15. LUKE xxii. 17-20. This passage has been made the subject of a most instructive discussion by Dean Blakesley(376) (d. 1885), whose notion respecting it deserves more consideration than it would seem to have received, though it must no doubt be ultimately set aside through the overpowering weight of hostile authority. He is perplexed by two difficulties lying on the surface, the fact that the Lord twice took a cup, before and after the breaking of the bread; and the close resemblance borne by vv. 19 and 20 to the parallel passage of St. Paul, 1 Cor. xi. 24, 25. The common mode of accounting for the latter phenomenon seems very reasonable, namely, that the Evangelist, Paul’s almost constant companion in travel, copied into his Gospel the very language of the Apostle, so far as it suited his design. In speaking of the two cups St. Luke stands alone, and much trouble has been taken to illustrate the use of the Paschal cup from Maimonides [d. 1206] and other Jewish doctors, all too modern to be implicitly depended on. Dean Alford indeed (N. T. _ad loc._) hails “this most important addition to our narrative,” which “amounts, I believe, to a solemn declaration of the fulfilment of the Passover rite, in both its usual divisions—the eating of the lamb, and drinking the cup of thanksgiving.” Thus regarded, the old rite would be concluded and abrogated in vv. 17, 18; the new rite instituted in vv. 19, 20. To Dean Blakesley all this appears wholly unsatisfactory, and he resorts for help to our critical authorities. He first gets rid of the words of ver. 19 after σῶμά μου, and of all ver. 20, and so far his course is sanctioned by Westcott and Hort, who place the whole passage within their double brackets, and pronounce it a perverse interpolation from 1 Cor. xi. 24, 25. This much accomplished, the cup is now mentioned but once, but with this awkward peculiarity, that it precedes the bread in the order of taking and blessing, which is a downright contradiction of St. Matthew (xxvi. 26-29) and of St. Mark (xiv. 22-25), as well as of St. Paul. Here Westcott and Hort refuse to be carried further, and thus leave the remedy worse than the disease(377), if indeed there be any disease to remedy. Dean Blakesley boldly places Luke xxii. 19 (ending at σῶμά μου) before ver. 17, and his work is done: the paragraph thus remodelled is self-consistent, but it is robbed of everything which has hitherto made it a distinctive narrative, supplementing as well as confirming those of the other two Evangelists.