Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of John 6:4
And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh.
4. And the Passover ] Better, Now the Passover.
a feast of the Jews ] Rather, the feast of the Jews. Possibly this near approach of the Passover is given merely as a date to mark the time. As already noticed (see on Joh 2:13), S. John groups his narrative round the Jewish festivals. But the statement may also be made as a further explanation of the multitude. Just before the Passover large bands of pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem would be passing along the east shore of the lake. But we find that the multitude in this case are quite ready ( Joh 6:24) to cross over to Capernaum, as if they had no intention of going to Jerusalem; so that this interpretation of the verse is uncertain. Still more doubtful is the theory that this verse gives a key of interpretation to the discourse which follows, the eating of Christ’s flesh and blood being the antitype of the Passover. Of this there is no indication whatever. It is safest to regard the verse as a mere note to time. In any case the addition of ‘the feast of the Jews’ again indicates that the author is writing away from Palestine. From Joh 7:1 it would seem that Jesus did not go up to Jerusalem for this Passover
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
The passover – See the notes at Mat 26:2, Mat 26:17.
A feast of the Jews – This is one of the circumstances of explanation thrown in by John which show that he wrote for those who were unacquainted with Jewish customs.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 4. And the passover – was nigh.] This happened about ten or twelve days before the third passover which Christ celebrated after his baptism. Calmet. For a particular account of our Lord’s four passovers See Clarke on Joh 2:13.
For thirty days before the Passover there were great preparations made by the Jews, but especially in the last nineteen days, in order to celebrate the feast with due solemnity. Lightfoot supposes that what is here related happened within the last fifteen days. See Calmet’s opinion above.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
4. passover . . . was nighbutfor the reason mentioned (Joh 7:1),Jesus kept away from it, remaining in Galilee.
Joh6:14-21. JESUS WALKSON THE SEA.
(Also see on Mr6:45-56).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh. This was the third passover, since our Lord’s baptism, and entrance on his public ministry; see Joh 2:13. Whether Christ went up to this feast is not certain; some think he did not; but from what is said in Joh 7:1, it looks as if he did: how nigh it was to the feast, cannot well be said. Thirty days before the feast, they began to talk about it; and especially in the last fifteen days, they made preparations for it, as being at hand b; and if there was now so long time to it, there was time enough for Jesus to go to it.
b T. Bab. Pesach. fol. 6. 1. Maimon. & Bartenora in Misn. Shekalim, c. 3. sect. 1.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The feast of the Jews ( ). Here used of the passover ( ) as in 7:2 of the tabernacles. This is probably the third passover in Christ’s ministry (2:13 and one unmentioned unless 5:1 be it). In 2:13, here, and 11:55 (the last one) the adverb (near) is used. John is fond of notes of time. Jesus failed to go to this passover because of the hostility in Jerusalem (7:1).
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
A feast [ ] . With the definite article, the feast; pointing to something well known.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “And the passover was nigh,” (en de engus to pascha) “The passover was then near,” that is the time or season of the annual Jewish Passover was near, Joh 2:13; Joh 11:5.
2) “A feast of the Jews.” (he heorte ton loudaion) “The feast of the Jews,” the most high feast of more than half a dozen that they observed annually, Purim, Tabernacles, etc.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
(4) A feast.Better, the feast. Comp. Joh. 5:1. This is added by St. John only, and is not simply a note of time, but gives a key of interpretation to the sign itself, and to the discourse which followed.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
4. The passover A caravan on its way to the Passover may have furnished a large part of the concourse. These may have been specially taken with the idea of crowning Jesus as King Messiah, and bearing him in triumph to Jerusalem.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘Now the Passover, the Feast of the Jews, was at hand.’
This mention of the Passover connects with the line Jesus would take later (Joh 6:52-58), and was probably deliberately inserted here by John in order to connect Jesus’ present actions and teaching with the sacrifice of the Passover. He sees Jesus as the Passover lamb (compare Joh 1:29), Who is offering His life for our deliverance, a sacrifice of which we, and the crowd, are called upon to partake. We find later that this was very much in Jesus’ mind too, and should be borne in mind in interpreting the chapter. John constantly stresses the Passover. But this Passover was evidently not so close in time that Jesus felt it necessary to commence the journey to Jerusalem. That the incident was prior to the Passover is confirmed by the mention of ‘green grass’ (Joh 6:10 with Mar 6:39).
