Gospel according to Saint Matthew, commented on verse by verse

Chapter 26

Mt26.¹ When Jesus had finished all these sayings, he said to his disciples:  – All these speeches are over.. Is the evangelist referring to all the speeches given by Our Lord since the beginning of his public life? St. Thomas Aquinas, Wichelhaus, Bisping, etc., have thought so. But we believe that he is only alluding to Jesus' final instructions, contained in the last three chapters, 23-25, and addressed partly to the people, partly to the Apostles. said to his disciples…When did he confide in them the message we are about to hear? In all likelihood, shortly after finishing his eschatological discourse, therefore on Tuesday evening. The very words of St. Matthew seem to make this quite clear; for they imply that there was no significant interval between the conclusion of the Discourse and the communication given to the Twelve by the Savior. Thus, Jesus was now withdrawn into the quiet and intimate circle of his followers, preparing himself immediately for the sacrifice. 

Mt26.² «You know that the Passover is in two days, and that the Son of Man is going to be handed over to be crucified.» – You know ; This was a perfectly clear fact. In two days, after two days. This date is rather vague in itself, because it allows for several ways of calculating the days. However, it is likely equivalent to our expression "the day after tomorrow." Since Passover began that year on Thursday evening, as we will explain later (see verse 17 and the commentary), it must have actually been on Tuesday that Jesus Christ spoke these words to his Apostles. Passover will take place. Passover was the first and most solemn of the three major festivals of the Jewish religious year. In the Book of Exodus, chapter 12, where its origin is recounted, it is shown that it was instituted in remembrance of the tenth plague of Egypt. The angel of God, passing by the houses during the night following the first celebration of the Passover feast, killed all the firstborn of the Egyptians; those of the Hebrews were saved by the blood of the lamb with which they had marked their doorposts. From this terrible or merciful event derived the name of the solemnity, according to the instructions of God himself, cf. Exodus 12:27-28. – The Passover festival began on the evening of Nisan 14 and lasted for a full octave from that moment, that is, until the evening of the 21st. The 15th and the 21st were the two principal days: they were obligatory days off. Jesus is obviously referring to the preliminary evening of the 14th, to the first vespers, as we would say today, since he speaks of Judas's betrayal, which took place towards the end of that same evening. Will be delivered…Reminding the Twelve of previous revelations (cf. 16:21; 20:18), the divine Master adds that the coming Passover will bring grave events for them and for him. It is then, in fact, that the Son of Man will be betrayed and crucified, as he foretold. This prophecy adds a new element to the previous ones: it specifies with great precision the time of Christ's Passion. Jesus does not want the Apostles to be caught off guard by the sudden, unforeseen arrival of such an event. – In the Greek, we read is delivered In the present tense: this tense better marks the proximity of the Passion and especially its irrevocable nature. "Jesus was ready to endure anything, and already the enemy was stirring," Bengel aptly puts it.

Plot of the Sanhedrin, vv. 3-5 Parallel. Mark 14, 1-2; Luke 22, 1-2

Mt26.³ Then the Princes of the priests and the Elders of the people gathered in the court of the high priest, called Caiaphas, – SO This refers to the first two verses of this chapter and also designates Tuesday evening. At the very moment when Jesus was speaking to the Apostles in the words we have just heard, the members of the Sanhedrin were meeting to plot against him. Let us remember that on that day, a few hours earlier, he had profoundly humiliated them, openly accusing them before the people; cf. 21:23 and ff., 46; 22; 23. The Savior announces his death: his enemies decide it. He knows the precise hour: for them, the time is uncertain. There is a striking parallel and contrast here. The princes of the priests and the elders…The Greek «Recepta» also mentions the Scribes, from which it follows that we are about to witness a full and official meeting of the Sanhedrin. See 2.4 and the commentary on the composition of this famous body. In the courtyard of the high priest…The assembly did not take place in the Gazzith, or hall of the «cut stones,» which was located in the temple's outbuildings (see Ancessi, Archaeological Atlas, pl. 9 and 10), and where such meetings were regularly held; rather, it was convened at the home of the high priest, its president. We will attempt to explain the reasons for this anomaly below. The Latin term «atrium» sometimes designates a large rectangular room directly connected to the vestibule and which could serve as a meeting place, sometimes an inner courtyard surrounded by galleries and porticoes (cf. vv. 58–69, etc.), and sometimes, by synecdoche, the house itself to which the atrium belonged. We will focus here on this last meaning, as do several exegetes (Fritzsche, de Wette, Schegg; cf. Bretschneider, Lexic. man. t. 1, p. 144). The evangelist notes as an extraordinary circumstance that the great Council assembled in the palace of the high priest. Called Caiaphas. The expression "called" is perfectly accurate; the true name of the prince of priests was Joseph; cf. Flav. Joseph, Ant. 18, 2, 2 and 4, 3. The nickname Caiaphas had become his common and popular name. This sinister man had been elevated to the high priesthood by the procurator Valerius Gratus: he held this office for 17 or 18 years, until he was deposed by the Proconsul Vitellius, a.D. 36. The rest of the Gospel narrative will reveal his character and the part he played in the condemnation of Jesus. The absolute ecclesiastical and judicial power he held in his hands made him the highest figure in Judaism at that time.

Mt26.⁴ And they plotted how they might seize Jesus by trickery and kill him. – They deliberated. Rather, a satanic secret meeting, as is evident from the following line. – The conjunction on It indicates both the purpose and the outcome of the meeting. To seize Jesus by trickery. This was the main topic of discussion: how to arrest Jesus by trickery, clandestinely, without arousing any alarm among his followers. And to kill him. The Savior's death had already been decided long before (cf. 12:14; Mark 3:6); and even recently, this plan had been definitively reversed (cf. John 10:47-53). This time, therefore, the primary concern is his arrest. Thus, the noun "cunning" only applies to the first of the two verbs. When Jesus falls into the hands of the Sanhedrin, they will no longer need cunning to make him disappear: the main thing is to seize him. It is already clear that a regular trial should not be expected: these preliminary details suggest that the Sanhedrin aimed "for a summary execution, if not an assassination." (Reuss, Gospel History, p. 619).

Mt26.⁵ «"But," they said, "it must not be during the festival, lest there be some tumult among the people."» – After this general decision, they make a specific determination. Not during the party. In Greek, during the festival, that is, throughout the entire Easter octave. Indeed, the danger would have been more or less the same until the end, as most of the pilgrims who came to Jerusalem for Passover did not leave until the solemnity had completely concluded. For fear that there might be an uproar. The Sanhedrin members who voted in favor of a delay thus cited their decisive motive. Sometimes, no doubt, the Jewish authorities delayed capital executions until the time of the major festivals, in order to produce a salutary impression of terror on the masses through the spectacle of the tortures awaiting the guilty; but, in the present case, it was understood that the effect might be entirely lost, and moreover, that a seditious movement was greatly to be feared, the Jewish people being largely favorable to Jesus. Were not his most ardent supporters Galilean Jews, that is to say, restless, easily irritable men? At that time, moreover, nothing was more common in Jerusalem than a riot during a festival. The texts of Flavius Josephus, *The Jewish War* 1.4.3; cf. 2.12.1; 4, 7, 2, prove that his compatriots were accustomed to this practice. The advice to wait until the end of Passover and the departure of the crowd was therefore very prudent, as it ensured the success of the previously adopted plan. It seems clear, however, that it did not concern the arrest of Jesus, which was to take place as soon as possible, as soon as a favorable circumstance facilitated it: it probably concerned only the execution of the Savior. – Such was the resolution voted on in the last instance. And yet, astonishingly, Our Lord was put to death publicly, not only during the Easter octave, but, according to the opinion we believe most likely, on the main day of the solemnity, the 15th of Nisan, in full view of all the people. Why this sudden change of heart? Undoubtedly, because the Sanhedrin soon learned that its fears of sedition were unfounded, and it learned this when it saw Judas, one of the Apostles, so easily betray his Master. Jesus, whom they supposed to be so beloved by the people, therefore had adversaries even within his inner circle? Certainly, a large faction among his followers thought like Judas, would act like Judas, and it was safe to confront public opinion. The victory would thus be more resounding for the Pharisees, the defeat of Jesus more crushing. This is why the Sanhedrin later reversed its decision. – The apocryphal minutes of the Sanhedrin session, which St. Matthew summarized in these three verses, can be found in Fabricius, Codex apocr. Nov. Test. t. 3, p. 487 ff. More interesting documents, collected by Messrs. Abbots Joseph Lémann (1836-1915) and Augustin Lémann (1836-1909) [Jewish brothers who became Catholic priests] and compiled in their book: The value of the assembly that pronounced the death penalty against Jesus Christ, The documents from Lyon, dated 1876, largely reconstruct the list of individuals who comprised the Great Council of Jews at that time, and allow us to assess their moral character. Reading these documents, one understands that, from such a supreme court, quite apart from the hatred it harbored for Jesus, he could expect neither justice nor mercy.

26.6-13. Parall. Mark 14:3-9; John 12:1-11.

Mt26.⁶ While Jesus was in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper, – St. Luke recounts a similar story above, in 7:37 ff., in which a woman likewise approaches Jesus while he is at table with a Jew named Simon, and anoints his feet, which she then wipes with her hair. Could this be the same meal? The same anointing? No, for there are notable differences between the accounts, which will be indicated in the explanation of the third Gospel. Moreover, the date is obviously not the same. One must be a rationalist to try to reconcile the two events and to attribute to a false tradition the separation of events that were originally intertwined. But while some seek to unjustly rob the Gospel of some of its finest gems, others multiply incidents without reason or purpose. This is why Origen, St. Jerome, Theophylact, Lightfoot, etc., admit up to three anointings, because they do not believe they can reconcile the account of St. John with that of St. Matthew and St. Mark. We will refute this error in its proper place. See John 12:1-11 and the commentary. At BethanySee 21:1 and the explanation. The date of the meal and the anointing at Bethany is a subject of serious debate among exegetes. Several, assuming a perfect continuity in St. Matthew's account, maintain the date given in verse 2. According to them, the three incidents we have encountered since the beginning of chapter 26 (see verses 1-2; 3-5; 6 ff.) would have taken place on one and the same day, Holy Tuesday, two days before Passover. But these authors seem not to have read the lines of St. John 12:1-3, which formally refute them: “Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived… A meal was given in Jesus’ honor…” Married had taken a pound of perfume… she poured the perfume on Jesus’ feet.” Everything is clear in this account; the date of the anointing is clearly established: it took place six days before Passover, that is, on the Friday or Saturday immediately preceding the Passion. St. Matthew and St. Mark, therefore, did not place this event in its chronological order: they deliberately delayed the narration, which they now resume retrospectively. We will see below, verse 14, what motive might have inspired this shift in perspective. Simon the Leper. This is the name of the one who was the Savior's guest on that memorable occasion. The epithet "leper" was either an old and hereditary nickname in his family, where there may have once been someone afflicted with leprosy, or a recent and personal one, in memory of his healing, perhaps performed by Jesus himself. Simon is a very common name among the Jews; those who bore it were usually distinguished by nicknames: e.g., Simon Bar-Jonah, Simon the Canaanite, etc. Traditions that appear apocryphal make Simon the leper sometimes the father of Lazarus, sometimes the husband of Saint Martha; cf. Nicephe's History of Ecclesiastes 1:27. It is at least likely that he was a friend of Saint Lazarus and his two sisters. Some authors have thought, but without the slightest foundation, that he was already dead at that time.

Mt26.⁷ A woman approached him with an alabaster vase containing very expensive perfume, and while he was at the table, she poured the perfume over his head. – He approached him : during a solemn meal given in honor of Jesus in the house of Simon. A womanSt. John kept his name: it was Married, sister of Martha and Lazarus, the Savior's devoted friend. Cf. Luke 10:39 ff.; John 11:1 ff. With an alabaster vase. The Greeks used this term for small vases, usually with long necks, used to store precious perfumes. Pliny the Elder, in his Natural History 3.20, explains the origin of this name: "The ointment vase, carved from alabaster stone, was used, according to custom, to preserve it from spoilage." Their material was therefore usually alabaster, a whitish calcareous substance that polishes like marble but is very easy to carve. Often, they were also made of onyx or other precious materials. A fragrance of great value. The perfume contained in the vase was nard, according to St. Mark and St. John. Judas valued it at three hundred denarii, John 12:5. On his head Similarly, St. Mark says, "She anointed Jesus' feet." St. John, on the contrary, says, "She anointed Jesus' feet." The reconciliation is easy: to achieve it, one simply needs to say that Married She perfumed both the head and feet of the Savior. In doing so, Lazarus' sister was not performing an extraordinary display, for it was the custom among the Jews (cf. Psalm 22:5; Luke 7:46) to pour precious oils and scented waters over the heads of distinguished guests whom one wished to honor in a special way during meals. However, in this instance, she had a special reason, which will be revealed later (v. 12) by Jesus. He was at the table : lying down at the table, in the manner of the ancients.

Mt26.⁸ Seeing this, the disciples said indignantly, "What good is this loss?" – When the disciples saw this… St. Mark: “Some were indignant.” St. John: “Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples, the one who was going to betray him, then said…” St. Matthew, as is his custom, generalizes in order to be brief. It is quite understandable, moreover, that Judas, having expressed to his table companions his displeasure at the act, or rather the expense, of MarriedSeveral other disciples shared his ideas and echoed them. But while the traitor was really only thinking of his own personal gain, the others were truly guided by their concern for the poor. This loss The loss of the perfume. For them, it was a pointless extravagance. Wouldn't a few drops of precious spikenard have sufficed?

Mt26.⁹ We could have sold this perfume at a very high price and given the proceeds to the poor.» – Very expensive. We have already indicated, according to St. John (cf. Mark 14:5), the considerable value of the perfume poured on Jesus' head. Pliny, Natural History 12.26; 13.4, goes further, for he sets the price of nard at 400 denarii per pound. This was the equivalent of a worker's wages for an entire year's labor. And give the prize to the poorThis destination for the perfume would have been, according to the disciples, much more meritorious and much more fitting. But, as M. de Pressensé so aptly puts it, in *Jesus Christ, His Time, His Life…*, p. 551, “the argument of the poor opposed to Married is merely a sophism. It is indeed a case of repeating: We must do this and not neglect that. Certainly, he who identified himself with the poor and said that what was done to them would be done to himself, sufficiently guaranteed their interests. Piety cannot take exclusively the form of almsgiving; it must also go directly to God in Jesus, lest we soon no longer recognize him under the veil of poverty and to accomplish more than a purely human act. The poor have everything to gain from this adoration; it is when the precious nard has been poured out that hands are most generously opened to help them. He who is stingy with God will be stingy with His creatures… alongside the daily and permanent duties of charity "And we must not neglect this; there are extraordinary occasions where piety must manifest itself in an exceptional way and freely follow its impulse."

