The Significance of Bread in the Bible

How many times does the word bread appear in the Bible? One source says 360 times, one source says 381 times and one source says 492 times. Perhaps it just depends on which version of the Bible you are reading. One writer claims "bread" is the most popular word in the Bible.

From Genesis through Revelation the significance of bread in the Bible is so important that it is still celebrated in both the Jewish and Christian faiths, today.

The Hebrew word for house or place is beit and the Hebrew word for bread is lechem. So beit lechem in Hebrew or Bethlehem in English means house of bread. Could Jesus (the Bread of Life) be born anywhere else?

So, what difference does it make if the bread is wheat or Barley?

When I was in my late 20's Rev. Tom Huxtable asked me to be a Sunday school teacher. I really didn't want to be a Sunday school teacher so I told Tom I didn't know enough about the Bible to teach it to anyone else. Then I said that all I knew about the Bible I learned in children's Sunday school. That was definitely the wrong thing to have said to Tom. He jumped right on that and he said, "Well that is really all you need to know to teach the children." Then he said something that really changed the Christian aspect of my life. He said, "Find something in the Bible that you love and read about it and the rest will take care of itself."

So, I just started reading about the plants and flowers of the Bible as I had always loved flowers. One thing kept leading to another. While reading about nonflowering plants, I started reading about wheat. Reading about wheat versus barley, it made me angry with God. Wheat had the reputation for making the best bread. Wheat was mainly grown in Egypt. It was way too expensive for the Hebrew people to buy. So, they bought barley instead which was half the price of wheat. They not only ate the barley themselves; they fed it to their animals as well.

Why, I kept wondering, if bread was so important to His chosen people, couldn't God make it possible for them to eat the best bread? I was still upset with God. It bothered me so much that I went searching for barley flour and baked a loaf of barley bread to taste it for myself. It was absolutely delicious with a kind of nut-like flavor. It was then I felt sure God was up there in heaven smiling and laughing at such a one as I am. I definitely needed to tell God I was very sorry for thinking what I had been thinking.

I kept on reading about bread in the bible and I soon learned that if bread was specifically named as barley bread in the story, there was going to be a miracle. What do I mean by that?

For example, in the Book of Judges 7:13 (New Oxford Bible) Gideon is spying on the Midianites and he hears a man telling a dream about a barley roll that tumbled into their camp. After Gideon heard the whole dream, he changed his battle plans winning the battle without the use of one weapon.

Another example of a barley story miracle is in the Book of Ruth. Ruth meets Boaz during the Barley harvest and they eventually get married and have a son named, Obed. Through this meeting, Ruth becomes the great grandmother of David, the King, and thus an ancestor of Jesus.

I'll cite one more example of the miracle of a barley story It's in the NT in the Book of John (6:9). "There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish." What happened in this story? Jesus performed the miracle of feeding the 5,000. How do you multiply bread? Jesus just told us. You ask the Father to bless it!

Tom Huxtable taught me so much about how to read the Bible. When you just start reading about one simple thing you love in the Bible, you discover so many beautiful and interesting stories that teach you about your faith. From this experience, I learned to search for answers to whatever questions I had (no matter how stupid they were). Like 1) Who was Barabbas and why did we only hear of him during Jesus' trial and never again? Or 2) If swaddling bands were the way babies were dressed in Jesus' day, why was so much made of wrapping Jesus in them and then placing Jesus in a manger? Was that important?

Over the years, I've had so many of these kinds of questions and when I finally find the answers it is so uplifting and only serves to deepen my faith. I'm 86 now (60+ years later) and I'm still looking for answers to my questions!

Recently, I've been trying to learn if Ruth, the Moabite Princess, (from the Book of Ruth) was half black as some scholars claim she was while other scholars disagree saying it can't be proven. Though I will continue to seek the answer to Ruth's ancestry, my faith tells me it is not really important because in God's eyes, there is only one race - the human race!

 

Judy Welch