Cuộc sống hiện tại có thể sẽ mang lại cho chúng ta những cú sốc tàn phá và những gánh nặng đau đớn. Nhiều người trong chúng ta có ít nhất một lần bị cú sốc quá đau đớn đến nổi la chỉ có muốn được chết thôi. Ngay cả cái chết nhiều khi có vẻ như là một sự lựa chọn hấp dẫn hơn là phải tiếp tục sự đau khổ. Nhưng Thiên Chúa còn vĩ đại hơn là bất cứ một sự đau khổ nào mà con người đã phải nhận. Vì Thiên Chúa rất vô cùng rộng lượng và luôn thương xót.
Như bài đọc trong sách Tôbia, ông Tobit không thể chịu đựng được cái cảnh mù loà của mình nữa và Sarah cũng đã bị áp đảo tinh thần bởi cái chết liên tiếp của bảy người chồng ngay trong đêm tân hôn. Cả hai đã cầu mong cho cái chết để cứu vãn sự đau khổ của họ, nhưng cả hai cuối cùng quay trở lại với Thiên Chúa. Ông Tobit đã được khôi phục và sáng mắt, Còn Sarah đã được cứu sống bởi Tobia và cuối cùng đã kết hôn với anh ta. Cuối cùng, họ đã ca ngợi Thiên Chúa vì lòng thương xót và lòng từ bi mà họ đã được chứng minh.
Đây là một lời nhắc nhở cho chúng ta biết là không nên dễ chán nãn bỏ cuộc hay đầu hàng bóng tối và sự tiêu cực. Sự đau khổ của con người không phải là ý muốn của Chúa, và Thiên Chúa luôn hiện diện nơi chúng ta để ban cho chúng ta lòng can đảm, niềm hy vọng, và sự chữa lành.
Chúng ta cần phải mở rộng tâm hồn và trái tim của chúng ta cho một cái gì đó to lớn hơn. Sự sống đời đời chắc chắn còn to lớn hơn những gì mà chúng ta có thể tưởng tượng và chúng ta không nên nghĩ về sự sống đời đời của chúng ta theo ý nghĩa hay điều kiện của con người trần thế. Có lẽ chúng ta có thể cho phép Thiên Chúa đến với chúng ta một cách bất ngờ và thách thức chúng ta trong việc trả lời câu hỏi về đức tin của chúng ta. Lạy Chúa, xin mở rộng long trí và trái tim của của chúng con.
Life can bring us some devastating blows and painful burdens. Many people have at one time or another reached their limit and longed to have their life end. Even death sometimes seems a more attractive option than continued misery and suffering. But God is greater than any human suffering and God is infinitely merciful. Tobit could not stand his blindness any longer and Sarah was overwhelmed by the death of seven consecutive husbands on her wedding night.
Both longed for death to give them relief, but both ultimately turned to God. Tobit had his sight restored and Sarah was rescued by Tobias and finally married to him. In the end, they praised God for the mercy and compassion they had been shown.
It is a reminder to us not to give up or to surrender to darkness and negativity. Human pain and misery is not God’s will, and God is always present to grant us courage, hope, and healing. The Sadducees tried to trap Jesus with a trick question about a woman married to seven different brothers. He replied that they knew neither the Scriptures nor the power of God — their question showed ignorance and a lack of religious imagination. Life in God’s Kingdom is not just a continuation of our earthly life.
We need to open our minds and hearts to something far greater — eternal life is greater than we can ever imagine and we should not think of it in earthly terms. Perhaps we can allow God to surprise and challenge us in answering our religious questions. Lord, expand my mind and heart.
Wednesday of the Ninth Week in Ordinary Time
Some Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus and put this question to him, saying, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us, ‘If someone’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother.’ Now there were seven brothers…” Mark 12:18–20
The Sadducees were a Jewish sect composed mainly of the Temple leaders, including many priests. They held theological and political views that differed significantly from those of the Pharisees. The Sadducees accepted only the Torah (the first five books of the Old Testament) as authoritative, whereas the Pharisees recognized the entire Hebrew Scriptures, including the Prophets, historical books, and Wisdom literature, and upheld a highly developed oral tradition based on centuries of rabbinic interpretation. This led to tension and theological disagreements.
The Sadducees denied the resurrection of the dead, the immortality of the soul, and the existence of angels—all of which were central to Pharisaic belief—because they believed those truths were not found in the Torah. They believed that God’s blessings were given for this life and that when one died, the soul perished with the body.
Despite their theological disputes with the Pharisees, both groups found common ground in opposing Jesus. Today’s Gospel illustrates the Sadducees’ failed attempt to trap Jesus in a legalistic theological dilemma, using the law of Levirate marriage (cf. Deuteronomy 25:5–10) to challenge the doctrine of the resurrection.
Second, Jesus refutes their denial of the resurrection of the dead using the Torah: “As for the dead being raised, have you not read in the Book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God told him, ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead but of the living.”
