What is the nature of the resurrected body and what are its characteristics?

It is a new body but not a completely new creation. From a physical perspective, it is related to the old body, although there are both similarities and differences between them. We can think of a grain of wheat that is sown and brings forth a spike of wheat, or a tiny zygote in his mother’s womb who is born as a perfectly formed baby. On the Day of the Lord, the remains of the body in the tomb, or that have dispersed, will be reconstructed as a new body; even those remains the Lord collects from we know not where — for God is not unaware of their location, nor is He incapable of collecting them, wherever they may be scattered. The Lord gathers them in a mysterious way, so that they rise without corruption; a body we must consider to be foreign to this present world.

The body adopts new characteristics befitting eternal life. The matter remains a mystery to us that is beyond our human capacity to know. The Lord of glory spoke of this change, saying, “For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven” (Matt. 22:30), and “nor can they die anymore, for they are equal to the angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection” (Luke 20:36). And the apostle Paul says, “Foods for the stomach and the stomach for foods, but God will destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body” (1 Cor. 6:13). Here are some of the characteristics of the resurrected body:

First: It is without corruption (1 Cor. 15:42). The apostle Paul says, “So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption.” The word “sown” is used as a more pleasant euphemism for “buried.” It is “sown in corruption,” for the body is subject to deterioration, corruption, and disintegration. “It is raised in incorruption” as a glorified body is no longer subject to corruption, disintegration, or death.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem says, “For this body shall be raised not remaining weak as now; but raised the very same body, though by putting on incorruption it shall be fashioned anew — as iron blending with fire becomes fire, or rather as He knows how, the Lord who raises us. This body therefore shall be raised, but it shall abide not such as it now is, but an eternal body; no longer needing for its life such nourishment as now, nor stairs for its ascent, for it shall be made spiritual, a marvelous thing, such as we cannot worthily speak of.”¹²⁹⁷

St. Augustine says:

“Although the saints are spiritually minded, they are still carnal in the corruptible body which is a load upon the soul (cf. Wisd. of Sol. 9:15). They will, however, be spiritual also in body when the body sown animal will rise spiritual (cf. 1 Cor. 15:44). They are still prisoners under the law of sin, inasmuch as they are subject to stimulations by desires to which they do not consent. Thus I came to understand this matter as did Hilary, Gregory, Ambrose, and other holy and renowned teachers of the Church, who saw that the Apostle, by

1297 St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures 18.18 (NPNF II/7:139).

his own words, fought strenuously the same battle against carnal concupiscences he did not wish to have.”¹²⁹⁸

“For as, when the spirit serves the flesh, it is fitly called carnal, so, when the flesh serves the spirit, it will justly be called spiritual. Not that it is converted into spirit, as some fancy from the words, ‘It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption’ (1 Cor. 15:42), but because it is subject to the spirit with a perfect and marvelous readiness of obedience, and responds in all things to the will that has entered on immortality,— all reluctance, all corruption, and all slowness being removed. For the body will not only be better than it was here in its best estate of health, but it will surpass the bodies of our first parents ere they sinned.”¹²⁹⁹

“For after one manner virginity shall shine there, after another shall wedded chastity shine there, after another shall holy widowhood shine there. They shall shine diversely, but all shall be there.”¹³⁰⁰

“You have smitten, you have wounded, you have thrown down; but He has been wounded for me who made me. O death, death, He who made me has been wounded for me, and by His Death has overcome you. And then in triumph shall they say, ‘O death, where is your contention? O death, where is your sting?’ [1 Cor. 15:55].”¹³⁰¹

“We shall also be renewed in the flesh, though, When this perishable thing puts on imperishability (1 Cor. 15:54) so that it may be an ‘enspirited’ body, into which Adam had not yet been changed, but into which he was to have been changed if he had not earned the death of his ‘ensouled’ body by sinning. Finally, the apostle did not say, ‘the body indeed is mortal because of sin,’ but: the body is dead because of sin (Rom. 8:10).”¹³⁰²

“Therefore, if I were to ask any good Christian who has a wife, and even though he may still be having children by her, whether he would like to have his wife in that kingdom; mindful in any case of the promises of God, and of that life where this incorruptible shall put on incorruption, and this mortal shall put on immortality (1 Cor. 15:53–54); though at present hesitating from the greatness, or at least from a certain degree of love, he would reply with loathing that he is strongly averse to it. Were I to ask him again, whether he would like his wife to live with him there, after the resurrection, when she had undergone that angelic change which is promised to the saints, he would reply that he desired this as strongly as he disapproved of the other.”¹³⁰³