Mt26.¹⁰ Jesus, having noticed this, said to them, «Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a good thing for me. – Jesus divines their thoughts; or rather, their murmurs reach him. He could have addressed the guilty parties with severe reproaches; but, while warmly praising his holy friend, he prefers to correct them kindly, blending instruction with rebuke as was his custom. Why are you causing pain to this woman?. «The disciples» conduct towards the Lord lacked respect; but he reproaches them for this less than for disturbing the woman,” Bengel judiciously observes. It is she, in fact, whom he defends above all. A good deed The Greek word means "a beautiful work": what is beautiful in the moral order is good by that very fact, and vice versa. The act of Married with regard to Jesus bore the visible imprint of this beauty, and consequently of this goodness: he breathed the most vivid feelings of love, faith, and piety towards Jesus.

Mt26.¹¹ Because you always have the poor with you, but you haven't always had me. – Drawing on the murmurs of his disciples for a personal argument, Our Lord establishes between the poor and this contrast will itself serve to further highlight the fault of the discontented. Always the poor …; they have and will always have many poor people with them, and if they so choose, they can do them good. Cf. Mark 14:7. You haven't always… A litotes meaning: I am with you only for a very short time. Having to enjoy the visible presence of their Master for only such a limited number of days, they will scarcely have the opportunity to honor his holy humanity. Why then do they view with such displeasure the homage that has just been paid to him?

Mt26.¹² By spreading this perfume on my body, she did it for my burial. – Jesus develops the last words of the preceding verse, in order to reveal the mysterious action of Married and to reveal its remarkable symbolism, its brilliant merit. You will not always have me, and you seem unconcerned: but this woman is thinking about it, and that is why she honors me in this way. Do you not see that what she has just done is a preemptive embalming? In view of my burial. The Greek verb encapsulates the numerous funeral rites (washing, anointing, embalming, covering) that the ancients, and especially the Eastern peoples, performed for the bodies of the deceased before placing them in the tomb. Lazarus' sister had performed these rites in advance for Jesus Christ by virtue of a prophetic premonition; or at least, if she had not considered the figurative meaning of her anointing, God had inspired her to perform this act as an unconscious foreshadowing of the Savior's impending death.

Mt26.¹³ Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she did will be recounted in her memory.» – After praise comes reward. The promise that will come from Jesus' lips is unique: the divine Master pronounces it emphatically, after placing it under the protection of an oath. Wherever it is preached…: that is to say, in all places and at all times, according to other words of Jesus, cf. 28, 19-20. – This Gospel ; cf. 24, 14. The Gospel preaching; the life, the mysteries, the doctrine of the Son of Man. Worldwide ; These words determine the meaning of "everywhere". We will tell…The prophecy has been admirably fulfilled. «On the contrary, it is known throughout the world, and it is still said every day after the revolution of so many centuries, that a sinful woman came to the house of a leper and, in the presence of twelve men, poured a very expensive perfume on the head of another man. The memory of this act has never faded. The Persians, the Indians, the Scythians, the Thracians, the Moorish people, and the inhabitants of the islands have learned and everywhere recount what this woman is doing today in secret in the house of a Pharisee.» St. John Chrysostom, Hom. 80 in Matthew. What glory for Married to see his name forever associated with the Gospel and Passion of Jesus.

Mt26.14-16 Parallel. Mark. 14, 10-11; Luke. 22, 3-6

Mt26.¹⁴ Then one of the Twelve, called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests, To avoid any error regarding this date and the event it introduces into the Gospel narrative, it is important to remember that verses 6-13 are not in their usual place (see the note on verse 6) and would have belonged to chapter 21 had the narrator strictly adhered to the chronological order. Thus, verse 14 connects directly to verses 3-5, and we have two parallel "then"s, both representing the evening of Holy Tuesday. The Sanhedrin had plotted the dark conspiracy against Jesus that we know of: at the same moment, by a providential coincidence, Judas decided to betray his Master. We will soon examine the motives that could have driven the traitor to such an infamous act (see verse 14). 15: His decisive motive, or, to use a popular image, the straw that broke the camel's back, was undoubtedly the rebuke Jesus addressed in the house of Simon the Leper to some disgruntled disciples, and especially to him; cf. John 12:4 ff. This is why St. Matthew and St. Mark broke the chronological chain of events at this point, in order to bring Judas's betrayal closer to the anointing of Married. – One of the twelve. The evangelists usually associate this phrase with Judas's actions to highlight their enormity. The princes of the priests. The hostility of the priestly caste toward Jesus was no secret; it had recently been on full display. It is only natural that Judas would have thought of taking advantage of this to achieve his own ends. He therefore went to find some of the chief priests. They had just come from the meeting in which Jesus' arrest had been voted on: one can imagine their surprise and malicious glee.

Mt26.¹⁵ and said to them, "What are you willing to give me and I will deliver it to you?" And they counted out thirty pieces of silver to him. – A revolting and cynical proposition which, better than the strange reasoning of our contemporary intellectuals, reveals Judas's true character and the nature of his actions. While it is true, from certain perspectives, that the betrayal of Our Lord Jesus Christ by one of his Apostles constitutes a "most difficult psychological problem" (Reuss, Hist. évang. p. 623), it is wrong to add that "our Gospels provide us with only insufficient elements for its solution." They not only point to the material fact of the betrayal, but they also allow us to glimpse its moral causes quite clearly. Thus, the Fathers and ancient authors had assessed Judas in his true light; cf. St. Augustine, De Cons. Evang. 3, 4; St. Jerome in 11; Maldonatus, Corneille, and Lapis Lazuli; Jansenius, etc. But those who, in our time, have attacked Jesus with such violence, did they not have an interest in siding with the traitor, in mitigating their own fault by excusing his? This is how they sought to idealize him, to transform him into a tragic hero. “Without denying,” writes M. Renan, *Life of Jesus*, 1st ed., p. 382, “that Judas of Kerioth contributed to the arrest of his Master (even for M. Renan, it would be quite difficult to deny this!), we believe that the curses heaped upon him are somewhat unjust. Perhaps there was more clumsiness than perversity in his actions… It does not seem that he had completely lost his moral compass since, seeing the consequences of his sin, he repented and, it is said, took his own life.” Why not simply say, as other authors suggest, that Judas betrayed his Master out of an excess of love? Firmly believing in Jesus' messianic role, he found it difficult to observe the slowness with which he established his kingdom. To force him out of this reserve, he supposedly feigned betrayal, placing him in a situation where, with all retreat impossible, he would be forced to proclaim his divine mission and resort to dazzling miracles and popular demonstrations. The throne of David would thus be swiftly and gloriously conquered (cf. Schollmeyer, Jesus und Judas, p. 52, Lüneburg 1846; K. Hase, Leben Jesu, p. 231 ff., 5th ed.). Without going quite so far, various modern writers have resorted to rather peculiar hypotheses to explain Judas's conduct. According to some, he was driven by a feeling of savage hatred and fierce vengeance that awoke in his heart, either at the sight of St. Peter being named Prince of the Apostles and St. John being chosen as his privileged disciple, or following some serious warnings from Jesus; according to others, by a profound disappointment, the Messianic kingdom, on whose earthly joys and glories he had counted, now appearing to him in all its nakedness from the point of view of worldly hopes; according to still others, by the fear of seeing Jesus soon overthrown by his powerful enemies, in which case his disciples would be exposed to the gravest dangers. – But no, such were not the real and principal motives for Judas's action: a sordid avarice, the desire for a miserable gain, dominated every other motive in his betrayal. “He was a thief,” we read in the inspired account, John 12:6; And does he not himself depict his act in its true light when he abruptly says to the chief priests, “What will you give me, and I will deliver him to you?” A man who speaks in such language is nothing but vile and vulgar: a betrayal proposed in such terms cannot find any remedy; it is the most shameful and detestable that can be committed. “Who could be astonished at the malice of Judas, who goes of his own accord to the Jews to betray his Master to them, and who sells him to them at such a paltry price?” (St. John Chrysostom, Hom. 80 in Matthew). We shall see, when studying the fourth Gospel, cf. John 6, 60 et seq., that Judas's dark plans against his Master dated back to a rather distant time; but his soul had only gradually reached this excess of infamy and impudence. And I. It seems he is emphasizing this personal pronoun. I, his apostle; I, for whom success will be so easy. Cf. Luke of Bruges, in hl – They agreed. «Like a new Ahithophel, Judas was received with transports of joy by the members of the Sanhedrin, as the former had been at the council of rebels convened by Absalom,» Lémann, <i>Valeur de l'assemblée</i>, etc., p. 54. According to the accounts of St. Mark 14:11 and St. Luke 22:5, the chief priests did not immediately hand over to Judas the price of his betrayal: they only promised to give it to him later, no doubt after he had personally carried out the part of the contract that concerned him. Thirty silver pieces. St. Matthew is the only one to note precisely the sum offered to Judas. What he calls a silver coin can only be the silver shekel, or sanctuary shekel, which was worth slightly more than the common shekel. Only sacred currency entered the Temple treasury: the priests could not promise Judas any other. Now, the sanctuary shekel was, according to the historian Josephus (Ant. 3.8.2), the equivalent of four Attic drachmas, or more precisely, according to St. Jerome, three and a third drachmas. Cf. Comm. in Mich. 19. This sum was certainly very small, which is why all sorts of suppositions have sometimes been used to explain why Judas was satisfied with it. The thirty shekels were only a deposit, says Dr. Sepp (Leben Jesu, vol. 6, p. 10). 22. Some authors believe the Sanhedrin acted ironically; or perhaps Judas hoped to gain more once his betrayal was complete. Rationalists (Strauss, de Wette, Ewald) find it simpler to assert that tradition, that is, the Gospel narrative, is mistaken. Certainly, the sum was relatively small; but besides the fact that greed, when inflamed, is easily satisfied, this circumstance must be seen as providential. God allowed precisely thirty shekels to be offered to Judas, thus fulfilling the prophetic oracle of Zechariah 11:12 ff.; cf. Matthew 27:9: «They gathered up the thirty pieces of silver.» The Church Fathers were already fond of pointing out that, according to the Law (Exodus 21:32), this same sum was paid as compensation to the master whose slave had been unintentionally killed. The blood of Jesus, like that of a slave, was therefore paid for with thirty pieces of silver. – Legend has seized upon the thirty pieces of silver, attributing to them a completely surprising origin and historical vicissitudes.

Mt26.¹⁶ From that moment on, he sought a favorable opportunity to betray Jesus. – Since that moment. From the moment the infamous deal had been concluded. He was looking Judas lay in wait like a wild beast, watching for a favorable opportunity in terms of time and place to deliver Jesus into the hands of his executioners. As we have seen (note to verse 5), the result of this betrayal was to solidify the Sanhedrin's uncertainty. There was no longer any question of waiting until the festival was over, until the masses had dispersed. They would seize the first opportune moment, since circumstances were so openly favorable to the Sanhedrin.

Mt26, 17-19. – Parallel. Mark. 14, 12-16; Luke, 22, 7-13.

Mt26.¹⁷ On the first day of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, «Where do you want us to prepare the Passover meal?» – The Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ dates back to the year 782 of the ancient Roman era, that is to say, the year 27 AD (the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius). The first day of unleavened bread—That is to say, the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Unleavened bread, cf. Leviticus 7:12, was called matzah, a very thin flatbread in whose composition not the slightest trace of leaven was to be used, and which replaced leavened bread throughout the Passover solemnity. Thus, Passover was called the Feast of Unleavened Bread. From around noon on the 14th of Nisan, all the leavened bread found in the houses was burned with the utmost care, and from the Last Supper until the evening of the 21st, only unleavened bread was used. "The first day of Unleavened Bread" was therefore in fact the day when leavened bread began to be replaced by unleavened bread, that is, the 14th of Nisan, although strictly speaking the festival did not begin until Friday evening, when the Passover lamb was eaten. – Thus, the Passover festival lasted seven days during which the Jews did not eat leavened bread, but only unleavened bread, that is, flatbread like the current Lebanese pita bread (the hosts in Catholic Masses come from this unleavened bread). The evangelists state that the Savior died on a Friday, shortly before the beginning of the Sabbath rest, cf. Mark 15:42; Luke 23, 54; John 19:31, and at the time of Passover. The three Synoptic Gospels indicate that Jesus ate the Passover «on the first day of Unleavened Bread», that is, on the evening of the 14th of Nisan, as prescribed by the Law; cf. Matthew 26:17 ff.; Mark 14:12 ff.; Luke 22:7 ff. St. John seems to contradict them: 13.¹ Before the Passover festival, Jesus, knowing that his hour had come to depart from this world to his Father, having loved his own who were in the world, loved them to the end. ² During dinner, (...); 18,²⁸ They led Jesus from Caiaphas's house to the Praetorium. It was morning. But they themselves did not enter the Praetorium, so as not to defile themselves and so that they could eat the Passover meal. ; 19, ¹⁴ It was the Preparation Day of Passover and about the sixth hour. These statements are reconciled because the Jews distinguished between Passover and unleavened bread, but in Hellenistic language, two different expressions could be used to designate the eight days of the Passover festival. Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities14, 2, 1 etc. uses yet another expression to refer to it. The Jews did not call the 14th of Nisan the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Another explanation for the differences between the Synoptic Gospels and St. John lies in the different calendars they refer to. While Matthew, Mark, and Luke would base their calculations on the traditional calendar attested to in the Book of Jubilees found at Qumran, John would calculate the days according to the pagan calendar followed by the Pharisees. The ritual slaughter of lambs began on Good Friday in the Temple, starting at noon, the hour at which Jesus was crucified.Gospel according to Saint John This symbolism is emphasized by specifying that Jesus was crucified at the sixth hour, that is, noon. For the Jews, the following day began as soon as the new moon was seen. For a non-Jew, Thursday was therefore the first day of the festival, and for a Jew, the eve of the festival, since the day of the festival did not begin for them until the evening. Jesus celebrated the first meal of the seven or eight days of the festival (if one includes the first day on which the bread is unleavened), but he did not consume the Passover lamb as St. John states. The disciples approached. This was probably in the morning, as the preparations for the Last Supper were quite numerous and required considerable time. We will describe them later. Jesus was then, in all likelihood, in Bethany. Or, In which house? Since the divine Master and his disciples were strangers in Jerusalem, they needed to find lodgings to celebrate the Passover feast. We were preparing you ; They speak to him as if he were a father, to whom the main role in this solemn occasion fell. Eating Passover, This is a Hebraism, which appears in the Greek text. There is some uncertainty about the type of meal Jesus ate with his apostles on Thursday evening. Some exegetes believe that Jesus moved the Passover meal forward to eat the Passover lamb before Friday evening, which would have been possible given the different calendars in use at the time. Other exegetes maintain that the Thursday evening meal, while related to the Passover feast days, did not include the consumption of the Passover lamb.

