Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (To the Greater Glory of God)
First Reading:
Holy Thursday - Evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper
From: Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14
The Institution of the Passover
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[1] The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, [2] "This month shall be for you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year for you. [3] Tell all the congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of this month they shall take every man a lamb according to their fathers' houses, a lamb for a household; [4] and if the household is too small for a lamb, then a man and his neighbor next to his house shall take according to the number of persons; according to what each can eat you shall make your count for the lamb. [5] Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male a year old; you shall take it from the sheep or from the goats; [6] and you shall keep it until, the fourteenth day of this month, when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs in the evening. [7] Then they shall take some of the blood, and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat them. [8] They shall eat the flesh that night, roasted; with unleavened bread and bitter herbs they shall eat it. [11] In this manner you shall eat it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in haste. It is the Lord's passover. [12] For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord. [13] The blood shall be a sign for you, upon the houses where you are; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague shall fall upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt.
[14] "This day shalt be for you a memorial day, and you shalt keep it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations you shall observe it as an ordinance for ever."
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Commentary:
12:1-14 This discourse of the Lord contains a number of rules for celebrating the Passover and the events commemorated in it; it is a kind of catechetical-liturgical text which admirably summarizes the profound meaning of that feast.
The Passover probably originated as a shepherds' feast held in springtime, when lambs are born and the migration to summer pastures was beginning; a new-born lamb was sacrificed and its blood used to perform a special rite in petition for the protection and fertility of the flocks. But once this feast became connected with the history of the Exodus it acquired a much deeper meaning, as did the rites attaching to it.
Thus, the "congregation" (v. 3) comprises all the Israelites organized as a religious community to commemorate the most important event in their history, deliverance from bondage.
The victim will be a lamb, without blemish (v. 5) because it is to be offered to God. Smearing the doorposts and lintel with the blood of the victim (vv 7, 13), an essential part of the rite, signifies protection from dangers. The Passover is essentially sacrificial from the very start. The meal (v. 11) is also a necessary part, and the manner in which it is held is a very appropriate way of showing the urgency imposed by circumstances: there is no time to season it (v. 9); no other food is eaten with it, except for the bread and desert herbs (a sign of indigence); the dress and posture of those taking part (standing, wearing sandals and holding a staff) show that they are on a journey. In the later liturgical commemoration of the Passover, these things indicate that the Lord is passing among his people.
The rules laid down for the Passover are evocative of very ancient nomadic desert rites, where there was no priest or temple or altar. When the Israelites had settled in Palestine, the Passover continued to be celebrated at home, always retaining the features of a sacrifice, a family meal and, very especially, a memorial of the deliverance the Lord brought about on that night.
Our Lord chose the context of the Passover Supper to institute the Eucharist: "By celebrating the Last Supper with his apostles in the course of the Passover meal, Jesus gave the Jewish Passover its definitive meaning. Jesus' passing over to his Father by his death and Resurrection, the new Passover, is anticipated in the Supper and celebrated in the Eucharist, which fulfills the Jewish Passover and anticipates the final Passover of the Church in the glory of the kingdom" ("Catechism of the Catholic Church", 1340).
12:2. This event is so important that it is going to mark the starting point in the reckoning of time. In the history of Israel there are two types of calendar, both based on the moon--one which begins the year in the autumn, after the feast of Weeks (cf. 23:16; 34:22), and the other beginning it in spring, between March and April. This second calendar probably held sway for quite a long time, for we know that the first month, known, as Abib (spring)--cf. 13:4: 23:18; 34:18 -- was called, in the post-exilic period (from the 6th century BC onwards) by the Babylonian name of Nisan (Neh 2:1; Esther 3:7). Be that as it may, the fact that this month is called the first month is a way of highlighting the importance of the event which is going to be commemorated (the Passover).
12:11. Even now it is difficult to work out the etymology of the word "Passover".
