John 6:39-40

6:39 Now this is the will of the one who sent me – that I should not lose one person of every one he has given me, but raise them all up ¹  at the last day. 6:40 For this is the will of my Father – for everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him to have eternal life, and I will raise him up ²  at the last day.” ³ 

John 6:44

6:44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, ⁴  and I will raise him up at the last day.

John 6:1

The Feeding of the Five Thousand

6:1 After this ⁵  Jesus went away to the other side of the Sea of Galilee (also called the Sea of Tiberias). ⁶ 

John 1:48

1:48 Nathanael asked him, “How do you know me?” Jesus replied, ⁷  “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, ⁸  I saw you.”

[6:39]  ¹ tn Or “resurrect them all,” or “make them all live again”; Grk “raise it up.” The word “all” is supplied to bring out the collective nature of the neuter singular pronoun αὐτό (auto) in Greek. The plural pronoun “them” is used rather than neuter singular “it” because this is clearer in English, which does not use neuter collective singulars in the same way Greek does.

[6:40]  ² tn Or “resurrect him,” or “make him live again.”

[6:40]  ³ sn Notice that here the result (having eternal life and being raised up at the last day) is produced by looking on the Son and believing in him. Compare John 6:54 where the same result is produced by eating Jesus’ flesh and drinking his blood. This suggests that the phrase in 6:54 (eats my flesh and drinks my blood) is to be understood in terms of the phrase here (looks on the Son and believes in him).

[6:44]  ³ tn Or “attracts him,” or “pulls him.” The word is used of pulling or dragging, often by force. It is even used once of magnetic attraction (A. Oepke, TDNT 2:503).

[6:1]  ⁴ tn Again, μετὰ ταῦτα (meta tauta) is a vague temporal reference. How Jesus got from Jerusalem to Galilee is not explained, which has led many scholars (e.g., Bernard, Bultmann, and Schnackenburg) to posit either editorial redaction or some sort of rearrangement or dislocation of material (such as reversing the order of chaps. 5 and 6, for example). Such a rearrangement of the material would give a simple and consistent connection of events, but in the absence of all external evidence it does not seem to be supportable. R. E. Brown (John [AB], 1:236) says that such an arrangement is attractive in some ways but not compelling, and that no rearrangement can solve all the geographical and chronological problems in John.

[6:1]  ⁵ sn This is a parenthetical note by the author. Only John in the New Testament refers to the Sea of Galilee by the name Sea of Tiberias (see also John 21:1), but this is correct local usage. In the mid-20’s Herod completed the building of the town of Tiberias on the southwestern shore of the lake; after this time the name came into use for the lake itself.

[1:48]  ⁵ tn Grk “answered and said to him.” This is somewhat redundant in English and has been simplified in the translation to “replied.”

[1:48]  ⁶ sn Many have speculated about what Nathanael was doing under the fig tree. Meditating on the Messiah who was to come? A good possibility, since the fig tree was used as shade for teaching or studying by the later rabbis (Ecclesiastes Rabbah 5:11). Also, the fig tree was symbolic for messianic peace and plenty (Mic 4:4, Zech 3:10.)