He said to them, “Why are you troubled? Why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is truly me. Touch me and see, for a spirit doesn’t have flesh and bones, as you see that I have.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet.
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Luke 24:38-40 sits inside this longer paragraph.
He said to them, “Why are you troubled? Why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is truly me. Touch me and see, for a spirit doesn’t have flesh and bones, as you see that I have.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they still didn’t believe for joy, and wondered, he said to them, “Do you have anything here to eat?”
Parallel Translations
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He said to them, “Why are you troubled? Why do doubts arise in your hearts?
See my hands and my feet, that it is truly me. Touch me and see, for a spirit doesn’t have flesh and bones, as you see that I have.”
When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet.
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And he sayde vnto them: Why are ye troubled and why do thoughtes aryse in youre hertes?
Beholde my hondes and my fete that it is even my selfe. Handle me and se: for spretes have not flesshe and bones as ye se me have.
And when he had thus spoken he shewed them his hondes and his fete.
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Then he saide vnto them, Why are ye troubled? and wherefore doe doutes arise in your hearts?
Beholde mine handes and my feete: for it is I my selfe: handle me, and see: for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me haue.
And when he had thus spoken, he shewed them his hands and feete.
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Contradictions (2)
Questions where the Bible appears to say two different things, with the passages on each side set together.
Cross-references (15)
- John 20:27 (v39) Then he said to Thomas, “Reach here your finger, and see my hands. Reach here your hand, and put it into my side. Don’t be unbelieving, but…
- 1 John 1:1 (v39) That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our eyes, that which we saw, and our hands…
- Ecclesiastes 12:7 (v39) and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.
- Jeremiah 4:14 (v38) Jerusalem, wash your heart from wickedness, that you may be saved. How long will your evil thoughts lodge within you?
- John 20:20 (v39) When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples therefore were glad when they saw the Lord.
Show all 15 cross-references
- Hebrews 4:13 (v38) There is no creature that is hidden from his sight, but all things are naked and laid open before the eyes of him to whom we must give an…
- Numbers 16:22 (v39) They fell on their faces, and said, “God, the God of the spirits of all flesh, shall one man sin, and will you be angry with all the…
- 1 Thessalonians 5:23 (v39) May the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our…
- Daniel 4:5 (v38) I saw a dream which made me afraid; and the thoughts on my bed and the visions of my head troubled me.
- Daniel 4:19 (v38) Then Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, was stricken mute for a while, and his thoughts troubled him. The king answered, “Belteshazzar,…
- John 20:25 (v39) The other disciples therefore said to him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he said to them, “Unless I see in his hands the print of the nails,…
- Hebrews 12:9 (v39) Furthermore, we had the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much rather be in subjection to the…
- Luke 23:46 (v39) Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” Having said this, he breathed his last.
- Acts 1:3 (v39) To these he also showed himself alive after he suffered, by many proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days, and speaking about…
- Matthew 16:8 (v38) Jesus, perceiving it, said, “Why do you reason among yourselves, you of little faith, ‘because you have brought no bread?’
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (14 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On v38 Divers and doubtful thoughts which fall oft into men’s…
Divers and doubtful thoughts which fall oft into men’s heads, when any strange thing falleth out, whereof there is no great likelihood.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv38–40 38 And he said unto them, Why are ye…
38 And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts?
Ver. 38. Why do thoughts arise] How easily can the Lord trouble us, by turning our own thoughts loose upon us.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On v38 If either the papists or the Lutherans could show…
If either the papists or the Lutherans could show us Christ’s hands or feet, while they impose upon us to believe that Christ’s body is really present at or in the Lord’s supper, they would not so fright us, nor make so many thoughts arise in us, as they do, about their apprehensions of the nature of a body. But while the papists allow us to handle and to taste the bread, and we find no such things, and the Lutherans suffer our eyes to be open, and we can see no such things, we cannot but conclude, that the body of Christ which they talk of must certainly be a spirit, which (according to our Saviour’s notion) is a substance which hath neither flesh nor bones, as we see the body they would have us to believe hath not; that is to say, that the body they talk of is no body. Our Saviour here proveth that it was his true body, which appeared to them, because,
1. It had integral parts, hands and feet.
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2. Because it might be seen.
