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Differences between the various New Testament accounts of the Last Supper.

Passover has great value for Christians because the New Testament places the account of Jesus’ death and resurrection within the Passover festival. More importantly, they explain the meaning of Christ’s atoning death by means of Passover typology. The hope of redemption which was nourished by the Passover ritual finds its realization in the sacrifice of Christ, the true Paschal Lamb. Thus, the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross at the time when Passover lambs were sacrificed links inextricably both Jewish and Christian Passovers. His death represents the fulfillment of Jewish Passover and the inauguration of Christian Passover.

The problem of dating Jesus’ Last Supper arises from the contradiction on this point between the Synoptic Gospels, on the one hand, Saint John’s Gospel, and on the other. Mark, whom Matthew and Luke follow in essentials, gives us a precise dating: “On the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb, his disciples said to him, ‘Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the Passover?’ … And when it was evening he came with the Twelve” (14:12, 17). Thus, we do have four accounts of the Supper, in three Synoptic Gospels and 1 Corinthians, but on the other hand there is nothing in the Gospel of the John, and in His Gospel; He only talks about foot-washing, which was not mentioned anywhere else. For this reason, these four accounts of the “Last Supper” are separated in two groups: Mark/Matthew and Paul/Luke, because of their differences and/or agreements with one another. Later in this writing we will examine some of those differences in details; for example in the first group we see the instructions from Jesus to “take (and eat)” which is not found in the second group. According to Paul/Luke the cup was shared “after the supper” and the words of the Jesus over the cup were: “the new covenant in my blood”. For now, start from the foundation.

The evening of the first day of Unleavened Bread, on which the Paschal lambs are slaughtered in the Temple, is the vigil of the Passover feast. According to the chronology of the Synoptic, this was a Thursday, Nisan 14th. Prior to that time, all leaven had to be burned and/or disposed of hours before the end of that day; then, the families would eat the Passover after roasting the lambs for ours until they were well cooked, more on this later, at some time after the beginning of Nisan 15, on the first annual High Holy Day of Unleavened Bread.

When liturgical scholars study the Christian Eucharist, there are two principle approaches that they use to examine the New Testament evidence. On the one hand, there is the route of exegesis (also called the Historical Critical Method). This approach seeks to answer who, what, when, where, and why: it is concerned with the events and sayings of Jesus. Secondly, there is the biblical theological approach, which is inspired by the narrative of various New Testament accounts; it seeks to unearth themes and associations in these stories.

Issues of historical reconstruction might involve looking, for example, at various meal practices in the gospel accounts (Jesus’ meals with his disciples, his post-resurrection meals, or early Christian meals in Acts), or trying to settle whether the Last Supper was in fact a Passover meal. Some biblical scholars have also tried to discern an exact order to the Eucharistic action or to discover the exact words of Jesus. These later efforts rarely produce definitive answers, but they are useful to establish general trends.

While doing this research beyond this paper, I found interesting short article, which was written by someone who does not believe the God and tried to tell us that “Church modified the Gospels so that theology of Paul can be incorporated”. I founded this amusing, so here is the article:

In 1 Corinthians 11:23 the apostle Paul writes, "For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread..." Here Paul claims that he got the instructions for the Lord's Supper directly from Jesus (evidently from one of his many revelations). Paul writes these words about twenty years after Jesus' death, and had the church already been celebrating the Lord's Supper he certainly would have been aware of it and would have had no need to receive it from the Lord. Some apologists try to play games with the text to make it seem like Paul actually received the instructions from the other apostles, but one thing Paul stresses is that what he teaches he receives from no man (Galatians 1:11-12).

The Lord's Supper was not invented by Paul, but was borrowed by him from Mithraism, the mystery religion that existed long before Christianity and was Christianity's chief competitor up until the time of Constantine. In Mithraism, the central figure is the mythical Mithras, who died for the sins of mankind and was resurrected. Believers in Mithras were rewarded with eternal life. Part of the Mithraic communion liturgy included the words, "He who will not eat of my body and drink of my blood, so that he will be made one with me and I with him, the same shall not know salvation."[*].

The early Church Fathers Justin Martyr and Tertullian tried to say that Mithraism copied the Lord's Supper from Christianity, but they were forced to say that demons had copied it since only demons could copy an event in advance of its happening! They could not say that the followers of Mithras had copied it - it was a known fact that Mithraism had included the ritual a long time before Christ was born.

