We are covering a very familiar passage today: the Last Supper. But to thoroughly understand it, you really need to look at the traditions behind the Passover meal and the various allusions to the Old Testament that Matthew includes. Just consider the verses that directly bracket today's passage.
Matthew 26:15-16 “What will you give me if I betray him to you?” They weighed out to him thirty pieces of silver. And from that moment he began to look for an opportunity to betray him.
I then said to them, “If it seems right to you, give me my wages; but if not, keep them.” So they weighed out as my wages thirty shekels of silver.” (Zechariah 11:12)
The context of the Zechariah passage is the removal of the good shepherd from Israel, a flock then doomed to destruction.
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Matthew 26:31 Then Jesus said to them, “You will all become deserters because of me this night; for it is written, 'I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.'”
(see Zechariah 13:7)
When
Matthew 26:17 On the first day of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Where do you want us to make the preparations for you to eat the Passover?”
We could spend a whole lesson discussing this controversial subject. The Feast of Unleavened Bread was a 7-8 day celebration, and the first day was technically the day before Passover, since that meal was held after sundown and thus counted as the following day.
This seems to contradict the timing of the trial in John 19:14: “Now it was the day of Preparation for the Passover; and it was about noon.” Possible ways of resolving this issue are given below:
a. The Last Supper was not a true Passover meal
There are a number of differences between details of the two events. However, Matthew specifically says it was the Passover meal.
b. The Passover was celebrated early on purpose.
c. The calendar used in Galilee was different from the priestly calendar.
d. There were differences between various sectarian calendars. For example, the Essenes used a solar calendar to determine the date of Passover vs. others who used a lunar calendar.
e. There was a difficulty that year in determining the phases of the moon. So there was uncertainty as to when the month of Passover actually began.
f. It took two days to slaughter the lambs for the Preparation.
g. “Day of Preparation” in John's Gospel just meant the Friday of Passover week. This is because the phrase “Day of Preparation” had come to mean any Friday since that was when the Jews prepared for the Sabbath.
Matthew 26:18-19 He said, “Go into the city to a certain man, and say to him, 'The Teacher says, My time is near; I will keep the Passover at your house with my disciples.'” 19 So the disciples did as Jesus had directed them, and they prepared the Passover meal.
Why?: “My time is near.”
How?: Prior arrangements for Passover were usually needed at this crowded time although there was a
rule at this time that any available space was to be offered free of charge to those who needed it for the
Passover. Was it a supernatural event or planned ahead of time? The same ambiguity is seen here as
with the donkey story in Matthew 21:1-3.
Where?: It literally reads. “go to so-and-so's house.” This indicates a particular person whose name is
being withheld from us. Luke tells us that only Peter and John were delegated to go. The secrecy here
may have been to prevent Judas from knowing the location until later. It has been proposed that the
meeting was in the upper room of John Mark's house, in which case the man may have been Mark or
his father. This is a speculation, but there is some possible evidence:
“A certain young man was following him, wearing nothing but a linen cloth. They caught hold of him,
but he left the linen cloth and ran off naked.” Mark 14:51-52
“As soon as he (Peter) realized this (he had been freed from jail), he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose other name was Mark, where many had gathered and were praying.” Acts 12:12
Matthew 26:20-21
Who? Jesus and the Twelve and perhaps some other followers nearby but not at the table itself. This
has been used as evidence that this was not a Passover meal since Passover was a family celebration
held at home. But consider John 12:47-50: Someone told him (Jesus), “Look, your mother and your
brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.” But to the one who had told him this, Jesus
replied, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?” And pointing to his disciples, he said, “Here
are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and
sister and mother.”
This is important to keep in mind when we celebrate the Lord's Supper; it is a family meal for all
believers.
Matthew 26:22 They were very sad and began to say to him one after the other, “Surely you don’t
mean me, Lord?” or “Is it I, Lord?”
Jacques Ellul: “The situation is unheard of. Of these disciples, the twelve chosen to be the nucleus of the church, the first emissaries sent to proclaim the Good News, not one of them feels sure of himself...On the one hand, they completely trust what Jesus is saying, not doubting that one of them will betray him, and on the other hand each one of them feels capable of betrayal.”
