James Ussher and Daniel's 70 weeks— Part 1

About 14 months ago, I was delighted to find that Worthington Public Libraries had purchased a copy of James Ussher's legendary Annals of the World in updated English. I was not so thrilled to find that the update and editing had been done by Larry Pierce, who is closely associated with the untrustworthy organization Answers In Genesis. As it turns out, this hasn't been as large an impediment as I suspected it would be, in part because I can access Ussher's original online via the Ohio State University's subscription to Early English Books Online to check editing I am suspicious of, and in part because Pierce's editing hasn't proved to be as ghastly as I expected.

James Ussher, of course, is the famous (or, depending on your POV infamous) archbishop who calculated the date of the creation of the world to be Oct. 23, 4004 BCE. Since this is the one fact that 99.9% of the rare people who even recognize the name James Ussher know about him, it is assumed that he was an ignoramus who based his famous chronology only on the Bible. The truth is far different. First, we should remember that no less a luminary than Sir Isaac Newton dated the creation of the world to 4000 BCE, four years later than Ussher! Few people would say that Sir Isaac was a dope, despite his "slight" miscalculation. Both Ussher and Newton lived in an age when the great age of the earth was not even suspected, let alone known.

And, in fact, Ussher was a far better historian than Newton. (Not surprising when you recall that Newton frittered away a lot of his time inventing calculus, discovering the laws of gravity, and rescuing England's monetary system.) Only about 1/6 of Ussher's most famous work is based on the Bible. The rest is based on a great number of ancient historians still looked to today as sources of the period: Herodotus, Thucydides, Arrius, Plutarch, and many more.

Of course, in a book of 1000 pages or so, Ussher wrote about far more than the date of creation. One thing that many have latched on to is his non-standard dating of the beginning of the reign of the Persian king Artaxerxes I. This is important to premillennialists because of their particular understanding of Daniel's prophecy of the 70 weeks (Daniel 9:24-27). The premillennialist understanding of this is usually that the beginning of this period begins with Artaxerxes' in the 20th year of his rule giving permission to Nehemiah to rebuild Jerusalem and the Temple (Nehemiah 2:7-9), and that the 69th week ends with the crucifixion of Christ.

Effectively all are agreed that these "weeks" are symbolic of seven year periods, although Christians, Jews, and secular historians disagree on their exact significance. And although Cyrus Scofield was happy enough to note that within the dates in dispute, no matter which year is chosen as the first of Artaxerxes, 69 times 7 years (483) gets us around the time of Christ, this is not enough for many, who want to hit 483 years on the dot. The scholarly consensus is that the first year of Artaxerxes was 465 BCE. If Nehemiah (2:1) is correct that Artaxerxes issued his decree in the 20th year of his reign (445 BCE), then 483 years from this date gives a date for the crucifixion of 39 CE. It is hard to argue that the crucifixion occurred this late.

If I were a premillennialist (which I'm not), I would leave well enough along and set Daniel's first 69 weeks as 445 BCE to 33 CE (the traditional date for the crucifixion) for a total of 477 years, or 68 "weeks" plus one year. Because of the way ancient Jewish historians and theologians reckoned partial periods of time, the remaining 1/7 "week" would have been rounded up to a whole number, hence 69 weeks. This solution also solves a problem for those that believe in a pre-tribulation rapture that isn't usually addressed: the fact that concerning the second coming, "of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven" (Mt. 24:36). Clearly, if the second coming occurred spit-spot on the dot 7 years after the rapture, everyone would know the day and the hour! Those recognizing the problem have suggested that perhaps the tribulation will be shorter than 7 years, based on Mt. 24:22— "And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved". Shortening the 69th week has a kind of elegance to it, I think, to parallel a hypothesized shortening of the 70th week.

