Thursday of Week 3 of Eastertide - John 6: 44-51

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John 6: 44-51 - 'I am the living bread which has come down from Heaven.'

Catechism of the Catholic Church Paragraphs:

- 259 (in 'The Divine Works and the Trinitarian Missions') - Being a work at once common and personal, the whole divine economy makes known both what is proper to the divine persons, and their one divine nature. Hence the whole Christian life is a communion with each of the divine persons, without in any way separating them. Everyone who glorifies the Father does so through the Son in the Holy Spirit; everyone who follows Christ does so because the Father draws him and the Spirit moves him.

- 1001 (in 'How do the dead rise?') - When? Definitively "at the last day," "at the end of the world." Indeed, the resurrection of the dead is closely associated with Christ's Parousia: For the Lord himself will descend from heaven, with a cry of command, with the archangel's call, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. and the dead in Christ will rise first.

- 151 (in 'To Believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God') - For a Christian, believing in God cannot be separated from believing in the One he sent, his "beloved Son", in whom the Father is "well pleased"; God tells us to listen to him. The Lord himself said to his disciples: "Believe in God, believe also in me." We can believe in Jesus Christ because he is himself God, the Word made flesh: "No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known." Because he "has seen the Father", Jesus Christ is the only one who knows him and can reveal him.

- 728 (in 'Christ Jesus') - Jesus does not reveal the Holy Spirit fully, until he himself has been glorified through his Death and Resurrection. Nevertheless, little by little he alludes to him even in his teaching of the multitudes, as when he reveals that his own flesh will be food for the life of the world (abbreviated).

- 1355 (in 'The Movement of the Eucharistic Celebration') - In the communion, preceded by the Lord's prayer and the breaking of the bread, the faithful receive "the bread of heaven" and "the cup of salvation," the body and blood of Christ who offered himself "for the life of the world." Because this bread and wine have been made Eucharist ("eucharisted," according to an ancient expression), "we call this food Eucharist, and no one may take part in it unless he believes that what we teach is true, has received baptism for the forgiveness of sins and new birth, and lives in keeping with what Christ taught."

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Hi everyone, welcome back to theDaily gospel exegesis.

(00:15):
Where we take a look, at the literal sense of the gospel for
the day. The gospel that's in the
lectionary for the Catholic mass.
And in the last few days. We have been looking at John
chapter 6 every day. That would that has In the
masses Gospel reading and we arecontinuing today.
John chapter 6 verses 44 251 So here's the reading and then

(00:38):
we'll do an exegesis on what theliteral sense is.
Telling us. Jesus said to the crowd.
No one can come to me, unless heis drawn by the father who sent
me and I will raise him up at the last day.
It is written in the prophets. They will all be taught by God

(01:00):
and to hear the teaching of the father and learn from it.
Is to come to me. Not that everybody not that.
Anybody has seen the father except the one who comes from
God. He has seen the father.
I tell you most solemnly, everybody who believes has
eternal life. I am the bread of life, your

(01:22):
fathers, ate the Manna in the desert and they are dead.
But this is the bread that comesdown from heaven.
So that a man may eat it and notdie.
I am the living bread which is come down from heaven.
Anyone who eats this bread will live forever.
And the bread that I shall give is my flesh for the life of the

(01:45):
world. So what's the context here?
So, Jesus has begun the Eucharistic discourse or the
bread of life discourse that started earlier in John chapter
6. And we learned later on the text
hasn't told us this yet, but it will at the end of the servant
it tells us the location of thisentire sermon is actually in the

(02:08):
synagogue at Capernaum. So Jesus is in the synagogue and
he's teaching the crowds. In the last few verses he's been
inviting people to have faith that he really is, the Son of
God, or the true bread from heaven, and then in verses, 42
and 43. Just before this, the crowd is
pretty indignant and they say, how can this man be from heaven?