Where did Mithraism come from? The ancient historian Plutarch mentioned Mithraism in connection with the pirates of Cilicia in Asia Minor encountering the Roman general Pompey in 67 BC. More recently, in 1989 Mithraic scholar David Ulansey wrote a book, The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries, in which he convincingly shows that Mithraism originated in the city of Tarsus in Cilicia. That this is also the home town of the apostle Paul cannot be a coincidence.

Paul admits that he did not know Jesus during Jesus' lifetime. He also says that his gospel was not taught to him by any man (Galatians 1:11-12). All of Paul's theology is based on his own revelations, or visions. Like dreams, visions or hallucinations do not come from nowhere, but reveal what is already in a person's subconscious. It is very likely that the source of most of Paul's visions, and therefore most of his theology, is to be found in Mithraism. That we find Jesus at the Last Supper saying more or less the same thing Paul said to the Corinthians many years later is another example of the church modifying the gospels to incorporate the theology of Paul, which eventually won out over the theology of Jesus' original disciples.

Continuing, we see particular biblical researchers, while studying Luke 22, for example, find that there are three major problems: First is the textual one. According to them, one of the Greek manuscripts omits the last half of verse 19 and all of verse 20. It would appear that this deletion was an attempt to solve the problem raised by the reference to two different cups of wine in the passage (very interesting). Secondly, the problem is one of harmony and chronology (discrepancy between the Synoptic Gospels and Gospel of John, as I mentioned earlier). This is where we compare the Last Supper narratives of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and I Corinthians and where we can notice some particular differences between stories. An exegetical approach seeks to explain these differences in light of historical data. For instance, the general consensus among scholars is that Mark is the oldest of the gospels because of its shortness, and because it is intended for a Jewish audience. Luke, on the other hand, is reckoned to be the latest of the synoptic gospels; its length and detail probably are intended for a Gentile audience – to fill them in on details that would be familiar to Jews. Part of this reconstruction includes noticing the special emphases of particular stories: Mark is rather apocalyptic in nature (Son of Man), Matthew is more Messianic (Son of David), Luke combines the farewell character with an eschatological emphasis, and Paul, in his usual energetic style, manages to bring together sacramental communion, eschatological expectation, paschal mystery, and the presence of the Spirit. Last but not least, according to biblical researchers, there is the great controversy over the precise meaning of the words of Jesus: “This is My Body”. Our major discussion here will be, in part, on a secondary issue, where we will exam some discrepancy about the date of the supper in Synoptic Gospels, Gospel of John and etc.

Matthew’s account (26:17-19):

Now the FIRST day of the feast of UNLEAVENED BREAD the disciples came to Jesus saying unto him, Where wilt thou that we PREPARE for thee to eat the Passover?

And he said, Go into city to such a man, and say unto him, The Master saith My time is at hand; I will keep the Passover at my house with my disciples. And the disciples did as Jesus had appointed them; and they MADE READY THE PASSOVER.

Mark’s account (14:12-16):

And the FIRST DAY of unleavened bread, when they killed the Passover, his disciples said unto him, where wilt thou that we go and PREPARE that thou mayest eat the Passover? … And his disciples went fort, and came into city, and found as he had said unto them: and they made ready the Passover.

Luke’s account (22:7-13):

Then came the DAY of unlevened bread, when the Passover must be killed. And he sent Peter and John, saying, Go and PREPARE us the Passover, that we may eat. And they said unto him, Where wilt thou that we PREPARE? … and they went, and found as he had said unto them: and they MADE READY the Passover.

