Eric Svendsen¹

I. THE ALLEGED SEPARATION OF THE EUCHARIST FROM THE COMMON MEAL

In 1 Corinthians 11, Paul addresses the Lord’s Supper as it relates to the unity within the assembly of the Corinthians. It is evident from Paul’s words in this passage that the Corinthians were partaking of an entire meal, not just the bread and wine. As we have already pointed out, very few dispute this.² What is disputed, however, is the precise relationship between the Lord’s Supper and the Corinthians’ meal, and whether Paul in this passage gives any indication that he wants the Corinthians to put an end to their practice of eating a meal together or whether he wants them to continue. To find the answers to these questions it will be helpful to look at the tradition that Paul received about the Supper, and then to reexamine the so-called “Pauline Precedent.”

A. Paul’s Concept of “The Lord’s Supper”

The first step in deciding about the ongoing relevance of the meal-aspect of the Supper is to determine just what Paul means by the title “Lord’s Supper” in 1 Cor 11:20. This title, kuriakon deipnon, occurs only here in the NT. The word kuriakon means roughly “belonging to the Lord.” In this case the title means “the supper belonging to the Lord.”³ Yet just what is this “supper”? Is Paul here referring to the meal of the Corinthians, of which the bread and wine are dominant features, or is he referring to the bread and wine alone? Put another way, could Paul have referred to the bread and wine as a “supper” apart from the meal?

It is an interesting fact that every other instance of “supper” in the NT refers to nothing less than a full meal, and in many (arguably, all) cases it refers to a banquet or feast. It would be odd in light of this to maintain that Paul has in mind the so-called “elements” (i.e., the bread and wine —apart from the meal—when he refers to the kuriakon deipnon. On the contrary, what Paul calls the “Lord’s Supper” is itself the meal with the bread and wine.⁴ The bread and wine by themselves can no more be called the Lord’s Supper than the meal without the bread and wine. Any attempt to view kuriakon deipnon as a title for a symbolic supper is refuted on the grounds that the Corinthians themselves were not partaking of a symbolic supper but rather a real supper.⁵ This seems clear from Paul’s corrective of their abuses: “When you come together, it is not the Lord’s Supper you eat, for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another gets drunk” (1 Cor 11:21-22).

B. The Order of the Lord’s Supper in Paul

One way to determine whether or not Paul considered the meal-aspect of the Lord’s Supper to be a crucial part of the Supper is to take a closer look at the tradition he received about the Supper. Paul tells us about this tradition in 1 Cor 11:23-26:

For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, 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.” In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

Several important points can be made about Paul’s words here. First, the order of consumption is, for Paul, bread/supper—cup. Paul does not say when they began eating the meal, only that the cup came after. The “cup” referred to here is likely the “cup of blessing” which in Jewish custom was consumed after eating, since, as Fee has noted, this phrase was in use as “a technical term for the final blessing offered at the end of the meal.”⁶ Paul, in fact, uses this phrase for the cup of the Lord’s Supper in 1 Cor 10:16.

Second, we may assume since Paul makes the point that the cup was distributed after supper, that the saying about the bread took place either immediately before the meal (to initiate the meal) or during the meal. It is therefore likely that, in Paul’s Lord’s Supper tradition, the loaf is distributed at the beginning or during the meal and the cup follows the meal. What is significant about this order is the inclusion of the mention of an actual meal within the tradition itself. Why does Paul include this? Doubtless there were many things that took place at the Last Supper that are not included in any of the Lord’s Supper traditions. Yet Paul speaks of the meal-aspect (“after supper”) as an integral part of his tradition.⁷ This passing reference does not bespeak the unimportance of the meal, but rather the assumption that the meal is to be included in the practice of the Lord’s Supper.⁸ Moreover, it was commonplace in the first century to initiate a meal by breaking bread. This fact alone argues strongly that the breaking of bread at the Lord’s Supper assumes the initiation of an actual meal.

