Likewise, Matthew 6: Be not anxious about what you shall eat, etc.
Likewise, in Luke 10 the Lord rebuked Martha, who was anxious about bodily food. Therefore it does not seem that a man ought to work for bodily food.
On the contrary: 1 Thessalonians 4: Work with your hands, as we have commanded you. — Likewise, 2 Thessalonians, last chapter: He who does not work, let him not eat: where the Apostle also says that he provided an example.
I respond: It must be said that it is good to work for obtaining bodily food, as it is said: You shall eat the labor of your hands: blessed are you, etc. But concerning this manual labor, a threefold disorder can occur: in intention, as when one seeks this food as an ultimate end, and the Lord prohibits this here; in solicitude, as when the mind is absorbed in earthly things, and thus the Lord prohibits in Matthew; in timing, as when one ought to be free for hearing the word of God, one is occupied with work or bodily food: and thus Christ rebuked Martha, who ought to have been listening to the Lord preaching.
52. Question III. There is a question about what he says: The work of God is that you believe in him whom he sent.
On the contrary: The Apostle says in Romans 3: We reckon that a man is justified by faith without the works of the Law: therefore to believe is not a work.
I respond: Work is taken broadly to include the work of working and the work wrought, spiritual and corporal, interior and exterior: in another way, properly, according to one of these distinctions. In the first way, to believe is a work; in the second way, not at all.
53. Question IV. Likewise, there is a question about what he says: Moses did not give you bread from heaven:
Because it is said in Wisdom 16: You provided them with ready bread from heaven.
Some respond that there is the empyrean heaven and the aerial heaven: from the first they did not have bread, but from the second.
This solution does not resolve the matter, because Christ was not bread from the empyrean heaven: and furthermore it is said in the Psalm: Man ate the bread of Angels, but the bread of Angels is not from the air.
I respond: It must be said that manna was a material food and from the material heaven, yet bearing the figure of the true, heavenly, and spiritual food. The authorities, therefore, which call that food heavenly, are to be understood according to figure and type: while the opposing ones are to be understood according to the manifest truth.
54. They said therefore to him. The Lord aroused the Jews to seek spiritual refreshment; here, to those now aroused and asking, he grants instruction. And since Christ is the bread that refreshes according to the divine nature and according to the human, therefore this part has two sections. In the first is treated the refreshment of this heavenly bread according to the divine nature; in the second, with respect to the human, there: And the bread which I shall give is my flesh, etc.
The first part has two parts. In the first is set forth instruction in response to the Jews' petition; in the second, the confirmation of the instruction on account of the Jews' murmuring, there: The Jews therefore murmured, etc.
He instructs therefore the Jews concerning the refreshment of this heavenly bread in this order: first he shows who this refreshing bread is; second, who are refreshed by this bread; third, why it refreshes those and not others.
55. (Verse 34). First therefore, in response to the Jews' petition, he teaches who this refreshing bread is; on account of which he introduces the Jews asking: They said therefore to him, namely the Jews: Lord, give us this bread always; because he had promised them living bread, therefore they ask so that they might not hunger, just as the woman asked for water; above in chapter four: "Lord, give me this water, that I may not thirst nor come here to draw." Thus therefore to those asking, the Lord shows the spiritual bread.
56. (Verse 35). But Jesus said to them: I am the bread of life, that is, the bread giving life; because he himself is Wisdom, of which Sirach four says: "Wisdom breathes life into her children"; nor is he only life-giving, but indeed also satisfying both the affection and the intellect; whence he says: He who comes to me, namely through charity, shall not hunger; Matthew eleven: "Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you." And he who believes in me shall never thirst, because, as is said above in chapter four, "whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall not thirst forever; but the water that I shall give shall become in him a fountain of water springing up into eternal life." —And it should be noted that charity feeds, because it resides in the affection, which is more closely united; faith gives drink, because it regards the act of the intellect, which is less closely united. And therefore, just as drink carries food through the members, so faith and the operation of the intellect directs the way for the virtues residing in the affection, in which the feeding takes place.
57. (Vers. 36.): But I said to you. Here the second point is noted, who namely are refreshed by this bread: because not the unbelieving, but the faithful elected and called by God. Therefore he says: Thus I said that "he who comes to me shall not hunger": but you, because you do not believe, cannot be refreshed: whence he says: But I said to you: That you have both seen me and do not believe. Above in the third chapter he said: "We speak what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony"; likewise above in the fifth chapter: "How can you believe, who receive glory from one another, and do not seek the glory that is from God alone"? Likewise above in the same chapter: "You seek me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of my loaves." And because you do not believe, you cannot be refreshed. Whence Bede says: "Do you desire bread from heaven? You have it before you and do not eat," because you do not believe: but those eat who have been elected by God and, being called, believe. Whence he says:
58. (Vers. 37.). All that the Father gives me, through eternal election and temporal calling; shall come to me, through faith and love. Concerning this giving, in the Psalm: "Ask of me, and I will give you the nations as your inheritance." The Lord requested these below in the seventeenth chapter: "Father, those whom you have given me, keep them in your name," etc. Concerning this coming to Christ, it is said in Isaiah 2: "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord and to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways." To this coming Isaiah exhorts in chapter 55: "All you who thirst, come to the waters." Those who come thus he refreshes: whence he also adds: And him who comes to me I will not cast out: I will not cast out, but I will refresh: I will not cast out, but I will bring in, according to that passage in Song of Songs 2: "He brought me into the wine cellar," etc. — Or: I will not cast him out, but I will enter in to him: Revelation 3: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if anyone hears my voice and opens the door to me, I will enter in to him and dine with him." And in this is shown the justice of God, because he refreshes only those who come, and his kindness, because he receives all and rejects none.
59. (Vers. 38.). Because I came down from heaven, etc. Here the third point is touched upon, why namely he refreshes only the predestined and those called by God. The reason is the conformity of his will to the divine will: therefore he says: Because I came down from heaven, by assuming flesh, not to do my own will, disagreeing with the Father, but the will of him who sent me, obeying him in all things: whence Philippians 2: "He was made obedient" to the Father "unto death, even the death of the cross"; above in the fifth chapter: "I do not seek my own will, but the will of him who sent me." But the will of the Father is that the elect and called be refreshed by this bread: on account of which he adds:
60. (Vers. 39.). For this is the will of my Father who sent me, that of all that he has given me, through election; Romans 8: "Those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son"; I should lose nothing of it, through reprobation, according to that passage of First Corinthians 1: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the prudence of the prudent I will reject." But should raise it up on the last day, unto participation in eternal beatitude: Romans 8: "If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies." He fulfilled this will in part: below in chapter eighteen: "Father, of those whom you gave me, I have lost none of them." And because God so chose us that we might attain beatitude through the merits of faith, in order to show the cooperation of our free will, he repeats again:
61. (Vers. 40.). But this is the will of my Father who sent me, that everyone who sees the Son, according to his humanity, and believes in him, through the freedom of his own will, because, as Augustine says, "a man cannot believe unless willing": should have eternal life, as a reward: and I will raise him up on the last day, and thus he will attain this life through the Son: Ephesians 2: "When we were dead in sins, he made us alive together with Christ and raised us up together and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus"; and this on the last day, because, as is said in First Corinthians 15, "the last of all enemies to be destroyed will be death."
Questions.
62. Question I. There is a question about what he says: He who comes to me shall not hunger.
To the contrary: It is found below in the same chapter that many of his disciples went back; and it is established that they had previously come to him; therefore he speaks falsely.