You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God

 

 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 nether 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. 

 

- Matthew 22:23–33 

 

In our current readings, it is Holy Week in Jerusalem, the final week of Christ's earthly life.  On Saturday 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, "Caesar's."  And He said to them, "Render therefore to 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 nether 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.   My study Bible explains that, in telling the Sadducees, "You are mistaken," Jesus confirms that there will be a resurrection -- but it will be nothing like what they are imagining.  These Sadducees consider the concept of resurrection to mean a simple continuation of earthly life (including earthly marriage) and so they mock the doctrine they imagine with an absurd scenario.  However, as Jesus asserts, they are ignorant of the Scriptures, for in them is a revelation of complete transformation of resurrectional life.  Thus, with an understanding of the Scriptures, their question becomes irrelevant.  Moreover, my study Bible says, they fail to understand how Abraham and his sons can be alive in God, even when they are physically dead.  My study Bible tells us, "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."

It's important to understand that the perspective and religious outlook of the Sadducees is itself rather earthly in emphasis, in the sense that they accepted only the first five books of the Old Testament (that is, the Pentateuch, or Torah), and were quite literal in their interpretation of the Law.  They were major landowners around the city of Jerusalem, and so were a type of aristocratic class.  They were also from the priestly class and controlled many functions in temple.  In terms of the Council they were the party that formed the chief rivals to the Pharisees, and rejected many of the Pharisees interpretations of the Law.  They neither believed in the existence of angels or the resurrection of the dead (both of which were accepted by the Pharisees).  So, in terms of their very "earthly" orientation -- which we might say contrasts to a more spiritual or mystical outlook of Judaism -- their question essentially makes sense.  Given their orientation, it is little wonder they form a question that must be answered in terms of property and even inheritance.  Their very anti-mystical orientation perhaps forms the framework for this question, as well as Jesus' response that they do not know the Scriptures nor the power of God.  In fact, Christ's answer affirms for us the essential importance of the understanding of the work of the Holy Spirit, and the role the Holy Spirit plays in our faith.  For without the "power of God" how would we have Scriptures?  How would we have the work of the prophets?  (For the Creed confesses that the Holy Spirit spoke through the prophets.)  How would we truly have proper interpretation or understanding of the Scriptures?  And clearly, we would not understand the power of God to transform life in the Resurrection --  and like the Sadducees, we could not understand the salvific role of angels in the entire economy of the cosmos and as part of Creation.  So, as far as Christ's response is concerned, because the Sadducees' perspective is so "earthly" in this sense, their understanding and respect for Scripture is lacking, and therefore their knowledge of spiritual truth is also lacking.  They do not understand the nature of the Resurrection for this reason.  It brings us back to the important mystical component of our faith.  Without it we cannot understand the meaning and power of sacrament, nor that Scripture is a kind of literature that is not just "literal," but must be understood with a prayerful perspective, and one hopefully guided by the holy prayerful figures who came before us, especially the holy Fathers and Mothers who guided the Church in her early centuries and those who followed in their footsteps.  We have an incredible treasury of beauty, knowledge, wisdom, and truth -- but none of it is properly understood except with this spiritual, mystical perspective to set us in the right place for our own receptivity to it.  Let us consider the beauty and mystery especially of this Nativity season as we enter into it, and the roles played by angels, holy men and women, people of wisdom who seek the Child they know will be born, and all the roles played by those wise and aged to the young shepherds, to the angels who proclaim to them the glory of God.  For without all of that our faith would be much poorer indeed.

 

For He is not the God of the dead but of the living, for all live to Him

 

 Then some of the Sadducees, who deny that there is a resurrection, came to Him and asked Him, saying:  "Teacher, Moses wrote to us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife, and he dies without children, his brother should take his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.  Now there were seven brothers.  And the first took a wife, and died without children.  And the second took her as wife, and he died childless.  Then the third took her, and in like manner the seven also; and they left no children, and died.  Last of all the woman died also.  Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife does she become?  For all seven had her as wife."  Jesus answered and said to them, "The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage.  But those who are counted worthy to attain that age, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage; nor can they die anymore, for they are equal to the angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.  But even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised, when he called the Lord 'the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.'  For He is not the God of the dead but of the living, for all live to Him."  Then some of the scribes answered and said, "Teacher, You have spoken well."  But after that they dared not question Him anymore.

