Episode Transcript  

One

Eucharist Means Thanksgiving

The word Eucharist literally means thanksgiving. In Hebrew, the word for thanksgiving is todah. Why is the central act of Christian worship called thanksgiving? To understand the Mass, we must understand the Todah sacrifice. Cardinal Ratzinger (who became Pope Benedict XVI) writes in The Feast of Faith, “It is critical to understand the todah sacrifice to understand the Mass.”

In the Old Testament, there were many kinds of sacrifices: peace offerings, guilt offerings, sin offerings, and others. Among them, the todah sacrifice held a unique place (cf. Lev 7:12; 22:29). The todah sacrifice presupposed a specific situation. A person is saved from death, from fatal illness, from enemies, or from some grave danger. Having been delivered by God, he offers a sacrifice of thanksgiving.

He gathers his family and friends for a sacred meal. A lamb is sacrificed in the Temple. Bread would be consecrated for the meal. Thanksgiving Psalms are sung. And the one who was saved lifts a cup of wine, gives thanks, and recounts how the Lord rescued him. Then they eat the meal together in gratitude.

The essential elements of the Todah sacrifice were: A lamb that was sacrificed, bread for the meal was consecrated in the Temple, Psalms of thanksgiving were sung, a cup of wine offered in thanksgiving, and a sacred meal shared in God’s presence.

Two

David Makes Thanksgiving the Heart of Worship

God began to save Israel from slavery through the Exodus. But the Exodus is not fully complete until God gives them rest from all their enemies. This happens when David captures Jerusalem. David brings the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem and offers sacrifice.

1 Chronicles 16:1–7, “And they brought the ark of God, and set it inside the tent which David had pitched for it; and they offered sacrifices before God. And when David had finished offering the sacrifices, he blessed the people in the name of the LORD, and distributed to all Israel a loaf of bread, a portion of lamb and flagons of wine. Moreover, he appointed certain of the Levites as ministers before the ark of the LORD, to invoke, to thank, and to praise the LORD, the God of Israel.”

The elements of the Todah sacrifice are unmistakable: a lamb was sacrificed, bread was consecrated for the meal, wine is offered to God in thanks, Psalms of thanksgiving are sung, and a meal shared. But David does something new. He commands the Levites to offer the Todah sacrifice, the sacrifice of thanksgiving, twenty-four hours a day. Thanksgiving becomes the heart of Jewish worship.

Three

The Expectation of the Messiah

An ancient rabbinic tradition states, “When the Messiah comes, all sacrifice will cease except for the todah sacrifice.” When the Messiah comes, all the sacrifices of the Temple will end, and only one will remain: the todah.

When the Rabbis translated the Hebrew word todah into Greek, the word chosen was eucharistia. Eucharist means thanksgiving.

Four

The Last Supper — Fulfillment

With the Last Supper and His sacrifice on Calvary, Jesus brings all the sacrifices of the Old Testament to completion. Recall the elements of the Todah: A lamb was sacrificed, bread was consecrated, a cup of wine was offered up, Psalms of thanksgiving were sung, and a sacred meal shared in gratitude for deliverance.

At the Last Supper Jesus is the Lamb of God who will be sacrificed on Calvary. He takes bread and wine and consecrates them, saying, “Take this, all of you, and eat of it, for this is my body, which will be given up for you…Take this, all of you, and drink from it, for this is the chalice of my blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenant, which will be poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.”

And they sang the Hallel psalms, Psalms 114–118, the traditional psalms of thanksgiving. He transforms the Todah into the Eucharist, fulfilled in His sacrifice on Calvary. The Messiah has come. All sacrifice ceases, except one, the Todah, which Jesus transformed into the Eucharist. 

Five

The Eucharist

The Jewish Temple was the only place where Israel could worship God through the necessary sacrifices. Synagogues were places of prayer and teaching, but not sacrifice. When Jesus died on the Cross, the veil of the Temple was torn from top to bottom (Matthew 27:51), signifying that the Temple sacrifices were brought to completion in Him.

In 70 AD, the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed. It has never been rebuilt. Why? Because Jesus transformed the Todah sacrifice into the sacrifice of the Eucharist, made present in every Catholic Mass: The Lamb once sacrificed, bread and wine transformed, Psalms of thanksgiving sung, a sacred meal shared. Every Mass is the Todah of the Messiah, the perfect sacrifice of thanksgiving offered to the Father. And every time we go to Mass, we enter the thanksgiving of the Messiah, saved from death and gathered at His table.

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