A feast had protocol. Guests were invited (“bidden”) beforehand; couches were assigned by rank, the worthiest in the middle, which is why “the chief place at feasts” was worth coveting (Matt 23:6) and why Jesus told guests to take the lowest place instead (Luke 14:7–10). The courses ran from an appetizer of salted food, through the dinner itself, to a dessert of fruit and pickled olives, radishes and lettuce; the learned were specially honored, sometimes with a double portion, and an unbidden guest was “proverbially an unwelcome apparition.” Yet hospitality was the prized virtue, a rabbinic saying held it “might make every home a sanctuary and every table an altar.”
Daily life in Bible times
Feasts and banquets
Food and meals
Sources, trace every one
Every cited verse, in full. Tap any reference to open it in the reader.
- Luke 14:7bsb
When Jesus noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, He told them a parable:
On contested questions we show every major view, attributed and cited, and pick no winner. Answers are synthesized from primary sources, truth you can trace, not opinion.