Anamnesis: “Make Present,” or just “Remember”?

There are basically two ways of translating “anamnesis,” which is the word Christ uses in the institution of the Lord’s Supper when he says “do this in remembrance of me,” or “do this as my memorial.”

They mean basically the same thing, but the emphasis is different.  In any case, tied to the word anamnesis is the issue of remembering.  In a Eucharistic or Old Testament sacrificial context, it is the remembering of what God has done for his people and offering of oneself to him in return.  It is thanksgiving.

But what does it mean to remember?  Is remembrance a mere cognitive exercise, or is there something more to it?  Of course today, when we use the word, we generally mean simply to bring a past event to mind.  But is this a Biblical view of remembrance?

In his milestone work, The Shape of the Liturgy, Dom Gregory Dix modified the Roman Catholic suggestion of re-sacrifice in the Eucharist to something a little less offensive to the Biblical mind.  Or much less so.  He defines remembrance as the act of making present.¹

According to Dix, when the church remembers the sacrifice of Christ in the Eucharist, they are recalling it not only to mind, but also to present effect.  Remembrance brings the effects of a past event to bear on the present.  It identifies one directly with those people for whom that past event was a present reality.

Of course, since the popularization of this view, Roman Catholics have been using it to stump their Protestant friends who accuse them of viewing the Eucharist as a re-sacrifice.  “Why, no we don’t!  We believe it is simply a making present of the past sacrifice.”

Well, yeah, that’s true as far as it goes, but that’s only because they changed their tune.  Of course, they still believe it means to make physically present . . . though not locally, and that is where we go down the rabbit trail of medieval categories.

But aside from the dissonance, what about the basic melody of this new tune?  Is it any more pleasant than the last?  Let’s take a look.

First there is the language of how God himself remembers.

Genesis 9:15
I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh.

Exodus 2:24
And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.

There are many other similar examples.  And there is one interesting example that seems to have a very strong relation to God’s presence.

Numbers 10:9
And when you go to war in your land against the adversary who oppresses you, then you shall sound an alarm with the trumpets, that you may be remembered before the LORD your God, and you shall be saved from your enemies.

We should realize by now that Biblically speaking, remembrance is more than a cognitive recollection.  God certainly does not need to be cognitively reminded of his people or covenants.  He knows all, and he does not forget.  We should also note that when God remembers, it is always a catalyst to action.  The remembrance and the resulting action are so inseparable as to be one and the same.

So what about human remembrance?  How does God command us to remember?

Deuteronomy 15:15
You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God redeemed you; therefore I command you this today.

Was this command for that generation of the Exodus only?  This is after the forty years wandering in the wilderness.  An entire generation perished because of unbelief.  Most of those to whom Deuteronomy was given never saw slavery in Egypt.  How can they then rightly remember that God delivered them?  This is a question made all the more stark when we consider that the memorial sacrifices and feasts were to be observed by Israel continually.  Was the celebration of Passover by succeeding generations a mere cognitive exercise or was it an act of identification with God’s deliverance?

I read this passage a couple weeks ago, and found it quite interesting.  Pay attention especially to the pronouns.

Deuteronomy 26:3-10
“And you shall go to the priest who is in office at that time and say to him, ‘I declare today to the LORD your God that I have come into the land that the LORD swore to our fathers to give us.’ Then the priest shall take the basket from your hand and set it down before the altar of the LORD your God.

“And you shall make response before the LORD your God, ‘a wandering Aramean was my father. And he went down into Egypt and sojourned there, few in number, and there he became a nation, great, mighty, and populous. And the Egyptians treated us harshly and humiliated us and laid on us hard labor. Then we cried to the LORD, the God of our fathers, and the LORD heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. And the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great deeds of terror, with signs and wonders. And he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. And behold, now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground, which you, O LORD, have given me.’

Notice how the perspective shifts in the act of remembrance.  The one offering thanksgiving here moves from a sort of separation between himself and his fathers to the point where speaks of himself and his fathers as one identity.  “A wandering Aramean was my father . . . he went down into Egypt” becomes “the Egyptians treated us harshly . . . the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand . . . and gave us this land.”

See how the identity of Israel as a people converge into one identity.  What God did for the fathers he did for the one who offers thanksgiving.  The suffering of the fathers is to be remembered as the suffering of the one who makes sacrifice, so that the deliverance of God might be known for all generations.

