John 6:58

This is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(58) This is that (better, the) bread which came down . . . i.e., of this nature, which He has expounded from John 6:32 onwards. The tense is now in the past, pointing to His historic coming, because He has asserted that He is the bread. (Comp. John 6:33; John 6:38.)

Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead.—Read, with the best MSS., not as your fathers did eat, and are dead.

The discourse ends with that which has been the text of it.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

6:52-59 The flesh and blood of the Son of man, denote the Redeemer in the nature of man; Christ and him crucified, and the redemption wrought out by him, with all the precious benefits of redemption; pardon of sin, acceptance with God, the way to the throne of grace, the promises of the covenant, and eternal life. These are called the flesh and blood of Christ, because they are purchased by the breaking his body, and the shedding of his blood. Also, because they are meat and drink to our souls. Eating this flesh and drinking this blood mean believing in Christ. We partake of Christ and his benefits by faith. The soul that rightly knows its state and wants, finds whatever can calm the conscience, and promote true holiness, in the redeemer, God manifest in the flesh. Meditating upon the cross of Christ gives life to our repentance, love, and gratitude. We live by him, as our bodies live by our food. We live by him, as the members by the head, the branches by the root: because he lives we shall live also.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

This is that bread ... - This is the true bread that came down. The word "that" should not be in the translation.

Shall live for ever - Not on the earth, but in the enjoyments of a better world.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

58. This is that bread, &c.—a sort of summing up of the whole discourse, on which let this one further remark suffice—that as our Lord, instead of softening down His figurative sublimities, or even putting them in naked phraseology, leaves the great truths of His Person and Office, and our participation of Him and it, enshrined for all time in those glorious forms of speech, so when we attempt to strip the truth of these figures, figures though they be, it goes away from us, like water when the vessel is broken, and our wisdom lies in raising our own spirit, and attuning our own ear, to our Lord's chosen modes of expression. (It should be added that although this discourse has nothing to do with the Sacrament of the Supper, the Sacrament has everything to do with it, as the visible embodiment of these figures, and, to the believing partaker, a real, yea, and the most lively and affecting participation of His flesh and blood, and nourishment thereby of the spiritual and eternal life, here below).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

There is no more said in this verse than John 6:49-51: See Poole on "John 6:49", and following verses to John 6:51. From this whole discourse it is as evident as the light, that the justification of the soul depends upon believing; and the spiritual life of the soul floweth not from love or obedience to the works of the law, but from faith in Jesus Christ: though it be true, that true faith cannot be without works, and no man without obedience in sincerity (though not in perfection) to the will of God, shall ever obtain eternal life and salvation; but this obedience is not faith, nor doth it enter into the justification of the soul, but is the certain and necessary product of that faith which justifieth, which cannot be justified as true and saving without obedience. In all this discourse here is no mention of love, or obedience, as that to which the promises of life everlasting and a joyful resurrection are so often made; but only of eating Christ; eating his flesh and drinking his blood; eating him as the bread which came down from heaven, &c.; which are phrases no way expressive of obedience to the works of the law, but of believing, John 6:47-49. The other texts of Scripture make it plain enough, that there can be no believing without obeying, nor any eternal life and salvation obtained without both.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

This is that bread which came down from heaven,.... That true bread, the bread of God, the bread of life, living bread; meaning himself, as in John 6:32;

not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: this is bread of a quite different nature from that; that was only typical bread, this true; that was the bread of angels, but this is the bread of God; that came but from the air, this from the third heaven; that men ate of, and died; but whoever eats of this, lives for ever; see John 6:49; as follows:

he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever; See Gill on John 6:51.

Geneva Study Bible

This is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Meyer's NT Commentary

John 6:58-59. A concluding summary, repeating the figure from which the whole discourse arose, John 6:32.

οὗτος] of this nature, as explained in John 6:32-57. Comp. John 6:50; not: “this, which gives life to him who partakes of it” (Lücke); nor: “this, i.e. my flesh and blood” (De Wette); what follows requires in οὗτος the idea of modality.

οὐ καθὼς, κ.τ.λ.] It is the bread that came down from heaven, but not in the same way and manner that the fathers did eat heavenly bread. It is quite different in the case of this bread.

John 6:59 is simply an historical observation, without any further significance (Chrysostom: in order to impress us with the great guilt of the people of Capernaum). That ταῦτα means simply the discourse from John 6:41 onwards, and that what precedes down to John 6:40 was not spoken in the synagogue, but elsewhere, upon the first meeting with the people, John 6:24-25 (Ewald), would need to have been more distinctly indicated. Taking John’s words as they stand, ἐν συναγωγῇ, etc., is a more definite (according to Schenkel, indeed, mistaken) supplementary explanation of the vague πέραν τ. θαλάσσης of John 6:25.

ἐν συναγωγῇ, without the Art., as in John 18:20 : in synagogue; then follows the still more detailed designation of the locality, “teaching in Capernaum.”

Expositor's Greek Testament

John 6:58. οὗτός ἐστιν … αἰῶνα. These characteristics, now mentioned, identify this bread from heaven as something of a different and superior nature to the manna.

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

58. This is that bread] Better, this is the Bread: see on John 6:48. The verse is a general summing up of the whole, returning from the imagery of Flesh and Blood to the main expression of the discourse—the Bread that came down from heaven and its superiority to all earthly food.

not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead] Better, not as the Fathers did eat and died (see on John 6:49): ‘your’ and ‘manna’ are wanting in the best MSS. It is not in that way that the Bread comes down from heaven, nor is it such food.

eateth of] Omit ‘of,’ as in John 6:54; John 6:56 : ‘of’ is rightly inserted in John 6:26; John 6:50-51.

Bengel's Gnomen

John 6:58. Οὗτος, this) that is, I Myself, John 6:57.—ὁ ἄρτος, the bread) His discourse goes back to those things which were set forth in John 6:32, “My Father giveth you the true bread from heaven.”

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 58. - Here the Lord returns once more to the starting point of the discourse. This is the bread that came down from heaven (cf. vers. 50, 51). Already he had said, "I am the living Bread that came down from heaven," and he has expanded the statement to show how much was contained or involved in eating it. He has, moreover, emphasized the two sides of his offer of himself to the world, and shown how the twofold reception of beth sides becomes a thorough acceptance of himself, and a twofold identification of himself with his people. He forthwith returns to the original statement, and to its implied contrast with that which these sign-loving Jews had demanded. Not as (your ) fathers ate, and died: he that eateth of this bread shall live forever. This is a strong reassertion of the language of vers. 49-51. Life itself in its highest sense shall be independent of death, and will triumph over it. John 6:58