 

- Luke 20:27–40 

 

Yesterday we read that the religious leaders in Jerusalem watched Jesus as He taught in the temple, and sent spies who pretended to be righteous, that they might seize on His words, in order to deliver Him to the power and the authority of the governor.  Then they asked Him, saying, "Teacher, we know that You say and teach rightly, and You do not show personal favoritism, but teach the way of God in truth:  Is it lawful for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?"  But He perceived their craftiness, and said to them, "Why do you test Me?  Show Me a denarius.  Whose image and inscription does it have?"  They answered and said, "Caesar's."  And He said to them, "Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's."  But they could not catch Him in His words in the presence of the people.  And they marveled at His answer and kept silent.   

 

  Then some of the Sadducees, who deny that there is a resurrection, came to Him and asked Him, saying:  "Teacher, Moses wrote to us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife, and he dies without children, his brother should take his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.  Now there were seven brothers.  And the first took a wife, and died without children.  And the second took her as wife, and he died childless.  Then the third took her, and in like manner the seven also; and they left no children, and died.  Last of all the woman died also.  Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife does she become?  For all seven had her as wife."  Jesus answered and said to them, "The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage.  But those who are counted worthy to attain that age, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage; nor can they die anymore, for they are equal to the angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.  But even Moses showed in the burning bush passage that the dead are raised, when he called the Lord 'the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.'  For He is not the God of the dead but of the living, for all live to Him."  Then some of the scribes answered and said, "Teacher, You have spoken well."  But after that they dared not question Him anymore.  The Sadducees ask this question perhaps because, unlike the Pharisees, they did not believe in resurrection.  In this scenario, they present what they presume to be a resurrectional image; that is, that they presume it is meant to be a continuation of earthly life, including earthly marriage.  So they effectively seek to mock the doctrine with this absurd scenario.  My study Bible comments here that Christ confirms that there will be a resurrection, but not of the sort the Sadducees present in their question.  The resurrection is a transformed life, one in which those who are counted worthy to attain that age neither marry nor are given in marriage, nor can they die anymore -- for they are equal to the angels.  Jesus calls them sons of the resurrection, meaning of the new life of the resurrection, a transfigured life that is different in nature from earthly life.  Moreover, they fail to understand the Scripture passage of the burning bush, which indicates that the dead are raised, in which Moses called the Lord 'the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob,' as each one of a different generation was alive in God.  They fail to understand how Abraham and his sons can be alive in God even if they are physically dead.  My study Bible comments that it is the clear teaching of Christ the 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.  The scribes, whose expertise was on Mosaic Law and interpretation of the Scriptures, comment that Jesus has spoken well.

