3. Feeding the 5000

Question 1

1. What Happened?

Answer 1

• Jesus is in Galilee with a huge crowd that has come to hear him preach
• Bread and Fish multiplied to feed 5000
• Nature Miracle: multiplying of bread and fish happens in nature.
- Wheat is planted and multiplies, fish spawn and multiply
- Natural fertility was created by God (Be fruitful and increase in number)
- Jesus does the same thing, showing him to be God!

Question 2

2. The Bread

Answer 2

• Barley loaves would have been flat unleavened bread (stable diet of the poor and the bread used at the Jewish Passover)
• Bread represents Jesus’ body, which is shared by Christians at the Eucharist (Jesus takes Bread, gives thanks then distributes it)
• Some believe that the 5 Loaves symbolises the 5 wounds that Jesus suffered or the 5 sense that believers come to know God’s Creation
• Bread could represent Christian message being spread (disciples hand it out)

Question 3

3. The Fish

Answer 3

• Probably would have been dried or pickled sardines.
• Links to Jesus’ disciples being fishermen. (Jesus said to his disciples: “I will send you out to fish for people”)
• Fish represent the souls of people who believe in Christ.
• Early Christians use the symbol of the fish as a symbol. Greek for Fish was code for ‘Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour’

Question 4

4. Eternal Life

Answer 4

• Disciples think the crowd suffer from physical hunger, which can be dealt with by spending money.
• Jesus diagnoses them as suffering from spiritual hunger.
• Loaves and fish symbolise Eternal Life that will truly satisfy.

Question 5

5. 12 Baskets

Answer 5

• More than enough bread created symbolising God’s Grace
• Hebrew numbering system symbolises 12 as perfection (12 baskets)
• 12 Tribes of Israelites, bot only 2 survived (2 fish?
• Jesus appoints 12 Disciples to be his team

Question 6

6. Kingly Messiah

Answer 6

• Crowd want to make Jesus a king, but Jesus escapes
• Suggests that Galileans wanted Jesus to be a Kingly Messiah
• Crowd may have been Zealots.
• Wilson: Jesus’ instruction to “make the men sit down” is a coded message that Zealots should abandon their violent rebellion against Rome.

Question 7

7. Implications

Answer 7

• Eucharist (Johannine Community definitely upheld this)
• Bultmann: argued NT needed to be de-mythologised to get to its original teaching. This was not a miracle, but people being pressured into sharing.

Question 8

Summary

Answer 8

1. What Happened?
2. The Bread
3. The Fish
4. Eternal Life
5. 12 Baskets
6. Kingly Messiah
7. Implications