All 4 canonical Gospels include the feeding of the 5000. 5000 is the number of adult males in the crowd that Jesus fed with just a few loaves and fishes.
We might wonder why only the men were counted. It would be even more impressive to hear the total number of people.
Another unusual detail is the fact that 12 baskets of bread pieces were collected after the meal. Why was so much bread left uneaten, and why were the leftovers collected?
New Testament scholar David Instone-Brewer suggests some answers based on Jewish dining practices of that time. I describe his answers in a new post at the Grace & Knowledge website.
Tags:
grace and knowledge articles
Posted at: 05:28 PM | 0 Comments | Add Comment | Permalink
