Go to your roam and shut the doar and read all of John 6,and see what our Lord said and then tell why the jews got up and walk away
Well Bill, following your advice I had a close look at John 6 to see why certain members of Jesus’s audience left. I note:
a) Christ made absolutely no mention and gave no indication that the flesh eating that he had in mind involved bread that had been transubstantiated into his body. Transubstantiation would have been such a foreign concept to the people’s experience and to the reality that the people enjoyed that they would have never even envisioned such a possibility. ** As such, the “hard teaching” that some walked away from was not transubstantiation or the Catholic teaching regarding the Eucharist, b/c that teaching was never provided.**
b) Likewise, Christ made absolutely no mention and gave no indication that the flesh eating that he had in mind involved bread that had been mysteriously changed into his body. That such could be the case would also have been such a foreign concept to the people’s experience and to the reality that the people enjoyed that they would have never even envisioned such a possibility. ** As such, the “hard teaching” that some walked away from was not any sort of “real presence” teaching regarding the Eucharist, b/c that teaching was never provided.**
c) At the time of John 6 the Lord’s Supper had not been held and as such, there is no way that the audience could have even understood that Jesus was talking about a future Sacrament involving bread and wine. ** As such, the “hard teaching” that some rejected was not was not in any way connected to the Eucharist (in their minds), b/c the future existence of that Sacrament was totally unknown to the audience.**
What then was the “hard teaching” that they heard? I suppose (like Augustine) one could believe that they took Jesus to be requiring a cannibalistic act from them….such is possible b/c that is where a literal understanding (of his very graphic words) would lead. If that is right, then those that left rejected cannibalism (and the teacher of it).
I don’t know that any of those people would have thought that Jesus was requiring a cannibalistic act from them. Jesus was profoundly moral and cannibalism is profoundly immoral. I suspect many would have concluded that Jesus couldn’t have intended to be taken literally, but w/o further explanation from him, they wouldn’t have known what to make of his words. Those words wouldn’t have made sense and would have been offensive. If that is right, then those that left rejected (what to them seemed to be) a nonsensical and offensive teaching (and the perceived teacher of it).
The text doesn’t say why Jesus made no effort to clarify his meaning, but it makes it very clear that none left who had been actually called by the Father. Christ could have called out, “Wait I am only speaking metaphorically” or “Wait I am not speaking of cannibalism or of your teeth actually chewing my flesh”, but he didn’t, b/c it seems, that he didn’t care to.