Jesus, Marriage, & The Resurrection

Written by Cedric Parsels

Although the Gospels never record for us an instance in which Jesus directly addressed the morality of same-sex relationships, they nevertheless provide us with enough information about Jesus’ views on marriage for us to reasonably conclude that he would never have approved of them. To support this claim, scholars often focus on what Jesus says about marriage in Matthew 19:1-12. In this article, however, I want to highlight another gospel passage which doesn’t get as much attention, but which I believe is just as important for reconstructing Jesus’ views on marriage, namely, Luke 20:27-36.

(Re)Marriage: A Problem for the Resurrection?

During the week leading up to Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion, Luke tells us that on one occasion some Sadducees approached Jesus to ask him a question about the resurrection. We know from context that, in approaching Jesus, the Sadducees were not genuinely interested in learning from him. Instead, the Sadducees’ aim was to make Jesus look ridiculous in front of the crowds by showing that his belief in the resurrection was incompatible with God’s Law.  

 The Sadducees begin by reminding Jesus of the law regulating levirate marriage. According to this law, “if a man’s brother dies, having a wife but no children, the man must take the widow and raise up offspring for his brother” (Lk. 20:28). Originally, the purpose of this law was to keep both the dead husband’s name and his household from going extinct. It is doubtful, however, that the Sadducees’s intent is to draw attention to the law’s original purpose. Instead, it is more likely that they cite it for the simple reason that it is God’s Law. It represents what God says a man “must” do when his “brother dies, having a wife but no children.” 

In verses 29-32, the Sadducees go on to provide an example of how the levirate law could work in practice. “Now there were seven brothers. The first took a wife, and died without children. And the second  and the third took her, and likewise all seven left no children and died.  Afterward the woman also died.” 

The Sadducees’ example is likely a fiction based on a popular folktale of the day. Nevertheless, what it describes is something that everyone at the time would have found easy to imagine. In a society where the average life expectancy was less than twenty-five years, it was not uncommon for a woman to be married more than once. What makes the Sadducees’ example extreme is that the woman in their story is married seven times and all of her husbands were presumably biological brothers.  

In verse 33, the Sadducees finally come to their question: “In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had her as wife.” To understand the connection between verses 28-32 and verse 33, it is important to note two assumptions that the Sadducees are making. First, the Sadducees assume that a woman cannot have seven husbands at the same time. At the time of this encounter, anyone who even suggested such a thing would not have been taken seriously. And if someone added the detail that all seven of the woman’s husbands would be brothers, people would have considered it utterly ridiculous, if not obscene. In fact, God’s Law teaches that such a thing is an abomination (cf. Lev. 18:6).  

The Sadducees’ second assumption is that life in the age to come will essentially be a continuation of life in this present age. More specifically, they assume that, if there is a resurrection, then, in the age to come, the godly relationships people have entered into in this age will be revived. So, for example, if a woman is legitimately married to a man in this present age, then she will be married to that man in the age to come. 

Of course, if Jesus adopts these two assumptions, it seems inevitable that He will find himself face to face with an extremely absurd situation. For, if those who are married in this age end up married to each other again in the age to come, then the woman in the Sadducees’ example will end up married to seven men at the same time! Indeed, she will not only end up married to seven men at the same time, but to seven brothers! By a perverse twist of logic, by striving to live in accordance with God’s Law, the brothers and the widow have ended up in a relationship that God’s Law declares to be an abomination (cf., Lev. 18:30)! Obviously it is absurd to think that God would allow this to happen, but again, according to the assumptions, it must.

Jesus on the End of Marriage (Luke 20:34-36)

In verses 34-36, Jesus deftly avoids the Sadducees’ trap by denying their second assumption. According to Jesus, the Sadducees are simply wrong to assume that, in the age to come, God will revive the godly relationships that people had in the present age. Instead, Jesus says that God will profoundly transform human beings and the ways in which they relate to one another. As Jesus puts it, “The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage…” (Lk. 20:34-35). So, the Sadducees’ question of “whose wife will the woman be” entirely misses the mark. In the age to come, there will be no marriage. So, the problematic scenario that the Sadducees imagine will not arise. 

Jesus’ response on this occasion obviously undermines the Sadducees’ argument. Nevertheless, the way in which Jesus undermines the argument has proven perplexing to many modern Christians. After all, marriage is a part of God’s good creation and is often greatly desirable (cf., Gen. 1:27-28; 2:18-24). In marriage, God provides companionship for husband and wife. He establishes an arena in which to rightly express their sexual natures. And He provides an environment in which children can receive the nurture they need to flourish. Why would God exclude something that has so much potential for good from the age to come?

