Novum Testamentum 49 (2007) 232-256

www.brill.nl/nt

Death, Covenants, and the Proof of Resurrection in Mark 12:18-27*

Bradley R. Trick
Durham, North Carolina

Abstract Interpretations of the resurrection proof in Mark 12:26-27a must explain the relevance of Jesus Exod. 3:6 citation and indicate how his conclusion points to resurrection rather than immortality. Current scholarly proposals often render the proof unconvincing in its logic and incompatible with / irrelevant to other NT presentations of resurrection. This article argues instead that Jesus proof rests on the premise derived from the Sadducees example of marriage that death annuls a covenant. Since the death of the patriarchs would therefore have released God from his covenantal obligations, Gods faithfulness to those obligations in the Exodus must imply the patriarchs continuing existence and eventual resurrection. This interpretation not only shows Jesus response to the Sadducees to be a well-reasoned, coherent whole, it also accords well with the presentation of resurrection elsewhere in the NT. Keywords resurrection, covenants, marriage, Sadducees, OT in the NT

I. Introduction
In arguing for the basic historicity of Jesus dispute with the Sadducees over resurrection in Mark 12:18-27 parr.,1 John Meier emphasizes the criterion of discontinuity.2 He points to such factors as the lack of a realistic Sitz
*) I would like to thank Richard Hays for his helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. 1) Parallel accounts appear in Matt. 22:23-33 and Luke 20:27-38, but, as W.D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, Jr., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel according to Saint Matthew (ICC; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1997), note, There is no evidence of nonMarkan tradition in either Matthew or Luke (221). This article accordingly focuses on the account in Mark while remaining attentive to the parallel versions. 2) John P. Meier, The Debate on the Resurrection of the Dead: An Incident from the Ministry of the Historical Jesus?, JSNT 77 (2000) 8-14. Cf. N.T. Wright, The Resurrection
Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2007 DOI: 10.1163/156853607X214976

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im Leben that could explain the storys invention by the early church and the complete absence in both Jewish and early Christian literature of other appeals to Exod. 3:6 as a proof for resurrection. The main force of his argument from discontinuity, however, falls on his observation that Jesus manner of arguing for a general resurrection in this passage diers markedly from the manner in which the early Christians argued for a general resurrection:
In the debate in Mk 12.18-27, Jesus handles both the how (manner) and the that (fact) of the resurrection quite dierently from the early Christians. Jesus answers the how by a comparison to the angels and the that by an appeal to Exod. 3.6. The early Christians, instead, handle both the how (see Phil. 3.21) and the that (1 Cor. 15.12-20) simply by pointing to the risen Jesus.3

In short, Meier argues for the pericopes historicity by suggesting that early Christians who wanted to prove a general resurrection would have appealed to Jesus resurrection rather than invent a story that sought to achieve this polemical task simply by citing a single scripture passage whose relevance to the discussion was far from established. Meiers cogent observations naturally raise the question of whether this dierence in theological reasoning between Jesus and the NT authors implies a corresponding dierence in their underlying theologies of resurrection. That is to say, are the NT authors christological justications of resurrection ultimately grounded in the same scriptural understanding that Jesus answer here presupposes? Or, to put the matter in yet another way, how well does the understanding of resurrection expressed in Mark 12:26-27a cohere with the wider NT portrayal of a general resurrection? Given the proposed historicity of Mark 12:18-27,4 the threefold inclusion of this pericope in the NT, and the foundational signicance of both Jesus and resurrection in early Christian theology, one might expect the portrayal of resurrection in this passage to have a fairly integral and resonant relationship to other NT discussions of resurrection. Scholarship, however, has often argued otherwise, frequently interpreting Mark 12:26-27a in a way that renders its theology of resurrection essentially incompatible
of the Son of God (vol. 3 of Christian Origins and the Question of God; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003) 418 n. 61. 3) Meier, Debate, 14; italics original. 4) See also Otto Schwankl, Die Sadduzerfrage (Mk. 12, 18-27 parr): Eine exegetisch-theologische Studie zur Auferstehungserwartung (BBB 66; Frankfurt: Athenum, 1987) 501-587.

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with and/or irrelevant to the understanding of resurrection expressed elsewhere in the NT. This state of aairs can be traced directly to two related exegetical diculties in the passage. First, it is not immediately clear how Jesus citation of Exod. 3:6I [am] the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob5concerns resurrection at all, let alone how the verse could possibly prove that the dead will be raised. Second, Jesus seeming inference from this citation that [God] is not a god of dead people but of living (Mark 12:27a) sounds as if it would be more appropriate concluding an argument for some kind of immortality rather than an argument for resurrection. A twofold quandary thus faces the interpreter: Jesus argument does not actually seem to prove anything, but if it does prove anything, it seems to prove immortality, not resurrection. The latter of these diculties has led some scholars to conclude that Jesus here denes resurrection in terms of immortality. John Donahue, for instance, argues that the
view of resurrection [in Mark 12:26-27] is . . . dierent from . . . [the view in] 1 Cor 15:35-41 since in Mark there is virtually no hint of the resurrection and/or transformation of the body, but rather a way of speaking closer to a doctrine of immortality. . . . [For the Markan Jesus,] [r]esurrection is not return from the grave, but enduring life hidden in the power of God.6

In other words, Jesus here describes a non-physical form of resurrection that stands in stark contrast to the emphasis on the physical resurrection of both Christ and believers elsewhere in the NT (and, it must be added, in stark contrast to the usual meaning of the word , resurrection).7 The NTs later christological justications that tie a general resurrection of believers to the physical resurrection of Christ would thus oppose the view of resurrection implied by this reading of Jesus scriptural proof.8
Unless otherwise noted, all translations are my own. John R. Donahue, A Neglected Factor in the Theology of Mark, JBL 101 (1982) 576, 577-578. 7) See Wright, who argues that resurrection always means life after life after death (Resurrection, 31). 8) Other scholars who deny that this passage concerns physical resurrection include John Hargreaves, A Guide to Marks Gospel (rev. ed.; TEF Study Guide 2; London: SPCK, 1995) 220; Pheme Perkins, The Gospel of Mark, in The New Interpreters Bible 8 (Nashville: Abingdon, 1995) 676; and Arland J. Hultgren, Jesus and His Adversaries: The Form and Function of the Conict Stories in the Synoptic Tradition (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1979) 126.
6) 5)

