a spiritual man.5 ME: (This is probably a veiled reference to becoming baptized in the Spirit) Origin: The bearing is this. Those of the tribes offer to God, through the levites and priests, tithes and first fruits; not everything which they possess do they regard as tithe or first fruit. The levites and priests, on the other hand, have no possessions but tithes and first fruits; yet they also in turn offer tithes to God through the high-priests, and, I believe, first fruits too. The same is the case with those who approach Christian studies. Most of us (current failing experience of his day) devote most of our time to the things of this life, and dedicate to God only a few special acts, thus resembling those members of the tribes who had but few transactions with the priest, and discharged their religious duties with no great expense of time. But those who devote themselves to the divine word and have no other employment but the service of God may not unnaturally, allowing for the difference of occupation in the two cases, be called our Levites and priests.
ME (Origen in his day of 200 -230 AD roughly 100 years after the death of the Apostle John, speaks of the rise of a priesthood and high priests within the church devote themselves to the study of scripture and the service of God for the rest of the people. And because of the lack of spirituality and dedication of the common believer that they have adopted a Levitical order to deal directly with God for the common believers they are the churches Levites or priests – note also the lack of the mention of Apostle and Prophet in this equation for as the gifts became rare so the ministration of these higher offices.)
Origen: And those who fulfil a more distinguished office than their kinsmen6 will perhaps be high-priests, according to the order of Aaron, not that of Melchisedek. Here some one may object that it is somewhat too bold to apply the name of high-priests to men,
ME:( Origen here is saying that while the concept of priests for the people was already set in place, the concept of an order of priests for the priests themselves and their subsequent lack of spirituality and devotion was not universally accepted among in the church at that time)
Origen: when Jesus Himself is spoken of in many a prophetic passage as the one great priest, as7 "We have a great high-priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God." But to this we reply that the Apostle clearly defined his meaning, and declared the prophet to have said about the Christ, "Thou8 art a priest for ever, according to the order of Melchisedek," and not according to the order of Aaron. We say accordingly that men can be high-priests according to the order of Aaron, but according to the order of Melchisedek only the Christ of God.
ME:(So Origen flat tells us that they have re-established the order or Aaron within their ranks. And that the Church had passed from every believer being a priest unto God -- to kingdom having a representational priesthood)
So what does this have to to with the didache -- Origen is telling us that in his day the office of prophet and apostle had passed and that a man-made levitical priesthood had been put in its place. So many of the passages within the didache had lost their meaning becausae there were no longer any wandering apsotles or wandering prophets.
Origen: Now our whole activity is devoted to God, and our whole life, since we are bent on progress in divine things. If, then, it be our desire to have the whole of those first fruits spoken of above (their man-made priesthood) which are made up of the many first fruits, if we are not mistaken in this view, Me:(By saying this I think Origen is acknowledging that he was on shaky ground and was seeking advise and consent. It is most unfortunate that there was none left alive that could reprove these growing notions and turn the church back to the old paths -- taught by Christ and the Apostles.)
The purpose of my reading of the didache and the writings of the Apostolic fathers is to compare our ideas of what scriptures mean with what they beleived.
When I was young I took a class on drafting and later worked as a carpenter. In drafting I was taught you make a starting point on the page and from that point all measurements and calculations are made. The habit of people is to measure and make a mark measure, from that mark and make another mark and measure, and from that mark they measure again and make the next mark. This distorts the design becasue I am told all human measurements are inaccurate so that when we take our measurements from previous human measurements the design pattern or even a building we are building gets farther and farther off. Now in the case that one is not certain where a certain mark is in construction and surveying theyare told to go to the last known mark that is closes to the the original and search from that point.
Justin Martyr in 160 AD said: "For the prophetical gifts remain with us, even to the present time. And hence you ought to understand that[the gifts] formerly among your nation have been transferred to us.
(Justin Martyr is saying here that this transference of the holy spirit ie the gifts of the holy spirit; tongues, healing, miracles, prophecy, etc. from Israel to the church is the clinching proof that God changed horses from Israel to the Church. If the spirit of prophecy and gifts left the church in the 4th century and it did by the apostollic father's own testimony then it would be evident that God transferred the inheritance to yet another having rejected the early Church as he rejected Israel.)
What the NT presents, differs considerably from what the Didache presents.
Commentary from Harvard Professor, Helmut Koester:
"The Eucharist prayers [in the Didache] also have their origin in Hellenistic Judaism. ... In their Christian form they relate the cup to the covenant of David and understand the bread as the symbol of the oneness of the congregation. There is no attempt to connect wine and bread... to the death of Jesus….
[T]here is no reason to assume that the communities of Syria, for whom the Didache was written, followed the same eucharistic practice and formulae that are attested in 1 Cor 11:23- 26. [This is my body, this is my blood, etc.] Rather, these prayers may well belong to a direct continuation of the fellowship meal that Jesus celebrated with his disciples and friends."
[Koester, Helmut. History and Literature of Early Christianity, Volume 2, Introduction to the New Testament, 2d edition. (2000), pg. 164]
Here is more interesting commentary on the Eucharist celebration in the Didache:
http://www.geocities.com/aleph135/didache.html
http://www.geocities.com/aleph135/index.html
Also, if I have time, I will post some interesting commentary(on same topic) from a book I read last year...if I can find it.