How does this apply to us?  Well, if Abraham is our father, we must do the same.  The deliverance of Israel we must recognize as our own.  The word of the prophets called us to repentance.  And finally, Jesus died and rose again for us.  When we celebrate the Lord’s Supper, we make present that reality in the sense that we identify ourselves with the sacrifice of Christ.  In remembrance, the Holy Spirit really (spiritual realities are real no less than the physical) applies to us the effects of the sacrifice.

Benjamin Warfield, in speaking of the Lord’s Supper, wrote this:

Assuredly, for example, the sacrificial feast is not a repetition of the sacrifice; and equally certainly it is something more than a mere commemoration of the sacrifice: it is specifically a part of the sacrifice, and more particularly this part—the application of it. . . . Precisely what our Lord did therefore . . . he, the true Passover, the Lamb of God, that takes away the sin of the world—was to establish a perpetual sacrificial feast, under universal forms, capable of observation everywhere and at all times . . . All who partake of this bread and wine, the appointed symbols of his body and blood, therefore, are symbolically partaking of the victim offered on the altar of the cross, and are by this act professing themselves offerers of the sacrifice and seeking to become beneficiaries of it. That is the fundamental significance of the Lord’s Supper.  Whenever the Lord’s Supper is spread before us we are invited to take our place at the sacrificial feast, the substance of which is the flesh and blood of the victim which has been sacrificed once for all at Calvary . . . ²

So then, with Dix, we might affirm that remembrance is indeed a making present to us the reality of Christ’s one sacrifice, and with Warfield, who it appears would agree with that, we say that it is the application of the sacrifice to the one who partakes.

Anamnesis, then, is the recollection to us the realities of the past in such a way that they may no longer be thought of to be a mere past reality brought to mind, but a present one as well.

There are more things to look at in this.  For instance, how our celebration of the Supper brings us to God’s remembrance, and so into his presence.  I don’t want anyone to think I overlooked that.  Dix deals with this at length, and to properly address Dix, we have to consider that sense of the word.  But this is enough for one post.  I’ll probably look at this again.

Jesus is the Bread of Life: Lukan Bookends

We are into the third week of Advent, with Christmas less than a couple weeks off.  So I wanted to take a brief look at the Gospel of Luke, and particularly at Luke’s theme of Jesus as the Bread of Life.

Luke never actually calls Jesus “the bread of life”—that title comes from John’s Gospel.  But the theme of Jesus and His relationship and identification with bread runs deep through Luke’s account, with stories like the feeding of the five thousand, the comparing of the kingdom to leaven, etc.  In fact, the Gospel of Luke is bookended by stories that relate to bread.

At the end of Luke’s gospel we have the story of Jesus meeting the disciples on the road to Emmaus.  The crucifixion has taken place just a couple days prior, and two disciples are returning home from Jerusalem, somber for the events of the past week.  Jesus meets them on the road and expounds the entire Scripture to them and how the witness of the prophets made it plain that the Messiah must die and rise again on the third day.

Even so, they don’t really get it until Jesus administers to them the first Eucharist after the institution at the Last Supper.  He takes bread, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it to them.  That’s when their eyes are opened.  Jesus is here!  He is present with us now in the breaking of bread. It is the first anamnesis, and the disciples immediately recall what is meant by this ritual action.  Apart from the berakah, there are no words spoken by Jesus here.  It is the action itself that is the memorial—that reveals Christ to them and makes present the moment when he first took bread and said “This is my body, which is given for you.”

By now, Jesus has vanished, but his disciples have gotten the point.  So they do exactly the same thing that we are commissioned to do after every observance of the Supper—they return to Jerusalem, proclaiming the good news of Christ’s resurrection:

Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.
~Luke 24:35

In the same way, Jesus is known to us also in the breaking of bread.  It is Luke’s final lesson to us (until we get to Acts, where there is much more breaking of bread).

But back to our Christmas theme.  The story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus is the climax of Luke’s gospel.  It’s the realization of what he foreshadowed at the beginning of his account.

It is not insignificant for Luke that Jesus is born in a town called Bethlehem—the house of bread.  Matthew also records that Jesus is born in Bethlehem, but he is more focused on how the birth in Bethlehem fulfills the Old Testament prophets, and makes less of the name itself.

