FEED MY SHEEP IN JOHN 21:15-17 AND THE PASTORAL ROLE OF PRIESTS IN NIGERIA

John 21:15-17 is a self contained narrative unit, made up specifically of the encounter between Jesus and Peter, thematically distinct from although literally connected to the preceding and following units in the same chapter, first contains three short dialogues between Jesus and Peter, each of which follows the same pattern, and ends with in a command. Thereafter there is a stated implication arising out of the dialogues. Using a literary-theological approach, this work discusses analytically the metaphoric and spiritual nature of Jesus’ directive to Peter to feed his sheep. This article argues that the verbs used for love in verses 15-17 may have different nuances, however, the contrast is not the focus of the dialogue. The priests who, like Peter, can truly claim that the love Jesus based on their closeness to Jesus and sound knowledge of his teaching are also asked to continue feeding or giving life to the hungry sheep of Jesus through adequate approach to evengelisation. Author(s) retain the copyright of this article ©2023 Publishedby VEDA Publications This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creative commons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ BIBLICAL STUDIES JOURNAL (BSJ) http://www.biblicalstudies.in/ Paul Danbaki Jatau BSJ.2023; 5(2):01-16