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Joh 6:4. The passover, a feast of the Jews, This is generally supposed to be the third passover of our Lord’s public ministry. The evangelist probably mentions this to shew the time of the year, &c.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Joh 6:4 . ] close at hand . See on Joh 5:1 . Paulus wrongly renders it not long since past . See, on the contrary, Joh 2:13 , Joh 7:2 , Joh 11:55 . The statement is intended as introductory to Joh 6:5 , explaining how it happened (comp. Joh 11:55 ) that Jesus, after He had withdrawn to the mountain, was again attended by a great multitude (Joh 6:5 ), a thing which could not have happened had not the Passover been nigh. It was another crowd (not, as is commonly assumed, that named in Joh 6:2 , which had followed Him in His progress towards the lake), composed of pilgrims to the feast , who therefore were going the opposite way, from the neighbourhood of the lake in the direction of Jerusalem . Thus Joh 6:4 is not a mere chronological note (B. Crusius, Maier, Brckner, Ewald), against which the analogy of Joh 7:2 (with the following, Joh 6:3 ) is decisive; nor is it, because every more specific hint to that effect is wanting, to be looked upon as referring by anticipation [224] to the following discourse of Jesus concerning eating His flesh and blood as the antitype of the Passover (B. Bauer; comp. Baur, p. 262, Luthardt, Hengstenberg, and already Lampe).
. ] . . There is no intimation that Jesus Himself went up to this feast (Lcke). See rather Joh 7:1 .
[224] Comp. also Godet: Jesus must have been in the position “ d’un proscrit ,” and could not go to Jerusalem to the Passover; He therefore saw in the approaching multitudes a sign from the Father, and thought, “ Et moi aussi, je clbrerai une pque .” This is pure invention.
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
4 And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh.
Ver. 4. And the passover ] The third passover (likely) after his baptism. And this might occasion him to speak of the spiritual eating of himself, the true Paschal Lamb: for even “Christ our passover was sacrificed for us,”1Co 5:71Co 5:7 .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
4. ] This will account, not for so great a multitude coming to Him , but perhaps (?) for the circumstance that the people at that time were gathered in multitudes, ready to set out on their journey to Jerusalem. We must remember also that the reference of the following discourse to the Passover being so pointed, the remark would naturally be here inserted by the Evangelist: but I would not, with Luthardt (i. 80; ii. 41) insist on this as the only reason for his making it.
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Joh 6:4 . But another crowd was to be accounted for, as Joh 6:4 intimates, , “now the Passover, the Jewish feast, was at hand”. [Grotius says: “Hoc ideo interjicit, ut intelligatur tempus fuisse opportunum ad eliciendam multitudinem, et quo melius cohaereat quod de herba sequitur”. Godet’s account of the insertion of this clause, that it was meant to show that the nearness of the Passover suggested to Jesus the idea “we will keep a Passover here,” is plainly out of the question.] Jesus therefore (or better, “accordingly”; connects what He saw with the foregoing statement).
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
And = Now.
passover. Greek. pascha. Aramaic. App-94.
a = the.
feast of the Jews. See note on Joh 2:13.
Jews. See note on Joh 1:19.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
4.] This will account, not for so great a multitude coming to Him, but perhaps (?) for the circumstance that the people at that time were gathered in multitudes, ready to set out on their journey to Jerusalem. We must remember also that the reference of the following discourse to the Passover being so pointed, the remark would naturally be here inserted by the Evangelist: but I would not, with Luthardt (i. 80; ii. 41) insist on this as the only reason for his making it.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Joh 6:4. , nigh) There was a great concourse of men at that time of the year: ch. Joh 11:55, Many went out of the country up to Jerusalem, before the Passover, to purify themselves.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
John 6:4
Joh 6:4
Now the passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.-The feast of the Passover came on the fourteenth day of the month Abib or Nisan. If we count the feast mentioned in chapter 5:1 as a Passover feast, this is the third Passover since the baptism of Jesus. It shows that John recorded but little of what Jesus said or did in the earlier years of his public ministry. Only what is given in the fifth chapter is of what he did and taught during these years and yet Jesus was not idle.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Joh 2:13, Joh 5:1, Joh 11:55, Joh 12:1, Joh 13:1, Exo 12:6-14, Lev 23:5, Lev 23:7, Deu 16:1
Reciprocal: Mar 6:37 – give Luk 2:41 – the
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
CHRIST AND THE GREAT COMPANY
And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh. When Jesus then lifted up His eyes, and saw a great company come unto Him, Be saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat?
