John 6 and the Eucharist

From Eric Svendsen's book, Evangelical Answers:

Catholics see in this passage [John 6] a direct teaching by Jesus about the Eucharist. They point out that Jesus calls himself the "bread" of life and that the one who "eats" this bread will live forever. They note that in order to have eternal life one must "eat [Jesus’] flesh" and "drink [Jesus’] blood," because Jesus’ flesh is "real" food and his blood is "real" drink.

What are we to make of these claims? Is this passage referring to the Eucharist? It must be pointed out at the start that the episode recorded in John 6 happened before the institution of the Eucharist in the other gospels (In fact, John does not record the Last Supper at all in his account). Therefore, none of the original hearers would have understood Jesus to be referring to the Eucharist. Instead, when Jesus did finally speak the eucharistic words "this is my body" the hearers would naturally have recalled Jesus’ words in John 6. The significance of this is that the Eucharist must then be seen as symbolizing Jesus’ teaching in John 6, not the other way around.

It must also be insisted that this passage is to be interpreted in light of the surrounding context. Jesus had just fed the five thousand (6:5-14). The very next day these same people, remembering what Jesus had done, compare Jesus’ miracle to Moses’ miracle of feeding the Israelites manna ("bread from heaven") for forty years (vv. 30-31), while Jesus had fed them for only a day. Jesus, playing off of the crowd’s comparison, states that he is the true bread from heaven (vv. 32-33). The crowd, still dull in understanding, ask to be given this "true" bread, whereupon Jesus says: "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty" (v. 35).

Jesus, of course, is saying nothing new. The same crowd had previously asked him what "work" needed to be done to earn eternal life (v. 28). Jesus, again playing off of their dullness, answers in an ironic fashion: "The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent" (v. 29). In other words, Jesus says: "You want works? Okay, here’s the work God requires—believe!" Jesus takes this same ironic tone with those in the crowd when answering their question about Moses’ provision of bread for forty years. Bread was considered a staple (as it is today), and Moses’ provision of "bread from heaven" meant that Moses provided that which was necessary to sustain life. Jesus picks up on that idea and says in essence: "You think Moses provided you with the necessities of life? He provided the sustenance for mere physical life. I will provide you with all the necessities to sustain eternal life!" Jesus uses the analogy of bread only because that is what the crowd was interested in at that moment.

That this is Jesus’ intent is clear from other passages in this same chapter. In the midst of the bread discourse Jesus affirms: "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty" (v. 35) There can be no doubt that what Jesus meant by "eating" and "drinking" him was to come to him and to believe in him. This is further evident from v. 47: "I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life," which is immediately followed by:

Again, Jesus equates the "eating" of him to believing in him. This belief results in eternal life:

Elsewhere in this passage Jesus states the same truth, but uses the analogy of bread—the sustenance of life:

Jesus’ point is that, just as physical bread sustains physical life by physically eating it, so Jesus is the heavenly bread that sustains spiritual life by spiritually "eating" him (i.e., believing in him). Physical food is no more in view here than is physical life.

Augustine’s view of this passage parallels the Evangelical view. To interpret it otherwise destroys the physical/spiritual contrast, reduces a life-giving, personal relationship to a mere physical consumption of food, and makes no sense at all of the text.

Another example of this kind of metaphor is found in John 4, where Jesus is met at the well by a Samaritan woman. After some preliminary conversation Jesus says:

This passage has many remarkable similarities to the John 6 passage. In John 6, Jesus picks up on the crowd’s interest in bread: in John 4, Jesus picks up on the woman’s interest in water. In both cases eternal life is in view. In both cases a metaphor of consumption is used to illustrate belief in Jesus. In both cases Jesus’ audience mistakenly takes the metaphor literally. In John 4, Jesus makes no attempt to clear up the woman’s confusion (i.e., he did not expressly state that drinking "living water" means to believe in him and have eternal life). In John 6, Jesus makes at least some attempt to explain what his metaphor means (Contra Keating [Catholicism and Fundamentalism] who thinks there was no attempt by Jesus to clarify that he was not speaking of literal bread). Keating asks, "If they had [been confused], why no corrections?" (233). But Keating ignores the fact that neither were there corrections by Jesus to the woman at the well in John 4. Yet, are we to take Jesus’ words there literally? In both cases Jesus’ audience compares him to one of the Old Testament patriarchs (John 4—Jacob; John 6—Moses).

Since Jesus is obviously speaking of the same thing in both passages (eternal life), the question must be asked: If the Catholic church insists on viewing Jesus’ words in John 6 literally (so that we must literally eat bread to gain eternal life), why does that same Catholic church not teach that we must drink physical water to gain eternal life per John 4? Why understand the "eating and drinking" in John 6 as literal, physical eating, and not understand the "drinking" in John 4 as a literal, physical drinking? Conversely, if one understands John 4 symbolically, then one has no basis for rejecting the symbolic understanding of John 6.

(In a recent internet debate, Catholic apologist David Palm asserts that trôgô is never used symbolically in the New Testament. But this is simply not the case. The only other time this word is used in John it is clearly in a symbolic sense: "He who shares [trôgô] my bread has lifted up his heel against me" (John 13:18). This is a quotation by Jesus of Ps 41:9 to show that Judas’ betrayal fulfills the Scriptures. The phrase "he who eats my bread" is no more "literal" than that Judas literally "lifted up his heel" against Jesus. The former symbolizes that the betrayer would be an intimate friend, while the latter symbolizes the betrayal itself).

Third, if one insists that John 6 is a reference to the Eucharist, then the inescapable conclusion according to this passage is that anyone who does not partake of the Eucharist does not have eternal life. Christ states unequivocally that "unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you" (John 6:53). Clearly, if this is a reference to the Eucharist, then no Evangelical has eternal life. Catholic apologists do not want to take Jesus’ statement to its logical conclusion. They believe that Evangelicals can and do have eternal life without partaking of the Catholic Eucharist. Yet, Jesus’ words could not be clearer. Catholic apologists want to have their eucharistic cake and eat it too; but they cannot. Either Jesus is not referring to the Catholic Eucharist in this passage and Evangelicals can have eternal life; or Jesus is referring to the Catholic Eucharist and Evangelicals cannot have eternal life. The latter proposition contradicts the Catholic Catechism, which refers to Protestants as "separated brethren" whose churches are a "means of salvation" (Catechism, Art. 818-819). The Catholic apologist will have to decide whether he believes Jesus’ clear statement in John 6, or the official teaching of Rome. They cannot both be true.