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25 Then Judas, which betrayed him, answered and said, Master, is it I? He said unto him, Thou hast said.

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Verse 25. Thou hast said.-Judas addresses Christ, not by the usual term, KUPLE, Lord, but by the title of Rabbi. Some think that he was thereby disposed to show our Saviour less respect than the other disciples; but, on the contrary, he feigned to show him greater; for kupios, though capable of the highest sense as applied to God, was in general use as a term of ordinary civility to any superior, or even equal; and when used without intended and obvious inference, often answers to our SIR. But Rabbi was exclusively used as a title of high reverand the application of it here to our Lord by Judas, was in perfect correspondence with the rest of his conduct at the supper, when he affected to disguise his designs by an apparent sorrow that he should think himself in any danger, by endeavouring to clear himself like the rest, and in this instance by giving our Lord a flattering title which he did not usually receive. Christ's reply, Thou hast said, is a Jewish form of assent or affirmation, equivalent to, It is thou. This was probably said in a low voice, so that the rest did not distinctly hear it, like the answer of our Lord to John, when he pointed out the traitor; for as, when Judas went out as soon as he had received the sop, the other disciples thought, because he was the purse-bearer, that he was gone to procure things necessary for the feast; this would have been a most improbable supposition, had the words been uttered in their hearing. For the same reason we may conclude that what our Lord said to John when, upon the suggestion of Peter, he asked who should betray him, was not only heard by the beloved disciple alone, but kept in his bosom, except that he might intimate it to Peter.

That after this Judas should remain and be present at the celebration of the eucharist, is highly improbable. From St. John we learn, that, as soon as he had received the sop, which was during the eating of the passover, he went out; and

though it has been supposed that he returned, because St. Luke introduces our Lord's words, "Behold, the hand of him that betrayeth me is with me on the table," after his account of the institution of the Lord's supper; yet, as that evangelist manifestly brings in several miscellaneous discourses which appear to have been uttered at different intervals during the paschal supper, it is probable that he recorded this observation of our Lord without intending to mark the precise time of the evening when it was delivered.

The mode of celebrating the passover, as given by Maimonides, may form a proper introduction to the institution of the Lord's supper, as mentioned in the following verses. 1. They mingled a cup of wine with water, and gave thanks. 2. They washed their hands. 3. The table was furnished with two cakes of unleavened bread, with bitter herbs, and with the paschal lamb roasted whole; all which were appointed by the law: also with other meats, as the remains of chagigah, or peace-offerings of the preceding day; and with a thick sauce made of dates, figs, raisins, vinegar, &c., mingled together, named charoseth, to represent the clay of which their ancestors made bricks in Egypt. 4. They ate first a small piece of the salad of bitter herbs, and explained to the children the nature of the feast. 5. They took a second cup of wine, repeating Psalms cxiii. and cxiv. These two Psalms were the first part of the hymn, or Hallel, which was composed of five Psalms, from Psalm cxiii. to cxviii., inclusive. 6. Their hands were again washed, and the master proceeded to break and bless a cake of the unleavened bread, reserving a part of it under a napkin for the last morsel; for the rule was, to conclude with eating a small piece of the paschal Jamb, or, after the fall of the temple, of unleavened bread. 7. The rest of the cake they ate with the charoseth or sauce and the bitter herbs. 8.

26 And as they were eating, 'Jesus took bread, and * blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.

i 1 Cor. xì. 24.

* Many Greek copies have, gave thanks.

Then the flesh of the peace-offerings, and the flesh of the paschal lamb, were eaten; after which they again washed. 9. The third cup of wine, or cup of blessing, was filled, over which they gave thanks, and drank it. 10. Over the fourth cup of wine they completed the Hallel or hymn of the five Psalms, offered a prayer, and concluded.

