Lord's Table/Communion bread question

[jckstraw72]

the word used is "artos" which can only mean leavened bread.

 

[a_ntv]

the word used is "artos" which can only mean leavened bread.

In addition, both early Jewish writers Josephus and Philo use artos in their description of the matzo [unleavened bread] of the Passover meal. Also, the loaves of the unleavened showbread in the Tabernacle and Temple, were regularly called artoi (plural of artos). It is understandable, then, that the gospel writers used the generic term artos because they knew that their readers would know what kind of bread they were talking about. (link)

 

[jckstraw72]

well then the question is why would the Christian Church just start using leavened bread for no reason then? including the west -- the entire Church used leavned bread for the first several centuries.

 

[prodromos]

Thou shalt not eat leaven with it; seven days shalt thou eat unleavened [bread] with it, bread of affliction, because ye came forth out of Egypt in haste; that ye may remember the day of your coming forth out of the land of Egypt all the days of your life. Deut. 16:1-3​

This is another reason why leavened bread was used by the Church, because "bread of affliction" is not at all appropriate as a description of the flesh of our Lord and Savior.

Re the OP, leavened bread, baked by the parishoners.

 

[prodromos]

The problem with this is that we do maintain the Eucharist in the Tabernacle for emergencies and to take to the sick and there are no preservatives in the breads and they can spoil. The wafers do not spoil.

PS: also the Catholic Church used in the first centuries leavened bread for the Eucharist. And the CC started to use unleavened bread simply because it is easier to keep for many days after the consacration.

On Holy Thursday (Thursday of Holy week of Pascha) the bread and wine which are consecrated at the liturgy are held for emergencies until the following Pascha. Leavened bread is consecrated and for the entire year it does not go bad.

 

[a_ntv]

well then the question is why would the Christian Church just start using leavened bread for no reason then? including the west -- the entire Church used leavned bread for the first several centuries.

Well, you are assuming that the Lord Supper was actually the model for the next Divine Liturgies of the Eucharist: in other words, you are assuming that the apostoles used went on coping the Last Supper in building up the Liturgy (it is a typical protestant assumption)

But there is not even a little proof of this assumption.

Many scolars of ancient liturgy now think tha the Christian Eucharist Service (Divine Liturgy) cames from a christian modification of the Jewish prayer of the 18 blessings (the core of the synagogue's worship) and not from the Jewish Liturgy of the evening Meal (Sedar, Last Supper)

 

[jckstraw72]

well what do the Fathers have to say about the origin of the Eucharist?

 

[a_ntv]

well what do the Fathers have to say about the origin of the Eucharist?

They usually speak more of John 6 than of the Last Supper: and they point out that th Eucharist is a offering (a sacrifice), a typos (sacrament) of the Body and Blood of Christ, it is a medicine. They dont point out that it is a meal with Christ.

No doubt anyway that the Eucharist was institued in the Last Supper.

The point is: which rite was copied by the early christians to create the early liturgies (if they used the Jews meal -the Sader- as base, we can aspect to have unleavened bread, while if they used other Jewsish liturgies as base there is no reason for they to use unleavened bread): the Fathers dont help us, but we have some ancient liturgical document of the Father age

That is a very difficoult question. We can look at the very early liturgies we have: in the '70 the scolars were sure that the base was the Sedar, but now they are no more so sure: the base could probably has been the Jewsh liturgy of the synagoque to which they simply added the Bread and Wine to be blessed(consacrated).

If the main reference in the Father to the Eucharist is John 6 and they did not used the Sedar rite as base, for the early christians it was not a issue to use leavened or un-leaved bread

 

[lmnop9876]

in my church we use leavened bread, a single loaf with the crusts cut off to make it easier to pull apart, and a common cup of red wine.

 

[Ave Maria]

We use whole wheat bread like you can get from the store.