Mt26.¹⁸ Jesus answered them, «Go into the city to a certain man and tell him, »The Teacher says: My time is near; I will celebrate the Passover with my disciples at your house.’” – The divine Master, addressed as the head of the apostolic family, immediately gives his instructions for the feast. His response concerns primarily the specific point on which he had been consulted. Go to the city : in Jerusalem; proof that Jesus and his followers were then some distance away. It was in the Jewish capital that the Passover feast was to be celebrated: God's commands were explicit on this point and dated back to the earliest days of the theocracy (see Deuteronomy 16:5-7), as did most of the other ordinances relating to this great solemnity. In such aA mysterious phrase, which has often tested the sagacity of exegetes. In Greek: "to such and such a person." Might Jesus not have uttered a proper name instead of this vague term? Several authors have thought so. They add that St. Matthew omitted it from his account for a reason we can no longer determine (Meyer), or more simply, because he had forgotten it (Henneberg). But it seems certain that the Savior did not give any name, since, according to the more complete accounts of St. Mark and St. Luke, he gave his two messengers a special sign by which they would easily reach the one who would offer them a place for the Last Supper. The true words of Our Lord are preserved in the second and third Gospels. St. Matthew, who wanted to shorten them, as was his frequent custom, condensed them into the simple phrase "Go to such and such a person." But he certainly preserved their spirit. For it is evident that, if Jesus used a completely extraordinary means to reveal to the two delegated disciples the house in which they were to prepare the Passover, he had a pressing motive for doing so: and this motive was, according to the general consensus of exegetes, the fear that Judas, knowing several hours in advance the place where Jesus would eat the Passover lamb, might reveal it to the chief priests; and then, an early arrest could have prevented or at least disrupted the institution of the holy EucharistThanks to the mysterious language of the divine Master, the traitor only learned of the house in the evening when he entered it, and by then it was too late to warn his accomplices. Now, St. Matthew, with his abbreviated formula, very well preserves the secret of Jesus. St. Augustine was right to write, in Gospel Book 2, Chapter 80: "(St. Matthew) adds of his own accord: 'At such and such a man', not that the Lord expressed himself in this way, but to make us understand that there was a man in the city to whom the Lord was sending his disciples to prepare the Passover." The Master said : the Master par excellence; cf. 23, 8, 10. These words presuppose that the person to whom the two disciples were sent knew Our Lord, and that he would gladly offer him thehospitality for the evening. Had there been some prior arrangement between her and Jesus on this point? Some authors have thought so; others deny it. It is certain, at least, that there was a miracle in the way the Savior's messengers were led to the Upper Room. See Mark 14:13-16 and the commentary. My time. Not "the time at which I must celebrate Passover," according to Grotius, Neander, etc., but "the time of my death"; cf. St. John Chrysostom, Hom. 81 in Matthew, Maldon, Luke of Bruges, Jansenius, E. Reuss, etc. This is an urgent way of emphasizing his request: I am going to die soon; grant me this last favor. At your placeWhat an honor for this stranger! There were many a house in Jerusalem devoted to Christ that would have gladly received him. Moreover, on the occasion of the Easter celebrations, all the inhabitants of the capital practiced the broadest hospitality with regard to foreign brothers. Dr. Sepp claims, but without the slightest semblance of reason, that the person to whom Our Lord attributes these words was none other than Nicodemus. I will celebrate Easter. The present instead of the future: the divine Master speaks with authority. «Celebrating Passover» was the technical term used to designate the observance of the main rites of the festival; cf. Exodus 12:48; Numbers 9:4; Hebrews 11:28. The classical texts had similar terms. With my disciples. Jesus did not invite himself to participate in the master of the house's meal; he only asked for a separate room, in which he would eat the Passover lamb with his Apostles. For, according to tradition, the word "disciples" should be understood here in a very restricted sense: the Savior had no other witnesses than the Twelve during those solemn hours in the Upper Room.

Mt26.¹⁹ The disciples did as Jesus had commanded them, and they prepared the Passover. – We know from the testimony of St. Luke, 22:8, that the two disciples chosen by Jesus were St. Peter and St. John. They prepared for Passover. It was a rather complicated operation. A year-old lamb, without blemish or defect, which had been set aside a few days earlier to serve as the Passover sacrifice, had to be brought to the Temple; it was slaughtered in the afternoon according to a specific rite, the details of which have been preserved in the Talmud, tractate Pesachim, 5, 6-8. The heads of families or their delegates were brought in groups into the Temple courtyard: at the given signal, each slaughtered his lamb. Priests arranged in two lines received the blood of the sacrifices in gold or silver basins, which they passed from hand to hand to the colleague closest to the altar. This priest emptied the bowls at the foot of the altar and returned them to the priests. The lambs were then butchered, but with the greatest care, as no bones were to be broken, cf. Exodus 12:46. The fat was set aside to be burned on the altar of burnt offerings. When these preliminary preparations had been completed in the Temple to the singing of Psalms, the lambs were taken to private homes to be roasted in the oven. Two pieces of pomegranate wood, tied together in the shape of a cross (cf. St. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, ch. 40), held them in a position determined by custom. Preparing for Passover also involved obtaining unleavened bread, wine, bitter herbs, charoceth (a kind of thick, reddish sauce made of dates, figs, almonds, and spices bound together with vinegar), and the various dishes that would complete the meal. Finally, the table had to be set and the banquet hall decorated; but this last task had already been completed when the disciples arrived at the house Jesus had indicated to them (cf. Mark). 14, 15; Luke, 22, 12.

26.20-26. Parallel. Mark. 14, 18-20; Luke. 22, 14, 21-23; John 13, 1-30.

Mt26.²⁰ When evening came, he sat down to eat with the Twelve. – Evening having arrived, That is, after sunset, because that was when the Passover solemnity began. The 15th of Nisan was supposed to start then, according to the Jewish custom of counting the days from evening to evening. He sat down at the table. According to the Law, Exodus 12:11, the Passover lamb was to be eaten standing up, with one's loins girded, a staff in hand—in short, in the posture of travelers. But this prescription soon fell into disuse, along with many others that had been introduced specifically for the "Egyptian Passover," as the Rabbis call it (cf. Pesachim 9:5). "The perpetual Passover" no longer had the simple and austere character of ancient times: a host of new rules had been introduced, particularly that of celebrating the legal meal reclining on low couches. "Custom dictates," says the Talmud, Hieros. Pesach. f. 37, 2, "that servants eat standing up; at that time, they ate reclining, to signify that they were leaving the condition of servants to become free." The change in status had brought about a change in attitude. With his twelve disciples. The number of guests who could gather for the Passover meal was not to be less than ten; generally, it rarely exceeded twenty. The select group gathered around Jesus was somewhere between these two extremes. Euthymius Zigabenus alone claims that the Savior invited several disciples in addition to his Apostles. This is, moreover, refuted by the Gospel account, which mentions only the Twelve.

Mt26.²¹ While they were eating, he said, "Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me."« – While they were eating. The many moving ceremonies that accompanied the Passover feast are summarized in these two words by the evangelist. But we believe it necessary to indicate at least a few, chosen from among the most important, in order to place before the reader a vivid picture of what the divine Master did during that evening. Jesus, reclining in the place of honor and representing the father of the family, first took a cup, filled it with wine, and passed it around among the assembly after having himself dipped his lips in it, saying: Blessed are you, Lord our God, who created the fruit of the vine. Then everyone washed their hands, and the table was brought into the midst of the guests. After a special blessing was pronounced over the bitter herbs, each person took a few leaves and ate them, seasoning them with charoketh. Only then was the Passover lamb placed on the table before Jesus. The Savior spoke to his disciples, explaining the meaning of the feast and its rites, as prescribed by the Law (see Exodus 12:26). After this, everyone sang the first part of the prayer called Hallel, that is, Psalms 112 and 113 (Hebrews 113:114-115). A second bowl was emptied; Jesus took some unleavened bread, broke it, ate a piece with the bitter herbs and charoketh, and distributed the rest to the disciples. He then blessed the Passover lamb and the other sacred meats that accompanied it. At this point, the meal proper began. The ritual allowed some freedom to the guests for this part of the ceremony; however, it was stipulated that the symbolic lamb would be eaten last and that nothing else would be eaten afterward. Once this meal was finished, a third cup, blessed by Jesus like the first two, was passed around. The second part of the Hallel prayer, Psalms 114-117 (Hebrews 116-118), was sung. A fourth cup usually concluded the Last Supper. However, if anyone present wished, a fifth could be passed around, provided that the Great Hallel, Psalms 119-136 (Hebrews 120-135), was recited as a general conclusion to the meal. Everyone had to leave before midnight. Truly, I tell you. The thing that Jesus is about to predict will seem so incredible to the Twelve that he guarantees its perfect truth in advance with his usual oath. One of you. There is a lot of emphasis and sadness in this "you". Will betray me. Several days earlier, Jesus had already prophesied the betrayal of which he would be the object, cf. 20, 18; 26, 2; at this moment, he specifies further and announces that the traitor will come from the ranks of his Apostles.

Mt26.²² They were deeply saddened, and each one began to say to him, "Is it I, Lord?"« – The Master betrayed by one of their own. This news struck the apostolic circle, the innocent and the guilty, like a thunderbolt. The eleven were devastated, dismayed. The evangelists, especially St. John, have vividly described the turmoil this pronouncement caused among Jesus' disciples. – Hardly recovered from their initial shock, they took turns asking their master: "Is it I?" In Greek, "Surely it wasn't me?" expresses the same idea more delicately, for it implies that the answer will be negative. Such must have been the language of a soul that had not the slightest suspicion of his guilt.

Mt26.²³ He replied: "Whoever has dipped their hand into the dish with me will betray me.". – In his reply, the Savior forcefully repeats his initial assertion, merely adding a detail that further highlights the heinous nature of the betrayal. Hand on the plate. Jesus alludes to a custom that still persists in the modern East, much to the annoyance of European travelers. Dishes are usually served on large platters from which each guest, holding a piece of bread, helps themselves directly to the meat, sauces, and vegetables. This saying of the Savior has often been taken literally, leading to the conclusion that at the moment it was spoken, Judas was in fact reaching for the communal dish (D. Calmet, Corn. a Lap., Rosenmüller, Fritzsche, de Wette, etc.). But it is not possible to attribute this meaning to it, since then Judas would have been clearly identified as the traitor, whereas we know, from John 13:20, that his crime remained a mystery to most of the Apostles. It is therefore a general expression meaning: One of my closest friends. See Psalm 40:10: «Even my close friend, in whom I trusted and who shared my bread, has struck me with his heel.» On the plate It referred to a large dish. That one is emphatic, like "you" above.

Mt26.²⁴ The Son of Man will go as it is written about him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for him if that man had not been born.» – To this response, which merely confirmed his initial assertion, the Savior added a solemn declaration, a grave threat, intended, if there was still time, to bring the traitor back to his senses. The Son of Man. «As for what is» as opposed to «while» which follows. Jesus establishes a striking contrast between his person and that of the traitor, between the very distinct ends that await them. He leaves. A majestic phrase, which Christ loved to use to refer to his imminent death; cf. John 7:33; 8:22. It expresses at the same time, as the ancient exegetes noted, Jesus' perfect freedom with regard to his suffering. "Christ shows that his death is more like a transition than a true death. By these same words, he makes us understand that he went freely to his death," Victor of Antioch in Mark 14:21; cf. Maldonatus in hl – As it is written…Perfect obedience, despite freedom; the prophecies will be fulfilled down to the smallest detail. But alas!. A threat of eternal doom; a terrible inscription engraved by Jesus Christ himself on Judas's tomb. It would have been betterIndeed, says St. Jerome, in hl, «nothingness is better than the eternal torments of hell.» And yet, God created Judas. Jesus made him his Apostle, fully aware that he would betray him. A great theological mystery. But «God judges the present, not the future; he does not condemn according to his foreknowledge if he recognizes someone who will displease him later; but his goodness and mercy are so great that he chooses the one who will serve him well for a time, knowing, however, that afterward he will become wicked. He thus gives him the opportunity to convert and do penance.» The solution to the problem lies entirely in these lines of St. Jerome, adv. Pelagian. 3. On the lively and curious discussions of the Scholastics concerning the phrase "It would have been better…", see Maldonat, in hl – Stier, a Protestant author, rightly writes (die Reden des Herrn Jesu, hl): "These words, taken literally and strictly, forever close the door of hope. They preclude any thought of a later and final salvation; for, if there could be redemption for the soul of Judas in the future revolutions of the ages, it would have been better for him to have received life." Thus, Krummacher says that Our Lord never uttered a more dreadful word.

Mt26.²⁵ Judas, who betrayed him, spoke up and said, "Is it I, Master?" "You have said so," replied Jesus. – Speaking. The traitor, initially more stunned than anyone else by Jesus' unexpected revelation (v. 21), had not participated in the others' question (v. 22). He now fears that his silence will expose his guilt. Therefore, he asks in turn, with an outward show of profound respect: Is that me? We are outraged by his cold impudence. But we admire him. gentleness of Jesus. You said it, “Yes,” he simply replied, using a formula of assent frequently employed by Jews, Greeks, and Romans. “Yes, it’s you, you know that.” These words were spoken in a low voice so as to be heard only by Judas, as is evident from the more complete account in John 13:28-29.

26.26-29. Parallel. Mark. 14, 22-25; Luke. 22, 15-20.

