Disciples Doubts

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How could the disciples not believe that Jesus would be with them in the form of bread and wine when shortly before they had witnessed the miracle of loaves and fishes? It wasn’t like a magic trick but a true miracle.
 
gclark2110 said:
How could the disciples not believe that Jesus would be with them in the form of bread and wine when shortly before they had witnessed the miracle of loaves and fishes? It wasn’t like a magic trick but a true miracle.
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There is an interesting dissonance in the scriptures between the apparent fact of the miracles said to have happened, and the willingness of people to not believe that Jesus was anything special because of them. The dead rising, the miracle of the loaves, the tearing of the veil of the temple, the mass resurrections after the passion and Christ’s rising, and so on. yet the scriptures also record widespread unbelief. One explanation is that the miracles were in fact the sort of miracles we see reported today - fine if you belief, not if you don’t, and the the scriptures have exaggerated the physical facts of what happened. If the NT miracles happened as claimed, almost everyone would certainly, and with good reason, believed that Jesus had supernatural power. Yet they did not. The most likely explanation is that they did not see the miracles as reported.
 
Hokomai said:
There is an interesting dissonance in the scriptures between the apparent fact of the miracles said to have happened, and the willingness of people to not believe that Jesus was anything special because of them. The dead rising, the miracle of the loaves, the tearing of the veil of the temple, the mass resurrections after the passion and Christ’s rising, and so on. yet the scriptures also record widespread unbelief. One explanation is that the miracles were in fact the sort of miracles we see reported today - fine if you belief, not if you don’t, and the the scriptures have exaggerated the physical facts of what happened. If the NT miracles happened as claimed, almost everyone would certainly, and with good reason, believed that Jesus had supernatural power. Yet they did not. The most likely explanation is that they did not see the miracles as reported.
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I am so sorry, I will pray for you.
May God bless you
 
Of course the Pharisees in John 9 had a miracle practically shoved in their face, and went to every length to deny it.
 
The Catholic view affirms the “Real Presence” of Christ in the Eucharist in that Christ is “truly, really, and substantially” present and the elements are mysteriously changed, transformed, and become the body and blood, along with the soul and divinity of Christ, the whole Christ. Also, we believe the Eucharist is a true sacrifice, in that the one and only propitiatory sacrifice of Christ is “re-presented” or “made present” for our benefit and application today. I shall call this the “literal” or “realist” view. Why do Catholics (and Orthodox) believe this?

First, we believe it is a solidly biblical teaching. Second, we know it is the clear and unanimous teaching of the Church Fathers, those early Saints, Bishops, and immediate successors of the Apostles, the Christian believers for the first several centuries of Christianity. The evidence for the Catholic belief in the Eucharist is simply overwhelming. It was not until the 11th century (with Berengarius of Tours) that this belief was challenged in the Catholic Church. Many Fundamentalists and Evangelicals who hold the purely “symbolic” view are not aware of this overwhelming testimony for the literal and realist view.

John 6 and the Real Presence

There are several reasons why the Catholic Church takes the words of Jesus here literally and as referring to the Eucharist.

(1) the words used
(2) the context
(3) the difficulties created by a “figurative” interpretation
(4) the consistent teaching of the Church Fathers

The Words of John 6:51ff

First, from the actual words used. He uses the realistic expressions that His flesh is TRUE, REAL FOOD and His blood is TRUE, REAL DRINK (v. 55 alethes = ACTUAL, REAL, “INDEED” not “symbolic” food or drink). Also, the Greek word for EAT (v. 54, 56-58) is trogo = “to GNAW, to CHEW” which is not the language of a metaphor.
Shalom
God Bless
 
