I See Dead People

[DLH]

A response to a skeptical interpretation of Matthew 27:52-53 as dead people walking around.

Matthew was the only one to mention dead people emerging from their graves upon Jesus' death. It is assumed that these resurrected dead were walking around.

The omission of the dead people emerging from the graves by the other writers does not, of course, mean anything. Matthew was the first gospel to be written. In De viris inlustribus (Concerning Illustrious Men), chapter III, Jerome says: "Matthew, who is also Levi, and who from a publican came to be an apostle, first of all composed a Gospel of Christ in Judaea in the Hebrew language and characters for the benefit of those of the circumcision who had believed." So this (Matthew having been the first gospel) might be a reason for the others having not included the dead people emerging
from their graves.

Any serious scholar of the Bible could tell you that at Matthew 27:52-53 the Greek egeiro means simply raised up rather than resurrected back to life, and in addition to this "they" (meaning the bodies that were walking around) is a pronoun, and in Greek all pronouns have gender and "they" is masculine whereas bodies" (the bodies that were lifted up) is in the neuter. They are not the same.

Adam Clarke: "It is difficult to account for the transaction mentioned in verses 52 and 53. Some have thought that these two verses have been introduced into the text of Matthew from the gospel of the Nazarenes, others think the simple meaning is this: - by the earthquake several bodies that had been buried were thrown up and exposed to view, and continued above ground till after Christ's resurrection, and were seen by many persons in the city."

Theobald Daechsel's translation: "And tombs opened up, and many corpses of saints laying at rest were lifted up."

Johannes Greber's translation: "Tombs were laid open, and many bodies of those buried there were tossed upright. In this posture they projected from the graves and were seen by many who passed by the place on their way back to the city."​

 

[steve_bank]

I saw Dead people back in the 70s. I was at a Grateful Dead concert and there were walking talking Dead People all around.

 

[Learner]

Bruce Willis can help you.

 

[BH]

As someone with and undergraduate degree and made it halfway through a graduate degree in history that passage always haunted me. If it was actually dead saints rising from the dead and walking around the city even in those primitive times of communication, it would have caused a huge uproar around the area. No doubt Josephus and Philo would have known about it at the very least.

I believe Eusebius was the church father and scholar who stated Jesus execution order could still be found in Rome's archives. This is also very strange. Eusebius had a reputation for making things up and being dishonest, but that execution order would have been a prime relic the church would want to get hold of. Either a pagan destroyed it out of spite, Eusebius made it up it still existed, or maybe if it was there the report that came with it may have flatly contradicted what the gospels said occurred as to why the arrest was made and the record of the trial.

 

[blastula]

Matthew was the first gospel to be written. In De viris inlustribus (Concerning Illustrious Men), chapter III, Jerome says: "Matthew, who is also Levi, and who from a publican came to be an apostle, first of all composed a Gospel of Christ in Judaea in the Hebrew language and characters for the benefit of those of the circumcision who had believed."

The Gospel of Matthew was not written by Matthew, was not the first, and was not written in Hebrew. We know today better and more than what Jerome did.

 

[WAB]

The Gospel of Matthew was written by the Earl of Oxford, obviously! He used a time machine inspired by HG Wells (who was really the poofter, Oscar Wilde), contrived by Tesla (who was actually the inventor of the seed drill, Jethro Tull, not to be confused with the rock band led by Tony Iommi and Karen Carpenter), and manufactured by the rollers of Cuban cigars in the southern districts of Nova Scotia by Alaskan immigrants without papers.

 

[Politesse]

Matthew was the first gospel to be written.

This is a minority position in the field; most scholars, especially non-Catholic scholars, believe that Mark was the first of the Synoptic gospels to be written. Certainly, there's no reason to assume Jerome would have any special knowledge about Biblical authorship, why would he have?

Any serious scholar of the Bible could tell you that at Matthew 27:52-53 the Greek egeiro means simply raised up rather than resurrected back to life, and in addition to this "they" (meaning the bodies that were walking around) is a pronoun, and in Greek all pronouns have gender and "they" is masculine whereas bodies" (the bodies that were lifted up) is in the neuter. They are not the same.

That is quite a tangle, and not very accurate. The sentence in question is:

και τα μνημεια ανεωχθησαν και πολλα σωματα των κεκοιμημενων αγιων ηγερθη και εξελθοντες εκ των μνημειων μετα την εγερσιν αυτου εισηλθον εις την αγιαν πολιν και ενεφανισθησαν πολλοις

It is very clear from context that the same group of people are being referenced, as there's no one else mentioned for the prepositional phrase to be referring to and you wouldn't find it on its own. It is true that bodies, and pronouns referring to bodies, are in the neuter, but that doesn't mean they are referring to different individuals, bodies and body parts have their own gender just as in every language I know of that assigns grammatical gender. You may be socially female, but your body is grammatically male in French, "le corps" and in German "der körper", no matter how big its breasts are. Likewise in Greek, bodies are neuter, and therefore so are any words or phrases linked to them.

The only true part in all this is that the meaning of ηγερθη is pretty vague. It's meaning is clearly nonliteral, and words evolve. "Raised up" is a dubious translation into English, though, because that suggests something more than just being physically lifted. Like, buildings were "raised", but nearly everything else we see this word attached to are animate subjects; to Koine speakers, you were "raised from slumber", "raised to attention", "raised to a higher rank" and other such words connoting a metaphorical rather than physical act of lifting.

 

[Politesse]

I personally think that the author meant this as a reference to the folk story about Ezekiel and the valley of bones, further solidifying Jesus' claim to be a prophet of G-D, and that preserving an accurate history of events in the modern sense was not the goal of the author of Matthew. They weren't eyewitnesses, they were proselytizers, and they were telling a story to Diasporic Jews who had no way of proving or disproving what they claimed. There is a lot of weird crap in Matthew, and 90% of it is references to Hebrew Scripture and prophecies; the author was at pains throughout the document to make an argument about the credentials and lineage of this would-be King of Israel slain by the Romans lest he come into his birthright.

 

[DLH]

Matthew was the first gospel to be written. In De viris inlustribus (Concerning Illustrious Men), chapter III, Jerome says: "Matthew, who is also Levi, and who from a publican came to be an apostle, first of all composed a Gospel of Christ in Judaea in the Hebrew language and characters for the benefit of those of the circumcision who had believed."

The Gospel of Matthew was not written by Matthew, was not the first, and was not written in Hebrew. We know today better and more than what Jerome did.

Okay. Other than you read it on some dumb quasi atheist site tell me how we know that.

 

[Ramaraksha]

Hinduism says "That Tvam Asi" - You Are That - basically you become who you are as a person or what you want
And so those who dream of getting to Heaven - no one mentions any work being done, no one even asks! They want an easy lazy life sponging off God - no work, no worries
Well, such a life IS the life of our pets - Dog, Cat - or even Sheep, Pigs!
They get their Heaven - the easy lazy life, no work, no worries!
.
And so those who ask for an eternal "life" end up as Ghosts!
Ask then what they do with this eternal "life" and they have no clue!
Eternal existence is more like it & they shall have it as Ghosts
Caught between life & death - they will get their eternal "life"
One day the earth will be swallowed up by the sun, then the sun will die as well, then science says even this universe will die out
The universe will be a cold, dark place
But these Ghosts will still be here where the earth once stood

 

[WAB]

Ghost is a great band.