ABSTRACT
From Eat, Drink, and Be Merry (Luke 12:19) – Food and Wine in Byzantium. Copyright © 2007 by the Society for the Promotion of Byzantine Studies. Published by Ashgate Publishing Ltd,
In John 6.35, Jesus says to the disciples, ‘I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst.’ Metaphors involving food – one has only to think of Christ as bread, the true vine (John 15.1), the living water (John 4.14) and so on – permeate the Gospels, especially that of John. These are in turn based on types in the Old Testament such as the manna which God sent down from heaven (Exodus 16.4, and following), the water which gushed forth from the rock when Moses struck it with his rod (Exodus 17.1-6), and many others. Anyone who had a chance to listen to the enthronement sermon of Rowan Williams, the current archbishop of Canterbury, may have noticed his sustained use of food metaphors, especially the image of God, or Truth, as the bread of life. ‘The one great purpose of the Church’s existence is to share that bread of life,’ stated the archbishop, and ‘the people who are in trouble are those who have seen everything and grasped nothing; who know everything about bread except that you are meant to eat it.’1
