15th Week in Ord. Time, Friday – 21st July 2023 – Exodus 11,10-12,14; Mt 12,1-8
Re-Enactment of the Redemption
Today’s first reading is the familiar account of the first Passover. We read how the Israelites are instructed to take the blood of the lamb and apply it to the doorposts and lintels of their homes, in order that God, using the angel of death, would ‘pass over’ their homes and not kill their first-born sons. It also describes the meal they were to eat and how they were to keep this festival meal as a memorial of the Lord’s freeing them from their slavery. Ever since the Exodus, the chosen people have remembered their being set free from slavery by having a special meal (Seder) in which they re-enacted the events of the Exodus. God commanded that they celebrate the Passover with this meal of remembrance. They were to eat bitter herbs – to remind them of the bitterness of their slavery, unleavened bread – to recall their hasty departure from Egypt, roasted lamb – symbolic of the blood of the lamb which was a sign for the angel of death to “pass over” their homes, and to drink a shared cup of wine – sign of joy looking forward to their return to the Promised Land. In re-enacting this meal, the Israelites, even generations later, would be part of the Exodus. Once associated with this historical occurrence, they recalled how God had saved his people.
From New Testament times onwards, this Jewish Passover became a rehearsal for the Christian Passover: the Lamb of God, Christ, is sacrificed (on the cross) and eaten (at the Last Supper). Thus, Jesus brings salvation to the world. The mystical re-enactment of the redemptive act of Jesus becomes the central feature of the Christian liturgy, the Eucharistic Meal, which is at once Sacrifice and sacrificial meal.
