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Document Details :

Title: The Birkath Ha-mazon and the Body of the Lord
Subtitle: A Study of Didache 9-10
Author(s): STEWART-SYKES, Alistair
Journal: Questions Liturgiques/Studies in Liturgy
Volume: 85    Issue: 4   Date: 2004   
Pages: 197-205
DOI: 10.2143/QL.85.4.519147

Abstract :
The possibility that some Christian eucharistic prayers may in some way have derived from the Jewish meal prayers known as the Birkath Ha-mazon has been widely canvassed. Although this hypothesis has met with a mixed response, there is one question which arises, were it to be argued that a eucharistic prayer had some derivation from these table prayers, which seems not to have been answered. Namely, since the Birkath Ha-mazon are said after the meal, and so have regard to a meal which has already taken place, whereas the anaphora precedes the administration of Communion and so looks forward to ritual eating which is to come, how then, if the Birkath Ha-mazon are the origin of any anaphora, do they come to precede, rather than follow, the sacred eating?

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