That’s not what you said originally, you said the spirit was the life. Nothwistanding the semantics, I don’t see the logic jump from having faith in Jesus to eating his body and drinking his blood as being the same, especially in light of John 6:55, which you still haven’t commented on…
I am not sure what you are asking, maybe you can be more specific but I will do my best to answer your question.
If that is deceptive then Jesus spoke elsewhere deceptivly:
If that is deceptive then Jesus spoke elsewhere deceptivly:
The problem with this reasoning is that in John 6, he deliberately tells him that he is talking about his body. I think the problem here is the assumption that Our Lord cannot both speak metaphorically and literally at the same time. In fact he does just this in John 6. I’ll explain below.
That’s a pretty big assumption, and I’m not sure you can back that up with Scripture. I think it might be instructive to re-examine Matt 16:8-11. In fact, as I’ll discuss, Jesus did explain himself to the disciples, and when they still grumbled, he reiterated his explanation in even more graphic terms.
Here is where I think you confuse things a bit. What you are describing here is not an explanation, it is the metaphor I was talking about above. Remember the flow of the passage, it begins with his followers demanding a miraculous sign, like the one Moses gave their fathers in the desert. In the quotes above, Jesus is figuratively comparing himself with the manna
Now this is the explanation of the metaphor. The bread which comes down from heaven is his flesh, which we may eat so as to not die. This is when the disciples began to grumble, asking how He could give them his flesh to eat and blood to drink. If your interpretation is correct and eating the bread from heaven was a metaphor for eating his flesh, which in turn was a metaphor for “believing on him”, He would have explained as he did in Matt 16:8-11. But he didn’t, did he? This is where Jesus reiterated his explanation even more forcefully, from “eating” to gnawing/chewing on his body.
Again, the big problem with this is that you forget that to “eat the body” and “drink the blood” were already figures of speech in Jesus’ culture. It meant to revile, or harm/attack:
Jeff, this last part comes dangerously close to denying the incarnation, despite your previous post to the contrary. The meat he is talking about in this passage is not his flesh, but the meat that he would eat, that is his “delicacy”. However, if your interpretation is correct, then His flesh is His meat, which is to do the will of his Father. Thus, His flesh is to do the will of the Father. Therefore, using your reasoning, the flesh that he gave on the cross for the life of the world was doing the Father’s will. In other words, “doing the will of the Father” is what got crucified on Calvary. I’m not sure you want to be making statements with such implications.
michaelp said:
michaelp said:
michaelp said:
I agree, Mickey. Furthermore, it can be shown that throughout the Bible things are referred to in the manner in which they appear. Just a couple of note that I know offhand:Protestants have recourse to the text of St. Matthew, who relates that Christ, after the completion of the Last Supper, declared: “I will not drink from henceforth of this fruit of the vine genimen vitis]” (Matt 26:29). It is to be noted that St. Luke (22:18 sqq.), who is chronologically more exact, places these words of Christ before his account of the Institution, and that the true Blood of Christ may with right still be called (consecrated) wine, on the one hand, because the Blood was partaken of after the manner in which wine is drunk and, on the other, because the Blood continues to exist under the **outward **appearances of the wine.
Are you saying that Christ before he was born on earth existed in the flesh in heaven and came down?
Actually the language could of been a metaphor for two reasons:
Cannibalism!!! smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/36/36_11_6.gif smileys.smileycentral.com/cat/4/4_1_72.gif
That’s quite a stretch, Jeff.
Mickey, I usually concur 100% with what you write but in this case, I can’t. Jeff was struggling manfully with a very difficult concept – a concept even Catholic Church declares to be largely an unfathomable mystery.
I’m sorry mercygate, but the anti-Catholic cannibalism thing has come up so many times on this forum, I assumed that Jeff had read the other threads, and chose to ignore the true interpretation. I’m sorry if I offended anyone–I know better than to assume. But everytime the cannibalism thing is brought up, it makes me laugh because of the ridiculousness of the claim. Again, if I offended you Jeff, I am sorry.
Just what sacrifice are you talking about here? A lawful sacrifice to god, or a slaughter of the wicked (same word in Hebrew)? Look at the context if those verses you posted. God is speaking of the destruction of Gog and Magog, and of cleansing of the land. He instructs Ezekiel to tell the birds that they will have the flesh and blood of the mighty to eat. Certainly God isn’t mandating human sacrifice. No, the eating and drinking of blood is used in the same sense as I posted above, to do harm to another. Look verse following those you posted:
If anything these verses strengthen my point.
Again, what happened to the Paschal lamb after it was slain? Was it literal or figurative?
Of course the metaphorical explanation breaks down, it didn’t (and doesn’t make any sense). However, you haven’t shown that the literal breaks down. In fact, the literal explanation is the only one that works. Why else would the crowd leave and walk with him no more? They correctly understood he was speaking literally, their problem was in not believing how it could be done (“this is a hard saying”). As St. Augustine points out, those who left foolishly thought He meant to give them his limbs to eat. His words, though, were of spirit and of life. It is a mystery to be understood spiritually.
Sure He was metaphorically the lamb to be sacrificed (I mean He was a true man, not a lamb). What you have not demonstrated is that the eating of the lamb is metaphorical. In fact, as is evident from Scripture, to metaphorically eat the flesh is to do harm to someone and still makes no sense in the context of John 6 unless one thinks John 6:53 should read:
I read you, Mickey. You’re a mensch to apologize.I’m sorry mercygate, but the anti-Catholic cannibalism thing has come up so many times on this forum, I assumed that Jeff had read the other threads, and chose to ignore the true interpretation. I’m sorry if I offended anyone–I know better than to assume. But everytime the cannibalism thing is brought up, it makes me laugh because of the ridiculousness of the claim. Again, if I offended you Jeff, I am sorry.