Observations from the Greek text in John's Gospel: 6:1-15

There are a few interesting things about the Greek text in this passage.  The story, of course, is a wonderful story of Jesus feeding the 5000 people.

In verse 2, John calls the crowd a ὄχλος πολύς.  πολύς is normally translated as “much” when found in the singular as it is here.  The NIV11 translates this as “a great crowd”.  The NET as “a large crowd”.  Both of these capture what John was trying to say, but it really is “a much crowd”.

In verse 5, we have a wonderful way of stating things.

6:5 Ἐπάρας οὖν τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς ὁ Ἰησοῦς καὶ θεασάμενος ὅτι πολὺς ὄχλος ἔρχεται πρὸς αὐτὸν λέγει πρὸς Φίλιππον· πόθεν ἀγοράσωμεν ἄρτους ἵνα φάγωσιν οὗτοι;

6:5 Then, after lifting up the eyes and seeing that the much crowd is coming to him, Jesus is saying to Philip, “From where may we buy bread so that these may eat?”

Most translations would render the first line as “Then, he looked up and saw the large crowd”.  A couple of other interesting things about this is that all is actual verbs are in the present tense: “is coming” and “is saying”.  This is probably John’s way of adding a bit of vividness to the passage as it would have been read out loud.

Finally, in verse 9, we have yet another way to say “child” or “boy”.  Back in 4:43-53, John created a word play for “son” and “child”.  See blog here.  In this passage, John uses παιδάριον “child”, “boy”, or “girl” to refer the boy who had the five barley loaves and the two fishes.  παιδάριον was not used in 4:43-53.