Mt26.²⁶ During the meal, Jesus took the bread, and after saying a blessing, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, «Take and eat; this is my body.» The Synoptic Gospels, which passed quickly over the legal supper, dwell at greater length on the Eucharistic banquet, for it held a completely different significance for them. By distributing to his Apostles a little bread, a little wine, and by commanding them to do the same for Christians throughout the ages, was not Jesus instituting the most sublime of sacraments? Was he not leaving to his Church the most perfect memorial of his love, as well as the continuation of the sacrifice of Calvary? Cf. Council of Trent, Session 13, c. 2. Here, then, is our true Paschal Lamb, which will replace the shadows and the figures. During the meal. Cf. the accounts of St. Luke 22:20 and St. Paul 1 Corinthians 11:25. Legally, the prescribed meal was not yet complete when Jesus instituted the sacrament of the altar, since the Eucharistic chalice is one and the same as the fifth Paschal cup (see the notes on verses 21 and 27); nevertheless, it could be said to have been completed in practice, since they had to stop eating even before taking the third cup. One evangelist could therefore use the expression "during the meal," another write "after the meal"; it all depends on the perspective from which each of them chose to read. St. Matthew, who wants to show us the New Testament emerging from the Old like a flower from the root, connects the Eucharistic supper to the prescribed meal. The phrase "during the meal" parallels "while they were eating" in verse 21. Jesus took breadAt that time, in the Upper Room and in the house, there was only unleavened bread, the only kind, as we have seen, that was permissible from the middle of the 14th of Nisan until the evening of the 21st. The Latin Church therefore faithfully follows the example of Jesus when it uses exclusively unleavened bread for the preparation of the holy EucharistBread and wine, these are in the hands of the Savior, these will forever be the only substances of the ultimate sacrifice. Thus was fulfilled the Jewish prophecy that, when the Messiah came to assume the priestly functions according to the order of Melchizedek, animal substances would cease to be offered as sacrifices, for they would give way to two plant-based species, bread and wine. He blessed him. According to St. Thomas Aquinas and several exegetes (Maldonatus, Luke of Bruges, etc.), this expression represents the very act of sacramental consecration. It is widely believed to correspond to the blessing that the head of the household pronounced over the unleavened bread before distributing it to the guests (see the explanation of verse 21), which usually consisted of the following phrase: "Blessed is He who produces the bread of the earth." He broke itJust as he had previously broken the unleavened bread before eating the Passover meal. This breaking of bread in the legal supper symbolized the sufferings once endured by the Jewish people; in the Eucharistic supper, it represented the Passion and immolation of Our Lord Jesus Christ. It is known that this rite, imitated by the apostles and their successors, led to the Eucharistic mysteries being called the "breaking of bread" in the early Church. Cf. Acts of the Apostles 2:42; 1 Corinthians 10:16 etc. And the donna Jesus did not give the Apostles communion in the manner now used in the Church; he placed a piece of the consecrated bread in each of their hands. This is evident from the word "take" and from ancient ecclesiastical customs. This is…“Alas,” exclaims the Protestant Olshausen, in his Bibl. Comment. über saemmtl. Schrift. des N. Test. 3rd ed., vol. 2, p. 441, addressing the explanation of the words of consecration, “the banquet of love has served, even to our time, as an occasion for the most violent and saddening polemics that the history of the Church and the history of dogma have to record.” The expressions used by Our Lord are, however, so clear in their sublimity. But negative theology has done everything to heap clouds around them. It is not our intention to study them here from a dogmatic point of view; numerous and illustrious authors have published remarkable essays on this subject in which it is thoroughly treated: we refer the reader to them. See in particular Wiseman, *The Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Blessed Eucharist*. London, 1855 (excellent treatise translated in Migne's Demonstrations Évangéliques, vol. 15, col. 1159 ff.); Franzelin, Tractatus de SS. Eucharistiae Sacramento et Sacrificio, Rome 1868, pp. 31-70. Our role, therefore, consists simply in exegesis of the words spoken by Jesus at this solemn moment, words of the most important that ever came from his mouth, since they establish together the sacrifice of the new Covenant, the sacrament of the Eucharist and the new priesthood intended to replace that of the Levitical race. – The demonstrative pronoun “this” is used substantively. Christ deliberately used it in the neuter; the masculine “this” would have directly designated only the bread, “this bread.” “This” means, in a general way: What I present to you, what will pass from my hands into yours. – The copula “is” was undoubtedly not uttered by Our Lord, for the Aramaic language, in which he was then speaking, omits it in such circumstances. But the copula was required by the genius of the Indo-Germanic languages, and it was rightly inserted into the formula of consecration. However, from what we have just said, it is evident that “is” cannot mean here, any more than in verse 1. 28, “means, represents,” as has so often been required since Zwingli. If I were to show a child a stone, a piece of bread, saying: This is bread, this is a stone, would he ever think to translate: This represents a stone, bread? This my body, or this is my body, can therefore only mean one thing: What you see is truly my body, regardless of all appearances. This is what grammar, logic, and simple common sense demand. My body. Grammar, logic, and simple common sense alike demand that these two words be translated as "my body," my true body. To claim that Jesus intended to offer the Apostles only a symbol of his body is a completely gratuitous assertion, to say the least. When one presents a symbol, one indicates it in some way, unless the fact is self-evident. However, the Savior showed, on the contrary, in a very explicit way that he meant to speak of a reality when he characterized the value of this body given to the apostles (cf. Luke 22:19; 1 Corinthians 11:24). The body of Jesus given for us was certainly not a symbol. We will have already noticed the great resemblance between the ceremonies of the Eucharistic Last Supper and those of the legal Last Supper, which we summarized above: Jesus blesses, shares, and distributes the consecrated bread to his disciples, just as he had blessed, broken, and distributed the unleavened bread to them. But that's not all. When carving the Passover Lamb, he pronounced a particular formula that we have not yet quoted: "This is the body of the Passover lamb." We see that, from beginning to end, apart from the necessary modifications, the new Last Supper is, in a way, modeled on the old one, Jesus thus wanting to show the relationship that existed between reality and symbol. But we also see that, while the old formula designated a real body, in flesh and blood, the new formula can also only designate a real body and not a mere symbol. We will give an account elsewhere (Commentary on Luke 22:19) of the difference that exists between the formulas of consecration in the Gospels and in the Liturgies. – Such is the natural meaning of the words «This is my body.» The Apostles and the entire tradition understood and translated them as the Church does. Error in such a grave matter would be inconceivable. – When Jesus had uttered these marvelous words, a miracle of the first order was instantly produced: the bread, to use the language of the Church, was immediately transubstantiated into the body of the Savior; the accidents remained [the appearances remained the same], but the substance had disappeared, and the promise made long ago by Christ (cf. John 6) was fulfilled. We had heavenly food that gives immortality.

Mt26.²⁷ Then he took the cup, and after giving thanks, he gave it to them, saying, «Drink from it, all of you: – But, for the banquet of love to be complete, a beverage of the same nature was needed. Jesus therefore proceeds to a second consecration. Taking the chalice. The cup, which had already been passed around several times during the legal feast, was to bring the Apostles a truly divine beverage. Its shape was quite different from that of our modern chalices. It was, in all likelihood, a shallow, very wide-mouthed goblet with a very short foot and two small handles, imitating Greek and Roman models, like most Jewish utensils of that period. (See A. Rich, Dictionary of Romance and Greek Antiquities, under the entry "Calix"; Smith, Dictionary of the Bible, article "Cup.") Legend has not failed to seize upon it, as it did with the thirty pieces of silver: it traces its history back to the patriarch Noah. Into this chalice Jesus poured red wine, for it is the most common in Palestine and, according to Tertullian, best represents blood. He also poured in a little water. This is the general tradition. Origen, however, maintained the use of wine, arguing that it better symbolized the pure blood of the Savior. But Jewish ritual explicitly prescribed mixing water with the wine in the cups of the legal feast, one of which was to be used to merge with the Eucharistic chalice, as is commonly accepted by exegetes. The third cup was called in Jewish liturgical language the "cup of blessing," a name that St. Paul gives precisely to the sacramental species (cf. 1 Corinthians 10:16); it was this cup that was considered the principal one, because it immediately followed the eating of the Passover lamb. For these reasons, various authors have suggested that it was this cup that had the honor of being transformed into the body and blood of the Savior. Other exegetes have argued in favor of the fourth cup; others in favor of the fifth, which concluded the Last Supper. We will see, when we explain the word "all", that this last hypothesis is probably the truest of the three. He gave thanks. ; In Greek, "Eucharist" means thanksgiving, given to the divine sacrament of the altar, which Jesus instituted by giving thanks to his Father. Other rites, those which the priest performs daily when consecrating the elements of the wine, must have been followed by Jesus: he slightly raised the cup and looked up to heaven, as the head of the household was to do during the Passover feast, according to Jewish tradition. Cf. the gloss in Bab. Berach. f. 51, 1. They gave it to them He passed the chalice from hand to hand, after recommending that they all drink from it without exception: Drink some, everyone. This "all" has received very diverse, sometimes even ridiculous, interpretations. For example, Protestants, and generally those who support communion under both kinds, have claimed that Jesus deliberately directed it, in a prophetic premonition, against the Catholic Church, which would later withdraw the use of the chalice from the laity. According to Corneille de Lapierre, in 11, Our Lord simply wanted to show his disciples and their successors that both kinds of bread and wine are essential for the sacrifice of the Mass to be complete, but that only priests have the right to receive communion under both kinds. Maldonat and Father Perrone, in *Dogmatic Theology*, Book 8, § 198, offer another conjecture regarding the insertion of the word "all." His aim, they say, was to suggest to the disciples that, since all were to partake of this single cup, each should take precautions to leave some for the others. – Surely, none of these explanations will have seemed satisfactory to our readers. We propose the following interpretation, which has the double advantage of containing nothing eccentric and being based on the sacred customs of the Jews. We stated, in the note to verse 21, that at the end of the prescribed meal, when the second part of the Hallel had been recited, the guests had the right to offer a fifth cup. We believe that Our Lord, exercising this right, filled for the fifth time the cup that had been used by the assembly: indeed, it was then that he consecrated the wine in his blood. But since each person was free, according to the instructions of the ritual, to accept or refuse this last cup, he took care to indicate to his apostles that they should all partake of it. Hence the insertion of the adjective "all".

Mt26.²⁸ for this is my blood, the blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the forgiveness of sins. – Hence also that of the particle because Drink from it, all of you, for it is not an ordinary beverage, but my own blood. – The second formula of consecration, «all things being equal,» is a repetition of the first; it is thereby its confirmation. Thus, the Protestant Stier, in his *Reden des Herrn.*, is right to say that those who might be tempted to interpret one of the two statements of institution superficially or erroneously can find in the other the true meaning intended by Jesus. This is what Tertullian already indicated in his vigorous language: «By instituting, in the mention of the chalice, a testament signed in his blood, he confirms by that very fact that it is the substance of his body, for blood cannot belong to any other body than a carnal one» (quoted by Stier). This is The subject is indeterminate, as in verse 26. This, what this cup contains. My blood ; my true blood, and not its symbol. The phrase "This is my body" directly changed the bread into the body of the Savior; the similar phrase "This is my blood" directly transubstantiated the wine into his blood. The words of Jesus were indeed, as theology teaches, operative words. To the heretics who claim that the Eucharistic supper is "a parable for the eye, the touch, the taste," we reply with St. Thomas Aquinas that the eye, the touch, the taste are mistaken if they judge only by appearances. The Eucharist is a mystery that demands faith. The new alliance. The old covenant, made between God and the Jewish people, was inaugurated and sealed at the foot of Mount Sinai with the blood of many sacrifices; cf. Exodus 24:5-8; Hebrews 9. Moses, sprinkling some drops of this blood on the people, said, «This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words» (Exodus 24:8). Jesus likewise wishes to inaugurate and seal, with shed blood, the new covenant of which he is the mediator; however, it is his own blood that will redeem humanity. For many ; That is to say, for all those who will apply it, cf. 20, 28. Will be widespread This alludes to the Passion of the following day. In Greek, the verb is in the present tense, to better emphasize that the Savior's blood would flow in just a few hours, like a libation pleasing to God. The words "poured out for the multitude" follow, indicating that the liquid contained in the cup after the consecration was essentially the same as the blood that was to be shed on Good Friday for the salvation of the world. For the remission of sinsThe sufferings and death of Our Lord Jesus Christ had no other purpose than to forgive the sins of mankind. “The blood of Jesus… cleanses us from all sin.”¹ John 1, 7; cf. Hebrews 9, 14; 1 Peter 1, 19; Revelation 1, 5. – We will speak elsewhere (explanation of St. Luke, 22, 20) of the variants which exist between the Gospels concerning this second formula; they are even more considerable than those which exist concerning the first.

Mt26.²⁹ I tell you, I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom.» – Having instituted and bequeathed to his Church a twofold pledge of his love, the divine sacrament of the altar and the holy sacrifice of the Mass, Jesus Christ announces that he has only to die. I will not drink anymore From now on, from this moment on. In all likelihood (see the note on Mark 14:25), Jesus had not received communion under either species. He therefore warned his apostles that, although he had recommended to all of them without exception that they drink from the Eucharistic cup, he himself would not drink from it. From this fruit of the vine. A poetic expression for wine. Protestants have sometimes concluded from these words that, even after the consecration, there was wine in the chalice that was then passed among the disciples; several of their number (Olshausen, Stier, etc.) easily refute this by showing that the Savior was not speaking exclusively of the liquid contained in the cup, but of wine in general. To this day : the day of the Resurrection, according to Greek authors; the sky, according to the context. – I will drink it… It is clear that here the language of Our Lord should not be taken literally: it is an oriental metaphor, moreover perfectly biblical, intended to represent the delights of heaven, compared to those of a feast. Again, That is to say, "in a new and unprecedented way," according to St. John Chrysostom, Hom 82 in Matth. and Theophylact; "once again," according to others; more simply: new, better, superior. In the kingdom of my Father : in the messianic kingdom, having reached its blessed and glorious consummation. – Thus, at the end of the Last Supper, Jesus Christ associates the joyful thought of his future reign with the sorrowful picture of his sufferings. For us, the holy Eucharist that he had just instituted is therefore at the same time a memorial and a prophetic emblem: a memorial from the point of view of the past, because it reminds us of the Passion of Christ; a prophetic emblem from the point of view of the future, since it is the type of the wedding feast of the lamb that we will celebrate eternally in heaven.

26, 30-35. – Parallel. Mark. 14, 26-31; Luke. 22, 34; John 13, 36-38.

Mt26.³⁰ After the singing of the hymn, they went to the Mount of Olives. – After reciting the anthem. St. Matthew thus designates the second part of the Hallel (cf. explanation of verse 21) or, according to the opinion we have adopted, the great Hallel (Psalms 119-136; Hebrews 120-137) which was to be recited after the fifth cup had been taken. It has been claimed, it is true, that Our Lord composed a hymn expressly for the occasion: but this is a legendary hypothesis based on apocryphal accounts. Cf. Augustine's letter 237, to the Bishops of Ceretium; Grotius and Calmet in hl – They went ; They left the upper room, then the city, to go beyond the Kidron Valley. At the Mountain of Olives : more precisely (cf. v. 36) in the garden of Gethsemane, located at the foot of the Mount of Olives.

Mt26.³¹ Then Jesus said to them, «This very night I will cause all of you to stumble, for it is written: ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.’. – SO. According to the context, this word would indicate that Jesus' prediction concerning St. Peter's impending denial took place on the road to Gethsemane; but St. Luke 22:31ff. and St. John 13:36; cf. 14:31, place it in the Upper Room: from which it follows that the particle "then," here as elsewhere, serves as a general formula for St. Matthew to move from one scene to another, without regard for a strictly chronological order. Patrizzi and other authors believe they restore the harmony between the accounts more perfectly by admitting that there were two successive predictions of the same event, one during, the other after, the Last Supper. But it seems difficult to us that Jesus would have repeated the same things twice at such short intervals. You will all be : all without exception, even St. Peter, St. James, and St. John. – Outraged. This is not a true apostasy, but only a momentary desertion, a cowardly abandonment, that Jesus is foretelling at this moment. About me, for "because of me." I will be an occasion of your downfall; my Passion will be an obstacle against which your weakness will stumble, so as to overthrow you for a moment. For it is written. This sad course of action of the Apostles had been foreseen by God, and Scripture had long ago foretold it. Cf. Zechariah 13:7. I will strike…The text of Zechariah is not quoted verbatim by St. Matthew; however, we find the exact meaning of the prophecy in the Gospel. There, God, addressing his sword, said to it: «Sword, rise up against my shepherd… Strike the shepherd, and let the sheep be scattered!» Here, he announces that he will strike the shepherd directly. This shepherd is obviously Our Lord Jesus Christ, cf. John 10:11: the sheep are a symbol of the Apostles who, at the first sign of danger, fled and scattered like a timid and defenseless flock. Their faith was undoubtedly strong, but it was not to fully withstand the shock of the events they were soon to witness.