Nevertheless, I have found it interesting to examine the attempts to move the start of Xerxes' reign to some other year than 465 BCE, and the main point of this blog is to share the results of my investigation. My starting point was the following editorial comment found in paragraph 1177 of Pierce's update:

1177. Artaxerxes was made viceroy with his father Xerxes in the twelfth year of Xerxes' reign. This time marks the first year of Artaxerxes reign. Ptolemy's Canon does not record viceroy relationships hence starts Artaxerxes' reign nine years later when his father died. (Since the time when Ussher wrote his document, this new information has come to light from archaeology. We are thankful for Dr. Floyd Jones for finding the exact source of this information {B. W. Savile, "Revelation and Science", Journal of Sacred Literature & Biblical Record, Series 4 (London: Williams and Norgate Pub. April 1863), p. 156}

"It is satisfactory to know that the idea entertained by Archbishop Ussher of dating the commencement of Artaxerxes reign nine years earlier than the canon of Ptolemy allows, grounded upon what Thucydides says of Themistocles' flight to Persia, has been confirmed by hieroglyphic inscriptions in Egypt, showing that Artaxerxes was associated with his father in the twelfth year of Xerxes reign, so that there ought to be no longer any doubt respecting that famous prophecy of Daniel, so far as at least regards the crucifixion."

This is an interesting hypothesis, but it is not what Ussher says! Instead, Ussher follows the idea that Xerxes died in 474 BCE, not that he appointed Xerxes viceroy in 474 and died nine years later. Obviously both hypotheses cannot be correct. Either one or the other might be correct, or they might both be incorrect. First, I will look at the idea of a coregency, partly because it is easier to deal with, and partly because it will shed light on the idea that Xerxes actually died in 474 (or 475) BCE instead of 465.

The reason I have to add 475 BCE in parenthesis is partly because it will become relevant in Part 2, and partly because Savile actually dates Daniel's 70 weeks as commencing in 455 BCE, and ending with the crucifixion in 29 CE. Pierce neglects to say that just prior to the paragraph he quotes, Saville contradicts Ussher's proposed chronology of the 70 weeks, writing:

The commission was given to Nehemiah by king Artaxerxes in the twentieth year of his reign, as Neh. ii. very clearly shews, which must be dated B.C. 455, and from "the month of Nisan" of that year to the Passover of A.D. 29, when the crucifixion took place, is the required number of four hundred and eighty-three years. (ibid, p. 156)

Furthermore, when we dig into the issue a bit more, we find that the inscription doesn't mention Xerxes at all. In a book published 19 years after what Savile wrote in 1863, the same author writes:

On the Cosseir road in Egypt, leading from Hammamet to the Red Sea, stands a monument, with an hieroglyphic inscription, recording that a certain functionary, named "Adenes," Lord of Coptos, held office in Egypt during the reigns of three Persian kings, viz., six years under Cambyses, thirty-six under Darius Hystospes, and twelve under his son Xerxes. Whiston, writing on this subject upwards of one and a half centuries ago, justly supposes that Xerxes admitted his son Artaxerxes into partnership in the twelfth year of his reign, under the direction of his prime minister Artaphanes.— Fulfilled Prophecy, in Proof of the Truth of Scripture, Bourchier Wrey Savile, p. 325 (Longmans, Green, 1882)

So in fact the functionary mentioned in conjunction with Xerxes is not Artaxerxes, but a certain functionary named "Adenes," and this fact led a certain Whiston to conclude that this had some bearing on Araxerxes. Now in fact the inscription does line up with what we know about the reigns of these three kings:

Cambyses: 530 BCE – 522 BCE
Darius I September: 522 BCE to October 486 BCE
Xerxes I: 486–465 BCE

By doing simple math, we can see that Adenes held his office for 54 years, from 528 BCE — 474 BCE. I don't see any reason, though, to suppose that 474 has any connection whatsoever to Xerxes. Likely the old man Adenes either died in that year or decided that it was time to retire and live the good life.

An Atheist Defense of Faith

Hugh Kramer, a friend of mine, has written a cogent attack on the concept of faith, asking, "Is faith a virtue?" Well, let's take up the challenge, shall we?

As with anything, we have to start with a working definition of faith, while noting that definitions are starting points, not ending points. Defining words, especially hot button words like faith, is more than half the battle. If you ask three dictionaries what faith is, you are likely to get nine different answers. There is a temptation to scan these nine answers, pick the one that supports your case, and use it to make your point.