Third, none of the Synoptic accounts contradicts Paul’s order here. Matthew and Mark place the saying about the bread “while they were eating,” whereas Luke is silent in this regard. While Luke’s silence may be taken to mean that they were not yet eating when Jesus distributed the bread, it may also be taken to mean that Luke assumes they were already eating. In any case, as has already been pointed out in a previous chapter,⁹ Paul is, strictly speaking, the only one of the four whose primary purpose for including this tradition is to establish the correct practice of the Supper. To that extent, Paul’s order must be seen as more relevant to the actual practice of the early church than the Synoptic accounts.

It should be mentioned here that Marshall objects to the idea that the early church followed the order of the Last Supper meal since “it ignores the fact that what Paul cited was not an account of what the church ought to do but a description of what Jesus did… the church’s meal was not a Passover meal.”¹⁰ While it is true that the church’s meal was not a Passover, it seems difficult to imagine why Paul’s tradition, which Marshall regards as a liturgical account, would not be formulated in such a way as to indicate the order of the proceedings which the church was to follow. Indeed, what reason is there to assume that the order would be otherwise? In light of this, it seems best to view Paul’s tradition of the Supper as that which is to be reflected by the practice of the church. As Theissen notes:

It is unthinkable that Paul would quote a sacred, cultic formula, expressly state that he received it in just this and no other form, yet at the same time tacitly suppose that its order is not to be followed…If he wants to bring about some order [1 Co 11:34], he cannot possibly repeat obsolete instructions.¹¹

Fourth, the question must again be asked: What does Paul mean by “supper” in this passage? Does he have in mind here a symbolic supper consisting only of bread and wine? Or, does he have in mind an actual meal as would be expected of one recalling the events of the Last Supper of the Lord and his disciples? Paul uses the same word (deipnon) that he used in v. 20 (although in the verbal form this time). It seems then that Paul sees the meal-aspect as part of his tradition, and that the meal with the bread and cup form the Lord’s Supper.

C. The “Pauline Precedent” Reexamined

Many who concede that the Corinthians were, in fact, partaking of an actual meal have postulated that Paul’s purpose for writing this pericope is to put an end to the meal-aspect.¹² This is alternatively based on the assumption that Paul sees this meal as the source of the Corinthians’ divisions,¹³ or that Paul does not view the meal as an essential aspect of the Lord’s Supper to begin with,¹⁴ or a combination of both.¹⁵ Evidence that can be adduced in favor of the view that Paul is here putting an end to the meal-aspect of the Lord’s Supper includes: (1) Paul tells the Corinthians that their meal is not the Lord’s Supper (v 20) and that the Lord’s Supper consists only of the bread and cup to which Paul refers extensively in verses 23-28; (2) Paul implies that he wants them to cease practice of the meal-aspect by his statement, “Don’t you have homes to eat and drink in?” (v 22); and (3) Paul ends this section with the words “if anyone is hungry, he should eat at home, so that when you meet together it may not result in judgment” (v 34). Here, it is argued, is the Pauline Precedent that initiated the cessation of the meal-aspect of the Lord’s Supper once and for all.¹⁶

Against point (1) it may be noted that the seeming emphasis Paul places on the bread and cup in verses 23-28 is not intended to de-emphasize the importance of the meal-aspect. Even Fee (who subscribes to the cessationist view of the meal-aspect) concedes this point: “The context makes it clear that ‘to eat the bread and drink the cup of the Lord’ means simply to participate in the meal known as the Lord’s Supper. Paul is not trying to give special emphasis to the bread and wine per se.”¹⁷ In addition, Paul’s statement “it is not the Lord’s Supper you eat” (v 20) is not intended to deny that the Lord’s Supper consists of a meal; rather that the Corinthian meal, at one time regarded as the Lord’s Supper, can no longer be regarded as such because of the abuses associated with it. This is clear from Paul’s explanation of his statement in the very next verse: “for as you eat, each of you goes ahead without waiting for anybody else. One remains hungry, another gets drunk” (v 21). In other words, what would, under normal conditions, be the Lord’s Supper, the Corinthians, by their divisions, have turned into their own Supper. Paul is not here attempting to separate the meal from the bread and wine; rather whatever points he makes about the meal are applied equally to the bread and cup (vv 29-30).

