readings? A cursory glance upon the ancient sources allows one to map the development.
2.1 East of Byzantium in the Fifth Century
Reinhard Meßner observes that the East Syrian churches of the Sassanian Empire adopted the Western custom to celebrate a Liturgy of the Word as preceding the celebration of Eucharists in the early fifth century.1 Texts from Eastern synods hint at the fact that Eastern congregations continued to celebrate the Eucharists as (more or less stylized) banquets without preceding Liturgies of the Word. The adoption of the Western custom to add a Liturgy of the Word to every Sunday celebration of the Eucharist and to stop the performance of sympotic Eucharists in houses and apparently also in church buildings led to the dissemination of the Liturgy of the Word East of Byzantium.
Gerard Rouwhorst claims that the practice of reading the Holy Scriptures links Judaism and Christianity, because no other community of the ancient world would perform such services.2 This is indisputably true as long as one understands reading services in terms of highly ritualized performances in Christianity and Judaism as they are attested at the end of late Antiquity. Taken in a broader perspective which comprises also less ritualized activities than Christian and Jewish Liturgies of the Word—activities like study sessions of groups of philosophers—Jewish and Christian liturgies lose this kind of uniqueness. Second century Christian as well as Rabbinic groups were firmly rooted within their cultural environment. Groups like Justin’s (who did not know a Liturgy of the Word in a strict sense) understood themselves as philosophers. They occupied themselves with important texts and composed and extemporized pieces of explanatory rhetoric.
Meßner’s analysis is important for the present purpose, because it shows that the connection of the Eucharist with a Liturgy of the Word was not ubiquitous in the first half of the first millennium C.E. Furthermore, reading of texts from the (canonical) Gospels (and apparently not from the Diatessaron etc.) was regarded as a typical if not indispensable component of Liturgies of the Word.
2.2 The Apostolic Constitutions (Late Fourth Century)
Somewhat further to the West—from Seleucia-Ctesiphon towards Antioch—the second and eighth books of the Apostolic Constitutions contain obvious attestations of a standardized form of the Eucharist preceded by a Liturgy of the Word.1 It mentions the reading of “the Law and the Prophets, our [i.e. the Apostles’] Letters, the Acts and the Gospels”2 by a presbyter or deacon and “Moses, Joshua, Judges, Kings, Chronicles, the Return (from the exile, i.e. Ezra); then the writings of Job and Salomon and the sixteen Prophets” followed by the singing of the “hymns of David”, the Acts of the Apostles, Pauline Letters concluded by the Gospels, whose reading is elevated over the other scriptural texts by different liturgical means;3 “the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel”4, or “Prophets and Gospel”5. Each of the readings is followed by the singing of Psalms. A sermon may be added.6 After the dismissal of the catechumens,7 the assembly prays. The deacons prepare the gifts and men and women exchange the kiss of peace separately. The deacon pronounces intercessions and the bishop blesses the people. The celebration of the Eucharist follows.
These texts assume that the bishop’s church owns a considerable series of books for the performance of the liturgy. They do not address the question how less affluent congregations celebrated Liturgies of the Word. Its representativity is (as often in this genre) debatable. In this system, mostly Old Testament readings precede the reading of the Gospels—the obvious point of culmination of the sequence of proclaimed texts.
2.3 Origen
Harald Buchinger observes that Origen “gives no unambiguous testimony for the connection of the celebration of the Eucharist with a Liturgy of the Word”1. Nevertheless, circumstantial evidence shows that Origen may already have known this connection as well as the performance of one single Eucharistic prayer over bread and wine following—not preceding—a Liturgy of the Word. It may be inferred from Origen’s extant homilies that Gospel pericopes were read on Sundays and could be preceded by readings from other books.2 According to Buchinger, “every further reconstruction remains simply a projection of later conditions”3. Origen’s church most probably performs a common prayer of all faithful and the kiss of peace before the celebration of the Eucharist.4
Apart from all uncertainty, Origen seems to presuppose that Eucharistic celebrations were preceded by Liturgies of the Word. If this custom should go back to a kind of first century Christianity, it becomes inexplicable why congregations in the Christian East could have been living for centuries in ignorance of this custom. If Liturgies of the Word containing the reading of Gospel texts should be an innovation of the early third century, one would need to postulate a powerful hierarchy that could enforce world-wide liturgical reforms. The reconstruction of such an institution would be anachronistic. However, one may imagine a powerful movement in Early Christianity whose adherents would propagate liturgical customs on their own initiative. The opposition against Marcion could have been such a movement uniting diverse writers without orchestration from an established authority.
2.4 Tertullian
At this point, two texts from Tertullian’s oeuvre must be mentioned as it seems that this author is talking about a Liturgy of the Word that precedes the consumption of the Eucharistic meal as the typical form of Christian meeting.1 In De anima 9, Tertullian mentions visions of a prophetess during dominica sollemnia.2 The prophetess derives subjects for her prophecy from the readings of scripturae (leguntur), the singing of psalms, or the performance of sermons. The reading of a Gospel text and the Eucharist are not mentioned.3 The list contains activities at a Christian—in this case, a Montanist—meeting. Even if the list does not testify to a complete repertoire of ritual elements of Christian gatherings, a Gospel reading within a Liturgy of the Word and preceding the Eucharist is nothing but mere conjecture.
Similar observations can be collected from Tertullian’s (pre-Montanistic) Apologeticum 39, a chapter that contains a bright description of the Christian Eucharistic meeting against the background of the dark depiction of other groups’ disgusting behavior at meals. Tertullian mentions prayer, the exposition of scriptural texts, and sermons that lead up to ethical topics. This chapter does not describe the reading of scriptures.4 Tertullian does not, likewise, mention that Gospels are read as part of Eucharistic or non-Eucharistic meetings. He does not, moreover, refer to a ritual link between the meal and a kind of meeting that may be devoted to learning and study. The sequence of liturgical actions does not, furthermore, reflect the structure of any single liturgical performance. The chapter discusses diverse topics in a polemical way.5 While theological topics would of course be discussed as parts of the table-talk in Tertullian’s congregations, the ritualized performance of scripture readings was not an integral part of Eucharistic celebrations.
With these observations, the search for Liturgies of the Word comes to an end. Christians of Tertullian’s time are interested in the Holy Scriptures including the Gospels.6 Nevertheless, they do not perform Liturgies of the Word connected with the celebration of their Eucharists. Liturgies of the Word apparently emerged only after the demise of sympotic Eucharists—a process that had only begun in Tertullian’s church.7 Testimonies for early readings of the Gospels locate those readings in Liturgies of the Word. Liturgies of the Word emerge in the third century. This observation does not, of course, silence the question whether there could have been other forms of ritualized Gospel readings.
3 Liturgical Functions of the Gospels in the Gospels and in
1 Corinthians?
Going back in the history of Christian liturgies, the typical and technical Liturgy of the Word that contained a reading of the Gospels makes its appearance in the middle of the third century. Christian groups were used to engaging in the reading and exegesis of the Bible before that time. One may thus ask whether or not this activity was an integral component of Christian meals before the sources mention the Gospels as part of Liturgies of the Word. Thus, two passages of the Gospel of Luke and the last chapters of the First Letter to the Corinthians may point to more ancient liturgical needs for