The Sadducees were a wealthy landowning class in Jerusalem, one which has often been referred to as an aristocracy.   They held many of the priestly positions including that of high priest and chief priest, had inherited positions concerning duties of maintaining the temple and the majority of the seats in the Sanhedrin, or ruling Council.  In effect, they controlled the temple and internal political affairs of the Jews.   Essentially we could probably say that the Sadducees were extremely pragmatic as a class, holding to their possessions around Jerusalem, their places in the temple and the political affairs of the Jews, and securing their places as best they could by dealing with the various great powers that vied for control of Judea, such as the Romans.  They did not cherish a messianic hope as did the Pharisees, nor did they believe in resurrection or apparently various aspects of spiritual life.  So, the question about "whose wife" this woman married to seven brothers would be makes some sense in that light.  But Christ's answer essentially refutes this very earthly-oriented sense of life that belonged to the Sadducees.  While the New Testament often gives us a picture of Jesus' tussles with the Pharisees, and His scathing pronouncements about their hypocrisy, the life of the Sadducees was one that Christ's doctrine clearly did not embrace as it was so materially-oriented.   In the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, Jesus clearly tells them in His reply to this question that they know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God (Matthew 22:29, Mark 12:24).  Even their question about marriage -- and whose wife this woman would be -- seems to reflect a materialist perspective, in that the wife seems to be viewed as a possession and a means for gaining offspring.  But Jesus' response opens up an opposite understanding of life.  If resurrection means an eternal life, one without death, then what of the institution of human marriage?  If all live to God, then what of the inheritance of land and possessions, an aristocracy that builds life and purpose upon keeping control of possessions and inherited positions?  In some sense, we can view this confrontation as one in which the Sadducees are clearly at a loss to understand Christ, and only the scribe is aware of Christ's discernment of what is written in the Scriptures, and values such.  According to some sources, it is only when Christ's ministry comes to this acute point at which social upheaval -- and therefore the unwanted attention of the Roman state -- becomes a worrisome possibility that the Sadducees get involved with the decision to do away with Jesus.  In John's Gospel we're told that it was Caiaphas, the high priest that year, who insists that Jesus should be put to death to avoid a greater problem with the Romans.  This is just after the social and political impact of Jesus and His ministry come to an acute crisis with the raising of Lazarus before witnesses who apparently included prominent people from Jerusalem.  Caiaphas says to the Sanhedrin, "You know nothing at all, nor do you consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, and not that the whole nation should perish."  But the Gospel of John, unlike the literal-minded Sadducees, understands that Caiaphas "did not say on his own authority; but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation, and not for that nation only, but also that He would gather together in one the children of God who were scattered abroad" (see John 11:49-52).  In effect, it is this pronunciation and advocacy for Jesus' death by Caiaphas the high priest that ultimately ushers in the death of the Sadducees for all time.  For with the destruction of Jerusalem that would come in 70 AD, so went the Sadducees from history.  These events should be enough to make us pause to consider Jesus' words over Jerusalem, which we read in Saturday's reading.  Jesus said, "If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes."   It would seem that the Sadducees, not understanding the Scriptures or the power of God, do not know what makes for the peace of Jerusalem, whose name means "foundation of peace."   Their pragmatic politics will not be enough to maintain the peace of Jerusalem, nor indeed in future the well-being and stability of their own people.  Let us consider for our own times what it means when our own material focus blinds us to the greater truths of God, even the spiritual reality at work in our own lives.  For Christ asks us to consider the Scriptures and the power of God, even His promise of life abundantly -- not as that which simply concerns us after our lives in this world, but as that which is also a part of us, as we participate in the life of God in which we're held, "for all live to Him."  If the things of Christ are the things that make for our peace, then let us focus all the more deeply on His word and teachings, and where He leads us, even now.  That would mean especially the life of the kingdom of God in whom "we live and move and have our being" (see Acts 17:25-28). 

