Arguments against John 6

[flameburns623]

DavidV:

This parallel does not come from a temptation, it come right out and hits you.

No disrespect but . . . perhaps you mean iit ‘hits’ you in the same way that “I am the Living Water” reminds one of foot-washing? Keeping in mind that foot-washing is a sacrament in some Protestant churches?

I still think the parallels are subjective and derived from the Catholoics’ pre-assumed emphasis upon communion. Assign a lower degree of importance to that rite, divorce oneself from the ‘magical thinking’ notion of grace-as-a-force which is built into Catholic theology, and John 6 becomes yet another simile Christ employed to reveal Himself to the world.

Per Catholic theology, I could say Mass in every great cathedral in the world, in every Catholic Rite known (tough work since I can’t read any alphabets except the English one), and what I’d end up with is bread and wine. I’m not a Catholic Priest endowed with the appropriate ‘faculties’. Snag a priest with said faculties to do likewise–but substitute American junk food for bread and wine and what the priest ends up with are Hershey’s bars and and soda pop–and perhaps an increased number of communicants. Put the same said priest in a dungyard, make him a renegade Catholic priest-turned-Satanist, hand him a rite in a language he can’t speak or understand, but give him bread and wine accompanied by the real intent to consecrate same and voila–you get transubstantantiation.

Carry that sort of preconception of how the world works into one’s reading of Scripture and you’re going to impose mystical interpretations onto the text every time the word ‘bread’ or wine shows up. I just don’t think John 6 demands the interpretation Catholics lend to it.

 

[martino]

Flameburns, let me try to answer your question about John 4, “The Living Water”
In the first dialogue between Jesus and the Samaritan woman concerning the “living water” Jesus is not speaking of a literal “spring of water welling up to eternal life” but of the Holy Spirit, he is speaking figuratively. On that we would agree.

In the second dialogue immediately following between Jesus and the disciples concerning Jesus’ “food”, he is not speaking literally of food that they will eat to nourish their bodies, but rather *"My food is to do the will of him who sent me,”. *They took him literally just like the Samaritan woman did but he corrects them (like he always does) so that they know he is only speaking figuratively. Also we would agree.

***John ***6:51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he will live for ever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh." 52 The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” 53 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you; 54 he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. 55 For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. 56 He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats me will live because of me. 58 This is the bread which came down from heaven, not such as the fathers ate and died; he who eats this bread will live for ever.”

Jesus is again speaking to the disciples, they are obviously confused as to what he is talking about, but He does not try to assure them that He is only speaking figuratively like he did so many times before. In fact the Jews new that he could not have been speaking figuratively because the phrase “to eat my flesh/drink my blood” already had a figurative meaning; it meant to “do violence” or “assault”, and obviously doesn’t fit in this context. They continue to murmur among themselves and ultimately they leave, never to follow Him again, yet he does not try to call them back, something he surely would have done if they had only misunderstood Him. Jesus was in fact speaking literally, and the 12 apostles that did not leave Him were rewarded for their faith, (“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life…” ) at the Last Supper when Jesus finally reveals to them just how they were to eat His body and drink His blood, when he holds up the bread and says “Take; this is my body which is for you”.

Jesus was speaking literally in John 6 and if we try to put a figurative meaning on it then it doesn’t make any sense at all. There is indeed a great mystery involved which is why we must decide if we are like the murmuring Jews that choose not to believe or if we are like Peter and the apostles who accept the teaching on faith, “to whom shall we go, you have the words of eternal life; and we have believed and come to know that you are the Holy One of God”—By the way, Judas apparently didnt believe in the Real Presence either!

 

[SPOKENWORD]

In verse 63,Jesus says just after He finished talking with His Apostles. The words I have spoken are SPIRIT AND LIFE. This means in my oppinion] What He said was in the natural but the true meaning was in the supernatural.

 

[Tom]

sabrinaofmn:

I am a Protestant and I am considering converting. It was the Eucharist that drew me in, and after reading John 6 with an unbiased state of mind, I am increasingly convinced that transubstantiation is real.

