1. Mark 6:38 (ESV)
  2. Exposition

Is there symbolism behind the numbers five and two?

Mark 6:38 (ESV)

38 And he said to them, “How many loaves do you have? Go and see.” And when they had found out, they said, “Five, and two fish.”

Since no one, for the sake of symbolism, will have brought five loaves of bread and two fish (Mark 6:38), we too must not look for a symbolic meaning here (as happened often in the early church) when among the public there is a boy (John 6:9) with five loaves of bread and two fish (taken along to sell?).1