56Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. 57Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. 58This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live for ever.’59He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum. 60 When many of his disciples heard it, they said, ‘This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?’ 61But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, ‘Does this offend you?62Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? 63It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64But among you there are some who do not believe.’ For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him. 65And he said, ‘For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father.’
66 Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. 67So Jesus asked the twelve, ‘Do you also wish to go away?’ 68Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.’
Translation: The one chewing my flesh and drinking my blood abides in me and I in that one. Just as the living Father sent me, and I am living through the Father, and the one chewing me, that one will live through me. This is the bread which came down out of heaven, not like the fathers ate and they died. The one chewing this bread will live into the eternal.
He said these things in a synagogue, teaching in Capernaum. Then, many of his disciples, when they heard, said, "This word is hard. Who of him is able to hear?" But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, "Are you scandalized by this? Then what if you were to see the son of man going up to where he was first? The spirit is the one giving life, the flesh profits nothing. The words which I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you not believing"--for Jesus knew from the beginning who were the ones not believing and who is the one who would deliver him over. And he said, "Through this, I answered you that no one is able to come to me unless it has been given to that one out of the Father."
Then, out of this, many of his disciples went back into the things of the past and no longer were going about with him. Then Jesus said to the twelve, "And you, do you not wish to go?" Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. And we have faithed and we have known that you are the Holy One of God."
Background and situation: Verse 58 overlaps with the reading of last week. To review the opening verses, and verse 58, Jesus promises "life eternal" to those who eat his body and drink his blood.
"Life eternal" is the fourth gospel's way of speaking about what the synoptics call the "kingdom of God." As one may live in the "kingdom of God" right now, so one may also have "life eternal" right now. In 6:54, the verb is in the present tense.
It is also a promise. In 6:58, the verb is future tense. Thus, "life eternal" is both present now and a promise for the future.
Greek has two words for "life"--zoe and bios. Bios refers to physical life--we get our word "biology" from it. Our text uses zoe, however, and zoe is different. Zoe is not about physical life necessarily, although physical life certainly flows from it. Zoe "life" is connected to the very source of all life. It is the Life Principle itself.
In a synagogue: Then comes this surprising twist: "He said these things in a synagogue, teaching in Capernaum." This is the first use of the word synagoge (synagogue) in reference to a place in the fourth gospel. (The word simply means "gather together.")
Jesus is speaking to "the Judeans" (6:52). The "Judeans" represent a particular point of view in the fourth gospel. They are, you might say, "the establishment"--the chief priests, scribes, the Temple apparatchiks, the rich families of Jerusalem.
Earlier in the fourth gospel, synagoge had been used as a verb. See the "gathering together" of the harvest (4:36) and "gathering together" the leftover bread from the feeding of the 5000 (6:12).
One wonders: Is the fourth gospel saying that, within a Judean worldview, synagoge is a noun, the name of a place, indeed an institutional place? Is the author also saying that, for the community of the fourth gospel, synagoge is a verb and that "gathering together" is its appointed task and mission?
Talk of "chomping flesh" and "drinking blood" is provocative to begin with, but would be especially provocative when spoken in a synagogue. The tradition was clear: Eating flesh was forbidden. It was associated with vultures (Ez 39:17) and evildoers (Zech 11:9). Drinking blood was equally offensive. "You shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood," said Genesis (9:4). "You shall not eat...any blood," said Leviticus (3:17). "You shall not eat flesh and drink blood," said Ezekial (39:17).
Who is able to hear?: When this dialog began, Jesus was speaking with "the crowd." Later, he was speaking to "the Judeans." Now, the dialog shifts yet again, this time to "many of his disciples."
These disciples--these people who would be following Jesus--begin to have trouble with the outrageous things Jesus has been saying. He has encouraged the very things the existing tradition had expressly forbidden. In a classic understatement, they say, "This word is hard (skleros). Who of him is able to hear it?"
Who indeed is able to hear? Throughout the Bible, God tends to be known both through hearing and seeing, though, usually, God is apprehended more often through hearing. Think of the voice calling in the night, or the various dreams sprinkled throughout scripture. (One word sometimes translated as "sin" is parakouo which means "failure to listen." Failure to hear--especially failing to hear "this word" (logos)--represents being shut off from God.)
Jesus knew that his disciples were "grumbling." The word is the same the Septuagint used to translate the "murmuring" of the people following Moses in the wilderness. The "murmurers" are thus associated with those who, long ago, gave Moses a hard time and also resisted his leadership.
Jesus asks, in NRSV, "Does this offend you?" The word is scandalizei, which means "cause to stumble" or "trip over." We get our modern word "scandal" from it. We can understand Jesus to be asking, "Are you scandalized by this?" If you are "scandalized," he asks, then what would you do if you saw the son of man "going up" (anabainonta) to where he was first."
Jesus has previously used the expression of the "son of man going up" in his dialog with Nicodemus in 3:13. The context in chapter 3 is similar to that of chapter 6 in that Nicodemus insists on thinking in an "earthly" way and not in a "heavenly" one. The son of man comes from heaven, Jesus says to Nicodemus, and therefore knows what he is talking about.
Rather than speak of ascending to heaven in this instance (6:62), however, Jesus here speaks of ascending to "where he was before" or "where he was first." In light of chapter one where Jesus the Word was "with" God and "was" God, that place "where he was first" would be heaven, of course, but heaven in light of the Word's pre-existence and unity with God.
