The Age of Admission to the Lord’s Supper

By Roger T. Beckwith

Latimer House, Oxford, England

The fascinating article by Christian L. Keidel in the Spring 1975 issue of the Westminster Theological Journal lends its weight to a proposal which is being widely canvassed in the Christian Church at the present time, namely, that baptized infants or children should be admitted to the Lord’s supper. The proposal is being discussed all over the Anglican Communion and in many of the churches linked to the World Council of Churches, whose Faith and Order Commission supported it at their 1971 Louvain conference.[1] The proposal assumes the rightness of infant baptism, and so is not entertained by Baptists, but Baptists have played a large part in popularising the proposal by their claim that those who baptize infants ought in consistency to admit them to the Lord’s Supper as well. Mr. Keidel tells us (p. 305) that his own conversion to belief in infant communion was prompted by Baptist polemic, and his hope is that by adopting this practice the Reformed Churches will strengthen the case for infant baptism and lead Baptists to consider it more sympathetically.

Whether Baptists would really react in this way may be doubted: they might rather be shocked and repelled to see candidates being admitted to all the ordinances of Christianity without having made any profession of repentance and faith, or indeed being capable of doing so. Mr. Keidel thinks that the remedy is “require” them “when they reach an age of discernment…to have a credible confession of faith” (p. 341). But supposing they have not: are they then to be excommunicated? This would be a very damaging procedure, much worse than not to have admitted them in the first place. For the New Testament reserves excommunication for flagrant offences against doctrine and morality, not for the absence of a credible profession of faith.

It is not, however, to be taken for granted that the consistency of the pedobaptist case really depends upon the acceptance of infant communion. The Baptist claim that infant baptism and infant communion stand or fall together must first be scrutinized. Baptists have made no great effort to prove their claim: it is usually brought forward more in the way of a debating point. And my own conviction is that the more closely it is examined, the more vulnerable it is found to be. It rests upon six assumptions: (i) that, if infant baptism is early attested in the history of the church, infant communion is attested equally early; (ii) that, if baptism is a ceremony suitable to infants, the Lord’s supper is a ceremony equally suitable; (iii) that, if the solidarity of the household entitles the child of believers to be baptized, it also entitles him to receive the Lord’s supper; (iv) that, if infants can be admitted to the church and kingdom of God through baptism, they are as much entitled as any other member of the church and any other citizen of the kingdom to partake of the Lord’s supper; (v) that, if the Old Testament antecedent of baptism (i.e. circumcision) was given to infants, so was the Old Testament antecedent of the Lord’s supper (i.e. the passover meal); and (vi) that, if the New Testament requirement of repentance and faith in connection with baptism can be deferred, so can the New Testament requirement of “discernment” and “remembering” in connection with the Lord’s supper. As we shall discover, the first two of these assumptions are certainly wrong, the next three are dubious, and only the final one can be conditionally admitted. The condition for admitting the final assumption would be that it could be shown to be at least probable that the Lord’s supper was intended for infants. Then indeed one could admit the propriety of deferring the moral requirements for receiving the Lord’s supper, just as one defers them in the case of baptism. However, the church does not defer the moral requirements for baptism without good evidence that baptism is intended for infants, and similar evidence would be needed in the case of the Lord’s supper. Everything, therefore, rests upon the preceding five points to show that the Lord’s supper is, at least probably, intended for infants, just as baptism is: only then could the sixth point be admitted and the moral requirements deferred.

Since the case for infant communion rests upon the first five points listed, we will now examine each of them in turn.

1. The Antiquity of Infant Communion

Infant communion certainly cannot be traced back as far as infant baptism. The first definite reference to infant baptism is in Irenaeus, about 180 A.D., who speaks of “all who through Christ are born again to God, infants and children and boys and young men and old men” (Against Heresies 2:22:4, or 2:33:2), “born again to God” being a technical phrase meaning baptism, well attested in other parts of Irenaeus’ writings.[2] Considering the small compass of the patristic literature before the time of Irenaeus, this reference is significantly early, and may well reflect a practice originating in New Testament times. In the next few decades Tertullian, Hippolytus, and Origen add their testimony to Irenaeus’. The earliest definite reference to infant or child communion, on the other hand, is in Cyprian (On the Lapsed 9, 25) about the year 251, after the voluminous writings of Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Hippolytus, and Origen had appeared, without any reference to such a practice; and there is both earlier and contemporary evidence that this was something of a novelty. Cyprian was a Western Father, writing in the Latin-speaking seaboard of North Africa opposite Italy; but about sixteen years earlier Origen, by then permanently resident in Palestine, states that children (parvuli) are not given communion, and what he says may well apply not only to Palestine but also to his homeland of Egypt.[3] His words are these:

Before we arrive at the provision of the heavenly bread, and are filled with the flesh of the spotless Lamb, before we are inebriated with the blood of the true Vine which sprang from the root of David, while we are children, and are fed with milk, and retain the discourse about the first principles of Christ, as children we act under the oversight of stewards, namely the guardian angels (Homilies on the Book of Judges 6:2).

Though Origen’s language is highly metaphorical, it is difficult to understand him as speaking of anything but literal children and the literal sacrament. Literal children, if they have learned the first principles of Christ, do not have to wait before feeding on Christ spiritually, though they may have to wait before feeding on him sacramentally. Adults young in the faith do not have to wait before feeding on Christ spiritually, and though they might have to wait before feeding on him sacramentally (especially in the early church, with its long course of catechizing for adult converts), this would only be if they were waiting to be baptized as well, and Origen makes no allusion to baptism. So it seems that he is speaking of literal children, already baptized, but waiting for admission to the Lord’s supper.

Contemporary with Cyprian is the author of the Syrian Didascalia, but his evidence agrees with Origen’s. He writes:

Honour the bishops, who have loosed you from your sins, who by the water regenerated you, who filled you with the Holy Spirit, who reared you with the word as with milk, who bred you up with teaching, who established you with admonition, and made you to partake of the holy eucharist of God, and made you partakers and joint-heirs of the promise of God. These reverence…(Didascalia Apostolorum, ch. 9, R. H. Connolly’s edition, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1929, p. 94).

The order here is surely significant. The bisbop’s flock had first been baptized, then been reared with a long course of teaching, and finally, in maturity, been admitted to communion.

Now, many patristic scholars today are inclined to regard evidence from Syria and Palestine, where the geographical and linguistic links with Palestinian Judaism and with primitive Jewish Christianity were strongest, as more likely than any other to have preserved traditional links with the Christianity of Jesus and his earliest followers, comparatively unaffected by outside influences. If so, the evidence of Origen and the Didascalia on the practice of Palestine, Syria, and Egypt is not only the earliest evidence bearing on our subject, but is on other grounds also more likely than Cyprian’s to reflect the ancient Christian custom. Mr. Keidel calls upon the church to return to the practice of antiquity (pp. 301, 305, 341), but in the remotest antiquity it appears that infant and child communion did not exist.