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.  Jesus is now in Jerusalem and it is the final week of His earthly life.  The Pharisees 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, "Caesar's."  And He said to them, "Render therefore to 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.  Jesus tells that Sadducees, "You are mistaken."  The Sadducees were an aristocratic party in Jerusalem; they were wealthy landowners who had inherited roles in maintaining the temple, as members of the high-priestly and landowning class who controlled the temple and the internal political affairs of the Jews.  They held only to the Torah, the written Law (the first five Books of the Bible).  In contrast to the Pharisees, they rejected oral tradition.   They believed neither in the resurrection nor in spirits like angels.  In His response to them, Jesus confirms that there will be a resurrection, but not of the nature they are imagining.  The Sadducees consider the concept of resurrection to mean a continuation of earthly life (including earthly marriage), so they mock the doctrine with an absurd scenario.  But, as Jesus tells them, they are ignorant of the Scriptures, which reveal a complete transfiguration of life in the resurrection, which makes their earthly-oriented question irrelevant.  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."  My study Bible explains that the Pharisees had found 613 commandments in the Scriptures, and they debated about which one was central.  So the question to Jesus is a significant one and pertinent to their concerns and focus.  Here Jesus sets forth the first and the second commandment, which together constitute the grand summary of the Law.  Although this lawyer has come with malice to test Christ, we know from St. Mark that this man is converted by Jesus' answer (Mark 12:28-34).  Additionally, my study Bible comments that the second commandment cited by Jesus must be understood as it is written:  You shall love your neighbor as yourself -- or more, expressly, "as being yourself."  It's frequently misinterpreted to be understood, "You shall love your neighbor as you love yourself," but this takes away the force of the statement.  How much we love ourselves is not the standard set by Christ.  We are called to love our neighbor as being of the same nature as we are, as being created in God's image and likeness as we are.  Patristic teaching holds that we find our true self in loving our neighbor; that is, these commandments taken together give us a sense of how the love of God is expressed in love of neighbor, and is inseparable from love in action in our lives.

I was recently participating in a prayer group in which we focused in part on a section St. Paul's letter to the Romans (Romans 6:3-11).  In that part of his letter, St. Paul writes, "Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life" (verses 3-4).  In other words, St. Paul writes that baptism is both baptism into the death and the resurrection of Christ; so we take on that new life into which He was resurrected.  And St. Paul's understanding of baptism pertains deeply to today's passage.  Jesus tries to give insight into the Scriptures to the Sadducees, who reject any Scripture beyond the Torah (or Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible).  He tells them about this resurrected life, and tries to explain the condition of those in this life.  It is images like the one He describes here when He says, "they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven" that contribute to an ideal of monastic life, which is often called the "angelic life."  This is so precisely because, as St. Paul says, we are baptized both into His earthly death, and also His resurrected life.  We take on the qualities of that resurrection through baptism and the work of the Holy Spirit, and through our faith.  That is, aspects of that resurrectional life become part of the fruits of the Spirit.  Of course, the qualities of that life are many and varied beyond our imaginations and understanding, but this is part of the experience of the Church and its myriad saints and faithful.  It is this life into which we are baptized that helps to make it possible for us to break destructive habits, to take on hopes we don't think are possible, to accept that although we might find ourselves in very difficult circumstances, there is a way in which we might transcend them and in which God can help to transfigure them and fill them with meanings we could not discern otherwise.  These are all aspects of that resurrectional life into which we're baptized and in which we might participate -- even highly tangentially and partially -- while we yet live in this world as faithful.  And so Christ also explains to the Sadducees, just as would inspire St. Paul to his own understanding, that God is the God of the living and not the God of the dead.  In Luke's version of this passage, Jesus says, "For He is not the God of the dead but of the living, for all live to Him" (Luke 20:38; my italics added for emphasis).  That "for all live to Him" include us, we the living and the faithful, and this also informs St. Paul's declaration in the letter to the Hebrews that "we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses" (see Hebrews 12:1-3).    (After writing about the witnesses to faith Abraham and his descendants in chapter 11, St. Paul draws those to whom he writes into the understanding of their continuation in and with Christ's flock and the promise of Christ.)  And so, Jesus speaks of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in today's passage as "the living," and will draw all those in the resurrectional life -- into which we are also baptized thanks to Christ's Passion -- so that the Sadducees and others who listen in the temple, as well as all those who have read ever since including us, will start to ponder just what that life is which He promises and about which He speaks in reference to the Kingdom of God.  When we think about our own faith, we should also remember that additional phrase added in St. Luke's Gospel, "for all live to Him."  For insofar as St. Paul writes, we are baptized into His death and His resurrection and we participate -- through the Cross -- in that newness of life described here.  It permeates in moments of darkness with light that shines there, even if the darkness cannot take it in (John 1:5).