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Hi,

I am wondering if anyone can help me with this verse? I don't need them both translated or anything like that. What I am trying to establish is the Real Presence in the communion theology. I have been told that the Greek word that was used for remembrance actually meant to re-live.



I Cor 11: 23-27

For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, "This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord.

Paul uses twice the word "anamnesis" A)NA/MNHSIS [size=150]ἀνάμνησις[/size]. It means (see LSJ) "calling to mind, reminiscence", sometimes "memorial sacrifice" (Septuagint, Numbers, 10.10 and Luke, 22, 19). I don't see any meaning of "re-live".

I've heard somewhere that the greeks had to different words for the notion of remembrance. One meant simply to think of something or someone (je me souviens de toi) who played a role in the past and the other meant to try to retrieve something lost in one's memory but actually present. anamnesis seems to refer precisely to that notion: Jesus is there already but we have to "remember" him. The ceremonies of November 11 refer to the other kind of remembrance: it is a commemoration of someone who is no longer there.