2. The Suitability of the Ceremony to Infants

If infants are as capable as adults of being washed with water in baptism, the Baptist argues, they are as capable as adults of eating a little bread and drinking a little wine in the Lord’s supper. The assumption that it will be a little is an arbitrary inference from later Christian practice: at the Last supper the sacrament was part of a larger meal, probably the passover meal, in which neither the bread nor the wine seems to have been stinted. If the account of the passover meal in the Mishnah is any guide, it was a substantial meal of more than one course, at which a minimum of four cups of wine were drunk or circulated, and unlimited drinking could take place between the first and third cups (Pesahim 10:1–8). Throughout the New Testament period probably (certainly in 1 Cor 11) the sacrament remained part of a larger meal, the agape (2 Pet 2:13; Jude 12), and it is still part of the agape in the Didache, about the end of the century, where the significant words “after you are satisfied” are used (10:1). Moreover, even a little bread would not be easily consumable by infants in the first few months of life (particularly if it was unleavened bread—a dry biscuit), which Mr. Keidel concedes, and attempts to draw a distinction between “early infancy” and “later infancy” (pp. 308f). In addition, it needs to be borne in mind that the age of weaning was late in biblical and intertestamental times—2 Maccabees 7:27, in about the first century B.C., speaks of suckling for three years from birth as if it were normal—and that therefore the introduction of the infant to solid foods was probably late also (cf 1 Cor 3:1f; Heb 5:12–14).4 Bread, however, is a small problem compared with wine. Wine, being an intoxicant, is a drink which needs to be treated with discretion, as the Bible emphasizes (Prov 20:7; 21:17; Isa 5:11–13; 56:10–12). Discretion, however, is precisely what infants and children lack (Deut 1:39; 1 Kings 3:7–9; Eccles. 10:16; Isa 3:4; 7:15f; 1 Cor 13:11; 14:20; Gal 4:lf; Eph 4:14; Heb 5:13f). The proposal that infants and children should be introduced to the use of wine, and that Christ intended that they should, is therefore one which should be viewed with the greatest suspicion. Only the clearest evidence would be sufficient to support it, and no real evidence seems to be forthcoming. All that Mr. Keidel can offer is Lam 2:llf (pp. 309f). But the various words for “wine” in the Old Testament are also used for bunches of grapes (Deut 16:13; Jer 40:10, 12; Joel 1:10), and Lam 2:11f is probably just another such instance.

3. Membership of a Christian Household

The argument that, if the solidarity of the household entitles the infant to be baptized, it also entitles him to partake of the Lord’s supper, proceeds on the assumption that the Lord’s supper is a ceremony as suitable to infants as baptism is, which we have now seen it is not. Membership of a household does not abolish distinctions of age. The child must not usurp the position of the parent, nor the younger the position of the elder. As regards religious privileges and responsibilities, the child of a Christian (or Jewish) household is indeed entitled to all privileges, and responsible to perform all duties, which are suitable to his age. He is entitled to baptism (or circumcision) in infancy, and is responsible for exercising the faith and repentance which baptism and circumcision imply when he is old enough. To this end, he is entitled to be taught the oracles of God (Rom 5:2), but only when understanding begins (Neh 8:2f), and understanding does not begin until weaning is past (Isa 28:9) and the child becomes capable of speech (Isa 8:4). After he has learned to repent and believe through the knowledge of the Scriptures (2 Tim 3:15), he may properly be admitted to the Lord’s supper, and the best age for this may well be the age of discretion, which our Lord’s use of wine as one of the sacramental elements suggests.5 The age of discretion is not, of course, exactly determined, but we saw above that according to the Old and New Testaments it is an age not yet attained by infants or children, and the intertestamental literature takes the same view (Wisdom 12:24—26; 15:14). At this age, somewhere between the early teens and the early twenties probably, the new communicant will also be able to make a mature profession of faith; such a profession is implicit in his public use of the sacrament, and the church may well ask him to put it into words. In all this, there is no failure to recognize his membership of a Christian household from infancy, or what that membership implies.

4. Membership of the Church and Kingdom of God

One of Mr. Keidel’s main points is that the baptized infant’s membership of the church visible carries with it a right to partake of the Lord’s supper (pp. 306, 336-341). But here again the question of age must not be ignored. His baptism carries with it a right and duty to partake of the Lord’s supper when he reaches the appropriate age. But the claim that the appropriate age is before faith and repentance become possible is open to question not only on the grounds urged hitherto, but also on the grounds of the New Testament doctrine of baptism.

In the New Testament, as pedobaptists no less than their critics recognize, baptism is linked very closely with repentance and faith (Acts 2:38; 19:4f; Gal 3:26f; Col 2:12f). It is similarly linked with the ministry of the word (Eph 5:26), for it is through the ministry of the word that faith is evoked (John 17:20; Rom 10:17; Eph 1:13). The New Testament practice was to baptize people immediately they made a profession of faith (Acts 2:41; 8:12, 16, 36; 9:18; 10:47f; 16:33; 18:8; 19:5; 22:16). And the same graces are stated to be given through baptism and through the word, faith or repentance—namely, salvation (Eph 2:8; Titus 3:5; 1 Pet 3:21), regeneration (John 1:12f; 3:5; Titus 3:5; Jam. 1:18; 1 Pet 1:23–25), forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38; 13:38f; 22:16; Col 2:12f), the gift of the Spirit (Acts 2:38; Gal 3:2, 14; Eph 1:13), adoption (John 1:12; Gal 3:26f) and a share in Christ’s death and resurrection (Rom 6:3–11; Col 2:12). When, therefore, baptism is extended to infants, this does not dispense with faith or repentance but looks forward to it; and when, through the ministry of the word, they do believe and repent, their baptism is thereby completed. The baptized, undoubtedly, are proper candidates for admission to communion (Acts 2:41f; 1 Cor 10:1–4; cf. Exod 12:43f), but the question is, has the proper time for their admission come until they have completed their baptism by believing and repenting? This is, at the very least, an open question; and many would consider that a negative answer has more to be said for it than a positive one.

5. The Analogy of the Passover Meal

It is to the fifth point that Mr. Keidel devotes the greatest amount of space (pp. 306-322, 335f), and it is certainly a matter of crucial importance. The passover meal was the chief event of the week-long festival of the passover and unleavened bread for which Jesus and his disciples had come up to Jerusalem at the time of his passion. It was in this context that he instituted the Lord’s supper, and the similarity between the two ceremonies, as each being feasts upon a sacrifice (either upon the passover lamb or upon himself, the true passover lamb), is a definite link. St. Mark, like the other synoptic gospels, appears to say that the Last supper was the actual passover meal (Mark 14–12-26), and this view has been powerfully advocated in recent years by Joachim Jeremias,6 and is accepted by Mr. Keidel. Various means have been sought for reconciling the synoptic evidence with the apparent evidence of the fourth gospel to the contrary (especially John 18:28), and the most probable seems to be that John is using “eat the passover” in the broad sense of Deut 16:3. (John very likely assumes a knowledge of the synoptic tradition, and therefore does not expect to be misunderstood.) Assuming, then, as common ground that the Last supper was the passover meal, and that Jesus instituted the sacrament of his body and blood as the Christian counterpart to the passover meal, we can proceed to enquire whether the passover meal was intended for infants and children.

