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by Tony Cassidy CSSR)
A Talk to the Ecumenical
Society of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Canterbury, 29th October
2007
Published on our website with the permission of the author.
Preliminary Note:
It is a principle of biblical study or exegesis that an understanding
of the context of a particular quotation is vital to its proper
interpretation: it is easy to quote a verse or passage of scripture to support
a certain point of view (this is called using a proof text), but often
an examination of the wider setting of the words in question, and an
understanding of the background of the society in which the author was at work,
as well as the literary conventions of the time can yield quite a different
interpretation or meaning.
* * * * *
The central figure in the Gospel tradition is Jesus of Nazareth, and any
other person in the story is to be understood in relation to him. This
principle applies to the figure of Mary. Her importance in the gospels of
Matthew and Luke lies in her role in the mystery of the Incarnation, the coming
of the Son of God into our world as one of us (St Athanasius describes her as
the guarantee of the Incarnation). Luke presents her not only as a woman
and mother, but also as the model disciple of Jesus, one who hears the word of
God and puts it into practice (1:38, 11:28). For him, this is her true
significance. Her status as the physical or natural mother of Jesus is
subordinate to this, and the emphasis on discipleship as listening to the word
of God and putting it into practice is clear from the incidents regarding the
defining of the true family of Jesus (8:19-21) and praise for Mary as his
physical or biological mother (11:27-28). In the first of these, Luke presents
his mother and his brothers in a more positive light than do the other
synoptic evangelists (Mark 3:31-32, Matt 12:46-50), who make a clear
distinction between Jesus’ natural family and his true family,
which consists of the circle of disciples around him.
In the first of these examples, the members of his natural family are
presented as deliberately standing outside the house and summoning Jesus to
them, in Mark probably because they have heard reports that he is out of his
mind (Mark 3:21). Luke’s presentation is much more favourable, following
onto the picture which he paints of Mary in the first two chapters of his work
(the theological account of the birth of Jesus, which serves as the overture to
the body of the gospel, in which the main themes to be developed later are
introduced.
In the second of these scenes (11:27-28), when a woman calls out from
the crowd, Blessed is the womb that carried you and the breast that suckled
you! in other words, Blessed is your mother, Jesus deflects the
attention from the fact of Mary’s being his physical mother to that of her
exemplifying the characteristics of the person who is his disciple, Blessed
are those who hear the word of God and keep it: for Luke, there is no
distinction between the two groups, Jesus’ relatives are members of the
circle.
We should note that the work of Luke includes the Acts of the Apostles,
and is generally known as Luke-Acts. The Gospel has a geographical theme which
shows Jesus travelling towards Jerusalem, the focal point at which the
saving event of his passion, death and resurrection will take place: in Acts,
Jerusalem becomes the centre from which the missionary activity of the
community of disciples radiates. At the beginning of both of these stages of
the story of redemption, Mary is present at the coming of the Holy Spirit,
which represents God’s power at work in human beings to carry out the
divine plan, first at the Annunciation (1:35), and then at Pentecost (Acts
1:14, 2:1-4).
The fact that Luke presents Mary as present at Pentecost with the other
disciples, who number about one hundred and twenty in all, who had
accompanied Jesus during his ministry and were with him (the whole multitude
of disciples (19:37) when he entered Jerusalem, were present at the Mount
of Olives immediately after the Last Supper (22:39) and at the crucifixion
(23:49), suggests strongly that the evangelist envisages the entire group of
disciples, including the women mentioned at 8:1-3, as participating in the
celebration of the Passover (the Last Supper, 22:14-38), which takes place at
the heart of the events located in or near the city.
It is worth noting in passing that many of our ideas about scenes
from the bible owe more to sacred art than to the actual text describing the
event or incident: for instance, the accounts of the birth of Jesus by Luke and
Matthew are to all intents and purposes two entirely separate stories with
practically no details in common. As will become clear, our conception of the
Last Supper is probably coloured by the fresco of Leonardo da Vinci.
It might be useful to consider the idea of the Twelve in the
context of the disciples. It is clear that Jesus chooses them from the
wider group (6:15) and given the additional title apostles (Luke
specifically says that he also named them apostles). The significance of
the number is that they represent the twelve patriarchs of the twelve tribes of
Israel, the community which Luke understands to be replaced by the christian
church, hence the need to make up the number again after the defection of
Judas, in preparation for the Pentecost event (Acts 1:15-26).
