The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis

Abstract

NT scholar and Christian apologist Michael R. Licona, in his 2010 book "The
Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach", interpreted the passage in
Mt 27:52-53 about the raising of many saints at the time of Jesus' death as a poetic
device written with eschatological Jewish texts in mind. Here I argue that it is a
historical account written with two scriptural passages in mind: first the prophecy in
Eze 37:12-14, of which it is a precise literal fulfillment, and secondly the killings in
Mt 2:16-17, of which it is an undoing. Further, I propose the hypothesis that the
saints resurrected in Mt 27:52 were precisely the children killed in Mt 2:16, and show
that this hypothesis allows to overcome neatly and easily all difficulties posed by the
passage.

1. Introduction

New Testament scholar and Christian apologist Michael R. Licona published in 2010
a book titled "The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach" [1].
While the book has received good reviews by prominent New Testament scholars and
historians [2], it has given rise to a controversy on Licona's exegesis of a passage of
Matthew's Gospel following Jesus' death:

"The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were
raised; and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection they entered the holy city
and appeared to many." (Mt 27:52-53)

On that passage, Licona wrote:

“it seems to me that an understanding of the language in Matthew 27:52-53 as

‘special effects’ with eschatological Jewish texts and thought in mind is most
plausible. There is further support for this interpretation. If the tombs opened and
the saints being raised upon Jesus’ death was not strange enough, Matthew adds
that they did not come out of their tombs until after Jesus’ resurrection. What were
The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis 2

they doing between Friday afternoon and early Sunday morning? Were they standing
in the now open doorways of their tombs and waiting?
[...]
It seems best to regard this difficult text in Matthew as a poetic device added to
communicate that the Son of God had died and that impending judgment awaited
Israel.” (pp. 552-53)

This non-historical exegesis was objected to by evangelical theologian and

philosopher Norman L. Geisler [3], to whom Licona replied:

"Further research over the last year in the Greco-Roman literature has led me to
reexamine the position I took in my book. Although additional research certainly
remains, at present I am just as inclined to understand the narrative of the raised
saints in Matthew 27 as a report of a factual (i.e., literal) event as I am to view it as
an apocalyptic symbol. It may also be a report of a real event described partially in
apocalyptic terms. I will be pleased to revise the relevant section in a future edition
of my book." [4]

Shortly thereafter, Baptist theologian Albert Mohler objected to Licona's exegesis in

the same line as Geisler [5]. Then, at a 2012 roundtable, Licona said:

"Since my book was published, I have found additional ancient reports that
confirm this interpretation and others that cast doubt on it. Accordingly, I am
presently undecided pertaining to how Matthew intended his readers to
understand the saints raised at Jesus’ death. More research needs to be conducted.
It’s a tough passage." [6]

As we will see, no extra-biblical source is needed for the exegesis of this passage,
either eschatological Jewish texts or Greco-Roman literature, but first of all a
passage of the book of prophet Ezekiel, which notably had been pointed out online
in 1997 [7], and then the other NT passages which contain the verb usually
translated in this passage as "appeared".
The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis 3

2. Mt 27:52-53 as literal fulfillment of Eze 37:12-14

It can be immediately seen that the passage in question fulfills literally this promise
that the LORD made to Israel through prophet Ezekiel:

“Therefore prophesy and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD, “Behold, I will open
your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves, My people; and I will bring
you into the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the LORD, when I have
opened your graves and caused you to come up out of your graves, My people. I will
put My Spirit within you and you will come to life, and I will place you on your own
land. Then you will know that I, the LORD, have spoken and done it,” declares the
LORD.’” (Eze 37:12-14).

I will highlight the exact correlation between the two passages by placing each action
promised by the LORD through Ezequiel, in its two statements, next to its fulfillment
recorded by Matthew:

1. Behold, I will open your graves / when I have opened your graves

1. The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep
were raised;

2. and cause you to come up out of your graves, My people; / and [I have] caused
you to come up out of your graves, My people.

2. and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection

3. and I will bring you into the land of Israel. / and I will place you on your own land.

3. they entered the holy city and appeared to many.

