How Many Loaves and Fishes Was That?
Hello folks,
We are back after, in Beryl’s case, a well-deserved vacation, and in mine, a few weeks of reduced hours.
I want to thank everyone who followed along with our informal bible study in July (Jesus camp, as some have dubbed it), reading through the gospel of Mark. I know that at least a few were following along with the readings even though they did not participate in the discussion on Facebook. I apologize to those people for abandoning the Facebook posts in Mid-July due to lack of participation. Some days, it was just me commenting!
I did in the end read through the whole book, and I hope some of you did too. Although I was familiar with most of the stories in Mark – many of which have counterparts in the other gospels – reading through the whole thing from beginning to end yielded a few surprises.
On July 13th, when we got to chapter 8, I was astonished to realize that – according to Mark, and Matthew - Jesus performed the miracle of the loaves and fishes twice! (I’m sure many of you knew this, but it was news to me). For the most part, Mark is very precise with his numbers in these two accounts. Here’s how they compare:
The first time (Mark 6:35-44), Jesus feeds 5000 men with 5 loaves and 2 fish. After everyone has had their fill, the disciples are able to fill 12 baskets with the leftovers. This version appears in all four gospels.
The second time (Mark 8:1-9 and Matthew 15:32-39), Jesus feeds 4000 people with 7 loaves and “a few small fish” (the only imprecise number). When everyone has had enough, the disciples collect 7 baskets full of leftovers.
I can’t help noticing that the second miracle is slightly less impressive than the first, in the sense that, the first time, Jesus starts with a smaller amount and yet makes a larger amount than in the second. These two stories would be more satisfying somehow if they were told in the opposite order. The feeding of the 4000 would be amazing, and then the feeding of the 5000 would top it!
As we have seen elsewhere in the gospels, performing miracles takes a lot out of Jesus; he needs to go off by himself and pray after performing one in order to refuel. Maybe the second loaves-and-fishes miracle is slightly smaller in scope because Jesus is depleted from all the healing he has been doing.
I enjoyed pondering on the bible stories even though, as I said right off the bat, I am a lay person with no particular training in this area. I do think it’s important to remember that Protestantism was born out of a belief that every Christian can engage directly with the word of God and the Savior.
Facebook obviously wasn’t the ideal forum for bible study as some didn’t have access to it and others felt shy to comment on such a public platform. If people are interested in continuing with some kind of informal bible study, I would love to hear suggestions for how that could work.
Blessings,
Amy