Matthew 22:32

New Testament

29 Jesus answered them, “You are deceived because you don’t know the scriptures or the power of God. 30 For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. 31 Now as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, 32 ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not the God of the dead but of the living!” 33 When the crowds heard this, they were amazed at his teaching.

4 Maccabees 7:19

Pseudepigrapha

16 If, therefore, because of piety an aged man despised tortures even to death, most certainly devout reason is governor of the emotions. 17 Some perhaps might say, "Not all have full command of their emotions, because not all have prudent reason." 18 But as many as attend to religion with a whole heart, these alone are able to control the passions of the flesh, 19 since they believe that they, like our patriarchs Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, do not die to God, but live to God. 20 No contradiction therefore arises when some persons appear to be dominated by their emotions because of the weakness of their reason.

 Notes and References

"... Additionally, Jesus provided scriptural support for the reality of the resurrection. The covenant formula, “I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob” demonstrates that he is “God not of the dead, but of the living.” The precise logic of the argument is difficult to follow. It is complicated by Luke’s addition “for all live to him [i.e., God]” (Luke 20:38) — a possible allusion to 4 Maccabees 7:19; 16:25. Perhaps, by knocking down the Sadducees’ disbelief in any sort of afterlife, Jesus has opened the way to believing the entire eschatological program: life even now in the presence of God for the faithful departed, and eternal life in the age to come at the resurrection ..."

Green, J. B. Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels: A Compendium of Contemporary Biblical Scholarship (p. 780) InterVarsity Press, 2018

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