From the Rising of the Sun: Malachi's Prophecy of the Mass

Here's a remarkable verse from Malachi:

Because even among you the doors shall be shut, and one will not kindle the fire of mine altar for nothing, I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord Almighty, and I will not accept a sacrifice at your hands.
For from the rising of the sun even to the going down thereof my name has been glorified among the Gentiles; and in every place incense is offered to my name, and a pure offering: for my name is great among the Gentiles, saith the Lord Almighty.

--Mal 1:10-11

From the earliest times Christians saw this verse in Malachi as a prophecy regarding the Mass. St. Justin Martyr, in his Dialogue With Trypho (AD 155) quotes the passage and then explains: "It is of the sacrifices offered to Him in every place by us, the gentiles, that is, of the Bread of the Eucharist and likewise of the cup of the Eucharist, that He speaks at that time."

And really, can it be anything else? What other Sacrifice is offered, not by the Jews, but by the Gentiles (us) with incense? What other pure offering is offered from the rising of the sun to its setting in every place? The only offering that fulfills this prophecy is the Mass: the pure offering of Jesus in the Eucharist, offered around the world, every hour of every day.

Now, that's interesting, but what's even more interesting is the actual word used for "offering" is the Hebrew word minchâh. According to Strong's Hebrew Dictionary, the word means "a sacrificial offering (usually bloodless and voluntary): - gift, oblation, (meat) offering, present, sacrifice."

This is interesting because non-Catholics who look at this passage tend to interpret "offering" or "sacrifice" as a "sacrifice of Praise." Or possibly prayers and praises--in short, worship. However, that explanation simply doesn't account for the word, minchâh, used in the text.

In searching the Old Testament for other uses of minchâh, we find that most of those instances are translated as a "meat offering" (and none refer to a mere symbolic "sacrifice of praise").

What's more interesting is that a "meat offering" isn't what we might typically think. In fact, instead of including flesh of any kind, a meat offering was an unbloody offering of fine flour, unleavened and baked in an oven. Leviticus 2:4 explains this clearly and is really quite startling: "But when thou offerest a sacrifice baked in the oven of flour, to wit, loaves without leaven, tempered with oil, and unleavened wafers, anointed with oil". (see also Lev. 2:11).

But that's not all. According to Smith's Bible Dictionary a meat offering was just as we described above, but was also "generally accompanied by a drink offering of wine."

So, let's go back to the passage from Malachi (and the prophecy given to him by God) and ask ourselves: What pure, unbloody sacrifice of flour, unleavened and baked, in the form of wafers is offered to God by the Gentiles from the rising of the sun to its setting, in every place in this world and is accompanied by a drink offering of wine?

It can't be a "sacrifice of praise" or some other anachronistic concoction because the prophecy specifically refers to a "meat offering". The only sacrifice that completely fulfills this Holy Spirit-inspired prophecy is the sacrifice of the Mass.