This is what the early church believed about the understanding of those who left. I am sure there is more written about this, but this is all I am aware of. Aren’t these writings showing that these early Christians believed that those who left misunderstood?
Augustine:
“It seemed unto them hard that He said, Except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, you have no life in you:
they received it foolishly, they thought of it carnally, and imagined that the Lord would cut off parts from His body, and give unto them; and they said, This is a hard saying. It was they who were hard, not the saying; for unless they had been hard, and not meek, they would have said unto themselves, He says not this without reason, but there must be some latent mystery herein. They would have remained with Him, softened, not hard: and would have learned that from Him which they who remained, when the others departed, learned.”
newadvent.org/fathers/1801099.htm
- Many therefore, not of His enemies, but of His disciples, when they had heard this, said, This is a hard saying; who can hear it? If His disciples accounted this saying hard, what must His enemies have thought? And yet so it behooved that to be said which should not be understood by all. The secret of God ought to make men eagerly attentive, not hostile. But these men quickly departed from Him, while the Lord said such things: they did not believe Him to be saying something great, and covering some grace by these words; they understood just according to their wishes, and in the manner of men, that Jesus was able, or was determined upon this, namely, to distribute the flesh with which the Word was clothed, piecemeal, as it were, to those that believe in Him. This, say they, is a hard saying; who can hear it?
newadvent.org/fathers/1701027.htm
Tertullian:
He says, it is true, that the flesh profits nothing; John*6:63 but then, as in the former case, the meaning must be regulated by the subject which is spoken of. Now, because
they thought His discourse was harsh and intolerable, supposing that He had really and literally enjoined on them to eat his flesh, He, with the view of ordering the state of salvation as a spiritual thing, set out with the principle, It is the spirit that quickens; and then added, The flesh profits nothing,— meaning, of course, to the giving of life.
newadvent.org/fathers/0316.htm
John Chrysostom:
“John 6:63
It is the Spirit that quickens, the flesh profits nothing.
His meaning is, You must hear spiritually what relates to Me, for he who hears carnally is not profited, nor gathers any advantage. It was carnal to question how He came down from heaven, to deem that He was the son of Joseph, to ask, How can he give us His flesh to eat?
All this was carnal, when they ought to have understood the matter in a mystical and spiritual sense. But, says some one, how could they understand what the ‘eating flesh’ might mean? Then it was their duty to wait for the proper time and enquire, and not to abandon Him.
The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life.
That is, they are divine and spiritual, have nothing carnal about them, are not subject to the laws of physical consequence, but are free from any such necessity, are even set above the laws appointed for this world, and have also another and a different meaning. Now as in this passage He said spirit, instead of spiritual, so when He speaks of flesh, He meant not carnal things, but carnally hearing, and alluding at the same time to them, because they ever desired carnal things when they ought to have desired spiritual. For if a man receives them carnally, he profits nothing. What then, is not His flesh, flesh? Most certainly. How then says He, that the flesh profits nothing? He speaks not of His own flesh, (God forbid!) but of those who received His words in a carnal manner. But what is understanding carnally? It is looking merely to what is before our eyes, without imagining anything beyond. This is understanding carnally. But we must not judge thus by sight, but must look into all mysteries with the eyes within. This is seeing spiritually. He that eats not His flesh, and drinks not His blood, has no life in him. How then does the flesh profit nothing, if without it we cannot live? Do you see that the words, the flesh profits nothing, are spoken not of His own flesh, but of carnal hearing?”