Verse 26. And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, &c.—Some commentators render colorTwv auTwv, when they had eaten; but Rosenmuller, more consistently with the sense, towards the end of the supper. The paschal lamb had been eaten, but the bread which was reserved to be eaten last remained, and either the third cup, or cup of blessing, or the fourth, concluding cup, or both were probably yet to be drunk; for that the paschal supper was not finished in all its ceremonies is evident, from the concluding prayer being offered and the concluding hymn sung by our Saviour, after he had instituted his own ordinance. It appears then, that after every thing pertaining to the passover as it was prescribed in the law had been observed, namely, the flesh of the lamb eaten with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, our Lord dispensed with the customary additions to the ceremony, on which the law was silent, and took that part of the remaining bread which was usually reserved to be the last mouthful, and the cup which was with the Jews the third cup, or cup of blessing, and with these elements he instituted his supper. Instead, also, of the usual prayer, he offered that which is recorded in John xvii., and then sang the hymn, or concluding part of the Hallel, which consisted of Psalms cxv. to cxviii. inclusive; than which nothing could be more appropriate to the new ordinance, since they contain the strongest evangelical allusions. Previously, then, to the usual concluding ceremonies, Jesus took

bread, τον αρτον, the bread, or CAKE, for in this form the bread of the Jews was made; and if there is any force in the article before aprov, which is omitted in the parallel passages of St. Mark and Luke, but ought probably to have been retained, it points out the cake as that which had been reserved from the former part of the feast according to custom, but which was now to be employed to a higher purpose, as the emblem of the body of our Lord. This bread was unleavened; which has given rise to a dispute whether the Lord's supper ought not still to be celebrated with unleavened bread. At an early age of the church, we find this regarded as an unimportant circumstance, and the Greek church and many of the reformed churches use leavened bread without hesitation, whilst the Roman and Lutheran churches make a point of using unleavened bread or wafers. As unleavened bread was the only kind at hand during the passover, and no allusion at all is made in the institution to it with respect to its quality as being without leaven, it is not probable that our Lord intended any importance to be attached to this circumstance. BREAD considered as FOOD appears to constitute the mystic emblem. Taking the bread, he blessed. Our translators have inserted IT; but this act of blessing was an act of thanksgiving to God, according to the practice of the Jews, who took no food or wine without first offering thanks to God. This was the office of him that presided at the feast. "He blesses," say the Rabbins, "and then he breaks." The rule also was, "If they sit at the meal, every one blesses for himself; but if they lie along," which marked a more formal meal, "one blessed for them all." To bless is to give thanks; hence St. Paul, when describing the institution of the supper of our Lord, instead of the term blessings, says, "when he had given thanks, he brake and

said, Take, eat," &c. Whether our Lord used the same words in blessing God before this distribution of the bread, or others suited to the occasion of a distinct institution, immediately following the eating of the passover, does not appear. The probability is, that he did; for, as the bread had been broken, and distributed during the proper paschal supper, and eaten with the flesh of the lamb according to the law, he had, as the Master of the feast, already used the usual Jewish form of blessing, both over the bread and the wine; and now probably varied it in accordance with the rite which he was about to substitute for ever for the Jewish passover.

And brake it. The object of the verb is here properly supplied, but there was nothing in the act of breaking peculiar to the eucharist. This was the manner in which bread was distributed in their common meals when one presided; the cakes being thin and brittle, and knives not being in use, nor indeed convenient for the purpose. As to the breaking of bread at the passover, the Talmud gives it as the rule, "The master of the house breaks neither a small piece, lest he should seem to be sparing; nor a large piece bigger than an egg, lest any should appear to be famished." Our Lord broke the bread, both when he fed the five thousand, and the four thousand; so that no mystery in the Lord's supper appears to have been hidden, as some suppose, under this action. The bread was broken simply for convenient distribution to every one; so that there appears not the least reason to assume that breaking of bread is at all essential to the right administration of the ordinance. How ever the portions may be separated from the cake or loaf, is obviously a matter of indifference. It is true that St. Paul, 1 Cor. xi. 23, &c., makes the words of Christ to be, "Take, eat; this is my body, which is BROKEN for you," which might seem to indicate, that the broken bread was made an emblem of his wounded and torn body; but St. Paul's words can be no more than equivalent to those of the first institution, which according to St. Luke

were, "my body, which is GIVEN for you;" so that the circumstance of being broken is used not in any emblematical sense, but with reference to the giving of the body of Christ for every one, as bread is broken to be given to every one at the same table. If the breaking of the bread had been a symbolical circumstance, all notice of it would scarcely have been omitted by the three evangelists, who record the institution with so much particularity.