These were taken from The King James Version of the Bible, and as we can see in Matthew’s example the words “day” and “feast of” are a wrong translation and the correct verse should say: “Now on the first [day] of unleavened bread”. Looking into the Greek, it reads: “Now on the first day of unleavened bread”. So if we accept this and we look into the calendar, we would see that the first day of unleavened bread would not come untill Nisan 15th. Therefore, the true translation of the Matthew verse merely states: “Now in the beginning of unleavened bread” or “Now before unleavened bread”. In conclusion, this refers to a period of time at the beginning of, or preceding the, Feast of Unleavened Bread – an indefinite period which is not a specified but which is related to the beginning of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

As you probably noticed I made the word “DAY” capital and bold. We find this word in the accounts of Mark and Luke. Mark says it was the “first day” of unleavened bred “when they killed the Passover”. On the other hand, Luke says it was “the day” of unleavened bread when the Passover “must be killed”. Once again we will examine the original word in the Greek “hemera”. From different sources of dictionaries we can find that this word clearly has many different uses in the Greek language and most certainly does not always refer to a particular 24 hour “day”. Perfect example could be found in various New Testament Scriptures, like in John 8:56; Act 8:1; Rom 10:21; II Pet 3:8; II Pet 3:10 and etc. Compared to this the verses of Mark and Luke can be translated and understood as:

“And the beginning period of unleavened bread, when they killed Passover” (Mark 14:12)

“Then came the time of unleavened bread, when the Passover must be killed” (Luke 22:7)

The Passover feast commenced the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which was a week-long celebration. Preparations for the Passover meal began on Thursday morning, Nisan 12th, with a diligent search for any leaven which might be in the house. Leaven was not to be used in the bread which was baked in preparation for the original exodus from Egypt because there would not be time to bake bread that would have to rise (Exodus 12:34). Also, leaven was a symbol of evil, and was therefore forbidden to be present (cf. 1 Corinthians 5:6-8). On Thursday morning the unleavened bread would be prepared for the feast. In the afternoon, the Passover celebration itself would begin with the sacrificing of the lambs - Nisan 14th, and the lamb would be taken to the temple and slain. After sunset, when all lambs were well cooked, the actual Passover meal was observed. Normally, this was a family gathering, with not less than ten, or usually more than twenty at the table. According to biblical writers, Jesus treated this meal with extreme importance; it was unique and it was not an isolated event in His life. Many at that time could not understand this, because His table was table of fellowship with everybody: saint or sinner and this were a way to proclaim God’s forgiveness to everyone. Again, this was not accepted; because the meal that was shared was not the only thing you shared, but your life as well – so how would you accept to share your life with stranger you do not know?

So what do we know about this meal?

The head of the household pronounced the prayer of sanctification, comprising the benediction for the festival and the first cup. The preliminary course, consisting of green herbs, bitter herbs and a sauce of fruit juice was eaten without bread. The meal was brought in but not yet eaten; the second cup was mixed with water and placed on the table, but not yet drunk. After this, the head of the household explained the special features of the Passover meal (Exod. 12:26) and proclaimed the outline of the story, the Haggadah; the first part of the Passover Hallel (Psa. 113) was sung and the second cup (Haggadah cup) was drunk. Then, head of the household pronounced a benediction over the unleavened bread, which was distributed and the meal eaten which consisted of the Passover Lamb, mazzoth, bitter herbs (Exod. 12:8) and wine (optional). After grace the third cup (cup of blessing) was drunk. Finally, the second part of the Hallel (Ps. 115-118) was sung and a benediction pronounced over the fourth cup (Hallel cup).

So was this the Last Supper or “Lord’s (Mystical – Μυστικος Δειπνος) Supper” as it is known in the Christian liturgical tradition?

To be able to answer this we need to look the very nature and purpose of the Last Supper narratives, which are not complete historical descriptions, but individual with limited key elements, as we will see later.

In verses 7-13 Luke told of the preparations that were made for the supper. It is obvious that the location and details of the Last Supper were a closely guarded secret. The disciples did not know where the Passover was to be held nor what preparations had been made. Luke alone tells us that Peter and John (two of the most intimate of the disciples) were sent to handle the preparations. They were not told the location of the house where they were to gather, but were to discern that by a set of circumstances, all of which were out of the ordinary. They would see a man carrying a clay water vessel. This was unusual, because normally these pots were borne by the women, while men carried water in skins. When they followed this man to his destination they were to ask the owner of the house for a room for the Teacher to use to keep the Passover (verse 11). He would then show them where they were to make their preparations. This preparation probably took on Nisan 12th, which was Tuesday morning – two days before slaughtering the lambs and one half days before the Passover would be eaten (chronologically speaking). After finding the house and the room where to make the preparations, much work would be involved. First they would need to clean the room (to be sure it was free of all leaven); secondly they would go to a local market to purchase the supplies and stock up on food and unleavened bread to use during the last four or five hours – in other words get everything ready for the upcoming Passover celebration. If this is true than all this happened on the daylight portion of Nisan 12th, which was Monday. The question one might ask here, if all this is true, why would our Lord wait till the last minute to instruct His disciples’ to make such an important preparation?

