Wednesday, May 18, 2022

Benjamin E. Reynolds on the Reception of Eternal Life being "Already and not Yet" in John 6

  

Although the giving in 6.27 is a future event, this eternal life seems to be available to believers in the present. Jesus indicates that the one who presently believes in the one whom God sent receives eternal life. This becomes more explicit in 6.32 where Jesus states that Moses did not give their fathers bread from heaven but ο πατηρ μου διδωσιν υμιν τον αρτον εκ του ουρανου τον αληθινον. Thus, the benefits of this food that remains to eternal life can be experienced in the present, even though the food will be given. As Frey points out, there is both a present and future dimension to eternal life. It begins in the present but extends into the future (Frey, Eschatologie 3.270). The tension between present and future life-giving was also depicted in 5.24-26, 28-29, where eternal life is presently realized and yet also remains a future reality. In 6.27, the heavenly manna is available now. The giving of salvation takes place in the present for those who believe in the one whom the Father has sent, suggesting that the time of the messianic age and the greater things have already begun. Eternal life stretches before and beyond the cross, even though the cross is important for the giving of the bread of life. As in 1.51, so here in 6.27, the Johannine Son of Man makes a future event possible in the present. (Benjamin E. Reynolds, The Apocalyptic Son of Man in the Gospel of John [Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 249; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007], 152)