32 Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I
say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth
you the true bread from heaven. 33 For
the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the
world.
Here, Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah, God in the flesh,
contradicts the Jewish understanding of the following passages from the Old
Testament and the event itself.
Exodus 16:4 Then said the LORD unto Moses, Behold, I will
rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a
certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my
law, or no.
Psalm 105:40 The people asked, and he brought quails, and
satisfied them with the bread of heaven.
Nehemiah 9:15 And gavest them bread from heaven for their
hunger, and broughtest forth water for them out of the rock for their thirst,
and promisedst them that they should go in to possess the land which thou hadst
sworn to give them.
The bread from heaven the Jews received in the wilderness
was but a shadow, a type of what was to come. This event and these passages
pointed, like many others, to the presence of Jesus Christ on the earth,
offering salvation to the Jews and then, to all mankind. He offered the reality
of God. As He said here in referring to the, “true bread from heaven,” the
gospel writer, John, later refers to Jesus as the true God;
1John 5:20 And we know that the Son of God is come, and
hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are
in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and
eternal life.
True, in Biblical parlance, means authentic and real and
genuine along with meaning the opposite of a lie or a falsehood.
Genesis 42:11 We are all one man’s sons; we are true men,
thy servants are no spies.
In Jesus’ speech He corrects many misunderstandings about
the meaning of Old Testament events and written statements. For instance, in
the following verse He clarifies what, “Thou shalt not kill,” in Exodus 20:13
and Deuteronomy 5:17 means;
Matthew 19:18 He saith unto him, Which? Jesus said, Thou
shalt do no murder, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not steal, Thou
shalt not bear false witness,
…even though He also quotes it as, “kill,” in the same
gospel as reported by the same gospel writer;
Matthew 5:21 Ye have heard that it was said by them of old
time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the
judgment:
So, it is not a matter of Matthew’s opinion getting in the
way of God’s words as a liberal theologian might contend.
Jesus also, in another place defines what, “some
uncleanness,” means, which is the Jew’s justification for finding no favor in a
wife’s husband’s eyes, which is the literal context.
Deuteronomy 24:1
¶ When a man hath taken a wife, and
married her, and it come to pass that she find no favour in his eyes, because
he hath found some uncleanness in her: then let him write her a bill of
divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house.
See how the Pharisees, like a Christian fundamentalist
today, twisted that;
Matthew 19:3 ¶ The Pharisees also came unto him, tempting
him, and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every
cause? 4 And he answered and said unto
them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male
and female, 5 And said, For this cause
shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they
twain shall be one flesh? 6 Wherefore
they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together,
let not man put asunder. 7 They say unto
him, Why did Moses then command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put
her away? 8 He saith unto them, Moses
because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but
from the beginning it was not so. 9 And
I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for
fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth
her which is put away doth commit adultery. 10
His disciples say unto him, If the case of the man be so with his wife,
it is not good to marry. 11 But he said
unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given.
12 For there are some eunuchs, which
were so born from their mother’s womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were
made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs
for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. He that is able to receive it, let him
receive it.
Notice how they had taken, “some uncleanness,” and
interpreted it by the finding no favor part of the Law, which was backwards.
Fornication, that the bride had put herself up as a virgin but had been immoral
before she was married legally, was the only cause for divorce in this
instance. Without going into vulgar details understand that a woman who falsely
professed to be pure could have been stoned as per Deuteronomy 22. This was the, “some uncleanness,” not a
criminal charge but suspicion in its vagueness, therefore requiring a bill of
divorcement rather than a charge before the elders. Jesus notes that this
freedom was given because men’s hearts were hard implying that God would prefer
forgiveness.
Notice, that this
misunderstanding and misapplication of the Law also made others sinners,
perhaps without knowledge. But certainly, under the Law given by Moses, Jesus
asserts that whoever puts his wife away for any reason other than fornication
and marries another is committing adultery and anyone who marries a woman who
was put away for any reason other than fornication is committing adultery.
Finally, in this context, a eunuch is someone who follows the disciples’
complaint and does not marry and does not produce offspring. It has nothing to
do with a person who engages in homosexual behavior. Examine the context and
quit misrepresenting God in your speech and teaching. Do you think that God is
pleased when either a conservative Christian or a non-believer rips a verse out
of context to make it mean something He never meant it to mean to satisfy their
own agenda? I can think of a dozen examples of that in typical fundamentalist
preaching without even straining. It is abomination.
Jesus is here about to drop a bombshell and the hard of
heart will totally misunderstand it, although the context should make it clear.
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