Although the Twelve constitute a kind of inner circle within the
whole multitude of disciples, their prominence diminishes with the
appointment of the Seven ((deacons) Acts 6:1-6) and the conversion of Saul/Paul
(Acts 9:1-22): they are the only ones who remain in Jerusalem when persecution
breaks out (Acts 8:1), and take no direct part in the wider mission. Their only
further role in the story is to adjudicate on the question as to whether
gentile converts were to be obliged to observe Jewish customs (15:1-21). With
the coming of the Spirit, which is the completion of the Easter event,
Jerusalem loses its significance as the locus of salvation, and with the
ministry of Stephen and then of Paul, the preaching of the gospel, which means
giving witness to the risen Christ, passes from the Twelve, and they gradually
fade from the story. It may be of interest to note in this connection, that
after all the concern to complete the number of the Twelve, Matthias is never
mentioned again.
Note: the term “apostle” is not restricted in the
wider New Testament to the twelve disciples specially chosen by Jesus. Paul,
writing before the gospels were written, uses the term about himself, citing an
experience (“Seeing”) of the Risen Lord as the criterion (1 Cor 9:1),
and mentions “apostles” as one of the ranks of ministers within the
body of Christ (1 Cor 12:28).
* * * * *
There is, as mentioned already, a consistent picture of a wider group
accompanying Jesus during his ministry: to have done so, all the while the
Lord Jesus was going about among us, from his baptism by John until the day
when he was taken up from us, is the qualification for being elected to the
number of the Twelve. We might consider some indications as to the nature of
this group.
We have seen that Jesus calls the Twelve out of a larger group (Luke
6:12-16). Luke mentions three women by name and many other women who
accompany him and the Twelve on a preaching tour and look after them out of
their own resources (8:1-3). Jesus sends out two sets of disciples on parallel
missions, the Twelve (9:1-6) and the Seventy (-two) (10:1-20). The total comes
reasonably close to that of the hundred and twenty gathered before
Pentecost, and it is clear that women are included in the circle of Jesus’
disciples. There is no reason from the text of the gospel for confining the
mission which Jesus entrusts to the disciples simply to male disciples.
There is also no reason from the text why the companion of Cleopas on the road
to Emmaus could not be his wife or other female companion (24:13-35, cf John
19:25, which speaks of Mary, the wife of Clopas: there are connections
between the traditions underlying these two gospels).
* * * * *
The Last Supper (Luke 22:1-38)
We now come to consider the Last supper itself. Jesus sends Peter and
John to prepare the Passover, and to ask “where is the guest room, where I
am to eat the Passover with my disciples?” (22:11). The word in the
original text, which is translated as guest room is in fact the same
word normally rendered as inn during the story of the arrival of Mary
and Joseph in Bethlehem (2:7), so it suggests a sizeable building containing a
large upper room (22:12). (A better contemporary term, which would
capture the transitory character of the pilgrim clientele might be
motel. The Passover was one of the three pilgrimage feasts which
were celebrated at Jerusalem, the others being Tabernacles and Dedication. It
would seem that this is the place where the disciples lived for the duration of
their stay in Jerusalem, rather than being simply a dining-room for this one
significant meal, and was large enough to accommodate about one hundred and
fifty persons (see Acts 1:13-14).
The city was regarded as being the property of the nation, and the
inhabitants were expected to extend hospitality to the pilgrims, so the idea of
the two putting this question to a perfect stranger is not as peculiar as it
might seem at first glance.
Although the celebration of the Passover had been centralised around the
Temple and Jerusalem, it never lost its character as an essentially family
occasion, so although the lambs destined for the meal were slaughtered in the
Temple precincts, the priests took no other official part in the feast. The
presence of women and children is taken for granted. The story of the
institution of the Passover is related in chapters 12-13 of Exodus, and lest
the significance of the use of blood and unleavened bread be lost, ritual
questions are prescribed: And when your children ask you, “What is the
meaning of this rite?”, you must say, “It is the Lord’s Passover
… “ (Exod 12:26-27). The explanation of the unleavened bread, and
of the redeeming of this first-born, is directed specifically to the son (Exod
13:8,14-15).
The text then suggests that although Luke says that when the hour
came, he sat at table, and the apostles with him, this need not mean that
only the twelve were present (as the da Vinci fresco would have it), but
rather that there was a “top table”, with the other disciples around
and nearby. As Joachim Jeremias observed in 1966, “According to Mark 14:17
(par Matt 26:20) Jesus celebrated the Last Supper with the Twelve. It is not
possible, however, to assume from this that the women mentioned in Mark 15:40;
Luke 23:49,55 were excluded; in Eastern text the argument from silence is
inadmissible in such cases” (my italics. He had earlier expressed
surprise at the absence of the women who appear elsewhere in the gospel in the
first edition, published in 1955. Another scholar, E. Schweizer, suggested that
without women present, the Last Supper could not have been a Passover meal).
