32ND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (C)

Some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, came forward and put this question to him….

Lk 20: 27-38

Parallels are: Mt 22:23-33; Mk 12:18-27.

v. 27 - Some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, came forward and put this question to him….

• The Sadducees were priests and aristocrats. They were wealthy and collaborated with the Romans. The Pharisees were apolitical.
• The Sadducees did not expect any Messiah. The Pharisees did.
• The Sadducees believed in free will. The Pharisees believed in fate.
• The Sadducees only accepted the Torah. The Pharisees accepted all of Scrip-tures as well as the oral and ceremonial laws.
• The Sadducees did not believe in the after-life, in the resurrection, in angels and demons. The Pharisees believed in all of these (Acts 23:8). But their belief in the after-life is very physical and carried to the extreme. For example, they believed that women will give birth every day.

Belief in the Resurrection appeared only 2 centuries before and can be found in Daniel 12:2-3. Since the Sadducees did not accept Daniel, they did not accept the belief in the Resurrection.

The Sadducees contested the Resurrection by using an argument that shows the resurrection to be ridiculous.
The response of Jesus was based on Exodus whose authority the Sadducees accept.

v. 28 - 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.'

This is called the Levirite law and found in Dt. 25-5-6. This, however, is prohi-bited by Lev 18:16 and 20:21.
The purpose is the perpetuate the name of the family and to assure an heir for the deceased. But the law was already in disuse at the time of Jesus. Moreover, the law became less important when daughters were allowed to inherit (Num 36).

This practice is also found among the Hittites and the Assyrians.

v. 35-36 - 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 the children of God because they are the ones who will rise.

The phrase “deemed worthy” seems to suggest that it is a grace to be admitted to the world to come.
Jesus gives us an idea of what the resurrection entails, “we shall be like the angels”. The material will pass away.

Instead of children of God, read “sons of the resurrection”. They are heirs of the new world to come and of the life in that world.

There is no intention to devalue marriage. The intention is to stress that in the after-life there is no other preoccupation but to serve and praise God.

v. 37-38 - 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.

Jesus quotes Ex 3:6 because the Sadducees accept the authority of the Book of Exodus, being part of the Torah. “I am the God of your father," he continued, "the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob." Take note that God says: “I AM the God your father” not “I WAS the God of your father.”
God takes care of the living. God revealed himself to Moses as the God of the Patriarchs, as a living God who guides the history of the living. Moreover, men may lose their friends to death. But not God.

v. 39 - Some of the scribes said in reply, "Teacher, you have answered well."

The scribes applaud Jesus because he has proven the Sadducees wrong. We can also find in Mk 12:32, a scribe commending Jesus for his answer. The scribe said to him, "Well said, teacher. You are right in saying, 'He is One and there is no other than he.'”