Though the Sadducees had built their entire theology on the Torah, they failed to recognize the implication of God’s words to Moses. If God is “the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,” then these patriarchs must still be alive in His presence. God did not say, “I was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,” but “I AM.” With this statement, Jesus shatters their disbelief and unveils the reality of eternal life. Perhaps even the Pharisees enjoyed His answer.
Reflect today on the central truth Jesus revealed to the Sadducees: The soul is immortal, and those who die in God’s grace will rise again to live eternally in His presence, in perfect communion with all the angels and saints. This truth must always be our focal point in life. Too often, we live as the Sadducees did—as if this life is an end in itself. By turning our eyes toward eternity, we not only better our lives here and now, but we also live in the hope of Heaven, knowing that all we do now must be for the sake of eternal treasure in the life to come.
My eternal Lord, I believe in the promise of Heaven and the coming of the New Heavens and Earth, when all souls will rise and receive their eternal reward or judgment. As I journey through this life, keep my eyes fixed on eternity, and let my hope be firmly rooted in the resurrection to come. Jesus, I trust in You.
Opening Prayer: Lord God, I believe in your power to raise me to new life. I have already begun to experience your eternal life through Baptism. Teach me each day to share more deeply in your life, in the life of your Son, and in the life of the Spirit.
1. The Sadducees and the Second Test: In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus is demonstrating his authority as the Son of David and the New Solomon. He demonstrates divine wisdom and passes each of the tests put forth by the religious authorities. Yesterday, we read how the Pharisees and Herodians asked him a difficult question about earthly, political authority. Today, we read that the Sadducees ask Jesus a difficult question about marriage and eternal life. “The Sadducees were an elite and powerful party within Judaism, consisting of the priestly aristocracy, their families, and supporters. … They had more lenient religious views than the Pharisees, accepting only the Torah (not the Prophets or Psalms) as sacred Scripture, and rejecting traditions that had arisen more recently in Judaism, such as belief in angels, spirits, and the resurrection from the dead (see Acts 23:6-10)” (Healy, The Gospel of Mark, 243).
Some Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus and put this question to him, saying, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us, ‘If someone’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no child, his brother must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother.’ Now there were seven brothers…” Mark 12:18–20
And these Sadducees then go on to present to Jesus a long and unlikely hypothetical scenario in which this woman eventually married all seven brothers after each one died. And at the conclusion of their hypothetical situation, the Sadducees ask Jesus, “At the resurrection when they arise whose wife will she be?” Of course, Jesus offers them the correct answer and then also states something interesting. He tells the Sadducees that they “are greatly misled.” Just prior to this conversation with the Sadducees, the Pharisees had presented their own question to Jesus in an attempt to trap Him. The difference seems to be that the Sadducees had more sincerity in their pursuit of the truth whereas the Pharisees were more obsessed with their own authority and power.
The Sadducees were considered the more traditional of the religious leaders, in that they accepted only the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament, as authentically revealed. They also did not accept the afterlife or the resurrection of the dead because they believed that the Torah did not explicitly teach those things. The Pharisees not only accepted the Torah but also the rest of what is contained in the Old Testament. The Pharisees also accepted what was referred to as the “tradition of the elders,” which meant that they paid much attention to the scrupulous multiplication of laws and regulations that other Pharisees devised, and they sought to impose those man-made laws upon the people.
In this Gospel passage, the problem with the Sadducees seems to be scrupulosity and rigidity in their approach to the faith. They clearly relied upon human reason, and they applied their human reason to the Torah. And though human reason and logical deduction are helpful and necessary in life, they attempted to solve every matter of faith by their own effort by narrowly and rigidly interpreting the Torah. They did not allow themselves to be open to the deeper wisdom of God that floods one’s human reason when one is attentive to divine inspiration and revelation. Instead, they were black and white in all of their deductions and practices. This rigidity left them “greatly misled.”
In our own lives, we can also become greatly misled when we use the gift of our human reason in a rigid and narrow way. We must never overly simplify the faith, and we must never think that we will easily be able to arrive at all the answers by our own effort. Our constant goal must be to allow our minds to become fully immersed in the deepest wisdom of God and all that He has revealed. The teachings of the Church will guide us, keeping us on the straight path, but it will be the voice of God, speaking to our minds in a real and personal way, that will help us to understand the depth and breadth of God’s Will, His Truth, and Wisdom.
Reflect, today, upon any tendency you have to be like these Sadducees. Are you rigid? Or narrow minded? Do you allow yourself to be misled into thinking you have all the answers? If so, seek humility. Humble yourself before the awesome mysteries of Heaven. Use your mind to probe the truths that God has revealed and be ready to be drawn deeper and deeper into the life of God Himself.
My Lord of infinite wisdom, You are Truth Itself, and You continually reveal Yourself to us. Give me the humility I need to always be open to all divine Truth in my life so that I will come to know You and Your holy will as You desire. Jesus, I trust in You.
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