Last of all the woman died also.
υστερον δε OMIT δε παντων απεθανεν και η γυνη
9 Church Fathers comment on this verse · 10 commentaries
The Sadducees lacked faith in the teaching of resurrection, relying on a fragile basis for their beliefs. Their assumption that there could be physical existence following resurrection led them to err significantly. Consequently, they mocked the concept of resurrection as absurd and concocted an utterly nonsensical tale.
Consequently, they confront Christ, our shared Redeemer, who embodies Life and Resurrection, in an effort to refute the truth of resurrection: as individuals steeped in disdain and disbelief, they concoct a tale rich in ignorance and, through a series of cold assertions, audaciously strive to eradicate the hope of all humanity. We maintain that the hope of all humanity is found in the resurrection from the dead, with Christ being the firstborn and the firstfruits of this resurrection.
Thus, the wise Apostle Paul, linking our resurrection to His triumph over death, states, ‘If the dead are not raised, neither was Christ raised;’ and he reinforces this point, countering doubts by saying, ‘But if Christ was raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection from the dead?’ The individuals making such claims were the Sadducees, whom we now discuss.
However, let us examine the absurdity of their argument. They posit that there were seven brothers who successively took a single woman as wife in accordance with the Mosaic law; she passed away without bearing children: whose wife, then, will she be in the resurrection? Yet this inquiry is nonsensical and completely contradicts the divine Scriptures. Our Saviour's response is more than adequate to expose the foolishness of their tale and to lead us to dismiss both their fabrication and the assumptions upon which it stands. Still, it is necessary to hold them accountable for their foolishness against the holy Scriptures, revealing their complete ignorance of the profound truths conveyed within the sacred texts.
Let us consider what the holy prophets relay on this matter, and the pronouncements made by the Lord of hosts through them. Concerning those who have passed away, He proclaimed: ‘I will deliver them from the hand of the grave; I will redeem them from death: Where is thy judgment, O death? O grave, where is thy sting?’ The meaning of the condemnation associated with death and its sting was elucidated by Blessed Paul when he stated: ‘But the sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.’ For he likens death to a scorpion, whose sting signifies sin, given that its venom brings about the demise of the soul. The law, he asserts, serves as the strength of sin, as evidenced by his declaration elsewhere: ‘I learned sin no other way than through the law. For where there is no law, there is no transgression.’ Therefore, Christ liberated those who have faith in Him from the grasp of the accursed law and abolished the sting of death, which is sin; and with sin eliminated, death necessarily followed suit, for it was through him and because of him that death first entered the world.
Thus, as God bestows the promise, ‘I will deliver them from the hand of the grave, and from death I will redeem them,’ the blessed prophets concur with the heavenly decrees, speaking ‘not according to their own heart, nor according to the will of man, but from the mouth of God,’ as it is written. The Holy Spirit, inspiring them, declares the judgments of God and His unchangeable will on every subject. Therefore, the prophet Isaiah proclaims, ‘Thy dead shall rise, and they that are in the graves shall rise again, and they that dwell in the earth shall rejoice; for the dew from thee shall heal them.’ The term ‘dew,’ I believe, refers to the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit, which nullifies death in its divine vitality.
Additionally, the blessed David, in the Psalms, states concerning all who dwell on earth, ‘Thou takest away their spirit, and they die and return to their dust: thou sendest forth thy Spirit, and they are built up, and thou renewest the face of the earth.’ Do you perceive that the working and life-giving grace of the Holy Spirit will rejuvenate the face of the earth? By ‘the face of the earth,’ it signifies its beauty, and the splendor of human nature is rightly interpreted as incorruptibility. ‘For what is sown in corruption shall rise in incorruption; what is sown in weakness shall rise in strength; what is sown in dishonor shall rise in glory.’ The prophet Isaiah assures us again that death, which entered through sin, does not hold eternal dominion over those who dwell on earth, but is rendered powerless by the resurrection of Christ, who renews creation and restores it to its original state—‘For God created all things for incorruption,’ as it is written. He states, ‘He hath swallowed up death, becoming mighty: and God shall take away every cry from every face; He shall remove the reproach of the people from all the earth.’ Sin is referred to as the reproach of the people; and once it was removed, death was likewise vanquished, and corruption receded from among men. With the end of lamentation, He quiets every grief, leaving no valid cause for the sorrows and complaints of humanity.
If a man has a brother who passes away… (Luke 20:28). Through this inquiry, the Sadducees, who represent the shrewdest elements among the Jews, sought to challenge the Lord. Their misinterpretation is clearly countered, and the matter of marital fidelity, which they themselves introduced, is profoundly turned against them. In the scenario presented, the woman is forced against her will to marry multiple times, so that her deceased brother's lineage may continue, as noted in Deuteronomy 25:5-10. This illustrates that the letter of the law brings death (2 Cor. 3:6) and that only the Spirit teaches true chastity.