Mt26.³² But after I have risen, I will go ahead of you to Galilee.» – Zechariah's prophetic passage ended with a comforting promise from God. After the terrible address to his sword that we heard, the Lord added: “And I will turn my hand toward the weak,” thus announcing that he would save the poor sheep, even after their foolish and culpable scattering. Jesus makes a similar promise to the Apostles. But, after that…; «but,» in contrast to the disciples’ flight. I will be resurrected : a word of joy and great encouragement, which the Savior never fails to pronounce whenever he foretells the painful circumstances of his Passion. I will precede you…After his death, the Apostles left Jerusalem and Judea to take refuge in Galilee, a province dear to them all because of the sweet joys they had found in the company of Jesus; a province where they would be safe from the hierarchs who were fiercely opposed to the Christianity at the beginning: the divine Master promises them not only to go and join them there, but to be there before them to receive them. Which he did indeed, as we shall soon see, 28, 10-16; Cf. John 21; 1 Corinthians 15, 6.

Mt26.³³ Peter, speaking up, said to him, «Even if you cause everyone to stumble, you never will cause me to stumble.» – The head of the sacred College refuses to believe that he would cowardly abandon his Master. Carried away by the indignation that such a prophecy aroused in his heart, he cries out with his customary vehemence: – When you would be…The others will do as they please; he has no need to concern himself with them now; for him, never, neither during this night (cf. v. 31) nor under any other circumstance. «He committed a double crime in these bold words: first, resisting the express word of his master; and second, preferring himself to the other disciples. And I would even add a third, by which he attributed everything to himself as coming from his own accord and his own strength alone,» says St. John Chrysostom, Hom. 82 in Matth. But he then adds, quite truthfully, that the fault of the Prince of the Apostles stemmed from his great love.

Mt26.³⁴ Jesus said to him, «Truly I tell you, this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.» Jesus repeats his previous assertion in a firmer and more solemn tone, taking care to clarify it further in order to better demonstrate its perfect certainty. Moreover, this time he applies it directly to his opponent. Before the rooster crows. The Greeks called the third watch of the night, the one between midnight and three o'clock, "cockcrow," because that is when the rooster crows in the morning. From this, various authors have thought that Our Lord intended to designate this special part of the night, also known to the Latins as "Gallicinium" (cf. Pliny, Natural History 10, 21; Amm. Marcellus 22). But it is better to let his words retain the more general meaning already admitted by the Syriac version: "Before the night has passed," or better still, according to St. Mark 14:30: Before the rooster has ceased to crow. You will deny me three times. The unfortunate disciple, in a few hours, will have denied his Master up to three times. The others will only abandon Jesus; but he, the head of the Apostolic College, will go so far as to deny Him. Cf. vv. 67-74 and parallels.

Mt26.³⁵ Peter answered him, «Even if I have to die with you, I will not deny you.» And all the other disciples said the same. Just as Jesus had kept his sad prediction, so too does St. Peter keep his first promise, strengthening it to the best of his ability. When I would need“Faithful to the end, even unto death if necessary!” he exclaimed impetuously. While condemning his presumption, which made him rely too much on himself and not enough on God, the Fathers could not help but admire and praise his courage, born of a generous love. I will not disown you The negation is doubled to represent an absolute impossibility. Likewise …The other apostles all affirmed with equal vehemence that they would rather die than abandon their Master. Jesus let them speak without pressing them further, seeing that they were at that moment too agitated to understand his advice and to heed it.

26.36-46. Parallel. Mark. 14, 32-42; Luke. 22, 39-46.

Mt26.³⁶ Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, «Sit here while I go over there and pray.»– This is where the Passion of the Savior truly begins. It opens with one of the most painful scenes Jesus had to endure before his death. Only the agony of the cross can be compared to the agony of Gethsemane. The tortures inflicted by men, however heart-rending they may be, are nevertheless nothing compared to the moral sufferings directly imposed by God; and it was God himself who made the soul of the Savior bear, in the garden of Gethsemane, the terrible weight of all the sins of the world. Jesus came with them to an estate. This area was located beyond the Kidron Valley (cf. John 18:1), at the foot of the Mount of Olives. The pilgrim finds, precisely northeast of Jerusalem, not far from St. Stephen's Gate and the city walls, on the other side of the Kidron, a roughly square plot, 50 meters long and 45 meters wide, which, according to a tradition dating back at least to Constantine (cf. Eusebius, Onomasticon, s.v. Gethsemane; St. Jerome, ibid.), is said to have been the site of Jesus' agony. The Franciscan Fathers, to whose care it has long been entrusted, have recently surrounded it with high walls; they have planted there in abundance the so-called Passion flower, the rose, rosemary, and the "Graphalium sanguineum," or Blood Drop, which, according to legend, sprang from the bloody sweat of Jesus. But the principal ornament of this precious enclosure consists of eight enormous olive trees, with gnarled trunks and sparse foliage, which experts date back as far as two thousand years (cf. O. Strauss, Sinai u. Golgotha, 8th ed., p. 224), and which indeed miraculously escaped the numerous fellings carried out in the vicinity of Jerusalem by Pompey, Titus, Hadrian, and the Crusaders. (Cf. Chateaubriand, Itinéraire de Paris à Jérusalem, Paris 1837, vol. 2, p. 181; Lamartine, Voyage en Orient, vol. 1, p. 470; Mgr. Mislin, Les Saints Lieux, 1st ed., vol. 2, p. 4 ff.; Fouard, La Passion de Notre-Seigneur Jésus-Christ, p. 25.) Called Gethsemane. The most likely etymology of this name is Gath Schemâné, "oil press." The garden would have been so named because of the press that was located there for crushing olives at harvest time. Others prefer Ghé Schemâné, "oil valley," that is, a fertile valley, or a valley producing a lot of oil; but then, how to apply the insertion of the T? Cf. Winer, bibl. Realwoerterbuch, sv – He said to his disciples There were only eight left, Judas having left and three other apostles, St. Peter, St. James and St. John, to accompany Jesus; cf. v. 37. Sit down, That is to say, "stay". While I'm there. «Here, there»: Jesus was indicating the two places with his gesture. These words have been aptly compared to those of Abraham leaving his servants at the foot of Moriah, which he was about to climb with Isaac: «Abraham said to his servants, »Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there to worship and then we will come back to you,’” Genesis 22:5. In his agony, will not Jesus, in his prayer of anguish, extend himself on the altar with the faith of Abraham and the resignation of Isaac? Cf. Stier, Reden des Herrn, in hl.

Mt26.³⁷ Having taken with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, he began to feel sorrow and anguish.The presence of all the disciples during the painful and solemn drama that was about to unfold would have disturbed Jesus's composure; moreover, their current state of mind was in no way suited to the situation he was about to face. He therefore took with him only the three closest apostles: Peter, the head of the sacred College, who had just so warmly demonstrated his love; and the sons of Zebedee, who had agreed to drink the cup of bitterness with Jesus. Together, they went deeper into the garden. Those who had witnessed the glorious Transfiguration of the divine Master were about to contemplate his humiliation up close. He began. This is the prelude to the terrible struggle that Jesus will face. Sad and distressed. These two words express the feeling of pain, but a pain that has reached varying degrees of intensity. The first corresponds to the opposite of rejoicing; the second represents excessive sadness, poignant anguish; Suidas explains it as "being extremely afflicted, unable to bear it any longer"; Euthymius as "having a heavy heart"; Hesychius as "being in agony." St. Justin, in his Dialogue with Trypho 125, says that this pain had paralyzed the soul of Jesus, just as the mysterious hand of the angel had once paralyzed the strength of Jacob. And this is only the beginning of the Savior's agony.

Mt26.³⁸ And he said to them, «My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death; stay here and keep watch with me.» – Jesus cannot help but humbly confess to his friends the immense pain that weighs on his heart. My soul is sad : in Greek, "having sadness all around oneself". To die for. To be sad unto death is to be prey to a grief beyond human strength and capable of causing death. Others, before Our Lord Jesus Christ, had used this expression to represent sorrow reached its supreme degree; cf. John 4:9; Judges 16:16; Ecclesiasticus 37:2; but, if for them it was hyperbole, for Jesus it was an absolute reality. An ordinary man would inevitably have succumbed under such a heavy burden. «Ah, Lord,» exclaims Bourdaloue, First Sermon on the Passion, Part 1, “your sorrow is like a vast sea, whose depths cannot be fathomed, nor its immensity measured.” It was to swell and increase this sea that all the sins of men, as Scripture says, entered like so many rivers into the soul of the Son of God… Is it any wonder that all this, following the metaphor of the Holy Spirit, having formed a deluge of waters in this blessed soul, it remains as if absorbed by it?” Stay here : synonym of "sit here" from verse 36, "stay here". And keep watch with me. Even the closest of his closest confidants were not to be immediate witnesses to the Savior's agony: such struggles and such suffering require solitude. The thought that his three best Apostles were watching over him from some distance would be a consolation to Jesus' heart.

Mt26.³⁹ And going a little farther, he bowed down with his face to the ground, praying and saying, «My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.»– St. Luke specifies the exact distance: «He withdrew from them about a stone’s throw» (22:41). In the Garden of Gethsemane, a dark cave is shown where Our Lord is said to have withdrawn for his agony. A little further on is a rock that is said to have served as a bench for the three disciples, and near there the sinister site of the betrayal, which the pilgrim from Bordeaux already mentioned in 333. He prostrated himself ; He prostrated himself at full length, assuming an attitude of annihilation, desolation, but also of perfect submission. PrayingPrayer is her best remedy in this terrible moment. The Holy Spirit He has deigned to preserve for our perpetual instruction and consolation the formula that escaped from the heart and lips of Jesus. Although it is reported with some variations by the Synoptic Gospels, it is essentially the same in their accounts. Three main elements are noticeable: a confident appeal to the Eternal Father, an urgent supplication, and the most absolute resignation. My Father God remains his Father, even though He overwhelms him with suffering. Prostrate as he is in the dust, Jesus retains a full awareness of his dignity and his divine sonship. If possible. It is to this beloved Father that Our Lord addresses his request; but, before formulating it, he already testifies to his perfect submission. If possible. Indeed, it was not absolutely impossible: Jesus was not subject to the blows of an inexorable destiny. And yet, are not the heavenly decrees concerning the Passion of Christ fixed from all eternity? Is it not because he knows them that the Savior is so deeply troubled? This is why, «He does not pray as if he doubted the power and will of his Father, or what would happen. He vehemently expresses the desire of his natural will, but in such a way that it is in all things subject to the good pleasure of the Father,» Luke of Bruges, in Matthew 11:11; cf. Corinthians 11:13. It is therefore from his human nature that this conditional desire arises. Move away from me. A beautiful metaphor. Let him pass by without my having to drink it. Therefore: Let him move away from me. This Chalice That is to say, the bitter sorrow of which the cup was sometimes the emblem among the ancients; cf. 20, 22 and the commentary. This chalice that Our Lord Jesus Christ was to empty to the dregs was, first and foremost, the Passion and death with all their horrors. «The soul naturally desires to be united with the body, and this dwelt in the soul of Christ, for he ate, drank, and felt hunger. The separation [of his soul] therefore went against this natural desire. The separation thus caused him sorrow,» St. Thomas Aquinas, [26, 38]. But this was not the sole cause, nor even the principal cause, of Christ’s anguish: the contrary supposition would be an insult to his soul, capable of all heroism. Therefore, the Angelic Doctor takes care to add, Summa Theologica 3a, q. 46, art. 6, ad. 4: «Christ suffered not only from the loss of his bodily life, but also for the sins of all mankind.» Our sins, as we have already indicated from Bourdaloue, were the true reason for his immense sorrow. It was their overwhelming weight that crushed him and made him cry out for mercy to divine justice. However. As a victim, the Savior trembled and groaned; but as a priest, he submits unreservedly to the good pleasure of his Father. «This saying, «May this cup, if it be possible, pass from me,» shows humanity; but this one, «Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done,» reveals the resignation of a strong and virtuous soul and teaches us to obey God despite the repugnances of nature,» St. John Chrysostom, Hom. 83 in Matthew. Christ’s human nature may well tremble under the impression of intense suffering, but it cannot be rebellious, cannot truly resist the heavenly will. If, according to a striking comparison, the human heart is like a vessel full of water, but at the bottom of which there is mud, filth that the slightest disturbance brings to the surface: the soul of Jesus, free from all sin, contains only the purest liquid. There is no temptation, no agitation that can disturb her in the least (Rambach's thought). Not the way I want, but the way you want.. A famous passage in the history of dogma. The Church rightly relied on it to refute the heresies of the Monophysites and Monothelites. Cf. Petavius, Theology of Dogma, vol. 4, book 4, chapters 6-9; Perrone, De Incarnate, no. 453. In Jesus Christ, there are two natures and two wills: the human nature and will, and the divine nature and will. The Savior himself embodies this twofold distinction. As a man, he would like to escape the excruciating suffering he endures; but as one with God the Father and with the Holy Spirit, he generously accepts the cup of bitterness. Since the human "will" clashes with the "will" of God, the outcome of the struggle is not in doubt. "As you will," such is the glorious result. Certainly, the evangelist does not recount the entire conflict; he merely expresses its two phases clearly: the phase of poignant agony and the phase of complete victory. Jesus' prayer is simply a summary of a long oration.

Mt26.⁴⁰ He then came to his disciples, and finding them asleep, he said to Peter, «So you could not watch with me for one hour. Having thus triumphed over his terrors, the Son of Man returned to his three chosen disciples. It seemed that his tormented heart longed to find some consolation in the friendship of these Apostles. But God willed that Jesus be deprived even of a sign of human sympathy during those terrible hours. They were found asleep. This is a most surprising sleep for such disciples, especially after Jesus' urgent exhortation (cf. v. 38). All three are asleep; they were ready, just a moment ago, to give their lives for him, and yet here they cannot even resist sleep for a few moments to keep him company and share in his sorrow. But, as Jesus knew better than anyone, their sleep did not betray a lack of sympathy: on the contrary, it was sadness, as the physiologist St. Luke tells us (22:45), that had thus dulled them. Besides, the night was already quite advanced, and the day had been very difficult, especially for two of them, St. Peter and St. John, who had been constantly on their feet making preparations for the Last Supper. Therefore, you were unable to. However, Jesus gently complained to them about their apparent abandonment. He had asked very little of them, and they had been unable to give him even that little. One hour. These words, although their meaning should not be rushed, determine the duration of the first part of the Savior's agony.