This entire shroud of secrecy was on account of Judas, who had already agreed to betray the whereabouts of the Lord, and who waited for an opportune time, out of the sight of the crowds (verses 3-6). So far as Judas was concerned there would have been no better time than during the meal itself. Jesus carefully removed this option by keeping Judas ‘in the dark’ until it was too late for him to notify the officials as to their exact place of meeting. Judas, you will recall (John 13:27-30), left sometime during the meal to disclose the location where Jesus could be apprehended. I suspect that he led the temple guard first to the upper room, and, then, finding Him already gone, began to search for Him at some of His most frequently used places of refuge and privacy.

What happened next?

Now in Matthew and Mark we see that this meal was just a dinner and/or supper which were held among friends. In following passages’ of Matthew and Mark there is no stating that this night as being a “Passover” night.

“Now when the even???? was come [that very night, which would be the beginning of Nisan 13th – Tuesday night], he sat down with the twelve. And as they did eat, he said, Verily I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me. And they were exceeding sorrowful, and began every one of them to say unto him, Lord is it I?” (Matt. 26:20-22)

“And in the evening he cometh with the twelve. And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, One of you which eateth with me shall betray me. And they began to be sorrowful, and to say unto him one by one, Is it I? and another said, Is it I? And he answered and said unto them, It is one of the twelve, that dippeth with me in the dish. The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is written of him: but woe to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! good were it for that man if he had never been born”. (Mark 14:17-21)

To summarize what occurred on Tuesday: The Lord sent His disciples into the city to “prepare for Passover”, which was coming soon, so much preparation was needed. Then that evening the “last supper” occurred; but let’s follow, keeping this in mind, the words from the Apostle Luke:

“And when the hour was come, he sat down, and the twelve apostles with him. And he said unto them, With desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer: For I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take this, and divide it among yourselves: For I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come.” (Luke 22:14-18)

An ordinary person, by reading these verses, could not say much about it; but here we can find the remarkable astonishing statement of our Lord: “…With desire I have desired to eat this Passover with you…”. So the question is does this statement “prove” that this was the “Passover dinner”? Well, you be the judge! The Lord could easily have been harkening back to the Passover, which they had been preparing for, which was due to arrive a few days later. On the other hand, they all understood what the Lord was talking about; and that He meant the upcoming Passover Festival, which would be on Nisan 15: “In the first month, in the fourteenth day of the month, ye shall have the Passover, a feast of seven days; unleavened bread shall be eaten”. (Ezekiel 45:21)

Again, we must turn our attention to original Greek word for “desire”, which is “eudokia”, but literally this means “good pleasure”. The word that our Lord used is “epithumia” which means “a longing” – the word comes from the word “epithumeo”, which means “set the heart upon”, “long for “, “desire” and etc. The Lord longed to be able to partake of the upcoming Passover celebration and He is merely expressing to the disciples His strong desire to be able to keep the Passover with them, because He knew it would not be possible – that is, because He was going to be our Passover Lamb that very Passover, and that was the plan of God. Rather than eat the Passover with them, He would be our “Passover lamb”, sacrificed for us (I Corinthians 5:7). So what the Lord was longing, in this particular instance, was “forbidden” – He could not simply do both: partake of the Passover and be our Passover.

I furthermore looked in a Greek-English Lexicon about this word and it literally means “desire, craving, longing”, specifically “desire for what is forbidden; lust”. In the human aspect of the Lord, we know that He did not want to go through God’s plan: being beaten, scourged, nailed to the Cross and killed. We see this in His prayer to the Father, later that same night: “Saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.” (Luke 22:42) – “And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.” (Verse 44). From this we see that this trial of crucifixion was a great ordeal even for our Lord and He did not look forward to it.

The above facts that I mentioned have additional meaning and give a deeper perception of our Lord’s remarkable words, which he spoke to His disciples. He literally “craved” to eat this upcoming Passover with them (Nisan 15) and not to go through great ordeal, which will prevent Him from doing so.

