A listener named Brian asks Father Dave about a specific part of the Eucharistic Prayer. “The words of the consecration say that Jesus took the bread, said the blessing, gave it to his disciples, and it ends with ‘do this in memory of me,’” Brian begins. “My question is, if Jesus said the blessing, and I assume that blessing they referred to was something standard in the Hebrew tradition, why is that blessing not part of the Eucharistic Prayer?”
Father Dave explains how these are “the words of institution” during this portion of the Eucharistic prayer. “Those four actions that we see in the second half of the Mass – we take, bless, break, and share – happen not only at the Last Supper account in the Scriptures, but also several times throughout the different Gospels.” He notes the feeding of the five thousand as another example.
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“In all those instances, it merely says, ‘he said the blessing.’ Sometimes the translation is ‘after giving thanks.’ Essentially, it’s saying grace before a meal,” Father Dave says. He compares it to the shorthand of saying that “Father Dave said a Hail Mary” rather than “Father Dave said, ‘Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee…”
Father Dave confirms Brian’s guess that the Scriptures are referring to a common Jewish blessing. “It’s called a berakhah blessing. There were certain versions that had somewhat different wordings, but in the same way of grace, it was a standard formula that you would give thanks for and bless the food,” he says.
“The other reason why we don’t repeat this blessing is because the Eucharistic Prayer, in the Christian era, is the berakhah blessing. The Eucharistic Prayer follows the general formula of the Jewish meal blessing. We don’t repeat the Jewish one because this one has now taken its place,” Father Dave says.
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“When we have that little historical flashback during the Mass and say ‘Jesus took the bread, said the blessing, broke the bread, and gave it to his disciples,’ we recount that little snapshot as one part of the Eucharistic Prayer. But what we’re doing in the entirety of the Eucharistic Prayer is all of those things,” he says. This begins with someone bringing up the gifts of bread and wine during Mass, the priest blessing them, breaking the host, and then distributing the Eucharist to the congregation.
Father Dave relates it to the Bread of Life discourse that Jesus proclaims in the Gospel of John. “Just like when Jesus says ‘you had the manna and now you have the bread of life,’ we’re actually doubling down on that blessing, and the Eucharistic Prayer has become the new berakhah blessing in the Christian era.”