On this issue, Mr. Keidel depends on three main arguments. The first (pp. 307f) is that the phrase “each one according to the mouth of his eating” (Exod 12:4, literally rendered) implies that the physical capacity to eat was the sole criterion for admission to the first passover meal. The same phrase, he says, appears elsewhere only in Exod 16:16, 18, 21, where it refers to the manna, and must certainly include infants and children, since there was nothing else in the wilderness for them to eat. It should be remembered, however, that mouths are for drinking as well as eating, and that this is the chief use to which they would be put by infants. The phrase does not, therefore, imply “each one according as he has a mouth,” but “each one according to the quantity which he will eat,” which, in the case of sucklings, might well mean none at all. If ground manna was of the texture of soft meal, it could be used to supplement the diet of a suckling after a few months. But the instituted elements of the passover meal were roast meat, unleavened bread (dry biscuit) and bitter herbs (Exod 12:8f; Num 9:11). The second could be given to an infant by the time he was teething, but the first would be beyond his capacity until his teeth had developed, and the third would probably be rejected by him as unpalatable until well into his childhood. Moreover, in a society where the age of weaning and of introduction to solid foods was late, roast meat and unleavened bread might not be thought appropriate food until a somewhat later age than in western society today. So it must be regarded as highly questionable whether Exod 12:4 supplies any evidence that the instituted elements were given, or intended to be given, to infants, though it does seem to supply evidence that at the first passover they were given to children.

Mr. Keidel’s second main argument (pp. 312-316) is ingenious, but speculative. It relates to the difference between the first passover and subsequent passovers. He concedes that the command to go up to Jerusalem in subsequent years for the passover and the other two pilgrim feasts applied only to males (Exod 23:17; 34:23; Deut 16:16), and only to those among them who had reached the age for the fulfilling of the commandments. But he contends that this change was because of the centralized sanctuary, which has now, under the gospel, been abolished; so the true antecedent of the Lord’s supper is not the later passovers but the first passover, where women and children partook as well as men. He adds that to argue from the later passovers that children should not partake of the Lord’s Supper means arguing that women should not partake either.

Three points are here raised, which must be considered in turn.

(i) It is held that the participation of women and children in the passover meal is the norm, but that the centralized sanctuary made it somewhat uncommon. This is plausible. One might expect the first passover to set the pattern and serve as the norm. But it is important to note that even from the beginning it is recognized that the future pattern will be different. In the promised land, unleavened bread will be eaten “in all thy borders” (Exod 13:5–8; Deut 16:4), i.e. by the women and children, while the men go up to keep the full ritual of the passover “before the Lord,” “in the place which the Lord shall choose to cause his name to dwell there” (Exod 23:17; 34:23; Deut 16:2, 5–7, 16f). Under these regulations, women and children are not excluded from subsequent passover meals, but the command to observe the passover is directed solely to men, and the participation of women and children does not seem to be either expected or encouraged. In practice, their participation is not actually recorded between the institution of the passover and the first century A.D. In the meantime, as we shall see, there is reason to think that their participation may for a time have died out entirely, and only been revived around the beginning of the Christian era.

(ii) It is held that the true antecedent of the Lord’s supper is the first passover, not subsequent passovers. Against this contention stands the obvious fact that the occasion on which the Lord’s supper was instituted, and therefore its immediate background, was not the first passover meal but one of the subsequent passover meals. The passover of the Last Supper was eaten at Jerusalem, in accordance with Deut 16:5–7, and not at home. Its blood had been sprinkled in the temple, in accordance with 2 Chron 30:15–17; 35:5–17, and not on the lintel and doorposts of the worshipper’s house. Those present were all adult males—Christ and the twelve apostles. They did not stand, as at the first passover (Exod 12:11), but reclined (Mark 14:18; John 13:12, 23–25). They used wine (Luke 22:17f), in addition to the instituted elements of the passover meal. Christ did not ignore these later developments or sweep them away, but observed them all; and he laid great emphasis on the last of them by making wine one of the only two elements of the Christian passover meal, which he instituted on that occasion.

It is true that the abolition of the centralized sanctuary affects Christianity in important ways, but one of those ways is not necessarily to assimilate the Lord’s supper to the first passover meal. The Lord’s supper would still be the Christian passover meal, whether it were modelled on the original passover meal, of which children partook, or on the subsequent passover meals, of which children did not normally partake. Any privileges which children lost through the centralized sanctuary could be restored through the Lord’s supper, but they could equally be restored in other ways. The main privilege which they lost was that of eating at the table of God. But under the gospel all meals are “sanctified,” as provision from God’s table (1 Tim 4:3–5; cp. 1 Cor 9:13f). The title “Lord’s supper” (i.e. supper at which the Lord presides as host) is therefore extended by Paul from the sacrament to the love feast which formed its setting (1 Cor 11:20–22, 33f), and though children probably did not partake of the former they certainly partook of the latter, since it was supplied by the rich for the benefit of the poor (v. 22). So it would be difficult to deny that Christian children do eat at the table of God, even though they do not receive communion.

These conclusions are further supported by the parallel case of baptism. The immediate background to Christian baptism is not circumcision as instituted in Gen 17, but circumcision as practised in the first century A.D. The developments that had taken place by the first century are by no means irrelevant to an understanding of the relationship between circumcision and baptism. The two ceremonies are outwardly dissimilar, but when one notes that by the first century a ritual ablution or baptism for proselytes had been added to circumcision, because they had not hitherto observed the laws of ceremonial cleanness (Sybilline Oracles 4:165–67; Mishnah, Pesahim 8:8; etc.), an outward similarity at once appears. Moreover, the Old Testament does not apparently envisage the case of a woman becoming a proselyte without her husband, and so does not say whether her children are to be circumcised. Since the mother herself cannot be circumcised, one might well conclude that her children may not be. Around the beginning of the Christian era, however, many wives did become proselytes to Judaism without their husbands (see Jewish Encyclopaedia, art. “Proselyte”), and one such is mentioned in the New Testament (Acts 16:1–3; 2 Tim 1:5; 3:15). The ritual ablution or baptism for proselytes was by this time in use, and was required of women as well as men (Greek Testament of Levi 14:6; Joseph and Asenath). The rabbis therefore decided, as the Mishnah shows,[7] that the wife’s children might also receive the initiation rites (circumcision and proselyte baptism), although her husband was not doing so. Now, it is only against this background that one can understand the rule, laid down by Paul in 1 Cor 7:14, that the children of a converted mother are holy, even if her husband is not converted; and against this background one can see that the rule clearly implies that her children are eligible to receive the Christian initiation rites—a conclusion which could never have been inferred from the Old Testament in isolation. Thus, the background of Christian baptism is not circumcision as originally instituted, but circumcision as practised in the first century—an age when the institution was still respected, but had been interpreted and elaborated in certain significant ways.

