The Jewish historian Josephus tells us that the Sadducees claimed that the soul perished along with the body at death. St. Luke describes the Sadducees as, “those who deny that there is a resurrection” (Luke 20:27, cf. Acts 23:7-8). The Sadducees limited sacred scripture to first five books of the Bible, and denied the existence of angels (Acts 23:7–8).
In an attempt to make Jesus look foolish, the Sadducees confront Jesus with a dilemma story, intended to disprove the resurrection. According to Jewish law, if a married man died childless, his brother was required to marry his widow and to produce a male child. “The firstborn son she bears shall continue the name of the deceased brother” (Deuteronomy 25:6).
This type of Levirate marriage was a popular as means of caring for widows and securing property rights. In the ancient world, couples would not engage in courtship and decide for themselves whom to marry. Instead, their families arranged the marriage. Marriage had more to do with inheritance, and kinship bonds, than with mutual love.
Using the laws of Levirate marriage, the Sadducees present an absurd dilemma to trap Jesus. What would happen if a certain widow married a second time to her bother-in-law, and then he in turn died childless? In the Sadducees story, the widow eventually marries seven brothers, each of whom dies childless. Finally, the woman herself dies.
Attempting to make their point, the Sadducees ask, “Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her.” The Sadducee’s believe this line of argument proves that the resurrection is a ludicrous idea.
Jesus counters by first pointing out that the dead who rise will “neither marry nor are given in marriage.” Again, reaching across different cultures, the primary purpose of marriage in the ancient world was the production of children. The dead who rise will no longer die, so Jesus says they will be ‘like’ or ‘equal to’ the angels who also never die and have no need to produce children to perpetuate their kind.
What does Jesus mean when he says the resurrected children of God are like angels? In popular culture, it is common to tell someone who has recently lost a love one that they “have an angel in heaven.” God created angels as beings of pure spirit. Unlike angels, humans have a body and a soul.
Although death temporarily separates from our bodies from our eternal soul, this is not our final state. At the resurrection, our souls are joined again to eternal glorified bodies.
Although our resurrected bodies will be very different from our present bodies (1 Corinthians 15:35–58), we will still spend eternity in bodily existence. Jesus says we will be like angels because we will never die, not because we become angels. Since we will no longer die, marriage is not necessary in our heavenly existence.
Jesus then uses Scripture to answer the Sadducees. He could have quoted Daniel 12:2-3, which is a clear reference to the resurrection, but since the Sadducees especially reverenced the traditions of Moses, Jesus makes his point from Exodus. In the narrative at the burning bush the Lord says, “I am the God of Abraham . . . of Isaac . . . and of Jacob.” (Exodus 3:2–6). Jesus says God “is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive” (Luke 20:38).
What does this encounter with Jesus mean to us today? First, many people in our modern world treat religious doctrine and dogma, as an infringement on their personal right to choose whatever beliefs they want. Instead, they simply seek to be ‘spiritual’ in their own way. Does it really matter to Jesus what we believe about the resurrection? Based on this Gospel encounter with Jesus, we would have to say; “Yes, the resurrection matters to Jesus.” In fact, each Sunday in the creed we recite, “I look forward to the resurrection of the dead.”
In fact St. Paul notes that if Christ is not raised from the dead, our faith is in vain (1 Corinthians 15:16-18). Without the resurrection our faith is a fraud and meaningless! The resurrection teaches us three central things about our faith. First the resurrection demonstrates God’s love for us. Secondly, it is through the resurrection we have eternal life, and finally the resurrection holds us each accountability before God’s judgment.
While each one of us by nature craves the feeling of belonging and meaningful connection with others, many people are left feeling empty and lonely. Christ took the initiative to fulfill this need in an ultimate way by in sharing his love and relationship with us. We are not only joined to Christ, but in Christ to his body, the church. The communion of saints ensures belonging and meaningful connection with all Christians. He will not leave us lonely and unconnected. St. Paul writes, “But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).
Not only is the resurrection a proof of God’s love it also the means of eternal life for us. Jesus humbled himself taking on human flesh so that he might become “obedient to death, even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8) and after this to rise to newness of life and to share that life with us in baptism (Romans 6:4).
Finally, if death is simply the end of our existence and there is nothing else, then there is no accountability. Without the resurrection, who cares! We confess in the creed, “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.” Love is always our starting place, and even though we were each chosen for adoption as God’s children before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4), but we are still held accountable for our own freely chosen actions in this world. We are held accountable for our cooperation with God's grace.
In truth, nothing could be more central to our faith than Christ rising from the dead. God reveals his love to us through the resurrection, and his power to save us is made manifest on the cross and brought to fulfillment in his resurrection and ascension into Heaven.
Although our resurrected bodies will be very different from our present bodies (1 Corinthians 15:35–58), we will still spend eternity in bodily existence. Jesus says we will be like angels because we will never die, not because we become angels. Since we will no longer die, marriage is not necessary in our heavenly existence.
