Mark 12:26

οὐκ�; The first-mentioned cause of error, ignorance of Scripture, is now corrected. We have had a similar question Mark 2:25 (see note and Mark 12:10).

ἐν τῇ βίβλῳ Μωυσέως. This tells us nothing as to the authorship of the Pentateuch or of the passage quoted. Our Lord uses “Moses” and “David” in the way in which all Jews used them at that time (Mark 1:44; Mark 7:10; Mark 10:3; Mark 12:36). It is incredible that in so doing He was deciding critical questions authoritatively.

ἐπὶ τοῦ βάτου. “At the portion of Scripture known as The Bush.” The section which contains the incident of the burning bush was so called. Similarly, ἐν Ἠλίᾳ (Romans 11:2) means in the section which contains the story of Elijah. Cf. 2 Samuel 1:18. But ἐπί (not ἐν) makes this explanation somewhat doubtful; ἐπί may be simply local, “at the bush.” This local meaning would be certain if the words ran πῶς ἐπὶ τοῦ βάτου, as A.V. takes them; but ἐπὶ τ. β. πῶς throws the probability the other way. In LXX., as here, βάτος. is masc. In Luke 20:37 and Acts 7:35 it is fem.

Christ does not appeal to Daniel 12:2. He goes to what for every Jew was the highest authority of all, the Pentateuch. That the Sadducees accepted no other books, though asserted by some Fathers, seems to be an error. In the Books of Moses, again and again the doctrine of a future life is to be found by those who have spiritual insight. In Genesis 26:24; Genesis 28:13, after the death of Abraham, God calls Himself “the God of Abraham.” In Exodus 3:6; Exodus 3:15-16; Exodus 4:5, after the death of all three, God calls Himself “the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.” If God is still their God, they are still alive; for “He is not a God of dead men, but of living.” Lifeless things can have a Creator, but not a God. “O ye ice and snow, bless ye the Lord” is poetical personification rather than intelligible worship. Gamaliel is said to have used a somewhat similar argument. God made promises to the patriarchs which were not fulfilled during their life on earth, and of course God’s promises to them must be fulfilled; therefore the patriarchs are still alive or will be revived. Christ’s argument is found 4Ma 7:19; 4Ma 16:25, but the date of that book may be later than Mk.

It will be observed that Christ’s argument, like St Paul’s, does not prove the resuscitation of the material body; it proves the survival of the soul or spirit, which will have a spiritual body suited to it (1 Corinthians 15:35-45). Christ says that the living God cannot be a God of dead persons; the continued relation of each one of them to Him as God (note the repetition of Θεός with each name) shows that the personal life of each one of them still survives. St Paul says that the continued relation of each believer to the Christ, who has been raised in a glorified Body of which believers are members, secures for each the continuance of bodily life. Death may lessen or destroy their relation to the world of sense, but it intensifies their relation to Christ and to God. Neither Christ nor St Paul tells us the connexion between the spiritual body which is immortal and the material body which is dissolved by death. Science shows us that the material particles of living organisms, in the course of ages, are used over and over again; and to ask Whose shall they be at the Resurrection? is repeating the error of the Sadducees.