Shari:

I hope we can welcome you home soon. I too am a protestant on my way home. Shari

Welcome home both of you. May the peace and love of our Lord, Jesus the Christ, be with you always.
Tom

 

[space_ghost]

if you are having to defend John 6… well my friend you have a long road ahead of you… i cannot imagine a more straight forward chapter, clear, concise, specific and little left up to refutation…

yeah, if they are duking it out with you on this chapter, you can’t live long enough to have serious discussions where there might be some gray areas to dispute…

I wish you luck, and peace to the one who disagrees…

 

[flameburns623]

The Catholic interpretation of John 6 is NOT a literal interpretation. Christ’s body was NOT composed of particles of wheat and water, baked in an oven at 375 degrees. He was not a walking Gingerbread Man. His body was flesh, as any human body. Had anyone gnawed on Christ’s body–either during the discourse in John Chapter 6 or at the Crucifixion—they would have obtained naught more than a mouthful of meat. Indeed–cannibalizing Christ’s literal body would not have been salvific but sinful. You are still superimposing Catholic presuppositions upon the text rather than reading from the text what it really says.

In John Chapter 4 and John Chapter 6, Christ affirms His role as the Source of Life–oblique professions of Deity. The Samaritan women and her townsfolk accept this declaration eagerly. The Jewish followers of Christ–excepting the apostles–first challenge Christ’s claim to deity (perhaps hoping He would drop His use of a simile and make a straightforward declaration for which He could be stoned), and then–as Christ persists in His revelation of Himself–they abandon Him. Simple straightforward reading of this passage without making untoward connections between this episode of Christ’s ministry and communion.

 

[martino]

flameburns623:

The Catholic interpretation of John 6 is NOT a literal interpretation. Christ’s body was NOT composed of particles of wheat and water, baked in an oven at 375 degrees. He was not a walking Gingerbread Man. His body was flesh, as any human body. Had anyone gnawed on Christ’s body–either during the discourse in John Chapter 6 or at the Crucifixion—they would have obtained naught more than a mouthful of meat. Indeed–cannibalizing Christ’s literal body would not have been salvific but sinful. You are still superimposing Catholic presuppositions upon the text rather than reading from the text what it really says.

In John Chapter 4 and John Chapter 6, Christ affirms His role as the Source of Life–oblique professions of Deity. The Samaritan women and her townsfolk accept this declaration eagerly. The Jewish followers of Christ–excepting the apostles–first challenge Christ’s claim to deity (perhaps hoping He would drop His use of a simile and make a straightforward declaration for which He could be stoned), and then–as Christ persists in His revelation of Himself–they abandon Him. Simple straightforward reading of this passage without making untoward connections between this episode of Christ’s ministry and communion.

The Eucharistic discourse in John 6 was absolutely meant to be taken literally, the problem is that you dont believe that Christ literally becomes sacramentally present in the Eucharist. Even Luke tells us that “He was made known to us in the breaking of the bread”. The Jewish followers in John 6 were not questioning His diety, they were questioning how in the world they were supposed to eat his flesh! That is quite clear from the text."52 The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” The reason Jesus didnt “drop his simile and make a starightforward declaration” is because He wasn’t using a simile, metaphor or anything else, He could not have been more straightforward or direct, “55 For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.”

Let me turn this around a little bit and ask you a few questions. If Jesus was speaking metaphoriscally in John 6 when he spoke of the consumption of His flesh; what is the metaphor for “eat my flesh” and “drink my blood” in Jewish tradition? And why didnt He call the disciples back when they got so upset over His language? What good teacher would allow them to leave Him based on their misunderstanding? After all He had corrected the disciples many time before, why would He not do it this time, especially when you consider how important this teaching was.

Maybe they didnt misunderstand Him at all, maybe they just didnt have the faith to believe He could accomplish what He said!
The apostles didnt understand either, the difference is their faith in Jesus; they believed simply because He said it!

 

[flameburns623]

It is not the metaphoric interpretation of ‘eating flesh’ which is at stake here but the metaphoric meaning of ‘bread’, to which Christ had likened His flesh. Bread, like water, was a basic staff of life. An extensive conversation had preceded the ‘Bread of Life’ claim (John 6: 26-35). To be deprived of bread was to be deprived of life. To claim to be the Bread of Heaven was to claim to be the ultimate source of life. It was a claim to deity, and the Jews, knowing this, did not hesitate to try to corner Christ into making a more-direct profession of Himself. It was for this reason they raised the hyper-literal interpretation of Christ’s words: “What? You’re proposing cannibalism, now, are you? Who are you really claiming to be, if you claim we can eat your flesh and live forever, eh?”

