On Resurrection : Don’t Even Think about Messing with Jesus! He Would Throw You a Punch!

Within a few days upon entering Jerusalem to complete his salvific mission, a bunch of Sadducees came to Jesus and challenged him for his teaching on resurrection. Unlike the Pharisees, the Sadducees do not believe resurrection after death. No wonder that Jesus’ teaching on resurrection invited unwanted attention from the Sadducees.

In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus touched on resurrection in teaching of humility and compassion, while he was still in Galilee with these words:

“When you hold a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or your wealthy neighbors, in case they may invite you back and you have repayment. Rather, when you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”  (Luke 14: 12-14)

Namely, according to Jesus, resurrection is a natural consequence of the righteous conducts, such as practicing the virtues of humility and compassion.

Even there was no such a thing like Facebook and Twitter, back then, news about Jesus’ teaching had traveled to Jerusalem faster than Jesus. So, by the time Jesus arrived in Jerusalem, his teaching on resurrection was already known to the Sadducees in Jerusalem.

Imagine if you were one of these Sadducees and just found out that the very person, whose teaching is contrary to what you believe. As a Sadducee, you are adamant that resurrection is a hoax that Jesus made up to mislead people. Then, Jesus is now coming to your town. Wouldn’t you want to confront Jesus and blow your punch on his face so that he would lose his face as a teacher? Perhaps, these Sadducees in the Gospel story felt this way. The punch they threw at Jesus’ face was this question:

“Teacher, Moses wrote for us, ‘If someone’s brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; first married a woman but died childless. Then the second and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. Now at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had been married to her”. Luke 20:28-33

By citing the Levirate Law from Deuteronomy 25:5-10, the Sadducees threw a punch at Jesus through the above question. Probably, they were hoping to make Jesus look “stupid. They wanted Jesus to lose his face, as they were confident that Jesus would not be able to answer their question.

Now, imagine if a bunch of Sadducees asked you the same question, how would you answer?

Perhaps, you would be tempted to answer that this woman is now nobody’s wife, as all the brothers she had married, according to the law, died. But, if you answered this way, then, they would laugh at you contemptuously, because it would also contradict the teaching of resurrection. If the teaching of resurrection is to withstand, then, this woman would never become a widow, as her dead husband would resurrect and take her as his wife again.

So, how would you answer and respond to the Sadducees’ such a question?

Or, would you remain silence, lest that you would be in their “trap” to ridicule you?

In fact, hypocrite religious leaders who tried to attack Jesus in a similar way used this silence technique as they could not answer Jesus’ counter punch, embarrassing themselves to Jesus.

In Luke 20;1-8, chief priests and other religious leaders asked Jesus by what authority he was teaching to people in the Temple are in Jerusalem, and where he received the authority. It was their attempt to incriminate him. In response to this, Jesus asked them, baptism that John the Baptist conducted was of heavenly origin or human origin. They could not answer, because they felt Jesus would criticize them for not believing in what John was doing if they answered “heavenly origin”, also because they was afraid that people would stone then if they said “human origin”, as people had thought of John as a prophet. In a way, Jesus made them look fool and caused them lose their face at that time.

So, this is how Jesus first answered:

“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”. Luke 20:34-35.

This is like Jesus telling the Sadducees, “Duh! Guys, why you ask such a stupid question? You guys don’t know what you are talking about!  Life after resurrection is not subject to what the Levirate Law and any other laws any more. What you are asking me is just as stupid as bringing an apple to where you are to bring an orange. Are you thinking that orange will also taste like apple?”

Then, Jesus further tells:

“They can no longer die, for they are like angels; and they are the children of God because they are the ones who will rise. That the dead will rise even Moses made known in the passage about the bush, when he called ‘Lord’ the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; and he is not God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive”, Luke 20:36-38

Now, through Luke 20:34-38, in response to the Sadducee’s question on how the Levirate Law would apply in after-life situations, Jesus elaborates on his teaching and promise on resurrection, which is found in Luke 14:14 and John 6:40.

For those who are faithful, compassionate, and humble enough to enjoy resurrection after their death, all the laws on earth, including the Mosaic Laws, in which the Levirate Law is found, are no longer applicable, though we are subject to these laws until we die. Resurrection is not to “restart” an earthly life elsewhere. This is not about what Hindu reincarnation concept suggests. This is not anything like samsara cycle in Buddhism, either. Therefore, those who are raised as Jesus has taught and promised are also free from the deuteronomic cycle of sins, though we are subject to the laws while in the cycle.

These Sadducees might have thought that they could cause Jesus to lose his face this time by throwing the question on the Levirate Law in the case of after-life. They had thought that such a challenge would force Jesus to invalidate his teaching on resurrection based on the Levirate Law. However, such an attempt of theirs to attack Jesus backfired against them. Now, they look stupid.

So, here is a lesson:

Don’t even think of messing with Jesus. You sure will be made sorry for that.

Back in January 2015, flying from Sri Lanka to the Philippines, Pope Francis humorously and perhaps, hyperbolically, said, “If you insult my mother, expect a punch!”.  Well, if you try to make Jesus look stupid, expect a punch to make yourself stupid!