In other Semitic languages it means "joy" or "festive joy" or also "ritual and festive leap". In the Bible the same root means "dancing or limping" in an idolatrous rite (cf. 1 Kings 18:21, 26) and "protecting" (cf. Is 31:5), so it could mean "punishment, lash" and also "salvation, protection". In the present text the writer is providing a popular, non-scholarly etymology, and it is taken as meaning that "the Lord passes through", slaying Egyptians and sparing the Israelites.
In the New Testament it will be applied to Christ's passage to the Father by death and resurrection, and the Church's "passage" to the eternal Kingdom: "The Church will enter the glory of the kingdom only through this final Passover, when she will follow her Lord in his death and Resurrection" ("Catechism of the Catholic Church", 677).
12:14. The formal tone of these words gives an idea of the importance the Passover always had. If the historical books (Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings) hardly mention it, the reason is that they allude only to sacrifices in the temple, and the Passover was always celebrated in people's homes. When the temple ceased to be (6th century BC), the feast acquired more prominence, as can be seen from the post-exilic biblical texts (cf. Ezra 6:19-22; 2 Chron 30:1-27; 35:1-19) and extrabiblical texts such as the famous "Passover papyrus of Elephantine" (Egypt) of the 5th century BC. In Jesus' time a solemn passover sacrifice was celebrated in the temple and the passover meal was held at home.
From: 1 Corinthians 11:23-26
The Institution of the Eucharist
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[23] For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when He was betrayed took bread, [24] 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." [25] In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me." [26] For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until He comes.
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Commentary:
23-26. These verses clearly bear witness to the early Christians' faith in the eucharistic mystery. St. Paul is writing around the year 57--only twenty-seven years since the institution of the Eucharist--reminding the Corinthians of what they had been taught some years earlier (c. the year 51). The words "received" and "delivered" are technical terms used to indicate that a teaching is part of apostolic Tradition; cf. also 1 Corinthians 15:3. These two passages highlight the importance of that apostolic Tradition. The words "I received from the Lord" are a technical expression which means "I received through that Tradition which goes back to the Lord Himself."
There are three other New Testament accounts of the institution of the Eucharist (Matthew 26:26-29; Mark 14:22-25; Luke 22:16-20). This account, which is most like St. Luke's, is the earliest of the four.
The text contains the fundamental elements of Christian faith in the mystery of the Eucharist: 1) the institution of this Sacrament by Jesus Christ and His real presence in it; 2) the institution of the Christian priesthood; 3) the Eucharist is the sacrifice of the New Testament (cf. notes on Matthew 26:26-29; Mark 14:22-25; Luke 22:16-20; 1 Corinthians 10:14-22).
"Do this in remembrance of Me": in instituting the Eucharist, our Lord charged that it be re-enacted until the end of time (cf. Luke 22:19), thereby instituting the priesthood. The Council of Trent teaches that Jesus Christ our Lord, at the Last Supper, "offered His body and blood under the species of bread and wine to God the Father and He gave His body and blood under the same species to the Apostles to receive, making them priests of the New Testament at that time. [...] He ordered the Apostles and their successors in the priesthood to offer this Sacrament when He said, "Do this in remembrance of Me", as the Catholic Church has always understood and taught" ("De SS. Missae Sacrificio", Chapter 1; cf. Canon 2). And so, Pope John Paul II teaches, the Eucharist is "the principal and central reason-of-being of the Sacrament of the priesthood, which effectively came into being at the moment of the institution of the Eucharist, and together with it" ("Letter To All Bishops", 24 February 1980).
The word "remembrance" is charged with the meaning of a Hebrew word which was used to convey the essence of the feast of the Passover--commemoration of the exodus from Egypt. For the Israelites the Passover rite not only reminded them of a bygone event: they were conscious of making that event present, reviving it, in order to participate in it, in some way, generation after generation (cf. Exodus 12:26-27; Deuteronomy 6:20-25). So, when our Lord commands His Apostles to "do this in remembrance of Me", it is not a matter of merely recalling His supper but of renewing His own Passover sacrifice of Calvary, which already, at the Last Supper, was present in an anticipated way.