Commentary on Matthew 14:13-21

Fortunately, the people who passed along their memories of Jesus were better at storytelling than they were at counting. Because it sounds like someone wasn’t trying hard when they included this line: “Those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children” (Matthew 14:21). So, let’s rename this story to “The Feeding of Many More Than 5000.”

Matthew’s account goes beyond preserving details of the event. This passage tells readers a good deal about Jesus, the priorities of his ministry, his reputation and appeal, his connections to John the Baptizer, and the sociopolitical climate of his time and place. When preachers attend to those aspects of the passage and sketch a fuller picture of the story, beyond simply marveling over a miracle of abundant sustenance, congregations get a better sense of what it means to be a follower of Jesus. Fulfilling his commission to promote obedience to his way (Matthew 28:20) requires us to make mercy, healing, empowering, and feeding as central to our efforts as they were to Jesus’s.

Earlier in Matthew, Jesus launches his public ministry when he learns that John—his forerunner, his baptizer, and likely also his teacher—has been arrested (4:12–17). More recently in the narrative, John reaches out from his incarceration to seek clarity from Jesus. In that scene (11:2–19), Jesus calls attention to ministry he has done to benefit those who are poor and those who contend with physical ailments that usually contribute to poverty and powerlessness. Now, in the passage before us, Jesus attempts to sail to a deserted area alone because he has learned about John’s execution at the order of Herod Antipas (14:1–12).

Repeated references to the persecution of John provide regular reminders of the danger that comes with prophetic action and speech. If it’s politically expedient to slay John because of his popularity (according to Josephus, Antiquities 18.116–19) or his vocal criticisms of the corruption among the leadership class (according to Matthew 14:4), it could be the same for Jesus, who keeps spreading hope and joy among those who suffer and live in poverty.

Jesus has good reason, therefore, to seek to lay low for a while, or at least to tend to his own spirit in solitude.

He’s too deep into his ministry, however. The plan fails. Crowds pursue him, with some even gathering at his destination before he can come ashore. Maybe some who follow him mean to protect him from the authorities by their presence. Others, it appears, have come to be healed of a range of sicknesses. The sheer volume of human need always outweighs other concerns, and so Jesus’s compassion seizes his guts (see the great verb splagchnizomai in 14:14) and prompts him to heal. So much for carving out some inconspicuousness during this risky time.

Since returning to Matthew during the season after Pentecost, the Revised Common Lectionary has given significant attention to Jesus’s teachings in Matthew 9–13; the stories of his healings and exorcisms in that part of the gospel (and also in chapter 8) have been largely passed over. Preachers do well to remind congregations that Jesus’s ministry in Matthew up to this point has involved many acts of mercy. 

The crowds know him as a healer, so they come to him for healing, not conversion. In the passage in front of us, he is not forgiving sins or teaching about finding belonging within a new kinship group. These crowds of Jews who seek him don’t appear to be religiously marginalized or dissatisfied in any way. Preaching that assumes they are risks reasserting, even implicitly, the long and lethal history of Christian anti-Judaism.

At last, the disciples arrive on the scene once nightfall nears. Their desire to dismiss the now-healed crowds has a veneer of compassion. The desert brings real practical challenges for staying alive, unless you’re planning for manna and quail to fall from the sky or something extraordinary like that.

Jesus has his own compassionate idea. He knows a thing or two about God’s delight in providing sustenance—food given “without price,” as Isaiah 55:1 puts it. He also knows about enlisting others in the toil and joy of offering food to people who are hungry. Tonight’s meal isn’t going to descend from the heavens; it’s going to be passed around by human hands.

Earlier I mentioned the verb splagchnizomai (“to have compassion”). Matthew has used that word once already, back in 9:36: “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” 

Jesus aches over the oppression and neglect the masses suffer because of neglectful or exploitative leaders (shepherds). In that previous scene, his compassion spurs him to call his disciples into action, as he empowers the Twelve to heal those who are sick and liberate those who are hounded by demonic powers (10:1, 7–8). Something similar happens in the passage in front of us, when Jesus commissions the Twelve as the waitstaff for his impromptu repast on the grass.

In other words, whenever Jesus feels compassion for those who are disadvantaged and in harm’s way, he calls the church into action.

Like I said earlier, addressing the sheer volume of human need always outweighs other concerns. It’s the most essential piece of Christian ministry.

We would have a different story if Jesus were to instruct the crowds to come forward and take their loaves and fish from a central distribution point. More different still if a full plate magically materialized in front of each person. Instead, the disciples distribute the food, looking again and again into hopeful and delighted eyes as they move from one hungry body to the next. What a different banquet this is, in contrast to the macabre celebration of Herod Antipas’s birthday in 14:6–11.

The meal in the desert is about more than survival. It’s a feast. Everyone eats until “filled” (chortazō in 14:20). Afterward, each of the Twelve gets a basket to collect the scraps—12 individual reminders of the plenitude. How fortunate many of us are to be able to eat our meals until we are “full” or “stuffed.” We can reasonably suppose that such an experience is rare for many of the Galileans Jesus feeds.

The abundance speaks to the depth of Jesus’s compassion and also to his courage in the face of the dangers that stalk people like him and John. Localized food shortages were common within the Roman Empire, and officials knew the political value of grain giveaways and circulating propaganda that trumpeted Rome’s ability to feed its people. Someone who’s able to feed the masses in a desolate place can give hope to the masses who reside in the empire’s periphery.

This passage must remind us that hungry people are not metaphors. Hunger is persistent. It always returns, as we are reminded by “The Feeding of Many More Than 4000,” which comes in Matthew 15:32–39. Compassion must not grow tired. God summons the church to mercy, generosity, and problem-solving.

That work will often be criticized, if not criminalized. In some settings, compassion is dangerous.

“You pray for the hungry. Then you feed them. This is how prayer works.” (This statement is widely attributed to Pope Francis, but apparently it’s more a paraphrase of his teachings than an actual quotation.)