Do you not yet understand, neither remember the five loaves of the five thousand, and how many baskets you took up?
All Commentaries on Matthew 16:9 Go To Matthew 16
John Chrysostom
AD 407
Do you see intense displeasure? For nowhere else does He appear to have so rebuked them. Wherefore then does He so? In order again to cast out their prejudice about the meats. I mean that with this view, whereas then He had only said, Perceive ye not, neither understand? in this place, and with a strong rebuke, He says, O you of little faith.
For not everywhere is lenity a good thing. And as He used to allow them freedom of speech, so does He also reprove, by this variety providing for their salvation. And mark at once His reproof, how strong, and His mildness. For all but excusing Himself to them for His severe reproofs to them, He says, Do ye not yet consider the five loaves, and how many baskets ye took up; and the seven loaves, and how many baskets ye took up? And to this end He sets down also the numbers, as well of the persons fed as of the fragments, at once both bringing them to recollection of the past, and making them more attentive to the future.
