ART. or did, according to thofe forms with which they were XXVIII. acquainted.

There were after fupper, upon a new covering of the table, loaves of unleavened bread, and cups of wine fet on it; in which though the bread was very unacceptable, yet they drank liberally of the wine: Chrift took a portion of that bread, and brake it, and gave it to his Difciples, and faid, This is my body which is broken for you: Do this in remembrance of me. He did not fay only, this is my body, but, this is my body broken; fo that his body must be understood to be there in its broken state, if the words are to be expounded literally. And no reafon can be affigned why the word broken should be fo feparated from body; or that the bread fhould be literally his body, and not literally his body broken: the whole period must be either literally true, or must be understood mystically. And if any will fay, that his body cannot be there but in the fame ftate in which it is now in heaven; and fince it is not now broken, nor is the blood fbed or feparated from the body there, therefore the words. must be understood thus; This is my body which is to be broken. But from thence we argue, that fince all is one period, it must be all understood in the fame manner : and fince it is impoffible that broken and bed can be underftood literally of the body and blood, that therefore the whole is to be myftically understood: and this appears more evident, fince the Difciples, who were naturally flow at understanding the eafieft myfteries, that he opened to them, must naturally have understood those words as they did the other words of the pafchal fupper, This is the Lord's paffover; that is, this is the memorial of it: and that the rather, fince Chrift added these words, Do this in remembrance of me. If they had understood them in any other fenfe, that must have surprised them, and naturally have led them to ask him many queftions: which we find them doing upon occafions that were much less surprising, as appears by the queftions in the 14th of St. John, that difcourfe coming probably immediately after this inftitution: whereas no queftion was afked upon this; fo it is reasonable to conclude that they could understand these words, This is my body, no other way, but as they underftood that of the lamb, This is the Lord's paffover. And by confequence, as their celebrating the pafcha was a conftant memorial of the deliverance out of Egypt, and was a fymbolical action by which they had a title to the bleffings of the covenant that Mofes made with their fathers; it was natural for them to conclude, that after Christ had

made

made himself to be truly that, which the first lamb was in a type, the true facrifice of a greater and better passover ; they were to commemorate it, and to communicate in the benefits and effects of it, by continuing that action of taking, bleffing, breaking, and diftributing of bread: which was to be the memorial and the communion of his death in all fucceeding ages.

ART.

XXVII.

This will yet appear more evident from the fecond part of this inftitution: he took the cup and bleffed it, and gave it to them, faying, This cup is the New Teftament, or New Covenant, in my blood: drink ye all of it. Or, as the other Golpels report it, This is my blood of the New Teftament, which is fhed for many for the remiffion of fins. As Mofes had enjoined the fprinkling of the blood of the lamb, fo he himself sprinkled both the book of the law, and all the people, with the blood of calves and of goats, faying, This is the blood of the Teftament Heb.ix. 20. (or Covenant) which God bath enjoined you. The blood of the pafchal lamb was the token of that covenant which God made then with them.

The Jews were under a very ftrict prohibition of eating

no blood at all: but it feems by the Pfalms, that when Pfal. cxvi. they paid their vows unto God, they took in their hands a cup of falvation, that is, of an acknowledgment of their falvation, and fo were to rejoice before the Lord.

26, 27.

These being the laws and cuftoms of the Jews, they could not without horror have heard Chrift, when he gave them the cup, fay, This is my blood: the prohibition of blood was given in fuch fevere terms, as that God would Levit. vii. fet his face against him that did eat blood, and cut bim off Levit. xvii. from among bis people. And this was fo often repeated in 14 the books of Mofes, that befides the natural horror which humanity gives at the mention of drinking a man's blood, it was a special part of their religion to make no ufe of blood: yet after all this, the Disciples were not startled at it; which fhews that they must have understood it in fuch a way as was agreeable to the law and cuftoms of their country: and fince St. Luke and St. Paul report the words that our Saviour faid when he gave it, differently from what is reported by St. Matthew and St. Mark, it is most probable that he fpake both the one and the other; that he firft faid, This is my blood, and then, as a clearer explanation of it, he faid, This cup is the New Tefiament in my blood: the one being a more eafy expreffion, and in a style to which the Jews had been more accustomed. They knew that the blood of the lamb was sprinkled; and by their fo doing they entered into a covenant with God:

33.

ART. and though the blood was never to be sprinkled after the XXVIII. firft paffover; yet it was to be poured out before the Lord,

in remembrance of that fprinkling in Eygpt: in remembrance of that deliverance, they drank of the cup of bleffing and falvation, and rejoiced before the Lord. So that they could not underftand our Saviour otherwife, than that the cup fo bleffed was to be to them the affurance of a New Teftament or Covenant, which was to be established by the blood of Chrift; and which was to be thed: in lieu of which they were to drink this cup of bleffing and praife.