To which Christ could have responded in either one of three fashions: drop the simile entirely and declare Himself God. At which point He would have committed blasphemy and contravened His entire mission. Remember–Christ’s sentence of death upon a cross is meritorious because He was UNJUSTLY sentenced to die there. Nowhere does Christ personally make an explicit profession of deity: He comes very close and He makes claims that only Deity should be able to make. We can from our own perspective connect all of His claims and allusions and recognize Him for who He is. But when Christ says, “No one convicts Me of sin” (John 8:46) it is because Christ kept the Law perfectly. The Law did not forbid one from making blasphemous statements “only” if such statements were untrue: the Law forbade blasphemy. An explicit claim by Christ to be God would have been blasphemy. Therefore, for Christ to declare Himself openly was not an option.

On the other hand–to deny His simile would have been to deny Himself. To deny who He really is. This is not a thing possible for Christ. Hence, this tactic was not available to Christ.

So Christ employed the other strategy available to Him: He re-affirmed His simile even in the face of criticism. That the followers of Christ did not take Christ’s words in a wooden literal sense–they KNEW He was not advocating cannibalism–is evident by the fact that they did not immediately stone Him for advocating a breach of dietary laws: human flesh is an ‘unclean food’. Humans do not ‘cleave the foot nor chew the cud’ and we’re not on the list of creatures who are excepted from the requirement to be a cloven-footed cud-chewing herbivore in order to be a prospective entre on a dinner plate.

Christ’s followers abandoned Him because they knew what He had revealed to them–His deity–and found it unacceptable. Had He given them clear grounds, they would have stoned Him on their way out. But He had not done so: He had not said: “You can fry my biceps and they’ll taste like a cross between chicken and steak”. This would have been an overt advocacy of cannibalism, for which Christ would have been invited to a ‘rock concert’ involving some pretty hefty rocks. The symbol of Christianity would have been a pebble on a pendant. Rather–pebbles on pendants are a symbol of Shirley McClaine.

Instead, Christ had said, “My flesh is bread”, “I am bread”. Much akin to saying, “My apple is an orange”. Philosophically He was claiming His flesh, His body, was both “a” and “non-a” in the same sense at the same time. The Torah proscribed many things, prescribed the death penalty for many of them–but being philosophically irrational was not one of those things. No violation of Law incurred, yet it was being implied, yet not so plainly that the Law could be invoked . . .and so the only options which existed were to accept the claim of Christ about Himself or reject it. The majority voted with their feet and shuffled away. Unlike the Samaritans two chapters prior, who essentially had accepted Him on the word of an adulterous woman.

 

[martino]

Flameburns- You say that it is not the metaphoric meaning of “eat my flesh” but rather the metaphoric meaning of “bread of life” that is at stake here. Well I will conceded that if chapter 6 (Gospel of John) had ended at verse 49 then we would not be having this discussion right now. I will except your metaphor for “bread of life”, that way nothing is at stake except the meaning of “eat my flesh”. Jesus doesn’t stop at verse 49; He moves from the metephoric language to the literal language explaining in vivid detail exactly what he means when He says “I am the bread of life”.

I’m sure that we would agree that Scripture is not one demensional; there are actually 4 senses of Scripture (literal, allegorical, moral, and anagogical). I would say that you gave a terrific allegorical interpretation for Jn 6 (up to verse 49). However, any allegory that was used in this chapter ends with verse 49. From that point on Jesus goes to great pains to elaborate for the sake of His disciples, on this most important teaching. This is when he gets to the meat of it, quite literally! This is the only time in all of Scripture that Jesus or anyone else repeats themself not once or twice but 7 times, using stronger language each time. So what is at stake is not the metaphoric sense of “bread of life”, but the command to “eat my flesh”. Jesus was not playing word games with the disciples, saying things like “my flesh is food indeed and my blood is drink indeed” in hopes that a collective lightbuld would go off and the disciples would say, “ahhhh , I get it , He is trying to tell us something here! He is divine!, this game is fun, do another one Jesus!” Jesus wasn’t playing charades with the disciples salvation on the line. He had corrected them many times before when they had misunderstood his meaning; He does not want to leave them in error. Why would He now play games and then watch them all walk away? It doesnt make sense.
Starting with verse 50 Jesus is telling His disciples something very important regarding His body, and commanding them very specifically to eat of it. I have no desire to take the mystery out of the doctrine and will not attempt to do so. But this is not symbolic language being used, he repeats it 7 times, and there is no correction given. He is preparing them for what is to take place at the Last Supper, that is where He reveals the real meaning of “eat my flesh” when he holds up the bread at Passover and says, “this IS my body”. Which is why it is recorded in Luke that “He made Himself known to us in the breaking of the bread”. This is why the disciples began going out on the first day of the week breaking bread and saying prayers. This is why the first century Christians professed the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist!