Against point (2) above we may again question the assumptions regarding Paul’s intent. Barrett is right when he notes about verse 22:

On the surface this seems to imply that ordinary, non-cultic eating and drinking should be done at home, contradicting the inference drawn above [from vv. 20-21] that the Corinthian supper included an ordinary meal. But Paul’s point is that, if the rich wish to eat and drink on their own, enjoying better food than their poorer brothers, they should do this at home; if they cannot wait for others (verse 33), if they must indulge to excess, they can at least keep the church’s common meal free from practices that can only bring discredit upon it.¹⁸ (Italics mine)

This same observation may be made against point (3) above. There it is argued that Paul’s closing words for this section (“if anyone is hungry, he should eat at home,” v 34) imply Paul’s desire that the meal-aspect of the Lord’s Supper should cease. Yet, as Barrett notes above about verse 22, Paul’s concern is to put an end, not to the meal itself, but to the abuses that accompanied the meal. This seems clear on two counts. First, Paul uses the singular pronoun and the singular imperative in this verse—lit., “if anyone is hungry, let him eat at home”—not the plural. This suggests strongly that Paul’s point is simply that if any individual cannot restrain himself from eating the Supper before the poor arrive, then that individual should eat something at home so that he won’t be tempted to hoard that which rightly belongs to the entire body. Second, the verse that immediately precedes verse 34 seems to preclude any notion that Paul here intends to put an end to the meal-aspect: “So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for each other,” (v 33). If Paul means to abolish the meal-aspect of the Lord’s Supper then it is odd that he would make a closing statement which assumes that the Corinthians will continue the meal as they have been (minus, of course, the abuses). Indeed, the only modification of the Supper that interests Paul is that the Corinthians “wait for each other” so that all may partake of the meal together.¹⁹

II. THE AGAPE IN JUDE 12

Tucked away in Jude’s short epistle is a singular reference to the Agape (Jude 12, agapais, often translated as “love feasts”). There may also be a reference to this “feast” in 2 Pet 2:13 (“feasting with you”). This feast in Jude (as well as in Peter) is included as a passing reference (not unlike Paul’s teaching on the bread and cup in 1 Cor 10:16-17). However, as with Paul, we may detect certain assumptions on the part of Jude for including it in the first place. It will be helpful first to survey the context in which this reference is found.

Jude’s letter is one of urgency; that much is evident from his greeting. Although he had originally planned to write a general letter dealing with issues of salvation, he felt constrained to write instead to warn his readers about certain heretics who had infiltrated the church (vv 3-4). He compares these heretics to some of the OT villains that incurred God’s judgment, including the rabble that Moses had to deal with, fallen angels, and the men of Sodom and Gomorrah (vv 5-7). Beginning then in verse 8, Jude sets out to make application to the current heretics. They “pollute their own bodies, reject authority and slander celestial beings” (v 8). They are compared, not only to the foregoing villains, but to Cain, Balaam, and Korah as well (v 11). It is in this context that Jude mentions the Agape: “These men are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm” (v 12). The question is: Just what is this Agape?

A. Common Meal or Lord’s Supper?

On a purely contextual level, it seems evident that Jude is first referring to a common meal. Although the word agapais is literally “loves,” it is closely connected by Jude to the participle form of “feast together” (suneuōchoumenoi), which occurs only in Jude 12 and in 2 Pet 2:13. For this reason, and since Jude and Peter cite identical thematic content, it seems safe to assume that both writers have the same thing in mind. Aside from this evidence (and the witness of the early church in the post-apostolic era, to which we will turn shortly), no scholar seems to question that Jude is using agapais as a term for a Christian feast. The disagreement is over whether it is a term that designates merely a common meal, or is, in fact, a synonym for the Lord’s Supper.