@ O.P. because they had the freedom to choose. They were not forced to believe. In the Old Testament the prophets did great things in God’s name, yet the people hardly believed and were still rebellious. In the gospels the same takes place. When the Father spoke and all heard His voice, on one occasion, some heard the words clearly, others said: “it is just thunder”. When Jesus exorcised a man, some gave praise to God, others said that he was expelling demons in the name of the prince of the demons. Who among the children of men will ever understand men? Even Christ said: “they have hated me for no reason”, and prayed to the Father: “forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing”. We are poor and blind, but if we do not acknowledge this and claim that we can see very well, what hope is there for us?
Hokomai said:
There is an interesting dissonance in the scriptures between the apparent fact of the miracles said to have happened, and the willingness of people to not believe that Jesus was anything special because of them. The dead rising, the miracle of the loaves, the tearing of the veil of the temple, the mass resurrections after the passion and Christ’s rising, and so on. yet the scriptures also record widespread unbelief. One explanation is that the miracles were in fact the sort of miracles we see reported today - fine if you belief, not if you don’t, and the the scriptures have exaggerated the physical facts of what happened. If the NT miracles happened as claimed, almost everyone would certainly, and with good reason, believed that Jesus had supernatural power. Yet they did not. The most likely explanation is that they did not see the miracles as reported.
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Miracles happen all the time nowadays. Perhaps not like when the Christ walked among us, surrounded by an aching crowd longing for help, but they still happen. All the time, with countless witnesses. Perhaps not messianic miracles, like multiplying fish for thousands or walking on water and calming a storm, but healings, conversions, and much more.

Yet people still don’t believe them. Even if they were to see them with their very eyes and touch them with their very hands.

I have seen doctors witness miraculous healings; some have praised God, others have said they could not explain it but still did not believe in God.

Do not be surprised if you have never or rarely been a personal witness of such miracles: we do not see what we internally refuse to believe. How often we do not see a loved one’s defects because we are blinded by our love? In a similar way, our pride often blinds us from seeing God’s greatness, His presence among us, and His great works.

“Your eyes have only to look”… for “my eyes have seen the salvation, which He has prepared in the sight of every people…a light to reveal Him to the nations”.
 
Hokomai said:
There is an interesting dissonance in the scriptures between the apparent fact of the miracles said to have happened, and the willingness of people to not believe that Jesus was anything special because of them. The dead rising, the miracle of the loaves, the tearing of the veil of the temple, the mass resurrections after the passion and Christ’s rising, and so on. yet the scriptures also record widespread unbelief. One explanation is that the miracles were in fact the sort of miracles we see reported today - fine if you belief, not if you don’t, and the the scriptures have exaggerated the physical facts of what happened. If the NT miracles happened as claimed, almost everyone would certainly, and with good reason, believed that Jesus had supernatural power. Yet they did not. The most likely explanation is that they did not see the miracles as reported.
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Humans are really good at not believing things, and we do have good evidence of the scepticism of people in the ancient world (q.v. Plutarch on gods and heroes) and of their belief in inflexible natural laws (q.v. Aristotle). When people already “know” that something is impossible, they are not about to rush to believe it.

To that we can add the activities of the μαγοι, the magi, who were notorious for performing all manner of “miracles” so as to con people out of money. When people heard about Jesus’ miracles, quite a few would likely have said, “Oh great, another charlatan!”

The Gospels are unquestionably written from the point of view of those who believed Jesus’ miracles to have been just that, but one of the texts’ most valuable literary-historical aspects is their acknowledgement that people did doubt, their avoidance of the fairy tale simplicity of everyone believing.
 
gclark2110 said:
How could the disciples not believe that Jesus would be with them in the form of bread and wine when shortly before they had witnessed the miracle of loaves and fishes? It wasn’t like a magic trick but a true miracle.
Click to expand...
If you mean John 6, one of my parish’s priests was talking about this last week, and mentioned that one of the factors at work there is the Law:
Lev_3:17 It shall be a perpetual statute for your generations throughout all your dwellings, that ye eat neither fat nor blood.
Lev_7:26 Moreover ye shall eat no manner of blood, whether it be of fowl or of beast, in any of your dwellings.
Lev_17:12 Therefore I said unto the children of Israel, No soul of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you eat blood.
Lev_17:14 For it is the life of all flesh; the blood of it is for the life thereof: therefore I said unto the children of Israel, Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh: for the life of all flesh is the blood thereof: whosoever eateth it shall be cut off.

With such an emphatic and repeated declaration that consumption of blood is utterly forbidden, Jesus’ statements about drinking his blood in Jn 6:53-56 were a direct violation of what they had been brought up to believe was right. Preconceptions, especially well-embedded ones, tend to be very hard to shift.
 
