2. New Testament
Passing now to the proofs contained in the New Testament, we may begin by remarking that many dogmatic writers see in the dialogue of Jesus with the Samaritan woman at Jacob's well a prophetic reference to the Mass (John, iv, 21 sqq ): "Woman believe me, that the hour cometh, when you shall neither on this mountain [Garizim] nor in Jerusalem, adore the Father.... But the hour cometh and now is, when the true adorers shall adore the Father in spirit and in truth." Since the point at issue between the Samaritans and the Jews related, not to the ordinary, private offering of prayer practised everywhere, but to the solemn, public worship embodied in a real Sacrifice, Jesus really seems to refer to a future real sacrifice of praise, which would not be confined in its liturgy to the city Jerusalem but would captivate the whole world (see Bellarmine, "De Euchar., v, 11). Not without good reason do most commentators appeal to Heb., xiii, 10: We have an altar [Thysiastesion, altare], whereof they have no power to eat [Phagein, edere], who serve the tabernacle." Since St. Paul has just contrasted the Jewish food offering (Bromasin, escis) and Christian altar food, the partaking of which was denied to the Jews, the inference is obvious: where is an altar, there is a sacrifice. But the Eucharist is the food which the Christians alone are permitted to eat: therefore there is a Eucharistic sacrifice. The objection that, in Apostolic times, the term altar was not yet used in the sense of the "Lord's table" (cf. I Cor., x, 21) is clearly a begging of the question, since Paul might well have been the first to introduce the name, it being adopted from him by later writers (e.g. Ignatius of Antioch died A.D. 107).
It can scarcely be denied that the entirely mystical explanation of the "spiritual food from the altar of the cross", favoured by St. Thomas Aquinas, Estius, and Stentrup, is far-fetched. It might on the other hand appear still more strange that in the passage of the Epistle to the Hebrews, where Christ and Melchisedech are compared, the two food offerings should be only not placed in prophetical relation with each other but not even mentioned. The reason, however, is not far to seek: parallel lay entirely outside the scope of the argument. All that St. Paul desired to show was that the high priesthood of Christ was superior to the Levitical priesthood of the Old Testament (cf. Heb., vii, 4 sqq.), and this is fully demonstrated by proving that Aaron and his priesthood stood far below the unattainable height of Melchisedech. So much the more, therefore, must Christ as "priest according to the order of Melchisedech" excel the Levitical priesthood. The peculiar dignity of Melchisedech, however, was manifested not through the fact that he made a food offering of bread and wine, a thing which the Levites also were able to do, but chiefly through the fact that he blessed the great "Father Abraham and received the tithes from him".
The main testimony of the New Testament lies in the account of the institution of the Eucharist, and most clearly in the words of consecration spoken over the chalice. For this reason we shall consider these words first, since thereby, owing to the analogy between the two formulas clearer light will be thrown on the meaning of the words of consecration spoken over the chalice. For this reason we shall consider these words first, since thereby, owing to the analogy between the two formulae, clearer light will be thrown on the meaning of the words of consecration pronounced over the bread. For the sake of clearness and easy comparison we subjoin the four passages in Greek and English:
* Matt., xxvi, 28: Touto gar estin to aima mou to tes [kaines] diathekes to peri pollon ekchynnomenon eis aphesin amartion. For this is my blood of the new testament, which shall be shed for many unto remission of sins.
* Mark, xiv, 24: Touto estin to aima mou tes kaines diathekes to yper pollon ekchynnomenon. This is my blood of the new testament which shall be shed for many.
* Luke, xxii, 20: Touto to poterion he kaine diatheke en to aimati mou, to yper ymon ekchynnomenon. This is the chalice, the new testament in my blood, which shall be shed for you.
* I Cor., xi, 25: Touto to poterion he kaine diatheke estin en to emo aimati. This chalice is the new testament in my blood.
The Divine institution of the sacrifice of the altar is proved by showing
* that the "shedding of blood" spoken of in the text took place there and then and not for the first time on the cross;
* that it was a true and real sacrifice;
* that it was considered a permanent institution in the Church.
The present form of the participle ekchynnomenon in conjunction with the present estin establishes the first point. For it is a grammatical rule of New Testament Greek, that, when the double present is used (that is, in both the participle and the finite verb, as is the case here), the time denoted is not the distant or near future, but strictly the present (see Fr. Blass, "Grammatik des N. T. Griechisch", p. 193, Gottingen, 1896). This rule does not apply to other constructions of the present tense, as when Christ says earlier (John, xiv, 12): I go (poreuomai) to the father". Alleged exceptions to the rule are not such in reality, as, for instance, Matt., vi, 30: "And if the grass of the field, which is today and tomorrow is cast into the oven (ballomenon) God doth so clothe (amphiennysin): how much more you, O ye of little faith?" For in this passage it is a question not of something in the future but of something occurring every day. When the Vulgate translates the Greek participles by the future (effundetur, fundetur), it is not at variance with facts, considering that the mystical shedding of blood in the chalice, if it were not brought into intimate relation with the physical shedding of blood on the cross, would be impossible and meaningless; for the one is the essential presupposition and foundation of the other. Still, from the standpoint of philology, effunditur (funditur) ought to be translated into the strictly present, as is really done in many ancient codices. The accuracy of this exegesis is finally attested in a striking way by the Greek wording in St. Luke: to poterion . . . ekchynnomenon. Here the shedding of blood appears as taking place directly in the chalice, and therefore in the present. Overzealous critics, it is true, have assumed that there is here a grammatical mistake, in that St. Luke erroneously connects the "shedding" with the chalice (poterion), instead of with "blood" (to aimati) which is in the dative. Rather than correct this highly cultivated Greek, as though he were a school boy, we prefer to assume that he intended to use synecdoche, a figure of speech known to everybody, and therefore put the vessel to indicate its contents.