Some scholars view Jude’s reference here as nothing more than a common fellowship meal.²⁰ This is not a widely held view, however, and most scholars have adopted the view that Jude is here referring to none other than the Lord’s Supper itself.²¹ In Townsend’s words:

There is nothing…to suggest that this excludes the Eucharist itself…[and]…there seems [to be] no good reason why agapais here should not fulfill the same function as kuriakon deipnon does in 1 Cor 11:20, where, as we have seen, it refers to the total complex of events, i.e., the Eucharist in its normal common-meal setting…It is prima facie unlikely…that Jude 12 should refer to an Agape distinct from the Eucharist.²²

With this Marshall agrees when he notes: “There is nothing to suggest that the love feast was a separate kind of meal from the Lord’s Supper, and it seems more probable that these were two different names for the same occasion.”²³ It is indeed more difficult to understand Jude’s anxiety about ungodly men partaking of this meal if it is not the Lord’s Supper and if it does not include the Eucharist. It seems best, therefore, to view Jude’s Agape as the Lord’s Supper itself.

B. Jude’s Relevance to the Issue

Jude’s relevance to the issue of the common meal in the Lord’s Supper is twofold: (1) Jude offers non-Pauline corroboration about the Supper; and (2) he reveals the importance of the Supper via a specialized term. We shall elaborate on each of these points in turn.

C. Non-Pauline Corroboration

The fact that Jude, in writing to his churches, can refer to a church practice that is similar to Paul’s is revealing in that it implies the universality of this practice. Higgins assumes that this meal-aspect of the Lord’s Supper was practiced universally by the church when he says, “The custom at Corinth, as elsewhere, was for the special eucharistic partaking of bread and wine to take place during the course of a meal”²⁴ (italics mine). Not only was this participation in a eucharistic common meal “likely the practice of every Pauline church,”²⁵ it was, as Jude 12 indicates, likely the practice of every apostolic church. In Spicq’s view the church held the Agape in order to “reproduce as exactly as possible the circumstances that surrounded the institution of the Eucharist.”²⁶ It would be odd in light of this to maintain that this meal was confined to Pauline churches alone; for the meaning and significance of the Last Supper applies equally to all churches. It seems best then to conclude that the Agape in Jude corroborates the Lord’s Supper in Paul as a common meal which served as a setting for the bread and cup of the Eucharist, and which was practiced universally by the apostolic church.

D. Agape as a Specialized Term

One other indication of the universality of the Agape may be seen in the name itself. While the mere practice of the Agape by the early church cannot be seen as the determining factor in whether or not this practice was considered normative,²⁷ it seems likely that since this practice had been given a special name it was indeed considered a normative practice by the apostolic church itself. This is the basis upon which Bauckham²⁸ and Lincoln²⁹ view Sunday as the normative day of meeting for the church. Bauckham notes, for instance, that the regular, consistent practice of meeting on Sunday coupled with the use of the specialized term, Lord’s Day, “gives that custom the stamp of canonical authority.”³⁰ With this Lincoln concurs:

That the first day of the week was given the title Lord’s Day suggests a matter of far greater import than convenience or practicality…True, the designation “Lord’s Day” in [Rev 1:10] is incidental rather than being part of the primary didactic intent of the writer, but we are not using this passing reference in order to establish a precedent but to show that a precedent had already been set in the practice of at least John’s churches and evidently met with his approval. So in the case of worship on the first day of the week we have a pattern that is repeated in the New Testament, and as is shown by Revelation 1:10, the pattern had become established.³¹

