Matt.27: 51-54 Do you remember WT saying these were bodies tossed about?

by whyizit 15 Replies latest jw friends

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  whyizit

  I swear that my JW friend told me that Matt. 27:51-54 wasn't really speaking of a resurrection, but that the bodies were tossed out of the graves by the quake and only "appeared" to be alive, ....etc.....( They were tumbling around and looked like they were walking, but they were really just dead bodies that fell out of their graves and were moving around because of the quake.)

  Have any of you heard this before, and could you give me a clearer explanation of how this was explained? Maybe even show me what books or publications said this. I know I read it somewhere else too, but I cannot find the source.
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  AlmostAtheist

  I remember this, too. They said that the bodies were tossed out of the ground and rolled into the living areas. I don't recall anything about them appearing animated, as if they might be mistaken for being alive. Just that they were brought up from their graves by the quakes and jiggled into places where they could be seen.

  Sorry, I don't have a reference.

  Dave
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  DocBob

  I swear that my JW friend told me that Matt. 27:51-54 wasn't really speaking of a resurrection, but that the bodies were tossed out of the graves by the quake and only "appeared" to be alive, ....etc.....( They were tumbling around and looked like they were walking, but they were really just dead bodies that fell out of their graves and were moving around because of the quake.)

  Yes, I remember this well. This is one of the subjects on which the WTS quotes spiritist Johannes Greber for support. If no one gets to it before I get home tonight, I'll post the quote from the WT pubs.
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  Legolas

  Yes that is what they believe!

  ‘Many Bodies of the Holy Ones Were Raised Up’

  "THE earth quaked, and the rock-masses were split. And the memorial tombs were opened and many bodies of the holy ones that had fallen asleep were raised up, (and persons, coming out from among the memorial tombs after his being raised up, entered into the holy city,) and they became visible to many people." (Matthew 27:51-53) Catholic scholar Karl Staab calls this event that occurred at Jesus’ death "most mysterious." What happened?

  Epiphanius and other early Church Fathers taught that the holy ones literally came to life and went with the resurrected Jesus to heaven. Augustine, Theophylactus, and Zigabenus believed that these dead ones received a temporary resurrection but later returned to their tombs. The latter opinion, however, "did not gain wide recognition," comments scholar Erich Fascher. When rendering Matthew 27:52, 53, many modern Bible translations give the impression that a resurrection took place. Not so the New World Translation, which points to the effects of an earthquake. Why?

  First, whoever "the holy ones" were, Matthew did not say they were raised up. He said their bodies, or corpses, were. Second, he did not say these bodies came to life. He said they were raised up, and the Greek verb e·gei´ro, meaning to "raise up," does not always refer to a resurrection. It can, among other things, also mean to "lift out" from a pit or to "get up" from the ground. (Matthew 12:11; 17:7; Luke 1:69) The upheaval at Jesus’ death opened tombs, tossing lifeless bodies into the open. Such occurrences during earthquakes were reported in the second century C.E. by Greek writer Aelius Aristides and more recently, in 1962, in Colombia.

  BTW...My NIV bible says they did come to life!
  
  
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  GermanXJW

  They referred to the translation by spiritist Johannes Greber which reads:
  
  "Tombs were laid open, and many bodies of those buried were tossed upright. In this posture they projected from the graves and were seen by many who passed by the place on their way back to the city."-Matt. 27:52, 53.
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  whyizit

  I knew I didn't dream it! My friend who is studying with the JWs, looked at me like I was nuts, when I told her that a JW told me this. In my KIT, under the Greek words, it says: the bodies of the holy ones, after being raised up of him, "going forth" and being made apparent to many. (this is not a word-for-word quote) My friend is telling me that this means "spirits", but there is nothing in these Scriptures that indicates they are spirits. It says very plainly they are "bodies". Have you got any advice on how to approach this with her?
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  Leolaia

