Discovery BoxJohn 6:43-51 
Context6:43 Jesus replied, 1 “Do not complain about me to one another. 2 6:44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, 3 and I will raise him up at the last day. 6:45 It is written in the prophets, ‘And they will all be taught by God.’ 4 Everyone who hears and learns from the Father 5 comes to me. 6:46 (Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God – he 6 has seen the Father.) 7 6:47 I tell you the solemn truth, 8 the one who believes 9 has eternal life. 10 6:48 I am the bread of life. 11 6:49 Your ancestors 12 ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. 6:50 This 13 is the bread that has come down from heaven, so that a person 14 may eat from it and not die. 6:51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats from this bread he will live forever. The bread 15 that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
1 tn Grk “answered and said to them.”
2 tn Or “Do not grumble among yourselves.” The words “about me” are supplied to clarify the translation “complain to one another” (otherwise the Jewish opponents could be understood to be complaining about one another, rather than complaining to one another about Jesus).
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).
sn The Father who sent me draws him. The author never specifically explains what this “drawing” consists of. It is evidently some kind of attraction; whether it is binding and irresistible or not is not mentioned. But there does seem to be a parallel with 6:65, where Jesus says that no one is able to come to him unless the Father has allowed it. This apparently parallels the use of Isaiah by John to reflect the spiritual blindness of the Jewish leaders (see the quotations from Isaiah in John 9:41 and 12:39-40).
4 sn A quotation from Isa 54:13.
5 tn Or “listens to the Father and learns.”
6 tn Grk “this one.”
7 sn This is best taken as a parenthetical note by the author. Although some would attribute these words to Jesus himself, the switch from first person in Jesus’ preceding and following remarks to third person in v. 46 suggests that the author has added a clarifying comment here.
8 tn Grk “Truly, truly, I say to you.”
9 tc Most witnesses (A C2 D Ψ Ë1,13 33 Ï lat and other versions) have “in me” (εἰς ἐμέ, eis eme) here, while the Sinaitic and Curetonian Syriac versions read “in God.” These clarifying readings are predictable variants, being motivated by the scribal tendency toward greater explicitness. That the earliest and best witnesses (Ì66,75vid א B C* L T W Θ 892 pc) lack any object is solid testimony to the shorter text’s authenticity.
11 tn That is, “the bread that produces (eternal) life.”
12 tn Or “forefathers”; Grk “fathers.”
13 tn Or “Here.”
14 tn Grk “someone” (τις, tis).
15 tn Grk “And the bread.”