What can be said here about the “Lord’s Day” applies with equal force to the “Lord’s Supper/Agape.” Indeed, we may claim even more evidence for a normative practice of this meal since much more is said about it in the NT than about the Lord’s Day. Moreover, as Lincoln has noted, John alone uses the title Lord’s Day. Yet, as Lincoln further notes:

Although we have evidence for this pattern from only some parts of the early church, its rationale is not one that was applicable only to those parts or indeed applicable only to the early church period but one that remains applicable throughout the church’s life. Hence the practice of Sunday worship can be said to be not merely one that recommends itself because it bears the mark of antiquity but one that, though not directly commanded, lays high claim to bearing the mark of canonical authority.³²

This is likewise true in the case of the Agape. Although Jude alone uses this title, Paul, as we have seen, refers to the same meal and calls it the Lord’s Supper. Neither writer gives a direct command to adhere to this practice of holding a meal; yet, as in the case of John and the Lord’s Day, each writer assumes, by virtue of the use of a specialized name, that the practice is an established, universal custom. Moreover, as with the Lord’s Day, the “rationale” of the meal (inasmuch as it is part and parcel of the tradition that was handed down to Paul from the other Apostles, and inasmuch as it is a “reproduction” of the Last Supper³³) must apply equally and in the same way to all churches.

III. THE TESTIMONY OF EARLY CHURCH HISTORY

By the middle of the second century the Eucharist and the accompanying meal stand as separate ceremonies, presumably to keep the Eucharist from becoming profaned by the participation of unbelievers.³⁴ Jeremias thinks that the origin of this separation can be traced back to “the time of Paul”³⁵ and was done to safeguard the Eucharist from the unbaptized. However, while Jeremias’ rationale for this separation is no doubt valid, Townsend is probably correct in ascribing the separation to the post-apostolic period.³⁶ As Townsend notes:

At the earliest stage of the tradition however, there is no evidence that such a procedure [of separating the Eucharist from the Agape] was envisaged. We must be extremely careful not to read back into the NT from the undoubted practice of the second and subsequent Christian centuries.³⁷

This separation then most likely occurred during the second century; yet throughout the NT period and even beyond “Christians met together to hold common meals that were more than a token reception of bread and wine.”³⁸ Marshall is no doubt right in his belief that whatever may have been the relationship between the Eucharist and the common meal in later times, “they belonged together in New Testament times.”³⁹ Although we cannot know with certainty the exact date at which this separation occurred, we can nevertheless pinpoint the general period by examining some of the writings of the second century.

A. Tertullian

Although Tertullian does not make the express connection between the Eucharist and the Agape, we know with certainty that the Agape was still in practice during his time. In his Apology, Tertullian describes for us a meeting of the early church during an Agape.⁴⁰ His thrust is clearly to defend the Christian feast against false accusations of extravagance. Tertullian insists that at this feast Christians eat and drink as “temperate people,” eating only as much as satisfies hunger and drinking only as much as needed to quench thirst. Through it all, Tertullian gives no indication that there would be cessation of partaking of this meal. On the contrary, he insists that it involves nothing that can be considered illegal and characterizes the feast as a “rule of life” for Christians. Moreover, it seems likely that Tertullian views the Agape as the Lord’s Supper itself since he contrasts its practice with the meals held by the pagans in honor of Hercules and Serapis. It would be strange if the parallel he makes does not correspond to the Lord’s Supper.

B. Clement of Alexandria

In his The Instructor, Clement of Alexandria writes extensively about the Agape. As with Tertullian above, we cannot know with certainty whether the Eucharist is to be included in Clement’s Agape. However, there are indications that Clement sees the Agape and the Eucharist as integral parts of the same practice. When contrasting the Christian Agape with the feasts practiced by non-Christians he writes: “But we who seek the heavenly bread must rule the belly.”⁴¹ This can only be an allusion to John 6.