 

[flameburns623]

Again:

To have abandoned His simile for explicit declarative language would have been to violate the law against blasphemy. The Mosaic law forbade a man to liken himself to God: it made no exceptions for a God-man. To have made Himself an exception would have been to have made a liar of His own claim that no one could accuse Him of sin.

To have denied His simile would have been to have denied Himself.

Hence He maintained His simile and reinforced it. The disciples who abandoned Him sought earnestly to entrap Him and He refused to put His head therein. Had they believed Him to be speaking literally of advocating cannibalism----the provision of the Law would have been stoning. That they did not stone Him is evidence they were not taking Him literally.

So far as ‘not playing word games’: this is precisely the sort of reasoning our Lord used regularly: “Whose image is on the coin for the tax? Ceasar’s? Then render to Ceasar what is Ceasar’s and to God what is God’s!” “Do not the Scriptures say 'I AM the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob? God is not the God of the dead but of the living!” “I will tell you of My authority when you tell me: John’s baptism, was it of God or of men?” All of these quite shrewd and subtle arguments–it took me, personally, some number of years to ‘grok the fulness’ of the ‘I AM the God of the living’ passage. (‘Grok the fulness’ is a phrase from a Heinlein novel–supposedly means something like, ‘intuit thoroughly and fully’). Christ regularly spoke in such a fashion that “seeing they see not; hearing, they hear not; lest they return and be forgiven” (Mark 4:12).

This thread is duplicated elsewhere in this forum, and it was there suggested that this is ‘my novel argument’. To respond to this: I am a security guard with a lot of time to listen to Christian radio shows. I’m not a theologian. My BA is in sociology, which rarely prepares one to confabulate ‘novel arguments’ about scripture exegesis. I purloined this argument from someone, though I don’t recall who–some radio evangelist or Protestant apologist somewhere ‘out there’. Knowing electronic evangelists as I do, I am fairly certain that whomever I heard first frame this argument probably didn’t invent it. A careful researcher in theological history could probably uncover the original source, who likely as not could defend this interpretation more ably than I.

Finally: as a traditionalist Anglican–NOT a member of ECUSA but of a separate organization–I happen to accept the doctrine of the ‘real presence of Christ’ in the Eucharist. I just don’t happen to accept transubstantiation, a philosophical attempt to explain the Mystery of Faith in terms which inevitably lead to wafer-worship. And, I don’t accept that John 6 is fairly or appropriately applied to or understood as a reference to the Eucharist. Someone named ‘Cephas’ asked for arguments against the Catholic interpretation of John 6. I provided one. Whether it is novel or not, here it is. (The argument from novelty, incidentally, is actually a fallacious one: I could indeed have composed an entirely novel and yet entirely true exegesis of John 6. I might also compose a Grand Unified Theory of the Universe. Neither is likely, given my educational background and station in life, however).

 

[martino]

flameburns623:

Finally: as a traditionalist Anglican–NOT a member of ECUSA but of a separate organization–I happen to accept the doctrine of the ‘real presence of Christ’ in the Eucharist. I just don’t happen to accept transubstantiation, a philosophical attempt to explain the Mystery of Faith in terms which inevitably lead to wafer-worship. And, I don’t accept that John 6 is fairly or appropriately applied to or understood as a reference to the Eucharist.

You believe in the ‘real presence of Christ’ in the Eucharist; can you please explain why you believe such a thing and where does it teach that in the Bible?