1298 St. Augustine of Hippo, Against Julian 6.23.70 (FOTC 35:382).

1299 St. Augustine of Hippo, City of God 13.20 (NPNF I/2:255–256).

1300 St. Augustine of Hippo, Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament Sermon 82.3 (NPNF I/6:505).

1301 St. Augustine of Hippo, Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament Sermon 78.10 (NPNF I/6:494) amended.

1302 The Works of St. Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century: Part I—Books; Volume XIII: On Genesis trans., Edmund Hill, ed., John E. Rotelle (New City Press, 2002) 6.24.35–36: p. 321.

1303 St. Augustine of Hippo, Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount 1.15.41 (NPNF I/6:18) amended.

From St. Augustine’s words, we understand that spouses should love each other and care for each other’s spiritual lives, so that their relationship with each other is more than just a physical connection that will end and pass away with the passing of the world. We think of this in the same way we think of food: it is not something forbidden or impure, but it must not become a goal in itself for us, for corruptible food does not last forever. Marriage is a holy sacrament with its own dignity and sanctity, established by the Lord of glory Himself.

St. Augustine himself says of it, “The sanctity of the Sacrament is of more avail than the fruitfulness of the womb.”¹³⁰⁴ He also says, “Thus a good Christian is found in one and the same woman to love the creature of God, whom he desires to be transformed and renewed; but to hate the corruptible and mortal conjugal connection and sexual intercourse: i.e. to love in her what is characteristic of a human being, to hate what belongs to her as a wife. So also he loves his enemy, not in as far as he is an enemy, but in as far as he is a man; so that he wishes the same prosperity to come to him as to himself, viz. that he may reach the kingdom of heaven rectified and renewed. This is to be understood both of father and mother and the other ties of blood, that we hate in them what has fallen to the lot of the human race in being born and dying, but that we love what can be carried along with us to those realms where no one says, My Father; but all say to the one God, ‘Our Father’: and no one says: My mother; but all say to that other Jerusalem, Our mother: and no one says: My brother; but each says respecting every other, Our brother. But in fact there will be a marriage on our part as of one spouse (when we have been brought together into unity), with Him who has delivered us from the pollution of this world by the shedding of His own blood. It is necessary, therefore, that the disciple of Christ should hate these things which pass away, in those whom he desires along with himself to reach those things which shall for ever remain; and that he should the more hate these things in them, the more he loves themselves.”¹³⁰⁵

And St. John Chrysostom says, “However, ‘this corruption’ of the body ‘shall put on incorruption’ (1 Cor. 15:53), but the other of the soul, never; for where incorruption is, there is no corruption. Thus is it a corruption which is incorruptible, which has no end, a deathless death; which would have been, had the body remained deathless. Now if we shall depart into the next world having not corruption, we have that corruption incorruptible and endless; for to be ever burning, and not burnt up, ever wasted by the worm, is corruption incorruptible; like as was the case with the blessed Job. He was corrupted, and died not, and that through a lengthened period, and ‘wasted continually, scraping the clods of dust from his sore’ (Job 7:5 LXX).”¹³⁰⁶

“Thus lest any, hearing that ‘flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God,’ should suppose that our bodies do not rise again; he adds, ‘this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.’ Now the body is ‘corruptible,’ the body is ‘mortal:’

1304 St. Augustine of Hippo, On the Good of Marriage 21 (NPNF I/3:408).

1305 St. Augustine of Hippo, Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount 1.15.41 (NPNF I/6:18).

1306 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Ephesians 24 (NPNF I/13:172).

so that the body indeed remains, for it is the body which is put on; but its mortality and corruption vanish away, when immortality and incorruption come upon it. Do not therefore question hereafter how it shall live an endless life, now that you have heard of its becoming incorruptible.”¹³⁰⁷

Second: It is glorified (1 Cor. 15:43). It is a characteristic of the risen body that it is glorified, and the Lord Christ said, “Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (Matt. 13:43). While the righteous shine like stars more than the sun, the wicked are in darkness. The apostle Paul says, “It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory.” Because of sin, the body with all its faculties, senses, and emotions was deprived of all glory, became degraded, and its fate became death. But it will rise in glory to enjoy immortality, eternally free from the bondage of death.