Mt26.⁴¹ Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.» – To his friendly reproach, Jesus adds a very valuable piece of advice, which he addressed not only to the three Apostles who were with him at that time, but which he extended in thought to his future disciples. Watch and pray. Watching and praying: these are the two great acts of a Christian, at all times and especially in times of danger. Vigilance warns of the enemy's presence; prayer helps to overcome him. So that you don't fall…«To enter into temptation,» or, to make the Hebraism more complete, «to enter into the hand of temptation,» cf. Wittsius and Grotius in h. l., is a picturesque and forceful expression that means: to succumb completely to temptation, to allow oneself to be subjugated by it so as to become its slave. For Peter, James, and John, the most immediate danger was that of abandoning or denying the Messiah: this danger being imminent, as Jesus had foretold, they should have been watching and praying to prepare themselves for it; but here, on the contrary, they slept as if they were in perfect security. The mind is quick. In an important aphorism, the truth of which was all too clearly demonstrated during that sorrowful night, the Savior explains the reason for the warning he has just given his disciples. He undoubtedly knows their good intentions, but he also knows their weakness, and it is against this weakness that he wishes to warn them. Fast, Ardent, generous, and full of enthusiasm. The Apostles demonstrated the fervor of their spirit when they promised their Master they would die with him if necessary. But the flesh is weak. While the immaterial spirit has noble impulses and fervent aspirations that lift humanity upward, the mortal and animal flesh, on the contrary, drags it downward, either because it is incapable of following the spirit, or because, having felt the effects of sin more keenly than humanity, it is more steeped in corruption and malice. Between these two parts that compose human nature, there exists a sad contrast, often described by the Apostle St. Paul, and whose effects Jesus was then personally experiencing. But in him, the flesh was subdued by the spirit; whereas in his disciples, the spirit is often defeated and outraged by the flesh.

Mt26.⁴² He withdrew a second time and prayed thus: "My Father, if this cup cannot pass away unless I drink it, may your will be done."« – He left. Having failed to find even the most legitimate earthly consolations, Jesus returns to his Father: only there will he find the comfort he needs. My Father…His new prayer differs only slightly from the one we heard earlier. It consists of exactly the same elements. Nevertheless, he modifies it slightly, to emphasize the most complete submission. The direct request has even disappeared: it now appears only veiled under the expression of total assent to the divine will. If this chalice cannot…God wants him to drink the bitter cup to the dregs: the continuation of his inner anguish is a clear sign of this for him. He therefore prepares himself for absolute obedience. Thy will be done. «These are not the words of someone who merely accepts what he cannot avoid, but who acquiesces with all his soul,» Rosenmüller, Scholia in Matth., hl.

Mt26.⁴³ When he came again, he found them still asleep, for their eyes were heavy. After indulging in these feelings of resignation for some time, and after forcing nature to submit to the laws of the spirit, Jesus approached his disciples a second time; but again he found them asleep. The Evangelist seems to excuse their sleep by saying that their eyes were heavy. Who hasn't experienced eyelids heavy with fatigue or boredom? It's difficult to keep them open then; they close as if they were made of lead.

Mt26.⁴⁴ He left them, and went away to pray for the third time, saying the same words. He does not wake them; but, renouncing the displays of affection by which he hoped to alleviate his pain somewhat, he retires for the third time to his deep retreat in the garden. He prayed for the third time. As long as the inner struggle lasts, he prays. This is what St. Luke expresses admirably: «And being in agony, he prayed more earnestly…» (22:44). See in the account of this same evangelist the details relating to the appearance of the angel and the Savior’s sweat of blood. By saying the same words. Jesus repeats the second formula, verse 42, which, his heart told him, expressed the sentiment most in accordance with the circumstances and divine decrees. Again, therefore, he acquiesces to everything without hesitation. After this third assault, his victory is complete: suffering may befall him in the most cruel and varied forms, but he will endure it with invincible courage. Let us note in passing the moral lesson that emerges for us from this admirable scene. «Jesus Christ teaches us, by his example, in the agony of soul and body, to pray; he will take pity on us, even if our weakness leaves us with only the strength to repeat the same words.» Fouard, Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, p. 30.

Mt26.⁴⁵ Then he returned to his disciples and said to them, «Sleep now and rest, for the hour is near when the Son of Man will be delivered into the hands of sinners. – Then he came back…«When Our Lord returns to his disciples and finds them asleep, the first time he rebukes them; the second time he remains silent; the third time he commands them to rest,» says St. Hilary, noting the difference in the visits Jesus made to the apostles after each of his prayers. However, not all exegetes agree with him on the meaning of the words sleep now. Theophylact, Euthymius, Maldonatus, Meyer, and others believe that they are expressing a biting irony: «Here I am about to be arrested; sleep if you have the courage.» But irony seems to us unnatural, unworthy of Jesus at such a moment. Nothing indicates that he departed at that instant from the spirit of gentleness that had animated all his actions and words during that memorable evening. We therefore prefer, with most commentators, to take the phrase in its obvious meaning: «Sleep now and rest!» as St. Augustine so aptly puts it in *Conseils Evangi*, Book 3, Chapter 4. From now on, he is strong enough to do without any human assistance: he therefore kindly allows his friends to rest until the arrival of the traitor. Rest ; This expression signifies complete rest and supports the opinion we have just adopted. The divine Master could only have used it to truly grant the three disciples complete freedom to seek in restorative sleep some respite from their fatigue and anxieties. The time is approaching.… It is as if he were saying: Take advantage of this very short respite that has been granted to you. With what calm the soul of Jesus, reassured by prayer and by the most perfect surrender to the divine plan, contemplates the terrible sufferings that await him.

Mt26.⁴⁶ "Get up, come on, the one who betrays me is near here."» – Stand up. A considerable amount of time passed between these words and those of the preceding verse. Under their Master's care, the apostles fell asleep. Then, Jesus awakened them at the moment of the arrival of the traitor and his henchmen. Let's goHe wants to go to meet his executioners. “He goes towards his persecutors and presents himself to death: ‘Rise, let us go,’ that is to say, so that they do not find you prey to apprehension and fear, let us walk of our own accord to death, and that they may witness the assurance and of joy of the one they are going to make suffer,” St. Jerome in hl So complete was his triumph.

26, 47-56. Parallel. Mark. 14, 43-52; Luke. 22, 47-53; John 18, 1-11.

Mt26.⁴⁷ He was still speaking when Judas, one of the Twelve, arrived, and with him a large troop of men armed with swords and clubs, sent by the chief priests and the elders of the people. Jesus had barely finished announcing Judas' arrival when the latter appeared at the entrance to the garden. One of the twelve. St. Matthew had already noted above, verse 14, this circumstance which adds so much darkness to the traitor's crime; he points it out a second time, in concert with the other evangelists, to better condemn the wretch who had abused so many graces. Arrived… Judas went directly to Gethsemane because he knew, from John 18:2, that it was the Savior's favorite retreat. He had assumed that his Master had come there immediately after the Last Supper. As far as he was concerned, Judas had left the Upper Room before the others (see John 13:30) in order to go and warn the chief priests and ask them about the company with which he was now traveling. A large crowd. In this sinister group, one could see a number of servants of the Sanhedrin, a Roman cohort (see John 18:3), and even several members of the Sanhedrin who had wanted to witness the arrest of their enemy (see Luke 22:52). Along the way, it had undoubtedly grown in number by recruiting some fanatics and curious onlookers. Army of swords. The word used in the Greek text refers to the short, single-edged sword, which was in common use at the time. It was likely the soldiers who carried them. As for the sticks, they must have armed the fanatics who had joined forces with the assassins sent by the Great Council. A large deployment of forces had been made to arrest Our Lord, for they wanted to seize him at all costs and feared some resistance from his friends.

Mt26.⁴⁸ The traitor had given them this sign: "The one I kiss is him, arrest him."« – A sign. The traitor thinks of everything. Jesus will not be alone in the garden; besides, it is night, although the moon may have been at its fullest; finally, most of those who form Judas's escort may not have known Our Lord personally. A sign was therefore necessary so that he could be easily distinguished among his entourage. The one I will kiss. In the East, the kiss has always been one of the most common forms of greeting. Among the Jews in particular, disciples were accustomed to greeting their Master by kissing him. Judas's gesture was therefore chosen as carefully as possible to maintain appearances and conceal his betrayal from the other apostles. This is what leads St. Jerome to say: "He is so ashamed before the disciples that he does not openly betray the Lord to his persecutors, but only with the sign of a kiss." But on the other hand, how dark it is to transform the sign of friendship and tenderness into that of the most perfidious betrayal! It's him Him, by antonomasia. The one we are looking for. Grab it. St. Mark adds, "and take him away under guard." The traitor feared that Jesus, whose miraculous power he knew, would use it to escape from his captors.

Mt26.⁴⁹ And immediately, approaching Jesus, he said, "Greetings, Master," and he kissed him. – Having thus reached an agreement with his escort, Judas approached Jesus with all the outward signs of affection and respect. Hello, Master It's a hypocritical expression of his supposed respect. He kissed her. This is no less a hypocritical expression of his affection. A dreadful kiss, of which Joab's (cf. 2 Samuel 20:9 ff.) was the archetype; it is because of the legitimate horror it inspires that the Church has suppressed the kiss of peace in the liturgy of Holy Thursday. According to the Greek text, it seems that the traitor pretended to prolong it, or even repeat it several times, to better conceal his true intentions. And Jesus allowed it. He did not withdraw his divine countenance to escape this infamous caress.

Mt26.⁵⁰ Jesus said to him, «Friend, why are you here?» At the same time, they came forward, laid hands on Jesus, and seized him. – At least he wanted to show the traitor that he wasn't misled by this outward display of friendship. My friend. Some authors still attribute an ironic meaning to this expression. According to them, it would be a synonym for "very bad man." We prefer to see it as a kind word addressed to the traitor to move him. Why did you come?. An exclamation of painful surprise, and at the same time a justly severe reproach disguised as delicacy. In these words lies a thunderous appeal to Judas's conscience and heart. The Savior added, according to the account in St. Luke: "Judas, you betray the Son of Man with a kiss!" Then they stepped forward not only in an immediate way; beforehand, the scene recounted by St. John 18:4-8 took place. They put their hands… St. John Chrysostom cannot help but say, when quoting this passage: «However, they could have done nothing, if he himself had not allowed it.» Hom. 83 in Matth.

Mt26.⁵¹ And behold, one of those who were with Jesus, drawing his sword, struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear. – However, there was someone who defended Jesus at the time of his arrest. It was St. Peter, admittedly hiding behind the vague expression A of St. Matthew, but clearly designated by the fourth Evangelist, cf. John 18:10. Why did St. Matthew not name him? Often, the answer has been given, for fear of incurring the wrath of the Jews, since he was still alive when the first Gospel was published. This motive is not without merit, although it is rejected by most modern exegetes. Extending the hand : quaint detail. His sword. See in Luke 22:38 ff., the singular error of the disciples, as a result of which Peter armed himself with the sword that nearly endangered the entire apostolic company. He struck the servant…The servant of the high priest wounded by St. Peter was named Malchus. Cf. John 18:10. He cut off his ear. Carried away by his reckless zeal, and remembering his recent promises, Simon Peter wanted to split open the skull of one of the henchmen accompanying Judas; but his haste caused him to miss his mark, and he only struck Malchus's right ear. (Cf. John 11).

Mt26.⁵² Then Jesus said to him, «Put your sword back in its place, for all who draw the sword will perish by the sword.”. – Peter had again raised his sword and was preparing to strike another opponent, when Jesus stopped him with a firm command accompanied by a serious reflection. Hand over… That is the order: Pierre must immediately put the sword back in its sheath. In his place, That is to say, in the sheath, as St. John says. Because all those…It is reflection that motivates the order. It consists of an axiom whose general meaning is that violence serves no purpose, but rebounds on its perpetrator; or that blind zeal is usually harmful. Who will take up the sword?. This is not about the "right of the sword" that societies possess and need for self-defense: the proverb is addressed only to individuals who, without real necessity, would draw their swords arbitrarily. These imprudent people are well warned that there is a kind of retaliation of which they will sooner or later be the victims. Jesus says nothing different to St. Peter: it is therefore quite arbitrarily that several exegetes, including Euthymius and Grotius, see in these words a prediction of the future ruin of the Jews and the Romans. A more accurate comparison can be made with the famous proverb "Ecclesia non sitit sanguinem," the Church is not bloodthirsty.

Mt26.⁵³ Do you think I cannot pray to my Father right now, who would give me more than twelve legions of angels? – Jesus points out to the overly zealous Apostle a second reason why he should have exercised restraint. Do you think so?. The Apostle seemed to prove by his conduct that he was unaware of his Master's power: the latter reminded him of the personal influence he enjoyed with God. He would only need to address a simple prayer to his heavenly Father to obtain swift and powerful help, which would thwart the efforts of his enemies. He could therefore do without any human intervention. Who would give me ; He will provide for me, he will place me at his side. Twelve legions of angels. The legion, so named because its members were originally chosen from among Roman citizens, did not always have the same number of soldiers. Nevertheless, since the time of Marius, it usually comprised six thousand, not counting a sizable auxiliary corps and a cavalry wing of three hundred men. Taking this round figure of 6,000 men, the angelic army, formed of twelve legions—as many legions as Jesus had Apostles—would have numbered 72,000 combatants. It is understandable that with such a force, the Savior could have defied all his adversaries. But he will be careful not to address a prayer to God that would provide him with this army: has he not accepted the role of Redeemer? He will fulfill it to the very end.

Mt26.⁵⁴ How then will the Scriptures be fulfilled, which testify that it must happen this way?» – So how… Indeed, if his Father were to send him twelve legions of angels to rescue him from his executioners, how would the Scriptures be fulfilled, where it is so clearly foretold that Christ must suffer and die for the salvation of the world? Cf. Isaiah 53 ; Daniel 9:26; etc. Jesus could not contradict the prophecies of the Old Testament. So… There is here an obvious Hebraism, as well as an ellipsis. «We must understand,” Maldonat (Comm. in hl) very aptly puts it, “how the Scriptures which say: because that it must be so. This because "Of the Hebrews" usually plays the role of an infinitive: "who say that it will be so." "So," that is, as it actually happens. – On it must be so, see 16, 21 and the explanation.

