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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 October 2024
There is a wrinkle in the story of common features in West Syrian anaphoras, which John Fenwick called “the Missing Oblation.” In this article, I argue that the importance of the “missing oblation” highlighted by Fenwick, Robert Taft, Stefano Parenti and others needs to be balanced against the verbs of oblation that are present. The emphasis on the missing oblation, combined with the tendency to summarize the Antiochene structure with little reference to the importance of these verbs, results in an inaccurate and unbalanced sense of the degree to which the anaphora expresses the belief that the action of offering bread and wine is constitutive of the eucharistic action. This should lead to a caution with the unhelpful heuristic about the spiritualization of sacrifice in contemporary scholarship and the underemphasis of the belief in the materiality of the eucharistic sacrifice in writers such as John Chrysostom and earlier anaphoras.
I wish to thank the three anonymous HTR readers of an earlier version of this article, each of whom provided very helpful comments and suggestions. I also wish to express gratitude to my colleague, Paul Wheatley, for his generous assistance with the Syriac and Coptic in this article and to Andy Golla for his assistance in the preparation of the manuscript. I alone, of course, remain responsible for the final version.
1 Paul F. Bradshaw and Maxwell E. Johnson, The Eucharistic Liturgies: Their Evolution and Interpretation (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2012) 327 (italics in original). See also John Baldovin, “Eucharistic Prayer,” in The New Westminster Dictionary of Liturgy and Worship (ed. Paul F. Bradshaw; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2002) 195–97, at 195 (hereafter DLW). See also Bryan D. Spinks, “Berakah, Anaphoral Theory and Luther,” Lutheran Quarterly 3.3 (1989) 267–80, at 267; Frank C. Senn, “Towards a Different Anaphoral Structure,” Worship 58.4 (1984) 346–58.
2 Prayers of the Eucharist: Early and Reformed (ed. R. C. D. Jasper et al.; 4th edition; Collegeville: Liturgical Press Academic, 2019) 154 (hereafter PEER).
3 PEER, 15864; Prex eucharistica: textus e variis liturgiis antiquioribus selecti (ed. Anton Hänggi and Irmgard Pahl; Spicelegium Friburgense 12; Fribourg: Éditions universitaires, 1968) 265–68 (hereafter PE); Anaphorae Syriacae: quotquot in codicibus adhuc repertae sunt, cura Pontificii Instituti Studiorum Orientalium editae et latine versae (vol. I–II; Rome: Pontificium Institutum Studiorum Orientalium, 1939) I.2, 231–63 (hereafter AS); Sebastian P. Brock, “The Syriac Anaphora of the Twelve Apostles: An English Translation,” in Thysia aineseōs: mélanges liturgiques offerts à la mémoire de l’archevêque Georges Wagner (1930-1993) (ed. J. Getcha and André Lossky; Analecta Sergiana 2; Paris: Presses Saint-Serge, 2005) 65–75.
4 PEER (3rd ed., 1987), 138–41; PE, 219–22. Hans-Jurgen Feulner lists 83 (“Zu den Editionen orientalischer Anaphoren,” in Crossroads of Cultures: Studies in Liturgy and Patristics in Honor of Gabriele Winkler [ed. Robert F. Taft, Feulner Hans-Jürgen, and Elena Velkovska; Orientalia Christiana Analecta 260; Rome: Pontifical Oriental Institute, 2000] 252–81).
5 PEER, 115–23; PE, 347–57. See the received version still in use in the Coptic Church in Bohairic; Liturgiarum Orientalium Collectio (ed. Eusèbe Renaudot; 2 vols.; 2nd. corrected ed; Frankfurt: Joseph Bauer, 1847) II.13–18 [Latin translation of the Bohairic]; Un témoin archaïque de la liturgie copte de saint Basile (ed. Jean Doresse, Emmanuel Lanne, and Bernard Capelle; Bibliothèque de Muséon 47; Louvain: Publications Universitaires, 1960) [Sahidic, with Latin translation]; Anne McGowan, “The Basilian Anaphoras: Rethinking the Question,” in Issues in Eucharistic Praying in East and West: Essays in Liturgical and Theological Analysis (ed. Maxwell E. Johnson; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2010) 219–62 and Gabriele Winkler, Die Basilius-Anaphora: Edition der beiden armenischen Redaktionen und der relevanten Fragmente (AO 2; AA 2; Rome: Pontificio Istituto Orientale, 2005).
