very early, or to have become
uncertain, the actual state of things being no longer favourable to
it;[287] at any rate, it does not explain the designation of baptism as
[Greek: photismos].

As regards the Lord's Supper, the most important point is that its
celebration became more and more the central point, not only for the
worship of the Church, but for its very life as a Church. The form of
this celebration, the common meal, made it appear to be a fitting
expression of the brotherly unity of the community (on the public
confession before the meal, see Didache, 14, and my notes on the
passage). The prayers which it included presented themselves as vehicles
for bringing before God, in thanksgiving and intercession, every thing
that affected the community; and the presentation of the elements for
the holy ordinance was naturally extended to the offering of gifts for
the poor brethren, who in this way received them from the hand of God
himself. In all these respects, however, the holy ordinance appeared as
a sacrifice of the community, and indeed, as it was also named, [Greek:
eucharistia], sacrifice of thanksgiving.[288] As an act of sacrifice,
_termini technici_ which the Old Testament applied to sacrifice could be
applied to it, and all the wealth of ideas which the Old Testament
connects with sacrifice, could be transferred to it. One cannot say that
anything absolutely foreign was therewith introduced into the ordinance,
however doubtful it may be whether in the idea of its founder the meal
was thought of as a sacrificial meal. But it must have been of the most
wide-reaching significance, that a wealth of ideas was in this way
connected with the ordinance, which had nothing whatever in common,
either with the purpose of the meal as a memorial of Christ's
death,[289] or with the mysterious symbols of the body and blood of
Christ. The result was that the one transaction obtained a double value.
At one time it appeared as the [Greek: prosphora] and [Greek: thusia] of
the Church,[290] as the pure sacrifice which is presented to the great
king by Christians scattered over the world, as they offer to him their
prayers, and place before him again what he has bestowed in order to
receive it back with thanks and praise. But there is no reference in
this to the mysterious words that the bread and wine are the body of
Christ broken, and the blood of Christ shed for the forgiveness of sin.
These words, in and of themselves, mu