Clement’s language sometimes suggests that he is against the idea of a Christian feast altogether; yet it is clear that Clement is interested only in the separation of extravagance from the meal, not in abandoning the meal itself.⁴² He believes the Agape should be a means of showing love to the poor,⁴³ and is meant to provide sustenance, not pleasure.⁴⁴ Far from abandoning the Agape, Clement desires only to correct potential abuses of it.

C. The Letter of Pliny

One of the earliest pieces of evidence that we have for the postapostolic practice of the early church is that found in a letter of Pliny to the Emperor Trajan dated about AD 111-112. In this letter Pliny relates the testimony of former Christians who have defected and renounced Christ. The portion of the letter that alludes to the Agape is one that is often cited in quips and quotes in some of the more popular manuals of church history:

They were in the habit of meeting on a certain fixed day before sunrise and reciting an antiphonal hymn to Christ as God, and binding themselves with an oath—not to commit any crime, but to abstain from all acts of theft, robbery and adultery, from breaches of faith, from denying a trust when called upon to honor it. After this, they went on, it was their custom to separate, and then to meet again to partake of food, but food of an ordinary and innocent kind. And even this, they said, they had given up doing since the publication of my edict in which, according to your instructions, I had placed a ban on private associations.⁴⁵

The last two sentences are of particular interest to those attempting to pinpoint the exact date of the cessation of the Agape. Clearly Pliny can be describing nothing other than the Christian feast, and for this reason many scholars have seen in this edict the end of the Agape as practiced in the first century. Wainwright echoes the widely accepted view that the phrase, “even this they had given up doing since my edict,” refers to the church at large abandoning the common meal.⁴⁶ Goguel sees the word sacramentum (“oath”) as evidence that the Eucharist was transferred to the morning meeting after Pliny’s edict against social gatherings.⁴⁷ Kasper sees this as “clear evidence” for the separation of the Eucharist from the Agape in the second century.⁴⁸

But just how this letter supports the separation of the Eucharist from the Agape is not so apparent. Against Goguel’s view, sacramentum is probably best taken here as “oath.”⁴⁹ Moreover, Pliny speaks of the sacramentum as being practiced in the morning during the same pre-edict period as when the common meal was practiced in the evening. What reason then would there be for separating meal from Eucharist if they were being practiced separately before the edict?

The strongest argument for the cessation of the Agape in Pliny is the statement to which Wainwright refers:

It was their custom to separate, and then to meet again to partake of food, but food of an ordinary and innocent kind. And even this, they said, they had given up doing since the publication of my edict in which, according to your instructions, I had placed a ban on private associations.

Wainwright (among others) takes this to mean that the church universally abandoned the meal aspect due to the edict of Pliny that banned private associations. This assumes however that “they” refers to the entire church. It is more likely, in view of the fact that this is a report from ex-Christians who were making statements in denial of the charge that they were continuing in their associations with other Christians, that “they” refers here not to the church, but to these ex-Christians only. In other words, the ex-Christians had given up meeting with the church since the publication of the edict. These may have been nominal Christians who had joined the ranks of the church perhaps for social reasons and left for purposes of expediency; namely, the threat of execution!⁵⁰ Moreover, it is doubtful that the phrase, “and even this, they said, they had given up doing since the publication of my edict,” pertains to the Agape specifically, but more likely refers to any meeting with the church. Indeed, the ban was placed upon “private associations,” not specifically cultic meals. It was the apostate Christians who had “given up” meeting together, not the church.

