222 ÉTIENNE NODET significant number of historical and ritual issues stand against such a device? The question will be considered under two titles: Paul’s author- ity and the pattern of Joshua’s Passover on entering Canaan. 1. Paul’s Authority and the First Paschal Controversy When he criticizes some disorder in the community meals, Paul accepts that the Eucharistic rite is performed in the context of a meal. Then he recalls the tradition he has received “from the Lord ” (1 Cor 11,23-25). The rite proclaims Jesus’ death, it was es- tablished on the night when he was handed over and it takes place during a meal. The style is so concise that its details may allow for some flexibility of interpretation: “handed over” may be close to “ judged and put to death”. Moreover, Christ is “our Passover” (1 Cor 5,7). In this shortened form, a frame emerges: the rite, within a meal, announces the imminent death of Christ, “our Pas- sover ”. With a play on the two meanings of “Passover” (lamb, feast), the result is a kind of Christianized Passover, beginning with the rite after sunset and culminating with the crucifixion and burial before the next sunset. This matches Justin’s testimony except for the meal, since in his time the rite had been separated from the agape meal. This, too, is the outline of the Passion narratives in the Synoptics, to which traditional materials have been added with minor changes. However, we should not be content with such a logical puzzle. It is necessary to look for customs or rites which could have guided such a composition. In this respect, Eusebius reports (HE 5.23-24) a memorable controversy about the Paschal fast, around 191 CE : the Quartodecimans of the Churches of Minor Asia cele- brated the Passover of the Lord on 14th Nisan, the day when the lamb was slaughtered; so they stopped fasting on that day. But in all other churches, the fast continued until the day of the resurrec- tion, the Sunday. The Quartodeciman camp, led by Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus, defended this tradition as apostolic, on the au- thority of John and Philip, as well as that of Polycarp of Smyrna. The spokesman for the opposite camp, which was in the majority, was Victor, bishop of Rome, but he had no argument to offer except his own authority. He probably would have excommuni-