Ephrem Helps Us Understand the 'Docetic' Crucifixion Tradition

I know it is fashionable among scholars to parrot the assumptions of the Church Fathers with respect to the 'insane' suggestion of the Marcionites that Jesus had no physical reality or that he didn't 'really' suffer at the crucifixion. Nevertheless it is amazing to see how similar Ephrem and all those who used the Diatessaron are to the Marcionite conception. As Mathews notes:

In addition to its Old Testament reference, the institution of the Eucharist looks forward to the Crucifixion, and this is already contained in Christ's words, "This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins." (Matt 26:29) But it would be difficult to overemphasize the vividness with which the Fastern Fathers identified the Eucharist with Christ's actual death. To Chrysostom the identification was so real that he could use the Last Supper as a refutation of Marcionite and Manichean denials of Christ's physical suffering.(Chrysostom, "In Matt. Hom. 81 chap. 1 - 2) To Syrian and Armenian commentators, however, Christ is already dead from the moment of instituting the Eucharist. According to Ephraem, "From the moment in which he broke his body for his disciples and gave his body to his apostles, one counts the three days in which he was reckoned to be in the number of the dead, like Adam; for after eating of the tree (Adam) lived many years, but since he had transgressed the command he was counted in the number of the dead ... Since (Christ) gave his body to be eaten in the mystery of his death, he entered into their belly as into the earth."(Ephrem Commentary bk 19 ch 4; Aphrahat expresses the same opinion in Demonstrations 12.6 - 8)

This is a most unusual position in Patristic literature, but Ephraem in no way shrinks from its logical consequence, namely, that Christ has effectively killed himself in the Eucharist. "Even though the people killed him, he killed himself with his own hands. Those insane people on Golgotha crucified a man whose own hands had already killed him. If he had not killed himself in the mystery, they would not have killed in reality. The day before, he killed himself in figure and then the day after, they killed him."(Ephraem, Hymn 48, Hymnes dt Saint Ephrem, PC 3o (1961), 225) [Mathews Armenian Gospel Iconography p. 107]