(02:30):
And that's what is the context. And now, Jesus launches into
this in verse 44. No one can come to me, unless he
is drawn by the father who sent me.
So there seems to be a response to their question about How can
this man be from heaven? And so the answer appears to be?
Well, you're not going to believe that unless the father

(02:51):
gives you a revelation or leads you to believe that.
And this is amplifying, a point here made a few verses earlier
about his will and the father's will be United.
So, the main point Jesus is making here, is that to believe
Jesus is the son of God. It's not automatic.
And in fact, it's probably not easy.
So the father must already be working in the person's heart to

(03:14):
help a person. Person realize that he is the
son of God. So in answer to their question,
how can this man? Say, he's the son of God?
That he's from Heaven. Jesus answer is well.
Only the father can reveal that to you.
That's his basic answer and he finishes that thought by saying
I will raise him up at the last day and he'd actually said this,

(03:35):
a few verses earlier. That's the mission.
The father has given the son. He's given the Sun.
The job of raising humans up bodily on the last day so that
they can live with him in heavenbodily.
That's the mission. The overall goal.
Verse 45. It is written in the prophets.

(03:56):
They will all be taught by God. So, this is Jesus quoting the
Old Testament. Now, it's not a direct quote.
It's a paraphrase of Isaiah 54, verse 13.
And if you read that in context,that's a prophecy that God gives
about the end times. Jesus God basically says, one
day, you will all be taught by Me by god.

(04:19):
Notice that Jesus, though says prophets, it is written in the
prophets plural. So he's probably thinking of
this General line of thinking that all the prophets teach or
at least a few of the prophets teach.
For example, in Jeremiah 31. There's the same idea that one
day in the end times, all peoplewill be taught by God.
So Jesus quotes this. And then he says and to hear the

(04:40):
teaching of the father and to learn from it, is to come to me.
And that will be quite shocking to the crowd because Jesus
quotes the Old Testament passage.
No one. Sorry it is written in the
prophets. They will all be taught by God.
So, he quotes that. And then he says, it's fulfilled
in me in Jesus. So the Jews who read the Old

(05:02):
Testament, they did believe thatthese passages will be fulfilled
one day in the end times, but they imagined that what the
passage was teaching was that God would speak directly to them
in the end times. Well, here comes Jesus and he
says that's exactly what God is doing.
The sun has received his messagedirectly from the father and now

(05:22):
he's communicating it directly to the people.
This is a fulfillment of that. Passage.
The end times are here. God is speaking directly to his
People through Jesus. So in other words, it's the
father's will that the people listened to the sun, learn from
his message and come to him for salvation?
That's Jesus. Main point verse 46.

(05:44):
Jesus says not that anybody has seen the father.
So Jesus here is probably correcting their idea that they
had that God himself as father would teach them directly.
He's saying not that anybody hasseen the father but then he adds
this qualifier except the one who comes from God.
He has seen the father. So who is the one that comes

(06:06):
from God? It's the Sun.
So, Jesus point is since the only person who has seen God
directly is the sun. No one else has then people
should listen to the sun if theywant to know the words of God.
So it's an interesting. Well, it's a very clever way of
going about it. Jesus constantly starts with

(06:26):
things that the people agree with.
He starts with presuppositions that they accept, and then he
gets them to think a bit deeper about it.
And what that means in the context of him, being the son of
God. Verse 47.
I tell you most solemnly. So that means is about to say
something fairly important, everybody who believes.

(06:47):
So believes, what anyone who believes?
What Jesus has just been talkingabout.
So anyone who believes that Jesus really is the Son of God,
and they choose to listen to him, has eternal life.
Now notice that's a present tense.
Jesus says that, anyone who believes already has eternal
life. They already have fellowship

(07:08):
with God. So that's verse 47 and that's
the end of that particular thought.
We now get to Voice verse 48 andverse 48 to 58 is what a lot of
Scholars would say, is the second half of the bread of life
discourse. So, if the first half was an
invitation to Faith, we're now starting the second half which

(07:30):
is an invitation to the Eucharist.
So at this point on verse 48 on words, Jesus starts to get
explicitly Eucharistic and he starts to talk more about flesh.
And bread. So up until now, he's been
asking the crowd to believe in his identity as the one who sent
from the Father, the one who's from heaven.
Now, he's going to take it a step further, and he's going to

(07:51):
invite the crowd, to go deeper, and to actually eat his flesh
and drink his blood. That's the language that Jesus
eventually ends up using. So the general flow of the
sermon is the Jesus starts by getting them to believe in him
or to believe that he's the son of God, but then the believing
leads to eating That's what we're about to see.
Believing leads to doing something verse 48.