Mystophilus said:
If you mean John 6, one of my parish’s priests was talking about this last week, and mentioned that one of the factors at work there is the Law:
Lev_3:17 It shall be a perpetual statute for your generations throughout all your dwellings, that ye eat neither fat nor blood.
Lev_7:26 Moreover ye shall eat no manner of blood, whether it be of fowl or of beast, in any of your dwellings.
Lev_17:12 Therefore I said unto the children of Israel, No soul of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you eat blood.
Lev_17:14 For it is the life of all flesh; the blood of it is for the life thereof: therefore I said unto the children of Israel, Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh: for the life of all flesh is the blood thereof: whosoever eateth it shall be cut off.

With such an emphatic and repeated declaration that consumption of blood is utterly forbidden, Jesus’ statements about drinking his blood in Jn 6:53-56 were a direct violation of what they had been brought up to believe was right. Preconceptions, especially well-embedded ones, tend to be very hard to shift.
Click to expand...
The Law isn’t a “preconception,” it’s the law, and what it prescribes is real. The prohibition against blood in Lev 3:17 is “everlasting.” There’s absolutely no confusion about that in the passage.

That prohibition will never be lifted.

Jesus knew that. Therefore, Jesus could not have meant that His flesh and blood were to be literally consume. Those who left understood wrongly that Jesus meant they were to literally eat His flesh and blood.
 
Miracles happen all the time nowadays. Perhaps not like when the Christ walked among us, surrounded by an aching crowd longing for help, but they still happen. All the time, with countless witnesses. Perhaps not messianic miracles, like multiplying fish for thousands or walking on water and calming a storm, but healings, conversions, and much more.
Click to expand...
Yet people still don’t believe them. Even if they were to see them with their very eyes and touch them with their very hands.
Click to expand...
I have seen doctors witness miraculous healings; some have praised God, others have said they could not explain it but still did not believe in God.
Click to expand...
Do not be surprised if you have never or rarely been a personal witness of such miracles: we do not see what we internally refuse to believe. How often we do not see a loved one’s defects because we are blinded by our love? In a similar way, our pride often blinds us from seeing God’s greatness, His presence among us, and His great works.
Click to expand...
“Your eyes have only to look”… for “my eyes have seen the salvation, which He has prepared in the sight of every people…a light to reveal Him to the nations”.
Click to expand...
This redefines ‘miracle’ as ‘unexpected coincidence of events, interpreted as divine influence on contingencies’. The NT miracles as described are simply not the sort of thing you would believe or not believe on the basis of faith. You would have to believe them because of their scale and impossibility of replication. The raising to life of already-decomposing corpses is one obvious example. This is massively different from a spontaneous remission of cancer, or an unexplained ability to regain some movement in a paralyzed limb, or the unexpected arrival of help for someone in need which is, I’m guessing, the sort of ‘miracle’ you are talking about.
 
William_C said:
The Law isn’t a “preconception,” it’s the law, and what it prescribes is real. The prohibition against blood in Lev 3:17 is “everlasting.” There’s absolutely no confusion about that in the passage.

That prohibition will never be lifted.

Jesus knew that. Therefore, Jesus could not have meant that His flesh and blood were to be literally consume. Those who left understood wrongly that Jesus meant they were to literally eat His flesh and blood.
Click to expand...
You are reading scripture incorrectly.

God prohibited the consumption of blood because the life of every creature is in its blood. Blood was life.

"For the life of every creature is the blood of it; therefore I have said to the people of Israel, You shall not eat the blood of any creature, for the life of every creature is its blood; whoever eats it shall be cut off." (Leviticus 17:14)

If the life of a creature is in its blood, then consuming the blood of an animal gave you the life of that animal. Consuming the blood of a beast gave you the life of a beast. Those who consumed animal blood were themselves no better than animals, obeying their own passions and living by instinct.

Jesus understood this. He knew that the life of every creature is in its blood, and so he commanded us to consume his perfect blood, so that we could have his perfect, imperishable, eternal life. God reserved the consumption of blood until the perfect blood of Christ. When we consume the blood of Christ, we consume the life of Christ, because the “Life of every creature is its blood.”

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; he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. (John 6:53:54)

Christ has eternal life, and so we eat his flesh and drink his blood so that we can live the life of Christ eternally, not the life of a beast, or of an animal, but the eternal life of God.