As he said to Nicodemus, Jesus is now telling his disciples, "Get your minds off 'earthly' ways of thinking and start thinking in spiritual and heavenly ways!" To underline what he has said, he continues, "The spirit is the one giving life, the flesh profits nothing." Compare to his statement to Nicodemus, "What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the spirit is spirit" (3:6).
The odd thing is that Jesus has himself just spoken at a very "fleshy" level. He has spoken of "chewing flesh" and "drinking blood." You could hardly get more earthy or more physical than that! Then, he turns right around and tells the people to think God's thoughts and to raise their hearts and minds into the realm of the spirit. What gives? Wes Howard-Brook analyzes:
"...what is useless is the 'low' way of thinking, the path that gets us caught up in our mental categories and blocks new ideas; what Jesus' flesh offers, though, is the path to him, which is the path to God, via open and committed membership in the Johannine community..." (p. 166-170).
One of the several uses of the word "flesh" in the New Testament is to define it as referring to the world which we experience through our physical nature. That's "flesh." We experience Christ's "flesh" in the eucharist, yes, but the fourth gospel also wants to say that our apprehension is not limited to our physical nature. The spirit expands our consciousness beyond the earthy and the physical toward the true source of all life.
"Faithing" again:
But there are some of you not believing"--for Jesus knew from the beginning who were the ones not believing and who is the one who would deliver him over. And he said, "Through this, I answered you that no one is able to come to me unless it has been given to that one out of the Father."
Then, out of this, many of his disciples went back into the things of the past and no longer were going about with him. Then Jesus said to the twelve, "And you, do you not wish to go?" Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. And we have faithed and we have known that you are the Holy One of God."
Jesus asserts that some of his own disciples have not been "faithing." They have not been trusting wholeheartedly. Moreover, Jesus knew all along who would not "faith," and he also knew who would be the one who would deliver him over, or betray him.
We should not be surprised that the subject of betrayal enters the fourth gospel for the first time precisely at that point where his own disciples are "scandalized" by his anti-traditional views. Some of them went back "into the things of the past"--eis ta opiso, a phrase unfortunately not rendered in most translations. They retreat back into the old way in search of psychological and spiritual safety.
Then, the focus of the audience narrows yet again. Now, Jesus speaks specifically to the Twelve and asks them if they also want to retreat from his way and return to "the things of the past" rather than move forward into the true life (zoe) which is eternal.
We are past dealing with "the crowd" or the "Judeans" or even "many of his disciples." We have now moved to the core of the Jesus movement and the question, again, is one of faith. Do you really "faith" or don't you?
Simon Peter--the name itself refers to his former person (Simon) and his "new person" (Peter)--responds with a classic statement which is also spoken in our liturgy: "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life." Again, the word for "life" is zoe, which refers to the basic principle of life itself--not biological life, in other words, but life in touch with the source of all life and, thus, life that never dies.
This may be Simon Peter's best moment in all four of the gospels. "We have faithed," he asserts, "and we know that you are the Holy One of God." The fourth gospel constantly encourages faith and "receiving" (1:12) Jesus, even in spite of the opposition of the forces of the world which influences even "his own" to receive him not (1:11). "We have faithed," says Simon Peter in a bold declaration of the community's commitment.
Not only that, but "we have known" Jesus' true identity. The world "did not know him" (1:10), yet the disciples have known him. The word is ginosko, a word which indicates "knowing" in a deep and interior way.
In this lection, Jesus had also "known." He had "known" that his disciples were "murmuring" (6:61), and he had "known" who would "faith" and who would "betray." Now, Simon Peter claims that his twelve disciples--the core of the Jesus movement--also "know" Jesus in a deep and complete way.
Note as well that Peter identifies Jesus as "the Holy One of God." The word "holy" is hagios, a word which was not used in classical Greek. (It appears nowhere in Homer or the Greek plays.) Hagios comes from a Greek word which means "to separate."
The Holy One is, then, the one "set apart," the one designated, the one with a special task. That this "Holy One" is "of God" indicates that God is the one setting him apart, and therefore, he can be trusted.
Summary: Verse 63 is puzzling because of the tenses of the verbs. I've translated it as: "The words which I have spoken to you are spirit and life." The problem is that the verb is the third person singular form of the verb "to be." The word to which it refers--"words"--is plural. The subject and verb do not agree in number.
Unless--unless one would understand the phrase "the words which I have spoken" to be one body of teaching. The "words spoken by Jesus"--all of them taken together--are One Thing. Taken together, these "words spoken by Jesus" is spirit and is life.
This would explain the use of the word hramata for "words" instead of logos. Often, the two words are used interchangeably. Either one means "word" or "words." If a distinction was to be made as to their meaning, however, hramata would more likely be associated with literal "words," while logos might refer more to the principle or understanding behind the words.
In the fourth gospel, Christ himself is the logos, the principle behind the words, while his spoken words--his hramata--are the totality of his teaching of the new way of God. This way is "spirit" and "life" because it follows directly out of Christ, the source of true zoe life.
This way of God has specific meaning and takes specific form in the world through the followers of Jesus who are inspired by his new way of living--not tribalism, but crossing of boundaries, not the Temple as a broker to God, but Christ who draws all to himself (12:52), not the oppression of the poor, but a place for all in the Beloved Community.
Image: To whom shall we go, Matti Sirvio
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