Hi everyone. Welcome back to the Daily
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I would love to hear from you. Today, we're looking at a really
interesting encounter Here with Jesus and the Jewish leaders.
Mark chapter 12, verses 18 to 27.
Some Sadducees who deny that there is a resurrection came to
him and they put this question to him Master.
We have it from Moses in writing, if a man's brother
dies, leaving a wife but no child.
The man must marry the Widow to raise up children for his
brother. Now, there were seven brothers,
the first married, a wife. And then died leaving.
No children. The second married, the Widow.
And he too died. Leaving.
No children. With the third, it was the same
and none of the seven left any children.
Last of all the woman died, now at the resurrection, when they
Rise Again, whose wife will, she be since she had been married to
all seven. Jesus said to them, is not the
reason why you go wrong that you understand, neither the
scriptures nor the power of God For when they rise from the dead
men and women do not marry know. They are like the angels in
heaven. Now about the Dead Rising again.
Have you never read in the book of Moses in the passage, about
the Bush, how God spoke to him, and said, I am the god of
Abraham, the god of Isaac, and the god of Jacob, he is, God not
of the dead, but of the living, you are very much mistaken.
So a really interesting passage and this is one of those ones
where we really get a lot from digging into the phrases.
And there's some things going on here that Jesus is trying to get
across that we might miss. So, let's have a go at doing an
exegesis of this passage. What's the context?
So Jesus has entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, this is already
happened in. Mark, he's cursed the Fig Tree
and his cleanse, the temple, and he's been teaching in the temple
up to a now. He's been questioned by the
herodians and The Pharisees. We saw that in the previous
passage. Now, we see a different group of
Jewish leaders who come and try to trap him.
And these are the Sadducees, they don't appear a whole lot in
the gospels, but they were quite a prominent group in the time of
Jesus. Basically, the Sadducees were
wealthy priests who are like the upper class of Jewish Society,
not all of them were priests, but certainly all of them were
closely associated with the temple.
They'll quite a powerful party and And quite an elite party
within Judaism, so they had a lot of influence.
Also, part of the Sadducees, was the relatives and the friends of
the Sadducees, and all the wealthy aristocracy of
Jerusalem, tended, to support the Sadducees as well.
So, it's sort of like the Jewish leaders who were supported by
the upper class of society. Now, the Sadducees cooperated
with the Romans and they facilitated good relationships
with them. We started They promoted
tolerance in particular as a result.
They had a lot less popular appeal than the Pharisees
because most popular people did not want to cooperate with the
Romans, but the wealthy Jews did support them.
So, that's a bit of background on the Sadducees.
But most important is not their political views, but their
theological views, and Mark actually tells them a key part
of that here. He says, the Sadducees deny.
There is a resurrection So thinking here about the teaching
that there will be a resurrection of the body on the
last day of The Last Judgement, the Sadducees did not believe
that. The Pharisees did believe that
with the Sadducees don't. So the Sadducees often consider
to be like the Liberals of the day, perhaps the ones who
struggle with Supernatural ideas.
They only accepted the first five books of Moses, Moses.
And therefore, since nowhere in the first five books of Moses,
is it clear that there is going to be a resurrection of the
Dead? They didn't believe that there
will be a resurrection. Of the Dead, unlike most of the
other Jews at the time of Jesus. So, they believed that when the
salt, when the body dies, the soul parishes along with it.
So, some Scholars have characterized the Sadducees as
conservative in this sense that they are not willing to embrace
any new ideas, but they're also kind of progressives in this
sense that they really don't like Supernatural teachings.
So, it's an interesting set of beliefs that they have By the
way, this is one of the arguments that's worth talking
about in relation to how many books should be in the Bible in
the Old Testament in particular, because you probably know that
Catholics have more books in their Old Testament than other
questions do. And often one of the arguments
for why the Protestant Bible is correct is that Protestants
might say it's in the time of Jesus there was a closed Canon,
everyone knew which books belonged in the Old Testament.
Well here, if we look Look, even just at the Sadducees, it's
pretty clear that the Jews did not agree, which books should be
in the Old Testament, the Pharisees and the Sadducees
disagreed. So that's not a particularly
good argument to make. It was only later after the time
of Jesus that the Jews sort of came up with a universal Cannon
and that was not the one that Christians accepted for 1500
years. So there's a whole lot of
interesting historical questions about the way that the Canon was
determined. It certainly was not agreed
upon. Amongst the Jews at the time of
Jesus. There were some disputes about
it. Anyway, let's get back to the
text. So they come to Jesus and they
put this question to him. So the Sadducees a bringing a
trap question to Jesus, similar to the question, his just
answered about paying taxes to Caesar.
And they say this master, we have it from Moses in writing,
if a man's brother dies, leaving a wife, but no child, the man
must marry the Widow to raise up children for his brother.
Now, this was a real Jewish law. It's called the lever right law.
This is in Deuteronomy chapter 25, verse 5.
And it does say that if a man dies without having children,
then his brother must take his wife and have children on his
dead brother's behalf. So, this is a real Jewish law
that president. Renting a real law here to
Jesus. They haven't made one up and
keep in mind since this is in Deuteronomy.
