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Doulos,
The verbage in the greek changes in the 6th Chapter of St. John's Gospel. First he uses the word phagein which means to eat in an orderly way, think High Tea at 2:30 with Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth. Later he changes the verb to trogein which means to crunch, gnaw, or chew. It is used in the context of the feeding of animals. This is after they grumble about "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?"

Symbolically and idiomaically in Semitic languages, to eat someone's flesh and drink his blood means to persecute him. Why would Our Lord order us to do that? (Ezek 39:17-20; Num 23:24; Is 49:26)

Also, where else does the Spirit mean symbolic in Scripture? "...Babptize them in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Symbolic???"

I have more, but I'm pressed for time.

God Bless You,

Dr. Eric

Dr Eric,
I didn't mean to equate "spiritual" with "symbolic." My main question is: what does the Lord Jesus mean when He says that the flesh avails nothing? He says this after some in the crowd have questionned Him and left because He tells them to eat His flesh. So when He says the flesh avails nothing, He is talking to those who have chosen to stay with Him and are more likely to be seeking to really follow Him. Maybe, in light of the persecution aspect, He is pointing to the persecution that all beleivers can expect, that His followers will suffer as He will suffer, that they will become united with Him in suffering for the sake of the kingdom and the raw language, "eat, chew, gnaw" highlights the very real pain of being a follower of Christ in this world, for those who take up their cross daily. OK, highly speculative, I admit, but I am just trying to understand what Christ was in fact saying. I really want to understand what the Lord Jesus is saying in this passage. Truly.
Any help you can offer is deeply appreciated.
Michele

First off, Our Lord tells them "Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will not have Life within you." Which idiomatically would be, "Unless you persecute me, you will not have Life within you." And that makes no sense whatsoever.

As far as the flesh is concerned. If we think that we have to eat His flesh in the usual way, like taking a big bite out of His thigh, then yes that is of no avail. The Spirit gives Life because it is by the Power of the Holy Spirit that the gifts are transformed (transubstantiated, metanoia-ed) into the Body and Blood of Christ. (Matt 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-25; Luke 22:19-20; 1 Cor 10:16; 1 Cor 11:23-31)

If the Eucharist is just a symbol why would somebody die who recieved it unworthily? (See references above.)

I have to go bathe the children. If you have any more questions, I will check back later.

God Bless You,

Dr. Eric

Hi Mom, Dr. Eric,
I thought I would offer my two cents. I think some ideas are getting lost in translation.

Then what exactly is Jesus saying in this passage? If what He says with His literal language makes no sense then what is He really trying to tell His followers? Did He assume that they would catch the different meaning to His words? Did He know that they would take them literally instead of idiomatically?
I had more questions and thoughts but can't get them to come out of my fingers at the moment, maybe later.
God bless,
Sarai

An idiom is a figure of speach and yet all who hear it can understand the true meaning. Like right now here in Missouri it's raining cats and dogs. Now we know that cats and dogs are not literally falling out of the sky onto the pavement outside my window. But every American understands that we are having a larger than normal amount of rain at this time. (Even if I was to write a heavy rain, that's still an idiom since the water drops don't weigh more than other water drops!)

So in the matter of the 6th Chapter of John concerning the Eucharist you can either take Our Lord's words literally as the Catholic and Orthodox Churches do (I am a Catholic and this Chapter brought me back to True practice of the Faith.) Or you can take it figuratively, which the Protestants, Evangelicals, and the Non-Denominationalist Christian Denominations do. But, there already is a precedent in that the idiom already exists in Semitic languages for eating another person's body and drinking his blood whcih means to persecute that person.

So, therefore the Jews that heard Our Lord couldn't accept the idiom which didn't make sense and would mean that He was teling them to persecute him and to commit sin... and therefore He is not Light of Light, True God of True God if He tells them to persecute Him.

And they couldn't accept the true teaching on the Holy Eucharist in that the bread and wine become His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity because they were thinking in terms of the flesh. They assumed that He meant, "Come here and take a bite out of my leg." But He really means what we as Catholics and Orthodox know, that the Power of the Holy Ghost overshadows the gifts and they are transformed into the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Our Lord, God, and Savior Jesus Christ.

