Daily Bible Readings Wednesday March 19, 2008 Holy Week

March 19 2008 Wednesday Holy Week

About the sources used. The readings on this site are not official for the Mass of Roman Rite of the Catholic Church in the USA, but are from sources free from copyright. They are here to present the comparable readings alongside traditional Catholic commentary as published in the Haydock Bible for your own personal study. Readings vary depending on your local calendar.

Official Readings of the Liturgy at – http://www.usccb.org/nab/readings/031908.shtml – Note. The Official Liturgical readings may not match the current NAB you may have.

All DR Challoner Text. Commentary From the Haydock Commentary Website with permission.

Isaiah 50:4-9a

4 The Lord hath given me a learned tongue, that I should know how to uphold by word him that is weary: he wakeneth in the morning, in the morning he wakeneth my ear, that I may hear him as a master.
5 The Lord God hath opened my ear, and I do not resist: I have not gone back.
6 I have given my body to the strikers, and my cheeks to them that plucked them: I have not turned away my face from them that rebuked me, and spit upon me.
7 The Lord God is my helper, therefore am I not confounded: therefore have I set my face as a most hard rock, and I know that I shall not be confounded.
8 He is near that justifieth me, who will contend with me? let us stand together, who is my adversary? let him come near to me.
9 Behold the Lord God is my helper: who is he that shall condemn me?

Responsorial Psalm 68LXX or 69Hebrew

Because for thy sake I have borne reproach;
shame hath covered my face.
I am become a stranger to my brethren,
and an alien to the sons of my mother.
For the zeal of thy house hath eaten me up:
and the reproaches of them that reproached thee are fallen upon me.
In thy sight are all they that afflict me;
my heart hath expected reproach and misery.
And I looked for one that would grieve together with me,
but there was none:
and for one that would comfort me,
and I found none.
And they gave me gall for my food,
and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
I will praise the name of God with a canticle:
and I will magnify him with praise.
Let the poor see and rejoice:
seek ye God, and your soul shall live.
For the Lord hath heard the poor:
and hath not despised his prisoners.

The Gospel According to Saint Matthew 26:14-25

Then went one of the twelve, who was called Judas Iscariot, to the chief priests. And said to them:

What will you give me, and I will deliver him unto you?

But they appointed him thirty pieces of silver. And from thenceforth he sought opportunity to betray him. And on the first day of the Azymes, the disciples came to Jesus, saying:

Where wilt thou that we prepare for thee to eat the pasch?

But Jesus said:

Go ye into the city to a certain man and say to him: The master saith, My time is near at hand. With thee I make the pasch with my disciples.

And the disciples did as Jesus appointed to them: and they prepared the pasch. But when it was evening, he sat down with his twelve disciples. And whilst they were eating, he said:

Amen I say to you that one of you is about to betray me.

And they being very much troubled began every one to say:

Is it I, Lord?

But he answering said:

He that dippeth his hand with me in the dish, he shall betray me. The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is written of him. But woe to that man by whom the Son of man shall be betrayed. It were better for him, if that man had not been born.

And Judas that betrayed him answering, said:

Is it I, Rabbi?

He saith to him:

Thou hast said it.

Haydock Commentary Isaiah 5-:4-9

• Ver. 4. Weary. Isaias speaks in the name of Christ, whose words carried conviction and comfort along with them, John vi. 69., and vii. 46. (Calmet) — Wakeneth. Literally, “lifteth up.” Cynthius aurem—Vellit. (Ec. vi.) — Hear, or obey. (Haydock) — Christ preached more powerfully than Isaias, and continues to do so by his pastors. (St. Jerome) (Worthington)
• Ver. 6. Spit. The greatest indignity, Job xxx. 10., and Deuteronomy xxv. 9. Yet this was the treatment of our Saviour, Luke xviii. 31., and Matthew xxvi. 67. (Calmet) — “The great Grotius, (I wish he were great in explaining the prophets)” applies this to Jeremias. (Houbigant)
• Ver. 7. Rock. Christ heard the accusations of his enemies unmoved, as the had not been afraid to blame the conduct of the Pharisees.