Hugh defines faith as "a belief not based on proof," which is close enough to some dictionary definitions to seem credible enough. But I believe that the entire concept of a belief not based on proof logically falls apart if examined closely. There simply is no such thing as a belief not based on proof. The word proof, used in its general sense and not in the specific technical sense of logic or math, means simply evidence or argument establishing or helping to establish a fact or the truth of a statement. We see that in most cases, proof is a synonym for evidence or argument. Let's plug these synonyms into Hugh's definition. Does anyone hold any belief whatsoever that is based neither on evidence or argument? The evidence or argument may be scant and/or awful, but it cannot be non-existent.

Other dictionaries offer a slight modification of Hugh's definition by saying that faith is a belief that does not rely on material proof. Using this better definition of faith, we are in a better position to evaluate whether faith is a valuable thing or not.

Within the narrow confines of atheist vs. theist internet echo chambers, faith has come to have the narrow definition of whether God exists or whether the Bible is infallible. But real people in the real world seldom define faith in this way. Instead, faith becomes synonymous with hope for a better future. I would even argue that this is its primary meaning in the New Testament. When the book of Hebrews famously said, "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen," it was speaking not of the unseen God but the unseen Day of the Lord, a future event for which all Biblical saints hoped.

Since faith and hope are synonyms, some atheists have argued we should just do away with the word faith and substitute hope, since "faith is a loaded gun." But faith is much more powerful than mere hope. A loved one who is going through a life threatening illness would much rather hear, "I believe you will recover," not "I hope you will recover."

Einstein wrote: "I was barked at by numerous dogs who are earning their food guarding ignorance and superstition for the benefit of those who profit from it. Then there are the fanatical atheists whose intolerance is of the same kind as the intolerance of the religious fanatics and comes from the same source. They are like slaves who are still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard struggle. They are creatures who—in their grudge against the traditional 'opium of the people'—cannot bear the music of the spheres."

I have used that quote many times before realizing the most important point: the "same source" that Einstein is speaking of shared by the rigid orthodoxies of fanatical religion and fanatical atheism. That source is fear. The statement that "faith is a loaded gun" demonstrates the fear of the fanatical atheist. Yet Einstein, like Carl Sagan, like most great minds, recognized religion as a natural part of the human condition. We can only make better religion, we cannot banish it. To borrow one of my favorite phrases from the show the Big Bang theory, it is, like politics, a "non-optional social convention." Religion, like politics, is a messy business, but one cannot simply "opt out." Einstein realized this:

"We followers of Spinoza see our God in the wonderful order and lawfulness of all that exists and in its soul as it reveals itself in man and animal. It is a different question whether belief in a personal God should be contested. Freud endorsed this view in his latest publication. I myself would never engage in such a task. For such a belief seems to me preferable to the lack of any transcendental outlook of life, and I wonder whether one can ever successfully render to the majority of mankind a more sublime means in order to satisfy its metaphysical needs."

Atheists should be the first, not the last, to understand and embrace the fact that religion and religious language has and will evolve. It doesn't do any more good to wail about the dismal state of religion than it does to wail about the dismal state of politics. We need to roll up our sleeves, get in the pits next to the rest of humanity, and not be afraid to use words such as faith, virtue, belief, religion, and yes, even God, in a more intelligent way than the ignorant. Not to use these words is essentially to take yourself out of the meme pool, to use a Darwinian metaphor. Einstein was prescient in his statement about God. All the studies show that religious practices such as prayer, meditation, and church attendance are good for your health. Even though I no longer believe in the God of Abraham, I get to church whenever I can, and practice some of the techniques I have learned in <i>How God Changes Your Brain</i> (a book written by two atheists, BTW).

9/11/2001

Prior to 9/11/2001, I had never met a Muslim. At least not that I was aware of, at least. Like many Americans, I had this strange idea that one could tell a Muslim easily by their outward appearance, just as the leopard betrays his identity by its spots, or the Nubian by his skin. Silly idea, this. Can you tell the difference between a Catholic and a Protestant by the way they look?