(iii) It is held that, if the analogy of the passover meal had excluded children from partaking of the Lord’s Supper, it would also have excluded women. This does not follow. The New Testament makes a definite change in the status of women, but not in the status of children. It tells us that, as regards faith, baptism and union with Christ, “there can be no male and female” (Gal 3:26–28). Since this change of status applies to the initiation ceremonies of the church, it presumably applies to the church’s fellowship meal as well. But there has been no such change in the case of infants or children. Indeed, it is on this fact of the unchanged status of infants that the practice of infant baptism rests. And that the first Christians recognized the disparity between the case of infants or children and the case of women is indicated by the fact that, though evidence for infant and child communion is decidedly later than evidence for infant and child baptism, evidence for the communion of women is not. In about the last twenty years of the second century, the period when definite evidence for infant baptism appears, there also appear the following pieces of evidence for the participation of the Lord’s Supper by women: the Acts of Peter (in E. Hennecke, New Testament Apocrypha, E.T., London, Lutterworth, 1963–65, vol. 2, p. 280), the Acts of Paul (op. cit., vol. 2, p. 372), and Tertullian, To his Wife 2:4, 8.

Mr. Keidel’s final main argument (pp. 313,335f) is based on the analogy of the other sacrificial meals of the Old Testament. He considers that indirect encouragement is given for women and children to partake of the passover, when they are encouraged or permitted to partake of peace-offerings and firstlings (Num 6:2, 13–21; Deut 12:6f; 11f, 17f; 14:23–26; 15:19f; 16:10f; Prov 7:14). These sacrifices resemble the passover to the extent that they include sacred meals, and firstlings have a common origin with the passover and share its obligatory and commemorative character (Exod 13:1f, 11–16), while they differ from it in not being regular or atoning, and not being subject to those rigid restrictions of sanctity that no bone must be broken and that flesh left overnight must be burned. Peace offerings are much less closely linked to the passover, having a different origin (Lev 3:1–17; 7:11–21, 28–34), and not being obligatory, commemorative, regular, or atoning, or generally subject to the rigid restrictions just mentioned. Mr. Keidel contends that the encouragement for women and children to partake of free-will peace offerings at pentecost (Deut 16:10f) applies, in context, to passover and tabernacles as well. But the generally similar language used about tabernacles (v. 14) is in two points significantly different, that it contains no reference to “a freewill offering” or to the rejoicing being “before the Lord thy God”; while the language used about the passover differs completely. A possible reason for this is that women and children could celebrate passover and tabernacles at home, by eating unleavened bread or dwelling in booths, but that to celebrate pentecost, which provided no such ceremony, they needed to go to the sanctuary.[8] The differences in all these cases are really as great as the similarities, and to argue that what is true of peace offerings, firstlings and the feast of pentecost must be true of the passover as well is a non sequitur.

There are other sacrifices also which include sacred meals, but meals confined to the priests and their families. It is worth noting that in these a distinction is drawn between those which may only be eaten by the adult male priests, on duty in the sanctuary,[9] and those which may also be eaten by their wives and children at home. In the first category come the meal offerings, the sin offerings and the guilt offerings (Lev 2:3, 10; 5:13; 6:16–18, 26, 29; 7:6–10; 10:12f, 17f; 14:13; Num 18:9f), while in the second category come the priestly portions of the peace offerings and firstlings (Lev 10:14f; 22:11–13; Num 18:11–19). It is therefore entirely credible that there are similar distinctions among the sacrificial meals allowed to laymen.

The Last Supper in its Contemporary Passover Setting

If, however, the background and antecedent of the Lord’s supper is not the first passover meal, but the passover meal of later generations, it remains to consider in more detail the nature of that meal and its relation to the Lord’s supper, especially as regards our main topic of inquiry. We have said that the participation of women and children is not recorded between the institution of the passover and the first century A.D., and that it probably died out completely in between. Mr. Keidel, however, thinks that the annual sacrifice offered by Elkanah (1 Sam 1:3, 21; 2:19), of which he gave portions to his wives and their children (1 Sam 1:4f), was more likely than not the passover (p. 336). But the individual attention which Hannah gains from the high priest (1 Sam 1:9–18) makes it improbable that the occasion was one of the crowded pilgrim festivals; and the reference to Elkanah paying his vow (1 Sam 1:21) suggests that his sacrifice was either a peace offering for a vow (Lev 7:16; 22:21; Num 6:14, 17; Deut 12:6f, 11f,17f; Prov 7:14), or one of the other types of peace offering (a freewill offering or a peace offering for thanksgiving) offered on the same occasion. If this is the case, it raises the question whether Elkanahs annual visit to fulfil his vow was his only annual visit to the sanctuary. Certainly it was his only visit with his wives and children, as is implied by 1 Sam 1:21f; 2:19. But that means either that Elkanah did not observe the passover, or that he went up to it without his wives or children.

No other references to women and children attending the passover before the first century A.D. are even claimed to exist. True, it is not unlikely that they attended the great passovers in the first year of king Hezekiah and the eighteenth year of king Josiah (2 Kings 23:21–23; 2 Chron 30:1–27; 35:1–19), but, if so, this is because they were acts of national repentance after long ungodliness or disobedience rather than simple passovers. Josephus speaks of women and children accompanying their menfolk and attending the passover held by the newly returned exiles (Antiquities 11:4:8, or 11:109f), but he adds the reference to women and children on his own authority, since it is not in his sources (Ezra 6:19–22; 1 Esdras 7:10–15), and he probably does so because their attendance was considered normal by a Pharisee of the late first century A.D. The details of his account are more to be relied upon when he describes events in A.D. 70, and speaks of women partaking (War 6:9:3, or 6:426). Moreover, Luke tells us that at the beginning of the century it was the custom of Mary and Joseph to go up to the passover each year, and that Jesus accompanied them when he was twelve (Luke 2:41–51).

The long silence which precedes the first century A.D. is once broken, in the late second century B.C., by the author of the book of Jubilees, whose remarkable words are these:

And every man who has come upon its day (i.e. that of the passover) shall eat it in the sanctuary of your God before the Lord from twenty years old and upwards (Jub 49:17).