Luke, on the other hand, leaves aside the prophets for a moment to set out for us the scene of Jesus’ birth.  He first gives an extended account of what brought Mary and Joseph to this remote town, and then, in case we missed the significance of the town’s name, he includes the detail of Mary laying Jesus in a feeding trough (Luke 2:7).  The point is repeated and emphasized when the angels proclaim the good news to the shepherds.  “This will be a sign for you: you’ll find a baby . . . lying in a feeding trough” (verse 12).  Wait . . . that’s a sign?  A sign of what?  Again a third time, in case our wits are slow, Luke tells us: “They went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a feeding trough” (verse 16).

In Bethlehem.  In the house of bread.

So.  Have we got it yet?

Sources and additional reading:

Read more »

Names and Roman Weddings

“Ubi tu Caius, ego Caia.”
“Wherever thou art Caius, there I am Caia.”

I first came upon this phrase when reading Quo Vadis, and thought it was the sweetest thing ever.  After having given it some thought, I like it even more.  These are the words that were spoken by a Roman bride at her wedding, probably in response to the groom’s question, “What is your name?”

After the bride’s response, the groom would then (ideally) sweep her off her feet and carry her across the threshold into his home.

I think the phrase is pretty much the most succinct and, at the same time, possibly the most romantic one I have ever heard or read of in a wedding.  But there are specific reasons I find it so, which transcend mere sentimentality.  Those Romans were not much for bandying about words.  Not like the Greeks, in any case.  The less said the better, if it got the point across.  And these words are loaded.

We are all familiar with the traditional wedding vows, and the Roman one is much like them.  One might even find that our modern form originates here in part.  In this phrase, the bride vows to go and to be wherever her husband is, whenever he is.  Eternity is implied.  The phrase encapsulates the marriage vow (at least the bride’s side of it) into five words in the Latin.

It is also a symbolic renaming.  The bride declares that she is taking the name of her groom.  In this case, not literally.  There were dudes not named “Caius” who got married in Rome.  The name Caius/Caia (or Gaius/Gaia) means happiness and rejoicing.  An appropriate description of a wedding, intended to portend the fortunes of the new couple.

But no matter the given names of the couple, the symbolism remains.  The bride declares that she will henceforth be identified with her husband, as she has been identified with her father until this point.  In fact, by using the name Caius/Caia, she pledges not only her physical presence but her heart and her emotions as well.  Wherever he rejoices, there she also will find her joy.

To a Christian, what does this mean?  Can we possibly learn anything from the pagan Romans?  Sure, why not?  In the same way that the bride pledges her life to her groom and takes his name upon herself, we also have pledged our lives to Christ and taken His name.

The Church is the Bride of Christ, and every one of the baptized community is a member.  From the point of our entrance into that body to now, and until Christ returns, we should ever be saying:  “Wherever thou art Christ, there I am Christian.”

In fact, we do something like this every week before we come to the Lord’s table, our earthly foretaste of the Lamb’s marriage supper.  When the officiant asks the congregation: “Christian, in whom do you believe?” we respond, “I believe in one God the Father Almighty . . . And in one Lord Jesus Christ . . . And in the Holy Spirit.”

“In whom do you believe?” is a question very much like “What is your name?”  For we become identified with that in which we believe.  Our Credo is an affirmation of our baptism into the name of the Triune God.  And having confessed Christ and having declared our identity in Him as a body, we are then welcomed to the wedding feast at His table.

Regulative Principle and Weekly Communion, with some thoughts on the Calendar

There are many good and Biblical reasons for Christians to gather at the Lord’s Table in Communion to celebrate Eucharist every week.  But for this post I just want to focus on the reasons for doing so based on the Reformed Regulative Principle of worship.  In particular, I want to use a common objection to the Church Calendar and reapply it to the issue of the regular celebration of the Eucharist.

A great deal of emphasis in discussion of Regulative Principle is placed on what is not commanded for worship, and the prohibition of those things.  But I think we often overlook what is commanded when we look at the subject of Lord’s Day worship.

In regards to the Sabbath law of the fourth commandment, the Reformers were particularly concerned that any day might become more important than the Sabbath rest.  This is a legitimate concern in some ways, especially regarding discussions of the Church Calendar.  How many nominal Christians go to worship only on Easter and Christmas?  Or, even if they regularly attend, how many become more fervent at those times of year than at others?