By now it is cliché of course, but after 9/11 I was eager to seek out information on the religion that could apparently inspire such a horrific act. Knowing of the Mosque on Riverside Drive here in Columbus Ohio, I mounted my trusty bicycle and headed off. I found the Mosque apparently closed, but a couple locals saw me snooping around. One of them looked like he had just stepped out of an Arabian movie set, and seemed a bit disturbed by my presence. The other looked like an Indian. When he learned that I was looking for a Qur'an, he invited me to his home and we sat down for a chat. I learned that he was Bangladeshi, and he taught me many other things besides. His home didn't seem Muslim at all. (Like Muslim homes should have a look). This is, of course, because Bangladesh is closer to Indian culture than Arab. Although I would have been terrified to be in an Arab home, being in an Indian home was pretty cool. (Isn't it funny how ridiculous some of our thoughts are if we only take a moment to examine them?) I learned some other things as well. When I apologized for needing an English Qur'an because I didn't know Arabic, he gave me a queer look and said, "Most Muslims don't know Arabic. I myself read an English Qur'an."

I didn't know it at the time, but one of my co-workers was a Muslim. He was an easy going, well liked character named Luke. Others called him Luke-man and I quickly started using this nickname as well. One day I wore a multicolor beanie of the style occasionally worn by Muslims and Luke half jokingly asked me, "You practicin'?" I chuckled and told him no; not only was I not a practicing Muslim I didn't practice my own religion very well. He chuckled as well and then told me that he was, in fact, "practicin'." And I discovered his name was Luqman, a hero of the Qur'an, and not Luke-man!

These are just two of the Muslims I have met since 9/11/2001. Now that I volunteer at a library near a significant Muslim population, I am having the privilege of meeting many more. When people express fear of Muslims, I sometimes wonder if they have ever even met one, let alone sat down with one and had a serious talk about their religion. I wonder if they make derogatory remarks at work about Islam, not knowing that one of their co-workers could easily be a Muslim.

What terrifies me more than Muslims is ignorance. I happened to catch a comment on Facebook today: "So, why did the Million Muslim March select 9/11 for their event...?" You know, if you want to know what Muslims think, why not just ask? The answer was on the AMPAC website:

Many non-Muslim Americans are terrified of Muslims, who are portrayed by Hollywood and the US media as fanatical terrorists. Muslims, too, live in fear – of being dragged off in the night to Guantanamo and tortured, simply for the crime of being Muslim in the wrong place at the wrong time [...] 

September 11th, 2001 was the beginning of a new era of fear. Since 9/11, Americans have been terrorized by the media. They have been taught to fear their neighbors. They have been inculcated with fear of other religions. They have been brainwashed into fearing people with brown skins, turbans, and foreign accents.

While I certainly know fear, I can only guess at the fear Muslims in the U.S. experience daily, especially in the post 9/11 world. But I did get a taste of it that day Luke asked me if I was praticin'. My boss also came up to me that day looking quite worried. She asked, "Are you wearing that hat for religious reasons?" When I assured her I was not, and that I would not wear it in public when representing the company, she visible relaxed.

Barry Goldwater, former presidential candidate and Senator from Arizona, called himself an "honorary gay." Ironically, this conservative icon fought for gay rights before it was fashionable. I will never approach Goldwater's stature in any respect, but nevertheless I am proud to declare myself an "honorary Muslim" on this day, if the Muslim community will allow me the privilege.

Flat Earth Convincingly Demonstrated

People have generally been led to believe that the surface of the earth is curved. What is little appreciated is that this is an illusion caused by our mistaken belief that space itself is flat. Einstein postulated in 1916 that space is not flat but curved around massive objects such as the earth, a hypothesis that was confirmed observationally by Eddington and Dyson just three years later. Thus the earth is flat, but only appears curved because space itself curves around it.

Although Einstein demonstrated nearly a century ago that the earth was flat, there is still no general consensus as to where its edge is located. Personally I believe, as the 19th century flat earth theorists did, it is at the South Pole. Because they mistakenly thought the earth did not spin, early flat earth theorists thought the edge was impassable. But since the earth does spin, and does so most quickly at its edge, one can step off of one side of the earth and immediately arrive at the other side because of relativistic effects.

