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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Matthew 14:13 - 14:13
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13–21. JESUS RETIRES TO A DESERT PLACE, WHERE HE FEEDS FIVE THOUSAND
Mar 6:31-44; Luk 9:10-17; Joh 6:5-14.
This is the only miracle narrated by all the Evangelists. In St John it prepares the way for the memorable discourse on the ‘Bread of Life.’ St John also mentions, as a result of this miracle, the desire of the people ‘to take him by force and make him a king.’ There is a question as to the locality of the miracle. St Luke says (ch. Mat 9:10) that Jesus ‘went aside privately into a desert place belonging to a city called Bethsaida.’ St Mark (Mar 6:45) describes the disciples as crossing to Bethsaida after the miracle. The general inference has been that there were two Bethsaidas; Bethsaida Julias, near the mouth of the Jordan (where the miracle is usually said to have taken place), and another Bethsaida, mentioned in the parallel passage in St Mark and possibly Joh 1:44. But the Sinaitic MS. omits the words in italics from Luke, and at Joh 6:23 reads, ‘When, therefore, the boats came from Tiberias, which was nigh unto the place where they did eat bread.’ If these readings be accepted, the scene of the miracle must be placed near Tiberias; the Bethsaida of Mark, to which the disciples crossed, will be the well-known Bethsaida Julias, and the other supposed Bethsaida will disappear even from the researches of travellers.