In my experience, this question has generated a lot of speculation. One theory that I have often heard is grounded in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. According to Paul, God established marriage to serve as a sign of the union between Christ and His Church. But, it is argued, once this union is fully realized in the age to come, there will be no need for the sign. And so, perhaps this is why “those considered worthy…to attain to the resurrection of the dead [will] neither marry nor [be] given in marriage” (Lk. 20:35).

It is possible that the above theory is one reason why there will be no marriage. But it is not the reason that Jesus gives in Luke 20:34-36. According to Jesus, the reason there will be no marriage in the age to come is because, like the angels, it will be impossible for people to die. “And Jesus said to them, ‘The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, for [Gr., γάρ] they cannot die anymore, because [Gr., γάρ] they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection” (Lk. 20:34-36). 

The two uses of the Greek word γάρ (gar) in Luke 20:36-37 are called “explanatory conjunctions.” As the name suggests, these words are used to introduce additional information that serves to explain or to give the reason for some other statement. In the context of this passage, the first γάρ in verse 36 introduces a clause that explains or gives the reason for why the righteous “neither marry nor are given in marriage.” The righteous neither marry nor are given in marriage, “for/because they cannot die anymore.” Likewise, γάρ in verse 37 introduces a clause that explains or gives the reason for what has been said in verse 36. The righteous “cannot die anymore…for/because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.” So, according to Jesus, the reason why there will be no marriage in the age to come is because, like the angels, the righteous will be immortal.

Still, someone will ask, “Why would immortality put an end to marriage?” After all, many people both past and present have expressed a desire to be married eternally to the ones they love. (Joseph Smith and the Mormons are prime examples.) So again, why does immortality put an end to marriage?

The most likely answer to this question is that, for Jesus, God instituted marriage for the purpose of ensuring the survival of our species. To state the obvious, our mortality implies that it is possible for our species to go extinct. The survival of our species then depends on men and women forming stable and supportive relationships which enable them to successfully procreate and raise children. And, for this reason, God instituted marriage. According to Jesus, however, in the age to come, God will make humanity immortal. Our species will no longer depend on procreation to survive. And so, Jesus concludes, in the age to come, human beings will “neither marry nor be given in marriage.” In short, by rendering procreation obsolete in the age to come, God will also render marriage obsolete. 

Understandably, this interpretation of Jesus’ reasoning is one that will generate questions in the minds of many readers. But it is an interpretation that fits the broader context of Luke 20:34-36. First, note that, in the verses immediately preceding verses 34-36, the Sadducees have already drawn the connection between death, marriage, and procreation. In fact, we might even say that it is not the Sadducees who draw this connection, but God who draws the connection by giving His people the law governing levirate marriage. The Sadducees simply cite this law and provide an example of how it might work in practice.  

Accordingly, in looking for the connection between Jesus’ statement about the end of marriage in verse 35 and his statement about death being the reason for that end in verse 36, we do not have to go very far. The Sadducees’ comments leading up to verses 34-36 have already made the connection for us. Because people die, they must procreate. Because people must procreate, God gave them marriage. 

Admittedly, one could argue that the levirate marriage law only tells us about the rationale and purpose for levirate marriage and nothing about the rationale and the purpose for marriage in general. In verses 34-36, however, Jesus does not make this distinction. He could have easily said that only ‘such’ marriages would cease to exist in the age to come. Presumably this would have involved Jesus somehow arguing that the woman would be married to the first brother. Instead, Jesus says that all marriages will cease to exist. This strongly suggests that Jesus sees no significant difference between the rationale and purpose of levirate marriages and the rationale and purpose for marriage in general. They are both essentially a response to death and ordered toward procreation.

Second, the connection between death, marriage, and procreation fits extremely well with what some 1^st Century Jewish sects believed about angels. Perhaps the most striking example of this is found in 1 Enoch, a text that greatly influenced the development of early Christianity (cf., Jude 14-15; 1 Enoch 1:9). In what some scholars consider to be the oldest section of 1 Enoch (written around 250 B.C.), God explains to a group of fallen angels that the reason humans marry whereas angels don’t is because men and women are mortal and, therefore, need to procreate. The angels, however, being immortal, do not need to procreate and, therefore, do not marry.

In addition to the obvious parallels between 1 Enoch 15:4-7 and Luke 20:34-36, it is relevant to note that, near the end of 1 Enoch, Enoch tells the righteous that, in the age to come, God will make them to be “like the angels of heaven” (1 Enoch 104:2-6; Lk. 20:36). Given these parallels between 1 Enoch and Jesus’ teaching in Luke 20:34-36, it seems reasonable to conclude that Jesus’ teaching in Luke 20:34-36 is an echo of a Jewish tradition reflected also in 1 Enoch. And so, we are justified in drawing the inference that, as in 1 Enoch 15:4-7, the reason the immortal will not marry in the age to come is because those who are immortal do not need to procreate.