Why natural gods are superior to supernatural gods

What does it mean for a Supernatural God to have a Nature?

We can begin to answer this question by asking about what it means for other classes of objects to have a nature. Inanimate objects have a nature because they have no choice in their actions. If you kick a rock, it has no choice but to follow the trajectory the laws of nature have proscribed for it. Descartes argued that animals have a similar nature. Although they do move on their own, their movements are guided solely by their non-rational nature. Famously, followers of Descartes would go around kicking dogs to hear them yelp. This demonstrated the involuntary nature of dog's actions. Descartes didn't believe that dogs even felt pain.

Humans, on the other hand, are, in classical thought, the only rational animal. Although we have a nature which constrains us to act in apparently preordained manners, much as the animals, it is subject to our rational minds which gives us the power to choose to do differently. In Pauline thought, although in our flesh we are "slaves of sin" (our nature) in our rational minds we can be "slaves of the law" and exercise free will by doing the right thing.

Is the Supernatural God's "Nature" like human nature? The whole contradictory idea of a "Supernatural Nature" was proposed to answer Euthyphro's dilemma, which destroys the idea that the will of any being, even God, can be the basis of morality. In order to avoid the dilemma, Christian apologists shifted the locus of morality from God's Will to God's Nature. God, they argued, can do nothing which is against his Nature. He cannot sin, he cannot lie, etc.

This presents something of a logical problem. In humans, we are presumed to have free will because our nature is subject to our will. God's Will is just the converse- it is subject to his Nature. Since a Nature, by definition, constrains an object to answer solely to Its Laws, how can a Will which is subject to such Laws possibly be considered free? Does it even make sense to call it a Will at all, since it flows from Natural laws? God's will, it would seem, is reduced to the level of a rock's "will".

Thomas Aquinas, who was a good deal smarter than all modern theologians, grasped the implications of this knotty problem and struggled with it mightily. He treats it at some length in Summa Theologica. He acknowledges that the perfection of God's knowledge constrains him to always make the best choice in all situations, which would seem to indicate that he has no will. Aquinas argued, however, that situations could arise where there were choices where the moral "weight" of the various choices were equal, and in this case God would have free will.

Aquinas stops his argument there, but I still see major objections. He gives no example of a morally neutral decision, so we don't know is such a beast exists. Our everyday experience suggests that it does. Surely it is morally neutral whether one prefers chocolate to vanilla? But this appearance could well be because of our ignorance. We do not have the perfect knowledge that a supernatural God does. Modern science has revealed that every decision we make alters the patterns of neuronal activity in our brains. Over time, these patterns can become fixed to such an extent that they can and do alter the physical structure of the brain. In light of the facts, how can it be said that any decision is morally neutral?

Even if a morally neutral decision exists, can it be said to be an act of the will to choose between equally best options? Such a choice is not an act of the will, but a random act. For Aquinas, all inanimate objects could only behave in preordained ways, so a god that could make a choice, even a random choice, was clearly different from an inanimate object. But we now know because of quantum physics that elementary particles have "choices" in how to behave because of wave/particle duality and quantum indeterminacy. Thus the will of Aquinas' God is ultimately reducible to the will of an elementary particle.

The Bible and The Origin of Species as compasses

The bible is a terrible moral compass, if you think about it. Of course, you can cherry pick the verses that you like, which means the verses that happen to coincide with our modern secular consensus, but then you need to have a rationale for leaving out the ones that say stone people to death if they break the Sabbath, or if they commit adultery. It’s an appalling moral compass.- Richard Dawkins

Dawkins should know better. This is a clear example of the fallacy of composition, the idea that something that is true of some parts of the whole are true of the whole. It is like concluding that an entire barrel of apples is bad because the first three you pull out happen to be bad. He doesn't like the fact that some Christians "cherry pick" their scriptures for the good bits, but doesn't have a problem at all "cherry picking" the bad bits for his own purposes.