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Even for scholars who contend that the passage does concern physical resurrection, the former of the exegetical diculties listed above often gives rise to an interpretation that renders Jesus theology of resurrection irrelevant to the rest of the NT witnesses. One of the most common explanations of the function of Exod. 3:6that the assumed present tense of the implied verb suggests that the patriarchs are still livingessentially interprets Jesus as arguing based on the fact of the patriarchs continuing existence rather than on the reason for that existence. This interpretive move means that the later appeals to Christs resurrection would have eectively replaced this scriptural argument: rather than pointing to the patriarchs, whose continuing existence presumably ensures their eventual resurrection, Christians could simply point to an already resurrected Jesus. (The resulting irrelevance of Jesus argument has an added theological benet for many Christian scholars: it frees them to dismiss his, in this reading, less-than-compelling logic without having to surrender their own belief in resurrection.) Is Jesus justication of resurrection in Mark 12:26-27a truly as theologically dissonant with the witness of the later NT authors as these interpretations indicate? I suggest that it is not, and that the perceived dissonance arises from a misunderstanding of Jesus argument. Of course, to prove this claim thoroughly would require that I analyze the theology of resurrection in Mark 12:26-27a and then compare the resulting picture with the theology indicated by the rest of the resurrection-related passages in the NT. Such comprehensive analysis lies well beyond the scope of this article. Instead, the article will focus primarily on the rst (and more manageable) part of this project, namely, the analysis of resurrection in Mark 12:2627a: how, exactly, does Jesus argument work? I will argue that Gods faithfulness to his continuing covenant with Abraham provides the key to understanding Jesus line of reasoning. There is a sense in which this suggestion is not new. An increasing number of scholars have, after all, claimed that Gods covenantal faithfulness forms an important part of Jesus argument.9 Yet even these interpreters seem to have
E.g., F. Dreyfus, LArgument scripturaire de Jsus en faveur de la rsurrection des morts (Marc XII, 26-27), RB 66 (1959) 222-223; Richard B. Hays, Reading Scripture in Light of the Resurrection, in Ellen F. Davis and Richard B. Hays (eds.), The Art of Reading Scripture (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003) 227; R.T. France, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary on the Greek Text (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002) 471-472; Douglas R. Hare, Mark (Westminster Bible Companion; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1996) 156;
9)

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overlooked what I regard as the crucial step of Jesus logic: Gods faithfulness to his covenant implies the patriarchs continuing existence since the patriarchs death would have released God from his covenantal obligations. In order to make its case, this article will consider the context of the larger pericope, seeking to understand both the Sadducees question and the cohesiveness of Jesus answer as a response to that question. As part of this analysis, I will examine the two exegetical cruxes in 12:26-27a (and their proposed resolutions) in greater detail. Finally, lest the prompting question of theological coherence be forgotten, I will briey discuss how this interpretation resolves the theological diculties identied above.

II. Mark 12:18-27

Appearing as the second of three vignettes in which religious leaders question Jesus, Mark 12:18-27 describes a dispute between Jesus and the Sadducees over resurrection. The pericope itself constitutes a self-contained unit composed of two main parts: the Sadducees rather involved question (12:18-23) and Jesus response (12:24-27). I will discuss each of these components in turn. 1. The Sadducees Question The Sadducees present Jesus with a hypothetical scenario: seven brothers successively marry the same woman in accordance with the Mosaic law of levirate marriage. Nevertheless, the woman, who outlives all seven of her husbands, eventually dies childless. The Sadducees then want to know whose wife she will be in the resurrection. The inquiry, of course, is not sincere; as Mark informs us at the outset of the episode, the Sadducees did not actually believe in resurrection (12:18).10 Accordingly, their constructed scenario appears to have been specically designed to bring out the absurdity of a belief in resurrection. At its most basic level, the story highlights a perceived logistical problem with such a belief: a woman who had outlived several spouses would suddenly nd
James A. Brooks, Mark (NAC 23; Nashville: Broadman, 1991) 196; Schwankl, Sadduzerfrage, 384-396; Larry W. Hurtado, Mark (Good News Commentaries; San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983) 183; William C. Lane, The Gospel of Mark (NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974) 429. 10) Cf. Josephus, B.J. 8.2.165; A.J. 18.1.16.

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them all simultaneously alive again. On what basis could one mans claim to be her husband be legitimated over the others claims? The Sadducees presentation, however, signicantly strengthens the force of this basic question. As their introductory citation of Deut. 25:5 indicates, the Mosaic law itself requires the woman to have taken these seven husbands. In other words, it is precisely her obedience to Gods command that would have created this absurd situation in the resurrection.11 Nor would this problem arise only in inconsequential cases: the Sadducees additional allusion to the fulllment of this law in the lives of Judah and Tamar (raise up seed for your brother, Gen. 38:8; cf. Mark 12:19) implies that the resolution of this issue aects even the patriarchs, the founders of the faith.12 Viewed in this light, a belief in resurrection threatens to make a mockery of both the Mosaic law (scripture) and the patriarchs by implicating them in this absurd scenario. That is to say, it threatens to make a mockery of the very foundations of Jewish belief. In addition to this overt attack, a wordplay involving the concept of raising up (, 12:19 / , , 12:23) suggests that the scenario also levels a subtler critique against resurrection. The levirate marriage law provides for the preservation of a mans place in Israel through the raising up of ospring in his name. In the Sadducees story, however, none of the seven brothers are able to raise up such a child. J. Gerald Janzen therefore argues that the scenario implies the following critique:
If God by the very means divinely provided in the Torahthe Levirate lawcannot or will not raise up children to a dead man (not even after an ideal number of opportunities), on what basis is one entitled to hope that God either will or can raise up that dead man himselfsomething for which the Mosaic Torah makes no provision at all?13

The suggested lesser-to-greater logic of this implied argument follows a common rst-century Jewish exegetical principle (qal vahomer)14 and
For the legal diculties this resurrection scenario creates with regard to Torah, see Emmanuelle Main, Les Sadducens et la rsurrection des morts: Comparison entre Mc 12, 18-27 et Lc 20, 27-38, RB 103 (1996) 416-417. 12) Cf.J. Gerald Janzen, Resurrection and Hermeneutics: On Exodus 3.6 in Mark 12.26, JSNT 23 (1985) 46-47. Of course, unlike the woman in the Sadducees story, Tamar does ultimately bear children (Gen. 38:12-30). 13) Janzen, Resurrection, 48. 14) The principle of qal vahomer appears as the rst of Hillels seven exegetical rules in t. Sanh. 7:11.
11)

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essentially critiques resurrection on two fronts: 1) if the natural raising up of childbirth has failed, how much more so will the more dicult raising up of resurrection, and 2) if the means for raising up provided by the Torah have failed, how much more so will a raising up that is not ordained by Torah.15 Granting for the moment the presence of this implied critique, the Sadducees argument against resurrection operates on two levels. On a surface level, they have constructed a scenario in which the application of the scriptural levirate marriage law seems to render a belief in resurrection problematic on logistical grounds. Lurking behind this seemingly innocent request for logistical resolution, however, lies the more sinister suggestion that the very existence of a scenario in which the levirate law could fail to raise up ospring implicitly rules out the possibility of resurrection. The question therefore functions as a trap: Jesus must address the proposed logistical objection to resurrection, but any resolution he could give would presumably entail an acceptance of the basic scenario that in and of itself renders resurrection problematic. Does such an analysisbased, as it is, on a proposed implied argumentread too much into the text? Two factors in addition to the wordplay suggest that it does not. First, the literary context leads a reader to expect that the Sadducees question will have some hidden twist. The passage comes as part of an escalating conict between Jesus and the Jewish leaders in the Temple courts. In Mark 11:27-33, Jesus traps the chief priests, scribes, and elders with an unanswerable question of his own: Was the baptism of John from heaven or from men? (11:29). He then further infuriates them by speaking the parable of the vineyard against them (12:1-11). As a result, these leaders desire to seize him, yet they cannot do so because they fear the reactions of the crowd (12:12). They accordingly withdraw from the scene and send people to question Jesus so that they might trap [] him in a statement (12:13). In the ensuing series of vignettes, representatives of various Jewish groups approach Jesus and question him: the Pharisees and Herodians in 12:13-17, the Sadducees in 12:18-27, and a scribe in 12:28-34. Jesus responds masterfully to each question, with the result that, after the third episode, no one any longer
15) Cf. Main, who suggests that the Sadducees scenario essentially raises the question of how one achieves immortality: whether through descendants (the method specied in Torah) or through resurrection (a method that creates problems for the method established in Torah) (Sadducens, 431).

