What Is “the Body of Moses” in Jude 9?
Jude 9 speaks of “Michael the archangel” as “contending with the devil” “about the body of Moses.” This is not referring to the literary body of Moses (Genesis to Deuteronomy and Psalm 90) or the civil body of Moses (the Jewish people). Jude 9 is dealing with the physical body of Moses, consisting of his flesh and bones.
It is hard even to imagine any meaningful contention between Michael and Satan over Moses’ (anatomical) body during his life on earth. Instead, Jude 9 refers to Moses’ body after his death. Deuteronomy 34 informs us of Moses’ decease and God’s burial of him “in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Beth-peor,” and the secret location of his tomb: “no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day” (6).
There are two main proposals regarding the subject of the dispute between Michael and the devil over the (dead) body of Moses. First, Satan wanted to make known the earthly location of Moses’ tomb in order to get superstitious Jews to worship him there. Second, the contention was over the justice of God’s bringing Moses body into heaven some time after his burial.
Here is a simple argument against the first view. Jude 9 does not say that Michael and the devil argued over the sepulchre of Moses (and whether its location should be made known). Instead, Jude 9 states that the dispute was over “the body of Moses.”
The second view finds support in the two parties who appeared at Christ’s transfiguration: Moses and Elijah (Matt. 17:3-4). In II Kings 2, Elijah was taken up into heaven bodily and he appeared bodily on the holy mount. Since Moses came to Jesus in a form like that of Elijah, surely his body had also been brought to heaven, like that of the Tishbite. This presents a theological rationale for an argument between Satan and Michael regarding the body of Moses, with the devil claiming that God had no right to take it to heaven (before Christ’s atoning death and victorious ascension).
This gives us three bodies in heaven in Old Testament days. The first in chronological order is Enoch, who never died, but was translated body and soul into heaven (Gen. 5:24; Heb. 11:5). Second, Moses died and was buried (Deut. 34:5-6), but afterwards his body was taken into heaven (Jude 9) and reunited with his soul. Third, like Enoch, Elijah never died, but was taken body and soul into heaven (II Kings 2:11).
Thus two Old Testament figures were translated without tasting death: Enoch and Elijah. Three Old Testament worthies had their bodies taken into heaven: Enoch, Moses (who died first) and Elijah. Of these three, two returned bodily to speak with Jesus about His departure from this world: Moses and Elijah, representing the two main divisions of the Old Testament Scriptures, the law and the prophets, respectively.
One lesson from this concerns God’s care of His people through angels. Our heavenly Father watches over and looks after us through angels while we are living, both in our bodies and our souls (e.g., II Kings 6:8-23). Our gracious Saviour also protects us through angels after death, both as to our souls, as with Lazarus the beggar (Luke 16:22), and as to our bodies, as with Moses (Jude 9)! Rev. Stewart
Christ’s Soon Coming
A reader asks about the soon coming of our Lord in connection with the book of Revelation: “What is our response to the preterist or postmillennialist claim that most of the apocalyptic visions in the book of Revelation were fulfilled within a comparatively short time after the apostle wrote—within John’s immediate future—and certainly not thousands of years later? They argue that God’s ‘judgments’ and the ‘coming of Christ’ recorded in Revelation must have been ‘spiritual’ or ‘picture’ references to the fall of Jerusalem to the Romans in AD 70.
For proof, they point out that Christ uses multiple temporal indicators throughout the book of Revelation, such as, ‘the time is at hand’ (1:3); ‘I will come unto thee quickly’ (2:16); ‘Behold, I come quickly’ (3:11; 22:7); ‘the time [for the fulfilment of the things recorded in this book] is at hand’ (22:10). What else do these time-references mean: ‘shortly,’ ‘soon’ and ‘quickly’? The preterists/postmillennialists argue that these words ‘mean what they say.’”
Preterism, mentioned in the question, is the view that the prophetic passages of the New Testament which speak of the return of Christ and the signs of His coming, and of such things as the Antichrist and the great tribulation, are already fulfilled and past (preterism is literally “past-ism”). Preterism finds the fulfilment of these passages, especially Matthew 24 and most of the book of Revelation, in the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70. Some preterists teach that the resurrection of the dead is past and that the only future for believers is here on earth. Thus there will be, they claim, no second coming, no heaven, no coming judgment day (e.g., David Chilton, Stephen Perks, Max King). This view is known as hyper-preterism or full preterism or consistent preterism.
These views are closely associated with postmillennialism, the view that the future for the church will be a very long period of peace and prosperity here on earth, and that this will be the fulfilment of Scripture’s prophecies of the coming kingdom of Christ. Views differ among postmillennialists but generally speaking they expect a time when the church will be dominant in the world, enjoying a time of rapid growth and earthly blessedness. Many postmillennialists believe that this will be the millennium of Revelation 20.
Preterism takes this a step farther and insists that those passages which seem (to amillennialists) to predict a difficult future for the church (e.g., persecution, apostasy and her being a “remnant”), are already fulfilled. Thus they accuse amillennialists of pessimism and consider themselves optimists regarding the church’s future in the world.