I wonder if Dawkins would mind terribly if I applied the same standard to The Origin of Species, about which Stephen J. Gould says:

A few figures in history have been so prescient in their principal contributions, and so acute and broad-ranging in their general perceptions, that they define (or at least intrude upon) almost any major piece of a comprehensive discussion ... Evolutionary biology possesses the great good fortune to embrace such a figure... The Origin of Species exceeds all other scientific "classics" of past centuries in immediate and continued relevance to the basic theoretical formulations and debates of current practitioners. Careful exegesis of Darwin's logic and intentions, through textual analysis of the Origin, therefore assumes unusual importance for the contemporary practice of science. The Structure of Evolutionary Theory, Stephen J. Gould, pp. 57-58

Oh, really? If I applied Dawkins' logic, I could say this:

The Origin is a terrible scientific compass, if you think about it. Of course, you can cherry pick the verses that you like, which means the verses that happen to coincide with our modern scientific consensus, but then you need to have a rationale for leaving out the ones that says whales evolved from bears or support pangenetic methods of inheritance. It’s an appalling scientific compass.

I'm being facetious, of course. I believe, as does Gould, that the Origin is a wonderful scientific compass. But the comparison does give us some tools for determining how the bible can serve us as a wonderful moral compass. The reason Dawkins' fallacious argument seems compelling is that so many commit the same fallacy of composition with respect to the bible, whereby they reason that since the bible contains so many wonderful verses, the whole thing must be wonderful. This usually goes in hand with the fallacy of division, whereby it is reasoned that because the bible is a good book, every bit of it must be good.

There is another error in Dawkins' reasoning that I feel compelled to point out. The reason the Origin can be considered the "bible" of biology is that it laid the foundation for the modern version of the whole field. Dawkins either does not realize or ignores how foundational the bible was for our modern view of morality. His quote seems to imply that our modern views of morality just happen to coincide with certain "cherry picked" themes in the bible. But this isn't just happy coincidence. Western civilization was intentionally built upon such themes as forgiveness, love, and the oft neglected but crucially important understanding of debt and usury that are found in the teachings of Jesus, much as the modern scientific consensus was intentionally built upon themes found in The Origin of Species.

Should a pantheist take communion?

When I still self-identified as a Christian, I would, of course, take communion in accordance with the practice of whatever church I attended. In almost every instance, communion was a solemn occasion. I had the feeling that the Lord was there in a special way that He was not during the rest of the service. The air seemed "thicker," if you will. And I knew that we were remembering in a special way both the occasion of Jesus' last meal with His disciples and His crucifixion.

Sometime later after I no longer identified myself as a Christian, I was sitting in a relative's church observing communion, and the words, "This is my body... this is my blood," hit me in a totally different way. I had the immediate thought: "This is cannibalism! Symbolic cannibalism, maybe, but how could I have done this for so many years and not noticed?" I had the sudden impulse to get up and run out of the room.

Since that time I realized that I had fallen into two intellectual traps common to those who have left the church after being long time Christians. One is that I had bought into the belief that there is one core, ideal Christianity which is some sense the authentic Christianity. The other trap is that this authentic Christianity is embodied however imperfectly by the general practice of the Church. Obviously if the former is false, the latter cannot be true. And even if the former is true, it does not follow that the latter is true.

Originally there were several groups of practicing Christians that had a common belief that Jesus was central to their faith, but working out this centrality in different ways. We imagine that the dominant group was the Pauline Christians, because they are over-represented in the Canon. But there are other early Christians, some of whom can be found in the Canon, others who are not. One group is represented by an early Christian text called the Didache (or teaching) of the twelve. It is interesting because it may represent our earliest account of the Eucharist:

Now concerning the Eucharist, give thanks as follows. First, concerning the cup: We give you thanks, our Father, for the holy vine of David your servant, which you have made known to us through Jesus, your servant; to you be the glory forever. And concerning the broken bread: We give you thanks, our Father, for the life and knowledge that you have made known to us through Jesus, your servant; to you be the glory forever. Just as this broken bread was scattered upon the mountains and then was gathered together and became one, so may your church be gathered together from the ends of the earth into your kingdom; for yours is the glory and the power through Jesus Christ forever. But let no one eat or drink of your Eucharist except those who have been baptized into the name of the Lord, for the Lord has also spoken concerning this: “Do not give what is holy to dogs.” (Didache 9:1-5)

Notice how differently these early Christians understood the Eucharist from modern Christians. There is no mention of the bread and wine being (or signifying) Jesus' flesh and blood. Instead the wine represents King David, and the bread represents the Church. What this account does have in common with the modern Eucharist is its exclusivity. It is for Christians only.

