Have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living

 The same day the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Him and asked Him, saying:  "Teacher, Moses said that if a man dies, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.  Now there were with us seven brothers.  The first died after he had married, and having no offspring, left his wife to his brother.  Likewise the second also, and the third, even to the seventh.  Last of all the woman died also.  Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife of the seven will she be?  For they all had her."  Jesus answered and said to them, "You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God."  For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.  But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'?  God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."  And when the multitudes heard this, they were astonished at His teaching.

But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together.  Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?"  Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it:  'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."

- Matthew 22:23-40

Yesterday we read that the Pharisees went and plotted how they might entangle Jesus in His talk.  And they sent to Him their disciples with the Herodians, saying, "Teacher, we know that You are true, and teach the way of God in truth; nor do You care about anyone, for You do not regard the person of men.  Tell us, therefore, what do You think?  Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?"  But Jesus perceived their wickedness, and said, "Why do you test Me, you hypocrites?  Show me the tax money."  So they brought Him a denarius.  And he said to them, "Whose image and inscription is this?"  They said to Him, "Caesars."  And He said to them, "Render therefore unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's."  When they had heard these words, they marveled, and left Him and went their way.

  The same day the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Him and asked Him, saying:  "Teacher, Moses said that if a man dies, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.  Now there were with us seven brothers.  The first died after he had married, and having no offspring, left his wife to his brother.  Likewise the second also, and the third, even to the seventh.  Last of all the woman died also.  Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife of the seven will she be?  For they all had her."  Jesus answered and said to them, "You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God."  For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.  But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'?  God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."  And when the multitudes heard this, they were astonished at His teaching.  The Sadducees were an aristocratic landowning class of Jerusalem.  They formed an important political "party" or block within the ruling Council, and played a key role in the maintenance of the temple and among the priesthood.  After the Siege and destruction of Jerusalem, they disappeared as a class.  As the text indicates, in contrast to the Pharisees, they did not believe in the resurrection of the dead.  For them the written Law of the Torah was important, in contrast to the oral traditions of the Pharisees.   Their question to Jesus reflects their understanding.  Jesus confirms that there will indeed be a resurrection, but not of the type that the Sadducees imagine here.  They consider the concept of resurrection to be a continuation of earthly life (including earthly marriage).  Therefore they mock the doctrine with an absurd scenario, my study bible says.  But the are ignorant of the Scriptures, which reveal a complete transfiguration of life in the resurrection, and make their questions irrelevant.  Moreover, they also fail to understand how Abraham and his sons can be alive in God even if they are physically dead.  My study bible says that it is the clear teaching of Christ that the souls of the faithful who have departed this life are sustained before the face of God in anticipation of the final joy of the resurrection.

But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together.  Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?"  Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it:  'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."  The Pharisees had found 613 commandments in the Scriptures, and their practice was to debate about which one was central.  Jesus here teaches us the first and the second, which He says constitute the grand framework of all the Law and the Prophets.   Although this lawyer has come purely to test Christ, St. Mark tells us that this man is converted by Jesus' answer (Mark 12:28-34). 

What is the purpose of the Law?  For that matter, of the Prophets, as Christ includes both in His summary with the two great commandments.  The Sadducees come asking about the resurrection, and the Pharisees test Christ about the Law.   How are the two questions related?  What we could answer to both is that Christ is in the world to teach us about life in abundance, and that He is life itself.  The purpose of the Law and the Prophets is to call us to that life, to form and to shape the people of God within that life of God that God wants for us.  The resurrection teaches us about that life that God has for us.  In Revelation, the One who sat on the throne says, "I am always making all things new" (Revelation 21:5 - in a literal translation of the Greek verb form).  The resurrection teaches us about the surprising renewal of life, the transformation in God's life for us.  We can see the effect that Jesus' holiness has on His surroundings.  His whole ministry is a renewal of faith, a rebirth in Judaism.  He gives us the very picture of the effects of this holiness when He teaches us about new wineskins that are necessary to hold the new wine (see this reading).  In the response of the leadership to Christ, in the questions of the Sadducees and Pharisees in today's reading, we can see the effects of Christ's renewal on the leadership.  He is calling them all to the truth of their faith, to redemption, and to repentance.  His first act in Jerusalem is to cleanse the temple, to put them all on notice.  The truth of His ministry is the powerful weapon at work here, and they are fighting back in the way they can.  They plot to trap Him so they can have Him put to death.  But what Jesus leaves us with is the truth that cannot die, that which will not be altered a jot or a tittle (5:17-20).  The power of His holiness, and His commandments, remains for each of us to follow and to put our faith into, to live.  Here, Jesus lays it all out:   the love of God comes first, and love of neighbor coupled with it.  And the purpose of all life is to be transformed, renewed, made new -- whether we are speaking of life in this world and the work of the Holy Spirit or life in the next.  Indeed, His commandments are life (John 12:50), and He is the living Word (John 1:1-5).  The members of the leadership cannot accept this shaking up of their world, their establishment, their places.  They are the custodians of the faith, and yet for them the spiritual eyes and ears of faith don't seem to mean much; Christ tells us, quoting Isaiah, that they have grown hard of hearing and their eyes have grown dim.  He calls them the blind leaders of the blind.  He offers to all people, including these in the leadership, renewal and light, vision and holiness.  His teachings are here for us, in every generation, so that we may find the life in abundance He promises.  The early Church understood that His was the way of life, and contrasted it with the way of death.  Let us be alert to the light of renewal for ourselves, and accept the changes God will bring to us, the ongoing transformation of metanoia (repentance).  His is the light that shines in love for each of us, to show us the way.