Joh 6:4-5
In this miracle our Lord appears as the Master of matterof material things, of natural laws. Let us, for one moment, endeavour to trace the contrast between the Son of Man and the sons of men in this respect.
I. We are the slaves of matter.Not only is our bodily organisation material, but matter seems to penetrate into the very inner sanctuary of the mind, so that a great number of those words which denote intellectual acts are derived from material objects. Yet there is, of course, another sense in which man may look upon himself as the lord of matter and of natural things. Witness the triumphs of the present day. Witness the fairy tales of science and the results of time. And yet, when we come to look at it closely, there is nothing royal or masterful in it after all. How does man prepare himself for these great achievements? By the humiliation of his spirit. Man stands utterly impotent before law.
II. But our Lord exercises over material things a direct and illimitable power.So, in this miracle, that which is not living is diminished by distribution; but He stands there apparently hour after hour in the midst of the multitude, and He takes the fragments of the five small loaves and of the two dead fishes, and impresses upon them the stamp of a higher life. There are around us thoughtful men, awed and terrified by the cold shadow of fatality, which seems more and more creeping on, and moving over what appeared before to be the domain of mans free action, who say with awe and astonishment, Do what you will, there is still the same broad, awful margin for vice and pauperism; still the hungry generations are treading down the weak and the despised. Shall there be no end of these thingsno escape from them? Do we believe in the life of our Lord? Then, above and around these perturbations and irregularities of time and of sin, there is a calmer and diviner world, of which Christ is King.
III. The parable of the bread.The ministry of our Blessed Lord consists of two great divisionsHis words and His works. His acts speak; His words are works. His miracles are parables, if we can only read their meaning. We should be better able to understand the refreshment that may come to us from the parable of the bread, if we read it in the light of our daily prayer, Give us this day our daily bread. What does that familiar petition mean? It means, no doubt, in the first instance, Give us our daily food; give us food sufficient for us. Let us not spiritualise this away on the one hand, nor let us gird in those words with the narrow run of the loaf and joint. They mean, surely, something more than our daily food. Surely it is not in vain, too, that this miracle has been recorded by all the four evangelists that our minds might, so to speak, become saturated with it.
IV. It is the eternal parable of the eternally abiding Church of our ever-living and ever-present Lord in its agency amongst us. There are many substitutes for the bread of Christ. We have heard a good deal about a morality utterly without dogma, which is to work like an infallible charm; which is to convince every educated child that lying, and stealing, and disobedience will as infallibly entail punishment and evil consequences as putting his hand into the fire or jumping from the garret window. We have been told of a refined education, which, when men shall have to eat their bread in sorrow and bitterness, will teach them to take the world of art as a resting-place for their spirits, and to give a hush to all their griefs. If this be so, we may as well push away at once the thorn-crowned Galilan, Who, from the centre of that true manhood of His, felt round the whole vast circumference of human sorrow. Are there amongst us any hearts that God once wounded, but which have been healed again? The fresh and dewy ocean breezes, the snowy heights of the Alps or the Pyrenees, to which you have carried your broken heartare these the things that have given you rest? Has it not been kneeling at the Holy Communion, the quiet hours spent over your Bible, and the learning from that the hope of meeting in the everlasting heaven?
Archbishop Alexander.
Illustration
A great miracle; but, as St. Augustine says, we shall not wonder much at what was done if we give heed to Him that did it. He Who multiplied the five loaves is He Who multiplies the seeds that grow in the earth, so that barns are at last filled by them. But because He does this every year no one marvels. Men marvel not at what is greater, but at what is rare. For Who is He that even now feeds the whole world, but He that of a few grains creates whole harvests? Christ wrought, therefore, as God. The power was in His hands; but those five loaves were as seed, not indeed committed to the earth, but multiplied by Him Who made the earth.
