it still more indefinite. There Jesus merely says, "the hand of him that betrays me is with me on the table," and no further inquiry is made by any one. Matthew, like Mark, represents each disciple as asking whether he was the one, and Jesus as giving the same indication about the dish. But he adds that Judas himself asked, "Is it I?" and that Jesus answered, "Thou hast said." Quite different is the account in John. There, instead of all the disciples inquiring whether it was he, a single disciple, leaning on the breast of Jesus, asks, on a sign from Peter, who it was to be. Jesus does not reply that it was he who dipped in the dish, but he to whom he should give a sop. He then gives the sop to Judas, and tells him to do quickly that which he is about to do; words understood by no one present.[1] The improbability of any of these stories is obvious. In the three first, Judas is pointed out to all the eleven as a man who is about to give up their master to punishment, and probable death, yet no step was taken or even suggested by any of them either to impede the false disciple in his movements, or to save Jesus by flight and concealment. The announcement is taken as quietly as if it were an every-*day occurrence that was referred to. John's narrative avoids this difficulty by supposing the intimation that Judas was the man to be conveyed by a private signal understood only by Peter and the disciple next to Jesus. These two may have felt it necessary to keep the secret, but why then could they not understand the words of Jesus to Judas, or why not at least inquire whether they had reference to his treachery, which had just before been so plainly intimated? That Jesus, with his keen vision, may have divined the proceedings of Judas, is quite possible; that he could have spoken of them at the table in this open way without exciting more attention, is hardly credible.
It was at this same passover that Christ, conscious of his approaching end, blessed the bread and the cup of wine, and giving them to his disciples, told them that the one was his body, and the other his blood in the new testament, or the new testament of his blood (Mk. xiv. 22-25; Mt. xxvi. 26-29; Lu. xxii. 14-21; I Cor. xi. 23-25). John who was confused about dates in
- ↑ Mk. xiv. 17-21; Mt. xxvi. 20-25; Lu. xxii. 21, 22; Jo. xiii. 21-28.