St. Didymus the Blind says, “When the body formed by the copulation of male and female is sown, honor and weakness will be in it because it is the body of a perishing soul and shares its characteristics. But when it rises again by the power of God, it appears as a spiritual body, having imperishability, power and honor.”¹³⁰⁸

Ambrosiaster says, “The body is sown in dishonor because it is placed in a coffin where it rots and is eaten by worms. But when it rises again, it will do so in glory, and all trace of this dishonor will vanish.”¹³⁰⁹

Third: It is powerful (1 Cor. 15:43). The apostle Paul says, “It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory.” “It is sown in weakness,” being subject to disease; and “raised in power,” no longer subject to weariness, disease, aging, decay, and death. What is meant by power here? It is not like the power of God or angels, nor is it physical strength, but the power to do that which seems impossible to us now. Also, power here is the opposite of the weakness to which the body was subjected in this world. This power means that the body does not submit to diseases, weaknesses, and physical needs such as eating, drinking, and sleeping; nor can death, corruption, or decay befall it.

Fourth: It is a spiritual body (1 Cor. 15:44). The apostle Paul says, “It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.” The body that is sown is a biological body like that of animals, made of same kinds of muscles, bones, nerves, and veins and arteries, etc. It has the same physiology, including a digestive system that transfers nutrients to the bloodstream, a respiratory system, etc. But it shall be “raised a spiritual body,” perfect in character, not needing any external source of nutrition, hydration, or air, nor subject to death. Its being is spiritual, and nourishment is spiritual.

1307 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the First Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians 42.3 (NPNF I/12:256) amended.

1308 St. Didymus the Blind, Commentary on 1 Corinthians On 1 Corinthians 15:43 (ACCOS 7:172).

1309 Ambrosiaster, Commentary on 1 Corinthians On 1 Corinthians 15:43 (ACCOS 7:172; CSEL 81.3:181).

The “animal body,” sometimes translated as “the natural body,” is the body with which an animal lives out its life of eating, drinking, breathing, perception, rest, and sleep. A “spiritual body” does not mean a spirit , for the spirit has no body.

What, then, does it mean that the body will be spiritual? The body will be spiritual, even if it was sown as a natural body. The scholar Origen believes that it will be spiritual because it will be delicate and light, similar to the bodies of angels.¹³¹⁰

St. John Chrysostom says that the body will be spiritual because the Holy Spirit will abide in the bodies of the righteous for eternity, or because the Holy Spirit shall govern them forever, or because they will be light, or perhaps a combination of all these factors together.¹³¹¹ He says, “What do you say? Is not ‘this’ body spiritual? It is indeed spiritual, but that will be much more so. For now oftentimes both the abundant grace of the Holy Spirit flies away on men’s committing great sins; and again, the Spirit continuing present, the life of the flesh depends on the soul: and the result in such a case is a void, without the Spirit. But in that day not so: rather he abides continually in the flesh of the righteous, and the victory shall be His, the natural soul also being present … believe from hence, that God can also make these corruptible bodies incorruptible and much more excellent than those which are visible.”¹³¹²

St. Augustine says, “For as those bodies of ours … which, being quickened by the Spirit, have the substance, but not the unwieldiness and corruption of flesh.”¹³¹³

“For as, when the spirit serves the flesh, it is fitly called carnal, so, when the flesh serves the spirit, it will justly be called spiritual. Not that it is converted into spirit, as some fancy from the words, ‘It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption’ (1 Cor. 15:42), but because it is subject to the spirit with a perfect and marvelous readiness of obedience, and responds in all things to the will that has entered on immortality,— all reluctance, all corruption, and all slowness being removed. For the body will not only be better than it was here in its best estate of health, but it will surpass the bodies of our first parents ere they sinned.”¹³¹⁴

Fifth: It is in the image of the body of the Second Adam, the Lord who came down from heaven (1 Cor. 15: 45–50). We shall put on the image of the heavenly, says the apostle Paul, “And so it is written: The first man Adam became a living being. The last Adam became a life-giving spirit” (1 Cor. 15:45). The apostle Paul refers here to the text of Gen. 2:7 where

1310 Origen of Alexandria, The Commentary of Origen on the Gospel of St. Matthew. Vol. 2 , trans., Ronald E. Heine (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2018) 17.30: p. 530.