(SECOND OUTLINE)
LOVE, POWER, ORDER
In this miracle we see the love, the power, and the order of heaven. The Good Shepherd was feeding His flock, and there was abundant provision for them all. They did all eat and were filled. And they took up twelve baskets full of the fragments, and of the fishes. Nothing was wasted, nothing lost.
Probably in blessing the food our Lord would adopt the ordinary form of thanksgiving in use at the time. Blessed art Thou, Jehovah our God, King of the world, Who causes to come forth bread from the earth.
I. In this prayer we notice, first, the look up to heaven which is characteristic of man, who is Gods child, created in His image, that He may know, love, and gratefully serve his heavenly Father in the spirit of piety and holy fear. No animal looks up to God or knows Him as the source of all blessings. Prayer is the ascent of the soul to God, and prayer is one of the chief marks which distinguish man from the beasts around him. To live without prayer is to live the life of a beast, not of a man upon earth. Our Lord, Who, as Perfect Man, is our example, looked up to heaven, and blessed the loaves before He brake them. If we follow His example we shall never forget to ask a blessing on our food, and to give thanks for it after we have taken it.
II. The second thought given to us in the prayer is that it is God Who causes bread to come forth from the earth. The germination of seed, the rise of the sap in the trees, the ripening of the corn, fruits, and flowers, year by year, is a never-ceasing wonder. God is not Nature, and Nature is not God, but our Lord Jesus Christ taught us that it is God Who clothes the lilies and all the flowers with their colour, and gives them beauty of form and fragrant scent. What we commonly call Nature would have no existence but for the upholding and directing power of God. Jesus Christ has taught us to say, Give us this day our daily bread. Living creatures, who need food for their sustenance, depend upon the Giver of that food.
III. Christ in His work made His disciples fellow-workers together with Himself.He used their ministry in feeding the multitude. Christ did not specially create the barley loaves and fishes, but took them out of the hands of a lad who was standing in the crowd, blessed them, and gave them to the apostles for distribution. Had the disciples taken the bread to the people without first bringing it to Christ, St. Andrews remark, What are they among so many? would have proved true. In all work done for Gods glory and the good of men, we should begin by bringing whatever we have to Christ for His blessing. He is with us still as the Head over all things to the Church, which is His body.
Rev. Canon Bodington.
Illustration
All our earthly comforts come to us originally from the hand of Christ; whoever brings them, He sends them; He distributes to them who distribute to us. So of spiritual blessings; in distributing the Bread of Life to those that follow Him, He is pleased to make use of the ministration of His disciples; they are the servitors of His Table, or, rather, rulers in His household, to give to every one their portion of meat in due season.
(THIRD OUTLINE)
SUPERFICIAL, YET PROFOUND
The miracle wrought. We learn from it (1) superficial lessons; (2) profounder lessons.
I. Superficial lessons.
(a) A lesson of considerateness in little things. No great suffering or distress would have befallen the multitude had they gone away without a meal; only inconvenience. But this inconvenience the thoughtfulness of the Saviour would spare them.
(b) A lesson of order. The men carefully arranged in plots, with broad passages between them. No confusion. The whole scene, busy as it was, characterised by the most perfect quietude and propriety.
(c) A lesson of economy. Possibly the disciples surprised to find Christ attaching so much importance to fragments of coarse food, especially after such a wonderful display of His power. But every gift of God to be made the most of. Fragments of time, money, opportunity, influence not to be flung away, but used.
(d) A lesson as to the source of our blessings. The food conveyed to the recipients by the disciples, but Christ the real Bestower of of it. So our blessings, temporal and spiritual, come to us through the instrumentality of other menparents, friends, ministersbut all to be traced up to Christ Himself.
II. The profounder lesson.Christ the Sustainer of spiritual life, as He is the Giver of it. At the present moment it was not revealed that He sustains this life by imparting Himself. But the revelation was soon made in the synagogue of Capernaum, and the miracle prepared the way for it.
Rev. Prebendary Gordon Calthrop.
Illustrations
(1) All other miracles of Christ are of a restorative character; but this is a grand exhibition of creative goodness, and, as such, stands alone in the Gospel narratives. It is, indeed, so remarkable that even John, who professes to give the words of Jesus rather than the acts of Jesus, records it fully.
