V. ConrizmaTion. This view of the subject derives some confirmation from a custom of the ancient Egyptians. They embalmed the bodies of their dead, and so preserved them for centuries. Their object, as is with strong probability supposed, was that the mummy corpse might be prepared for the reception of the returning soul, and for reoccupancy by that former inhabitant. If such were their belief, it was doubtless a ray of light derived from revelation, but distorted as usual in such cases, While they anticipated the glorious fact of a reunion of soul and body, they added thereto the fancy that the same body, unaltered and unimproved, would be its rece tacle. Revelation, however, confirms the one, but corrects the other; for these vile bodies shall be raised spiritual bodies, and fashioned like unto Christ’s glorious body.
VI. OruEs EXPLANATIONS. Some, we are aware, understand by resurrection in this passage merely a renewal of life, restricting that life to the soul. In this way they remove to some extent the difficulty involved in the reasoning, but destroy at the same time the proper meaning of the word, as might easily be shown from other Scriptures. Paul, for example, speaks of the resurrection in the ordinary and usual sense when he asks, “ How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come?” Besides, it is to be observed that, in our Lord’s quotation, God is not called the God of the souls of the patriarchs, but of their compound being, consisting of both soul and body. The reference to marriage in the verses preceding also points to the resurrection of the body as well as to the life of the soul. Life is thus implied in relation to both the con- stituent parts of man—present life for the soul, future life for the body. Others there are who, understanding the argument to relate exclusively to those who die the death of the righteous, elucidate it in this manner. The Scripture cited by our Lord, in which God declares himself the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, involves the Father- ship of God and the sonship of believers, as appears from such Scripture statements as “JT will be to him a God, and he shall be to me a son;” aiso, “I will be to you a Father, and ye shall be*to me sons and daughters.” Again, eur adoption as children of God includes the redemption of the body, and conseyuent recovery from the power of the grave, as may be gathered from Rom. viii. 23, “‘ We wait for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body.” Now, though this explanation, it must be admitted, is plausible, yet it appears too restricted, and not quite in harmony with our Lord’s own words in John y, 28, 29, “‘ The hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrec- tion of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.”
VII. PgacticaL opservaTions. 1. A few practical thoughts connect themselves with this subiect. We learn hence the value of an accurate acquaintance with the
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194 THE GOSPEI, ACCORDING TO ST. MARK. [os. xu. 1—44
Scriptures of the Old as well as of the New Testament. Our Lord refuted his adver- saries as he repelled Satan, by an appeal to the Law and to the testimony. He took every opportunity of putting honour on, and claiming respect for, the Divine Word. It is our safeguard against error. His quotation is from a portion of that Pentateuch which has in recent times been the object of repeated and insidious attacks. 2. We see how our Master meets his opponents on their own chosen ground, and reasons with them after their own favourite mode. They put their objections inferentially ; our Lord, who always adapted his discourse, whether sermon, or parable, or argument, to his audience, adopts the selfsame method. The Sadducees believed, at least, the five books of Moses; he quotes from an early portion of those books. He denounced their error with mildness, and demonstrated it from the very Scriptures to the authority of which they themselves deferred. He took the ground from under their feet by hard arguments, not by hard words. Persuasiveness, not abusiveness, characterizes his reasoning. 3. Let us seek grace that we may appreciate as we ought the comfort of this doctrine. Our very dust is dear to God. The visible sky above us may pass away, but no particle of this dust shall perish. Let us realize the duty of seeking a
art in the resurrection of the just. Let the doctrine have a practical effect upon our tan With this prospect in view, “ what manner of persons ought we to be jn all holy conversation and godliness ” ?
“ Those bodies that corrupted fall Shall incorrupted rise, And mortal forms shall spring to life, Immortal in the skies.”
Having this hope within us, let us purify ourselves, and by grace keep the bodily temple undefiled —J. J. G. i ihe
Vers. 28—34. Parallel passage: Matt. xxii. 34—40.— Question about the greatest commandment. J, PurRIITIES oF THE PHARISEES. The Pharisees busied themselves about the letter of the Law, but had little practical acquaintance with its true spirit. The Jews generally divided the commandments of the Law into the preceptive and prohibitory—the “ Do” and the “ De not; ” nor was there anything amiss in this. But the Pharisees, we are told, counted the affirmative precepts, and found them as many as the members of the body; they counted the negative, and reckoned them equal in number to the days of the year, viz. three hundred and sixty-five ; they then added them together, and found that the total made up the exact number of letters in the Decalogue. They also divided the commandments into great and small—the more important and the less important, or the heavy and the light; those of greater weight being such commandments as related to the sabbath, circumcision, sacrifice, fringes and phylacteries. They did not stop with puerilities of this sort, but descended to trifling minutis, which we have neither time nor wish to record. Some of their dis- tinctions were of a more mischievous kind, such as preferring the ceremonial to the moral Law, the oral to the written Law, and the trifles of the scribes to the teachings of the prophets. They also taught that obedience to certain commandments atoned 8 the neglect of others; in some measure like persons in much more recent times, w
“Oompound for sins they are inclined to, By damning those they have no mind ta”