1311 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the First Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians 41.3 (NPNF I/12: 250–251).

1312 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the First Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians 41.5 (NPNF I/12:252) amended.

1313 St. Augustine of Hippo, City of God 13.23 (NPNF I/2:257).

1314 St. Augustine of Hippo, City of God 13.20 (NPNF I/2:255–256).

we read that Adam became a living soul.¹³¹⁵ As for the Second Adam who became a lifegiving spirit, some Jews speak of the spirit of the Messiah as the spirit that was hovering over the waters (Gen. 1:2) to give life, and that they have always referred to the Messiah as giving life to those who dwell in the dust.

In the Gospel of John we read: “In Him was life” (John 1:4). God raised Adam as a living soul, but he needed life that was external to himself. For this reason, God gave him a wife, whom he called Eve , which means “life,” to bring life and to be the mother of all living, but instead, she brought death. But the Second Adam is the incarnate and life-giving Word, who assures us: “I am the life and the resurrection.” The fruit of our connection to our first forefather, Adam is that we bore a natural body. But the fruit of our union with our new forefather, the Second Adam, is that we become a spiritual body when He grants us eternal heavenly life.

Peter Chrysologus says, “The holy Apostle today recounts that two men gave an origin to the human race, namely, Adam and Christ. They are two men alike in body, but different in worth; truly similar in the structure of their members, but truly dissimilar in their own beginnings. ‘The first man, Adam,’ the text says, ‘became a living soul; the last Adam became a lifegiving spirit.’ That first one was made by this last One, from whom he got his soul to be alive. This last One was fashioned by His very Self, that He alone might not await life from another, but give it to all men. The first one was moulded from the cheapest earth; the last One came forth from the Virgin’s precious womb. In the case of the former, earth is changed into flesh; in that of the latter, flesh itself is raised up to God.

“Why should I say more? This last is the Adam who placed His own image in the first one when He made him. That is why He both plays the same role as the former and receives his name, in order not to let perish, as far as He was concerned, that which He had made to His own image. The first Adam, and the last Adam. That first one has a beginning; this last One has no limit. For, in truth, this last One is Himself first, as He says: ‘I am the first, and I am the last’ (Isa. 48:2). ‘I am the first,’ that is, without a beginning; ‘I am the last,’ assuredly without an end.

“‘But it is not the spiritual that comes first,’ the text says: ‘but the physical and then the spiritual.’ Surely the earth exists before the fruit, but it is not as precious as the fruit. The earth exacts groans and toil, but the fruit gives substance and life. The Prophet rightly glories over such fruit: ‘Our earth has yielded her fruit’ (Ps. 84:18). What fruit? Clearly, that of which he says elsewhere: ‘Of the fruit of thy womb I will set upon your throne’ (Ps.131:11).

“‘The first man,” the text continues, ‘was of the earth, earthy; the second man is from heaven, heavenly’ … But, let us hear what follows: ‘As was the earthy man, such are the earthy; and as is the heavenly man, such also are the heavenly.’ How will it be possible for

1315 Translators’ Note: While the NKJV renders this phrase “man became a living being ,” the Hebrew original uses the word nephesh , which is more accurately translated “ soul .”

those who were not born thus as heavenly men to be found heavenly men? Not through their remaining what they were born, but by continuing to be what they were when reborn. Brethren, that is why the heavenly Spirit by a mysterious injection of His light fecundates the womb of the virginal Mother. He desired to bring forth as heavenly beings those whom an origin from an ancestral stock of earth had brought forth as earthy men, in a wretched state. He wanted to bring them to the likeness of their Creator. So, let us who have already been reborn, and reformed to the image of our Creator, fulfill what the Apostle commands.

“‘Therefore, even as we have borne the likeness of the earthy, let us bear also the likeness of the heavenly’ … Yes, let us who have been reborn to the likeness of our Lord (as we mentioned) … and God adopted as His sons—let us bear the image of our Creator in a perfect reproduction. Let it be a reproduction not of that majesty in which He is unique, but of that innocence, simplicity, meekness, patience, humility, mercy, and peacefulness by which He deigned to become and to be one with us.”¹³¹⁶