Evenings With Bede are taken from the Sunday solemn Plainsong Evensong services of Saint Paul’s, New Smyrna Beach, Fla., for which I am Rector. The format is a Scripture passage, then a passage of commentary from the Venerable S. Bede, then a short homily by yours truly expounding upon both. The audio for all three is found above. The text of the two passages is found below.
A Lesson from the Gospel according to S. John 6.5
Lifting up his eyes, then, and seeing that a multitude was coming to him, Jesus said to Philip, “How are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” This he said to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a lad here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what are they among so many?” Jesus said, “Make the people sit down.” Now there was much grass in the place; so the men sat down, in number about five thousand. Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, “Gather up the fragments left over, that nothing may be lost.” So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten. When the people saw the sign which he had done, they said, “This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world!”
A Lesson from a Homily by the Venerable S. Bede (Homily II.2)
As to our Lord’s asking Philip, in order to test him, “Where shall we buy bread that these may eat?” this He doubtless did by His provident dispensation, not to learn something that He did not know, but so that Philip might reocgnize the sluggishness of his faith. His master knew of this, but Philip did not. Having been tested, he can recognize the truth, and, the miracle done, he can amend. . . . The five loaves of bread with which He satisfied the multitude of people are the five books of Moses. If they are opened up by spiritual understanding, and multiplied by penetration of their deeper meaning, they daily refresh the hearts of the believer who hear them. . . . The two fishes which He added not inappropriately signify the writings of the psalmists and prophets. One of these by chanting, and the other by talking, to those who listen, tell of the future sacramental mysteries of Christ and the Church. . . . And as for His ordering the disciples, after the crowd had been satisfied, to gather up whatever fragments were left over, so that they might not perish, this unquestionably signifies that there are many hidden mysteries of the divine tidings that the minds of ordinary people do not grasp. There are some that those less learned are unable to assimilate on their own, but which they are able to understand once they are explained by teachers. Those more able, then, should, by probing them more diligently, gather these mysteries up, and, by their speaking or writing, make them a guide for the less learned, so that the nourishment of the Word may not perish because of their inertia and be kept from the people by those who, through God’s gift, know how to gather these mysteries up by interpreting them.
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Evenings with Bede: Episode 4