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dared to ask him [anything] (12:34). The proposal of an implicit trap in the Sadducees question ts perfectly into such a framework.16 Three potential objections to this analysis of the literary context need to be addressed. It is true, for instance, that the Jewish leaders are only explicitly said to send the Pharisees and Herodians to trap Jesus with their question about paying taxes to Caesar (12:13). Nevertheless, the arrival of the Sadducees with an equally hypocritical question immediately after the rst groups failure to ensnare Jesus suggests that they also form a part of the leaders plot,17 especially since the Sadduceeswho can be linked to the high priests of 11:18 on socio-political grounds as well18appear nowhere else in Marks gospel. The suggested trap in the Sadducees question is also admittedly subtler than the Pharisees trap, but such escalation should be expected after Jesus had so cunningly discerned and avoided the rst attempt. Finally, the scribes question about the greatest commandment in 12:28-34the third and nal question in the seriesdoes not seem to function as a trap, thereby seeming to break the proposed pattern. The text explicitly states, however, that he asks his question after being drawn to the group by the earlier arguments (12:28), i.e., he is clearly not involved in the leaders plot. Signicantly, he is also the only questioner whom Jesus praises instead of rebuking (12:34).19 In addition to the wordplay and the literary context, Jesus response itself argues for the presence of this implicit trap in the Sadducees question. As the following section of this article will contend, Jesus not only
I therefore disagree with Mains conclusion that the evangelists give no indication that the Sadducees question is insincere (Sadducens, 416). Linking the Sadducees question with the Jewish leaders attempt to trap Jesus also helps to explain the Sadducees purpose in confronting Jesus. The traditional answer that the Sadducees habitually quizzed religious leaders about the resurrection (e.g., John R. Donahue and Daniel J. Harrington, The Gospel of Mark [Sacra Pagina 2; Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical, 2002] 349; cf. Josephus, A.J. 18.1.16) is plausible but not particularly compelling. 17) So James R. Edwards, The Gospel according to Mark (Pillar New Testament Commentary; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002) 361-362; and C.F.D. Moule, The Gospel according to Mark (CBC; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1965) 97. 18) See France, Mark, 470. 19) The divergent ways that Matthew and Luke adjust this episode reect the ambiguity of the scribes role in Mark. Luke separates Jesus interaction with the scribe (a in Luke 10:25-28) from this entrapment context (20:27-38), suggesting that he regards the scribes question as substantially dierent in nature from the Pharisees and Sadducees questions. Matthew, on the other hand, transforms the scribe into a Pharisee who explicitly tests Jesus (12:34-35), thereby linking this episode more closely to the preceding tests.
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solves the Sadducees logistical problem, he also addresses and refutes their implied critique that denies resurrection on the grounds that it 1) represents a more dicult raising up than the natural reproduction that has failed and 2) is not prescribed in Torah. While Jesus could theoretically have discerned a deeper theological issue of which his questioners were unaware, his harsh rebuke and the other indications of a hidden trap imply the Sadducees duplicity. 2. Jesus Response Jesus response consists of three parts: a frame asserting that the Sadducees are mistaken (12:24, 27b), a statement that there will be no marrying in the resurrection (12:25), and a proof that the dead will be raised (12:2627a). As I intend to show below, the three components function as a cohesive whole that eectively addresses both aspects of the Sadducees challenge. The analysis will begin with the frame. a. They Understand Neither the Scriptures nor Gods Power: The Frame (12:24, 27b) Jesus charge that the Sadducees are mistaken (12:24, 27b) appears somewhat curious, at least initially. After all, the Sadducees have simply presented a possible scenario and asked a question; they have not made any overt claims. As we saw above, however, their question actually implies two claims: 1) the surface claim that the scriptures (and the levirate marriage law in particular) render a belief in resurrection problematic and 2) the underlying claim that Gods failure to act in the simpler raising up of ospring precludes the possibility of his raising up the dead. Jesus accordingly asserts through his opening rhetorical question that the Sadducees are mistaken because they understand neither the scriptures (claim #1) nor the power of God (claim #2). In other words, Jesus opening remark reveals that he has discerned the Sadducees trap. The twofold nature of this opening critique naturally suggests a programmatic correspondence to the two internal segments of Jesus response. I accordingly propose that the two internal components (12:25 and 12:2627a) demonstrate how the Sadducees have misunderstood the scriptures and the power of God respectively. That is to say, I will argue that the statement in 12:25 regarding the lack of marrying in the resurrection refutes the Sadducees actual question about the woman and her seven husbands (claim #1) by revealing their misunderstanding of the very scripture to

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which they have appealed. The resurrection proof in 12:26-27a then refutes the underlying challenge posed by the scenario as a whole (claim #2) by showing that such a critique essentially questions Gods power. This suggestion reverses the typical scholarly conclusion. Having rightly sensed the programmatic nature of Jesus opening remark, many scholars identify the explicit appeal to scripture in 12:26-27a as evidence that this latter segment corresponds to the initial charge of misunderstanding the scriptures. Such an association then leaves 12:25 to complete the chiasm as the explanation of Gods power.20 I will illustrate the diculties with this interpretationwhich characteristically argues that the Sadducees have misunderstood both the manner (12:25) and the fact (12:26-27a) of the resurrection21as I proceed through the analysis of the internal components of Jesus response. b. Understanding the Scriptures: No Marrying in the Resurrection (12:25) Jesus begins his actual rebuttal of the Sadducees question in 12:25 with a statement about the lack of marrying in the resurrection:
For when they rise from among the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but they are like angels in the heavens.

