There is one proof at least of the implicit faith or rather trust of the disciples in their Master. They had given Him account of their own scanty provision, and yet, as He bade them make the people sit down to the meal, they hesitated not to obey. We can picture it to ourselves, what is so exquisitely sketched: the expanse of grass.' [3235] green,' and fresh, [3236] much grass;' [3237] then the people in their companies' [3238] of fifties and hundreds, reclining, [3239] and looking in their regular divisions, and with their bright many-coloured dresses, like garden-beds' [3240] [3241] on the turf. But One Figure must every eye have been bent. Around Him stood His Apostles. They had laid before Him the scant provision made for their own wants, and which was now to feed their great multitude. As was wont at meals, on the part of the head of the household, Jesus took the bread, blessed' [3242] or, as St. John puts it, gave thanks,' [3243] and brake' it. The expression recalls that connected with the Holy Eucharist, and leaves little doubt on the mind that, in the Discourse delivered in the Synagogue of Capernaum, [3244] there is also reference to the Lord's Supper. As of comparatively secondary importance, yet helping us better to realise the scene, we recall the Jewish ordinance, that the Head of the meal, yet if they who sat down to it were not merely guests, but his children, or his household, then might he speak it, even if he himself did not partake of the bread which he had broken. [3245]
We can scarcely be mistaken as to the words which Jesus spake when He gave thanks.' The Jewish Law [3246] allows the grace at meat to be said, not only in Hebrew, but in any language, the Jerusalem Talmud aptly remarking, that it was proper a person should understand to Whom he was giving thanks ({hebrew}). [3247] Similarly, we have very distinct information as regards a case like the present. We gather, that the use of savoury' with bread was specially common around the Lake of Galilee, and the Mishnah lays down the principle, that if bread and savory' were eaten, it would depend which of the two was the main article of diet, to determine whether thanksgiving' should be said for one or the other. In any case only one benediction was to be used. [3248] In this case, of course, it would be spoken over the bread, the savory' being merely an addition. There can be little doubt, therefore, that the words which Jesus spake, whether in Aramæan, Greek, or Hebrew, were those so well known: Blessed art Thou, Jehovah our God, King of the world, Who causes to come forth ({hebrew}) bread from the earth.' Assuredly it was this threefold thought: the upward thought (sursum corda), the recognition of the creative act as regards every piece of bread we eat, and the thanksgiving, which was realised anew in all its fulness, when, as He distributed to the disciples, the provision miraculously multiplied in His Hands. And still they bore it from His Hands from company to company, laying before each a store. When they were all filled, He that had provided the meal bade them gather up the fragments before each company. So doing, each of the twelve had his basket filled. Here also we have another life-touch. Those baskets' (kphinoi), known in Jewish writings by a similar name (Kephiphah), made of wicker or willows [3249] ({hebrew}) were in common use, but considered of the poorest kind. [3250] There is a sublimeness of contrast that passes description between this feast to the five thousand, besides women and children and the poor's provision of barley bread and the two small fishes; and, again, between the quantity left and the coarse wicker baskets in which it was stored. Nor do we forget to draw mentally the parallel between this Messianic feast and that banquet of the latter days' which Rabbinism pictured so realistically. But as the wondering multitude watched, as the disciples gathered from company to company the fragments into their baskets, the murmur ran through the ranks: This is truly the Prophet, This is truly the Prophet, "the coming One" (habba, {hebrew}) into the world.' And so the Baptist's last inquiry, Art Thou the Coming One?' [3251] was fully and publicly answered, and that by the Jews themselves.