6 PE, 358–73; Renaudot, Liturgiarum Orientalium Collectio, I:92–104.
7 PEER, 171–81; PE, 230–43; Liturgies, Eastern and Western; Being the Texts, Original or Translated, of the Principal Liturgies of the Church (ed. F. E. Brightman; vol. 1: Eastern Liturgies; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1896) 309–44 (hereafter LEW); John R. K. Fenwick, The Anaphoras of St. Basil and St. James: An Investigation into Their Common Origin (OCA 240; Rome: Pontificium Institutum Studiorum Orientalium, 1992).
8 PEER, 164–71; PE, 223–29; LEW, 309–99 (Barberini text), 470–81 (modern version); Robert F. Taft, “The Authenticity of the Chrysostom Anaphora Revisited, Determining Authorship of Liturgical Texts by Computer,” OCP 56 (1990) 5–51; Juan Mateos, A History of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom: Vol. I, The Liturgy of the Word (ed. Steven Hawkes-Teeples; Fairfax, VA: Eastern Christian Publications, 2016); volumes II, IV, V and VI were published as OCA 200 (1975), 238 (1991), 261 (2000), and 281 (2008). For the most recent comprehensive study of CHR, see Stefano Parenti, L’anafora di Crisostomo (Münster: Aschendorff Verlag, 2020).
9 PEER, 178–91; Hans-Jürgen Feulner, “The Armenian Anaphora of St. Athanasius,” in Issues in Eucharistic Praying, 189–218; Winkler, Die Basilius-Anaphora; Gabriele Winkler, “On the Formation of the Armenian Anaphora: Completely Revised and Updated Overview,” Studi Sull’Oriente Cristiano 11.2 (2007) 97–130; Hans-Jürgen Feulner, Die Armenische Athanasius-Anaphora: Kritische Edition, Übersetzung und liturgievergleichender Kommentar, AO 1 (Rome: Pontificio Istituto Orientale, 2001).
10 The evidence in West Syrian-style anaphoras, however, is not uniform. Most of the Syrian Orthodox anaphoras, as well as Coptic Gregory, however, are addressed to the Son. See Nicholas Newman, The Liturgy of Saint Gregory the Theologian: Critical Text with Translation and Commentary (Belleville, IL: Saint Dominic’s Media Inc., 2019).
11 See Baldovin, “Eucharistic Prayers,” DLW, 195. I have elsewhere addressed some matters related to oblation and epiclesis in Matthew S. C. Olver, “Offering for Change: The Logic of Consecration That Unites Early Christian Anaphoras,” Worship 96 (July 2022) 204–21 and I draw from it at points in this article.
12 Three years earlier, Kenneth Stevenson described this phenomenon in Kenneth Stevenson, Eucharist and Offering (New York: Pueblo Pub. Co., 1986) 64.
13 John R. K. Fenwick, The Missing Oblation: The Contents of the Early Antiochene Anaphora, Alcuin/GROW Liturgical Study 11 (Bramcote: Grove Books, 1989) 5; Robert F. Taft, “Some Structural Problems in the Syriac Anaphora of the Twelve Apostles I,” Aram 5.1–2 (1993) 505–20, at 505.
14 For more on how to understand the relationship between these anaphoras, see Bryan D. Spinks, “Crossing the Christological Divide: The Greek Anaphora of St. John Chrysostom and the Syriac Anaphoras of Twelve Apostles and Nestorius,” in Syriac Anaphoras (Arabic and English) (Kaslik: The University of the Holy Spirit, 2021) 175–97, at 178–79.
15 Stefano Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise: The Origin of Oblation in Syro-Byzantine Anaphoras,” SL 50.1 (2020) 86–100.
16 For a recent discussion of the ways in which sacrifice underwent a significant reconceptualization in post-70 AD Judaism, see Mira Balberg, Blood for Thought: The Reinvention of Sacrifice in Early Rabbinic Literature (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2017).