As part of the chiastic analysis of Jesus response, many scholars interpret this statement to mean that Gods power will so transform the body in the resurrectionthey are like angelsthat the marriage state will be transcended.22 Jesus thus refutes the Sadducees by highlighting the new state of resurrection existence that Gods power will bring about.
So Donahue and Harrington, Mark, 350; France, Mark, 474; Francis J. Moloney, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2002) 238; Main, Sadducens, 417; Robert H. Gundry, Mark: A Commentary on His Apology for the Cross (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1993) 703; Schwankl, Sadduzerfrage, 365; and Ezra P. Gould, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel according to St. Mark (ICC; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1896) 229. 21) Edwards, Mark, 367; Meier, Debate, 14; Hugh Anderson, The Gospel of Mark (NCB; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976) 276; Eduard Schweizer, The Good News according to Mark (trans. Donald H. Madvig; Atlanta: John Knox, 1970) 248; D.E. Nineham, Saint Mark (Westminster Pelican Commentaries; Philadelphia: Westminster, 1963) 321; C.E.B. Craneld, The Gospel according to Saint Mark (Cambridge Greek Testament; Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1959) 375. 22) For dierent suggestions on how this resurrection transformation will render marriage obsolete, see Caroline Vander Stichele, Like Angels in Heaven: Corporeality, Resurrection,
20)

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The chief problem with the chiastic explanation of Jesus answer lies in this analysis of 12:25: this reading assumes that it is the nature of the resurrection that renders the Sadducees argument irrelevant. In fact, this assumption appears even in interpretations that do not tie this verse to Gods power. Craig Evans, for instance, nds Jesus here to be making a point about scripture, namely, that scripture nowhere suggests that the marriage state continues after the resurrection (italics added).23 Although he understands Jesus logic dierently, Evans still identies resurrection as the event that enables a transcending of the marital bond. While this scholarly emphasis on resurrection is understandable given the pericopes topic, it does not adequately account for the sole emphasis on the process of marrying in Jesus response.24 This emphasis is all the more curious since it at rst seems to form a non sequitur to the preceding question. The Sadducees, after all, had not asked, Which of the seven will she marry? No, their questionWhose wife will she be?presumes that the womans marital relationship with at least one of the brothers would continue into the resurrected state.25 Indeed, the absurdity that their question is intended to imply with regard to resurrection depends upon this assumption: the scenario presents a conundrum only if the resurrected woman would suddenly nd herself with seven living husbands. As a critique of resurrection, then, the Sadducees question becomes moot if the woman would have to re-marry one of the brothers.26
and Gender in Mark 12:18-27, in Jonneke Bekkenkamp and Maaike de Haardt (eds.), Begin with the Body: Corporeality Religion and Gender (Leuven: Peeters, 1998) 215-232, and Schwankl, Sadduzerfrage, 369-375. 23) Craig A. Evans, Mark (WBC 34B; Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2001) 255. 24) France notes that Jesus denies the process of marrying rather than the resultant state of being married, but he then qualies this observation with the remark that if that state is carried over into the next life, the problem of competing relationships remains (Mark, 472). It is precisely this carrying over of the marriage relationship that I want to challenge. 25) Scholars typically suggest that Jesus is critiquing the Sadducees assumption that life (and marrying in particular) will continue as normal in the resurrection. E.g., Schwankl, Sadduzerfrage, 368. Such analyses fail because the Sadducees question in no way presupposes the contraction of new marriages in the resurrection. It requires only the continuity of the marriage state. 26) John J. Kilgallen, The Sadducees and Resurrection from the Dead: Luke 20,27-40, Bib 67 (1986) 478-495, proposes that the Sadducees (serious) question should be understood as asking which of the seven resurrected brothers would be required to fulll the levirate marriage law and produce an heir. Jesus then responds that that law will become obsolete (484-7). The lack of an heir, however, simply serves to keep the scenario going and prevent any of the brothers from having a special claim to be the womans husband. The

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Contrary to the Sadducees assumption, Jesus reply eectively implies that for this hypothetical woman to be the wife of one of the brothers, she would have to re-marry. This implication then leads to the question of when her previous marriages would have ended, the answer to which helps explain why Jesus phrases his response solely in terms of re-marriage. I suggest that Jesus does not refer to the dissolution of the womans marital bonds at the resurrection because those bonds would already have been annulled. That is to say, I suggest that he refers only to re-marriage because it is deathnot, as the commentators all suggest, resurrectionthat terminates the marriage covenant.27 This conclusion should not be surprising; even modern couples pledge to love one another til death do us part. Pauls letters to the Romans and the Corinthians establish this principle as the prevalent rst-century understanding of marriage:
Or do you not know brothers (for I speak to those who know the law) that the law rules over a person [only] as long as that person lives? For the married woman is bound by law to a living husband. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of the husband. So then, while her husband lives, she will be called an adulteress if she is joined to another man. But if her husband dies, she is free from the law, so as not to be an adulteress even though she is joined to another man. (Rom. 7:1-3) A woman is bound as long as her husband lives. But if the husband dies, she is free to be married to whomever she desires, only in the Lord. (1 Cor. 7:39)

The Romans passage is especially signicant since there Paul cites the principle that death annuls a marriage bond as the shared premise from which he then proceeds to argue his case. In other words, it is a premise with which those who know the law could be assumed to agree.28
Sadducees scenario does not present a serious dilemma that has helped lead to their position on resurrection but rather an absurd scenario constructed on the basis of that position. 27) Jesus answer therefore does not address the question of what happens to the marriage covenants of those who are still living at the time of the resurrection. Ben Witherington, III, The Gospel of Mark: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001) argues from Jesus silence regarding existing marriages that only levirate marriages will be dissolved at the resurrection; all other contracted marriages will continue (328-329). Not only does this suggestion impose an awkward distinction between levirate and normal marriages, it also fundamentally misunderstands what constitutes an existing marriage. 28) For rabbinic examples of this principle, see Walter Diezinger, Unter Toten Freigeworden: Eine Untersuchung zu Rm. III-VIII, NovT 5 (1962) 272-273. On the lack of explicit Jewish references to the resumption of marriage relationships in the resurrection, see Gundry, Mark, 707.

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We need not look to modern wedding ceremonies or to the letters of Paul, however, in order to establish death as the moment when a marriage ceases. The very levirate law that the Sadducees have cited depends upon this fact. Otherwise, the woman marrying her late husbands brother(s) would be an adulteress (cf. Rom. 7:3). The Sadducees have therefore misunderstood, not Gods power to transform the resurrected body, but the nature of the marriage covenant implied by the very scripture passage on which they have based their attack. Death breaks the marriage covenant, releasing the surviving party from further obligation. Once Jesus exposes this mistake, the absurdity of the Sadducees scenario (and its accompanying critique of resurrection) disappears. c. Understanding Gods Power: The Proof of Resurrection (12:26-27a) Having thus refuted the Sadducees explicit critique of resurrection, Jesus then addresses their implied critique with his proof of resurrection in 12:26-27a:
But concerning the dead, that they are raised, have you not read in the book of Moses [in the passage] about the bush how God spoke to him saying, I [am] the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. He is not a god of dead people but of living.