Is Pascha or Christmas inherently any more holy of a day than a Lord’s Day in the middle of “ordinary time”?  I would argue not, and I’ll probably want to address my reasoning for that at a later date.

But in looking into those questions, another thing struck me.  If we want to take care not to elevate any day over the Sabbath, or even one Sabbath day over another, then what does this say for the widespread tradition of celebrating communion only monthly, or in some cases, even quarterly or annually?  Does this not elevate those Sabbaths above all others?  Have you ever seen in a church service bulletin the reminder: Next week is communion Sunday.  Please prepare your heart during the week and make certain to attend.

Even if the intent is not to elevate those days above others, doesn’t this lend itself to the idea that those days are more holy (set apart) than other Sabbaths?

My intent is not to condemn those who do not celebrate communion weekly as “Sabbath breakers.”  We all fall short in many ways, and we all must serve and worship God to the best of our understanding.  I only want to suggest that perhaps . . . just perhaps the Regulative Principle of worship that so many Reformed Christians hold to, if followed consistently, requires that the Lord’s Supper be celebrated every week in order to maintain equality of holiness from each Lord’s Day to the next.

Furthermore, I believe that if communion were viewed as indispensable and central to each worship service, a great part of the tendency some feel to inappropriately elevate Church Calendar days would simply evaporate.  Because every Lord’s Day would be holy to the Lord, a day in which we meet Christ in His Word and dine with Him at His table.

I’ll conclude with this quote from the Westminster Confession of Faith:

Chapter XXI.V
The reading of the Scriptures with godly fear, the sound preaching and conscionable hearing of the Word, in obedience unto God, with understanding, faith and reverence, singing of psalms with grace in the heart; as also, the due administration and worthy receiving of the sacraments instituted by Christ, are all parts of the ordinary religious worship of God: beside religious oaths, vows, solemn fastings, and thanksgivings upon special occasions, which are, in their several times and seasons, to be used in an holy and religious manner.

Note those practices that are “ordinary religious worship” as distinct from those that are “beside.”  To use my earlier definition of the word “ordinary,” I would say that the practices listed as such—reading of Scripture, preaching, hearing of the Word, singing of psalms, and due administration of sacraments—are to be regular weekly occurrences in the worship of each Lord’s Day.

Continuity Between Prophetic Worship and the New Testament: A Puritan’s Doorway to Traditional Liturgy (Part 3)

In this post I’d like to dig right into some really good stuff.  As we look at these parallels in a little more detail we can see clearly how the New Covenant worship is to be a fuller realization of the Old, rather than a disconnect.  So what can we find by way of continuity?

Sanctus

In Isaiah the prophet is given a view into heaven.  He sees YHWH sitting on a throne above all the earth, his robe filling the temple.  Interesting that the temple is seen by Isaiah to be in heaven, not in Jerusalem.  Or is it both?  That might be an interesting idea to explore later.  It is quite possible that YHWH is in the Jerusalem temple here, as the seraphim are standing above Him.  In any case, his robe is in the Temple, and fills it.  The worship of the seraphim is responsive:

And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”
~Isaiah 6:3

So YHWH is present in the Temple on earth while the angels glorify Him above.  Does this remind us of any scene of the New Covenant?  It should.  In Revelation the apostle John sees a similar sight.  Or is it identical?

At once I was in the Spirit, and behold, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne . . . And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say,

“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!” ~Rev. 4:2-8

From this we may see that the way God is to be worshiped, at least in heaven, has not changed from the time of Isaiah to Revelation.  It is no accident that the Jewish Synagogue worship included the Sanctus of Isaiah in their Sabbath liturgy.  They understood that the way God is worshiped in heaven is the way we are to worship him on earth.

It is also likely that while the Sanctus was sung in the synagogue, it originated in the service of the Temple before the time of Christ.  And it was not long before the Christian Church followed suit, incorporating the Sanctus into the liturgy of the Eucharist.

Hosanna and Benedictus

Closely related to the Sanctus in both Jewish and Christian liturgy is the Hosanna.  In Hebrew it means “save us!” and is drawn from Psalm 118.