  Well, Matthew 27:52-53 states that during the earthquake at Jesus' death, "the tombs opened and many bodies of holy people (polla sómata tón hagión) who had died [lit. "sleeping (in death") were raised (égerthésan), and these, after his resurrection, came out of the tombs, entered the Holy City and appeared (enephanisthésan) to many people." The verb egeiró "rise up" can have mundane senses (cf. Mark 2:9, 4:27, John 11:29, Acts 9:8, 12:7, Revelation 11:1), but when it is used to refer to the dead rising, it always refers to resurrection....within Matthew and outside of the gospel (cf. Matthew 10:8, 11:5, 16:21, 17:9, 23, 26:32, 27:63-64, 28:6-7, Mark 12:26, 14:28, 16:6, Luke 7:14, 22, 9:22, 20:37, 24:6, 34, John 2:19-20, 22, 5:21, 12:9, 17, 21:14, Acts 3:15, 4:10, 5:30, 10:40, 13:30, 37, 26:8, Romans 4:25, 6:9, 7:4, 8:11, 34, 10:9, 1 Corinthians 15:4, 12-17, 20, 32, 35, 42-44, 52, 2 Corinthians 1:9, 4:14, 5:15, Galatians 1:1, Colossians 2:12, 2 Timothy 2:8, Hebrews 11:19, 1 Peter 1:21, etc.), and similarly the verb emphanizó "appear, manifest," which occurs in Matthew 27:53 concerning the dead "appearing" in Jerusalem, is used in Acts 10:40 to refer to Jesus post-resurrection appearances, and the related forms phainó (cf. Mark 16:9, Luke 24:11) and phaneroó (cf. Mark 16:12, 14, John 21:1, 14) are regularly used to refer to Jesus' post-resurrection appearances. Taken together, the language is strongly suggestive of resurrection.

  The idea that Jesus' resurrection was accompanied with a resurrection of others released from Hades (i.e. the communal resurrection), or was preceded by a preaching to the faithful dead in the underworld, appears in Ephesians 4:8-9, 1 Peter 3:18-19, Odes of Solomon 17:9-16, 22:1-10, 42:3-20, Justin Martyr, Dialogue 72.4, Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses 4.27.1-2, 4.33.12, 5.31.1, Sibylline Oracles 8.310-317, Epistula Apostolorum 51, and probably the Gospel of Peter 10:39-42.

  However the statement in Matthew (which doesn't refer to any ascension of these resurrected ones) directly contradicts Paul's doctrine on the resurrection. 1 Corinthians 15:20-23 states: "But Christ has in fact been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of all who have fallen asleep. Death came through one man and in the same way the resurrection of the dead has come through one man. Just as all men die in Adam, so all men will be brought to life in Christ; but all of them in their proper order: Christ as the first-fruits and then, after the coming of Christ, those who belong to him." Matthew 27:51-52, by stating that "the bodies of many holy men rose from the dead" at the very moment Jesus died suggests that the resurrection of the righteous happened before Jesus was resurrected. Here the "proper order" is reversed. Paul believes that "all who have fallen asleep", "all [who] die in Adam" (whom he equates with those "dead in Christ," since they have been redeemed by Him) would rise at Christ's return. This is the same view expressed in 1 Thessalonians 4:16, where those "dead in Christ" (presumably all who have been redeemed by Christ) "will be the first to rise" at Christ's second coming. 2 Timothy 2:18 (of the Paulinist school) specifically refutes the notion that "the resurrection has already taken place."

  So what's the deal with Matthew's narrative? It is important to note that this story about the holy ones rising from the dead was a Matthean addition to the original Markan account. This story is absent in Mark 15:38, and it doesn't appear in the Lukan version of the account (Luke 23:45). In fact, other early gospels based on the same crucifixion narrative also omit any mention of this resurrection but mention the splitting of the temple veil (cf. Gospel of Peter 5:15-20; Gospel of the Nazoreans, Fr. 21, 36; Acts of Pilate 11:1-3). Now this in itself is quite remarkable since the resurrection of the holy ones would have been an awesome event, even more so than the tear in the temple veil, yet it is nowhere mentioned by Mark, Luke, John, or any other gospel except of Matthew and later versions of Matthew. Furthermore, it is fairly certain that the account in Matthew has been altered in its wording. The biggest problem are the words "after his resurrection", which -- most bizarrely -- delays the appearance of those resurrected for three days (Matthew 27:53). This totally defeats the whole purpose of having them raised when Jesus dies on the cross as something that led the centurion to confess Jesus as the Son of God (Matthew 27:54). The centurion certainly could not have been awed by their resurrection if the resurrected dead did not leave their tombs! The delay however does bring the canonical account into line (partially) with Pauline theology, which proclaims Jesus as the "first fruits" of the resurrection. For Paul, the "saints" could not arise before Jesus himself has risen. Yet the gloss fails to bring Matthew fully into line with Pauline theology since the bodily resurrection of the righteous dead still takes place before Jesus.