D. The Didache

One other significant writing of the early second century that deserves mention in regard to the Agape is the Didache. In Did. 14 there are instructions on gathering together, one reason of which is to break bread. Didache 9-10, however, gives more explicit details about the early second century procedure for the eucharistic celebration. In Did. 10, immediately after the instructions about the sayings over the bread and cup, the writer says: “And after you are satisfied, thus give thanks,”⁵¹ and then proceeds to give instructions about prayer after the meal. The writer implies a meal here, for who could become “satisfied” on token elements? He makes the same allusion to a meal in the prayer said after the meal: “You, Almighty Master, created all things for your name’s sake, and gave food and drink to men for enjoyment.”⁵² The food for which the writer gives thanks is for “enjoyment,” not for representation. The allusion to a meal in connection with the Eucharist is revealing, for it indicates that the Agape was still very much a part of the Eucharist in the early second century.⁵³ It cannot be until later that the Agape faded from the scene. This in turn implies that there probably was no apostolic intent of the Agape ever ceasing. On the contrary, from Paul to Jude to the second-century church we have a consistent witness of a universal practice of the Agape without the slightest hint that it should not be practiced.

In the third and final part of this article, we will conclude our consideration of the Table of the Lord.

____________________

¹ Editor’s Note: This article was part of a booklet written by the author in 1996. It was published by the New Testament Restoration Foundation in Atlanta, GA. The plan is to publish the booklet in three parts in this journal. This is part 2, with part 1 having appeared in the Spring 2021 Journal. Due to length constraints, some sections are omitted, including some explanations found in footnotes. There are also format changes, such as the numbering of sections and the transliteration of Greek words. Regarding short form footnotes here in part 2, see part 1 for long form publication information. The full booklet, in its original format, can be found at: https://comingintheclouds.org/wpclouds7/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/the_table_of_lord_communion_Lords_supper.pdf. Used by permission.

² F. F. Bruce, First and Second Corinthians (London: Oliphants, 1971), 110.

³ C. K. Barrett, A Commentary on the First Epistle to the Corinthians (New York: Harper & Row, 1968), 262.

⁴ Michael J. Townsend, “Exit the Agape?” ExpT 90 (1978-79): 358.

⁵ H. R. Gummey, “Lord’s Supper,” The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979-88), 1923.

⁶ Fee, 468. So also Barrett, 231.

⁷ The early church must have understood the meal-aspect to be an integral part of the Lord’s Supper in order to have included this phrase; for as even Fee (554) concedes, it forms an “otherwise unnecessary role in the tradition.”

⁸ As Theissen (152) notes, “The formula presumes that there is a meal between the word over the bread and that spoken over the cup. One gets to the cup “after the supper” (italics his). See also Townsend, 357; Ringe, 62; and Bornkamm, 155.

⁹ Part 1 of this series is in the Spring 2021 edition of the JOTGES.

¹⁰ Marshall, Last Supper and Lord’s Supper, 111.

¹¹ Theissen, 152.

¹² So, e.g., Kasper (131-32), “The repetition of the special words and gestures of Jesus also came to be separated; [sic] at a very early stage, from the normal ‘full meal.’ This is already evident with Paul, in 1 Cor. 11:17-34.”

¹³ So Héring, 113. See also B. Klappert, “Lord’s Supper,” The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, vol. 2, ed. C. Brown (Grand Rapids: Zondervan/Exeter: Paternoster, 1975—78), 530, “the separation of the meal from the Lord’s Supper is also assumed in 1 Cor. 11. It is here that the direct cause of the Corinthian abuse lies.”

¹⁴ So Grosheide, 268. See also Frank C. Senn (“The Lord’s Supper, Not the Passover Seder,” Worship 60 [1986]: 366) who says, “If the Lord’s presence is attached to the bread and cup, the rest of the meal is superfluous…The Lord’s Supper is a ritual meal; it need not be an actual meal.”

¹⁵ So, e.g., Conzelmann (195) who, although seeing the Lord’s Supper in Corinth as a “real meal,” nevertheless views Paul’s corrective as an attempt “to separate the sacrament from satisfaction of hunger” so that the Supper “thereby loses its character of ‘agape.’” According to Conzelmann, “in this way the church celebration becomes a pure celebration of the Sacrament,” ibid.

¹⁶ So Higgins, 60-61, 71; and F. V. Filson, A New Testament History: The Story of the Emerging Church (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1964), 252.