I will argue below that this proof is grounded in the same principle as the rst part of Jesus response, namely, that death ends a persons covenantal obligations. Before explaining my interpretation, however, it will rst be helpful to survey and critique briey the various other interpretations of this passage. Explanations of Jesus proof tend to ground the argument in one of three factors: 1) lexical-grammatical issues, 2) Gods nature as a god of the living, or 3) the literary context of the Exodus citation. Moreover, although mixtures and slight variations occur, scholars have essentially proposed two distinct ways of construing Jesus logic for each of these three factors, leading to six main proposals. I will discuss each of these in turn. Beginning with the lexical-grammatical solutions, Frdric Manns suggests that Jesus logic here depends on an instance of al tiqra, a method of exegeting Hebrew texts by reading the consonants with a dierent vowel pointing. Basically, Manns argues that the phrase [Moses calls] the Lord the God of Abraham ( ) in Luke 20:37 reects the hrba . . . yhla hwhy of Exod. 3:15. He then suggests that the initial hw hy ] (Lord) behind Lukes could, with a dierent vowel pointing, be understood as a hiphil of hyh (to be) or even (by Jesus listeners) as a

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hiphil of hyj (to live), yielding the meaning in Hebrew, God causes Abraham to be/live.29 Although creative, this analysis makes Jesus argument hinge on a Hebrew word play that is only recoverable through a deconstruction of Lukes version. If correct, it would render Jesus argument unintelligible in Matthew and Mark, not to mention in the surface reading of Luke. While Mannss interpretation has garnered little scholarly support, a second grammatical explanation has long been one of the more inuential interpretations. In this widely held construal, the tense of the implied verb provides the key to Jesus case: the Lord says that he is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, not that he was their God. Thus, the argument goes, Jesus takes the implied present tense of the reference to the patriarchs as evidence that they must have still been alive in some sense.30 Despite its widespread appeal, this proposal is problematic on several grounds, foremost of which is that the all-important present-tense verb does not even appear in Mark, Luke, or the MT of Exod. 3:6. In other words, the single element on which, in this reading, the whole argument depends is omitted, an odd circumstance to say the least.31 Second, even assuming the implied present tense of the verb, Exod. 3:6 is primarily a statement about God (for whom the present tense would be appropriate), not about the patriarchs: he is the God whom they worshipped. This observation then leads to a third objection, namely that this reading of the citation violates the original meaning of the verse in its Exodus context, transforming the passage into a rather awkward proof-text. Not surprisingly considering these diculties, few scholars who advocate this explanation nd it a very convincing proof of resurrection. They therefore often qualify their analyses with statements to the eect that, although such arguments might not be convincing today, a rst-century audience would have found Jesus reasoning compelling, a claim often buttressed by vague appeals to rabbinic methods of exegesis.32 Rabbi D.M. Cohn-Sherbok, however, has argued that this type of reasoning does not bear any resemblance
Frdric Manns, La technique du Al Tiqra dans les Evangiles, RScR 64 (1990) 6. E.g., Donald H. Juel, The Gospel of Mark (IBT; Nashville: Abingdon, 1999) 78; Hargreaves, Mark, 221; Brooks, Mark, 196; Anderson, Mark, 279; Nineham, Mark, 322. Cf. Davies and Allison, Matthew, 232. 31) Although Matthews addition of could be taken as evidence supporting this interpretation of Jesus argument (so Davies and Allison, Matthew, 232), the addition could also simply be intended to bring the text into agreement with the LXX. 32) E.g., Anderson, Mark, 279: The argument . . ., not very convincing by modern standards, is a verbal one of the type common in contemporary rabbinic exegesis; Nineham,
30) 29)

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to known Tannaitic exegetical practices, raising the question of whether this argument would actually have been convincing even in the rst century.33 Turning to the two modes of interpretation that focus on Gods nature, they both suggest that Jesus ultimately grounds his proof in the principle that God cannot be in relationship with the dead, a principle that nds expression in 12:27a. Nevertheless, they dier in their analyses of Jesus logic. They dier, that is, in their understanding of how 12:27a functions in the ow of Jesus argument. One interpretation regards 12:27a as the second of two parallel premises: God is 1) God of the patriarchs (12:26) and 2) a god of the living (12:27a). As Otto Schwankl suggests, the juxtaposition of these two premises then implies, in typical rabbinic fashion, the desired-but-unstated conclusion (that the patriarchs are alive and therefore) that there is a resurrection of the dead.34 The strength of this view lies in its recognition that Jesus argument must have some type of implied conclusion; 12:27a, after all, does not state the point that Jesus is purportedly proving, namely, that God raises the dead. Yet even granting the cultural validity of 12:27a as an independent premise,35 this line of reasoning still has a major diculty: as the parentheses indicate, the logical combination of these two premises yields only the result that the patriarchs are alive.36 How this result might

Mark, 321: The argument is typical of contemporary methods of exegesis and not altogether convincing to modern ears. Cf. Donahue and Harrington, Mark, 352. Similar caveats appear with respect to other proposed solutions. See, e.g., Edwards, Mark, 368; and Gundry, Mark, 704. 33) D.M. Cohn-Sherbok, Jesus Defense of the Resurrection of the Dead, JSNT 11 (1981) 64-73. He even goes so far as to state that Jesus reasoning is defective by rabbinic standards (72). 34) Schwankl, Sadduzerfrage, 403-406. The parentheses in the implied conclusion reect Schwankls own formulation. Cf. Wright, Resurrection, 424; Main, Sadducens, 419. 35) As Schwankl notes, the saying in 12:27a appears nowhere else in the extant literature (Sadduzerfrage, 406). Since, in this reading, Jesus argument depends on the unquestioned validity of both premises, the unknown origin of this saying raises questions as to its potential persuasiveness in this type of proof, especially given the unique application that this view of Jesus logic would require. See too Main, who notes that the necessity of asserting this external premise undermines Jesus claim to prove resurrection based on what was written (Sadducens, 419). 36) Evans argues that the two premises lead to the conclusion that the patriarchs, though presently dead, must someday live (Mark, 257). Cf. Gundry, Mark, 703-4. This proposed conclusion, however, does not actually follow from the two premises; rather, it undermines the second premise by suggesting that God is indeed a god of the (presently) dead.

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imply resurrection will be considered below. For now I simply note that this suggestion awkwardly requires Jesus argument to have not one but two implied conclusions.37 In the second type of interpretive appeal to Gods nature, 12:27a provides the key to resolving a temporal or philosophical conundrum perceived to be inherent in the citation of Exod. 3:6. Unfortunately, such proposals often depend on problematic assertions about rst-century Jewish thought.38 F. Gerald Downing, however, provides a more nuanced version. Noting Philos embarrassment in De Abr. 50-55 that the immortal God would dene himself in Exod. 3:15 in relation to mortal men, Downing suggests that Gods identication of himself as the God of the patriarchs was perhaps more widely perceived as rais[ing] awkward and inescapable questions about mortality.39 While the platonist Philo could resolve the immortal/mortal tension simply by allegorizing the three patriarchs, Jesus instead reasons that Gods relatedness to the patriarchs requires that they still be alive. According to Downing, this particular case can then be expanded by implication to include all who respond to God, perhaps even indicating that relatedness to God constitutes a life that death cannot disrupt.40 Downings proposal for the ow of Jesus logic seems basically correct; I will similarly argue that the citation of Exod. 3:6 raises a question about mortality that Mark 12:27a resolves. I also agree with his conclusion that Jesus is here describing a life that death cannot disrupt. Nevertheless, there seems to be little evidence for grounding these observations in the perceived philosophical diculty that arises from relating the immortal to