Isaiah Commentary Matthew 26:14-25

• Ver. 14. The chief priests were then assembled; Judas, the disciple, who chiefly regretted the expense of the perfumes that had been used on his Lord and Master, at the feast of Bethania, and wished for an opportunity to make good the loss, when to the chief priests, saying:
• Ver. 15. What will you give me? The impious wretch did not betray his divine Master our of fear, but out of avarice. Of all passions the love of sordid lucre is the most vile; and the avaricious soul does not fear to plunge herself into the bottom of hell, for a trifling gain. There is no vestige of honour or justice, or probity, remaining in the heart of that man who is possessed with the love of base lucre; whose god is his money. The perfidious Judas, inebriated with this passion, while he thirsts after gain, sells with the most foolish impiety his Lord and his Master. (St. Leo the great) — He sells him for the paltry consideration of thirty pieces of silver, about £3 15. the price of a common slave. See Exodus xxi. 32. It is probable that even the obdurate heart of Judas would not have betrayed his Master to the Jews, had he not expected that Jesus would escape from their hands on this occasion, as he had done at Nazareth, and in the temple.
• The Pascal Supper.
• Ver. 17. The first day of the azymes; unleavened bread. St. Mark (xiv. 12.) adds, when they sacrificed the Pasch: and St. Luke (xxii. 7.) says, And the day of the unleavened bread came; on which it was necessary that the Pasch (i.e. the Paschal lamb) should be killed. From hence it follows, that Christ sent his apostles that very day (the 14th day of the month of Nisan) on which, in the evening, or at night, the Pasch was to be eaten; and which was to be with unleavened bread. It is true, the 15th day of that month is called (Exodus xii. 1.) the first day of unleavened bread: but we must take notice, that the Jews began their feasts, or festivals, from sunset of the evening before; and consequently on the evening of the 14th day of the moon: at which time there was to be no leavened bread in any of their houses. This shews that Christ eat the Pasch, or Paschal lamb, after sunset. And when the Paschal supper was over, he consecrated the blessed Eucharist, in unleavened bread, as the Latin Church doth. There are two or three difficulties relating to this matter in St. John, of which in their proper places. (Witham) — There were four passovers during Christ’s public ministry. The 1st was after the marriage feast of Cana, in the 31st year of Jesus, and the 779th from the foundation of Rome. to derive pascha from the Greek, paschein, to suffer, is a mistake, as St. Augustine observes; tract. lv. in Joah. It is certainly taken from the Hebrew, and signifies a passing by, or passing over: 1st, because the children of Israel passed in haste on that night out of the land of Egypt; 2d, because the angel, who on that night killed all the first-born of the Egyptians, seeing the doors of the Israelites stained with the blood of the paschal lamb, passed by all theirs untouched; 3d, because that was a figure of our Saviour passing out of this life to his eternal Father. Yet it must be observed that this same word, pascha, or passover, is used sometimes for the paschal lamb, that was sacrificed; (Luke xxii. 7.) elsewhere, for the first day of the paschal feast and solemnity, which lasted seven days; (Matthew xvi. 2; Ezechiel xlv. 21.) for the sabbath-day, which occurred within the seven days of the solemnity; (John xix. 14.) and also for all the sacrifices made during the seven days’ fest. The Passover was the most solemn of the old law. When God ordered the Israelites to sprinkle the blood of the lamb upon their door-posts, it was solely with a view of signifying, that the blood of the true Lamb was to be the distinctive mark of as many as should be saved. Every thing was mysteriously and prophetical. A bone of the lamb was not to be broken; and they broke not the arms or legs of Jesus Christ, on the cross. The lamb was to be free from blemish; to express the perfect sanctity of Jesus Christ, the immaculate Lamb of God. The paschal lamb was to be sacrificed and eaten; because Christ was to suffer and die for us: and unless we eat his flesh, we shall have no life in us. The door-posts of the Israelites were to be sprinkled with blood, that the destroying angel might pass over them; for with the blood of Christ our souls are to be purified, that sin and death may not prevail against us. In every house was eaten a whole lamb; and Christ, at communion, is received whole and entire by every faithful soul. — The manner in which it was to be eaten, shews the proper dispositions for Christians when they receive the blessed sacrament. The roasting by fire, expresses divine charity; the unleavened