Mt26.⁵⁵ At the same time, Jesus said to the crowd, «Have you come out as to a thief, with swords and clubs to arrest me? Every day I sat among you in the temple courts teaching, and you did not seize me, – Although he surrenders himself to his enemies, Jesus nevertheless rebukes them with majestic authority for the shame and cowardice of their conduct towards him. He makes them tremble under his gaze and his severe reproaches. Like after a thief…Their large number, their weapons, this solitary place, this nighttime hour—didn't everything seem to indicate that they were searching for a dangerous brigand? And yet the Savior had never sought to shield himself from their pursuit, as he himself stated, contrasting his frank and open manner of acting with their treacherous maneuvers. Every day Every day, when he was in Jerusalem during the festival season, and especially during that last week, he had spent long hours under the porticoes of the Temple, among his adversaries, since many of them belonged to the priestly party. And there, in the most public place in the Jewish capital, what was he doing? Peacefully teaching peaceful crowds. It would therefore have been easy for the sergeants of the Sanhedrin to arrest him, since he was then defenseless. Why didn't they? "But this is your hour, and the power of darkness," the Savior ironically adds, according to Luke 22:53.

Mt26.⁵⁶ But all this was done so that the words of the prophets might be fulfilled.» Then all the disciples deserted him and fled. – But all of this…: that is, the way you are treating me. Several authors consider these words to be a reflection of the evangelist (Erasmus, Bengel, Jansenius, Schegg, etc.). Common opinion very rightly attributes them to Jesus. There is no reason to take them away from him. The divine Master thus repeats to his executioners the thought he had just expressed to St. Peter, v. 54, and which he had repeated up to four times during that memorable evening (cf. vv. 24 and 31), so much did it occupy his mind. He clings strongly to Scripture, whether he is speaking to the exasperated Jews or addressing his obedient apostles. He confounds the former in their folly with proofs drawn from Scripture, and he strengthens the latter in their discouragement with the comforting promises of the Holy Scriptures. He appeals to Scripture in his vehement discussions with men; he appeals to Scripture when he consents to die for them. To Satan, he replies, "It is written," and he asks his Father that Scripture be fulfilled. The disciples fled. Thus was fulfilled the Savior's recent prophecy, verse 31. Seeing that their Master rejected all idea of human resistance and at the same time refused to seek help from above, they feared for their own freedom, perhaps even for their own lives, and they secured both by a swift flight. The Shepherd was struck, and the timid sheep scattered. But although foreseen and foretold, this blow must have been deeply felt in the heart of Jesus.

26, 57-68. Parallel. Mark. 14, 53-65; Luke. 22, 54-65; John 18, 19-23.

Mt26.⁵⁷ Those who had arrested Jesus took him to Caiaphas, the high priest, where the scribes and the elders of the people had gathered. – However, the troop that had arrested Our Lord set out to bring him before his judges, if one can call by that name men who long before had decreed his death. St. Matthew and the other two Synoptic Gospels say nothing of a first audience, admittedly quite private, which took place at Anna's house, as recounted in St. John 18:12–14:24, and they move immediately on to the official interrogation, which the entire Sanhedrin attended. The scribes and elders had gathered The priestly chamber is mentioned a little further down, verse 59. They are at their posts awaiting their victim, whom the traitor has gone to fetch from Gethsemane, accompanied, as we have seen, by some of their own. Once again, cf. verse 3, the Assembly is meeting in Caiaphas's palace, and not in the usual Gazzith chamber. And yet, it was enjoined, under penalty of nullity "ipso facto," that death sentences be pronounced in that chamber. The Talmud and its commentators state this explicitly: "When one leaves the Gazzith, one cannot pronounce a death sentence against anyone," Abod. Zar. ch. 1, f. 8, 1. "There could be no capital sentence unless the Sanhedrin sat in its proper place," Maimonides, tr. Sanh. ch. 14. Why then this anomaly in the present circumstance? Scholars offer different explanations. Several have viewed it as one of the glaring injustices that abound in the trial of Jesus. Others say that the night session was not strictly official, and that the sentence was only validly and definitively proclaimed the following morning, in the meeting mentioned in Luke 22:66; at that time, they would have assembled in the Gazzith. It is more likely that this event should be linked to the deprivation of the "right of the sword" inflicted on the Sanhedrin by the Romans. The Talmud is unequivocal on this point. About four years before the death of Jesus, the Rabbis recount, Rome having removed the Sanhedrin's right to carry out capital sentences, they ceased holding their sessions in the Hall of the Hewn Stones and began meeting in the city. Cf. Sanhedrin f. 24, 2; Avod. Zar. f. 8, 2. So that is why they would have gathered at the High Priest's house.

Mt26.⁵⁸ Peter followed him at a distance to the courtyard of the high priest, entered, and sat with the servants to see the end.This verse forms a parenthesis in the middle of the narrative; but the details it contains are intended to prepare for the sad scene of St. Peter's denial, which will be recounted later, vv. 69-75. The Prince of the Apostles had at first shamefully fled with his colleagues; soon, however, ashamed of his weakness, he grew bolder and followed, albeit from a distance, the group that was leading Jesus away captive. This was at least a mark of fidelity that he alone, along with St. John, gave to the Savior. All the way to the court…When the procession reached the entrance to the inner courtyard we mentioned in explaining verse 3, Peter was obliged to stop; but the beloved disciple, who then arrived, ushered him into the open-air atrium onto which the main apartments of the palace opened. Cf. John 18:15-18. It was a bold move, worthy of these two Apostles, so devoted to Jesus above all others. – He sat down with the servants. The servants of the Sanhedrin and the servants of the high priest, designated as «ministers,» after having led their prisoner to the audience chamber, where only a few of them remained, had withdrawn to the courtyard. St. John 18:18 shows them sitting around a fire they had lit because of the cold. Peter sat down beside them. – To see the end. His intention was to see the outcome of the interrogation. Not that it was possible for him to enter the room where the assembly was gathered; but, at such a close distance, he would soon learn the fate reserved for his Master. Alas. Sad events awaited him in the very dangerous environment into which he had imprudently plunged himself.

Mt26.⁵⁹ However, the chief priests and the entire council were seeking false testimony against Jesus in order to have him put to death., – More privileged than St. Peter, we can, thanks to the Gospel account and archaeological evidence, penetrate right into the audience chamber and observe firsthand the iniquitous conduct of the Sanhedrin, who, contrary to all human laws, simultaneously play the dual role of Judges and accusers. – The councilors are seated in a semicircle on cushions. In the center of the chamber, on raised platforms, stand the Nasi, or president—that is, Caiaphas in this instance—and the vice-president, who was perhaps Annas, the former high priest. Beside them are the Sages, the ordinary councilors of the Sanhedrin. At each end of the chamber is a secretary: the one on the right is tasked with gathering everything that exonerates the divinely accused, while the one on the left will record everything that is unfavorable to him. The first task will be easy: In the middle of the room we see the Savior, surrounded by armed men watching over him. See Lémann, Value of the assembly that pronounced the death penalty against Jesus Christ, p. 6 ff. They were looking for false testimony....A very significant statement. The Sanhedrin decided in principle on the death of their enemy, as expressed in the last words of the verse. To kill him. This is their aim: they want at all costs, says St. John Chrysostom, to satisfy their bloodthirsty rage. And yet they need at least a semblance of justice, and consequently, an appearance of a serious accusation. But what serious accusation will they level against Jesus? Has he not refuted, by utterly confounding them, all their previous attacks? They know this; therefore, they have taken their measures accordingly. False witnesses, bribed by them, are there in the courtroom, ready to bring the most mendacious charges against Jesus. The designation of "false" attributed in the Gospel account to the testimonies sought by the Judges is not only true, as Euthymius thought, from the narrator's point of view; it is accurate in every respect. The Sanhedrin knew beforehand that these testimonies were false, and yet they were determined to base their judgment on them. But their treacherous expectation was thwarted by Providence: it was not to be said that Jesus would be condemned even for the appearance of wrongdoing. His entire crime would be to affirm and prove that he was the Messiah.

Mt26. ⁶⁰ And they found none, although several false witnesses had come forward. Finally, two came. – The Savior's conduct, always so holy and at the same time so full of wisdom, offered no purchase even to false testimony. None of the accusations leveled against him had an air of truth or sufficient legality for his Judges, though devoid of conscience and pity, to dare use them to condemn him. And yet, as the Evangelist expressly states, false witnesses were not lacking. But, adds St. Mark 14:56, "the testimonies did not agree." Now, according to the law (cf. Numbers 35:30; Deuteronomy 14:15; 17:6), "a testimony was of no value unless those who bore it agreed on all points of the same matter" (Sanhedrin 5:2). Cf. Lémann, *Valeur de l'Assemblée*, etc., p. 78. Finally he came ; Finally, after a long series of invalid testimonies, a deposition is heard which may perhaps provide the Sanhedrin with the much-desired pretext. Two false witnesses. Two witnesses, false in truth, but that's just the required number: nothing else matters: The sentence can finally be pronounced.

Mt26.⁶¹ who said, "This man said, 'I can destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days.'"« – This man said. The saying that served as the basis for this false accusation dates back to the early days of the Savior's public ministry. Thanks to St. John, who preserved it for us (2:19), we can verify the false assertion of the two accusers. Jesus had said, "Destroy this temple, and I will rebuild it in three days," language that contained nothing disrespectful toward the temple, whether considered in itself or in light of the meaning intended by Our Lord. In itself, it was purely hypothetical and meant: suppose this temple is destroyed, I will rebuild it. From the perspective of its actual meaning, it contained no allusion to the temple proper, for it referred to the body of Jesus, whom this divine Master undertook to raise from the dead when the Jews had put him to death. But, distorted by the foolishness or malice of false witnesses, it immediately became sacrilegious, since it contained a threat against the most sacred object of Judaism. This testimony aimed to convince them of his impiety, since he proposed to destroy the most holy temple, and of his presumption or magical abilities, since he proposed to rebuild it.

Mt26.⁶² The high priest stood up and said to Jesus, «Have you nothing to say to the charges these men are bringing against you?» – Upon hearing this accusation, Caiaphas rose as if overcome by the most intense indignation, and as if he wished, through a respectful gesture, to protest against the outrage committed against the worship of God. But were not this theatrical gesture and the words that followed it intended rather to mask a further defeat, and to make the audience forget that this testimony was as invalid as the others? Indeed, we read in Mark 14:59 that even the last two witnesses could not agree. The high priest therefore pressed the accused to provide explanations to justify himself, if he could. You don't answer anything…Do you deny the accusation? Or did you actually utter those words? And if so, won't you tell us what you meant by them? This type of questioning is brutal: coming from the presiding judge, it constitutes a true disgrace, as well as a blatant injustice. – «You have nothing to say? To what these men are testifying against you?».

Mt26.⁶³ Jesus remained silent. And the high priest said to him, «I adjure you by the living God, tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God?» – But Jesus remained silent. The Savior, through this silence of ultimate dignity, fulfilled the oracle of the Prophet-King, Psalm 37:13-15: «Those who sought a pretext to take my life, and who wanted to destroy me, spoke vain and false things; they thought only of laying traps for me. But I was to them as one who is deaf and does not hear, and as one who is mute and does not open his mouth.» Besides, what good would it have done him to defend himself? «It was useless to answer, since there was no one who wanted to listen. There was only a sham judgment. And this council was indeed nothing but an assembly of murderers and thieves.» (St. John Chrysostom, Hom. 84 in Matthew) To the calumnies of these accusers, Jesus responds only with noble silence, although it would have been easy for him to refute them, as he had done so many times before. His hour has come. He lets his executioners act. Then the high priest… Caiaphas, wounded by the Savior's silence, pretends to resort to drastic measures. Still standing, he addresses the accused with these solemn words: "I adjure you by the living God to tell us if you are the Christ, Son of God." I beg you, «to make swear, to compel to take an oath.» By this formula, Caiaphas thus forced Our Lord Jesus Christ to answer, while simultaneously placing his answer under the seal of an oath. Compare Genesis 24:3; 50:5. By the living God, in the name of the living God. The accused was thus reminded that God would witness the words he uttered, and that God would, if necessary, avenge the perjury. If you are the Christ. Jesus must clearly tell the Sanhedrin whether or not he is the promised Messiah. His confession must be complete and leave no room for doubt. – Commentators are divided on the meaning of the words Son of God, which conclude Caiaphas's question. Several consider them a simple honorific, synonymous with "Messiah"; others believe that the high priest used them to designate a true divine sonship (Olshausen and Stier among Protestants, Bisping among Catholics). It seems to us beyond doubt that this second interpretation is the true one. Caiaphas, wanting to be done with it, wanting to obtain from Jesus an answer he can use to condemn him surely, is thereby asking for as much as possible. The Savior had often affirmed before the Jews, during the last period of his life, that he had God as his father: the Nasi is well aware of this, hence the precise form given to the question. It must be impossible for the accused to evade an answer this time.

Mt26.⁶⁴ Jesus answered him, «You have said so; moreover, I tell you, from now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Almighty and coming on the clouds of heaven.» – «Jesus respects the majesty of God’s name on the high priest’s lips. He yields to an interpellation whose malice he recognizes, but which is clothed in the most august aspects of religion. He is not deceived by the pontiff’s dissimulation, but he wishes to honor the divine name which the latter uses to conceal it,» Lémann, Valeur de l’Assemblée, etc., p. 82. Thus adjured, he will therefore pronounce the full and complete truth. You said it, “Yes,” he simply replied. “You yourself have declared it; yes, I am the Messiah, the Son of God.” Jesus then corroborated his assertion with a majestic declaration, delivered with the calm and authority of a king. What's more…I am the Christ, and the proof is that you will see me seated at the right hand of the Almighty. From now on It can only mean "from this moment on" (cf. Luke 22:69). This adverb cannot designate, as Maldonat claims, the Day of Judgment exclusively. The Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ is the starting point of the new order of things foretold at this time. Cf. John 13:31. You will seeThe Savior's Judges will personally experience, will see with their own eyes what He announces: they will witness the beginnings of His glory. Were they not witnesses to the miracles of Golgotha, of the Resurrectionof Pentecost, of the miracles performed by the Apostles, of the rapid establishment of the Church, and then of the terrible destruction of Jerusalem? And were not these events the preludes, the type, and the infallible guarantee of the second coming of Jesus, which the members of the Great Council will likewise contemplate on the last day? The Son of Man A humble title indeed, which the divinely accused deliberately adopts to establish a striking contrast between his present situation and the glorious state he prophesies. Seated on the right…He, so despised and outraged at this time, will be seen enthroned at the right hand of God (cf. 22:44), with all the glory of a supreme Judge. He will be seated as his accusers are now, and endowed with all heavenly power. – Regarding the Hebraism "power of God" for "of Almighty God," it is the abstract for the concrete. Coming on the clouds… Cf. 24, 30; Daniel 713-14. The entire judicial future of the Savior, all the historical manifestations of his power throughout the ages, with the ruin of Jerusalem and the end times as culminating points, are encompassed in this magnificent description. Not only does Jesus affirm that he is the Messiah, but he further attests that he will prove by deeds the reality of his messianic character and his divine sonship. Never had a more important testimony come from the lips of Jesus; for never had Our Lord proclaimed in such a clear, official, and sacred manner the titles to which he claimed. But to answer as he had just done, before such an assembly, was to take up the cross and the crown of thorns in advance, to pronounce his own condemnation. The sentence would not be long in coming.