The Gospel of John gives yet another differing account of the Eucharist. The other three Gospels make the setting of the Eucharist the last meal that Jesus shares with his disciples. It is the Passover, and Jesus clearly links the wine and bread to his upcoming crucifixion. Thus he institutes the rite of Holy Communion. John's account of Jesus' last meal is totally different. Rather than being Passover, it is the day before. The meal is just a regular meal, and Jesus says nothing about the wine or bread. Instead of instituting a rite of Holy Communion, Jesus institutes a rite of footwashing.

John however clearly remembers Jesus' words about the bread and the wine and believes them very important. But he moves them into an entirely different setting. A crowd of people have hunted Jesus down because he miraculously fed them with bread and fish the day before. There is a conversation that ensues in John 6, from which I have extracted the salient points:

Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you, for on Him the Father, God, has set His seal. For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world." Then they said to Him, "Lord, always give us this bread." Jesus said to them, "I am the bread of life ; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst...Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died...Truly, truly, I say to you, unless  you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves.

Notice how completely different this is than the synoptic accounts. Jesus draws no parallel between any physical bread and his body. Instead the act of eating signifies coming to Jesus and the act of drinking signifies believing in Jesus (see also John 4:13-14 and 7:38.) Instead of in an intimate gathering of close disciples, Jesus offer his body for very public consumption. As Ekaputra Tupamahu says: [T]he language that John uses is more inclusive and universal. Anybody can come and participate in the body and blood of Jesus. (Eucharist in the Didache and the Gospel of John, 2013).

Buddhist monk and author Thich Nhat Hanh has shocked Buddhists and angered Christians by participating in the Eucharist. Many have accused him of not understanding Christianity or the Eucharist. I think, perhaps, he understands the message of Jesus more deeply than most Christians. He has this to say about the Eucharist:

The practice of the Eucharist is a practice of awareness. When Jesus broke the bread and shared it with his disciples, he said, 'Eat this. This is my flesh.' He knew that if his disciples would eat one piece of bread with mindfulness, they would have real life. In their daily lives, they may have eaten their bread in forgetfulness, so the bread was not bread at all; it was a ghost. In our daily lives, we may see the people around us, but if we lack mindfulness, they are just phantoms, not real people, and we ourselves are also ghosts. Practicing mindfulness enables us to become a real person. When we are a real person, we see real people around us, and life is present in all its richness. The practice of eating bread, a tangerine, or a cookie is the same.

When we breathe, when we are mindful, when we look deeply at our food, life becomes real at that very moment. To me, the rite of the Eucharist is a wonderful practice of mindfulness. In a drastic way, Jesus tried to wake up his disciples.~ Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace is Every Step, pp. 22-23.

Although this interpretation of the Eucharist seems very far from how Christians practice today, I find it very close to the way John understands it. For John, the Eucharist is not so much a ritual as it is a way of life. It is recognizing the divine in the very food we eat, and the wine we drink. There is a line I remember from the old Eucharistic liturgy my priest used to say, "That we may dwell in him and he in us." As a pantheist that seems remarkably similar to what Neil DeGrasse Tyson said: "We are in the universe and the universe is in us." Or, as Jesus says in the Gospel of Thomas, "Blessed is the lion that a person will eat and the lion will become human."

I know that a pantheist could have considerable objections even to John's interpretation of the Eucharist, because John clearly understands Jesus as Lord of the universe. But as pantheists we need to remember that John's Jesus was the legend, not the man. He has no actual flesh that we can eat. Although we may not take the radical act of Thich Nhat Hanh and actually take communion, we can at least appreciate that within the Christian tradition, there are elements of pantheism to be appreciated.