In saying this, he sets his face against the participation of women and children. Now, the book of Jubilees was cherished by the Qumran community, who observed its eccentric 364-day calendar, and belongs to the broad Essene school of thought which, together with those of the Pharisees and Sadducees, existed among the Jews at least from the time of Jonathan Maccabaeus (160-143 B.C.) onwards.[10] The same eccentric calendar is propounded in 1 Enoch, to which the author of Jubilees refers as his source (ch. 4, vv. 17–21), but even by the time of 1 Enoch it had been in use long enough for its inconsistency with the true solar year to become apparent, i.e. for about fifty years.[11] It was evidently already in use when “the Wicked Priest,” commonly identified as Jonathan or Simon Maccabeus, made his expedition against the adherents of the Teacher of Righteousness on a day which was their day of atonement but not his, as described in the Qumran Commentary on Habakkuk 11:4–8. This shows, what is indeed commonly accepted, that the ceremonial regulations of the book of Jubilees are not original to the author, but are the codification of an older practice, which may have been developing through much of the post-exilic period, and which, at the time of the Maccabean war of liberation, was in serious contention for supremacy in the nation and in the temple with the rival forms of practice worked out by the Pharisees and Sadducees. It seems never to have achieved this supremacy, if one may judge from the statements of 1 Enoch 89:67, 73 and 93:9 that Enoch was “unable to see” whether the Lord’s sheep entered the temple any more, after the first temple was destroyed; that the sacrifices offered in the second temple were “polluted and not pure”; and that the period after the exile was the apostate seventh week of the world, the “era of wickedness” as it is repeatedly called in the Zadokite Document from Qumran. All the same, 1 Enoch takes a favourable view of Judas Maccabeus (ch. 90, vv. 6–13), the rededicator of the temple, and the breach with the temple was still not complete in the last five years of the second century B.C., when Judas the Essene is recorded to have taught there.[12] Even up to that date those “sons of Zadok” who were afterwards prominent at Qumran may have ministered there. Matters later went further, however, and the Essenes stopped sacrificing in the temple and stopped being admitted to it, though they continued to send votive offerings; after that the male, celibate group among them offered their sacrifices elsewhere, while the marrying Essenes apparently ceased offering sacrifices, until the setting up of the eschatological temple to which they looked forwards.[13]

Since Jubilees is codifying a form of practice which seems actually to have existed in the temple, alongside other forms, until perhaps the end of the second century B.C. the rule that it lays down about admission to the passovcr meal is all the more significant. It is a practical rule, intended for the whole nation, but it is not stated with the emphasis that would be necessary in the case of a radical innovation. It is stated in a positive, not a negative way—that the men of twenty and over shall partake: that the women and children shall not is simply implied. Had this been a controversial issue, it would certainly have been emphasized more, for the author is not shy of controversy. J. B. Segal is therefore probably right in holding that the participation of women and children in the passover meal had by the second century B.C. died out completely, and that the Essenes were not excluding them from a privilege of which, by then, they took any practical advantage.[14] The reasons for actually excluding them may have been that the use of wine at the passover meal had now become customary (Jub 49:6) and that the Essenes considered that the passover should be eaten in the temple court (Jub. 49:16–21), in accordance with 2 Chron 35:13, which would be difficult if there were too great a crowd of worshippers.

If it be asked why the participation of women and children had died out, the likely answer is to be found in the character of post-exilic Judaism. The Jews of that period had learned the lesson of the exile, to shun the heathen idolatries by which they had constantly been beguiled before; and, following in the footsteps of Ezra and Nehemiah, had separated themselves strictly from neighbouring peoples and given themselves up to the serious study and observance of the Mosaic Law. Their great concern was for obedience to God’s commandments. This involved the inquiry, which commandments bound men, which commandments bound women, and at what age did the commandments become binding. It was doubtless noted that, according to the Scriptures, education is possible once infancy is past (Deut 6:7; 11:19; Prov 22:6; 29:17; Isa 28:9), but that the age of maturity is twenty. At that age one reaches one’s full strength and begins one’s working life in earnest (Lev 27:1–7); and one also becomes eligible for military service (Num 1:3, 20, 22, 24 etc.; 26:2; 1 Chron 27:23), accountable for one’s actions (Num 14:29—31; 32:11) and liable to offer the half-shekel (Ex. 30:14; 38:26). It was, of course, noted at the same time that certain laws, including the law of the pilgrim festivals, bound only men. Consequently, those who were not bound by them, women and youths under twenty, ceased altogether to observe them, so that they could concentrate their attention on the laws by which they were bound.

However, neither the Essenes nor the Pharisees were content to leave matters there (though the Sadduccees, with their form of the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture, perhaps were). There is an Essene text from Qumran, and a Pharisaic text in the Mishnah, which show how the biblical regulations about age were elaborated in each school of thought. The former comes in the document which T. H. Gaster calls a “Manual of Discipline for the Future Congregation of Israel,” and runs:

Every person is to be trained from childhood in the Book of Study, to be enlightened (so far as his age permits) in the various provisions of the Covenant and to be schooled in its various injunctions for a period of ten years, after which (i.e. at the age of fifteen?) he is to be liable to the regulations regarding the several degrees of purity. At twenty, he is to undergo an examination preparatory to his admission by vote, as a constituent member of his family, to the council of the holy community. He is not to have carnal knowledge of woman until he is twenty years old and has reached the age of discretion. Furthermore, it is only then that he is to be eligible to give testimony in matters involving the Laws of the Torah or to attend judicial hearings. At twenty-five, he is to take his place in the formal structure of the holy community and be eligible for communal office. At thirty, he may take part in litigation and in rendering judgments and may occupy a position on the staff of the militia—that is, as the captain of a battalion etc.….If public notice is posted for a juridical or consultative assembly, or if notice of war be posted, everyone is to observe a three-day period of personal sanctification, so that anyone who presents himself on any of these occasions may come duly prepared. This refers to men over twenty…[15]

The latter runs:

At five years old one is fit for Scripture, at ten years for the Mishnah, at thirteen for the fulfillig of the commandments, at fifteen for the Talmud, at eighteen for the bridechamber, at twenty for pursuing a calling, at thirty for authority, at forty for discernment, at fifty for counsel, at sixty for to be an elder, at seventy for grey hairs, at eighty for special strength, at ninety for bowed back, and at a hundred a man is as one that has already died and passed away and ceased from the world (Aboth 5:21).

It will be seen that the age of twenty still plays an important part, especially in the former document, where it is the age of discretion, of examination for admission to the council, of marriage, of giving legal testimony, and of military service. (The age for offering sacrifice is not stated, but this also was doubtless twenty, in accordance with the teaching of Jubilees about the passover and the law in Exodus about offering the half-shekel.) In the passage from the Mishnah, twenty is the age for beginning one’s working life, and a little under twenty is the age for marriage. (One may add that in Philo, a writer of generally Pharisaic views, twenty is the age of adulthood and of military service.)[16] In both documents it is recognized that experience, and fitness to bear authority and give advice, come later, which is biblical enough, though they fix specific ages. But what is really striking is that the years below twenty are assigned not only to education but also to the fulfillment of certain, at least, of the commandments. In the Qumran document, the regulations about ceremonial purity, which were so emphasized by the Essenes, become obligatory at about the age of fifteen; while, in the Mishnah, the fulfilling of the commandments in general becomes obligatory at the earliest age which can reasonably be regarded as within the years of discretion, namely thirteen (cf. also Niddah 5:6). Forty is indeed called the age “for discernment,” but this must undoubtedly refer not to the age of discretion but to advancing years, with the superior wisdom which they bring: it is not conceivable that the Mishnah means that men are fit “for authority” ten years before the age of discretion. It is in fact clear from other passages of the Mishnah that the age of discretion is the age at which one ceases to be a minor and becomes subject to the commandments, i.e. thirteen. A minor, below this age, is not considered responsible for transgressing the commandments, any more than a deaf-mute or an imbecile is (Rosh ha-Shanah 3:8; Baba Kamma 4:4; 8:4), the reason being that he lacks understanding (Arakhin 1:1; Tohoroth 3:6; Makshirin 3:8; 6:1).