That's one of the first five books of the Sadducees do accept
this teaching, but they're now going to come up with a
fictional scenario that they think shows that doesn't work
with the lever right law basically and therefore they're
going to try and argue that the resurrection doesn't make sense
because this situation would be absurd if the resurrection was
true. So, then I go on to describe
this hypothetical scenario, which is deliberately designed
to trap Jesus, and they think they're pretty clever.
They think the scenario they describe can't possibly make
sense if there really is a resurrection from the dead.
So they think they've given Jesus a good case here, that's
going to trap him. So this is the case that they
say. Now, there were seven brothers,
the first married, a wife and then died.
Having no children. The second married, the Widow
and he too died, having no children.
When the third came, it was the same and none of the Seven
Brothers, left any children. Last of all the woman herself
died. Now at the resurrection, when
they Rise Again, whose wife will, she be?
Since she had been married to all seven, see see how the
argument is supposed to go according to the levirate law.
If this situation happened, then yes, the woman would have to be
married seven times, but according to the resurrection
that would mean that she has seven husbands and, and so the
Sadducees That just doesn't make sense.
Now, interestingly the scenario that I described here is quite
similar to a real story from the Old Testament that's in Tobit
3:8. Wear something like this does
happen. There's a woman who keeps being
married to different Brothers but the brothers keep dying on
the wedding night until she's gone through seven different
brothers. So that's interesting but we
can't read too much into that because the Sadducees did not
accept that tobert was one of the books of the Old Testament.
So Jesus replies to them. This way.
Verse 24 is not the reason why you go wrong.
So notice upfront, Jesus says that they are quite wrong, about
the Resurrection being impossible.
He says the reason you go wrong is that you neither understand
the scriptures nor the power of God.
Now that's some quite a insult to these influential Jewish
leaders. They don't understand the
scriptures or the power of God According To Jesus.
So Jesus, he is says that not only did the scriptures, make it
clear that there will be a resurrection.
So it's in the scripture he says, on top of that, if they
really believed in God, well then of course, he could raise
people from the dead. So apparently they have problems
with both the scripture and the belief that God can do anything.
Now, he's going to address each of these two points in reverse
order. So he's going to first address
the issue of God, raising people from the dead and then he's
going to go back and revisit the issue they have.
With the scriptures. So in other words, his first
going to address the marriage issue and then secondly he's
going to make a more fundamental point which is that the
Sadducees should really accept the resurrection.
Because it's actually in the first five books of Moses
itself, which they do except. So he starts his defense here in
verse 25 for when people rise from the dead men and women do
not marry. So, apparently the Sadducees had
this idea that at the Resurrection, when people rise
from the dead, it was going to be basically a continuation of
the current state of affairs on Earth.
So like a mere resuscitation of corpses perhaps Jesus here.
First tells them, that's not what the resurrection is going
to be like, it's a fundamentally different kind of existence men
and women will not marry. So that firstly that undercuts
their whole scenario about marriage.
He says, that's not even going to happen in the resurrection.
Now the lectionary reading we have here, actually takes out a
phrase in the original. If you read Mark chapter 12 in
most Bibles here, is what it says, men and women do not marry
nor are given in marriage. So there's actually an
additional phrase there about being given in marriage and in
that culture, basically that referred to sort of the way that
men and women did things. So men married, whereas women
were given in marriage. That's sort of how it worked
since Jesus uses both phrases. He says people are neither.
He says, men and women do not marry nor are given in marriage.
A lot of Scholars would say the fact that he deliberately goes
out of his way to say, both implies that, there still will
be men and women in a sense in the resurrection.
People will retain their biological sex and that's
important to keep in mind. This is a teaching that a lot of
married. People have struggled with men
and women will not marry in the resurrection.
And by extension, that probably means that people who were
married will no longer be married.
And that's, you know, a difficult teaching we need to
keep in mind, firstly, that this comes directly from Jesus.
This isn't something the church has made up later Jesus here.
Teachers that marriage won't be a thing in heaven between
humans. Why, what would be the reason
why God wouldn't want people to be married?
Heaven. If you think about it, marriage
in this life is a sign for the love of God.
It's a symbol of the even greater love of God, and God has
given us. This gift of marriage on Earth
as a symbol of the love. He has for us, but in heaven, in
the next life when we're United to God, we will have the real
thing. So there's not going to be a
need for models in the same way. So those who make it to heaven
will be completely fulfilled by God and therefore, they won't be
a need for marriage. And this is kind of similar to
something. Pull says, later on in the New
Testament, about a lot of the Old Testament with shadows, cast
by Jesus. And now that Jesus, the true
light has come then our attention should be focused on
Jesus, and not those Shadows. Well, a similar thing can be
said about Earthly, marriage, Earthly, marriage is a good
thing. It's a shadow of an even better
thing, but when we get access to the even better thing, it would
be foolish to cling onto the mere Shadows.
So it's a similar kind of argument.
Jesus. Now gives his reason for why
there won't be marriage in heaven.
In the resurrection he says because they will be like the
angels in heaven. Now in marks version that's all
he says he doesn't explain that comment any further.