A simple answer to the preterist or postmillennial view that Matthew 24 and most of Revelation are fulfilled and finished is that these Scriptures then have no meaning or application for us, except as matters of historical curiosity and so might just as well be removed from our Bibles. Then all the warnings and promises of Matthew 24 and of Revelation are not for us, but for a generation long dead.
This view of prophecy is very simplistic and mistaken. Prophecy seldom has a single fulfilment but has rather an on-going fulfilment. It usually has a limited fulfilment in the age in which it was given (e.g., the destruction of Jerusalem in Matthew 24) but a continued fulfilment in the ages that follow, reaching its final fulfilment only in the coming of Christ and the end of the world (more on that in the next article).
Because prophecy has an on-going fulfilment, no matter when we live, we must obey the warning of Jesus, “Take heed that no man deceive you” (Matt. 24:4). That warning was not just for those who would live to see the destruction of Jerusalem, but for you and me. The promise is also for you and me: “But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved” (13). Prophecy is always relevant because its fulfilment is not limited to one event or time.
When He spoke of coming quickly or soon, Christ did not mean that He would come again bodily within the next forty or so years. That was the error of the Thessalonians who thought “soon” meant that Jesus would return within their lifetimes. Thinking this, they were idle, sitting around waiting for Christ’s appearing. Not working and with nothing better to do, they became busybodies (II Thess. 3:10-12), troubled at the thought that those of the congregation who had died had missed out on the Lord’s return (cf. I Thess. 4:13-18).
If Christ’s soon coming did mean that He would come personally in AD 70, and all the promises connected with His coming have been fulfilled, then you and I have missed out on everything as well. Then there is no point in watching and waiting, no hope for a future and more glorious kingdom, except some earthly kingdom in this age. Then we might as well eat, drink, be merry and die, for, if this world is all we have, we have nothing.
When we think of Christ’s promise to come soon, we must not measure “soon” in terms of days, weeks, months and years, but must remember that He comes at the time appointed by the Father (Acts 1:7), and that the nearness of His coming must be measured on the clock and calendar of the eternal God, to whom a day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as a day (II Pet. 3:8; Ps. 90:4). We must also remember that on Jehovah’s calendar the whole New Testament age is the “last days.” From that point of view, no matter when one lives in the New Testament, the coming of Christ is soon for it is the next great redemptive event.
Christ’s coming is also near because His coming is not only future but always present (Matt. 28:20). The truth is not only that He will come but that He is already coming. He said that to the leaders of the Jews, “Hereafter [i.e., from now on] shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven” (26:64).
Our Lord’s visible and personal appearance as the judge of all rational-moral creatures must wait until the end of this age but He also comes in many other ways. He comes through His Spirit (John 14:16-18). He comes through the preaching of the gospel (10:27-28). He comes in the signs of the times (Matt. 24:3), for they are the sound of His footsteps as He comes. He comes through the judgments that He executes in this world (cf. John 12:31). He comes at death for each of His own (14:1-3). Christ’s promise to come again, therefore, has an on-going fulfilment. He indicates this in John 14:16-18 when He equates His coming with the coming of the Spirit at Pentecost.
Though His coming has an on-going fulfilment, all the different ways in which He comes are part of His one coming which begins in Bethlehem (His first coming) and ends with His second coming at the end of the world. That was the way the Old Testament prophets saw the coming of Christ and they were not wrong. All through the history of the New Testament age, He comes. Moreover, when He comes, He comes both for judgment and for salvation.
For each one of us, His coming is something with which we must reckon. Writing these words, I think of my own age and of Christ’s promise to come to take me to Himself, and I know that it will be very soon. I know that, when He keeps His promise to come for me, that will be for me a day of judgment and salvation, for that day, which may be today or tomorrow, will be the day I enter heaven and enjoy the blessedness of life everlasting, for I am, and will be, justified before the Great Judge. I do not even know whether I will live to see tomorrow, and so I must be watching and waiting every hour of today and living as though He will come for me today. Christ’s soon coming may not wait for tomorrow. Soon for me, as an old man, is very soon.
Certainly those words “soon,” “quickly” and “shortly” mean what they say, but they are God’s words and not men’s, and they must be interpreted in light of all that He says in Scripture and not by what we imagine. “Soon” must be measured against the eternity of God Himself, and not in terms of months and years. “Quickly” must be understood not only in reference to Christ’s appearance at the end of the ages but also in reference to my departure to be with Him. Even if I am still a youth, that will only be a few years. “Shortly” must be understood in reference to all of the different ways in which He comes.
What folly, therefore, to throw out all the warnings and promises of Matthew 24 and the book of Revelation and elsewhere in God’s Word, as though they have no application to us today, claiming that they reached their exhaustive fulfilment in the destruction of Jerusalem nearly two thousand years ago. What folly to live as though Christ’s words of prophecy only concerned people in the past or, by the same token, to live as though they will be fulfilled some time way off in the future, far beyond the few years left to us in this world. Rev. Ron Hanko