Even after lowering the age of discretion thus far, the Mishnah does as the Qumran document does and requires the fulfillment of certain commandments before the age of discretion is reached. It is curious how, in both traditions, the fulfillment of certain commandments below the age of discretion is actually forbidden (the passover among the Essenes, and certain different ceremonies in the Mishnah),[17] while the fulfillment of others is required. In the Mishnah, two commandments imposed on minors relate to the pilgrim feasts. One is the commandment requiring Israelites to live in booths at the feast of tabernacles, which is said to apply to all who are weaned (Sukkah 2:8). The second is the actual commandment to go up and appear before the Lord at the three pilgrim festivals, and not to appear before him empty, which is absurdly said to bind every boy who is old enough to walk the short distance from Jerusalem to the temple mount hand in hand with his father, or even old enough to ride that far on his father’s shoulders (Hagigah 1:1). The oddness of this interpretation does not end here, however, for the biblical command (in Exod 23:17; 34:23; Deut 16:16) is interpreted without regard to context, as not involving a requirement to keep the passover, but simply a requirement to appear at some time during the week of unleavened bread, and offer the usual festal sacrifice of a burnt offering and a peace offering (Hagigah, passim). Why the greatest of all the commandments relating to the pilgrim feasts should be excluded in this way one cannot be sure, but it is certainly not because the Pharisees agreed with the Essenes that women and children ought not to partake of the passover, for the Mishnah speaks clearly of women and minors partaking (provided they can eat an olive’s bulk of the flesh) and treats it as normal (Pesahim 8:1, 5, 7; 10:4). The reason may be that the law of the passover carries the severe penalty that those who neglect it will be “cut off” (Num 9:13; cf. Exod 12:15, 19), and that to extend the command to women and children would have been to extend to them the penalty also. In the Babylonian Talmud, the question whether the obligation and penalty extend to women is discussed: there is a difference of opinion about this, but even Rabbi Jose, who holds that they do extend to women, is quite clear that they do not extend to children:

While what does “that man shall bear his sin” (Num 9:13) exclude? It excludes a minor from the penalty of being cut off (Pesahim 91b; cf. also 79b).

The Mishnah is the earliest compilation of the legal traditions of the Pharisees, and is believed to have been written down about 180 A.D., but to reflect, generally speaking, the conditions of the previous century. In many places it professes to describe what was happening before the destruction of the temple in A.D. 70, and this is certainly true of its account of the passover. It draws a clear distinction between the first passover, celebrated in Egypt, the subsequent passovers, celebrated round the sanctuary (when the lamb was still sacrificed there), and the purely domestic passover celebrated since the temple was destroyed (Pesahim 9:5; Yom Tob 2:7). What it aims to depict is undoubtedly the second.[18] There is the more reason for crediting its account because Josephus (who lived in the latter half of the first century, was himself a priest, and was not bigoted in his Pharisaism) states that, though the Sadducees had possession of the high priesthood, the power of the Pharisees with the people was such that the Sadducees had to give way to the Pharisees on controverted issues, so that all worship and sacrifice was carried out in accordance with Pharisaic views.[19] Not only so, but, as we have seen, Josephus also confirms the Mishnah’s account by making it clear that women and children did come up to Jerusalem for the passover in his own day. The most that seems to have occurred between Josephus’ account and the Mishnah’s is that there has been a change of emphasis: the actual meal as described in the Mishnah is wholly domestic (Pesahim 10), and suggests that all men brought their wives and children, while in Josephus “companies” (phatriai) are as much in evidence at the passover as families.[20]

It thus appears that between the end of the second century B.C. and the latter half of the first century A.D. there was a marked change of practice. At the earlier date, the author of Jubilees can state in an uncontroversial way that participation in the passover meal is for men over twenty. Participation by women and children had then, evidently, died out. At the later date, Josephus can state that women and children partake of the passover, as well as men, and regard it as a natural practice which can be projected into an earlier age. Participation by women and children had now, evidently, been revived for quite some time. Those who had revived it were obviously the influential Pharisees, who favoured it, and any controversy that the revival had occasioned probably lay back in the first century B.C., when the movement to revive it began, and had virtually been forgotten. Controversy may never have been intense, since many of the Pharisees only encouraged the participation of others than men, without insisting on it as an obligation, and the Essenes, who disagreed with the participation of others than men, had at an early stage separated themselves from temple worship and ceased to provide practical opposition.

The Pharisees allowed children to partake while still very young, as is clear from the rule in the Mishnah that “if the son has not enough understanding his father instructs him” (i.e. what questions to ask, Pesahim 10:4). But they did not allow infants to partake, as is indicated by the further rule in the Mishnah that no one is to be admitted as a participant who cannot eat an olive’s bulk of the flesh (Pesahim 8:3, 6f). Mr. Keidel, in a slightly confused passage (pp. 314f), quite rightly points out that “an olive’s bulk” refers to the minimum quantity of meat to be apportioned to any participant, not the minimum quantity that a participant must be able to put in his mouth all at once. But that this minimum was still considered to exclude infants is clear from a work only slightly less ancient than the Mishnah itself, the third-century halakic midrash on Exodus, Mekilta. Expounding the phrase “according to the number of the souls” (Exod 12:4), it says:

Perhaps it means to include…the invalid and the little one (katan) who are not able to eat of it even as much as an olive’s bulk? But the phrase “according to the mouth of his eating” eliminates the invalid and the little one. Since they cannot consume of it as much as an olive’s bulk, the passover lamb may not be slaughtered for them (Pisha 3).

This conforms to the rules which the Mishnah gives about the festival pilgrimage and dwelling in booths: as we saw, it imposes these commandments on very young children, but not on infants. Similarly, very young children are encouraged to partake of the passover, but not infants.

One reason why the Pharisees encouraged the participation of children was doubtless to conform to their general policy on the pilgrim festivals, but another reason is evident from the account of the passover meal in the Mishnah. The Pharisees apparently understood Exod 12:26f to imply that the son would ask his question “What mean ye by this service?” at the passover meal (Pesahim 10:4). “Service” (abodah) means the service or worship of God in general terms, and the question may originally have concerned the removal of the leaven from the house “in all thy borders” (like the similar passage Exod 13:8), or the father’s preparations for his journey to the sanctuary, and not the meal itself. But the Pharisees understood it to relate to the meal itself, and made it part of the ritual of the meal.

