Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Corinthians 11:23

"For I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed took bread;" — 1 Corinthians 11:23 (ASV)

For I have received of the Lord.—Better, For I received from the Lord. Do these words imply that St. Paul had a direct revelation from Christ of the words and facts which he now recalls, or merely that he knew from the accounts given him by others who had been present, what took place on that memorable and solemn occasion?

The whole structure of the passage seems to imply that what follows had been received by St. Paul directly from Christ. He does not seem to be appealing to a well-known tradition, as in that case he would scarcely have used the singular, “I received.” Nor does he seem to be appealing to something he had learned from the other Apostles, for then he would not have said “I” emphatically (the word being emphasized by its expression in the Greek), nor “from the Lord,” because the other Apostles had not received their knowledge of these facts “from the Lord,” but from their own observation and hearing. How Christ thus communicated these truths to His new Apostle we are not told. The method of communication (whether in a trance, a state of ecstasy, or any other supernatural manner) does not appear to cause either doubt or difficulty to those to whom the Apostle conveyed the information thus miraculously bestowed upon him.

That which also I delivered to you.—The Apostle was not now for the first time communicating these solemn facts to the Corinthians. He had told them all this before, and therefore they were sinning against knowledge when they degraded a feast they knew to be so solemn to such an unworthy purpose.

There now follows an account of the institution of the Lord’s Supper, which, when compared with the accounts given in the Gospel narratives (Mark 14:22–25; Luke 22:19–20), possesses some noteworthy features. The Evangelists (St. Matthew and St. Mark) wrote their accounts many years after the occurrence and recorded what they remembered to have observed and heard. St. Paul writes here, within a very few years at any rate of his having received it, an account of what had been directly communicated by the Lord. This was also most probably the first written record of what occurred on that solemn night.

The fact that St. Luke’s narrative agrees most closely with St. Paul’s would imply, not as some rationalising critics insinuate, that St. Paul was indebted to St. Luke, but that St. Luke attached high value to an account which his companion had received directly from the glorified Christ. The only differences of any importance between St. Luke’s and St. Paul’s narrative are:

1. St. Luke writes “given for you;” St. Paul omits the word “given” (see Note on 1 Corinthians 11:24).
2. St. Luke omits the words “this do ye as oft as ye drink it,” after the giving of the cup; but he implies them by stating that the cup was given “in like manner” to the bread, in connection with which he records these words.

The suggestion that St. Luke copied his account of the Last Supper from this Epistle is a mere speculation, and in the highest degree improbable. If that Evangelist had used this Epistle in writing his Gospel, is it likely that he would have been content with giving the somewhat scanty account of our Lord’s appearances after His resurrection, when he had readily available the much fuller record of the appearance to the 500 brethren and to James, which this Epistle contains (1 Corinthians 15)?

In all the narratives, however, the outlines of the scene are the same. There can be no mistake that they are all truthful and (as the minor discrepancies prove) honestly independent records of an actual historical scene. It is worth noting that in the heated controversies that have raged around the Eucharistic Feast concerning its spiritual significance, its evidential value has frequently been overlooked.

If the Betrayal and Crucifixion are not historical facts, how can we account for the existence of the Eucharistic Feast? Here is an Epistle whose authenticity the most searching and ruthless criticism has never disputed.

We have evidence of the existence of this feast and its connection with events that occurred only twenty years before. If we bear in mind that the Apostles were Jews, and yet spoke of the wine they drank as “blood”—that they were lovingly devoted to the person of Christ, and yet spoke of the bread they ate as His “flesh”—can the wildest imagination conceive of this practice having originated with them as their most solemn religious rite and the profoundest expression of their love for their Lord?

Could anything but the record given in the Gospel narrative possibly account for such a ceremony holding such a place in a sect composed of Christianised Jews? A dark conspiracy like that of Catiline might have selected tasting human blood as the symbol of the conspirators’ sanguinary hatred of all human order and life; but such a band of men as the early Christians certainly could not, of their own accord, have made such a choice and publicly proclaimed it.

And if this is true—if Jesus, the night before an ignominious death, instituted this strange and solemn rite, which has been handed down century after century in unbroken continuity—can such foresight concerning the future of His Church be attributed to one who was less than what Christendom claims her Lord to be?

When Christ died, His Apostles gave up all as lost and went back sorrowfully to their old work as fishermen. Christendom was not an afterthought of the Apostles, but the forethought of the Lord.

The same night in which he was betrayed.—These words imply that the history of the Betrayal was familiar. They also solemnly and touchingly remind the Corinthians of the strange contrast between the events of that night and the scenes in which they now indulge on the same night that they partake of that supper.