Jesus then uses Scripture to answer the Sadducees. He could have quoted Daniel 12:2-3, which is a clear reference to the resurrection, but since the Sadducees especially reverenced the traditions of Moses, Jesus makes his point from Exodus. In the narrative at the burning bush the Lord says, “I am the God of Abraham . . . of Isaac . . . and of Jacob.” (Exodus 3:2–6). Jesus says God “is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive” (Luke 20:38).
What does this encounter with Jesus mean to us today? First, many people in our modern world treat religious doctrine and dogma, as an infringement on their personal right to choose whatever beliefs they want. Instead, they simply seek to be ‘spiritual’ in their own way. Does it really matter to Jesus what we believe about the resurrection? Based on this Gospel encounter with Jesus, we would have to say; “Yes, the resurrection matters to Jesus.” In fact, each Sunday in the creed we recite, “I look forward to the resurrection of the dead.”
In fact St. Paul notes that if Christ is not raised from the dead, our faith is in vain (1 Corinthians 15:16-18). Without the resurrection our faith is a fraud and meaningless! The resurrection teaches us three central things about our faith. First the resurrection demonstrates God’s love for us. Secondly, it is through the resurrection we have eternal life, and finally the resurrection holds us each accountability before God’s judgment.
While each one of us by nature craves the feeling of belonging and meaningful connection with others, many people are left feeling empty and lonely. Christ took the initiative to fulfill this need in an ultimate way by in sharing his love and relationship with us. We are not only joined to Christ, but in Christ to his body, the church. The communion of saints ensures belonging and meaningful connection with all Christians. He will not leave us lonely and unconnected. St. Paul writes, “But God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).
Not only is the resurrection a proof of God’s love it also the means of eternal life for us. Jesus humbled himself taking on human flesh so that he might become “obedient to death, even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8) and after this to rise to newness of life and to share that life with us in baptism (Romans 6:4).
Finally, if death is simply the end of our existence and there is nothing else, then there is no accountability. Without the resurrection, who cares! We confess in the creed, “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.” Love is always our starting place, and even though we were each chosen for adoption as God’s children before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4), but we are still held accountable for our own freely chosen actions in this world. We are held accountable for our cooperation with God's grace.
In truth, nothing could be more central to our faith than Christ rising from the dead. God reveals his love to us through the resurrection, and his power to save us is made manifest on the cross and brought to fulfillment in his resurrection and ascension into Heaven.
The resurrection is also our source of motivation here in this life. We can be motivated to act by means of duty, but love will move us to a higher level of understanding, to selfless sacrifice. We are called to imitate the love of Christ. Christ's own love is our motivation.
“For the love of Christ impels us, once we have come to the conviction that one died for all; therefore, all have died. . . . so that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised” (2 Corinthians 5:14–15).
While the saving power of the resurrection is the central truth of this Gospel passage, many people find Jesus words puzzling. In a modern sense, they are triggered by his comment, “the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage.” Failing from lack of imagination; some people fear this means that heaven will somehow be boring. Are we to believe that heaven will lack one of the most cherished pleasures of our earthly existence?
Will our heavenly existence leave out some important earthly pleasures? We must remember that the God who created the earth and all that is in it and declared it to be “very good” (Genesis 1:31) is the same God who created Heaven.
We must broaden our imagination. Simply being in the presence of God will be the fulfillment of every desire. We will not be missing any earthly thing. St. John tells us in the new heaven and the new earth God “will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain” (Revelation 21:4).
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI comments on this modern fear;
But then the question arises: do we really want this—to live eternally? Perhaps many people reject the faith today simply because they do not find the prospect of eternal life attractive. What they desire is not eternal life at all, but this present life, for which faith in eternal life seems something of an impediment. (Spe Salvi 10).
Talking about spiritual pleasures may still leave some people unconvinced. Yet must we view Heaven as having no continuity to our present life? Is heaven a kind of eternal choir practice among the clouds?
First it must be recalled that we will have bodily existence in Heaven and if we take hints from Jesus resurrected appearance, we may still eat and have a social existence (Luke 24:42). There is another interesting note in the book of Revelation were we are told about the heavenly New Jerusalem. St. John tells us that the kings of the earth will bring in their treasure into the heavenly city and that “the treasure and wealth of the nations will be brought there” (Revelation 21:26).
Rather than suggesting that God will make all things new (in complete discontinuity with this present life), I think this suggests that he will make new all things. Rather than beginning creation over with a blank slate, God will renew or remake creation with a continuity to what is holy and good and true in the previous creation. Our belief that God created us by sharing his own divine essence with us, strongly suggest that continuity is not only possible, but necessary.
Obviously, there will not be complete continuity, but I don’t think we need to think of eternity as having no correspondence to our current earthly realty. In the end, I am completely certain of one thing, Heaven will not be boring!
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