Joseph Moloney

Appearing in all four Gospels, the miraculous feeding of the multitudes in the desert is one of the best
attested stories in Scripture. In this essay, I will exegete the Feeding of the Five Thousand employing
a narrative-critical approach to the story, with particular attention on the Gospel of Luke’s version
(9:10-17). To do this, I will focus on the two main themes of the story being the Eucharist and the
identity of Jesus, especially as revealed in the eschatological expectations and prophecies of the Jews.
I will first reveal the Eucharistic typology and symbolism relevant to the story as it relates to the
Exodus story of the Manna in the desert. This Eucharistic theme is important especially for the
Christians looking back through the lens of the Last Supper and the Passion, but it is also especially
important for the Jews at the time as it tied in strongly with their Messianic expectations and the
prophecies of a Messianic Banquet. However, while the central theme of this story in John is
undoubtedly the Eucharist, for Luke, it is also especially about the identity of Jesus

In light of the Timaeus, I will assess Eusebius of Caesarea’s claim that Plato “has attained the porch
of [Christian] Truth”. 1 In analysing this claim, I will expose and then evaluate the more obvious
parallels to Christian doctrine and metaphysics that can be found in the Timaeus. My conclusion
is that I share Eusebius’s wonder of Plato. I am astounded at the consistency with which Plato
arrives at the same conclusions as Revealed Christian doctrine, especially in his marvellously
Christian metaphysics, the attributes of God, and his ordering and origins of the cosmos and his
belief in the singularity of the Demiurge as creator God

The Eucharist is an inexhaustible mystery. In this essay I study it from the angle that it is the object and
theme on which the Gospels are written. It would be a mistake to think the Synoptic genre is just that of
a historical narrative, a catechetical instruction, or a mere compilation of oral accounts. So rather, I discuss
the ways in which these Gospels are a unique literary genre spawned out of, and written for, the liturgical
setting of the early Church’s Eucharistic assemblies. I argue that the Last Supper and the Eucharist are
intimate to, and inseparable from the Passion, death and Resurrection of Jesus and that it is through the
Eucharist that the early Church commemorated these events. What is sometimes minimalized in Scripture
study is that a participation in the celebration of the Eucharist is a participation in these events for the
Church.