“And when Jesus had passed away from thence, he came nigh the sea of Galilee: And going up into a mountain, he sat there. And there came to him great multitudes, having with them the dumb, the blind, the lame, the maimed, and many others: and they cast them down at his feet, and he healed them: so that the multitudes marvelled seeing the dumb speak, the lame walk, and blind see: and they glorified the God of Israel. And Jesus called together his disciples, and said: ‘I have compassion on the multitudes, because they continue with me now three days, and have not what to eat, and I will not send them away fasting, lest they faint in the way.’ And the disciples say unto him: ‘Whence then should we have so many loaves in the desert, as to fill so great a multitude?’ And Jesus said to them: ‘How many loaves have you?’ But they said: ‘Seven, and a few little fishes.’ And he commanded the multitude to sit down upon the ground. And taking the seven loaves and the fishes, and giving thanks, he brake, and gave to his disciples, and the disciples gave to the people. And they did all eat, and had their fill. And they took up seven baskets full, of what remained of the fragments. And they that did eat, were four thousand men, beside children and women. And having dismissed the multitude, he went up into a boat, and came into the coasts of Magedan.”
It is the nature of love to seek and be sought, and here Jesus looks to be sought, having done much seeking: “And the Lord God called Adam, and said to him: ‘Where art thou?’” (Genesis 3:9). When Love sits, no longer fleeting and hard to grasp: “The voice of my beloved, behold he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping over the hills” (Canticle 2:8), the multitudes come to Him. So too, when you rest in your expression of love, having climbed the mountain of refining your I Love You to make it more beautiful: “They shall go from virtue to virtue: the God of gods shall be seen in Sion” (Psalm 83:8), not being agitated by what else can be done, but realizing that your love is lovely: “How beautiful are thy breasts,” which again represent acts of love for God and neighbor that come from the heart, “my sister, my spouse! Thy breasts are more beautiful than wine, and the sweet smell of thy ointments above all aromatical spices” (Canticle 4:10), you perfume the Church with the sweet aroma of a love well cultivated: “Mary therefore took a pound of ointment of right spikenard, of great price, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the odour of the ointment” (John 12:3). While Jesus sits at the top of the mountain of perfect love, He is like a mother bird, bidding you to lift your wings to this same love: “As the eagle enticing her young to fly, and hovering over them, he spread his wings, and hath taken him and carried him on his shoulders” (Deuteronomy 32:11). From here, St. John Chrysostom mentions that in His healing the multitudes, the people were in awe at the ease and rapidity with which it was done, and so too does the mighty lover of God move with ease from act of love to act of love, being led through life by love as in a dance: “And David danced with all his might before the Lord” (2 Kings 6:14), and because love only intensifies the more it grows, each one feeds the lover as one’s true food: “I have meat to eat, which you know not” (John 4:32), be it those that cannot speak the truth or praise God, represented by the dumb; the lame, whose love is feeble and easily falters; the blind, who cannot see what true love looks like; or the maimed, which represent the broken hearted, whose hearts are tattered with neglect or disappointment. Upon all these maladies love places a sweet balm: “Thy name is as oil poured out” (Canticle 1:2), a loving hand: “Thou hast formed me, and hast laid thy hand upon me” (Psalm 138:5). To have ascended the mountain of love, to be perfected in love: “He, who hath begun a good work in you, will perfect it unto the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6), draws hearts that will desire the gifts seen from the source: “All you that thirst, come to the waters” (Isaias 55:1). Jesus then turns with compassion to the many that have gathered to Him, which is an important lesson, that when you act compassionately to the need you see, you work organically, whereas when you demand to do something new, you are not acting out of love: “I did not send prophets, yet they ran” (Jeremias 23:21). They did not ask for food, but He who so loves His people, gives it to them: “For your Father knoweth that you have need of all these things” (Matthew 6:32). They had brought food with them, but it had been spent, and Jesus acts in accord with His love, and so Jesus, having healed the people, then feeds them. Thus it is an important lesson that sin must be put aside in order to understand the words of God, and the words of God received in such a way that one may know how loved they are: “Thou hast the words of eternal life” (John 6:69). There is then a lesson between the healing of the five thousand and the four, as the five thousand represent those that seek love and truth predominately through the senses, whereas those that are dried out from pleasures of the senses make fine kindling for giving the gift of love, as a four-sided cube does not rock or become easily moved from its foundation. With this, it can be understood that the four thousand is the number of those that adhere to the four cardinal virtues, each of which is attained by loving radically: “For all the law is fulfilled in one word: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself’” (Galatians 5:14). However, without delights of the senses, broken human nature protests: “We remember the fish that we ate in Egypt free cost: the cucumbers come into our mind, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. Our soul is dry, our eyes behold nothing else but manna” (Numbers 11:5-6), and so Jesus, not wanting His beloved to faint in their journey to love others, provides the nourishment of Sacred Scripture, which is what is represented by the seven loaves, as the books of the Bible can be divided into the Law, History, Wisdom or Poetry, Prophets, Gospels, History of the Church, and Letters, and in addition to this are the examples of the saints, who are the few little fishes. There is then a final point in the feeding of the four thousand, that the four thousand men are mentioned, but there is an exception of women and children, because the call of love of the Christian is to be what St. Hilary calls “the perfect man,” who does not seek to receive love from others as typified by the woman, or act childishly with much whining as typified by the children, but to give the gift of true, spiritual love in all things, for “The Son of man is not come to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a redemption for many” (Matthew 20:28). From this place, the Lord goes to Magedan, which is interpreted as “messenger” or “fruits,” because the messenger of divine love to others must himself pick heavenly fruit of God’s love and truth in the garden of his own heart: “Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat the fruit of his apple trees” (Canticle 5:1).