John 6:15

15 Then Jesus, [because he] knew that they were about to come and seize him in order to make [him] king, withdrew again up the mountain [by] himself alone.

John 6:15 Meaning and Commentary

John 6:15

When Jesus therefore perceived
As being the omniscient God, who knew their hearts, and the secret thoughts and purposes of them; or, as man, understood by their words and gestures:

that they would come and take him by force, and make him a king;
that they had "determined", as the Arabic version renders it; or "had it in their mind", as the Persic; to gather about him as one man, and seize him in a violent manner, whether he would or not; and proclaim him the King Messiah; place him at the head of them, to deliver the nation from the Roman yoke, and set up a temporal kingdom, in which they might hope for great secular advantages: and they might the rather be induced to take such a step, since, by this miracle, they could not doubt of his being able to support such an army of men, and to succeed in the enterprise; for he that could do this, what was it he could not do? but,

he departed again into a mountain, himself alone;
he left the company directly, upon this resolution of theirs, and even took not his disciples with him, who were in the same way of thinking about a temporal kingdom, as the people, and might encourage them in this undertaking: the mountain Christ went into, very probably was the same he went up to before; the reasons of his departure, were to prevent the attempt; to show that his kingdom was not of this world; to teach his followers to forsake the honours and riches of this world, for his sake; and to let them know, that those who sought only for a temporal redeemer, were unworthy of his presence: and also he went away alone, for the sake of secret retirement, and private prayer; and it may be chiefly, that he prayed that God would open the minds of these men, and particularly the disciples; that they might be convinced of their mistaken notions of him as a temporal prince: some copies add, "and he prayed there"; the Syriac, Ethiopic, and Persic versions leave out the word "again"; and the latter, contrary to all others, renders it, "Christ departed from the mountain alone".

John 6:15 In-Context

13 So they gathered [them], and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves which were left over by those who had eaten.

14 Now [when] the people saw the sign that he performed, they began to say, "This one is truly the Prophet who is to come into the world!"

15 Then Jesus, [because he] knew that they were about to come and seize him in order to make [him] king, withdrew again up the mountain [by] himself alone.

16 Now when evening came, his disciples went down to the sea.

17 And getting into a boat, they began to go to the other side of the sea, to Capernaum. And it had already become dark, and Jesus had not yet come to them.

Footnotes

• [a] *Here "[because]" is supplied as a component of the participle ("knew") which is understood as causal
• [b] *Here the direct object is supplied from context in the English translation