I often give the Apostles a bad rap for being obtuse, but I really admire their honesty here. My tendency would be to say, “Is it he?” not “Is it I?”
“Examine yourselves, and only then eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For all who eat and drink without discerning the body, eat and drink judgment against themselves.” I Corinthians 11:28-29
By the way, what does Paul mean when he says “all who partake without discerning the body are eating and drinking judgment on themselves”? In its context, it refers to the corporate body of church as represented in each congregation.
Matthew 26:23 Jesus replied, “The one who has dipped his hand into the bowl with me will betray me.” Most scholars feel that Jesus' comments were meant to be vague and include any of them. There is one other possibility: At least in the Dead Sea community there was a hierarchy determining who reached out his hand first to eat. Judas may have been denying Jesus' leadership by not waiting for him to eat first.
“Even my bosom friend in whom I trusted, who ate of my bread, has lifted the heel against me. “ Psalm 41:9
If you want to duplicate what was in the bowl, just mix together mashed dates, figs and raisins with vinegar and water
Matthew 26:24
“As it is written” probably refers to such OT passages as the various Suffering Servant songs in Isaiah 42-53 and Psalm 22
The teaching is similar to that in Matthew 18:7: “Woe to the world because of stumbling blocks!
Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe to the one by whom the stumbling block comes!”
Many explanations have been given to excuse Judas' behavior: perhaps acting out of a mistaken belief
that he could hasten the coming of an earthly kingdom by forcing Jesus to act against the Romans.
Also, John's Gospel twice says that Satan put it into Judas' heart to betray Jesus, as if that excused him.
It is best understood as similar to the hardening of Pharaoh's heart. In both cases, the people committed
sin first and only later were confirmed in that sin by external forces.
Once in a Sunday school class I was teaching, I asked the class to chose between the following
possibilities to explain Judas' actions. Surprisingly, the results were almost equally divided between
these five, and one can find support for each of them in the Bible:
1. Greed (John 12:6; Matthew 26:14-15)
2. To hasten the kingdom (This best explains Judas' suicide afterward)
3. Disillusionment (Mark 14 anointing of Jesus made him morally indignant)
4. Possession by Satan (John 13:2,27a)
5. He was a mere tool of God (OT prophecies of the betrayal and John 13:21,26-27)
I had one Sunday school teacher who insisted that Judas was in heaven because he had earlier made a
profession of faith and “Once saved, always saved.” This, of course, is contradicted by the Gospel
accounts. John 17:12 calls Judas one doomed to destruction, and Jesus in this verse makes it clear that
Judas' fate is not just death or annihilation, but something worse.
Why is Judas being held responsible for an act that led directly to Christ's atoning death, which was
clearly according to God's will?
Gary Friesen in his book Decision Making and the Will of God has an interesting chart showing the
relationship between God's sovereign will, moral will, and human will. An overlap can occur between
the first and third of these.
Matthew 26:25 Then Judas, the one who would betray him, said, “Surely you don’t mean me, Rabbi?” Jesus answered, “You have said so.”
Jesus' slightly ambiguous reply is one that the other apostles might not have understood if they were eavesdropping. But generally, it means “yes.”
Jesus reply is identical to that in Matthew 26:63-64: The high priest said to him... “tell us if you are the Messiah, the Son of God.” Jesus said to him, “You have said so.” Also see Matthew 27:11: The governor asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus said, “You say so.”
Judas calls him Rabbi, but in Matthew's Gospel it it only non-believers who call Jesus Rabbi.
Matthew 26:26 While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take and eat; this is my body.”
“So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate.” Genesis 3:6
Joyce Kidner: “Two verbs in Gen. 3:6, 'take' and 'eat' describe a very simple act in the garden. That act,
however, required a very costly remedy, for the Lord himself would have to taste death before these
verbs became verbs of salvation.”
At Passover a half piece of matzo bread was set aside for the Messiah and later became identified with
the Messiah himself. Jesus offers himself as the Messiah and the disciples confess him to be so when
they partake. In Aramaic it would be “This, my body.” It can equally mean, “This represents/
symbolizes / points to my body.”
Matthew 26:27
There were four cups at Passover. Luke calls it the cup after supper This was the third cup associated
with a blessing in Jewish tradition. Each of the cups was tied in to a clause from Exodus 6:6-7. The
first two looked backwards and the last two looked forward. This cup meant “I will redeem you.”