Actually, I think that Matthew did not state that this event was fulfillment of a
prophecy in the Old Testament, as he did in many other passages of his Gospel,
because the correlation between these two passages was so precise, so clear, so
The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis 4

evident, that he thought it was not even necessary to point it out. Since he was
writing for people familiar with the Hebrew Scriptures, his readers would notice the
correlation immediately by themselves.

We should note that this physical fulfillment of the prophecy in Eze 37:12-14 is a
sign of its way more important spiritual fulfillment in all Christian faithful. In other
words, this multiple resurrection to physical mortal life was, just as Lazarus'
resurrection to physical mortal life, a sign of the spiritual resurrection to eternal life
which Jesus earned for us with His death and resurrection, which we receive when we
are united to His death and resurrection in baptism (Rom 6:3-5), and which will
result, at Christ's glorious return, in our resurrection to physical immortal life.

3. Mt 27:52-53 as undoing of Mt 2:16-17

Considering the following data:

a. "For this reason the Son of God was revealed, so that He might undo the works of
the devil." (1 Jn 3:8).

b. Matthew is the only Evangelist who recorded the fact that king Herod "the Great"
sent men to "put to death all the boys in Bethlehem and in all its vicinity from two
years old and under," (Mt 2:16) after the visit of the Magi.

c. This fact, together with many others narrated by historian Josephus, shows clearly
that Herod was a man to whom these words of Jesus applied fully: "You are of your
father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer
from the beginning," (Jn 8:44).

and looking in parallel at the narrations - exclusive to Matthew - of these two events
that happened at the beginning and the end of Jesus' life respectively:

- the execution of children by Herod after Jesus' birth and as a reaction against it

- the resurrection of saints by Jesus (*) after his death and as a fruit of it
The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis 5

we can perceive an additional logic in Matthew's inclusion of both events in his

Gospel: while Jesus' birth gave occasion for Herod to - as a reaction against this
event - put innocent children to physical death, Jesus' death in filial obedience to the
Father - which was his full manifestation as Son of God, according to his words:
«When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I Am, and that I do
nothing from Myself, but as the Father taught Me, I speak these things. And He who
sent Me is with Me; He has not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are
pleasing to Him.» (Jn 8:28-29) - gave occasion for Him to - as a fruit of this event -
bring back to physical temporal life people who, spiritually, were innocent (which is
clear from their description as "saints" by Matthew), as a sign of the superabundance
of spiritual eternal life available to all men thanks to his merits in his obedience to
the Father to the point of death, even death on a cross (Rom 5:19 and Phil 2:8). In
other words, this undoing of the privation of physical temporal life of perhaps a few
dozen was a sign of the undoing of the privation of spiritual eternal life of perhaps
thousands of millions.

(*) Let us note that this undoing a work of the devil was performed by the Son of God
through the human nature that He had assumed, since it was Jesus Who, on arriving
in the state of disembodied soul to the Limbo of the Fathers or Abraham's Bosom,
ordered these saints who were there awaiting the Redemption to rise from the dead.

4. Hypothesis: identity of the subjects of Mt 2:16-17 and Mt 27:52-53

To the exegesis done to this point, I add now the following hypothesis: the saints
raised in Mt 27:52 were precisely the children murdered in Mt 2:16, so that Jesus, on
the occasion and as a fruit of his death, undid the specific works of the devil done by
Herod on the occasion of his birth. In my view, this hypothesis:

a. is fully compatible with the universal liturgical practice since the V century of
commemorating the Holy Innocents, because commemorating them as saints implies
to believe that they are enjoying the beatific vision, not that they were taken to the
beatific vision right after Jesus' death together with Moses, the prophets, and all the
rigtheous that were awaiting the Redemption in the Limbo of the Fathers or
The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis 6

Abraham's Bosom. They could have arrived to the beatific vision through a holy life
on earth. Let us note that leading these people to the beatific vision through a holy
and spiritually fruitful life on earth procures more glory to God (epistemic glory =
manifestation of his ontic glory) than taking them directly to the beatific vision.

