The Resurrection of the Flesh

This last article, which affirms the resurrection of the flesh, brings the whole sum of perfection to a close with short and pointed brevity. Yet on this point too the faith of the church is attacked, not only by pagans but by heretics as well. For Valentinus denies the resurrection of the flesh altogether, and so do the Manichaeans, as we showed above. But they refuse to listen to the prophet Isaiah when he says, “The dead will rise, and those who are in the graves will be raised,” or to the most wise Daniel when he declares, “Then those who are in the dust of the earth will arise, some to eternal life, but others to shame and confusion.” Yet even in the Gospels, which they appear to accept, they ought to learn from our Lord and Savior, who says, when instructing the Sadducees, “As for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read how he spoke to Moses at the bush: I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob? Now God is not the God of the dead but of the living.” And in the words before this he declares what and how great the glory of the resurrection is, saying, “But in the resurrection of the dead they will neither marry nor be given in marriage, but will be like the angels of God.” [a]

Now the power of the resurrection confers on people the state of angels, so that those who have risen from the earth will not live again on the earth with the animals without reason, but with the angels in heaven. Yet this is only for those whose purer life has fitted them for it: those, namely, who even now keep the flesh of their soul in chastity and have brought it under the rule of the Holy Spirit, and so, with every stain of sin done away, and changed into spiritual glory by the power of being made holy, have been counted worthy to have their flesh admitted into the company of the angels.