Word to the Wise
Saturday, November 24, 2012 - Saturday in the 33th Week in Ordinary Time
[Rev 11:4-12 and Luke 20:27-40]The children of this age marry and remarry; but those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. They can no longer die, for they are like angels; and they are children of God because they are the ones who will rise.
The incident in today's gospel is an attempt by a group called the Sadducees to trap Jesus theologically (and by extension, politically). They use an ancient method of argumentation called the reductio ad absurdum. By proposing an extreme case, they attempt to disprove a core truth. Their theological position committed them to accepting only the Torah (Pentateuch), the first five books of the Bible. Since they claimed there was no reference to resurrection in those books, then the Pharisees, who accepted many more scriptures had to be wrong in their belief in a final resurrection of the dead. As a case in point, they use the absurd situation of a woman being married to each of seven brothers because of the "levirate law" that was aimed at continuing a family line or name. (Deuteronomy 25:5-10) Jesus destroys their argument on two levels. First, he points out that marriage is something that occurs in this life and not in the next. So the relationship of the woman to those brothers is irrelevant in the resurrection. Second, he points out that resurrection is indeed mentioned as a logical conclusion from God's words to Moses at the burning bush [Exodus 3].
The broader context for this incident is Jesus responding to his principal opponents, the scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees, at the end of his journey to Jerusalem. They are determined to destroy him one way or another. We know well just from the experience of our recent elections in this country how opponents of one candidate can try to trap that candidate so they'll have something to use against him or her! Examples abounded of single comments making a difference in an election on all different levels of government! Often this will come as a result of a theoretical question - or an absurd "What if....." type question. This is what happened in today's gospel incident. In the version in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus is more blunt in his reply to the Sadducees: "You are misled because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God...." This should serve as a good piece of advice to all of us who feel at times that opponents to our faith seem to have strong arguments. We need to know our scriptures and the power of God that two thousand years of reflection have revealed. The Holy Spirit will help if we'll make the effort! AMEN