Mt26.⁶⁵ Then the high priest tore his clothes, saying, «He has blasphemed! What further need do we have of witnesses? You have just heard his blasphemy!” A judge who valued justice and truth should have initiated an inquiry to examine the accused's assertion. Jesus, after all, was not just anyone. His life, his preaching, and his miracles, considered alongside the testimony he had just solemnly given to himself, did they not contain the most authentic and irrefutable proof? But this was indeed a matter of inquiry and justice. They wanted the Savior's death, and from beginning to end, the proceedings were directed toward a death sentence. Caiaphas, forgetting his role as presiding judge, continued to play that of chief accuser. He tore his clothesThe East has always been preeminently the land of outward displays: pain, terror, indignation, and in general all intense emotions, were represented there by acts which, natural at first, had become purely conventional. Such was, among the Jews, the customary and even prescribed sign when one heard a blasphemy or witnessed a sacrilegious act. It consisted of immediately tearing, with the marks of holy anger, the garments with which one was covered. Cf. 2 Kings 18:17; Acts of the Apostles 19, 13; etc. The rabbis, who delighted in this kind of detail, had meticulously determined how this tearing should be carried out. “The tearing of the garments is done standing up. It starts at the front of the neck, not the back. It is not done on the sides or the fringes of the garment. The length of the tear is a palm. One does not tear the shirt or the outer cloak, but all the other garments one wears, even ten of them,” Maimonides, quoted by Buxtorf, Lexic. Talm. p. 2146; cf. Otho, Lexic. Rabb. sv. Blasphemus, Laceratio; Schoettgen, Hor. Hebr. in hl – Caiaphas then violently seized the top of his robe and tore it from the neck down to his chest. At the same time, he cried out: He has blasphemed. This man is guilty of blasphemy, since he dares to call himself the Christ, the Son of God. But wasn't it the high priest himself who was blaspheming at that moment, since he so clearly denied Jesus the titles to which he was entitled, and treated him like the worst of criminals? What else do we need?…Caiaphas was happy to be able to do without witnesses: a long and meticulous interrogation, conducted with bias, had only too clearly demonstrated to him the futility of this method in condemning Our Lord. He therefore dared to claim, in order to remove any scruples from his colleagues, and to preempt accusations from public opinion, that this formality was henceforth unnecessary, whereas the law enjoined it upon the Judges with great rigor. You just heard… You yourselves are sufficient witnesses.

Mt26.⁶⁶ "What do you think?" They replied, "He deserves to die."» «What do you think? That is, what is your opinion on the guilt of the accused and, consequently, on the punishment he deserves?» The high priest calls for a vote by acclamation, still in defiance of the law, according to which the judges were to acquit or condemn each in turn. (Cf. Sanhedrin 15:5). And then, “after having called Jesus Christ’s response a horrible blasphemy, after having declared that no new evidence or testimony is needed to impose a death penalty on him, to ask his colleagues what they think of it—is this not the bitterest of mockeries?” (Lémann, <i>Value of the Assembly</i>, etc., p. 86). But the Sanhedrin members are hardly concerned; their judgment has long been settled. They respond in accordance with the high priest’s wishes: He deserves to die. This was, moreover, the sentence pronounced by God himself against the crime attributed to Jesus: «Whoever blasphemes the name of the Lord shall surely be put to death,» Leviticus 24:16. After this cry of deicide, the session was adjourned: the Great Council had achieved its goal, for Jesus was condemned to death. – St. Luke and St. John will provide us with further information on the conduct of the supreme court of the Jews in the part of Our Lord's trial that fell within its jurisdiction; but what we have read in the first Gospel is more than sufficient to allow us to conclude that there was, in this instance, a terrible abuse of justice. We have noted some of the illegalities of the trial: the Abbots Lémann, who reviewed it «as sons of Israel,» that is to say, from the point of view of Jewish Law, in the interesting work that we have already cited several times (The value of the Assembly that pronounced the death penalty against Jesus Christ, (Lyon 1876), discovered up to twenty-seven manifest irregularities, the least serious of which rendered the sentence null and void. While several of these irregularities only affected the legal formalities of Jewish procedure, most of them were revolting injustices condemned by general law, regardless of the circumstances of time and place: Mr. Dupin demonstrated this in a famous pamphlet entitled: Jesus before Caiaphas and Pilate, Paris, 1829. They assemble to condemn; it is according to this predetermined plan that the proceedings are conducted. Witnesses for the defense are excluded: only the witnesses for the prosecution will be heard. The voice of the accused is loudly drowned out by the voice of the presiding judge. To sum it all up in a word, with St. John Chrysostom, Hom. 84: "they themselves were the accusers, the witnesses, the examiners, and the judges: they alone held the position of everything." And yet, there have been writers who have attempted to legitimize the condemnation of Jesus from a legal standpoint. Cf. Salvador, History of the Institutions of Moses and the Hebrew People, 4, p. 163 ff., Paris, 1828; by the same author, Jesus Christ and His Doctrine, Paris, 1836.

Mt26.⁶⁷ Then they spat in his face, and punched him; others slapped him., – When the Savior's sentence was pronounced, a dreadful scene, almost unheard of in the annals of civilized peoples, began. The divine condemned man was abandoned by the Sanhedrin to the servants and guards who subjected him to the ultimate indignities. Undoubtedly, it was not directly the members of the Great Council who were guilty of the infamies recounted in the Synoptic Gospels: Luke 22:63-65 very clearly places the blame on the subordinate officers who guarded Jesus. Nevertheless, they remain responsible for these unspeakable brutalities, which they could certainly have prevented. They spat in his faceIn an instant, the holy face of the Savior was covered with foul spittle. This affront was no less bloody in antiquity than it is today; cf. Romans 1214; Deuteronomy 14:9. With punches They overwhelmed him with blows. Slaps…blows delivered with an outstretched hand. The Savior’s executioners unknowingly fulfilled these typical words of Job: «They were not ashamed to spit in my face. They heaped a thousand insults upon me; they struck my cheeks. They reveled in my disgrace.» Job 16:11; 30:10.

Mt26.⁶⁸ saying, "Christ, guess who hit you."« – Prophesy to us. The bitter insult was added to the blows. St. Mark and St. Luke recount that, to make it more stinging, Jesus' face was veiled. The divine Master, who consented, during the agony in the garden, to drain the cup to the dregs, accepts everything without complaint, according to the prophecy of Isaiah 50:6-7: «I offered my back to those who struck me, and my cheeks to those who plucked out my beard. I did not hide my face from insults and spitting. The Lord my God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame.»

26, 69-75. Parallel. Mark. 14, 66-72; Luke. 22, 55-62; John 18, 15-18, 25-27.

Mt26.⁶⁹ However, Peter was outside, sitting in the courtyard. A servant girl approached him and said, "You also were with Jesus of Galilee."« By comparing the four Gospel accounts, the reader will see that, while the evangelists expressly note three distinct and consecutive acts of negation, in accordance with the Savior's prophecy (cf. Matthew 26:34 and parallels), they differ on matters of place, people, and so on. Rationalists, naturally, cry contradiction, as is their wont; then, based on this assertion, which they consider infallible, they reject the Synoptic Gospels' account in favor of that of St. John, which they claim is more plausible because it is simpler. Believing commentators, on the other hand, see in these slight discrepancies in detail a further example of the independence of the four evangelists and, consequently, striking proof of their veracity. On this point, as on all others, harmony is established without difficulty, without any forcing. The principle put forth by Bengel, Gnomon, in hl, and generally followed by commentators since, greatly facilitates the solution to this minor Gospel problem. "The threefold denial of St. Peter consists not in three isolated acts, but in three distinct circumstances, where the Apostle denied his Master several times," Fouard, Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, p. 186; cf. p. 60 ff. The "you will deny me three times" should therefore not be limited to three words spoken by St. Peter; for, if one were to add up the different occasions on which the head of the Apostles denied Jesus according to the four Evangelists, one would obtain as many as six (Dionysius the Carthusian), seven (Cajetan), and even eight denials (Paulus). The prophecy admits of a broader meaning. By combining all these negations, we obtain three groups of questions and answers, or, if you prefer, three successive acts, each composed of several varied scenes—that is, three acts during which St. Peter, questioned repeatedly by new people, denied Our Lord Jesus Christ several times. (See these groups in the note to John 18:27.) This suffices to establish the expression "three." As for the sacred writers, they freely chose from among all the details of the event those that suited them or that they knew best: from the features they omit or those they each recount individually, nothing can be concluded against the narratives of others. The discrepancies that exist between them are therefore merely minor variations. Pierre was sitting…After recounting, without interruption, the interrogation of Jesus and its immediate aftermath, St. Matthew returns to a sad incident that had taken place in the palace courtyard, while, not far away, Our Lord was being judged by the Sanhedrin. He relates it all at once, although it was composed of distinct parts, separated by rather considerable intervals. He first recalls that St. Peter, during the proceedings, had remained seated outside in the courtyard with the servants. Earlier, in verse 58, it is true, it had been said that Simon Peter had slipped inside: but the narrator was then thinking of the street, which the Apostle had just left to go into the courtyard. He now writes «outside,» in contrast to the apartments, and especially to the hall in which Jesus was being judged. See in Abbott, the New Testament, vol. Page 1, p. 303, shows the plan of an oriental house with its inner courtyard. – While Peter, worried about the way events were unfolding, warmed himself in silence, thinking of his Master, a servant girl, the gatekeeper according to John 18:17, approached him, looked at him attentively, and suddenly said: “You too were with Jesus of Galilee,” that is, you regularly followed him, you are one of his disciples. The gatekeeper made this assumption upon seeing the Apostle’s sad, frightened expression. This was not the attitude of the guards who had arrested Jesus. The servant girl could also have seen Peter in the company of the Savior.

Mt26.⁷⁰ But he denied it in front of everyone, saying, "I don't know what you mean."« – It was shortly after Pierre entered the courtyard. Taken aback by this sudden question, he became flustered and weakened. He denied it in front of everyone :aggravating circumstance; the entire audience witnessed his initial denial. I don't know what you're saying. The answer is evasive. It's as if he were saying: I don't know what this is about. But it is nonetheless a denial in an indirect form. He doesn't dare say that he is a disciple of Jesus; when his Master is mentioned to him, he cowardly claims not to understand. And it only takes a servant girl to intimidate him to this extent. "This column, which thought itself so firm, is shaken to its very foundations by the slightest breath of wind." St. Augustine, 113th treatise, in John, chapter 18.

Mt26.⁷¹ As he was heading towards the door to leave, another servant girl saw him and said to those who were there, "This man also was with Jesus of Nazareth."« – Feeling uneasy after what had just happened, St. Pierre wanted to flee; he headed towards the door to escape. He crossed the threshold ; A large, covered, vaulted gateway opened onto the street on one side and the courtyard on the other, leading from one to the other. But another servant noticed him and made the same observation. However, she didn't address him directly, but rather those who were near the gateway. With Jesus of Nazareth. The first slave had called Jesus a Galilean; this one calls him a Nazarene. She knows he is from Nazareth, or perhaps the Savior was given these two names interchangeably.

Mt26.⁷² And Peter denied it a second time under oath: "I do not know this man."« – This is the second denial, alas. Formal this time, and compounded by an oath, with oath. When the Apostle realized that his mere assertion was not being believed, he began to swear that he did not know Jesus. And what did he call him? I don't know this man : this man, or worse still, man.

Mt26.⁷³ Shortly afterward, those who were there approached Peter and said to him, "Surely you are one of them, for your very speech gives you away."« – According to Luke 22:58, about an hour passed between Peter's second and third denials. Those who were there…The rumor that one of Jesus' disciples was in the atrium had gradually spread: the servants of the high priest and the servants of the Sanhedrin began searching for this audacious stranger who had not hesitated to slip in among them. They had no difficulty recognizing him. You certainly are too…The servant girls shared their suspicions, and since they had overheard some of St. Peter's words, they undoubtedly informed the members of the Sanhedrin of the particular trait that inspired their complete certainty: You are a Galilean, it's obvious, your language proves it; therefore, you are one of his disciples. It was known, in fact, that most of Jesus' followers had been recruited from Galilee. "One of them" is contemptuous. Your accent makes you recognizable…The assumption was by no means unfounded. It was no more difficult for a Jerusalemite to recognize a Galilean by his speech alone than for a Parisian to distinguish by his pronunciation an inhabitant of Marseille or the Auvergne. The Galileans had a distinct dialect that differed markedly, especially in its errors and harshness, from the milder and purer idiom spoken in Judea. Idioms, grammatical oversights, a special accent—all these gave them away instantly. They confused several sounds (f and b, k and aspirated ch); or else, they omitted entire syllables, which sometimes led to farcical misunderstandings or mischievous jokes, of which the Talmud has preserved several examples. It is therefore understandable that St. Peter could hardly have concealed his Galilean origins. 

Mt26.⁷⁴ Then he began to curse and swear that he did not know this man. Immediately the rooster crowed. – Nevertheless, he asserts more vehemently than ever that he did not know Jesus. Terrified at the thought that his conduct in the garden might be discovered—one of Malchus's relatives had indeed just insinuated that he believed he had seen him in Gethsemane (cf. John 18:26)—Peter reinforces his third denial with anathemas and oaths. He pronounces all sorts of imprecations against himself, in case he does not tell the truth. He started swearing, As in verse 72, to affirm under oath. There is an easily grasped ascending gradation in the three denials: after the simple denial in verse 70 comes the denial accompanied by an oath in verse 72, and then, thirdly, the denial corroborated by imprecations and anathemas. The faithless apostle was beginning to anathematize himself when suddenly the rooster crowed.

Mt26.⁷⁵ And Peter remembered the word that Jesus had spoken to him: «Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times,» and he went out and wept bitterly. This cry immediately reminded St. Peter of Jesus' recent prediction (cf. v. 34), which had come all too true. Before the rooster crowed, the leader of the apostolic band had denied his Master three times. Heartbroken by the memory, he fled as quickly as possible from the scene of his shameful fall; he left the courtyard and went into the street to give free rein to his grief. He wept bitterly. This expresses a frequent and prolonged act. The sin had been great, but it was immediately expiated by a lively and profound contrition. “Holy Apostle, blessed were your tears which, by diluting the guilt of sin, had the power of holy baptism,” St. Leo, Sermon 9 on the Passion. The tradition recorded in the writings of St. Clement is well known. pope, according to which St. Peter's tears lasted as long as his life (cf. Corn. a Lap. in hl)