What's the Moral of the loaves and the fishes?

[Johnny Canuck3]

Godless Glands has a better ring i think.....

Impious tripe?

 

[Mrs Magpie]

Oh, yeah, I came onto this thread to help with homework.... I remember Father Vincent talking about this many moons ago...OK so you've got the miracle, that's fairly obvious, but it's about Jesus feeding souls doing the preaching (that's why the five thousand were there) as well as feeding their stomachs with the loaves and fishes. There's also symbolism of the loaves & fishes....Gods dominion over earth (fields of wheat) and sea ....God providing and all that...there's also the 'bread of life' motif...this miracle is mentioned in all four gospels which marks it out....there's also loads of symbolism about numbers in this particular bit that I never really fully grasped apart from the 12 baskets of scraps left over after everyone has eaten....it's emphasised though and Jesus goes on about it to the disciples later ....hope this helps...expand it out...btw it's not just feeding the five thousand...that's just the men that were there, In one of the gospels (don't ask me which) it talks about even more there that were fed as well as the 5,000, ie the women and children.....also the original 5 loaves and 2 fishes came from a small boy in the crowd so that's loaded with symbolism too....this is also the first really major (as in big crowd to see it) miracle....I think there were a couple before that, but this was the one with really big production values if you see what I mean....

 

[In Bloom]

Theology by numbers

The two stories of the feeding of the multitude have long been thought to have hidden meaning, particularly due to Mark's later cryptic reference to them. In early times the feeding of the 5000 with 5 loaves was interpreted as being a reference to the five books of the Torah feeding the Jews, with the 12 scraps being the 12 tribes of Israel, or more usually the 12 disciples who, after Judaism, were left over...

The trouble with this sort of numerological interpretation of Biblical stories is that there are so many significant numbers in Christian mythology. Look far enough back into the Old Testament and you can find a number of something to match up with some mundane object in one of Jesus' miracles.

Personally, I reckon it's pretty basic stuff. God is powerful, God provides, God will fuck your shit up if you don't do what he says.

 

[I-Roy]

This is what wikipedia says:

The two stories of the feeding of the multitude have long been thought to have hidden meaning, particularly due to Mark's later cryptic reference to them. In early times the feeding of the 5000 with 5 loaves was interpreted as being a reference to the five books of the Torah feeding the Jews, with the 12 scraps being the 12 tribes of Israel, or more usually the 12 disciples who, after Judaism, were left over.

In view of the context of Mark's account of the first miracle, it is also possible that there is an implicit comparison with King David. David, when he first ran from King Saul, fed his small group of followers, those who acknowledged him as the rightful king, with the priest's bread, asking the priest "Give me 5 loaves, or whatever you have" (I Samuel 21:3). In Mark 6, Jesus "saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd" (Mark 6:34), and he seated them on the "green grass" (Mark 6:39) in the middle of the wilderness. Under this interpretation, Jesus would be feeding those who wanted to hear his teaching, as the new David, and yet still having enough left over for all Israel besides (12 baskets of fragments/ 12 tribes of Israel in the Old Testament/ 12 apostles as the leaders of the "New Israel" in the New Testament).

The feeding of the 4000 was historically regarded as far more cryptic, and though there was generally an agreement that the 4000 probably would represent the gentiles, since their feeding followed after the one that had strong Jewish themes, there were various different interpretations of the 7s in the narrative; for example, one interpretation had the 7 leftovers being the 7 early major Christian geographic divisions and the 7 loaves as the Jewish menorah, representing the Temple, and so the temple being superseded by the Christian Churches. What is certain, however, is that Jesus placed some significance on the number of baskets of leftovers from both miracles (the feeding of the 4000 and 5000): "'Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remmber? When I brake the five loaves among five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up?' THey said unto him, 'Twelve.' 'And when the seven among four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up?' And they said, 'Seven.' 'And He said unto them, 'How is it that ye do not understand?'" He never explicitly states the interpretation of the numbers, but it is clear from this passage that he attaches some importance to them. When taken along with the Israelite connections of the first miracle, the 4000 could be taken to signify people from all over the earth (the earth, in a Jewish conceptual cosmology, has 4 corners). The number 7 often bears the significance of wholeness, completeness in the Old Testament. A full week has 7 days; on the 7th day, God rests because his work is finished. Then there are 7 baskets left over, because Jesus can meet the needs not only those who have come to him here, but the whole, complete earth besides.