Further, aside from the reports in the Synoptic Gospels, there is really nothing in the New Testament to cause us to think that Last Supper was a true Passover meal. All what we can say that there are two independent witness to the Synoptic tradition. Three Synoptic Gospels were written as narrative history and I Corinthians in liturgical form.

A biblical approach seeks to open the themes of the biblical narrative and to ask homiletic questions (What does this mean to us today?). It centers on Christ’s memorial command (‘do this in remembrance of me’), various biblical images, and the connection between the Eucharist and Christian life.

When Jesus said ‘Do this in remembrance of me,’ the word “this” is ambiguous. He could be referring to the individual elements (like taking the bread), but most likely he is referring to the whole of the Eucharistic action. In light of this full action, one might look at the various kinds of remembrance that are referred to in the Eucharist. The Jewish conception of remembrance is summed up on the word “zikkaron”, which emphasizes a process in which the past is recalled in the present, with an eye towards the future. The authors of early Eucharistic prayers used the Greek word “anamnesis” to describe past events being brought into the present. We understand a memorial to have several important elements: it is divinely ordained; it is reciprocal; it necessitates continued practice; it incorporates praise; it was present in temple, synagogue, and home worship in Jewish practice; and it anticipates God’s kingdom. In the Eucharist, we re-act or mime past events in memorial fashion, and we see a similar relationship between praise and sacrifice. Beyond the reenactment involved in memorial, there were also spiritual commemorations in post-temple Jewish practice, and there was a history of prophetic remembrance (e.g., Nehemiah 9, the Lamentation Psalms), in which the prophet reviews the elements of salvation history with an eye toward the future.

In first letter of Paul to the Corinthians, chapter 11 verses 17-34, (which was written about A.D. 56), we can find the earliest references of what we call the “Last Supper”. Looking in verses 20-21, we can see that Paul refers to what was apparently already a ritual custom among the Corinthian Christians: “When you meet in one place, then it’s not to eat the “Lord’s Supper”, for in eating, each one goes ahead with his own supper, and one goes hungry while another gets drunk”. In the previous chapter (10:16), in a warning against idolatry: "The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?" This ritual St. Paul compares to the sacrifices of Israel (v. 18) and pagan sacrifices (v. 20), and concludes (v. 21), "You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and also the cup of demons."

The foundation of the Eucharist can be found in Chapter 11 verses 23-25: "For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you that the Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed over, took bread, and, after he had given thanks [to God], broke it and said, 'This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.' 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.'" So according to this and strong early Christian tradition, we can trace the celebration of the Eucharist liturgy to the words and deeds of Jesus at final supper. No doubt about that Eucharist is resulting from the statement that Jesus “gave thanks”.

Throughout history, there were countless attempts to reconcile the chronology of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke with that of John. Earlier I wrote about the dates and month (Nisan) - many tried to resolve this divine mystery by accepting existence of two dates for Passover. The one was the calendar of the Pharisees and the other one by Sadducees. However two calendars were used in the time of Christ: old sacerdotal, which was based according to solar system, and an official calendar based on the lunar system. According to the solar system, Passover would always fall on a Wednesday while, according to the lunar system, Passover day varied from year to year. Many felt that John was following the official lunar calendar. According to this, one might see the fundamental problem with these theories that the writers were not thinking of the same Passover, but two different paschal celebrations conducted according to two different dates – but this assumption cannot be legitimately supported by the Gospels’ account of the Passover.

At the Last Supper Jesus said to His disciples: “I tell you I shall not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father’s kingdom” (Mat. 26:29). The message of the Kingdom entailed the suffering ordeal to come: a time of crisis and distress which was to inaugurate and move towards the day of the Son of Man (Mark 13 par.), the restoration of Israel (Mt. 19:28 par.), the banquet of the saved and the salvation of the nations (Mat. 8:11).

So to conclude, none of the Supper accounts are uniquely original; that’s because all have been affected by community tradition, especially liturgical practice. Mark’s (followed by Matthew) has its roots from early Palestinian tradition; Paul and Luke reflect the liturgical tradition from Antioch and all this can be traced from the first decade of the Church.

At the end, all accounts takes us back not merely to the interpretation of the Church, but to Jesus’ own understanding of His death and the meaning it gave to the farewell meal.


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