SUGGESTIONS FOR A CHRISTIAN CELEBRATION OF PASSOVER =================================================== Samuele Bacchiocchi, Ph. D., Professor of Theology and Church History, Andrews University NOTE: In a month time much of the Christian world will celebrate Easter. Should the Adventist church consider adopting an annual celebration of Passover or of Easter in addition to the quarterly Lord's Supper? In the previous two parts essay I submitted six main reasons for the continuity of Passover. At this junction I am submitting some suggestions on how to observe Passover.This material is excerpted from my recent book GOD'S FESTIVALS IN SCRIPTURE AND HISTORY. It is very difficult to describe how the Christian Passover should be observed today. In fact, the New Testament gives us no specific information on how Passover was celebrated during apostolic times. We are told that Paul kept the Feast of Unleavened Bread at Philippi (Acts 20:6), but we are not informed how he celebrated the Passover season with the believers. In 1 Corinthians 5:7-8, Paul mentions the behavioral implications of the celebration of Passover, but he says nothing about its actual observance. This gap is filled by the accounts of the Quartodeciman Christians, for the sources do inform us that they observed Passover according to the apostolic tradition. But even in these accounts we do not find a Passover Seder, that is, the order and ritual of the Passover service. In view of the limited information available on the actual observance of Passover in primitive Christianity, I do not attempt to propose a standard order of service for the Passover celebration today. Instead, I limit myself, first, to summarizing what we know about the observance of Passover in the early church, and, second, to suggesting a tentative guide to a Christian observance of Passover that reflects the teachings of the Scripture and the example of the early church. Christian Passover Similar to Jewish Passover. The two earliest documents mentioning the observance of Passover are The Epistle of the Apostles (about A. D. 150) and Melito's Paschal Homily (A. D. 165). These sources clearly indicate that in many ways, Christians observed Passover as did the Jews. They observed it at the same time, on the night of Nisan 15th, and by the date rather than the day. They read the same Exodus story, used the same metaphors, and observed the same fast. At first, some Christians celebrated Passover not only at the same time but also in the same manner-by eating the paschal lamb in a solemn feast.12 Most Christians, however, objected to eating the lamb. They believed that Christ was their Paschal Lamb and, consequently, no longer was there any need for them to sacrifice and eat the lamb. Apollinaris, Bishop of Hierapolis (about A. D. 170), refutes those who ate the paschal lamb at the same time and manner as the Jews, saying: "The 14th of Nisan is the true Passover of the Lord, the great Sacrifice; instead of the lamb we have the Son of God."13 This view prevailed and eventually led to the abandonment of the Jewish paschal feast and to the adoption of fasting instead. "Unfortunately," as Joachim Jeremias observes, "we do not know exactly when the festival was radically reconstructed, and the paschal vigil replaced the Passover meal."14 Essentially, the Christian Passover consisted of a night vigil during which Christians commemorated the suffering and death of Christ by fasting, praying, singing, reading appropriate Scriptures from the Old and New Testaments, and listening to the exposition and application of the Scripture readings. The vigil extended until early morning (cockcrow), when the fast was broken with the celebration of the Lord's Supper, followed by a fellowship (agape) meal. Expectation of Christ's Return. The paschal vigil was designed to prepare the community to receive the soon-coming Lord. While the Jews were awaiting the coming of the Messiah on Passover night, the Christians were expecting the Return of Christ. "The expectation of the parousia [Return of Christ]," writes Jeremias, "lay at the heart of the primitive Christian festival, and this soon came to have a profound effect on its course."15 The expectation of Christ's Return on Passover night was influenced not merely by the Jewish expectation of the Messiah, but primarily by Christ's pledge: "for I tell you, I will not eat it again until it finds fulfillment in the kingdom of God" (Luke 22:16, NIV). The two focal points of the Christian Passover were the passion and the parousia, that is, the commemoration of Christ's death and the expectation of His Return. Jeremias points out that the paschal vigil shows "how strongly the expectation of the parousia controlled the life of the Church in the earliest period."16 Apparently, Christians felt that the best way for them to be waiting and watching on Passover night for the Return of their Lord was by fasting, rather than by feasting. They were reminded of the words of Jesus that "the days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in that day" (Mark 2:20). They fasted also on behalf of the Jews who might repent for causing Christ's death. Epiphanius, for example, writes: "When they [the Jews] feast, we should mourn for them with fasting, because in that