As to the establishment of our second proposition, believing Protestants and Anglicans readily admit that the phrase: "to shed one's blood for others unto the remission of sins" is not only genuinely Biblical language relating to sacrifice, but also designates in particular the sacrifice of expiation (cf. Lev., vii 14; xiv, 17; xvii, 11; Rom. iii, 25, v, 9; Heb. ix, 10, etc.). They, however, refer this sacrifice of expiation not to what took place at the Last Supper, but to the Crucifixion the day after. From the demonstration given above that Christ, by the double consecration of bread and wine mystically separated His Blood from His Body and thus in a chalice itself poured out this Blood in a sacramental way, it is at once clear that he wished to solemnize the Last Supper not as a sacrament merely but also as a Eucharistic Sacrifice. If the "pouring out of the chalice" is to mean nothing more than the sacramental drinking of the Blood, the result is an intolerable tautology: "Drink ye all of this, for this is my blood, which is being drunk". As, however, it really reads "Drink ye all of this, for this is my blood, which is shed for many (you) unto remission of sins," the double character of the rite as sacrament and sacrifice is evident. The sacrament is shown forth in the "drinking", the sacrifice in the "shedding of blood". "The blood of the new testament", moreover, of which all the four passages speak, has its exact parallel in the analogous institution of the 0ld Testament through Moses. For by Divine command he sprinkled the people with the true blood of an animal and added, as Christ did, the words of institution (Ex., xxiv, 8): "This is the blood of the covenant (Sept.: idou to aima tes diathekes) which the Lord hath made with you". St. Paul, however, (Heb., ix, 18 sq.) after repeating this passage, solemnly demonstrates (ibid., ix, 11 sq) the institution of the New Law through the blood shed by Christ at the crucifixion; and the Savior Himself, with equal solemnity, says of the chalice: This is My Blood of the new testament ". It follows therefore that Christ had intended His true Blood in the chalice not only to be imparted as a sacrament, but to be also a sacrifice for the remission of sins. With the last remark our third statement, viz. as to the permanency of the institution in the Church, is also established. For the duration of the Eucharistic Sacrifice is indissolubly bound up with the duration of the sacrament. Christ's Last Supper thus takes on the significance of a Divine institution whereby the Mass is established in His Church. St. Paul (I Cor., xi, 25), in fact, puts into the mouth of the Savior the words: "This do ye, as often as you shall drink, for the commemoration of me".
We are now in a position to appreciate in their deeper sense Christ's words of consecration over the bread. Since only St. Luke and St. Paul have made additions to the sentence, "This is My Body", it is only on them that we can base our demonstration.
* Luke, xxii, 19: Hoc est corpus meum, quod pro vobis datur; touto esti to soma mou to uper umon didomenon; This is my body which is given for you.
* I Cor., xi, 24: Hoc est corpus meum, quod pro vobis tradetur; touto mou esti to soma to uper umon [klomenon]; This is my body which shall be broken for you.
Once more, we maintain that the sacrifical "giving of the body" (in organic unity of course with the "pouring of blood" in the chalice) is here to be interpreted as a present sacrifice and as a permanent institution in the Church. Regarding the decisive point, i.e. indication of what is actually taking place, it is again St. Luke who speaks with greatest clearness, for to soma he adds the present participle, didomenon by which he describes the "giving of the body" as something happening in the present, here and now, not as something to be done in the near future.
The reading klomenon in St. Paul is disputed. According to the best critical reading (Tischendorf, Lachmann) the participle is dropped altogether so that St. Paul probably wrote: to soma to uper umon (the body for you, i.e. for your salvation). There is good reason, however, for regarding the word klomenon (from klan to break) as Pauline, since St. Paul shortly before spoke of the "breaking of bread" (I Cor, x, 16), which for him meant "to offer as food the true body of Christ". From this however we may conclude that the "breaking of the body" not only confines Christ's action to the strictly present, especially as His natural Body could not be "broken" on the cross (cf. Ex, xii, 46; John, xix, 32 sq ), but also implies the intention of offering a "body broken for you" (uper umon) i.e. the act constituted in itself a true food offering. All doubt as to its sacrificial character is removed by the expresslon didomenon in St. Luke, which the Vulgate this time quite correctly translates into the present: "quod pro vobis datur." But "to give one's body for others" is as truly a Biblical expression for sacrifice (cf. John, vi, 52; Rom., vii, 4; Col., i, 22: Heb, x, 10, etc.) as the parallel phrase, "the shedding of blood". Christ, therefore, at the least Supper offered up His Body as an unbloody sacrifice. Finally, that He commanded the renewal for all time of the Eucharistic sacrifice through the Church is clear from the addition: "Do this for a commemoration of me" (Luke, xxxii, 19; I Cor, xi, 24).