Bread and Wine in the Old Testament
Andrzej Sebastian Jasiński OFM
Uniwersytet OpolskiAbstract
Bread and wine are realities known to Israelites in their every day life. The Bible – conveying Yahweh’s design – referred to these products in order to reveal figuratively the truths of redemption. Bread and wine were considered to be the basic gifts of Yahweh who takes care of His people. These were products made of crops provided by God. To produce them meant, thus, to cooperate with Yahweh’s creative powers. Both bread and wine were necessary to preserve life and to put thanksgiving to Yahweh. In the Messianic time, bread will become a special gift (Isa 30,23) and there will be delicious wine at the Messianic feast (Isa 25,6).
The Old Testament, stressing the importance of bread and wine, became a perfect reference for the New Testament theology of Eucharist, as it has placed Christ’ s goods, offered to his believers, fringing upon the temporal and the eternal: this is the core of the promise given to Christians.
They are some superficial analogies between pagan cultic rites and the Israelites’ thank-offering practices, but the activities of the chosen people present an original and unique understanding of the “offering”; an understanding which developed in the course of time throughout the Old Testament toward the New Covenant. One may see here a gradation of immanent values: bread food – wine – blood – life. God’s Providence reveals these values from the most ancient prehistoric Biblical days, patriarch’s histories and kings‚ and prophets’ stories; finally they show their utmost senses and worship the Everlasting Transcendence (bread and wine: Body and Blood: Eternal life).
Keywords:
bread, wine, Old Testament, prophets, Bible, Book of PsalmsReferences
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Andrzej Sebastian Jasiński OFMStatistics
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