17 See Robert J. Daly, Christian Sacrifice: The Judaeo-Christian Background before Origen (Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 1978); Frances M. Young, The Use of Sacrificial Ideas in Greek Christian Writers from the New Testament to John Chrysostom (Patristic Monograph Series 5; Cambridge, MA: Philadelphia Patristic Foundation, 1979); Louis Marie Chauvet, Symbol and Sacrament: A Sacramental Reinterpretation of Christian Existence (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1995) 228–319. For an example of an appreciative response to Daly’s approach, see John H. McKenna, “Eucharist and Sacrifice: An Overview,” Worship 76.5 (September 2002) 386–402, at 387.
18 Daly, Christian Sacrifice, 503.
19 Everett Ferguson, “Spiritual Sacrifice in Early Christianity and its Environment,” in ANRW, 20.1.1151–89, at 1167.
20 Andrew B. McGowan, “Eucharist and Sacrifice: Cultic Tradition and Transformation in Early Christian Ritual Meals,” in Mahl und religiöse Identität im frühen Christentum = Meals and Religious Identity in Early Christianity (ed. Matthias Klinghardt and Hal Taussig; TANZ 56; Tübingen: Francke, 2012) 1–45, at 7.
21 McGowan, “Eucharist and Sacrifice,” 3.
22 Joseph Crehan, “Introduction,” in Athenagoras, Embassy for the Christians, The Resurrection of the Dead (trans. Joseph Hugh Crehan SJ; New York: Paulist Press, 1956) 3–28, at 24–25. In Legatio pro Christianis, Athenagoras explains that, while they do not need to offer sacrifice, Christians nonetheless offer “a bloodless sacrifice, our spiritual worship” (δέον αναίμακτον θυσίαν καὶ τὴν λογικὴν προσάγειν λατρείαν; Leg., 13 (SC 379, 158) (ibid., 44). The idea of an unbloody sacrifice pre-dates Christianity. One of the earliest uses appears in the literature of Second Temple Judaism in the Testament of Levi, where the angels offer “to the Lord a pleasing odor [ὀσμὴν εὐωδίας], a rational and bloodless oblation [λογικὴν καὶ ἀναίμακτον προσφοράν]”; T. Levi 3:4-6; ET = OTP, I:789; Greek is taken from The Greek Versions of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (ed. R. H. Charles; London: Oxford University Press [1908] Hildesheim, Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1960) 34.
23 Christine Mohrmann, “Rationabilis-λογικός,” RIDA 5 (1950) 225–34; see also Bernard Botte, “Traduction du Canon de la messe,” LMD 23 (1950) 37–53.
24 Josef A. Jungmann, The Mass of the Roman Rite: Its Origins and Development (Missarum Sollemnia) (trans. Francis A. Brunner; 2 vols.; New York: Benziger, 1951) 2:189. Interestingly, in ATA, there appears to be a parallel to the use of λογικός in CHR that is quite close to how Jungmann defines the term, namely, as “this divine sacrifice” (ATA; ܠܕܒܚܬܐ ܗܕܐ ܐܠܗܝܬܐ ledbaḥāṭā haḍa alāhayāṭā; sacrificium hoc divinum; AS, I.2:248–49).
25 McGowan, “Eucharist and Sacrifice,” 5–6.
26 Bradshaw and Johnson, Eucharistic Liturgies, 131.
27 Jonathan Klawans, Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple: Symbolism and Supersessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006) 220.
28 Harold W. Attridge, “Review of Christian Sacrifice: The Judaeo-Christian Background before Origen, by Robert J. Daly,” JBL 100.1 (March 1981) 145–47, at 147.
