What does Mark 8:14 Mean?

Verse Meaning

The one loaf of bread also recalls the two miraculous feedings of multitudes. A shortage of bread should have been no great concern to the disciples in view of Jesus" supernatural powers. [source][source]

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Context Summary

Notice the Master's tender considerateness, Mark 8:1-9. He would not have the people faint on their way home. There are distinct differences between this miracle and the feeding of the five thousand. Most of these are evident to the English reader, but that between the baskets used for the fragments is clear only from the original-those used in the case of the five thousand being quite different from the large ones used here, Mark 8:20; Matthew 15:37. Our Lord never repeats His work.

The Savior sighed in the previous chapter over physical need; here He sighs over moral obtuseness, Mark 8:10-21. The language is very strong, and gives a glimpse into the Redeemer's heart. Had the Pharisees been as willing to discern the signs of the age as to read the weather, they must have been able to recognize Him and His claims; but their foolish heart was darkened. Having sighed over the hard-heartedness of the Pharisees, might He not equally have done so over the obtuseness of the Twelve? They thought that He was referring to their carelessness in omitting to take bread. How little they realized that the cause lay far deeper! Let us be quick to read the divine intention in very simple incidents, and to learn that all God's past dealings contain lessons for the present! [source]

Chapter Summary: Mark 8

¹  Jesus feeds the people miraculously;
¹⁰  refuses to give a sign to the Pharisees;
¹⁴  admonishes his disciples to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Herod;
²²  gives a blind man his sight;
²⁷  acknowledges that he is the Jesus who should suffer and rise again;
³⁴  and exhorts to patience in persecution for the profession of the gospel