- 39 - A n o t h e r f a l s i f i c a t i o n I have already explained to you. It is the passage in the Gospel of Matthew that speaks of the dead having risen from their graves on the day of the Crucifixion, whereas in reality it said that the earthquake had cast bodies from their tombs. “I should also mention here a passage from the Gospel of John, which reads: John 5: 28: ‘For the hour is coming, indeed it is already here, when all who are in the tombs shall hear his voice, and shall come forth.’ The word ‘tombs’ here refers to the same thing that Peter calls ‘prison’ when he writes in his epistle: I Peter 3: 19: ‘Christ went as a spirit and brought the tidings unto the spirits in prison.’ In another passage: II Peter 2: 4: ‘For God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell, and committed them to “caverns” of darkness.’ That the word ‘tombs’ as used by John in the passage I have cited cannot mean graves in the churchyard is clear from the words of Christ: ‘The hour is already here, when the dead in their graves shall hear the voice of the Son of God.’ Had that been the case, the bodies of the dead would have had to come out of the graves then and there. What Christ meant by his words was the spiritually dead in Satan’s dungeons, whom he intended to redeem on the occasion of his upcoming descent into hell, insofar as they would give heed to his voice. Furthermore, the fact that after his earthly death Christ appeared to his followers in material form has led you to the erroneous conclusion that his spirit re-entered his former physical body. In reality he made himself visible in the same manner in which all spirits do, namely by the materialization of their spiritual body. Had not many spirits done this before him? Did not three spirits, in completely human form, appear to Abraham, eating with him as Christ ate with his disciples after his death? Did not the Archangel Raphael for many weeks accompany young Tobias, eating and drinking with him, so that Tobias was convinced that he was dealing with an ordinary man? Was it, then, something extraordinary that Christ showed himself to his disciples after his death, and that he spoke, ate and drank with them? Yo u h a v e s i m i l a r c a s e s o f m a t e r i a l i z a t i o n t o d a y ! Evil spirits also are able to materialize themselves in the same manner. The true meaning of the ‘Resurrection of the dead’ was made clear to the Apostles and the faithful by spirits of God only after Christ’s ascension. Whenever during his earth life Christ spoke to the Apostles about his ‘Resurrection from the dead’, they were unable to understand what he meant. Mark 9: 10: ‘And they discussed among themselves the meaning of the phrase “risen from the dead”.’ About the views of the religious leaders of the Jewish people of the time on the ‘rising of the dead’, the Acts tell you:
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