¹⁷ Fee, 560.

¹⁸ Barrett, 263.

¹⁹ Cf. Marshall, Last Supper and Lord’s Supper, 110; Bornkamm, 129, 155; and Winter, 73.

²⁰ So Simon Kistemaker, Peter and Jude (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1987), 392; and W. Gunther and H. G. Link, “Love,” NIDNTT, vol. 2, 547; and, to some extent, J. N. D. Kelly, A Commentary on the Epistles of Peter and Jude, HNTC (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1969), 269-70.

²¹ Included here, among many others, are Green (188-89); Townsend (360); Marshall, Last Supper and Lord’s Supper, 110; Higgins (60), C. Spicq, Agape in the New Testament (St. Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1965), 370; R. Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter, WBC 50 (Waco, TX: Word, 1983), 84; and Edwin Blum “Jude,” EBC, 392.

²² Townsend, 360.

²³ Marshall, Last Supper and Lord’s Supper, 110.

²⁴ Higgins, 60.

²⁵ G. B. Caird, The Apostolic Age (London: Duckworth, 1975), 52.

²⁶ Spicq, 370.

²⁷ Other factors must be weighed as well, including the underlying theology of the practice, the way in which the practice is presented by the NT writers, and the extent to which the practice is distinct from the practices of the surrounding culture and other religious groups.

²⁸ Bauckham, “The Lord’s Day,” 221-50.

²⁹ Lincoln, 343-412.

³⁰ Bauckham, “The Lord’s Day,” 240.

³¹ Lincoln, 387-88.

³² Ibid., 388.

³³ Spicq, 370.

³⁴ J. Jeremias, The Eucharistic Words of Jesus (London: SCM, 1966), 116, 132-33

³⁵ Ibid., 133.

³⁶ Townsend, 359.

³⁷ Ibid., 360.

³⁸ Marshall, Last Supper and Lord’s Supper, 111.

³⁹ Ibid. 145.

⁴⁰ Tertullian, Apology 39:16, The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, vol. 10, ed. R. J. Defarrari, trans. R. Arbesmann, et al. (Washington, DC.: Catholic University of America Press, 1950), 101.

⁴¹ Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor, Book 2, 1:1, in Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 2, ed. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishing, 1994), 238.

⁴² Ibid., v. 15.

⁴³ Ibid., vv. 7, 11.

⁴⁴ Ibid., v. 8.

⁴⁵ Pliny to the Emperor Trajan 96, Book 10, vol. 2, rev. W. M. L. Hutchinson, trans. W. Melmoth (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1961), 403-405.

⁴⁶ Wainwright, 76.

⁴⁷ M. Goguel, The Primitive Church, trans. H. C. Snape (New York: Macmillan, 1964), 359.

⁴⁸ Kasper, 132.

⁴⁹ With Bruce, New Testament History, 424. Cf. The Oxford Latin Dictionary (ed. P. G. W. Glare [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983]) which gives the meaning, “an oath made to an organization,” military or otherwise; and The Latin-English Lexicon (ed. E. A. Andrews [New York: Harper & Brothers Publications, 1852]), which gives the meanings “a military oath of allegiance, a [non- military] oath, a solemn obligation.”

⁵⁰ The punishment for persistent refusal to recant [Christianity] was death: “So far this has been my procedure when people were charged before me with being Christians. . . I ordered them to be led off to execution,” Pliny to Trajan, Hutchinson, 401.

⁵¹ Lightfoot and Harmer, 232.

⁵² Ibid., 233.

⁵³ Contra G. D. Kilpatrick (The Eucharist in Bible and Liturgy, Moorehouse Lectures 1975 [Cambridge: CUP, 1983], 20) who believes these texts not to be referring to the Eucharist but to “an ordinary Christian meal.” Goguel (342), pointing out the similarities between chapters 9, 10, and 14, concludes that they all refer to the same rite.