b. explains the term "the Holy City" in Mt 27:53, which, if understood as referring to
physical Jerusalem, carries a strong cognitive dissonance. Would precisely Matthew,
who a few lines before had narrated that "All the people answered, “His blood be on
us and on our children!”" (Mt 27:25), refer to Jerusalem as "the Holy City"? It is far
more plausible that Matthew is referring here to the New Jerusalem, the spiritual
Jerusalem, the Church: the raised saints appeared, or better said manifested,
disclosed, revealed themselves as such (*), to members of the Church.

c. explains the total absence of social impact in Jerusalem out of that resurrection of
"many" (around 20 in this hypothesis) saints, since given that they had died 35 years
ago while being less than 2 years old, and that they had been raised as adults, any
inhabitant of Jerusalem that crossed ways with one of them would have no idea at all
of whom he was, even less of the fact that he had been raised from the dead, and
would simply take him as just another Jew that had come from far away to Jerusalem
for the Passover. Only those members of the Church to whom these raised saints
manifested, disclosed, revealed themselves as such (*) could come to know what had
really happened.

(*) The word in Mt 27:53 usually translated as "appeared" is enephanisthēsan, 3rd

person plural of the aorist indicative passive tense of the verb emphanizō, which
appears 10 times in the NT, with the following meanings in the other passages:

Jn 14:21-22: manifest, disclose, reveal (oneself)

Act 23:15: give notice, make a report, notify
Act 23:22: report, notify
Act 24:1; 25:2; 25:15: present (a case against X), inform (Y about X)
Heb 9:24: appear
Heb 11:14: make manifest, make it clear
The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis 7

From these occurrences, it is clear that the expression in Mt 27:53 can be plausibly
understood as meaning that the raised saints manifested, disclosed, revealed
themselves (as such) to many, that they notified many about their resurrection.

It is also clear that these "many" to whom the raised saints manfested themselves
were exclusively members of the initial community of disciples of Jesus, because
they were the only ones who could believe their testimony. Just think of the reaction
of an inhabitant of Jerusalem in 30 AD (or of any other place in any other time) if a
stranger approaches him saying: "Hi, I was dead for 35 years and have just been
raised from the dead. Would you be so kind as to provide me with lodging and food
for a while?"

Finally, regarding the question that Licona asks in his book about what the raised
saints were doing between Friday afternoon and early Sunday morning, a plausible
answer is that they alternated between praying and receiving from their guardian
angels a crash course on the basic skills for adult life.

References

[1] Michael R. Licona, The Resurrection of Jesus: A New Historiographical Approach .

Westmont, IL, USA: InterVarsity Press, 2010.

[2] https://www.ivpress.com/the-resurrection-of-jesus

[3] Norman L. Geisler. (2011). An Open Letter to Mike Licona on his View of the
Resurrected Saints in Matthew 27:52-53 [Online].
Available: http://normangeisler.com/an-open-letter-to-mike-licona-on-his-view-
of-the-resurrected-saints-in-matthew-27/

[4] Michael R. Licona. (2011, August 31). Press Release: Michael Licona Response to
Norm Geisler [Online].
Available: http://credohouse.org/blog/press-release-michael-licona-response-to-
norm-geisler
The raising of many saints in Mt 27:52-53: exegesis and a hypothesis 8

[5] Albert Mohler. (2011, September 14). The Devil is in the Details: Biblical Inerrancy
and the Licona Controversy [Online].
Available: http://www.albertmohler.com/2011/09/14/the-devil-is-in-the-details-
biblical-inerrancy-and-the-licona-controversy/

[6] Southeastern Theological Review Vol. 3, No. 1 Summer 2012.

Available (1): https://www.southeasternreview.com/s/STR_3_1_web.pdf
Available (2): https://www.risenjesus.com/wp-content/uploads/a-roundtable-
discussion-with-michael-licona-on-the-resurrection-of-jesus.pdf

[7] Glen Miller. (1997, April 7). Good question.... ...SURELY that thing about all those
resurrected people walking around in Jerusalem after Jesus' death is bogus, right?
[Online].
Available: http://christianthinktank.com/oddrise.html