feast they fastened Christ on the Cross."17 Christ the Paschal Lamb. There were some fundamental differences between the Jewish and Christian Passover. Christians did not sacrifice a lamb, and they did not commemorate the deliverance from Egypt under Moses. These events had received a new meaning. Melito reveals this in his Paschal Homily: "For led as lamb and slaughtered as a sheep, he [Jesus] ransomed us from the ruin of the world as from the land of Egypt, and freed us from slavery of the devil as from the hand of Pharaoh, and sealed our souls with his own spirit and the members of our bodies with his own blood. . . . This is he who rescued us from slavery to freedom, from darkness to light, from death to life, from oppression to an eternal Kingdom and made us a new priesthood and a chosen people. He is the true Passover."18 A striking parallelism exists between this passage and a similar one in the Mishnah: "In every generation a man must regard himself as if he came forth himself out of Egypt. . . . He [the Lord] brought us from bondage to freedom, from sorrow to gladness, and from mourning to a great light, and from servitude to redemption."19 The background of both passages is the Passover ritual. Both the Church and the Synagogue found in the Exodus deliverance a promise of redemption to be celebrated in the present. In the Christian celebration of Passover, the lamb played a most important role, because the lamb was Jesus. As Van Goudoever points out, "The lamb was not a type of Jesus, but Jesus was indeed the lamb. The Christians therefore did not sacrifice the lamb, because their Passover lamb was already slaughtered. This was a part of the theology of Paul. In his letter to the Corinthians he writes, 'Christ, our paschal lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us therefore celebrate the festival' (1 Cor 5:7). In John's Gospel, Jesus is also conceived of as the lamb for the Passover. Therefore 'no bone of him shall be broken' (John 19:36). It is possible that the Passover celebrated by Paul and John contained these new elements."20 The Lord's Supper and the Agape. The paschal vigil terminated in the early morning (cockcrow, about 3:00 a. m.) with the celebration of the Lord's Supper, which was followed by a fellowship meal, known as agape (love feast). The Epistle of the Apostles (about A. D. 150) specifically mentions that Christians terminated their vigil with the Lord's Supper and the agape: "And when ye have accomplished the memorial which is made for me, and the agape. . . ."21 In this text, the Lord's Supper is called "the memorial," obviously because it is a commemoration of Christ's death. The Lord's Supper was celebrated not only at Passover but periodically throughout the year because of the fundamental importance attached to the atoning sacrifice of Jesus. Unfortunately, we do not know how frequently the Lord's Supper was celebrated in the Apostolic Church. We observed earlier that Paul is very specific regarding the meaning and manner of observance of the Lord's Supper, but very vague regarding the time of its observance. Four times he repeats the expression "when you assemble . . ." (1 Cor 11: 18, 20, 33, 34) and once "as often as" (1 Cor 11:26). Both phrases suggest no specific time was set for the celebration of the Lord's Supper during the course of the year. At Passover, the Lord's Supper assumed a greater importance, because it was celebrated in the context of the actual anniversary of Christ's death. During the year, the Lord's Supper was celebrated as part of a religious service; at Passover it was the most important part of the celebration. The preceding all-night vigil heightened the importance of the Lord's Supper, which functioned as the climax of the Passover celebration. The commemoration of Christ's death at Passover entails more than a remembrance of the historical events leading to the crucifixion of Jesus. By partaking of the emblems of Christ's broken body and shed blood, we appropriate the benefits of Christ's death as a death suffered for us. This simple yet dramatic ritual enables believers not only to conceptualize but also to internalize and appropriate the reality of Christ's vicarious death. At the Lord's Table, believers enter into a special fellowship with the exalted Lord. Paul describes it as "a participation in the blood . . . [and] body of Christ" (1 Cor 10:16). The bond of fellowship and unity in the body of Christ celebrated formally through the Lord's Supper found informal expression in the ensuing agape feast. We are not told why the agape feast came after, rather than before, the Lord's Supper. We may surmise that one major reason was to protect the most sacred institution of the Church from the kind of abuses that occurred at Corinth. Separating the Lord's Supper from Agape. Christ instituted the Holy Communion in the context of a Passover Supper. At first, Christians followed Christ's example by celebrating the Lord's Supper in the context of an evening fellowship meal. Unfortunately, this practice led to abuses which Paul had to address in his letter to the Corinthians (1 Cor 11:20-22). Some Christians were more interested in eating and drinking than in partaking of the Lord's Supper. They began eating before all the other members