  There is actual textual evidence that the text in Matthew has been altered. One of its earliest witnesses was the Diatesseron, a gospel harmony produced by Tatian in the late second century. This harmony was in turn based on the one produced by Justin Martyr several decades earlier. The Pepysian Harmony and the Ephrem Commentary both attest the Diatessaron reading as follows:

  And with that, the veil that hung in the temple before the high altar burst in two pieces, the earth quaked, and the stones burst, and the dead men arose out of their graves. And entering the holy city, they appeared to many. And the centurion and those with him, who stood facing Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, and said with awe, "Truly this was the Son of God!"

  Here the interpolated gloss does not appear and the appearance of the risen dead in Jerusalem occurs at the same time as Jesus' death and was witnessed by the centurion. This reading makes better sense with the context. It also lacks the greater detail of the canonical account in this passage -- all of which is theologically loaded: "bodies" (more specific and agreeing with Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:35-44), "of saints" (certainly superior to the mere "dead" of the Diatessaron, and therefore more developed, and also Pauline), "who had fallen asleep" (again a more elegant description, and again used by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:20 and 1 Thessalonians 4:14). This suggests that the Diatessaron's reading is earlier and preserves a more primitive version of the text than does the canonical text, which has been revised to bring it into conformity with Pauline theology.
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  Mary

  OK, most of what Leolaia went right over my head, but I wanted to comment on this part:

  However the statement in Matthew (which doesn't refer to any ascension of these resurrected ones) directly contradicts Paul's doctrine on the resurrection. 1 Corinthians 15:20-23 states: "But Christ has in fact been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of all who have fallen asleep. Death came through one man and in the same way the resurrection of the dead has come through one man. Just as all men die in Adam, so all men will be brought to life in Christ; but all of them in their proper order: Christ as the first-fruits and then, after the coming of Christ, those who belong to him." Matthew 27:51-52, by stating that "the bodies of many holy men rose from the dead" at the very moment Jesus died suggests that the resurrection of the righteous happened before Jesus was resurrected.

  But does this mean that there were no resurrections at all before Jesus'? What about Lazarus or the widows' son? These were resurrected before Jesus' resurrection.......
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  Leolaia

  Well, for Paul, it is theologically very important for Jesus to be the resurrected first, as the "firstborn from the dead" (Colossians 1:18), or as the "first-fruits" (1 Corinthians 15:20). As for the stories in the gospels, it should be borne in mind that these were published later (i.e. Mark after AD 70, John around AD 95), so Paul may very well have never been acquainted with these stories....and the stories themselves may have developed sometime after Paul lived. Or, if Paul was acquainted with them, he may not have viewed them as true resurrections but as "resuscitations"...particularly in the case of the widow's son. On the other hand, Lazarus is much closer to the story of Jesus' own resurrection (for he had begun to decompose). The important thing to realize is that early Christianity was filled with many stories (i.e. it had a rich, vibrant story-telling oral tradition, as Papias also attests in the second century) that arose in different circles, and thus not everyone at any given time was acquainted with all of them....
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  Leolaia

  Here is another clear reference to the communal resurrection (dating to the second century AD):

  "I saw all the righteous from the time of Adam onwards [in seventh heaven]. And there I saw the holy Abel and all the righteous. And there I saw Enoch and all who were with him, stripped of their robes of flesh, and I saw them in their robes of above, and they were like the angels who stand there in great glory....[They arrive there after] the god of that world stretches out his hand against the Son and the people lay their hands upon him and hang him upon a tree, not knowing who he was.... And when he has plundered the angel of death, he will rise on the third day and will remain in that world for five hundred and forty-five days. And then many of the righteous will ascend with him, whose spirits do not receive their robes until the Lord Christ ascends and they ascend with him. Then indeed they will receive their robes and their thrones and their crowns, when he has ascended into the seventh heaven" (Ascension of Isaiah 9:6-9, 14-18).