According to their cuftoms and phrafes, the Difciples could understand our Saviour's words in this fenfe, and in no other. So that if he had intended that they fhould have understood him otherwife, he must have expreffed himself in another manner; and must have enlarged upon it, to have corrected thofe notions, into which it was otherwife moft natural for Jews to have fallen. Here is alfo to be remembered that which was formerly obferved upon the word broken, that if the words are to be expounded literally, then if the cup is literally the blood of Christ, it must be his blood bed, poured out of his veins, and feparated from his body. And if it is impoffible to understand it fo, we conclude that we are in the right to understand the whole period in a myftical and figurative fenfe. And therefore fince a man born and bred a Jew, and more particularly accustomed to the pafchal ceremonies, could not have underftood our Saviour's words, chiefly at the time of that feftivity, otherwife than of a new covenant that he was to make, in which his body was to be broken, and his blood hed for the remiffion of fins; and that he was to substitute bread and wine, to be the lafting memorials of it; in the repeating of which, his Difciples were to renew their covenant with God, and to claim a fhare in the bleffings of it; this, I fay, was the fenfe that must naturally have occurred to a Jew; upon all this, we muft conclude, that this is the true fenfe of thefe words; or, that otherwife our Saviour must have enlarged more upon them, and expreffed his meaning more particularly. Since therefore he faid no more than what, according to the ideas and customs of the Jews, must have been understood as has been explained, we must conclude, that it, and it only, is the true fenfe of them.

But we must next confider the importance of a long difJohn vi. 32, courfe of our Saviour's, fet down by St. John, which feems fuch a preparation of his Apoftles to understand this inftitution literally, that the weight of this argument muft turn upon the meaning of that difcourfe. The design of

that

XXVIII.

that was to fhew, that the doctrine of Chrift was more ART. excellent than the law of Mofes; that though Mofes gave the Ifraelites manna from heaven, to nourish their bodies, yet notwithstanding that they died in the wilderness: but Chrift was to give his followers fuch food that it should give them life; fo that if they did eat of it, they should never die: where it is apparent, that the bread and nourishment must be fuch as the life was; and that being eternal and fpiritual, the bread muft be fo understood: for it is clearly expreffed how that food was to be received; be that be- John vi. 40. lieveth on me bath everlasting life.

Since then he had formerly faid, that the bread which he was to give, fhould make them live for ever; and fince here it is faid, that this life is given by faith; then this bread must be his doctrine: for, this is that which faith receives. And when the Jews defired him to give them evermore of that bread, he answered, I am the bread of ver. 47, 48, life: be that comes to me fhall never bunger; and be that ke-51. lieveth on me fball never thirst.

In these words he tells them that they received that bread by coming to him, and by believing on him. Chrift calls himself that bread, and fays, that a man must eat thereof; which is plainly a figure: and if figures are confeffed to be in fome parts of their difcourfe, there is no reafon to deny that they run quite through it. Chrift fays, that this bread was his flesh, which he was to give for the life of the world; which can only be meant of his offering himself up upon the crofs for the fins of the world. The Jews murmured at this, and faid, How can this man give us bis flefb to eat? To which our Saviour answers, that except they did eat the flesh and drink the blood of the ver. 53, Son of man, they had no life in them.

Now if these words are to be understood of a literal eating of his flesh in the Sacrament, then no man can be faved that does not receive it: it was a natural confequence of the expounding these words of the Sacrament, to give it to children, fince it is fo exprefsly faid, that life is not to be had without it. But the words that come next carry this matter farther; whofo eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood bath eternal life. It is plain that Chrift is here fpeaking of that, without which no man can have life, and by which all who receive it have life: if therefore this is to be expounded of the Sacrament, none can be damned that does receive it, and none can be faved that receives it not.

Therefore fince eternal life does always follow the eating of Chrifl's flesh, and the drinking his blood, and cannot

Ee 3

be

54, 55.

ART be had without it; then this must be meant of an internal XXVIII. and fpiritual feeding on him: for, as none are faved with

John vi. 56.

ver. 63.

Marc Nevochim.

out that, fo all are faved that have it. This is yet clearer from the words that follow, my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed: it may well be inferred, that Chrift's flesh is eaten in the fame fenfe, in which he fays it is meat: now certainly it is not literally meat; for none do fay that the body is nourished by it; and yet there is fomewhat emphatical in this, fince the word indeed is not added in vain, but to give weight to the expreffion.

It is alfo faid, be that eats my flesh and drinks my blood, dwells in me and I in him. Here the defcription feems to be made of that eating and drinking of his flesh and blood; that it is fuch as the mutual indwelling of Chrift and believers is. Now that is certainly only internal and fpiritual, and not carnal or literal: and therefore fuch alfo muft the eating and drinking be.

All this feems to be very fully confirmed from the conclufion of that difcourfe, which ought to be confidered as the key to it all; for when the Jews were offended at the hardness of Chrift's difcourfe, he faid, It is the fpirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words I speak unto you, they are fpirit, and they are life: which do plainly import, that his former difcourfe was to be understood in a spiritual sense, that it was a divine /pirit that quickened them, or gave them that eternal life, of which he had been fpeaking; and that the flesh, his natural body, was not the conveyer of it.

All that is confirmed by the fenfe in which we find eating and drinking frequently used in the Scriptures, according to what is obferved by Jewish writers; they ftand for wifdom, learning, and all intellectual apprehenfions, through which the foul of man is preferved, by the perfection that is in them, as the body is preferved by food: So, Buy and eat; eat fat things; drink of wine well refined.

Maimonides alfo obferves, that whenfoever eating and drinking are mentioned in the Book of Proverbs, they are to be understood of wisdom and the law: and after he has brought feveral places of Scripture to this purpose, he concludes, that becaufe this acceptation of eating occurs fo often, and is fo manifeft, as if it were the primary and most proper fenfe of the word; therefore bunger and thirst stand for a privation of wisdom and understanding. And the ChalIfa. xii. 3. dee Paraphraft turns these words, ye jhall draw water out of the wells of falvation; thus, ye ball receive a new doctrine with joy from fome felect perfons.