Take, eat this is my body.-Here the great and true mystery of this holy sacrament cominences. The bread is distributed to every one; every one is to take; every one is to eat; and that which is thus taken and eaten, is the body of Christ; but the whole is emblematical. That the bread was not the real body of Christ, but only its emblem, is proved equally to sense as to reason; for if it had been the body of Christ, or transubstantiated into his very body, then was the body of Christ eaten by the eleven apostles, whilst yet their Lord remained before them; and if the body of Christ was thus eaten by the disciples, what was it that Judas betrayed and delivered into the hands of the officers of the chief priests a few hours afterwards? If the body of Christ had been disposed of by being eaten, that body could not have been taken into custody; and so Judas betrayed and Pilate crucified, not the body of our Lord, that is, not our Lord himself, but a phantom; on the contrary, if the real body of Christ was betrayed and crucified, then it could not be eaten, except in emblem, at the first supper. Still further, if the body of our Lord was not really and truly transubstantiated into the bread, and eaten at the first supper, as administered by Christ himself, as we see it could not be, then this transubstantiation could take place at no future time; for this is proved from the words of Christ, "This do in remembrance of me." Do what? Eat bread and drink wine; but if this was all they did at the first supper, and all they were to do at every succeeding celebration, then they could not, as the advocates of the real presence

contend, eat bread, but flesh; not drink wine, but blood; and that under the appearance of both. So completely confuted is the monstrous fiction of transubstantiation, by the circumstances of the first supper; and with this convincing evidence of its utter and shocking absurdity, it is almost trifling to attempt to show critically that the words, This is my body, are equivalent to, This bread SIGNIFIES, or REPRESENTS, my body, which is given for you. For since these words cannot, by any possibility, mean that the bread was really the body of Christ, for the plain reasons before given, the body of Christ could not be corporally given in the first supper to be eaten by the disciples; and if this is essential, as the papists pretend, to the true sacrament of the Lord's supper, then was not the first supper a true sacrament; and if the priest has now the consecration," power, by what is called " to transmute the bread and wine into the true body of our Lord, he pretends to do what our Lord himself did not, nor ever promised that his disciples should do and so that which the believers in the real presence call the sacrament of the eucharist, is, on their own principles, something quite distinct from that instituted by our Lord; something, the origin of which cannot be traced to any institution of his, and on which the New Testament is not only silent, but to which it is opposed. Whatever meaning therefore may be attached to the phrase, This is my body, the meaning forced upon it by the transubstantiatists cannot for a moment be entertained, being directly contradicted by the circumstances of the transaction itself. Nor less does this argument conclude against the doctrine of consubstantiation, or the real presence of the flesh and blood of our Lord WITH the elements of bread and wine in intimate union, though not changed into the same substance; which notion is represented under the comparison of the intimate, permeating presence of fire and red-hot iron, which is nevertheless not changed into the substance of the metal. For no such diffusion of the body of Christ could take place at the first supper, or a part only of