Let us consider whether the woman with seven husbands might symbolize the synagogue. The Samaritan woman was informed, "You have had five husbands" (John 4:18), referring to her people’s adherence to the five books of the Torah. The synagogue—seven in number—represents the idea that Samaritans accepted only the Pentateuch, while the Jews also included the Book of Joshua and the Book of Judges. After the resurrection, she will remain unable to unite with any of her husbands, having distorted the spiritual commandment with her carnal understanding. The Old Testament directive does not pertain to a physical brother restoring the lineage of a deceased sibling, but rather to the true Brother who would take the wisdom of the God-fearing from the dead Jewish nation to Himself as a Bride and from it regenerate the seed through the apostles. They remained as unborn children within the synagogue, descendants of the deceased Jews, but by the grace of God, they were blessed with a new lineage.
The synagogue frequently appears in festive attire, indicative of marriage, as it is the mother of the faithful. Yet, at times, this mother is rejected (Cf: Is. 50:1; Jer. 3:1) because she also nurtures the unfaithful. The law in its carnal sense has died for her, so that a spiritual law may be resurrected. If the holy people of God love the seven books of the law as they would cherish a spouse and obey them as if they were their beloved’s commands, they shall receive fellowship with the Bridegroom in the Resurrection, enriched with the gifts of divine grace, beyond any confusion of corporeal union.
In the fifty-third chapter of Matthew, one can find a comprehensive exposition.
*Matthew 22:23-28*
When the Pharisees were rendered speechless by this response, the Sadducees, also part of the Sanhedrin, delighted in their embarrassment and promptly posed a question concerning the doctrine of resurrection, which they had dismissed due to the absurd implications they believed it entailed. Just as the Lord had confronted the Pharisees, He addressed the Sadducees by uprooting the very reasoning they had used to dismiss the belief in resurrection. They cited the case of a woman who, according to the law, had been married successively to seven brothers. The Lord revealed to the Sadducees that their misunderstanding arose from two primary errors: first, they did not comprehend the Scriptures, and second, they failed to grasp the omnipotence of God.
Had they properly understood even the texts they acknowledged—not only in their literal sense but also in their deeper meaning—they would have recognized the essential link between the religious teachings within them and the belief in the everlasting existence of the individual soul. Furthermore, had they appreciated God’s omnipotence, they would not assert that human existence in the future is merely a continuation of the present life but would instead accept that God can transform human existence into a glorious, transfigured form. The Lord then made clear that the life to come must align with that of the heavenly beings. To support His argument, He referenced the frequent mentions in the books of Moses of God as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. How could God maintain such an intimate relationship and endow these individuals with significance and dignity, being called their God, if they were merely ephemeral and not destined for eternity?
The indicators of the approaching ages are evident in the unfolding events. Just as one can discern the arrival of summer by observing the tender branches and foliage of a fig tree, we too can interpret the signs of these events to understand the proximity of different ages. Regarding Jerusalem, the Lord has explicitly stated that this generation will not pass away until all that has been prophesied about it comes to fruition. "My words are more immutable than heaven and earth." However, it remains impossible to pinpoint the exact day or hour of these occurrences.
The collaboration of the Sadducees with the Pharisees in this instance is not clearly depicted in the Gospel narratives. It is possible that, witnessing how Jesus had outwitted the Pharisees and reveling in their embarrassment, they desired for Him to mock the Pharisees' doctrine regarding the resurrection of the dead. This doctrine held that the coming of the Messiah would lead all Israelites to be resurrected and to dwell in the holy land. Jesus’ response, however, pleased the scribes (Luke 39) and simultaneously bolstered the Pharisees after the Sadducees were confounded by His words (Matthew 34).
The Sadducees believed that according to the law of levirate marriage (Deuteronomy 25:5-6), which permits a woman to have multiple husbands during her lifetime, the concept of resurrection life as envisioned by the Pharisees was inconceivable. They argued that either this law must be deemed unreasonable or the idea of resurrection itself must be dismissed; since the law is divinely ordained, it, in their view, negates the possibility of life after death. The Sadducees' challenge stemmed from the Pharisees’ overly materialistic perspective on resurrection. In response, Jesus declared that the Sadducees (and the Pharisees) “do not know the Scriptures” and clarified that in the resurrection, “they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like the angels of God in heaven” (Matthew 30). Given that the Sadducees' contention was rooted in their belief that a decayed human body could not possibly rise again, Jesus pointed out that they were unaware of “the power of God” and demonstrated through Scripture (Exodus 3:6) that existence continues beyond death, affirming the truth of resurrection.