What does he mean? About angels being like them?
So therefore, a lot of people have looked at this and have
tried to interpret. What Jesus means, hear about
angels, they've said, perhaps the reason people will be like
angels in heaven in. A Shinto marriage.
Is that Angels don't have sexual desires.
So therefore humans being like Angels won't have sexual desires
either other another interpretation you might hear is
that what Jesus means here is that people will literally be
angels as in in the resurrection, people become
Angels. Now either of those
interpretations would be okay if we didn't have any more
information but if you look at the version of this passage in
Luke, Luke actually gives us more words that Jesus Says here,
Luke's version of this statement is more complete and in Luke's
version. Jesus does give the reason as to
why humans will be like angels in Luke's version.
It says, people will be like Angels because they can no
longer die. That's the similarity between
humans in the resurrection and angels.
So, since humans will no longer die in the resurrection, they're
no longer going to need to have children to repopulate the
Earth. And therefore, there's no need
to get married with. So you can see how that's the
basic argument. Jesus wants to make about why
humans are going to be similar to Angels.
Now what's interesting about this Jesus bringing up Angels is
the Sadducees did not believe in angels.
They thought the first five books of Moses doesn't teach
that clearly enough so they didn't believe in angels.
So Jesus is really digging in here by bringing up angels and
throwing it in their face verse 26.
Jesus now moves on to the second reason which remember was about
the scriptures. He says this now about the Dead
Rising again. So he's going to address their
lack of belief, in the resurrection as taught by the
first five books of Moses. He says, have you never read it
in the book of Moses in the passage, about the Bush, how God
spoke to him, and said, I am the god of Abraham, the god of Isaac
and the god of Jacob. Now, that's a quote from Exodus
chapter 3 verse 6 of The Burning Bush.
God says those things to Moses and obviously the Sadducees did
accept that because was The Exodus is part of the first five
books verse 27. Jesus says he is God not of the
dead but of the living So that's the argument he makes and it's
an interesting one, it's probably not the argument that
we would make, we might think. But let's think about why Jesus
said it this way in the burning bush episode.
God says to Moses, I am the god of Abraham, the god of Jacob.
And the god of Isaac notice, that God doesn't say.
I was the god of those people. He says, I am But even but by
then, by the time of Moses, Abraham, Jacob and Isaac will
well and truly dead and yet still God says I am their God.
For, for God to be the god of someone, he has to be in a
relationship with him. So from this Jesus argues that
at the time, Moses received the vision of the burning bush.
It must mean that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and therefore
all men are still alive in God's sight, in some sense.
So, Jesus is teaching them. People do not stop, existing
after death. That's all they're burning.
Bush passage teaches us is that God is still in relationship
with those patriarchy. So they haven't stopped existing
and therefore the main point Jesus makes is that the
resurrection is not at all impossible, people Souls do
continue after death. So that might not seem like the
best Old Testament texts for Jesus to pick there because
there are certainly clear passages in the Old Testament,
the talk about the Resurrection, The Book of Daniel it's quite
clear that there's going to be a resurrection of the end of time
and the Book of Maccabees also has that in there but remember
Jesus knows the Sadducees won't accept.
If he quotes from those books from Daniel and Maccabees
because the Sadducees don't accept them.
So Jesus options of passages that he can quote from a limited
to the first buy books. This is the example he picks and
it's a very clever one. He finishes by saying you are
very much mistaken or was other translations, put it, you are
quite wrong. Now that's where today's passage
ends Luke's version tells us that as soon as Jesus finishes
telling this the Sadducees accept two feet and they did not
dare ask him any more questions. So overall Jesus, he refutes the
Trap scenario that was created by the Sadducees and he teaches
his hearers about the nature of the Resurrection in the process.
Now, in the coming versus will see, Jesus being questioned by
other religious leaders in Jerusalem.
An interesting passage, I hope you agree.
Let's finish by taking a look at a couple of short paragraphs
from the catechism, which discuss what we've heard today
in Mark, chapter 12 paragraph. 993 is about the progressive
nature of the Resurrection. The Pharisees are many of the
Lord's. Contemporaries hoped for the
resurrection, Jesus teaches it firmly to the Sadducees, who
deny the resurrection, he answers is not this.
Why? You are wrong that you know
neither the scriptures nor the power of God through faith in
the resurrection rests, on faith in God, who is not God of the
dead, but of the living. So you can see that that passage
quotes directly from Mark chapter 12.
And then paragraph 16 19. This is an interesting one.
This is in the section about how some people choose virginity,
for the sake of the Kingdom. So, it's in the section about
marriage virginity, for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven is an
unfolding of baptismal Grace, a powerful sign of the supremacy
of the bond with Christ and of the Ardent expectation of his
return a sign, which also recalls that marriage is a
reality of this present age, which is passing away.
So here, the church agrees with what Jesus says about marriage.
Being only a temporary thing in this life.
And therefore, those who choose virginity in this life, do a
good thing. Because in a sense in the next
life, we'll all be virgins in a way.
So, an interesting application of that particular text.
Thank you again for listening. I hope you learned something new
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Gnu tomorrow.