29 See Andrew B. McGowan, “Philo and the Materialization of Sacrifice,” SPhilo 32 (2020) 183–204.
30 McGowan, “Eucharistic and Sacrifice,” 14–15.
31 Ibid., 8, 15.
32 There are a number of versions of JAMES, including both a longer and shorter version of SyJAMES, which Gabriele Winkler has explored recently. She recently overturned the standard position of Alphonse Raes, who was convinced that the short version of SyJAMES (which Winkler abbreviates as syr Jm II) was both a 13th century abbreviation and that it tracked exactly with the longer version of SyJAMES (syr Jm I); see AS, II.2:186. After comparing both Syriac versions of JAMES with its Ethiopic and Armenian versions, she concluded that (shorter) syr Jm II was older and was not a later abbreviation and further that longer SyJAMES (syr Jm I) had a great deal of unique linguistic overlap with Greek JAMES. Gabriele Winkler, “A New Study of the Liturgy of James,” OCP 80 (2014) 23–33, at 26–28; see also Winkler, Die Jakobus-Liturgie in ihren Überliferungssträngen. Edition des Cod. arm. 17 von Lyon, Übersetzung und Liturgievergleich, (AO 4; AA 4; Rome: Pontificio Istituto Orientale, 2013). Also, after a new comparison of the Armenian version of JAMES with all of the other extant versions led her “to the conclusion that this Armenian version seemingly derives from an earlier version than syr Jm I as it also showed that the Armenian redaction often agrees with syr Jm II (and eth Jm)”; Winkler, “A New Study of the Liturgy of James,” 29; see Winkler, Die Jakobus-Liturgie, 560–69. Even more surprising to her was the “discovery of the dependence of the Armenian version of the Liturgy of James (arm Jm) on the Armenian redaction Anaphora of Basil in its earliest form, namely arm Bas I”; Winkler, “A New Study of the Liturgy of James,” 29. The details of her massive study are too complex to deal with throughout this article. Nonetheless, when I look at the particular units of these various anaphoras, I will always note if and how the two recensions of SyJAMES differ from each other.
33 “The love of God the Father, the grace of our Lord God and Savior Jesus Christ, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all”; PEER, 143.
34 PEER, 144.
35 Dominic E. Serra, “The Roman Canon: The Theological Significance of Its Structure and Syntax,” EO 20.1 (2003) 99–128, at 103.
36 See Baldovin, “Eucharistic Prayers,” DLW, 195, who includes the oblation, while John Klentos, in “Eucharist: Eastern Churches,” in DLW, 175 does not.
37 Bradshaw and Johnson, Eucharistic Liturgies, 77 and Herman A. J. Wegman, Christian Worship in East and West: A Study Guide to Liturgical History (New York: Pueblo Pub. Co, 1985) 127 do not mention the oblation, while these sources do include it: E. J. Yarnold, “The Liturgy of the Faithful in the Fourth and Early Fifth Centuries,” in The Study of Liturgy (ed. Cheslyn Jones et al., rev. ed., London : New York: SPCK ; Oxford University Press, 1992) 230–45, at 235 and Bryan D. Spinks, Do This in Remembrance of Me: The Eucharist from the Early Church to the Present Day (SCM Studies in Worship and Liturgy Series; London: SCM Press, 2013) 65.
38 This unified double-epiclesis is also found in EgBASIL and in the following West Syrian-style anaphora: ApCon 8, EgBASIL, CHR, and ByzBASIL; see PEER, 59–60, 121, 169, 178.
39 See Fenwick, Missing Oblation, 12; Robert F. Taft, “Understanding the Byzantine Anaphoral Oblation,” in Rule of Prayer, Rule of Faith: Essays in Honor of Aidan Kavanagh, O.S.B (ed. Nathan Mitchell and John F. Baldovin; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1996) 32–55.
40 Fenwick, Missing Oblation, 6; Stevenson, Eucharist and Offering, 64. Engberding basically argued the following points: ATA is essential for understanding the development of CHR; the preface in ATA, with all its brevity and undeveloped theology, is likely the original form of the Antiochene preface, its Greek version dating to the 4th cent.; and the provenance is Antioch; Hieronymus Engberding, “Die syrische Anaphora der zwölf Apostel und ihre Paralleltexte,” OC 7 (1937) 213–47. The following scholars agreed with Engberding: Alphonse Raes, “L’authenticité de la liturgie byzantine de S. Jean Chrysostome,” OCP 24 (1958) 5–16; G. Khouri-Sarkis, “L’origine syrienne de l’anaphore Byzantine de Saint Jean Chrysostom,” Ostkirkliche Studien 7 (1962) 3–68. Fenwick, however, concludes that ATA, CHR, and ApCon are likely all independent developments from a common, shared source; Fenwick, Missing Oblation, 34.