Gould presents a variation of this argument that regards 12:27a more as a derived premise/inference: it follows from the nature of God that, when he calls himself the God of any people, certain things are implied in the statement about these people . . . immortality may be inferred from the nature of God himself [12:27a] in the case of those whom he calls his [12:26] (Mark, 230). This proposal falters by presuming the very point at issue, namely, that a relationship with God necessarily entails immortality/resurrection. 38) E.g., R.A. Cole, The Gospel according to Mark: An Introduction and Commentary (2nd ed.; TNTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989), suggests that Exod. 3:6 raises a temporal conundrum since a Hebrew mind could not conceive of God as being a God of the past experience of these men (265). Cf. Moloney, Mark, 239. 39) F. Gerald Downing, The Resurrection of the Dead: Jesus and Philo, JSNT 15 (1982) 47. Cf. Henry Barclay Swete, The Gospel according to Mark (3rd ed.; London: Macmillan and Co., 1909) 282. 40) Downing, Resurrection, 44-45.

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the mortal.41 As Downing himself admits, even the evidence from Philo is ambiguous as to whether or not this relationship represents a true diculty.42 F. Dreyfus oers a more promising approach for understanding Jesus reasoning by contextualizing the citation, an approach whose aptness is suggested by the fact that Jesus himself points to the context ([in the passage] about the bush). Based on a survey of contemporary Jewish literature, Dreyfus argues that the phrase God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob usually emphasizes Gods role rather than the role of the patriarchs. That is to say, the phrase most often signies, not the God whom the patriarchs worshipped, but the God who protected them.43 The literature typically invokes this name (and its equivalents) as an appeal for similar protection (e.g., T. Mos. 3.9). Dreyfus nds the revelation of the name to have this same signicance in Exod. 3-4: as God protected the patriarchs, so he will now protect Israel through the Exodus.44 How does this understanding of Exod. 3:6 relate to resurrection? According to Dreyfus, Jesus here adds a new dimension to the traditional understanding of Gods sovereign protection by implying that for God to allow his people to dieeven after a long lifewould make a mockery of his claim to protect. Gods protection must therefore ultimately entail resurrection.45 Dreyfus then suggests that Jesus conclusion represents the natural outworking for the individual of Gods covenantal promises to restore the nation of Israel (e.g., Ezek. 16:60; 37:1-28; Lev. 26:42; Ps. 106:45).46 While Janzen applauds Dreyfuss sensitivity to the original Exodus context of the citation, he suggests that the Markan context of the citation further sharpens our understanding of Jesus argument: Jesus is not just invoking in a general way the tradition of Gods protection and power; he is countering [the Sadducees ] story [of hopeless sterility and death] with a
41) The diculty with positing a mortal-immortal tension as the basis for Jesus argument can be seen in Downings inability to make cohesive sense of the surrounding context: he regards Mark 12:25-26a as a later insertion that breaks the ow of the argument (Resurrection, 45). 42) Downing notes that Philo does not seem to have a problem relating the mortal to the immortal in De Fuga, raising the distinct possibility that Philo simply manufactured the philosophical conundrum in De Abrahamo because he wanted to talk about moral virtues (Resurrection, 50 n. 7). 43) Dreyfus, LArgument, 216. 44) Dreyfus, LArgument, 219-220. 45) Dreyfus, LArgument, 221. 46) Dreyfus, LArgument, 222-3. For scholars who follow Dreyfus, see footnote 9 above.

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reminder of the ancestors story.47 For Janzen, the reference to God as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob recalls the repeated bouts of sterility in the patriarchal families and, more importantly, Gods subsequent miraculous provision of heirs. Similarly, in the Exodus story from which the citation comes, God arises to preserve his now-numerous people miraculously from a new sterility imposed by the murderous decrees of Pharaoh. In this reading, then, Jesus argues for resurrection by taking this foundational Jewish tradition of God as the one who overcomes sterility and death and applying it to the fate of the individual after death.48 Dreyfus and Janzen both helpfully advance the discussion by pointing to the interpretive signicance of the OT and NT contexts. Yet both also conclude that Jesus argument ultimately hinges on the principle of situational analogy, a form of argument that, by its very nature, cannot be conclusive. Indeed, Dreyfus and Janzen both admit that the inferences they attribute to Jesus stand in some tension with the very biblical texts that, in their view, gave rise to those inferences in the rst place. For Dreyfus, Jesus grounding of resurrection in Gods saving power goes beyond the Pentateuchal portrayal of Gods salvation as resulting simply in a long, fullled life.49 For Janzen, Gods character as the one who overcomes sterility leads Jesus to infer resurrection in spite of the fact that the levirate marriage law itself essentially attests to the reality that God does not always overcome even sterility.50 While it is true that ways can be found to resolve these tensionse.g., Janzen notes that [r]etrospectively, the levirate marriage law could be viewed as a promissory sign of Gods ultimate plan to overcome sterility and death51it remains to be seen how Jesus could have expected the Sadducees to draw the correct analogies and inferences from these texts. To put the matter another way, why does Jesus rebuke them so harshly if his own argument is less than decisive? It could, of course, be argued that the desire for a reasoned proof unjustly imposes modern concerns onto an ancient text. Richard Hays, e.g., suggests that Jesus oers here not so much a logical proof as a reminder of

Janzen, Resurrection, 50. Janzen, Resurrection, 55. Janzen suggests that Jesus here employs a hermeneutics of resurrection in which the citation has elements of both continuity and discontinuity with its original context (50). 49) Dreyfus, LArgument, 221. 50) Janzen, Resurrection, 51. 51) Janzen, Resurrection, 51.
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Gods power designed to serve as a stimulus to the theological imagination.52 It is always possible, too, that Jesus criticism is simply unjustied, or that his critique depends on some unmentioned factor such as his knowledge of the Sadducees hardened hearts or the need for the Spirits guidance in interpretation. Such proposals, however, should only come into consideration if a more logical explanation of Jesus argument cannot be discerned.53 I suggest that paying greater attention to the idea of covenant in Jesus argument both makes sense of his critique of the Sadducees and reveals his citation of Exod. 3:6 to be a reasoned proof of resurrectiona proof, that is, as long as one grants God the power to resurrect the dead. As Dreyfus and Janzen suggest, the key to understanding Jesus proof seems to lie in the OT and NT contexts of the Exodus citation. In its original context, Exod. 3:6 introduces Gods plan to deliver his people from their slavery in Egypt through Moses and the Exodus. Signicantly, this burning bush episode is immediately preceded by the observation that God heard the groaning of his people and remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Exod. 2:24). By invoking the three names again in 3:6, the text indicates that the Exodus to which God is calling Moses arises out of Gods faithfulness to his covenantal obligations to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It is at this point that the NT context becomes signicant. In the discussion of the rst part of Jesus response (12:25) above, I argued that Jesus criticizes the Sadducees for not inferring from the levirate marriage law that death ends a marriage covenant.54 The same principle appears to ground this segment of his response, only in reverse. That is to say, if the death of a covenantal party eectively annuls the covenant, then the fact that the Exodus represents an act of Gods faithfulness to his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob must imply that the three patriarchs are in some sense still alive to God. Otherwise their deaths would have annulled the covenant.55 Just to
His comment on an earlier version of this article. See too Hays, Reading Scripture, 224-9. For Jesus argument to rest on some unmentioned factor seems even less likely given that in 12:25 he confronts the Sadducees on their own terms (i.e., exegesis). Cf. Kilgallen, Sadducees, 480. 54) For the understanding of marriage as a covenantal relationship, see Gordon Paul Hugenberger, Marriage as a Covenant: A Study of Biblical Law and Ethics Governing Marriage Developed from the Perspective of Malachi (VTSup 52; Leiden: Brill, 1994). 55) This principle suggests that, when a nation or tribe constitutes a covenanting partner (as at Sinai), the covenant stipulations remain in force until the entire nation becomes extinct (e.g., 2 Sam. 21:1-14; cf. Josh. 9:1-27). God, however, clearly contracts his covenant
53) 52)