The Sadducees engaged in continuous arguments with the Pharisees regarding the resurrection of the soul, striving to demonstrate that the writings of Moses offered no evidence for the immortality of the soul. They contended that there existed Jewish laws that explicitly contradicted the belief in the resurrection of the dead. One such law required that a childless widow should marry her deceased husband's brother to ensure the continuation of her late husband's lineage. Citing this Mosaic ordinance, they posed the scenario: “There were seven brothers; the first took a wife and died without leaving children. The second also married her and died childless, followed in turn by the third, then the fourth, and so on, until all seven brothers had married her and died without heirs.
Finally, the woman passed away too. If there is a resurrection of the dead, whose wife will she be upon rising? After all, she had seven husbands! It would be illogical for her to be the wife of all or of none, and such a monumental and divinely appointed lawgiver as Moses would not endorse illogicalities in his statutes. Therefore, according to Moses' teachings, the notion of resurrection cannot stand.
In their quest to challenge Jesus, they selected a scenario from rabbinic debates involving a woman who had married seven brothers in succession, each of whom died without leaving children. They sought to understand which brother would be her husband at the time of resurrection. Though this situation was hypothetical, it was theoretically plausible due to the law that required a brother to marry his deceased brother's widow if he passed away without children. The firstborn from this second marriage would be considered the child of the deceased brother, thereby preserving his lineage.
The Sadducees, who did not believe in life after death or resurrection, assumed that Jesus, whom they believed shared the perspectives of their Pharisee rivals on these matters, would be flustered by this perplexing question, allowing them to mock both Him and the doctrine of resurrection. While some rabbis held more profound views on the afterlife, the majority adhered to rudimentary beliefs. They thought resurrection meant returning to life in their original bodies, with all previous desires and inclinations intact; resurrected individuals would eat, drink, and marry, arising in the very garments they wore in life, complete with their unique physical traits and imperfections, so that others could identify them as the same individuals they had known. The question posed by the Sadducees had already been addressed by rabbis who believed that “a woman who has been married to two husbands in this world, will be given to the first in the world to come.” With their unfounded and earthly perspectives on resurrection, coupled with their outright denial of it—believing it to be absent from the Mosaic Law, which they recognized—they approached the Savior with their inquiry.
The narrative provided by Luke regarding the inquiry of the Sadducees and the Lord's response aligns closely with that of the first two Evangelists, with only minor substitutions of similar phrases: refer to Matthew 22:23-33 and Mark 12:18-27. In this context, it is noted that "Moses showed when he called," which can be interpreted as "Moses proclaimed," indicating that he documented the words of the Lord spoken to him at the Tabernacle, where God identifies Himself as the God of the patriarchs of Israel. It was Moses, who, following a divine revelation, referred to God as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Regarding the mention of "Some of the scribes," it seems likely these were not members of the Sadducee sect, as their pride would have prevented them from publicly commending the Lord for His astute response. Instead, they were likely Pharisees, who, despite having previously conspired with the Sadducees, could find some satisfaction in witnessing their rivals embarrassed, as noted in Matthew 22:34 and following. The Gospel of Mark indicates that the scribe who questioned the Lord later recognized the wisdom of His answer to the Sadducees (Mark 12:23) and subsequently voiced his approval (Mark 12:32). This possibly refers to this particular scribe alongside others who shared a similar viewpoint, as noted in Luke, where they affirm, "Master, thou hast said well" after the Lord's response to the Sadducees. The Lord expertly utilized Scripture to affirm the truth of the resurrection of the dead to such an extent that even His adversaries honored Him in this instance (Luke 20:40-44).
Meanwhile, the Lord's inquiry concerning the Messiah—specifically, whose Son He is—parallels closely the accounts in Matthew and Mark. Refer to Matthew 22:41-46 and Mark 12:35-37, noting that following the Sadducees' embarrassment, no one dared to question Him further. Although a scribe attempted to inquire about the greatest commandment in the Law (as mentioned in Matthew 22:35-40 and Mark 12:28-34), it was after this that the Evangelists indicate a reluctance from others to engage with the Lord. While Luke omits the dialogue concerning the greatest commandment, he emphasizes that the Lord’s question regarding Christ was His own initiative. After addressing the Sadducees on the topic of resurrection, the question posed was, "How then is He the Son unto him?" Although Luke does not elaborate on the effect of this question on His audience, the accounts in Matthew and Mark indicate that no one was able to respond to Him, and the crowd was captivated by His teachings.
Passages read together with this verse.
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THEOSIS