(08:15):
I am the bread of life. So he's already said this once
in verse 35, and he's just restating it, your fathers, ate,
the Manna in the desert, but they are dead.
So, Jesus brings up the Manna inthe wilderness.
Again, this is something that I brought up earlier, which you
would have heard in the last couple of days on the podcast.
So he brings up the manner again.

(08:36):
Why? Because he knows that the crowd
has a really places a really bigimportance on this event where
God provides a Manna in the wilderness.
So Jesus keeps referring them back to that, and he wants them
to think a bit deeper about thatevent.
So, Jesus is saying, the Manna in the wilderness was bread from
Heaven. However, he Some to realize

(08:56):
that, even those who ate, the Manna in the wilderness in the
book of Exodus, they died, even though they ate this bread from
heaven. So Jesus wants to point them to
a greater version of this bread.From Heaven one that will
sustain people eternally and will not lead people to die,
eventually verse 50. This is the bread that comes

(09:18):
down from heaven. So that a man may eat it and not
die. I am the living bread, which is
come down from heaven. One who eats this bread will
live forever. So Jesus says that to eat the
Son of God as the one who comes down from heaven will give one
eternal life, unlike the manner,which could not give eternal

(09:39):
life. The new bread from Heaven is
here one greater than the Manna in the desert.
But Jesus hasn't answered the question yet.
Of what does it mean to eat the bread?
He hasn't said that yet. All he said, is that I am the
one who's come down from heaven.I am the true bread.
If you eat me, you will have eternal life, but he hasn't

(10:00):
actually said what to eat. Him means just yet.
So what does it mean to eat the son of man, or to East Jesus?
Well, on one level? It could refer to taking Jesus
as spiritual nourishment, as in,you need to absorb his
teachings. You need to meditate on him.
You need to follow him. So that's certainly Possible.
And that's probably true. However, Jesus is going to

(10:23):
amplify this in a much more physical literal way in the
coming verses and in the coming days will see that and certainly
that's the stumbling block for the crowd.
If you just meant, you need to absorb me spiritually.
They wouldn't have had a problemwith it.
But you'll see the language thatthe crowd uses.
They really are quite skeptical that he can literally give them

(10:44):
his flesh. But that seems to be what he's
getting at. So, this is what he says next,
whoever eats this bread will live forever.
And now that's probably an illusion to the Tree of Life In
the Garden of Eden. Remember in the Garden of Eden.
There's this tree of life and ifthey eat the fruit of it, they
can live forever, but then when they sin when Adam and Eve
sinned, their cast out and they can no longer access that tree,

(11:09):
So, in a sense, Jesus is fulfilling the original Tree of
Life. He's opening the way to
immortality, which was lost whenJesus was cast out from the tree
and that is essentially part of Catholic belief.
The Eucharist is in a sense, thefruit of the tree of life.
It doesn't give us physical immortality, but it does give us

(11:29):
a spiritual immortality. So that probably is at the back
of Jesus mind here when he's speaking verse 51.
And this is the last verse for today.
The bread that I shall give is my flesh for the life of the
world. So, Jesus now gets more
specific. Up till now you could have
thought the bread from Heaven isjust Jesus in general.

