Chap. xiii.—In the dead who were raised by Christ we possess the highest proof of the resurrection; and our hearts are shown to he capable of life eternal, because they can now receive the Spirit of God.
1. Let our opponents—that is, they who speak against their own salvation—inform us [as to this point]: The deceased daughter of the high priest;[1] the widow's dead son, who was being carried out [to burial] near the gate [of the city];[2] and Lazarus, who had lain four days in the tomb,[3]—in what bodies did they rise again? In those same, no doubt, in which they had also died. For if it were not in the very same, then certainly those same individuals who had died did not rise again. For [the Scripture] says, "The Lord took the hand of the dead man, and said to him, Young man, I say unto thee, Arise. And the dead man sat up, and He commanded that something should be given him to eat; and He delivered him to his mother."[4] Again, He called Lazarus "with a loud voice, saying, Lazarus, come forth; and he that was dead came forth bound with bandages, feet and hands." This was symbolical of that man who had been bound in sins. And therefore the Lord said, "Loose him, and let him depart." As, therefore, those who were healed were made whole in those members which had in times past been afflicted; and the dead rose in the identical bodies, their limbs and bodies receiving health, and that life which was granted by the Lord, who prefigures eternal things by temporal, and shows that it is He who is Himself able to extend both healing and life to His handiwork, that His words concerning its [future] resurrection may also be believed; so also at the end, when the Lord utters His voice "by the last trumpet,"[5] the dead shall be raised, as He Him-
