NT Text: 1 Corinthians 11:25
OT Source(s):
Source: Beale & Carson (eds.), Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament (2007); Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type: Allusion
Connection Method(s): Promise-Fulfillment + Longitudinal Theme
Anchor Text: Jer 31:31-34 — The New Covenant
Significance: Paul's transmission of the Lord's Supper tradition — "This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me" (1 Cor 11:25) — is the earliest written attestation of the Jeremianic-Eucharistic fusion, set down in the mid-50s AD, within roughly twenty years of the event. The phrase hē kainē diathēkē ("the new covenant") carries the LXX rendering of Jeremiah 31:31 (Jer 38:31 LXX), the only OT text to name a new covenant. Paul stresses that he "received from the Lord" what he passed on (11:23): the Jeremianic interpretation of the cup is dominical, not Pauline invention. The repeated "do this... in remembrance of Me" makes the new covenant a continually re-proclaimed reality in the church's worship until Christ comes (11:26). The verse anchors the church's central rite in Jeremiah's promise of a covenant of internalized law and definitive forgiveness, inaugurated by Christ's blood. Its telos is not mere ceremony but the believer's repeated savoring of the crucified Mediator whose covenant blood makes forgiveness and fellowship with God desirable and sure.