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Joh_6:41-42. “They murmured, and this μετʼ ἀλλήλων , Joh_6:43, against Him with reference to what He had said, viz. that,” etc. Upon all the rest they reflect no further, but this assertion of Jesus impresses them all the more offensively, and among themselves they give expression half aloud to their dissatisfaction. This last thought is not contained in the word itself (comp. Joh_7:32; Joh_7:12; according to Pollux, v. 89, it was also used of the cooing of doves), but in the context ( οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι ). We are not therefore, as De Wette supposes, to think of it merely as a whispering. Comp. rather Joh_6:61; Mat_20:11; Luk_5:30; 1Co_10:10; Num_11:1; Num_14:27; Sir_10:24; Jdt_5:22; Lobeck, ad Phryn. p. 358.
οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι ] The opposition party among the Jews were therefore among the ὄχλος (Joh_6:5; Joh_6:22; Joh_6:24). Even in the congregation of the synagogue itself (Joh_6:59), though it included many followers of Jesus (Joh_6:60), there may have been present members of the spiritual aristocracy (see on Joh_1:19). The assumption that the ὄχλος itself is here called οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι , on account of its refusal to recognise Jesus (De Wette, Tholuck, Baur, Brückner, Hengstenberg, Godet, and most others), is more far-fetched, for hitherto the ὄχλος had shown itself sensuously eager indeed after miracles, but not hostile.
ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ ἄρτος κ . τ . λ .] compiled from Joh_6:33; Joh_6:35; Joh_6:38.
οὗτος ] on both occasions, contemptuously.
ἡμεῖς ] we on our part.
οἴδαμεν τ . πατ . κ . τ . μητ .] This human descent which they knew (comp. Mat_13:55) seemed to them in contradiction with that assertion, and to exclude the possibility of its truth. Heb_7:3 ( ἀπάτωρ ἀμήτωρ ) does not apply here, because it is not a question of the Messiahship of Jesus, but of His coming down from heaven.
τὸν πατέρα κ . τὴν μητ .] The words, on the face of them, convey the impression that both were still alive; the usual opinion that Joseph (whom subsequent tradition represents as already an old man at the time of his espousal with Mary; see Thilo, ad Cod. Apocr. I. p. 361) was already dead, cannot, to say the least, be certainly proved (comp. also Keim, Gesch. J. I. 426), though in John also he is entirely withdrawn from the history.