41 AS, II.2:248–49.
42 Taft, “Some Structural Problems,” 505.
43 ET of ATA = Brock, “Twelve Apostles,” 69; ET of SyJAMES is adapted from Baby Varghese, The Syriac Version of the Liturgy of St James: A Brief History for Students, JLS 49 (Cambridge, UK: Grove Books Ltd., 2001) 32–39. The text that he is following, however, does not match the text in AS, II.2:149–53 and reproduced in PE, 269–75. In particular, the second oblation (just following the people’s Miserere nostri, Pater pantocrator) is not reflected in his translation. The order of the anaphoras in the tables was an attempt to put those anaphoras that had closer relationships next to each other, especially because there are times when ATA, SyJAMES, and JAMES will contain material not found in CHR, SyBASIL, and EgBASIL, and visa-versa.
44 Longer SyJAMES: es mqarrabinan lek lehadda dabāḥāṭā dhaylāṭā weddel dmā; Offerimus tibi hoc sacrificium hoc tremendum et incruentum (AS, II.2:148–49). Shorter SyJAMES; ܘܥܠ ܗܕܐ ܕܒܚܬܐ ܐܠ ܕܡܢܝܬܐ ܡܩܪܒܝܢܢ ܠܟ we ʿal hadda dabāḥāṭā al dmānāyṭā mqarrabinan lek; propterea sacrificium incruentum offerimus tibi (AS, II 2:196–97); JAMES: προσφέρομέν σοι, δέσποτα, τὴν φοβερὰν ταύτην καὶ ἀναίμακτον θυσίαν (PE, 248).
45 The offering is only present in the longer recension of SyJAMES: ܡܩܪܒܝܢܢ ܠܟ ܠܗ ܟܕ ܠܗ ܠܕܒܚܬܐ ܗܕܐ ܕܚܝܠܬܐ mqarrabinan lek leh kad leh ldabāḥāṭā hadda dhaylāṭā; Offerimus tibi, in omnibus et propter omnia (AS, II.2:148–49).
46 AS, II.2:152–53; Les constitutions apostoliques III (ed. Marcel Metzger; SCh, no 336; Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1987) 198.
47 PE, 226, 236.
48 See Alphonse Raes, “Un nouveau document de la liturgie de S. Basile,” OCP Periodica 26 (1960) 401–10.
49 Doresse, et al., La liturgie copte de sainte Basile, 18–20.
50 Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise,” 92–93.
51 PEER, 169; PE, 228, 236.
52 PEER, 145; PE, 248.
53 PEER, 169; PE, 228.
54 See PEER, 133-41.
55 For Strasbourg, Mark, and Sarapion see PE, 116, 102, and 130; for Ambrose, see SCh 25bis, 116.
56 See AS, II.2:198–99.
57 This unified double-epiclesis is also found in EgBASIL and in the following West Syrian-style anaphora: ApCon 8, EgBASIL, CHR, and ByzBASIL; see PEER, 59–60, 121, 169, 178.
58 AS, I.2: 246–47; PE, 250–51 (JAMES); AS, II.2:150–51 (Longer SyJAMES); AS, II.2:198–99 (Shorter SyJAMES); PE, 226–27 (CHR); PE, 236–37 (ByBASIL); Doresse, et al., La liturgie copte de sainte Basile, 20 (EgBASIL); Metzger, SCh, 336, 198 (ApCon).
59 For more on this, see Sebastian P. Brock, “Invocations to/for the Holy Spirit in Syria Liturgical Texts: Some Comparative Approaches,” in Comparative Liturgy Fifty Years after Anton Baumstark (1872–1948) (ed. Robert F. Taft and Gabriele Winkler; OCA 265; Rome: Pontifical Oriental Institute, 2001) 377–406, at 387–88.
