I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you: in
the night in which he was betrayed
The word ‘tradition’ naturally springs to mind
during Holy Week, when the Church observes the most ancient and primitive rites
and ceremonies of the liturgical year. But ‘tradition’ is most especially and
profoundly connected with Maundy Thursday. Indeed one of the most ancient names for this
day is ‘the day of the tradition.’ Like Palm Sunday Holy Thursday has a double
aspect: it is a day of joy, bells ringing and the singing of the Gloria, because God gives himself to man
and it is a day of sorrow, bells silenced and the altar stripped, because God
had to be murdered for man to receive the gift.
The word ‘tradition’ comes from the Latin tradere which means both ‘to hand down’, in the sense of ‘to pass on’ but also ‘to hand
over’ in the sense of ‘to give someone into the hands of an enemy or the
authorities or to death’. So the Latin
version of the Epistles reads something like: I received from Lord what I also
traditioned or handed down to you. . .In the night in which he was traditioned
or handed over.
The Maundy Thursday liturgy glides back and
forth between both senses, the giving of the Eucharist and the giving over to
death, between the light and the darkness. In either case we are talking about
‘giving’. I give something away wholly and it passes out of my possession into
that of another. When I have so given something, I have no right over it, nor
power over it. Right and power pass to the new owner. Such giving can be a
noble, if painful, renunciation of a loved one, when that is necessary. The purest
joy can also exist when a great love for the receiver makes the gift a wholly
free gift given out of love.
On the other hand, giving can be treason and
infidelity, a lack of conscience to give away something which ought not to be
given away, something which we are bound to defend with our life, if that should
that prove necessary. It is also betrayal when we know that the hand into which
we give a gift is not careful, not faithful, but rather careless and that it
will desecrate and destroy the gift.
This is true of people and of things and most
especially of the mysteries of faith and love, the presence of God among men,
the gift of this Thursday.
And this is why the Epistle continues with words
of warning:
“Whoever, therefore,
eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be
guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself,
and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks
without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself.”
This gift was entrusted into the hands of the
Apostles, given by Jesus, He in whom God bodily dwelt, the good
news of the Father’s love, and through the Apostles given to us, the mystery of
the Eucharistic bread and wine, Christ’s blood and flesh, the sacrifice which reconciles
and gives us life, the food which makes us immortal.
It should cause us to "tremble, tremble' as the old spiritual says. We should draw back as men from the greatness of
the gift, before the daring of God, who gives such gifts, --his own Son—into
such miserable hands, so little able to give the protection due them. But from the very beginning, in the very night
–this night – as the priest says in
the Canon of the Mass on Maundy Thursday, God’s gift is betrayed, man sold
Christ short, Judas sold him who had been entrusted to him, murdered him. Just
at the moment when God offers Himself to man in the sacrificial meal of praise,
anticipating that of the cross, man struck the hand offered to him.
This is the frightful aspect of the day, the
thing which is so terrifying, the indissoluble union of God’s love and man’s
faithlessness. Not only Israel turns away from the Messiah, faithless
Jerusalem, not only Judas but Peter denying the Lord as well.
The Church ever stands under the temptation to
break faith, to commit treason and denial. But even this sorrow is not just our
own, for
“He has borne our grief
and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and
afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our
iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his
stripes we are healed.”
For us this night there is left only the duty
of watching for one hour, being with Jesus, guarding Him, but guarding ourselves
as well, into whose hands He has been given.
I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you: in
the night in which he was betrayed.
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