God reserved the consumption of human flesh and the consumption of any blood until the perfect flesh and the perfect blood came down from heaven to give life to the world. In this the Law of Moses was fulfilled completely.

It’s not some random rule about blood. It’s about life, and which life you choose to live - the life of an animal or the life of Christ?

-Tim-
 
TimothyH said:
You are reading scripture incorrectly.

God prohibited the consumption of blood because the life of every creature is in its blood. Blood was life.

"For the life of every creature is the blood of it; therefore I have said to the people of Israel, You shall not eat the blood of any creature, for the life of every creature is its blood; whoever eats it shall be cut off." (Leviticus 17:14)

If the life of a creature is in its blood, then consuming the blood of an animal gave you the life of that animal. Consuming the blood of a beast gave you the life of a beast. Those who consumed animal blood were themselves no better than animals, obeying their own passions and living by instinct.

Jesus understood this. He knew that the life of every creature is in its blood, and so he commanded us to consume his perfect blood, so that we could have his perfect, imperishable, eternal life. God reserved the consumption of blood until the perfect blood of Christ. When we consume the blood of Christ, we consume the life of Christ, because the “Life of every creature is its blood.”

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; he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. (John 6:53:54)

Christ has eternal life, and so we eat his flesh and drink his blood so that we can live the life of Christ eternally, not the life of a beast, or of an animal, but the eternal life of God.

God reserved the consumption of human flesh and the consumption of any blood until the perfect flesh and the perfect blood came down from heaven to give life to the world. In this the Law of Moses was fulfilled completely.

It’s not some random rule about blood. It’s about life, and which life you choose to live - the life of an animal or the life of Christ?

-Tim-
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My friend, God is very clear in Leviticus 3:17 that the prohibition against blood is EVERLASTING.

Do you know what “everlasting” means? It means the prohibition never ends, but lasts FOREVER!
 
God did command not to eat blood, but to pour it out on the ground like water.

Only, you shall not eat of the blood, but must pour it out on the ground like water. (Dueteronomy 12:16)

This commandment has been fulfilled.

But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water. (John 19:34)

Jesus’ blood was poured out on the ground like water. God’s law has been perfectly fulfilled at the crucifixtion.

"Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfil them. (Matthew 5:17)

Christ fulfilled all of the law perfectly, and in so doing he abolishes the old covenant with its laws and regulations and establishes a new and better covenant.

In speaking of a new covenant he treats the first as obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away. (Hebrews 8:13)

For those who accept Christ’s new covenant, the laws of the old covenant have been made obsolete. That’s the entire theme of the book of Hebrews - the passing away of the old covenant with its rules, regulations and priesthood, and the new and better covenant of Christ who is the new Great High Priest.

-Tim-
 
William_C said:
My friend, God is very clear in Leviticus 3:17 that the prohibition against blood is EVERLASTING.

Do you know what “everlasting” means? It means the prohibition never ends, but lasts FOREVER!
Click to expand...
You don’t understand covenants or you are not understanding that the regulations in Leviticus, Exodus and Dueteronomy were part of the covenant.

All of the rules in Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy were rules that the Israelites had to obey as part of the covenant which they had made with God at Mt. Sinai.

Christ esablished a new covenant.

*But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry which is as much more excellent than the old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on better promises. (Hebrews 8:6)

**In speaking of a new covenant **he treats the first as obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away. (Hebrews 8:13)

and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks more graciously than the blood of Abel. (Hebrews 12:24)*

Christ esablished a new covenant, and for those under the new covenant, the old one with its rules and regulations is obsolete.

If you want to live under the rules and regulations of the old covenant, I know some Orthodox Jewish communities who would love to have you. They are some of the nicest people I know, but they live under the old covenant, with its rules and regulations. I live under a new covenant,

In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” (1 Corinthians 11:25)

That’s the covenant I live under - the covenant in Christ’s blood. The rules of Christ’s new covenant are simple and can be summed up on one word - love.

**For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” ** (Galatians 5:14)

-Tim-
 
William_C said:
My friend, God is very clear in Leviticus 3:17 that the prohibition against blood is EVERLASTING.

Do you know what “everlasting” means? It means the prohibition never ends, but lasts FOREVER!
Click to expand...
Jesus said, This IS My Body and This IS My Blood. I’m sure you don’t think Our Lord is a liar.
 
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