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our Lord's person was betrayed and crucified; and that defined and circumscribed body of our Saviour which the disciples saw and conversed with was not his whole person; and it must follow, among other absurdities, that the body of Christ was partly visible and partly invisible, partly defined and partly indefinitely extended, with various consequences as revolting to reason and to the senses as those involved in the doctrine of transubstantiation itself. The words used by our Lord have, however, no real difficulty. Bishop Law has remarked that there is no term in the Hebrew language which expresses to signify or denote; and that the Greek here naturally takes the impress of the Hebrew or Syriac idiom, IT IS being used for IT SIGNIFIES. Hence the similar use of the substantive verb in various passages, The three branches are three days," Gen. xl. 12. The seven kine are seven years," Gen. xli. 26. "The ten horns are ten kings," Dan. vii. 24. "The field is the world," Matt. xiii. 38. "The seven candlesticks are the seven churches," Rev. i. 20. there is no need to resort to this form of speaking, as though it were peculiar to the Hebrew or Syriac of our Lord's age. It is a natural mode of expression common to most languages, and occurs constantly in our own; for, in pointing to a portrait, for instance, instead of saying, "This REPRESENTS the person for whom it is taken," we far more frequently use the shorter and more spirited form, "This is the person himself." Still further, it is to be remarked, that our Lord's mode of speaking on this occasion was constantly used in the passover; for of this the Jewish writers afford sufficient evidence. The paschal lamb is, in many passages, produced by Buxtorf, called by them,

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THE BODY of the passover;" and the master of the family said, on breaking the bread, "This is the bread of affliction which our fathers ate in Egypt," by which he could only mean that the former REPRESENTED, or was an EMBLEM of, the latter.

But it is time to turn from this gross anti-christian perversion of Christ's holy

27 And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it;

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ordinance, to its noble and mystical import. Instead of this sacred rite being a carnal feeding upon the body of Christ, which in itself could have no connexion with the sanctification of the heart and affections, it is a spiritual participation of the effect and benefits of his death, by which life and strength are given to the soul. Our Lord did not take the flesh of the paschal lamb, and make that an element of his own institution. That was all previously eaten according to the law, which he who came" to fulfil all righteousness," was scrupulous to observe. Moreover, this might have appeared indicative that animal sacrifices were to be continued under the new dispensation; whereas his offering of himself once for all," abrogated them for ever. He therefore took the element of BREAD, which, by calling it his body, that is, the emblem or sign of his body, given for us, preserved as explicitly the essential idea of the sacrificial nature of his death, as if he had made the flesh of the paschal lamb the instituted sign. The connexion of the emblem of bread with his "flesh," that is, his sacrificial death, is strongly marked in John vi. 51, &c.: "And the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world;" words which plainly signify, that men live by the death which he was voluntarily to endure as an atonement for their sins, and as the meritorious means by which all the blessings included in "life" were to be procured for them. As, therefore, the bread itself was an emblem of his body offered for our sins, so the taking and eating of the bread must be figurative in its import also, and denotes that reception of Christ's sacrifice, by which its benefits are personally communicated; which, as we are taught, throughout the whole New Testament, is done by a true FAITH. Thus, therefore, to believe or trust in the sacrifice of Christ, is to "eat his flesh and drink his blood;" and from this results LIFE, which includes restoration to the

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divine favour; the nourishment of the soul in spiritual vigour,-"He that eateth me, even he shall live by me," John vi. 57; and life or felicity in the world to come, -"He that eateth of this bread shall live for ever," John vi. 58. All these expressions show that it is the life of the soul of which our Lord speaks; which could not be affected by a carnal eating of the real body of our Lord; but which is communicated through that vital and renewing influence of God upon the heart which is procured for us by the meritorious death of our Saviour, effected by the agency of the Holy Spirit, and received by the instrumentality of trusting in Christ as the true and only sacrifice for sin "As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me shall live by me." Of this vital influence the Father is the source; and it flows into man, through Christ, by the instrumentality of eating or believing on him. Of these spiritual acts, the eating of bread and the drinking of wine in the Lord's supper, are the established emblems; and he who truly receives those elements, discerning their intent, and exerting faith in the great object represented, which is Christ's sacrifice for sin, not only thus publicly and statedly professes his acceptance of that sacrifice as the only ground of his hope of salvation, and his sole dependence upon it, but actually derives to himself its stupendous benefits.

Verse 27. And he took the cup.—The Jews, in celebrating the passover, took four cups of wine mixed with water, which the master divided among those who composed the passover company. St. Luke mentions one cup taken and given by our Lord to the disciples before this, which he used in instituting his own supper. The cup, whether it were the third or fourth usually partaken of by the Jews in celebrating the passover, contained the other element by which his sacrificial death was emblematically re

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