Two other features of the account in the Mishnah help to confirm this reconstruction of the history. First, it speaks of sweet haroseth being used (a mixture of nuts and fruit, with vinegar added to make it into a sauce) in order to mitigate the flavour of the bitter herbs (Pesahim 10:3f). The likelihood is that this was introduced for the benefit of the children: according to the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds, the children were at another point in the meal given nuts and roasted ears of corn, a form of dessert which is elsewhere linked with dates, thus making a mixture not unlike the constituents of the haroseth (Jer Pesahim 10:1; Bab Pesahim 108b–109a, 119b). But, if so, it is significant that the Mishnah adds that “haroseth is not a religious obligation” (Pesahim 10:3). This probably indicates that haroseth was only a recent addition to the meal, for wine, which had been added to the instituted elements of the meal at an earlier period, was now regarded as a religious obligation (Pesahim 10:1, and compare also the baraitas cited below).[21] But if the haroseth had been recently added, and had been added for the benefit of the children, the implication is that the participation of children had only recently been revived.

The second significant feature of the account in the Mishnah is the absence of any indication that the women and children are to drink the four obligatory cups of wine. This is significant because we know from baraitas in the two Talmuds that the omission is deliberate. These quote Rabbi Judah (the compiler of the Mishnah, c. A.D. 180) as opposing the giving of the passover wine to women and children. They run:

The rabbans taught, “All are bound to drink the four cups, men, women and children.” Rabbi Judah said, “Of what benefit then is wine to children? But we distribute to them roasted ears of corn and nuts….” It was related of Rabbi Akiba (ob. c. 132 A.D.) that he used to distribute roasted ears and nuts to children…. 

The rabbans taught, “A man must make his children and his household rejoice on a festival, for it is said, And thou shalt rejoice in thy feast (thou, and thy son and thy daughter, and thy manservant and thy maidservant, Deut 16:14). Wherewith does he make them rejoice? With wine.” Rabbi Judah said, “Men with what is suitable for them, and women with what is suitable for them” (Bab Pesahim 108b–109a).

In the second baraita there is an inconsistency between Rabbi Judah’s reply and what prompts it. In that context, one would expect him to speak primarily of the children, as in his earlier reply, and not simply to leave their case to inference. Possibly the original form of his reply has become altered, but evidently there was opposition also to the giving of the passover wine to women (probably on grounds of tradition or the low view which the rabbis had of the female character).[22] Rabbi Judah’s opposition to giving the passover wine to women comes out clearly in the Jerusalem Talmud, where the two baraitas appear in combined form, as follows:

It was taught, “On a festival a man must make his wife and children rejoice. Wherewith does he make them rejoice? With wine.” Rabbi Judah said, “Women with what is suitable for them, and minors with what is suitable for them. Women with what is suitable for them, roasted ears and doves (or shoes and bright garments); minors with what is suitable for them, roasted ears and nuts.” They say that Rabbi Tarfon (a contemporary of Rabbi Akiba) acted thus (Jer Pesahim 10:1).

But if, in Rabbi Judah’s time, there was controversy about giving the passover wine to women and children, something must have happened to cause the controversy. The cause was not the introduction of wine, for wine was an old-established part of the meal, recorded in Jubilees 49:6. The recent innovation which caused the controversy must rather have been the revival of participation in the meal by women and children. It seems likely that the first step taken was to get women and children to come to the meal, without requiring that they drink the passover wine, and the second step to insist that they do this as well. The first step was taken in the first century B.C., and the custom of women and children participating grew from then onwards; but as the second step was still a matter of controversy in the time of Rabbi Judah, about 180 A.D., it was probably not taken before the beginning of the second century A.D. By that date the temple had been destroyed, the meal was in the home, women and children were attending it as a matter of course, and the time was ripe to incorporate them fully into the established ritual.

Now, even if the Mishnah slightly overemphasizes the domestic character of the passover meal at the end of the temple period, as we saw is suggested by the evidence of Josephus, there are no grounds for doubting that by A.D. 70 the participation of women and children had become common. By that date the passover had probably become more of a family occasion than it had been at any time since the exile, and possibly at any time since the entry into the promised land. All the same, the participation of women and children is unlikely to have been universal while it remained a pilgrim feast, except among the Jews of the dispersion, who already celebrated the meal domestically (without a sacrificed animal, presumably), except when they were able to visit Jerusalem.[23] Still less must we infer that the participation of women and children was universal in the lifetime of our Lord, from perhaps 4 B.C. to A.D. 31, before Pharisaic teaching had had so long to influence national habits. Finally, we must not infer that, whatever success Pharisaic teaching had achieved in Judea by our Lord’s lifetime, it had also achieved in Galilee. Galilee had its own legal traditions in various matters, few of the prominent Pharisees were Galileans, and they did not find very ready acceptance for their teaching in Galilee.[24] So, although the Pharisees had probably been encouraging the participation of women and children since some time in the first century B.C., it is likely that they had made less progress in achieving this aim by the time of our Lord than by A.D. 70, especially among the Galileans.

How, then, are we to interpret the passover events in the gospels? In Luke 2:41–51 we have the account of a passover which occurred in the first decade of the century, when our Lord was twelve. We read there that Mary regularly went up with Joseph to the passover, so it is clear that Pharisaic teaching was already having an influence on pious women in Galilee. Does this mean that children were being brought to the passover as well? We cannot be sure. The critical Galileans would not have been so easily persuaded that those below the years of discretion ought to fulfill this commandment as that adult women ought, and the Pharisees themselves (to judge by later evidence) put more stress on the participation of women than that of children, since some of them, as we saw, held that women were under a strict obligation to attend the passover, on pain of being “cut off.” It is possible, therefore, that children were still left in the care of elderly relatives at home. On the other hand, Jesus does attend the passover when he is twelve, and this may mean that Pharisaic teaching about children had influenced Galilee at this period to the extent that the lowering of the age for the fulfilling of the commandments to thirteen had been accepted, and that Jesus was taken up to Jerusalem by Mary and Joseph a year in advance, in accordance with the practice of preparing children in that way for the duties which would become obligatory when they were thirteen (Mishnah, Yoma 8:4).

