Examines the difficulty represented by the textual tradition in "Codex Bezae" at the point of the Last Supper narrative in "St Luke's Gospel". With a survey of explanations of the difficulty, this title examines the disputed words of Luke 22:19b-20 in regards to their style, grammar and theology, to ascertain their source and non-Lukan features.

This title posits a new explanation of the longstanding textual problem affecting the Words of Institution in St. Luke's Gospel, by arguing that the social situation of the early Christian community explains why such emendations were made.
By examining the manner in which manuscripts function as windows into the social world of early Christianity, Billings provides a fruitful study of the longstanding gap in our knowledge of a significant textual problem represented by the Western Text of Luke.

"Billing's thorough discussion of this classic textual puzzle succeeds in bolstering the case for the longer reading by producing a more credible motivation for creation of the rare Bezan text than has previously been offered."   Alan Garrow JSNTS Booklist, 2007