²⁵ When they had found him on the other side of the sea, they asked him, “Rabbi,^[a] when did you get here?”

²⁶ Jesus replied to them, “Truly, I tell all of you^[b] emphatically, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate the loaves and were completely satisfied. ²⁷ Do not work for food that perishes but for food that lasts for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set his seal on him.”

²⁸ Then they asked him, “What must we do to perform God’s works?”

²⁹ Jesus answered them, “This is God’s work: to believe in the one whom he has sent.”

³⁰ So they asked him, “What sign are you going to do so that we may see it and believe in you? What actions are you performing? ³¹ Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, just as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”^[c]

³² Jesus told them, “Truly, I tell all of you^[d] emphatically, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. ³³ The bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

³⁴ Then they told him, “Sir, give us this bread all the time.”

³⁵ Jesus told them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never become hungry, and whoever believes in me will never become thirsty. ³⁶ I told you that you have seen me,^[e] yet you don’t believe. ³⁷ Everything the Father gives me will come to me, and I’ll never turn away the one who comes to me. ³⁸ I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of the one who sent me. ³⁹ And this is the will of the one who sent me, that I should not lose anything that he has given me, but should raise it to life on the last day. ⁴⁰ This is my Father’s will: That everyone who sees the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him to life on the last day.”

⁴¹ Then the Jewish leaders^[f] began grumbling about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.”

⁴² They kept saying, “This is Jesus, the son of Joseph, isn’t it, whose father and mother we know? So how can he say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”

⁴³ Jesus answered them, “Stop grumbling among yourselves. ⁴⁴ No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him to life on the last day. ⁴⁵ It is written in the Prophets, ‘And all of them will be taught by God.’^[g] Everyone who has listened to the Father and has learned anything comes to me. ⁴⁶ Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who comes from God. This one has seen the Father. ⁴⁷ Truly, I tell all of you^[h] emphatically, the one who believes in me^[i] has eternal life. ⁴⁸ I’m the bread of life. ⁴⁹ Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness and died. ⁵⁰ This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that a person may eat it and not die. ⁵¹ I’m the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats this bread, he’ll live forever. And the bread I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

⁵² Then the Jewish leaders^[j] debated angrily with each other, asking, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

⁵³ So Jesus told them, “Truly, I tell all of you^[k] emphatically, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you don’t have life in yourselves. ⁵⁴ Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I’ll raise him to life on the last day, ⁵⁵ because my flesh is real^[l] food, and my blood is real^[m] drink. ⁵⁶ The person who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. ⁵⁷ Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will also live because of me. ⁵⁸ This is the bread that came down from heaven, not the kind that your ancestors ate. They died, but the one who eats this bread will live forever.” ⁵⁹ He said this while teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.