3. It might be handled.
4. It had flesh and bones, which a spirit hath not.
Then he shows them his hands and feet. So then our Saviour did not think that the judgment of our senses was to be rejected, concerning the nature of bodies, and his body in particular, and that in its state of exaltation, when it was raised from the dead; Do any of them say that Christ’s body here came through the door, or it could not have been here? How shall that be proved? We can easily tell them how his body might be in the midst of them, though it were not discerned while he was there; even as the eyes of the two disciples were held, Luk 24:16, that they could not discern Christ, so the eyes of the disciples might be held now, till he was in the midst amongst them.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv38–40 And when he had thus spoken,.... And put them…
And when he had thus spoken,.... And put them into a method of satisfying themselves by their senses:
he showed them his hands and his feet; that is, he held them forth to be seen and handled by them, which no doubt they did; and which were the infallible proofs by which he showed himself alive to them after his passion; and by which they knew the truth of his incarnation, or that he assumed a true and real body, and of the resurrection of the same body; see Act 1:3.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On v40 He showed them his hands and his feet -…
He showed them his hands and his feet - That they might either see or feel the prints of the nails.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv38–39 Why are ye troubled? - Why are you alarmed…
Why are ye troubled? - Why are you alarmed or frightened?
And why do thoughts ... - The word “thoughts” here means “doubts” or suspicions. It is used in this sense also in 1Ti 2:8. The doubts which they had were whether he was the Christ. He reproves them for doubting this; for,
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The Scriptures had foretold his death; He had himself repeatedly done it; and, They had now the testimony of Peter that he had seen Jesus alive, and of the angels that he was risen. After all this evidence, Jesus reproves them for doubting whether he was truly the Messiah.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On v39 A spirit hath not flesh and bones, as you…
A spirit hath not flesh and bones, as you see me to have. This was one argument of a true and real body. We may take notice, that Christ brought such proofs, as he knew were sufficient to convince them of his resurrection, though they were not of themselves demonstrations. For when they imagined they saw or touched a body, and that the eat with them, these things might apparently be done by a spirit. See Genesis xviii. ver. 9. and Genesis xix. ver. 3. and ver. 16. where we read that angels, in the shape of men, eat, and took Lot and his wife, and his daughters, by the hand, and led them away from Sodom. Our senses, therefore, may sometimes be deceived, as may be shewn by divers other instances. But the arguments which Christ made us of at this time, to induce the apostles to believe his resurrection, are to be taken with all the circumstances: as 1st, with the corroborating testimonies of the Holy Scriptures, in which his resurrection was foretold; 2ndly, they called to their minds what he himself had told them so often, that he would rise again the third day; 3rdly, concurred also the testimonies already given by the angels, that he was risen; 4thly, the miracles at his death and resurrection; 5thly, Christ himself at the same time opened their understanding, to know and believe this truth, that he was truly risen. (Witham)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On v39 Behold, &c.--lovingly offering them both ocular and tangible demonstration…
Behold, &c.--lovingly offering them both ocular and tangible demonstration of the reality of His resurrection.
a spirit hath not--an important statement regarding "spirits."
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flesh and bones--He says not "flesh and blood"; for the blood is the life of the animal and corruptible body (Gen 9:4), which "cannot inherit the kingdom of God" (Co1 15:50); but "flesh and bones," implying the identity, but with diversity of laws, of the resurrection body. (See on Joh 20:24-28).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On v39 39. A spirit hath not flesh and bones—We have…
39. A spirit hath not flesh and bones—We have here, in opposition to materialism, the clearest possible assertion of the independent existence of spirit. There is no other explanation of these words which does not insult the Saviour and abuse his language.
In regard to the nature of our Lord’s risen body previous to the ascension, we may say that there are FOUR different opinions prevalent. The first supposes a body in substance entirely new substituted for the previous body; the second, a body the same in substance and attributes; just as Lazarus’s natural unchanged body was raised the same as before death; the third, a body the same in substance but endowed with new properties and powers; the fourth, the same body glorified as completely as after his ascension.
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We reject the first as being no resurrection at all, but a creation; and doubt the fourth as not provable if true. That the third is preferable to the second may thus appear.
Perhaps all will grant that our Lord’s ordinary stay or abode between his resurrection and ascension was in the invisible; his visible appearances during the forty days being only occasional. His body possessed then normally, and perhaps we may say naturally, in its risen nature, the power of invisibility, at will. It possessed, also, a superiority to the control of gravitation, to the need of food, clothing, and other bodily necessities, and, probably, a superiority to disease and a second mortality. But these are all new powers; possible by miracle, but not belonging to man or to Jesus corporeally as a man. The third, therefore, seems the preferable view.