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be clear, it is not Gods covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that preserves their lives beyond physical death but their life beyond physical death that preserves the covenant. Jesus draws this implied conclusion: He is not a god of dead people but of living (12:27a). Luke makes the reasoning even more explicit by adding for all live to him (20:38).56 With respect to God, human life extends beyond the death of the physical body.57 This argument, of course, only proves some kind of post-mortem existence, not resurrection. The proof therefore requires the presence of an implied conclusion, as Schwankl correctly observes.58 In other words, the conclusion given in 12:27a functions only as a preliminary conclusion, a preliminary conclusion that then implies resurrection so clearly that, as often occurs in the rabbinic literature, the remainder of the argument goes unstated. How does the rest of the argument go? Interpreters used to justify the jump from immortality to resurrection by appealing to the unity of human nature. H.B. Swete, for instance, argues that God would not leave men with whom He maintained relations in an imperfect condition.59 The continuing presence of these immortal souls apart from their physical bodies undermines this suggestion. Alternatively, N.T. Wright contends that the patriarchs immortality necessarily implies a general resurrection because the two main Jewish understandings of the afterlife were 1) the Pharisaic, two-stage view in which an intermediate state was followed by bodily resurrection and 2) the Sadducean, no-stage view in which physical death marked the end of a person. Proving the existence of an interim state would therefore prove the Pharisaic two-stage view.60 More promising because it does not require the prior assumption of a Pharisaic view of the afterlife is E. Earle Elliss suggestion that Gods
with Abraham with an individual, as the extensions of the promises to Isaac (Gen. 26:3-5, 24) and Jacob (Gen. 28:13-15; 35:12) show. 56) Contra Kilgallen, this Lukan addition should not be understood to mean all people are meant to live, not die (Sadducees, 492). It simply does not say anything about Gods intention or desire. 57) Although Hurtado similarly points to the seeming incongruity of Gods having a continuing covenant with the dead patriarchs, he resolves the tension by adjusting the nature of the covenant: [Jesus] point seems to be that Gods covenant is meaningless if it is canceled by death (Mark, 183). Jesus answer in 12:25 and his inference in 12:27a support my contention that he challenges the patriarchs status instead. 58) Schwankl, Sadduzerfrage, 403-406. 59) Swete, Mark, 282. Cf. Craneld, Mark, 376. 60) Wright, Resurrection, 424.

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[covenantal] relationship to the dead presupposes that the relationship will be actualized by their deliverance from Sheol.61 Although Ellis leaves his suggestion at this fairly vague level, the basic thrust seems correct. I propose that Jesus argument runs as follows. Because it is based on Gods faithfulness to his covenant with the patriarchs, the Exodus out of Egypt proves that the patriarchs are in some sense still alive to God, the conclusion drawn in 12:27a. But if they are still alive, then God remains obligated to fulll all of his covenantal promises, one of which is to give the land of Canaan as an everlasting possession to the patriarchs (e.g., Gen. 17:8; Exod. 6:4; Num. 14:23; Deut. 11:21) and their descendants.62 Indeed, the Exodus context of the verse that Jesus cites evokes this very promise: almost immediately after revealing himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Yahweh goes on to identify the giving of this promised land as part of the motivation for the Exodus itself (Exod. 3:8, 17; cf. Gen. 15:13-16). For the patriarchs to receive the land personally as an everlasting possession, however, would presumably require their eventual resurrection.63 The purportedly Tannaitic proofs of resurrection in San. 90b provide parallels to this suggested logic:64
It has been taught: R. Simai said: Whence do we learn resurrection from the Torah? From the verse, And I also have established my covenant with them, [sc. the Patriarchs] to give them the land of Canaan [Exod 6:4]: [to give] you is not said, but [to give] them [personally]; thus resurrection is proved from the Torah. . . . Sectarians [minim] asked Rabban Gamaliel: Whence do we know that the Holy One, blessed be He, will resurrect the dead? . . . [Rabban Gamaliel did not satisfy them] until he quoted this verse, which the Lord sware unto your fathers to give to them [Deut 11:21]; not to you, but to them is said; hence resurrection is derived from the Torah.65 E. Earle Ellis, Jesus, the Sadducees and Qumran, NTS 10 (1963/1964) 275. Cf. Edwards, Mark, 369: If Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are dead . . . then Gods promise to them was limited to the duration of their earthly lives, which renders his promises nite and unlled; and Witherington, Mark, 329: The biblical God had made promises to these patriarchs, and since they had not all yet been fullled, it must be assumed that they are still alive. These scholars essentially argue that Gods unfullled promises keep the patriarchs alive. They thus reverse the relationship that I am proposing. 63) Thus would I counter Gundrys critique that Dreyfus . . . cannot show that Gods faithfulness to Gods covenant with those patriarchs demands their resurrection (Mark, 708). 64) So Schweizer, Mark, 248; Nineham, Mark, 321. 65) Sanhedrin (trans. H. Freedman [chps. 7-11]; vol. 3 of The Babylonian Talmud: Seder Nezikin in Four Volumes, ed. I. Epstein; London: Soncino, 1935) 604-605. All brackets and italics original.
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Although little is known of R. Simai, Rabban Gamaliel was a prominent rabbi who lived at the end of the rst century.66 According to Cohn-Sherbok, his reasoning here exemplies Hillels seventh exegetical principle, the explanation derived from the context.67 Of course, the attribution of this proof to Gamaliel could be apocryphal. Even if the attribution represents a later development, however, the type of reasoning nevertheless seems consistent with rst-century Jewish exegetical practices.68 The above interpretation of Jesus argument thus places him squarely in his rst-century context. I argued above that the Sadducees basic scenario of a woman who is unable to bear children despite having seven lawful husbands essentially attacks resurrection on two fronts since resurrection is 1) more dicult than natural childbearing and 2) not prescribed in the Torah. Jesus responds by referring to Gods fulllment of his covenantal obligations in the Exodus (Exod. 3:6). By alluding to this event, he implies that the Torah does prescribe resurrection:69 while God never promises that he will provide children through the levirate marriage law, he does promise to give the land of Canaan to the patriarchs and their descendants. This promise saw an initial fulllment in the Exodus out of Egypt; its complete fulllment will require the eventual resurrection of the patriarchs and their (deceased) descendants. If the Torah thus establishes resurrection as a component of Gods intended plan, then the Sadducees critique eectively amounts to little more than a questioning of Gods power. The Exodus story itself, however, is the story of Gods miraculous ability to overcome the seemingly insurmountable obstacles that threaten the fulllment of his promises. As the Lord explains in Exod. 6:6-8,
I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians . . . and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. And I will take you for my people,
66) Nineham, Mark, 321. This Gamaliel is presumably Gamaliel II, who headed the Yavneh academy. 67) Cohn-Sherbok, Jesus Defense, 71. According to Cohn-Sherbok, Gamaliel argues that, since Israel received the land after the patriarchs had died, God must have raised the patriarchs back to life since this would be the only way that God could keep his pledge (73 n. 14). This indication of a past resurrection does not disturb the parallel that I am suggesting: both Jesus (in my reading) and Gamaliel base their proof for resurrection on the fact that God will fulll / has fullled his promise to give the land to the patriarchs. 68) See David Instone Brewer, Techniques and Assumptions in Jewish Exegesis before 70 CE (TSAJ 30; Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992). 69) Whether or not Torah proves resurrection was an apparently heated rst-century debate (m. San. 10:1).