had arrived and failed to share their food with the less privileged. Such abuses desecrated the Lord's Supper. To remedy this problem, the regular Lord's Supper eventually was detached from an evening supper meal and moved to the morning church services. We do not know when this separation took place. Presumably, it occurred before the end of the first century because Pliny, the Governor of Bithynia, states in a letter he wrote to the Emperor Trajan in A. D. 112 that Christians had given up their evening religious meal after the publication of the imperial edict which prohibited evening fraternal meals.22 Earlier we mentioned this imperial legislation in conjunction with Paul's indefinite time references to the Lord's Supper. Apparently, this legislation caused Christians first to stagger the time and place of their evening Lord's Supper, and later to transfer it to the morning services altogether. By the middle of the second century, we have the explicit testimony of Justin Martyr that the Lord's Supper was celebrated at the conclusion of the morning church service: "When our prayer is ended, bread and wine and water are brought, and the president in like manner offers prayers and thanksgiving, according to his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen; and there is a distribution to each, and a participation of that over which thanks have been given, and to those who are absent a portion is sent by the deacons."23 While the regular Lord's Supper became separated from the agape meal on account of abuses and of the imperial legislation prohibiting evening fellowship meals, the special annual Passover Lord's Supper remained associated with the agape meal, which, however, was eaten after the Lord's Supper. With this arrangement, the social fellowship meal would not detract from the Holy Communion. In fact, the love-feast offered a practical opportunity to express and experience gratitude for the sacrificial love of Christ just commemorated through the emblems of His broken body and shed blood. The fellowship meal remained associated with the Paschal Lord's Supper, presumably because the essence of Passover is a sacred commemorative meal. By partaking of a fellowship meal in conjunction with the Holy Communion, it was possible to retain a vital aspect of the traditional Passover meal. Christian or Jewish Passover? The preceding description of the early Christian observance of Passover provides a basis for reflecting on how Passover should be celebrated today. While early Christian traditions are not always a safe guide for determining religious practices today because the mystery of iniquity was already at work in apostolic times (2 Thess 2:7), they do provide us with valuable insight on how Biblical teachings and practices such as Passover were understood and observed within different Christian communities. To be true to our Christian heritage, we need to be guided by the teachings of Scripture and by the witness of those Christians who have sought to be true to the teachings of the Word of God. Unfortunately, there is a tendency to ignore the past witness of faithful Christians when defining Christian beliefs and practices. A case in point is the several books published in recent years on how Christians can celebrate Old Testament feasts, such as Passover.24 The authors are to be commended for their efforts to make the annual feasts of Israel meaningful and spiritually enriching to Christian today. The problem I see in the books I have read is their lack of sensitivity to the witness of the New Testament and of the primitive church. Much of what is presented is largely based on Jewish traditional observance of the feasts. These books seem to aim to teach Christians how to celebrate Passover and the other feasts according to Jewish tradition rather than an authentic Christian perspective. Some minor Christian variations are suggested, but no attempt is made to understand how the early Christians understood and observed Passover. For example, in her creative book Celebrate the Feasts of the Old Testament in Your Home or Church, Martha Zimmerman lists nine items needed for a Christian Passover meal. These include a pair of candles, an order of service (haggadah) for all participants, a large plate containing a hard-boiled egg, roasted lamb-bone, a small bowl of salt water, greens such as parsley and celery, bitter herbs such as horseradish, and charoseth, "a special nut, apple, wine or grape juice mixture."25 Other items needed are a plate with unleavened bread (matzoth), wine, a common cup for the family to pass and to share the wine, the cup of Elijah, a pillow for father's chair, a bowl of water, a towel for handwashing, and a special dinner for the whole family.26 The items mentioned in this list are essentially those used by the Jews in the celebration of their Passover meal. In fact, the meaning given to each item relates primarily to the Egyptian experience of the Israelites. For example, the charoseth "is a mixture of coarsely chopped fruits and spices which resembles, in color, the clay or mortar that the Israelites made in Egypt."27 Similarly, "The hard-boiled egg represents the hardness of Pharaoh's heart. The salt water symbolizes the tears of the Hebrew slaves under Egypt's bondage."28 