(11:51):
But now Jesus says the bread that I shall give is my flesh.
So the bread that comes down from heaven is Jesus flesh.
So let's think about what Jesus has said so far.
He said that to achieve eternal life.
One must eat his flesh. That's the teaching so far.
And then he adds this bit, the flesh that I shall give for the

(12:14):
life of the world. When did Jesus give his flesh
for the life of the world? Well, there's probably different
interpretations. Probably in his Incarnation.
He's giving his flesh for the life of the world.
Certainly. The main event would be his
sacrifice on the cross. That's Out of love.
He gives he gives up his own flesh for the life of the world.
But neither of those events, theIncarnation and the crucifixion

(12:37):
lead to us being able to actually eat.
Jesus flesh. We can't actually partake of his
flesh from those events at leastnot in a physical literal way.
So when Jesus says the bread that I shall give is my flesh
for the life of the world. He's probably thinking of a
future event and in particular, his probably thinking about the

(12:58):
Eucharist. At the institution of the
Eucharist at the last supper. If you look at the accounts of
the Last, Supper, Jesus says, when he holds up the bread, this
is my body. So there's probably a connection
here. In fact, if you look at the
other gospels, when they talk about the last supper, and the
institution of the Eucharist, the same Greek word is used

(13:20):
there. When, in the Last Supper, it
says, this is my body given for you.
And here Jesus says, the bread that I shall give.
Is my flesh for the life of the world that same really specific
Greek word, which We're translating to English as for is
used in both cases. So I I Think Jesus here.

(13:41):
We can reasonably say he's probably thinking about the
institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper.
That's when he gives his flesh for the life of the world.
And that's the form of the sun'sflesh that he has given us to
partake in, its the Eucharist. And this teaching about flesh
and blood is going to get more graphic and more literal in the

(14:02):
coming versus. And we're look at this in the
coming days. So, how does this get taken up
into Catholic teaching? And where can we find a
reference to verses 44 251 in the catechism.
So there's a few verses or a fewparagraphs and I'll just read
out some of them which are the most striking.

(14:23):
So paragraph 259 is about the trinity.
And how the different roles of the Trinity play out in the
world. Quite a deep complex,
theological teaching. But this is what it says, being
a work at once, common and personal the whole Divine
economy makes known both, what is proper to the Divine persons,

(14:44):
and their one divine nature. Hence.
The whole Christian Life is a communion with each of the
Divine persons without any way, separating them.
Everyone who glorifies the father does, so through the son,
in the Holy Spirit, everyone whofollows Christ does.
So because the father draws him,and the spirit moves him.

(15:07):
So earlier at the start of our podcast today, we looked at how
it says, no one can come to the son unless the father draws him.
And that's the verse that the paragraph in.
The catechism is referring to here to be part of the Trinity,
is to be a part of all, three persons of the trinity.
Paragraph 1 V 1 is about believing in Jesus Christ.

(15:28):
As the Son of God, for a Christian believing in God
cannot be separated from believing in the one, he has
sent his beloved Son in whom thefather is well pleased, God
tells us to listen to him. The Lord himself said to his
disciples believe in God believe.
Also in me, we can believe in Jesus Christ because he is

(15:51):
himself. God, the word made flesh.
Quiet. No one has ever seen God.
The only son who is in the bosomof the father has made him known
because he has seen the father. Jesus Christ is the only one who
knows him and can reveal him. So there we see the catechism

(16:11):
bringing together various things.
Jesus says in the Gospel of Johnabout his own identity, as the
Son of God, who has come to reveal the will of the father.
And then in paragraph, 1 3 feet 1355, we have a reference to the
Eucharist and in particular the way the Eucharist is celebrated
in are in our modern Mass. It says, in the communion

(16:32):
preceded, by The Lord's Prayer and the breaking of the bread,
the faithful receive the Bread of Heaven and the cup of
Salvation, the body, and blood of Christ who offered himself
for the life of the world. Because this bread and wine have
been made. Eucharist Eucharist stood,
according to an ancient Greek. Expression we call this food

(16:53):
Eucharist and no one may take part in it.
Unless he believes that what we teach is true.
He has received baptism for the Forgiveness of sins and New
Birth and lives in keeping with what Christ taught.
And in the coming days, we're going to hear more and more of
these paragraphs from the catechism about the Catholic
teaching on the Eucharist. So please stick around for the

(17:16):
coming episodes in the next couple of days.
Thanks for listening. Please tune in again tomorrow.