I’d like to point out a few interesting facets of scripture that may shed some light on the passage:
“Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down from heaven–not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.” These things He said in the synagogue as He taught in Capernaum." John 6:53-59
- This teaching metaphor was taught at synagogue, to devout Jews, who have been waiting for the advent of their savior, and were unwittingly sitting in the same room as He. It follows on the heels of two important contextual clues regarding the current attitude of his very Jewish audience:
“The Jews then complained about Him, because He said, "I am the bread which came down from heaven." John 6:41
And
“The Jews therefore quarreled among themselves, saying, "How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?" John 6:52
Don’t let this context escape you while you consider the next part.
- Jesus had previously taught a Samaritan woman a similar idea using water as the essential source of eternal life:
“Jesus answered and said to her, "Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life." John 4:13-14
- Likewise, at the same event, he taught His disciples this idea about food:
“In the meantime His disciples urged Him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.” But He said to them, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.” Therefore the disciples said to one another, “Has anyone brought Him anything to eat?” Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work.” John 4:31-34
- Lastly, these teachings all occurred prior to (years before) the event we call “the last supper”; the event in which Jesus teaches his inner-circle of devout disciples how to internalize what was about to happen; and how to never allow the significance of the ensuing events to ever leave their memory. Three Gospel writers record it for posterity, John leaves it out of his gospel.
When you put these events within their context you will find that neither the Samaritan hearers in John 4, nor His disciples, nor the Jewish hearers in John 6 could ever have imagined anything like Jesus inaugurating a communion service, or any kind of ritual eating being prescribed. The “last supper” was the “first communion”; the idea of a commemorative eating flesh and blood had, to this point, not been established, not yet even imagined. All of the above teachings are tied together in the idea of internalizing The Living Word of God, (John 1:1), and have no real dietary or ritualistic salvific instruction. We are no more instructed to eat physical flesh or drink physical blood than we are expected to have a physical fountain of water spring out of our belly-button.
Jesus likened (symbolized) Himself as water, bread, and wine partially because of their universal and ubiquitous nature; these simple elements would have been handled every day, by every hearer, and attaching wisdom to them, via a significant memory, is a gift to us that aids us in our anthropological short attention spans, and counters our human proclivity to focus on minor things at the expense of major things. These teachings, and admonitions are gracious expressions of God’s unending love for His dear Children; the bride of His Son.
Imagine, what manner of Love God has bestowed on us; imagine, we can actually be called Sons of God!
(1 Jn 3:1)
Peace and blessings
KP
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