(2) Still to-day Christ gives both rest and food to all who come to Him. Still to-day He fills the hungry with good things. Dr. Arnot tells of a young Scotch girl who was sent to Madeira to escape the cold of a winter in Scotland. She wrote home a charming account of the place, of the climate and the landscape. And even in the matter of health there was neither sickness nor pain. But there was one sad complaint running through the lettershe could not eat. If only the appetite returned she felt she would be well. The next mail brought the news she was dead and buried. She died not for want of food, but from want of hunger.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
4
This is the third occurrence of the Passover in the course of Christ’s public ministry. The fourth and last is in chapter 13.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh.
[And the Passover was nigh.] “It is a tradition. They inquire and discourse about the rites of the Passover, thirty days before the feast.”
From the entrance of these thirty days and so onward, this feast was in the eyes and mouth of this people, but especially in the fifteen days immediately before the Passover. Hence, perhaps, we may take the meaning of these words, the Passover was nigh.
From the entrance or beginning of these thirty days, viz. “From the fifteenth day of the month Adar, they repaired the ways, the streets, the bridges, the pools, and despatched all other public business; they painted the sepulchres, and proceeded about matters of a heterogeneous nature.”
“These are all the businesses of the public; they judged all pecuniary faults, those also that were capital, and those for which the offenders were scourged. They redeemed devoted things; they made the suspected wife drink; they burnt the red heifer; they bored the ear of the Hebrew servant; they cleansed the lepers, and removed the covers from the well,” that every one might be at liberty to drink.
The Gloss is, “And some that were deputed in that affair went abroad to see if the fields were sown with corn, and the vineyards planted with heterogeneous trees.”
Fuente: Lightfoot Commentary Gospels
Joh 6:4. Now the passover, the feast of the Jews, was nigh. On the words of the Jews see the notes on Joh 1:19, Joh 2:13. The addition here serves to explain why Jesus did not go up to the Passover. He had been rejected by the Jews at the former Passover (Joh 2:18): the feast, which had before that time been robbed by them of its sanctity, belonged after their rejection of Him no longer to His Father but to the Jews. But if Jesus did not visit Jerusalem for this festival, why is it mentioned here? It certainly serves a chronological purpose (though it must be remembered that we cannot say with absolute certainly that this was the Passover immediately following that of Joh 2:11); but even in such incidental notices as these John has not his eye only or chiefly on chronology. Some have supposed that it is to account for the crowds which followed Him, and which may have consisted mainly or partly of the Galilean caravan on its way to the holy city to attend the feast. But Joh 6:2 makes this unlikely, for it gives an entirely different explanation of the concourse. Besides which, Joh 6:5 seems to connect the notice of the season and the miracle to follow in such a way as to suggest rather an internal than an external relation between them. It is probable, therefore, that the Evangelist by this mention of the Passover intends to show us the light in which the whole narrative should be viewed. The miracle and the discourses alike relate to the true Passover, the reality and substance of that feast which has now, alas! become the feast of the Jews.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Evidently John identified the nearness of the Passover because of Jesus’ later references to Himself as the Bread of Life (Joh 6:33; Joh 6:35; Joh 6:51), the fulfillment of what the Passover bread typified.
"The people were thinking in terms of blood, flesh, lambs, and unleavened bread. They longed for a new Moses who would deliver them from Roman bondage." [Note: Blum, p. 293.]
This was John’s second reference to a Passover feast during Jesus’ ministry (cf. Joh 2:13; Joh 2:23; Joh 11:55; Joh 13:1). Evidently this event happened two years after Jesus’ first cleansing of the temple and one year before He died on the cross. It would have taken place in April of A.D. 32. [Note: See Hoehner, pp. 55-59, 61, 143.]
"The movement from the miracle to the discourse, from Moses to Jesus (Joh 6:32-35, cf. Joh 1:17), and, above all, from bread to flesh, is almost unintelligible unless the reference in Joh 6:4 to the Passover picks up i. 29, 36, anticipates xix. 36 (Exo 12:46; Num 9:12), and governs the whole narrative." [Note: Hoskyns, p. 281.]
The Passover was an intensely nationalistic celebration in Israel. This accounts for the extreme zeal that many of the Jews demonstrated when they sought to draft Jesus as their political deliverer (Joh 6:15).