I'll end this with a quote from St. Ignatius of Antioch, who was the third bishop of Antioch and who was martyred in Rome for being a Christian in about A.D. 110:

"They [heretics] abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again. Those, therefore, who speak against this gift of God, incur death in the midst of their disputes."

-From his letter to the Smyrnaeans.

Let's not forget the biggie, 1 Tim. 3:15, which describes THE CHURCH as the "pillar and bulwark of the truth."

I also find it interesting that in scripture the term "bishop" is reinterpreted as "elder" in so many Protestant Bible versions. Do I sense an attempt to dodge any biblical reference to church hierarchy? :p

The passage in which God commands the making of cherubim to go in the Holy of Holies profoundly changed how I saw holy images, or icons. As you know, every Byzantine church to this day has these images surrounding the altar.

Another OT passage speaks of heaven smelling of incense, hence the Byzantine's constant use of it in worship. It's symbolic meaning to us is seen in the Psalms. Yet some Protestants will say that use of incense is pagan...

My memory is bad, so I apologize for not providing exact books, chapters and verses.

I have to say that in general, it is amazing to see things in scripture as an Orthodox that I never saw in my non-Orthodox years.

for certain Protestants to translate episcopos as elder (when the correct word to correct is presbyteros, I know I had Greek in Seminary)is a pathetic exercise.
however, at the same time, the office of Bishop was still in development during the time of the Apostles, and it wasn't until later Fathers that the office had come to be defined as it now stands in churches of episcopal polity.
things to think about.
Much Love,
Jonn

Doulos,
1) Bump means exactly what you thought. Pani Rose bumped the thread back to the top of the list so that it would be seen.

2) All the translations I have are essentially the same as your translation's rendering of John 6:63. "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life." I have that verse cross referenced with 2 Cor 3:6 and John 3:6. It appears to me that the common theme between all of them is the importance of being born again in a life in the Spirit. Here, Jesus says that being born in the Spirit includes the acceptance of these difficult words he speaks. Overall, it looks to me like a nail in the coffin of the Protestant viewpoint of the Eucharist.

In John, Jesus tells his followers that they must eat his flesh and drink his blood if they are to have everlasting life (John 6:54), and it says several of his followers left him because of it (John 6:66). He pushed the remaining disciples asking if his words offended them (John 6:61) and if they wanted to go elsewhere (John 6:67). Peter says that there is no where else to turn than to Jesus who has the words of eternal life (John 6:68). He decides to live a life in the Spirit as opposed to a life of the flesh. Living a life in the Spirit is required for eternal life while living a life in the flesh will cause you to die (2 Cor 3:6, John 3:6, John 6:63). Therefore, one must believe and accept that Jesus gave us his body and blood to literally consume as one aspect of living in the Spirit and not in the flesh (John 6:63).

Recap:
1. Jesus says you must literally eat his flesh and drink his blood to have everlasting life. (John 6:53-54)
2. Jesus preaches this concept at length, comparing himself to manna. Jesus separates himself from the symbolism of manna, though, saying those who ate it still died, but those who eat his flesh and drink his blood will live forever. (John 6:49-50,58)
3. Many of his disciples questioned him and had Jesus clarify what he meant by this idea of eating flesh and drinking blood because it was too difficult for them to accept. (John 6:52,60)
4. Knowing that many of his disciples are leaving, Jesus again reinforces the idea of a literal consumption of his body and blood by challenging his apostles on the teaching. (John 6:61)
5. He clarifies to his apostles that this is so important that it is something they must believe to have a life in the Spirit (as opposed to a life in the flesh). (John 6:63, John 3:6)
6. It is the Spirit who gives life. (2 Cor 3:6)
7. Jesus previously emphasized the need to be born again by water and the Spirit and not to be a person of the flesh. One is either of Spirit or of flesh. (John 3:6-7)
8. Shortly after, Jesus reveals another trying teaching in which he says the Spirit who gives life is the words he spoke. The words in question were a literal eating of his flesh and blood, as compared to the precursory (but not perfect, as they still died) literal eating of manna in the desert. (John 6:51, 58, 63)
9. Many people turned away from Christ completely because of this teaching of the consumption of his flesh and blood as being a requirement for life everlasting. (John 6:66)
10. Therefore, it appears to me that it is a requirement that a person who desires to walk with Christ (John 6:66) must be of the Spirit and not of the flesh (2 Cor 3:6), which requires baptism by water and Spirit (John 3:6) and the acceptance of his words, which are spirit and life (John 6:63), and which include this difficult teaching of his giving his flesh and blood for his followers to consume like the Father sent manna in the desert for the Israelites (John 6:53,57-58). His new covenant (2 Cor 3:6), however, is far greater than the old because those who ate the manna still died, but those who eat his body and blood will have everlasting life (John 6:49-50,53-54,58). This teaching is so controversial and so pivotal to the Christian faith that it determined whether or not one would remain a Christian, as evidenced by the many disciples who turned from him because of it (John 6:66). However, there really is no other place to turn no matter how difficult this teaching is because there is no one else with the words of eternal life (John 6:68). It appears then that in order to be of the Spirit and not of the flesh, we must accept and believe his teachings (as his words are spirit and life), we must be born of water and spirit, and we must eat his flesh and drink his blood. If we do not accept this teaching, we are people of the flesh, which will profit us nothing (or be to no avail).