While the author is to be commended for educating Christians on the rich ritual and symbols of the Jewish Passover, she ignores two facts when she tries to make the same elements the core of the Christian Passover. First, Christ selected only two elements from the Jewish Passover, the unleavened bread and the wine, to institute the paschal meal commemorative of His atoning death. Second, for Christians, Passover is the celebration of the deliverance, not from the physical bondage of Egyptian oppression, but from the spiritual bondage of sin. The latter is celebrated through the emblems of the Lord's Supper, not through all the ingredients of the Jewish Passover meal. Surprisingly, Martha Zimmerman and others who claim to provide a guide to the celebration of the Christian Passover omit altogether any reference to the Lord's Supper. Yet, as we have seen, the Lord's Supper was the climax of the early Christian celebration of Passover. Elements of a Christian Passover. At this juncture I make no attempt to provide a normative guide to a Christian celebration of Passover. I must confess I have never celebrated an annual Passover in my life. I have grown up in the Seventh-day Adventist Church in which there is no annual Passover celebration, only a quarterly Holy Communion service. Prior to this research, I had not understood the continuity and relevance of Old Testament feasts, such as Passover, for our Christian life today. Lacking the practical experience of celebrating Passover, I only venture some suggestions derived from the above study of Passover in Biblical and early Christian history. My concern is not to spell out details as to how Passover should be celebrated today. Rather, I prefer to propose ways in which we can make a celebration of Passover authentically Christian. Reflecting on the Lamb. Preparation is indispensable for a meaningful and successful celebration of a Holy Day. This is true of the weekly Sabbath as well as of annual festivals. Preparation also should be an essential component of the Passover celebration. By preparing our minds and our homes for the arrival of Passover night, we predispose ourselves to receive the blessings mediated to us through the feast. The Jews began their preparation for Passover on the 10th day of the month by selecting an unblemished, year-old male lamb, which they kept in their homes for four days before sacrificing him for the redemption of all the family members (Ex 12:3-6). Keeping a perfect, white, woolly lamb for four days in their home gave the Israelites the opportunity to become attached to him and to love him before offering him as a sacrifice for the redemption of their family members. As Christians, we do not need to select a real lamb, because Christ is our Paschal Lamb who already has been sacrificed for our redemption (1 Cor 5:7-8). Yet it might be helpful to place a little stuffed, fuzzy lamb on the table where the family gathers for meals. This could serve as the centerpiece of the table and of the conversation for a few days before Passover. The presence of the stuffed lamb may encourage us to reflect and talk about the meaning of the forthcoming Passover. We could read together Exodus 12:1-6 and talk about some of the spiritual object lessons of the story. For example, each Israelite needed to take a lamb (Ex 12:3) and to eat it (Ex 12:8), because salvation is an individual acceptance of the grace provided by God. God's plan was that all households experience salvation. Thus He prescribed a lamb for each family. By believing in Christ, we become members of the household of faith (Gal 6:10; Eph 2:19). Salvation for a household is available to all who believe in Christ (Acts 15:15, 31; 18:8). The chosen lamb was to be "without blemish" (Ex 12:5), because Jesus "offered himself without blemish to God" (Heb 9:14), to purify us and to present us "without blemish before the presence of his glory with rejoicing" (Jude 1:24). The lamb was "a male a year old" (Ex 12:5) because Jesus, the Son of God, died for our redemption in the fullness of His manhood. The lamb was to dwell with the family members (Ex 12:6) because Jesus wants to dwell in our homes. The lamb was loved before it was sacrificed, just as Jesus was loved by some before He was sacrificed. The blood of the lamb was placed on the two doorposts and lintel of the house (Ex 12:7) as a guarantee of divine protection. This can remind us that we have been redeemed "not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot" (1 Pet 1:18-19). "It was not enough that the paschal lamb be slain," writes Ellen White; "its blood must be sprinkled upon the doorposts; so the merits of Christ's blood must be applied to the soul. We must believe, not only that He died for the world, but that He died for us individually. We must appropriate to ourselves the virtue of the atoning sacrifice."29 Reflections such as these upon the meaning of the Passover lamb can predispose us for the celebration of the festival by reminding us that Christ is "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29). ---------------------------------- Christian regards Samuele Bacchiocchi, Ph. D., Professor of Theology and Church History Andrews University 4990 Appian Way Berrien Springs, MI 49103 samuele@andrews.edu