60 Two changes have been made in the typical arrangement of the anaphoras in this table in order to make certain relationships clearer for the reader. First, JAMES and SyJAMES have been combined, since they are identical, except for an additional phrase in SyJAMES in < > at the very end. Second, in this section in particular, there are sometimes parallels between only two anaphoras. So that one of those between ATA and CHY could be seen more clearly, ATA was moved from the left side to between CHY and ByBASIL. Also, some items that are on the same rows are not necessarily in parallel; the use of italics is especially important here to indicate when the language is unique to the anaphora in question.
61 AS, II.2:248–49.
62 AS, I.2:248–49; PE, 250 (JAMES); AS, II.2, 152–53 (Longer SyJAMES); AS, II.2:198–99 (Shorter SyJAMES); PE, 228 (CHR); Metzger, SCh, 336, 202–04 (ApCon).
63 AS, II.2:152–53 (Longer SyJAMES); AS, II.2:198–99 (Shorter SyJAMES); PE, 248 (JAMES); AS, I.2:248–49 (ATA).
64 Taft only lists five parts: 1. memores; 2. offerimus; 3. laudamus; 4; et/vel gratias agentes; 5. et petimus ut mittas/mittere/mitte Spiritum; Taft, “Some Structural Problems,” 505–06. I have mostly followed Taft’s terminology, but have also expanded his terms in order to better clarify the ways in which the anaphoras overlap and differ from each other.
65 Stevenson, Eucharist and Offering, 60.
66 Robert F. Taft, “The Oblation and Hymn of the Chrysostom Anaphora: Its Text and Antecedents,” BollGrott 46 (1992) 319–45; Taft, “Reconstructing the Oblation of the Chrysostom Anaphora: An Exercise In Comparative Liturgy,” OCP 59 (1993) 387–402; Taft, “Some Structural Problems.”
67 Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise,” 92–93.
68 Ibid., 100; Montminy, “L’offrande sacrificielle,” 395.
69 Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise,” 99; see René-Georges Coquin, “L’anaphore alexandrine de saint Marc,” LM 82 (1969) 307–56, at 342.
70 Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise,” 91.
71 PG 82, 736BC; r. 31 reads τύπoν, here corrected according to Catenae Graecorum Patrum in Novum Testamentum (ed. J. A. Cramer; Oxford, 1844) 581 r. 34; quoted in Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise,” 90.
72 A further complication is that definitions of terms such as typology, allegory, and symbolic are not self-evident and can vary widely between scholarly authors. For a helpful survey of the wide and conflicting definitions given to these two terms in 20th cent. scholarship (both within and outside theological disciplines), especially on the debate between de Lubac and Daniélou on what term to use when describing patristic exegesis, see Peter Martens, “Revisiting the Allegory/Typology Distinction: The Case of Origen,” JECS 16.3 (2008) 283–317; Martens, “Origen against History?: Reconsidering the Critique of Allegory,” MT 28.4 (2012) 635–56. For a survey of typology in Biblical studies, see Tibor Fabiny, “Typology: Pros and Cons in Biblical Hermeneutics and Literary Criticism (from Leonhard Goppelt to Northrop Frye),” RILCE. Revista de Filología Hispánica 25.1 (2009) 138–52.
73 Hom. in Heb. 17.3: PG 63, 129–31.
74 Clavis Patrum Graecorum (Turnhout: Brepols, 1974–2003) 4440; ET is based on Robert Louis Wilken, The Spirit of Early Christian Thought: Seeking the Face of God (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003) 35, but makes a few adjustments so that the same terms in Theodoret and Chrysostom are translated the same.
75 Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise,” 92–93.
76 Ibid., 99.
77 PE, 116.
78 Parenti, “Between Anamnesis and Praise,” 98–99.
79 Ibid., 99. See Michael Zheltov, “The Anaphora and the Thanksgiving Prayer from the Barcelona Papyrus: An Underestimated Testimony to the Anaphoral History in the Fourth Century,” VC, 62.5 (2008) 467–504 (484 vv. 1-2; δἰ οὗ προσφέρομέν σοι κτίσματά σου ταῦτα, ἄρτον τε καὶ ποτήριον).