Whose Wife Is She?

Whose Wife is She?

Luke 20:27-38

There is more to a question than the question itself. Sometimes they aren’t really looking for an answer. The classic question of this sort is “When did you stop beating your wife?” One immediately sees the trap in this question. No matter how one answers the question, the one who asks this question will turn it against you? If he answers affirmatively, then he is guilty of beating his wife. But if he were to answer that at some time in the past he stopped, then he is guilty. In other words, the question is a trap. So these type of questions cannot be answered directly.

Jesus had just finished silencing the Pharisees who had also Zealots and Herodians in their company. They had asked the question: “Is it lawful to pay tribute to Caesar or not?” If Jesus had answered yes, then the Zealots would condemn him. And if he said no, then the Herodians would arrest Him as a tax revolter. But Jesus, like usual, addressed the real issue behind the question by asking for a coin with Caesar’s head on it. He asked them to identify whose picture was on the coin. When they answered Caesar, He replied to give to Caesar what is His. More importantly, He told them to render to God what is His. He had escaped the trap.

Then the Sadducees took a turn to trap Jesus with a question. We are clued in of their bad intentions with the words “who deny there is a resurrection.” They preface the question with a story about seven brothers. The oldest married a woman but died without children. According to the Torah, the next eldest brother was to take the woman as a wife and beget a child in the place of his dead brother. To make it even more dramatic, it is said that there were seven brothers who all had the woman as wife and died without children. Then they asked Jesus the question: In the resurrection, whose wife shall she be?

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They were not asking Jesus to judge between the claims of the seven brothers in the resurrection. After all, they did not believe in a resurrection. What they were really trying to do is to ridicule the idea of the resurrection. What kind of heaven would it be if all sorts of disputes like this had to be settled? Jesus could have answered, for example, that the oldest brother was to have her because he was the oldest. Then the answer would be: “That’s not fair to the other six!” Therefore the question was meant to entrap Jesus.

Jesus was well aware of the trap. He answers the basis for the question and not the question itself. He tells them of the basic purpose for marriage. He says that it is for this world in which people die, it is necessary for children to be born. This is why men and women marry and are given in marriage. Originally, marriage, sex and having children were the means of filling the earth. Afterward. It was necessary to replace those who died. The latter was only made necessary because of sin which brought death. Otherwise, marriage, sex and children would have ended when full population was reached.

Jesus tells the Sadducees that they were ignorant of the coming age. People won’t die there, so there is no need for marriage at all. Those who are accounted worthy of attaining the resurrection will be one large family. In this world, it is necessary and good that families share a special bond with each other, which leads to playing favorites. Parents are to be bonded to each other and need to care for their children. This is why a man shall leave his mother and the woman her home to become one flesh, a new family. Anything in this world which disrupts the plan of one man, one wife is sinful as it disrupts stability. One could add that the diversity of nations and peoples fulfill a similar purpose. But in the resurrection, there will only be one nation and one family. Therefore, the very basis of the question was invalid. It was based upon willful ignorance of the nature of the resurrection. For since all will be as the angels, there is no need for marriage and no dispute to resolve.

Jesus now addresses the resurrection itself. As the Sadducees only believed that the first five books of the Bible (The Torah) was inspired, Jesus answers them from the Torah. He proves that the Torah itself speaks of the resurrection and quotes the passage of Moses and the burning bush as an example. In this passage, God reveals Himself to Moses as “I AM that I AM.” Yahweh is the eternally existent one, the source of all life, the Creator of heaven and earth. All things live by Him and for Him. He is the one who created man from the dust of the earth. And what is more, He is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The Scripture does not say “I was the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” The present tense of the verb says that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are alive, even though they had died and were buried in the past. The Sadducees were silenced. The Gospels state that from that point, no one else dared ask a question.