Luke 22:19–20

Context

Luke 22 records the meal Jesus shared with the apostles on the evening of the Passover, shortly before his arrest. This meal is commonly called the Last Supper. After saying that he had desired to eat this Passover with them before he suffered (Luke 22:15), Jesus shares the bread and the cup and explains their meaning.

Unlike the other Gospels, Luke mentions the cup twice (Luke 22:17, 22:20). The words over the bread, "this do in remembrance of me," and the description of the cup as the "new covenant" (KJV: "new testament") are closer to the Lord's Supper tradition Paul hands down in 1 Corinthians 11 than to the accounts in Matthew and Mark.

Interpretation

Many churches read these words as the basis for the institution of the Lord's Supper. Views differ, however, over what the words "This is my body" mean for how Christ is present in the sacrament.

• Roman Catholic reading: The Catholic Church teaches that when the priest consecrates the elements, the substance of the bread and wine is changed into the body and blood of Christ. This is called transubstantiation.
• Lutheran reading: Following Martin Luther, Lutherans hold that the bread and wine remain, while the body and blood of Christ are truly present "in, with, and under" them.
• Reformed and Presbyterian reading: Following John Calvin and the Westminster Confession of Faith, this tradition holds that Christ is spiritually present through the Holy Spirit and that those who receive in faith truly have communion with him.
• Memorialist reading: This view originates with Huldrych Zwingli. Emphasizing "in remembrance," it regards the Lord's Supper as a rite of remembering and confessing Christ's death. Many churches, including the Baptists, are generally regarded as holding an understanding close to this view.

The expression "new covenant" recalls the new covenant promised by Jeremiah and the "blood of the covenant" at Sinai (Exodus 24:8). Jesus' death is therefore read as the sacrifice that establishes the new covenant.

Controversies and Issues

• Textual question: The words from "which is given for you" in the latter part of verse 19 through the end of verse 20 are absent from some Western manuscripts, including Codex Bezae. The nineteenth-century scholars Westcott and Hort suspected that this portion was a later addition, and some English translations of the mid-twentieth century omitted it from the text. The great majority of manuscripts, however, including early papyri, contain it. For this reason most critical editions and Korean Bibles today print it as part of the text.
• Mode of presence: The differences of view described above lay at the heart of the Eucharistic controversy of the Reformation era. At the Marburg Colloquy in 1529, Luther and Zwingli failed to reach agreement on this question.
• Scope of "this do": During the COVID-19 pandemic, denominations reached differing judgments on whether the Lord's Supper could be celebrated remotely. This is treated in detail in the article Online Communion.

In the Korean Church

In communion services in Korean churches, the officiant often reads this passage or 1 Corinthians 11:23–26 as the "words of institution" before distributing the bread and the cup. The words "this do in remembrance of me" are sometimes inscribed on the communion table. How often the Lord's Supper is celebrated varies by denomination and congregation.

Related Passages

• Matthew 26:26–28
• Mark 14:22–25
• 1 Corinthians 11:23–26
• Jeremiah 31:31–34
• Hebrews 8:6–13