When Jesus speaks to the disciples during the course of the supper, he
mentions that the leader of the disciples should be like himself, one who
serves (22:27): the only others to whom this term is applied in the gospel,
during his ministry, are women, Peter’s mother-in-law (4:39), the women
from Galilee (8:3) and Martha (10:40), who exemplify the kind of leadership he
expects from his disciples.
Jesus also says, you are those who have continued with me in my
trials (22:28). If these trials (or better, tests) refer to
events during his ministry, then the statement applies to a wider group than
simply the Twelve (granted that Jesus is presented as speaking to them (see
22:30, 31-34, but then he mentions the mission, also entrusted to the
seventy-two (9:1-6, 10:1-20). If the trials/tests anticipate the coming
events of the passion, then all the disciples, including the women, are with
Jesus at the cross (23:49), the women witness his burial by Joseph of Arimathea
(not one of the Twelve, 23:50-55), prepare ointment for anointing his body and
return to the tomb on the third day (24:1). Twice during those accounts Luke
recalls that they (the women) had been following Jesus ever since Galilee
(23:49,55). The picture of their perseverance could hardly be more clear”
(Q. Quesnell, Supper (71).
Mary, the mother of Jesus, is presented as being among the
disciples of Jesus during his ministry and at Pentecost. If she is present
before and immediately after the Last Supper, there is no reason, on the level
of narrative, to exclude her from that celebration of the Passover.
* * * * *
Conclusion
The words of Jesus in Luke’s account of the Last Supper are
addressed to the whole multitude of the disciples. These words include
the command, Do this in memory of me, and refer to the celebration of
the eucharist, not simply to the consecration of the bread and wine. The
biblical idea of memorial does not refer to the simple re-enactment of
the Last Supper presided over by the human Jesus, but rather the ritual renewal
of what that symbolises, namely the saving event of his passion, death and
resurrection. This tradition goes back to the earliest days of the community of
disciples, to the time before Paul (see 1 Cor 11:23-26), and is entrusted to
the whole community of disciples, not just to the twelve.
Reflections
When we study questions relevant to the church of our own day, it is
natural that we look to the New Testament for light, but we should bear in mind
that we may not find answers to specific questions which were not of direct
concern or interest to the writers of that body of texts.
The church holds that there are two ways in which God’s word
(Revelation) is transmitted, namely, Scripture and Tradition: the first is
fixed and cannot be altered, the second develops and has to find a different
way of expressing what the church believes, in a way which is relevant and
understandable to the time in which it finds itself. This Tradition is the
church’s reflecting on divine truth contained in the Scriptures, and
anything in this Tradition must be contained, at least in principle in
the sacred writings.
It is essential to distinguish between Tradition
and custom. Tradition is the living belief of the
christian community. This community is hierarchical and organised, and
therefore ways of acting and behaving have grown up and developed over the
centuries, but, although we may refer to customs as traditions, they are not to
be identified with the Tradition of the church. In our present study, for
example, the celebration of the eucharist, instituted by Jesus Christ, is part
of Tradition: the way in which this celebration is conducted, and who presides
at the assembly is not. It is the function of the Magisterium, the teaching
authority in the church, to clarify and articulate what the church, the people
of God, believes: it is not the function of the teaching authority to propose
new doctrines.
The New Testament does not associate presiding at the eucharist with any
named officials of the community.
The priest today acts within the liturgy in persona Christi, and
also represents the church, using the pronoun we when praying in the
name of the community. All baptised persons have put on Christ as a
garment (Gal 3:37), just as all human beings are created in the image and
likeness of God (Gen 1:27), and so can properly represent the Risen Christ.
The Pontifical Biblical Commission, set up to study the role of women in
the Bible and whether or not women can be ordained to the priestly ministry
(especially as ministers of the eucharist and as leaders of the Christian
community), pointed out in its Report in 1976 the limits of such a study,
and concludes that it does not seem that the New Testament by itself alone
will permit us to settle in a clear way and once and for all the problem of the
possible accession of women to the presbyter ate.
Perhaps we should ask of any ecclesiastical practice or custom: does
it reflect the mind of Christ? If it does not, then it must be changed.
When we consider the christian community, perhaps the key text should be that
from the letter to the Galatians, which precedes the written gospels:
Baptised into union with him, you have put on Christ Jesus like a
garment. There is no such thing as Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and
female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus (Gal 3:28-28).
*******
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