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B.R. Trick / Novum Testamentum 49 (2007) 232-256 and I will be your God, and you will know that I am the Lord your God who brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. And I will bring you into the land that I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord.

Israels Exodus out of Egypt demonstrates the lengths to which God is both able and willing to go in order to fulll his covenantal promises. The God who sustains life beyond physical death, the God who delivered his people from the mighty Pharaoh through miraculous judgments and provision, this God is surely capable of resurrecting the dead. The Sadducees are thus mistaken because they do not understand Gods power. 3. Summary I began this examination of Mark 12:18-27 by arguing that the Sadducees proposed scenario functions as a trap. On a surface level, it points to a seeming conict between the scriptural levirate marriage law and a belief in resurrection. On a deeper level, however, the very scenario itself, a scenario in which a woman and her multiple husbands are unable to raise up children despite the provisions of the Torah, represents an implicit denial of the more dicult raising up of resurrection. Any attempt to resolve the logistical diculties of the presenting problem would presumably involve an acceptance of the scenario itself and, thus, its implicit critique of resurrection. Jesus, however, manages to refute the Sadducees critiques while also avoiding their trap. He rst demonstrates that their perceived conict between resurrection and the levirate marriage law rests on the Sadducees misunderstanding of the very scripture that they cite: since the levirate marriage law requires that death annuls the covenantal bond of marriage, none of the womans prior marital relationships would continue into the resurrected state. Jesus then addresses the implied critique, proving resurrection through a citation of Exod. 3:6. If, as he has just demonstrated, death annuls a covenantal bond, then the fact that God initiates the Exodus out of Egypt on the basis of his covenant with the patriarchs must imply that they are still alive to God. In fact, the Exodus story itself demonstrates Gods desire and power to fulll his promise to give the land of Canaan to the patriarchs and their descendants, a promise whose fulllment will ultimately require resurrection. The Sadducees have therefore also misunderstood Gods power.

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III. Theological Implications of Jesus Argument

Not only does this reading interpret Jesus answer as a coherent whole that makes logical sense in both the rst-century and modern contexts, it also reveals a response that coheres quite well with the presentation of resurrection in other NT texts. I noted at the beginning of this article that current interpretations of Mark 12:18-27 often yield little if any theological resonance with the rest of the NT. On the one hand, the suggestion that Jesus here denes resurrection in terms of immortality renders his logic incompatible with texts such as 1 Cor. 15:35-41 that clearly envision a bodily resurrection. On the other hand, the tendency for scholars to view Jesus as arguing from the fact of the patriarchs continuing existence rather than the reason for their continuing existence renders his logic largely irrelevant once believers could point to Jesus own resurrection. The interpretation oered in this article, in contrast, eectively resolves the theological dissonance that both of these readings create. First, as I argued above, Jesus reasoning in Mark 12:24-27 does point to the future bodily resurrection of the patriarchs. The passage does not, of course, argue that resurrection is bodily, but such an argument is unnecessary since it represents the underlying assumption inherent both in the language of resurrection and in the Sadducees scenario. Indeed, my suggested analysis of Jesus logic requires that rising from among the dead ( , 12:25) refers to bodily resurrection: if the patriarchs current non-corporeal existence represents a resurrected rather than an interim state, then they would presumably have already undergone a death sucient to annul Gods covenant, and Jesus whole argument would falter. The problem is that resurrection requires a death, but death annuls a covenant. To argue for resurrection based on Gods covenantal faithfulness therefore requires a kind of preliminary death, a death sucient to experience resurrection, yet not so complete as to annul the covenant. In other words, Jesus argument requires a persons continued existence in a noncorporeal interim state after physical death. The assumption of such an interim state then enables the following distinction: whereas physical death suces to annul covenants (such as marriages) between physical beings, it cannot annul covenants with God since all peoplenot just the patriarchscontinue living with respect to God even after physical death (cf. Luke 20:38). Resurrection must therefore refer, as it always does, to the restoration of an embodied state.

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Second, the above analysis of Jesus response suggests that he does base his proof of resurrection on the reason forand not just the fact ofthe patriarchs impending resurrection. That is to say, he grounds his resurrection belief in Gods faithfulness to the covenant with the patriarchs. Far from being irrelevant, this principle represents a fundamental tenet of NT theology. In Gal. 3:15-18, for instance, Paul identies Gods covenant with Abraham and his seed as the reason for Jesus receiving of the promised inheritance, an inheritance that his resurrection presumably indicates and enables (cf. Luke 1:55, 72-73; Acts 3:25-26; 7:2-53). Paul then goes on to state that his readers own hope rests in their status as heirs of Abraham through Christ (3:29; cf. Heb. 2:16). The debates with Jewish leaders recorded in the NT concerning who constitutes a true heir of Abraham and his covenant (e.g., Matt. 3:7-10 / Luke 3:7-9; John 8:39-40; cf. Rom. 4) similarly attest to the theological importance of this principle. This brief analysis does not exhaust the theological implications of this passage and their resonances within the rest of the NT.70 For now, however, it must suce simply to note that, in the reading proposed by this article, not only does Jesus refer to a bodily resurrection, but he also grounds his proof in the same theological understanding that emerges in the appeals to Jesus own resurrection made by the early church. This reading of the logic in Mark 12:26-27a thus achieves coherence with the other NT portrayals of resurrection at precisely those points where it might be expected, points where more traditional interpretations have tended to see dissonance.

For instance, the suggestion that life continues after physical death supports the idea of a second death described in Rev. 20:6, 14; 21:8.

70)