A profound symbol. The cup that Jesus wished could pass from him in the Garden of Olives already hints at the fragrance of the Kingdom beyond its bitterness.
“I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.” (Luke 22:15) Before suffering, Jesus said… Could joy be the primary intention? Did the Son become incarnate not primarily to take on our sins—though he did—but to share in the joy of this Passover with his friends? “For the joy set before him,” says the letter to the Hebrews (12:2), “he endured the cross…”
The Son was thus destined for joy before sin demanded that the Incarnation, the joyful news, also become an act of Redemption, an experience of Passion. “The joy set before him…”: before offering his Son to the world for Redemption, the Father gave the world to his Son so that, by taking on flesh, he could find delight in it.
No longer festive wine, but blood poured out
Indeed, during that Passover he “eagerly desired,” Jesus first drank the initial of three ritual cups of wine, signaling the start of the feast as the gathering sang psalms of praise. He also drank the second cup, which was paired with the eating of the lamb and unleavened bread. He then warned his disciples that this would be the last time he would drink from the fruit of the vine on this earth (Mt 26:29; Mk 14:25; Lk 22:18).
Then came the final cup of wine, traditionally marking the end of the meal. However, Jesus used it to inaugurate a new covenant. He did not drink from it himself but, because his disciples had asked him (Mt 20:22-23; Mk 10:38-39), he shared it with them. It was no longer festive wine but blood poured out. It was the cup that, in the Garden of Olives, Jesus wished could pass from him. His deep aversion to it and the anguish it caused reveal its true content: it is the cup referenced by Isaiah (51:22), Jeremiah (25:15), and John’s Revelation (16:1)—“the bitter cup of divine wrath.”
To love passionately, in the evangelical sense
Does this furious God contradict the joy of offering his Son the chance to take on flesh? Not at all. By making Creation the place where his Son would become incarnate and making the Incarnation a light that enlightens every person entering the world, God could not bear the scandal of innocence corrupted (Mt 18:6). His love is matched by an equally infinite disappointment. The Father’s wrath, which fills this cup, is less a blemish on the canvas and more his inability to join the logic of Evil. His only response was to love so profoundly as to outdo it. That this flesh, made for joy, should also endure the world’s violence, if necessary.
Love is not saccharine sweet. Love is bitter. Love, in the evangelical sense, is passionate. Love is what remains when a child, spouse, or friend is not so easily lovable. Yet this third cup the disciples drank did indeed have, like the wedding wine at Cana, the taste of wine. It already symbolized Christ’s final victory over Evil, the cup held up triumphantly. A cultivation of taste is needed, a kind of divine oenology: behind the bitterness, to sense the sweetness, the fragrance of the Kingdom.
Martin Steffens teaches philosophy at a secondary school in Strasbourg (France) and is a regular contributor to La Croix.
Reproduced with permission by La Croix International.