Our Abecedarian has posted well. I would also like to add that usually when Jesus talked about physical death he would say that a person was sleeping. Like Lazarus and the daughter of Jairus. When he spoke of death he usually meant the death of eternal damnation. Remember that many bad people ate the manna in the wilderness and did not attain eternal life. Yet if we eat the Eucharist, the fulfillment of the manna, we will have eternal life. Awesome!!!

Can you imagine, eternal life with Jesus! :goosebumps:

Dear Friends,

Actually, though, Protestants will tell you that they are NOT against good works and indeed encourage them.

They will say that Catholics often misrepresent them in this way.

They say that what they believe is that both faith and good works are necessary for salvation (faith alone for justification) but that the good works are done as a form of "penal servitude" and cannot gain merit in any sense.

However, it was John Wesley who countered what he (correctly) saw was a certain spiritual sloth and passivity within Protestantism with respect to prayer etc. with his Methodist movement.

Alex

I think perhaps Doulos misunderstood me. I did not mean thast Evangelicals teach that you can say a prayer and live as you please. I rec'd my Masters in a Baptist seminary, so I understand Evangelical theology. I am concerned with easy believism, as is Doulos. it is presumption pure and simple, cheap grace as Bonhoffer well noted. Evangelists need to point out the cost of discipleship to their converts and not play the number game of how many souls they saved.
as far as works is concerned, it says in Ephesians 2:8,9: "by grace are ye saved through faith, and not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, lest any man should boast". I know this verse by heart, have known so since childhood. but at the same time, the very next verse tells us that we are created for good works. both sides need to do the whole pericope, pure and simple. you cannot have one without the other.
Much Love,
Jonn

I think that the problem here is that we forget that everyone brings to his reading of Scripture what he has been taught beforehand. In other words, we all have a prism through which we view, interpret, and understand what we read. Not only that, but with the recent literary interpretation method known as "deconstruction" it is increasingly difficult to deal with people in one's own tradition let alone those of another. I have only my own experience in trying to deal with the subject of death and dying with the confirmation students in my parish over the last twenty odd years as a yardstick, but increasingly I find myself speaking a different language than the students to whom I am presenting.

Catholic and Orthodox Christians bring to the reading of the passages we have discussed here a common theology and spirituality. Mainline Protestants and Evangelicals also bring to the reading of Scripture a common starting point through which they read these passages: sola scriptura. We have to remember that this latter starting point was Luther's way of defending his reform: by establishing a new measure of how one is to determine "orthodoxy" and orthopraxy.

Since we don't agree about the common starting point, or prism, by which we are to view the passages of Scripture, it seems to me that we have no common language by which to understand what we are reading. In discussing these and other passages with Evangelicals in the past, it has been my experience that they are at once hostile to anything that they perceive as being Catholic teaching or interpretation concerning the truths taught in Scripture.

Just my two cents today.

BOB

Dear Doulous, I came across this thread while I was searching for something else. I bumped it up, not even necessarly realizing the title of the thread, but that as Catholics and Orthodox we are always needing to remind oursleves of Scriptures. These seemed to me to be good reference points. However, the discussion has been very interesting, and apparently a learning point for all of us, Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant.