that is, " I live because the Father hves." Schleusner and Park- hurst say much the same.
The ^' hring- Father " is a remarkable phrase. It is hke th6 "Uving God." (John vi. 69. Acts xiv. 15. Rom. ix. 26. 2 Cor. xxxiii. 6, 9. 1 Thess. i. 9. 1 Tim. vi. 17 ) It must mean the Futher who is the source of life, who '* hath life in himself." (John V. 26.) i» f^. — [I his is that Iread, etc.] Here our Lord sums up the whole discourse. He reverts to the saying with which the Jews had begun, about the fathers eating manna in the wilderness, and repeats the main points He would have His hearers carry away. These points were as follows : — (1.) That He himself was the true bread which had come down from heaven, to feed the world by the sacrifice of Himself. (2.) That they must not cling to the idea that their fathers had ever eaten this true bread, for they all died in the wilderness, and their souls received no benefit from the manna. (3.) And that those, on the contrary, who would eat of the bread He had come down to give, should live for ever, have everlasting life, and their souls never die. — It is as though He said, — " This sacrifice of Myself is the true bread from heaven, of which I spoke at the beginning. The eaters of this bread are in far better circumstances than your fathers when they ate manna in the wilderness. Your fathers died in spite of the manna, and beside that received from it no spiritual benefit whatever. He, on the contrary, who by faith eats the bread of my sacrifice for sin, shall have everlasting life, and his soul shall never die." — All the expressions in the verse, we should remark, have been used frequently in the discourse, and now all are grouped together, and presented in one view.
59. — [These things said.. .synagogue.. .Capernaum.'] This verse is not sufficiently noticed, I venture to think. I ask any one to compare it with the beginning of the discourse in this chapter, at the 25th verse, — "When they had found him on the other side of the sea, they said," etc. Are we to suppose that they fjund Him in the synagogue ? I cannot think it. To me it seems that there must have been a shght break or pause in the discourse. It began at the landing-place, or outside the city. It was resumed after a short interval, of a few hours perhaps, in the synagogue. And as I have said before, the break appears to me to be at verse 41.
Both the discourse of this chapter, and that of the preceding one, have this point in common, that they seem to have been delivered before formal assemblies of Jews.
In concluding the notes on this very important passage, T take occasion to express my entire dissenfr from the common opinion held by many, that the sixth chapter of John was inteuded to
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