Gospel for Sunday, July 28: John 6:1-15
XIV Sunday Year B
1After these events, Jesus passed on to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, that is, Tiberius, 2and a large crowd followed him, because they saw the signs he performed on the sick. 3Jesus went up the mountain and there sat down with his disciples. 4The Passover, the feast of the Jews, was near. 5Then Jesus looked up and saw that a large crowd was coming to him and said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread so that these people may have something to eat?” 6He said this to test him; for he knew what he was about to accomplish. 7Phillip answered him, “Two hundred denarii of bread is not enough even for each one to receive a piece.” 8Then one of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, 9 “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what is this to so many people?” 10Jesus answered, “Let them sit down.” There was much grass in that place. So they sat down, and there were about five thousand men. 11Then Jesus took the loaves and, after giving thanks, gave them to those who were sitting down, and the same he did with the fish, as much as they wanted. 12And when they were full, he said to his disciples, “Gather up the leftover pieces, that nothing may be lost.”13They collected them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves, left over from those who had eaten. 14Then the people, seeing the sign he had performed, said, “This is indeed the prophet, the one who is coming into the world!” 15But Jesus, knowing that they were coming to take him to make him king, withdrew again to the mountain, he alone.
Jn 6:1-15
Care sorelle e fratelli della Misericordie, sono Carlo Miglietta, medico, biblista, laico, marito, padre e nonno (www.buonabibbiaatutti.it). Anche oggi condivido con voi un breve pensiero di meditazione sul Vangelo, con speciale riferimento al tema della misericordia.
Chapter 6 of the Gospel of John
Chapter 6 of John’s Gospel has continuous references to the body and blood of Jesus. To understand it properly, we must immediately answer a central question: does it deal with the need to adhere to Christ by faith or does it tell us about the Eucharist?
John devotes five chapters to Jesus’ last meal with his own, without telling us about the institution of the Eucharist. This silence has given rise to widely differing interpretations: some theologians, such as Bultmann, say that in John there would be a clear anti-sacramental tendency, a reaction against the early Church, which regards sacred rites as means automatic salvation. Already the school of Alexandria, particularly with Origen and Clement, had given from chapter 6 an allegorical interpretation. Others, however, assert that John, writing at the end of the first century, takes the Eucharistic practice in his community for granted, and therefore sees fit to exegete it with the parallel account of the washing of the feet (both consist of a rite, accompanied by words of explanation and the invitation to repeat the rite itself…): this is the position of those, like Cullmann, who see in John a great sacramental interest. The Reformed Churches, with Luther and Calvin, will speak of chapter 6 as relating to the “manducation of the faith,” while Catholics will side with the purely sacramental interpretation.
Interesting is the position of those, such as Brown and Léon-Dufour, who assert that the theme of sacraments is present in the Fourth Gospel, but that the central proclamation remains that of the mystery of the Incarnation: the sacraments are important insofar as they unite us to Christ, the Incarnate Word; John is more concerned with showing us the spiritual fruits of the sacraments than dwelling on the rituals: this position can help us read chapter 6 wisely.
The Multiplication of the Loaves
The chapter begins with the account of the multiplication of the loaves (Jn 6:1-15). The narrative has as its backdrop the book of Exodus, to which it continually alludes: the crossing of the sea, the multitude on the way, the mountain, the bread, implicit quotations from the text (Ex 3; 16; 33…) and the rabbinic tradition about it.
The annotation in verse 4, “The Passover was near” (Jn 6:4), indicates to us that we must read this chapter in an Easter context. In chapter 2, during the First Passover, when Jesus, cleansing the temple, also casts out animals for sacrifice (Jn 2:15), the focus was primarily on Christ as the new sacrificial victim. Here more emphasis is placed on a second sign of the Jewish feast: the “mazzoth,” the unleavened loaves. In Deuteronomy (Deut. 16:3) they are presented as the loaves of affliction, the bread of the oppressed who cannot afford the time of leavening; but in Exodus (Ex. 12:39) they are the bread of liberation, which took place so quickly that there was no time for the slaves to bake themselves a normal loaf. Both of these meanings of unleavened bread are taken up by Jesus.
“Jesus went up the mountain and there he sat down with his disciples” (Jn 6:3); the mountain is the place, in the Old Testament, where God’s Presence dwells: on Sinai he reveals himself (Ex 19:18), on Mount Zion he dwells in the temple (Sl 87; Is 2:2-5; 1 Kings 8:11…). Jesus proclaims that he is the Place where the “Shekinah,” the Glory of God, is now definitely manifested. Before him stand the hungry crowds: not just for bread, but for meaning in life, for healing, for peace, for happiness (Jn. 6:5).
Jesus tests (“test” is a typically exodic theme: Ex 15; 16; 20; 32…) his Church, inviting it to feed these people. And his Church immediately gets into human calculations, thinking how it can solve the problem according to worldly logic (Jn 6:5-7). Jesus completely displaces her, imbibing in his omnipotence the Messianic Passover: he orders the crowd to be made to lie down (Jn 6:10: “anapesèin” is not being seated, but lying down, the attitude, during the meal, of free men), arranges them on a “place with much grass” (Jn 6:10: an oddity in the wilderness, but a clear allusion to the Messianic Kingdom: Sl 72:16; 23:1-2…), setting out the lavish and superabundant banquet of the “Day of JHWH” (Jn 6:11-13: cf. Pr 9:1-5; Is 25:6-12; 55:1-2; Rev 19:9.18), for a total of five thousand men (Jn 6:10: the eschatological Passover is no longer celebrated in the family, as Ex 12:3 required, but in community).
The story reminds us of the miracle of Elisha (2 Kings 4:42-44): there a hundred loaves had been enough for a hundred men, now five loaves are enough for five thousand. Jesus is far greater than Elisha: he is the “prophet who is to come into the world” (Jn. 6:14), the eschatological revelation of God promised to Moses (Deut. 18:15-18). The onlookers, awaiting a strong and powerful Messiah, want to make him king: the episode of idolatry of the Israelites in the wilderness (Ex 32) is repeated, when they try to worship JHWH according to the idea and image they have made of him: the golden calf, a symbol of strength and wealth. The Jews are willing to accept the Christ they expect, the one that suits them: but Jesus will be true King only on the cross. And Jesus’ ascent “up the mountain, all alone” (Jn. 6:15) is prophecy of the ascent of Golgotha alone, forsaken by all (Jn. 16:32).
The Lord makes his own experience his glory, to prepare them to accept also the shocking logic that he will make him broken bread to be eaten, and that he also asks them to become bread for their brothers, becoming their servants (Jn 13). The passage thus has strong references to the Eucharist: John explicitly mentions “giving thanks” (Jn 6:23), that is, “making Eucharist,” and twice mentions the “place” (“There was much grass in that place”: Jn 6:10; “by the place where they had eaten bread”: Jn 6:23), a Jewish synonym for the Presence of God and the Temple.
Buona Misericordia a tutti!
Chi volesse leggere un’esegesi più completa del testo, o qualche approfondimento, me lo chieda a migliettacarlo@gmail.com .