John 6:9 BSB — MannaFest

John 6:9

“Here is a boy with five barley loaves and two small fish. But what difference will these make among so many?”

BSB

Parallel translations (2) ▾

ASV

There is a lad here, who hath five barley loaves, and two fishes: but what are these among so many?

KJV

There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes: but what are they among so many?

⋯

Commentary

5 voices

Theophylact of Ohrid

Catena Aurea by Aquinas (1107)

Andrew is in the same perplexity that Philip is; only he has rather higher notions of our Lord: There is a lad here which hath five barley loaves and two small fishes. This passage confounds the Manicheans, who say that bread and all such things were created by an evil Deity. The Son of the good God, Jesus Christ, multiplied the loaves. Therefore they could not have been naturally evil; a good God would never have multiplied what was evil.

The record, by era

The Church Fathers1 voice

Irenaeus

AGAINST HERESIES 2.24.4 (202)

But that this point is true, that that number which is called five, which agrees in no respect with their argument, and does not harmonize with their system, nor is suitable for a typical manifestation of the things in the Pleroma, [yet has a wide prevalence,] will be proved as follows from the Scriptures. Soter is a name of five letters; Pater, too, contains five letters; Agape (love), too, consists of five letters; and our Lord, after blessing the five loaves, fed with them five thousand men.

The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice

John Gill

1697–1771

Exposition of the New Testament (1746-1748)

There is a lad here,.... Who either belonged to Christ and his disciples, and was employed to carry their provisions for them; which, if so, shows how meanly Christ and his disciples lived; or he belonged to some in the multitude; or rather he came here to sell what he had got: which hath five barley loaves.

The Nineteenth Century2 voices

Adam Clarke

1762–1832

Commentary on the Bible (1832)

There is a lad here - Παιδαριον, a little boy, or servant, probably one who carried the apostles’ provisions, or who came on purpose to sell his bread and fish. Five barley loaves - Barley scarcely bore one-third of the value of wheat in the east: see Rev 6:6. That it was a very mean fare appears from Eze 13:19, where the false prophetesses are said to pollute the name of God for handfuls of barley, i.e. for the meanest reward.

J.C. Ryle

1816–1900

Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: John (lightly modernized text, Grace Gems edition) (1869)

Voices on this verse

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Original language & word study

17 tagged words

Original	Transliteration	Meaning	Word study
ἔστιν	estin	Is	G1510 →
παιδάριον	paidarion	a little boy	G3808 →
ὧδε	hōde	here	G5602 →
ὃς	hos	who	G3739 →
ἔχει	echei	has	G2192 →
πέντε	pente	five	G4002 →
ἄρτους	artous	loaves	G740 →
κριθίνους	krithinous	barley	G2916 →
καὶ	kai	and	G2532 →
δύο	duo	two	G1417 →
ὀψάρια·	opsaria	small fish;	G3795 →
ἀλλὰ	alla	but	G235 →
ταῦτα	tauta	these	G3778 →
τί	ti	what	G5101 →
ἐστιν	estin	are	G1510 →
εἰς	eis	for	G1519 →
τοσούτους;	tosoutous	so many?	G5118 →

Rare words are the text's own signal of a deliberate thread: the fewer the occurrences, the more the places it appears belong together.

The walk

The walk8

Where the connections lead

Follow this verse’s cross-references two steps out. Each card is a verse this one points to, and beneath it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several different paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it. Every stop shows its own words, and every stop is a page.

Through
Luke 9:13
But Jesus told them, “You give them something to eat.” “We have only five loaves of bread and two fish,” they answered, “unless we go and buy food for all these people.”
leads to
- John 6:5–9
  When Jesus looked up and saw a large crowd coming toward Him, He said to Philip, “Where can we buy bread for these people to eat?”
  Reached by 2 independent paths from here.
- Proverbs 11:24–25
  One gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds what is right, only to become poor.
- 2 Kings 4:42–43
  Now a man from Baal-shalishah came to the man of God with a sack of twenty loaves of barley bread from the first ripe grain. “Give it to the people to eat,” said Elisha.
Through
Matthew 14:17
“We have here only five loaves of bread and two fish,” they answered.
leads to
- Luke 9:13
  But Jesus told them, “You give them something to eat.” “We have only five loaves of bread and two fish,” they answered, “unless we go and buy food for all these people.”
  Reached by 2 independent paths from here.
- Mark 6:37–38
  But Jesus told them, “You give them something to eat.” They asked Him, “Should we go out and spend two hundred denarii to give all of them bread to eat?”
  Reached by 2 independent paths from here.
Through
Psalms 78:19
They spoke against God, saying, “Can God really prepare a table in the wilderness?
leads to
- Numbers 21:5
  and spoke against God and against Moses: “Why have you led us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread or water, and we detest this wretched food!”
Through
Mark 6:38
“Go and see how many loaves you have,” He told them. And after checking, they said, “Five—and two fish.”
leads to
- Matthew 15:34
  “How many loaves do you have?” Jesus asked. “Seven,” they replied, “and a few small fish.”
- Mark 8:5
  “How many loaves do you have?” Jesus asked. “Seven,” they replied.