This view assumes, that although our Lord’s risen body had its own proper form and substance, and its own proper outline and limitation, yet that he was able, more or less, to modify it at will. so as to retain or resume traces, constituent parts, or substantive properties of its former self, such as wounds, limbs, flesh, and bones. However modified, temporarily or permanently, by will or by nature, it would be the same body; able to prove itself such to human eyes by resuming its old familiar peculiarities. So he could identify himself to Thomas, Joh_20:25; he could be grasped by the women, Joh_20:29; could (like the angels in Gen_18:8; Gen_19:3) invest himself with apparent garments, and eat and drink before his disciples. Luk_24:41-43.
By his self-modifying power he could not only enter the invisible instantaneously, (Luk_24:31,) but could appear under another form, (Mar_16:12;) could pass through any material impediments, doubtless by those interstices between particles which science has so amply revealed as belonging to solid bodies. Joh_20:19.* Nor was the rolling the stone from the tomb by angels necessary so far as his power was concerned; but necessary to render visible to the world’s perception, the external reality of the resurrection. So it was, apparently, that our Lord after his resurrection (as at no previous time) seemed often times unrecognisable to the best acquainted eyes. Joh_20:14; Joh_21:4; Joh_21:7; Joh_21:12. So his ready presence (Luk_24:36) at different places evinced his power of invisible and, probably, instantaneous transference through space at will.
[* In the most solid bodies the ultimate particles are supposed to be immensely smaller than the spaces between them. In a body as dense as water they are, proportionately, as “one hundred men distributed over the whole surface of England.”—Sir William Armstrong’s Presidential Address before the British Association, 1864.] All this involves not the idea either that his body was properly glorified, as after his ascension; or, as some imagine, that it underwent a gradual glorifying process through the forty days. The endowment with the properties belonging to a resurrection body (properties possessed even by the risen wicked) is one thing; his investiture at his enthronement with his full Mediatorial glories at God’s right hand is quite another thing.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv38–40 38. thoughts] Rather, reasonings.
38. thoughts] Rather, reasonings.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv38–39 (38) Why are ye troubled?—The question has a singular…
(38) Why are ye troubled?—The question has a singular interest as witnessing to the identity of character, if one may so speak, of the risen Lord with all that had belonged to His humanity in the days of His ministry. He, too, had known what it was to be “troubled in spirit” (Joh_11:33; Joh_12:27; Joh_13:21), and out of that experience had grown the tender sympathy which showed itself in the words addressed to the disciples, “Let not your heart be troubled” (Joh_14:1). Now they had a trouble of a different kind, and still, as before with the two who were on their way to Emmaus, He seeks to calm and sustain them. He knows even the unuttered thoughts and questionings that are rising in their hearts.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv38–40 And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled…
And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled t and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? He had just given them. his peace. He proceeds further to allay their fears. Before showing them his pierced hands and feet and side, before eating in their presence, he addresses these comforting words to them: "See," he seems to say, "I give you my peace: why are ye troubled? why do you allow perplexing, harassing thoughts to arise in your hearts? The past is forgiven and forgotten." "I come not," as Stier beautifully suggests, "as a wrathful Judge to reckon with you for your unbelief and unfaithfulness. I bring to you (and all the world) from my sepulchre something very different from up-braidings."
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v38 Why are you troubled?
Why are you troubled?
Jesus uses a question to comfort them. AT: "Do not be frightened." (See: Rhetorical Question)
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Why do questions arise in your heart?
Jesus uses a question to mildly rebuke them. Jesus was telling them not to doubt that he was alive. The word "heart" is a metonym for a persons' mind. AT: "Do not doubt in your minds!" or "Stop doubting!" (See: Rhetorical Question and Metonymy)
Touch me and see ... see me having
Jesus asks them to confirm by touch that he is not a ghost. It may be helpful to combine and reorder these two sentences. AT: "Touch me and feel that I have flesh and bones that a ghost would not have"
flesh and bones
This is a way of referring to the physical body.
his hands and his feet
It is understood that his hands and feet contained the nail marks from his crucifixion that would prove it was really Jesus. This can be made explicit. AT: "the wounds in his hands and his feet"
translationWords
trouble
spirit
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v39 24:39 ghosts don’t have bodies, as you see that…
24:39 ghosts don’t have bodies, as you see that I do: In his resurrected state, Jesus was not an immaterial spirit, but had a real immortal and imperishable body. Believers will receive similar bodies at the final resurrection (1 Cor 15:35-57).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.