Third, someone might wonder why Jesus doesn’t make the connection between marriage and procreation more explicit in Luke 20:34-36. The best answer to this question is that the connection was so well established at the time that Jesus didn’t need to make it explicit. For example, Josephus (c.37 – c.100 A.D.), a Jewish aristocrat born in Jerusalem, who became a Pharisee and an eyewitness to the Temple’s destruction in 70 A.D., bears witness to this in his book, Against Apion.  According to Josephus, when it comes to marriage, “[God’s] law owns no other mixture of sexes but that which nature hath appointed, of a man with his wife, and that this be used only for the procreation of children.” 

It was not just Pharisees (like Josephus), however, who held this view of the relationship between marriage and procreation. According to Josephus, another of the three main groups active in Judea prior to the destruction of the Temple, the Essenes, also understood procreation to be the aim of marriage.  According to Josephus, there were two groups or ‘orders’ of Essenes. The first mandated celibacy, but the second permitted marriage.  According to Josephus, this second order reasoned that “those who decline to marry cut off the chief function of life, the propagation of the race, and, what is more, that, were all to adopt the same view, the race would quickly die out.” In other words, for the Essenes, death required procreation and, consequently, marriage. Indeed, according to Josephus, so closely did the Essenes associate procreation and marriage that they would test prospective wives (as best they knew how) to ensure fertility. And once an Essene wife became pregnant, the husband and wife would live in separate locations “thus showing that their motive in marrying is not self-indulgence but the procreation of children….” 

It is important to note that my purpose in citing Josephus is not to claim that Jesus would have completely agreed with him and the Essenes nor that we should completely agree with them. My purpose is simply to point out that the essential connection between marriage and procreation was very well established in the religious context of First Century Judea. And so, Jesus did not need to make the connection between marriage and procreation more explicit in his discussion with the Sadducees. He could assume that His audience would easily have made the connection for themselves. 

Now, when we add the evidence from Josephus to the evidence from 1 Enoch and the evidence internal to Luke 20:27-36, the line of Jesus’ reasoning in Luke 20:34-36 becomes sufficiently clear. In brief, for Jesus,  immortality in the age to come does away with marriage because immortality does away with the need for procreation. This implies that, for Jesus, marriage as an institution is essentially ordered toward procreation. Accordingly, if we would follow in the footsteps of Jesus’ teaching on marriage, then we must conclude that only two people of the opposite sex can marry, because only a male and a female can, in principle, enter into a procreative relationship. 

Accordingly, Luke 20:27-36 provides strong additional evidence that the revisionist understanding of marriage is incompatible with “the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Tim. 6:3). During Christ’s earthly ministry, sex outside of marriage was considered unchaste. And, since Jesus’ view of marriage implies that two people of the same-sex cannot marry, it follows that Jesus would have considered homosexual sex to be, to say the least, unchaste.          

Conclusion

Before concluding, the reader should note that my interpretation of Jesus’ reasoning in response to the Sadducees is in no way novel but has deep roots in the history of Christian exegesis. In the early church, Origen (d. ± 253), Augustine of Hippo (d. 430), and, possibly, Cyril of Alexandria (d. 444) all interpreted these verses along the same lines. In the middle ages, the Orthodox exegete Theophylact of Ohrid and the Roman Catholic commentators Thomas Aquinas and Ludolph of Saxony also gave this interpretation. During the Reformation, John Calvin (d.1564) among the Reformed and Johannes Brenz (d. 1570) among the Lutherans interpreted the passage this way as well.  And, in the period of the Reformed Orthodox, both John Piscator (d. 1625) and the Westminster Divines in their widely read Annotations Upon All The Books of the Old And New Testaments drew the same conclusion. Finally, in modern times, many commentators – regardless of whether they are Christian or Jewish, Protestant or Catholic, liberal or conservative – have recognized this to be the basic logic of Luke 20:34-36. 

In conclusion, allow me to say again that I am fully aware that this interpretation raises important theological and ethical questions. Nevertheless, as Christ’s disciples, none of us can ignore the implications of what Jesus teaches about marriage in Luke 20:34-36. As I have argued, Jesus teaching about marriage in this passage implies that, if we would be Jesus’ faithful followers, then we must embrace the CRC’s confessional understanding of marriage and chastity.  

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