However, some of these interpretations were often arbitrary, and many would not be plausible at the time the Gospels were written; the Torah, for example, was at that time considered only 1 book, and was not divided into 5 until later. In consequence, there has been much speculation that the correct interpretation might be along lines similar to cryptic writings of Greek mysticism, such as Platonism. For example, there have been several attempts throughout history to regard the numbers as an instruction set for creating a mystic diagram, taking the gematria of the text into account.

More cynical and critical interpretations point out that the exact literal Greek text states only that Jesus displayed the loaves and fish, and did not give them out, suggesting that the text is a slight of hand - that the scraps were donations for the meal of the disciples themselves, and the multitude fed themselves by some other means.

The very few scholars who interpret the episode as neither allegory, nor miraculous, nor as having encoded meaning, occasionally see the second story as simply being a doubling of the first, with only a few numbers changed.

In Mark chapter 8, in the passage that describes Jesus warning his disciples to "beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, and of the leaven of Herod" (v.15), it is significant that in the course of the ensuing conversation, Jesus refers retrospectively to both the feeding of the 5000 (v.19) and the feeding of the 4000 (v.20). This creates a difficulty for those who interpret the two passages as if they described the same event twice.

Cheers for that - they may spot that a 12 yr old didn't write it

 

[WouldBe]

have you ever seen that program "amazing discoveries" where they set fire to the bonnet of a car and then magically clean it. and then try and sell you steak knives. its like that only with bread and fish. i am not sure of jesus offered the steak knife incentive.

Pfft. Not worth following if he's using steak knives on fish.

 

[kyser_soze]

What's the "fish of heaven" then?

Daryl Hannah in Splash, or Ariel the Litlle Mermaid?

I reckon it's a tip on inviting your local deity's offspring to a party running low on bread and booze meself...

My 3rd point is why conceal such a 'lesson' in such a stupidly obscure metaphor? Why not just be OBVIOUS about these things, make it nice and clear.

I don't want to go back to life of Brian here, but it's all a bit 'blessed are the cheesemakers' isn't it?

 

[Shippou-Sensei]

bread is practically the symbol of life (unless your one of those rice eating bastards!)

one you have one person being able to feed many that person is seen as a life giver

an interpretation would be the loaves and fishes highlight the bounty of the earth provided by god


another interpretation is like the above. that religion is another form of nourishment equally important to your life as bread and fish

sorta like religion will get your through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no religion (well it is the opiate of the masses)

hell and that's even before you link it to the whole eat of this bread for it is my body stuff

 

[Structaural]

I thought it was like that Stone Soup parable - where he makes everyone feel a bit guilty and get out their own bread and fishes that they've squirrelled away hoping for a bit of free food.

 

[kyser_soze]

This thread is, bizarrely, making me think of a couple of lines from JC Superstar:

'If you'd come to earth to day you could have told the whole nation
Israel in 3 BC had no mass communication'

 

[RhymnRzn]

^ i'd say the whole internet reminds me in many things of when there were gathered to the Lord an inumerable multitude of people, insomuch that they trode one upon another.......

 

[Hocus Eye.]

So there is Jesus with most of his best mates being fishermen, providing enough fish for 4 or 5 thousand people from just two original fish. He has just wiped out the market for fish for the day. He won't be popular with the bakers either.

The moral of the story is don't mess about with market forces.

 

[gentlegreen]

The moral of the story is don't mess about with market forces.

Perfect !