§1. Introduction
Approached from an interpretive tradition that sees the Bible as a collection of oral histories, Luke’s Institution Narrative in chapter 22 appears, like so many other narratives in the Bible, to be a patchwork quilt of competing retellings that the evangelical redactor was unable or unwilling to fully reconcile. Is it nothing more than an amalgamation of mutually inconsistent accounts that we need to interpret, like the creation accounts, as a high-level pedagogy of divine providence? Or might there be some way to understand the apparent redundancy, inconsistent chronology and linguistic conflict as the deliberate decision of a single author?
Modern interpretation leans toward the understanding that the meal celebrated in the upper room by Jesus and his disciples was not the Passover, and that he used bread and wine at the beginning and end of the meal to "represent his coming death" as a necessary if inscrutable prerequisite to the ushering in of the kingdom. [1] Since there is little effort to defend inerrancy in contemporary scholarship, discrepancies with Mark’s account of the prediction of betrayal and with both Matthew and Mark’s account of the greatest disciple dispute go largely unremarked. [2] On the other hand, interpretations of seemingly contradictory or at least inconsistent creation accounts have been reconciled by modern authors without resort to artificial harmonization. [3] It seems plausible, then, that a similar insight might make better sense of Luke’s weaving of prima facie unrelated material than the modern redaction or form hypotheses.
Let us suppose, then, that Luke’s purpose is to narrate the Last Supper in such a way that he fulfills his primary evangelical goal of illustrating how Christ establishes the Kingdom. I will attempt to provide a compelling argument that the Last Supper is Christ’s celebration of the Passover meal, during which he both inaugurates the Kingdom of God and establishes the New Covenant. The argument will be based primarily on typological parallels with the Exodus and the Mosaic covenant revealed through a close reading of the Institution Narrative and its immediate literary and historical context. I will show how the institution of the Divine Kingdom has ever been God’s plan, has been developed throughout history, and culminates in the mass.
[1] John P. Meier, "Jesus," in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, ed. Raymond E. Brown, S.S., Joseph E. Fitzmeyer, S.J., and Roland E. Murphy, O.Carm. (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1990), 1327.
[2] [2]Robert J. Karris, O.F.M., "The Gospel According to Luke," in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, ed. Raymond E. Brown, S.S., Joseph E. Fitzmeyer, S.J., and Roland E. Murphy, O.Carm. (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1990), 716. Mark 14:18-19 places the betrayal account before the words of institution, Luke 22:21 places it after. Fr. Karris further reports (article 51) that the greatest disciple dispute of 22:24-27 bears only "slight" resemblance to Mark’s 10:42-45 recounting and Matthew’s 19:28 promise to the twelve to sit on thrones and judge the twelve tribes. On a purely textual basis, however, the teachings are practically identical. All biblical quotes from Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE) (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1942, 1952, 1957).
[3] See, for example, John Paul II’s interpretation of the Biblical Account of Creation in his Wednesday lectures in John Paul II, The Theology of the Body: Human Love in the Divine Plan (Boston: Pauline Books and Media, 1997), 27 – 32, or Scott Hahn’s seamless integration of the creation accounts in Scott Hahn, A Father Who Keeps his Promises (Ann Arbor: Servant Publications, 1998).
