I am the Bread of Life

1.I was recently debating a Catholic on the correct interpretation of Jn 6. I stressed certain objections to the Eucharistic interpretation. One objection I accentuated was the fact that, in context, this interpretation is clearly anachronistic.

Now, my emphasis on this particular objection shouldn’t be taken to mean that’s the only major objection to the Eucharistic interpretation. But since Catholicism in general is guilty of foisting anachronistic interpretations on to Scripture, it’s worth devoting some time to this particular issue. And using Jn 6 is a good test-case. To clarify what’s wrong with anachronistic interpretations. That’s applicable to other Catholic prooftexts.

2.There are liberal commentators who admit that a Eucharistic reference in Jn 6 is anachronistic. But they don’t have a problem with that. From their viewpoint, this is a case in which the author of the Fourth Gospel, whom they don’t identify with the Apostle John, was historicizing a later doctrinal development. The author was backdating a later doctrinal development. On this view, the author began with a later doctrinal development, then invented a fictitious back-story to give it the illusion of dominical authorization. He made up a little story about the Eucharist, then put that on the lips of Jesus.

Since, on this view, the events in Jn 6 never happened, and since on this view, Jesus never spoke these words, there’s nothing wrong with a blatantly anachronistic reference to the Lord’s Supper–for Jn 6 isn’t a historical depiction in the first place.

The liberal interpretation at least as the virtue of being self-consistent–given its operation assumptions. And this is not a problem for Catholic commentators, since contemporary Catholic Bible scholars tend to be liberal. For them, Jn 6 is a record of the narrator’s theology, not a record of Jesus’ theology. The narrator is not a mouthpiece for Jesus; rather, Jesus is a mouthpiece for the narrator. From their standpoint, this is a speech spoken by no one to no one at no time and no place. Rather, it’s a fictitious speech, put in the mouth of a fictitious speaker, speaking to a fictitious audience, at a fictitious time and place.

But for Christians who think that Jn 6 describes a real world situation, we need to provide a realistic interpretation which matches the time, place, and audience.

3.Jason Engwer has raised another objection. In Jn 6, the Bread of Life discourse is preceded by the feeding of the 5000. That’s the lead in to the discourse. Indeed, at both a literary and chronological level, the prior event is a deliberate set up for what follows.

The feeding of the 5000 is a literal meal. Yet Jesus uses that event as a springboard to point out the spiritual inefficacy of physical consumption. And this is despite the fact that the feeding of the 5000 is no ordinary meal. It’s a miracle–just like the manna from heaven.

Jason then points out that Jesus is drawing a contrast between two different meals. But if both meals are literal, physical meals, then that destroys the intended contrast. What we have, instead, is a contrast between a literal meal and a figurative meal.

4.Finally, there are detailed exegetical objections to the Eucharistic interpretation by Johannine commentators like Craig Keener, D. A. Carson, and Herman Ridderbos.