Chapter XIV.
2490
—Christian Assembly on the Lord’s Day.
1. But every Lord’s day
2491
do ye gather yourselves together, and break bread, and give thanksgiving after having confessed your transgressions,
2492
that your sacrifice may be pure.
2493
2. But let no one that is at variance
2494
with his fellow come together with you, until they be reconciled, that your sacrifice may not be profaned. 3. For this is that which was spoken by the Lord: In every place and time offer to me a pure sacrifice;
2495
for I am a great King, saith the Lord, and my name is wonderful among the nations.
2496
2490
Verses 1 and 3 are given substantially in
Apostolic Constitutions
, vii. 30. This chapter would seem to belong more properly before chap. viii.; but the same order of topics is followed in
Apostolic Constitutions
,—a remarkable proof of literary connection.
2491
Comp.
Rev. i. 10
. Here the full form is
κατὰ κυριακὴν δὲ Κυρίον
. If the early date is allowed, this verse confirms the view that from the first the Lord’s Day was observed, and that, too, by a eucharistic celebration.
2492
Comp chap. iv. 14. No parallel in
Apostolic Constitutions
.
2493
On this spiritual sense of “sacrifice,” comp.
Rom. xii. 1
;
Phil. ii. 17
;
Heb. xiii. 15
;
1 Pet. ii. 5
.
2494
“That hath the (or, any) dispute” (
ἀμφιβολίαν
); comp.
Matt. v. 23, 24
.
2495
[See
Mal. i. 11
. See Irenæus, cap. xvii. 5, vol. i.
p. 484
.]
2496
Mal. i. 11, 14
. Quoted in
Apostolic Constitutions
and by several Ante-Nicene Fathers, with the same reference to the Eucharist.