I will take you out of Egypt
I will deliver you from slavery
I will redeem you
I
will take you as my people, and I will be your God
Exodus 6:6-7
Matthew 26:28 This is my blood of the (new) covenant, which is poured out for many for the
forgiveness of sins.
“New” is missing in the best ancient manuscripts, but is present in the parallel passages in Luke and I Corinthians.
There are many OT allusions here:
Moses took the blood and dashed it on the people, and said, “See the blood of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words (of the law).” Exodus 24:8
The author of Hebrews in the 9th chapter meditates on Christ's words and contrasts the two covenants; it is worth looking at on your own.
2. Because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. Zechariah 9:11
3. The days are surely coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah...this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people...for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more. Jeremiah 31:31-34
4. ...he poured out himself to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sins of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. Isaiah 53:12
“The effect on these Jewish disciples when it was first presented to them...can only be imagined.”
(France) We don't have to totally rely on our imagination. I give my grand-daughter a Bible lesson after
church most Sundays, and I was going through this lesson with her. When I had her read these words,
she got up dramatically and walked out of the room. She came back and said, “That's gross.” And then I
told her, “Imagine you were brought up Jewish and taught that even the animals you ate had to be
butchered in a particular way so that all the blood was drained out.”
Also just look at John 6. John doesn't mention the institution of the Lord's Supper specifically but in
verses 48-66 talks about us eating Jesus' flesh and drinking his blood.
I used to officiate at the Lord's Supper about once a month when I attended a small church in upstate
NY. I chose John's words for the communion meditation once, but never again. They were just a little
too graphic. I even get a little queasy reading them now.
Paul's added comments in I Corinthians 11:23-26: “Do this in remembrance of me” are the basis of our
continuing the practice today. The memorial looks both backward to his death and forward to his
coming just as the various cups at Passover symbolized both past and future deliverance of God's
people. But churches are divided today regarding the meaning of the Lord's Supper. There is no time to
discuss this subject in any detail now, but Wayne House's Charts of Christian Theology and Doctrine
has some convenient charts summarizing the views of various Christian groups on the Lord's Supper.
This is a good example of the difference between literal and figurative language in the Bible
It is good practice to assume that a passage is literal unless:
(a) it would lead to an absurdity
(b) it occurs in a figurative setting, such as book of poetry. Here we are in an historical section of the Bible where we should expect mainly literal language. However, the specific genre here is not history, but a teaching of Christ's, and he was constantly being misunderstood by his audience because he taught primarily through the use of figurative language such as parables and metaphors.
(c) it would contradict other biblical teachings
Against the literal view is the OT prohibition against eating or drinking blood which, according to the
Book of Acts, was extended even to first-century Gentile Christians. Then, concerning the Catholic
Mass specifically, there is an additional contradiction with Hebrews 7:27 on the once-only sacrifice of
Christ.
Matthew 26:29 I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I
drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”
This is one possible explanation for why Jesus did not drink the wine offered to him on the cross.
There are several references elsewhere in the Bible to the Heavenly Banquet.
“On this mountain the LORD of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear.” Isaiah 25:6-8
“Many will come from east and west and will eat with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of
heaven.” Matthew 8:11
“Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” Revelation 19:9
But there is another possible understanding of Jesus' words. Remember the four Passover cups:
I will take you out of Egypt
I will deliver you from slavery
I will redeem you
will take you as my people, and I will be your God (and I will bring you to the promised land)
Exodus 6:6-8
Some versions of the Passover observance include verse 8 of Exodus 6 as well. The fourth cup was
reserved for Elijah, who would reveal the Messiah bringing about the fulness of salvation. Jesus may
have been pointing to it when he said he would not drink it yet. It needs to wait until its fulfillment in
God's kingdom.
Matthew 26:30
We have a good idea what they were singing. During the Passover supper, most of the Hallel (“Praise”) Psalms were sung (Psalms 115-118), with the last psalm sung after dinner. At least in later years the Jews sang the last verses of that psalm antiphonally to represent the Messiah being greeted at his coming. It is interesting to imagine Jesus singing the part reserved for the Messiah and the apostles singing the rest.
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