Save us, we pray, O Lord! O Lord, we pray, give us success!  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! We bless you from the house of the Lord.
~Psalm 118:25-26

The people of Israel in the day of Christ understood that this was to be used to inaugurate the coming of the Messiah.  They sang this Psalm as Jesus entered the city of Jerusalem riding on a donkey, waving palm branches and spreading their garments at his feet.
(Matt. 21:9,  John 12:13)

The Hosanna also has connections to the book of Revelation.  There is a part in the vision that alludes directly to the triumphal entry, with all people of all tribes of all nations standing before the Lord with palm branches, just as the people of Israel did on Palm Sunday.

There is one marked difference, the contrast of which actually highlights a thematic continuity in the narrative of redemption.  Since Christ has conquered and is victorious, the Church now may say Hosanna (save us, Lord), but also says “salvation belongs to the Lord our God,” to which the angels reply in unison, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.” (Rev. 7:9-12)

Hallelujah (Alleluia)

Looking at the Hosanna will bring us directly to another parallel between Old Covenant and New.  The Psalms were written specifically to enhance and fill the worship of the Tabernacle and Temple.  What we find in the Psalms, if found in parallel in the New Testament, should tell us a great deal about how worship is to be done under the New Covenant.

One series of Psalms—the Hallel Psalms—is particularly striking.  Notice how often is repeated the call to “Praise YHWH” (Psalm 106:1, 111:1, 112:1, 113:1, 117:1, 135:1, 146:1, 147:1, 148:1, 149:1, 150:1).  A total of eleven Psalms begin with “Hallelujah!”  Clearly the call to Praise the Lord was a pervasive and integral part of the Old Covenant Temple worship.  By now we should not be surprised that we find the same liturgical call in the New Testament.

For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God’s truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, and in order that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy.  As it is written,

“Therefore I will praise you among the Gentiles,
and sing to your name.”

And again it is said, “Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people.”

And again, “Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles, and let all the peoples extol him.”  ~Romans 15:8-11

Clearly, Hallelujah is not only for Israel.

After this I heard what seemed to be the loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, crying out, “Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God . . .

Once more they cried out, “Hallelujah! The smoke from her goes up forever and ever.”

And the twenty-four elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshiped God who was seated on the throne, saying, “Amen. Hallelujah!”

And from the throne came a voice saying, “Praise our God, all you his servants, you who fear him, small and great.”

Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out, “Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns.

~Rev. 19:1, 3-6

Commentary

The people of God said and sang Hallelujah in God’s Temple under the Davidic litugical reforms, the Gentiles say Hallelujah as salvation comes from Israel and floods the nations.  The elders in heaven continually say Hallelujah before the throne of Christ.  They sing Hosanna—save us in the highest—as well as the acclamation celebrating that salvation, waving palms to welcome the king.  The seraphim say Sanctus—”Holy, Holy, Holy”—continually before the throne of God, glorifying the Three-in-One.

What’s more, in each description they do it very much in the same way throughout history, employing the same kind of language, with the same reverence and with the same manner of call and response between officiant(s) and congregation.  I find it hard to understand how Christians can read these descriptions of worship in both Old and New Covenant and then say we ought not to do it that way because it is not explicitly commanded.

But it is explicitly commanded!  The liturgy is the invasion of Heaven into Earth.  This is God’s glory breaking in upon our world and the worship of His person joining all the saints through out history in the past, present, and future, into a united divine service.  We cannot say “thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven” and then refuse to do not only what is done in heaven now and forever shall be in the future, but was already done in Israel for a thousand years.  There is no justification for a hiatus from reverent and vibrant liturgical worship.

The elements of the liturgy in the New Testament book of Revelation are not merely something to look forward to in eternity.  It is a description of how worship is to be done now, deeply rooted in an awareness of how worship was done then.  And we haven’t even touched on how incense, posture, musical instruments, and food are used in both Old Covenant worship and in the New.

As Reformed and Evangelical Christians, it is no credit to us that we look at the rite of the Roman Mass or the Orthodox Divine Liturgy and say,
“Oh, that’s rote.  We don’t do that” and then discard not only the corruptions but also the Scriptural elements of liturgy as “mere traditions of men.”  Or, even if we think the tradition is itself okay, we askew Biblical worship in order to avoid guilt by association.  After all, we wouldn’t want to look Catholic . . .

Methinks as Protestants we sometimes protest the wrong things, and far too loudly.  As far as I can see, the Reformed Regulative Principle not only permits us to employ a rich and engaging liturgy to worship God.  Rather, it demands it.

Next time: Keeping Time