Something over twenty years later, we again find Jesus observing the passover meal, on the occasion of the Last Supper. He is doing so this time not in a family but in a passover company, of thirteen adult men. Being men, they of course partake of the passover wine, as well as of the instituted elements, which women and children (if present) would at this date not have been accustomed to do. Indeed, it is quite uncertain whether Galileans would at this date have brought their children under thirteen to the meal, though they would often have brought their wives, and the absence of Peter’s wife is not significant. Jesus was far from being bound by tradition with regard to women, and certainly did not share the low opinion of their character which was common among the rabbis;[25] so, if these were the reasons for withholding wine from them, it is possible that he himself would have broken with convention and passed the passover cups to women, if present, as his followers were soon to do with the communion cup. But would he have done the same in the case of children? There is not the slightest reason to think so. He loved children, blessed them, and used them as object-lessons for adults, but he gave no indication that he regarded them as having the powers of discretion needed for the prudent use of wine; indeed, he gave an implicit warning to adults of the awful gravity of causing them to stumble (Mark 9:42, cf. v. 36). It may well be that Jesus was not accustomed to the presence of children at the passover meal, and he certainly seems to have given no hint that he intended them to be present either there or at the Christian passover meal which he instituted as a replacement. On the contrary, by making the merely traditional (and therefore dispensable) element of wine, which, quite properly, was not at that time given to children, into one of the instituted (and therefore indispensable) elements of his new ceremony, he gave a very intelligible token that he did not intend children to be present, or, if present, did not intend them to partake. Nothing in the rest of the New Testament conflicts with this conclusion, so the commands to remember Christ’s death, to discern his body, and to examine oneself (Luke 22:19; 1 Cor 11:24–34) should be taken at their face value, as applying to all communicants.

This historical reconstruction has inevitably involved some speculation, because of the incompleteness of the historical evidence. The writer does not claim that it is conclusive. He thinks he may claim, however, that it is the most probable reconstruction that can at present be made, after all the available facts have been taken into account. If so, it means that New Testament thinking on the Lord’s supper, understood against its historical background, is not in favour of giving the sacrament to children, but is against such a practice. Unless and until further evidence is uncovered which completely changes our picture of the historical background, this conclusion will stand, and the reformed churches will be right to adhere to their custom hitherto of not admitting children as communicants until they have reached the age of discretion.

Notes

1. Faith and Order: Louvain 1971 (Geneva, WCC, 1971), p. 49.
2. For references see Joachim Jeremias, Infant Baptism in the First Four Centuries (E.T., London, S.C.M., 1960), p. 73. This work and its sequel The Origins of Infant Baptism (E.T., London, S.C.M., 1963) collect all the evidence for the antiquity of infant baptism.
3. Earlier evidence on Egyptian practice is possibly provided by Clement of Alexandria, who writes, “Those who are full grown are said to drink, babes to suck. ‘For my blood,’ says the Lord, ‘is true drink’“ (Pedagogue 1:6:36, quoting John 6:55). Clement is not speaking of the Lord’s supper, but since he understands the symbolism of John 6 as suitable only to adults, he probably understood the symbolism of the Lord’s supper in the same way. The Pedagogue was written about 190–195 A.D.
4. For further evidence on the age of weaning, see my article “The Age of Admission to Communion” in The Churchman (London) Spring 1971, p. 23f.
5. Educational research is said to show that symbols are not readily grasped until about the age of twelve. If so, this would be an additional reason for thinking that the right age lies above twelve rather than below it. Twelve years of uncomprehending reception of the sacrament seems rather a long time!
6. The Eucharistic Words of Jesus (E.T., London, S.C.M., 1966).
7. Yebamoth 11:2; Ketuboth 4:3; 9:9.
8. This may be why the first-century writer Philo calls pentecost the “most popular” (demotelestatos) feast, and may help to explain why the Therapeutae, and possibly other Jewish groups of generally Essene character, regarded it as the chief of the feasts (see Philo, De Specialibus Legibus 1:183; De Vita Contemplativa 65). Deuteronomy elsewhere requires women and children to be assembled at the sanctuary on the occasion of the feast of tabernacles for the reading of the Law, but only once in seven years (Deut 31:10–13).
9. Whether the tribe of Levi began their duties in the sanctuary from the age of twenty (1 Chron 23:24, 27; 2 Chron 31:17; Ezra 3:8), twenty-five (Num 8:23–26) or thirty (Num 4:3, 23, 30, 35, 39, 43, 47; 1 Chron 23:3) is difficult to discern, but in any case it is a mature age, and in any case the priests seem to be included among them (Num 4:16; 1 Chron 23:13; 2 Chron 31:17).
10. See Josephus, Antiquities 13:5:9, or 13:171, and compare J. T. Milik, Ten Years of Discovery in the Wilderness of Judaea (E.T., London, S.C.M., 1959), ch. 3, “History of the Essenes”.
11. See 1 Enoch 80:2–8, and compare my article “The Modern Attempt to Reconcile the Qumran Calendar with the True Solar Year” (Revue de Qumran, no. 27, Dec. 1970).
12. See Josephus, War 1:3:5, or 1:78; Antiquities 13:11:2, or 13:311.
13. See Josephus, Antiquities 18:1:5, or 18:19, and compare my article “The Qumran Calendar and the Sacrifices of the Essenes” (Revue de Qumran, no. 28, Dec. 1971).
14. The Hebrew Passover from the Earliest Times to A.D. 70 (London, O.U.P., 1963), pp. 254, 257f etc. Segal is probably going too far in claiming that minors were not admitted to the passover until after A.D. 70, but his interpretation of Luke 2:41–51, which we follow below, is very plausible, as is his view that the Samaritan practice of giving the passover to infants and imbeciles is a sectarian peculiarity of dubious antiquity.
15. The Scriptures of the Dead Sea Sect (London, Secker and Warburg, 1957) p. 285f
16. Quaestiones et Solutiones in Genesin 1:91; 4:27.
17. Rosh ha-Shanah 3:8; Menahoth 9:8; Hullin 1:1; Parah 5:4.
18. See Pesahim 5:1–9:11; 10:3; and compare Pesahim 7:1 with Yom Tob 2:7.
19. Antiquities 13:15:5f, or 13:298,296,298; 18:1:3f, or 18:15, 17; Life 38, or 191.
20. War 6:9:3, or 6:423; Antiquities 2:14:6, or 2:312; 3:10:5, or 3:248. The Mishnah does mention companies in connection with the preparations for the passover meal, however, and the reference to the poor in ch. 10, v. 1, could imply something of the kind.
21. Baraitas are quotations from old rabbinical compilations other than the Mishnah. There are many such in the Talmud, and they are recognizable by the set formulas which introduce them.
22. On the rabbinical attitude to women, see Joachim Jeremias, Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus (E.T., London, S.C.M., 1969), ch. 18, “The Social Position of Women.”
23. Certainly this was the case in Alexandria, for Philo says that at the passover there is no need of priests, since the whole nation acts as priest and every house is a temple (De Vita Mosis 2:224f; De Decalogo 159; De Specialibus Legibus 2:145f, 148).
24. See Gustav Dalman, Sacred Sites and Ways (E.T., London, S.P.C.K., 1935), pp. 7-9.
25. Among Jesus’ unconventional acts was to converse publicly with them, allow them to accompany him in his travels, admit them among his students and make them the first witnesses of his resurrection.