bread, sincerity, truth, and a good conscience; the bitter herbs, repentance and contrition for sin; the girded loins and shod feet, the restraint upon our passions and lusts, and a readiness to follow the rules of the gospel; the staff, our mortal pilgrimage, and that having no lasting dwelling here, we should make the best of our way to our true country, the heavenly Chanaan. — On this day the passover was to be eaten, at least by a part of the people, according to St. Matthew, St. Mark, and St. Luke; i.e. according to some, by the Galileans; for, according to St. John, it appears that the priests, and the Jews properly so called, such as dwelt in Judea, did not immolate it till the next day. (John xiii. 1, xviii. 28, and xix. 14.) (Bible de Vence) — but we have here again to remark, that the Jews began their day from sunset of the previous day.
• Ver. 18. To a certain man, whom Sts. Mark and Luke call, the good man of the house, or master of the house. When St. Matthew therefore says, a certain man, he seems to do it for brevity’s sake; as not one ever speaks to his servants thus, go to a certain man. The evangelist, therefore, after giving our Saviour’s words, go ye into a certain city, he adds as from himself, to a certain man, to inform us that there was a particular man to whom Jesus sent his disciples. (St. Augustine) — In Greek, ton deina; in Hebrew, Pelona; words that express a person whose name is either not known, or is wished to be kept secret. (Jansenius)
• Ver. 19. And they prepared what was necessary, a lamb, wild lettuce, and unleavened bread. (Bible de Vence)
• Ver. 20. When it was evening.[2] St. Luke says, when the hour was come, which was at the latter evening, after sunset. The time of killing and sacrificing the lamb was, according to the 12th of Exodus, to be between the two evenings; (see Mark xiv. 15.) so that we may reasonably suppose, that Christ sent some of his apostles on Thursday, in the afternoon, to perform what was to be done, as to the killing and sacrificing of the lamb, and then to bring it away: and he eat it with his disciples after sunset. — He sat down, &c. Literally, laid down, in a leaning or lying position. Some pretend, from this circumstance, that he eat not the paschal lamb that year, because it was to be eaten, standing, according to the law. But they might stand at the paschal lamb, and eat the rest of the supper on couches; as it was then the custom. (Witham) — We must not hence suppose that he transgressed the law. He first eat the Pasch according to the Mosaic rite, standing, and then sat down to supper. (St. Chrysostom, hom. lxxxii.)
• Ver. 22. And they being very much troubled. There were three motives for this great sorrow in the disciples: 1st, because they saw their innocent and dear Master was soon to be taken from them, and delivered up to a most cruel and ignominious death; 2d, because each of them was afraid lest, through human frailty, he might fall into so great a crime; for they all were convinced, that what he said must necessarily come to pass: and lastly, that there could be found one among them so wretchedly perverse, as to deliver Jesus into the hands of his enemies. Hence afraid of themselves, and not daring to affix a suspicion on any individual, they began every one to say: Is it I, Lord, on whom so atrocious a crime is to fall? … It is extremely probable that Christ made this prediction three times: 1st, at the commencement of supper; (Matthew xxvi. 21.) 2d, after washing the feet; (John xiii. 18.) 3d, after the institution of the blessed Eucharist. (Luke xxii. 21.) Thus Pope Benedict XIV. Sandinus, &c.
• Ver. 23. He that dippeth. He that is associated to me, that eateth bread with me, shall life up his heel against me, according to the prophecy of the psalmist, cited by St. John, xiii. 18. — Jesus Christ doe not here manifest the traitor; he only aggravates the enormity and malice of the crime.
• Ver. 25. Is it I, Rabbi? After the other disciples had put their questions, and after our Saviour had finished speaking, Judas at length ventures to inquire if himself. With his usual hypocrisy, he wishes to cloke his wicked designs by asking a similar question with the rest. (Origen) — It is remarkable that Judas did not ask, is it I, Lord? but, is it I, Rabbi? to which our Saviour replied, thou hast said it: which answer might have been spoken in so low a tone of voice, as not perfectly to be heard by all the company. (Rabanus) — Hence it was that Peter beckoned to St. John, to learn more positively the person. Here St. Chrysostom justly remarks the patience and reserve of our Lord, who by his great meekness and self-possession, under the extremes of ingratitude, injustice, and blasphemy, shews how we ought to bear with the malice of others, and forget all personal injuries.