(17) Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father.--The probable explanation of these words is to be found in the fact that she had cast herself at His feet with the customary reverential embrace of the knees, and perhaps to make doubly sure the fact that it was the Lord's body, and that His words are meant to prevent this. The words themselves must be carefully considered. "Touch" represents a Greek word which means to "cling to," to "fasten on," to "grasp" an object. The tense is present, and the prohibition is, therefore, not of an individual act, but of a continuance of the act, of the habit, "Do not continue clinging to Me." Her act supposed a condition which had not yet been accomplished. He had not returned to earth to abide permanently with His disciples in the presence of the Paraclete (comp. John 14:18), for He had not yet ascended to the Father. There should come a permanent closeness of union in His presence in the soul; but then the spirit which her act was manifesting was one which would prevent this presence. The coming of the Paraclete depended upon His going to the Father (comp. John 16:7), but she would cling to a visible presence, and has not learnt the truth so hard to learn, "It is expedient for you that I go away" (John 16:7.)
But go to my brethren, and say unto them.--Comp. Notes on Matthew 28:10, and on John 15:15. There is a special force in the word "brethren" as spoken by the risen Lord, in that it declares the continuance of His human nature. (See Hebrews 2:11.)
I ascend unto my Father, and your Father.--The present is used of the future, which He regards as immediately at hand. The message to the brethren is an assurance that the going to the Father, of which He had so often spoken to them, was about to be realised. The victory over death has been accomplished. This appearance on earth is an earnest of the return to heaven. "Unto My Father," He now says, "and your Father." It is a more emphatic expression than "our Father" would have been. "I ascend unto My Father. Because He is My Father, He is also your Father, and you are My brethren. My victory over death was the victory of man, whose nature has in Me conquered death. My ascension into heaven will be the ascension of human nature, which in Me goes to the Father."
My God, and your God.--This phrase contains the same fulness of meaning, and adds the special thought of the continuity of the human nature of our Lord, which has already appeared in the word "brethren." (See Note above.)
Verse 17. - Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for, etc.
(1) Some, Bengal and others, make the γάρ govern the whole clause that follows, and so give the meaning," Stay not to touch me, but haste to my disciples, and say," etc.; but this would render the first clause very obscure, unless the further supposition be made, as by Baur, Bush, Sears, and many others, that our Lord was just on the point of ascending to heaven, i.e. of one (nay, the first) of his many ascensions to the Father, after which the touching, in the sense either of worship or of verification, would be possible and rightful, and also the supposition that an "ascension" intervened between the appearance to the Magdalene and the other women, or at all events before the revelation to the disciples at Emmaus, to Simon Peter, or to the eleven, at all of which both verification of his personality, if net worship at his feet, was permitted or encouraged. This hypothesis is perilously near to an assumption of a succession of illusive visions of that which had nothing but subjective reality.
(2) Olshausen and Schleiermacher give the utterly naturalistic view, that the Lord's spiritual body was so tender that he could not bear a vigorous grasp or physical touch. Still worse,
(3) Paulus supposed that he was still suffering from his cruel wounds, which, of course, would only imply an apparent death on the cross, and is a denial of the Resurrection altogether.
(4) Meyer's view seems to imply that Mary wondered whether he had only a glorified spirit without bodily form, and she wished to verify the latter by handling his Person, and "Jesus gives her by his verbal assurance the certainty she seeks, adding, For I am not yet ascended to the (my) Father; therefore as yet I am not a glorified spirit who has again come down from heaven, whither he had ascended." This is very subtle, and is equivalent to our Lord's saying, "Do not you, Mary, seek that kind of bodily tangible proof;" "I am not yet a glorified spirit, and have not yet the glorified body which you imagined." The difficulty of this interpretation is not what Godet says, "Jesus glorified does not become pure spirit," but that Mary is credited with a breadth and depth of apprehension so far in advance of her apparent despondency and her small amount of faith in the dignity of her Lord.
(5) Many take the μὴ μου ἄπτου, "Hold me not fast," as though ἄπτομαι were equal to κρατεῖν, "to hold fast," or to hold for purposes of enjoyment, and imply that Mary rushed to "embrace" our Lord (Hengstenberg and Bruckner), to clasp him by the knees or feet; that Jesus warned and repulsed the effort, implying that he repressed the exuberance of the joy which she manifested, pointing to a much higher and holier contact that would be possible when his glorification would be complete. Augustine ('Tract. in Io.,' 121:3), "' Touch me not,' that is, Believe not thus on me according to thy present notions. For how could it be otherwise than carnally that she still believed on him whom she was weeping over as a man? For I am not yet ascended to my Father.' There shalt thou touch me when thou believest me to be God in no wise unequal to the Father." Leo the Great ('Sermo,' 74. 100. 4, quoted by P. Schaff): "I am unwilling that you should approach me (carnaliter) by any mere physical touch, that you should recognize me by the physical senses (sensu carnis). I am drawing you to sublimer things; I am preparing greater things for you. When I shall have ascended to the Father, then you will handle me more perfectly and truly, being ready, as you then will be, to apprehend what you do not touch, and to believe that which you do not perceive." Many of the most able of modern expositors adopt this view or some modification of it (Calvin, Melancthon, Lampe, De Wette, and Tholuck); Luthardt now sees a difficulty in this interpretation, from the twofold sense thus attributed to the word ἄπτεσθαι, and falls back on the earlier view, "Cling not to me, but go and tell my disciples," etc. Godet, however, puts it thus: "I have not yet reached the state by means of' which I shall be able to live with you in the communion which I promised you;" and many of the ecclesiastical divines discover in the words an allusion to sacramental communion which will be possible in the future, when the dispensation of the Holy Spirit shall have beau inaugurated. The ascension of which he speaks is not of one definitive act, but of a continual state (ἀναβέβηκα, not ἀνέβην), and so the idea of the repeated ascensions is precluded. The difficulty arises from the permission the Lord gave to the eleven to prove by tangible evidence, by visible signs, the reality of his resurrection, showing them by way of identification the marks upon his person of the great agony. But there is no need to suppose that Mary was refused one touch when she seemed wishful to cling to his feet, and thus redouble the conviction already wrought in her by sight and hearing of his new mode of being. Ἄπτεσθαι has this double meaning, "to handle" and "to hold fast." The key of the passage is in the οὔπω, "not yet have I ascended to the Father;" and the reasonable, nay, the imperative, inference is that when he shall have ascended to the Father, there will be ample opportunity for that spiritual communion with him which will make him for ever present with his Church. The goal of all Christ's teaching (as recorded by John) is his return to the Father, and the consequent fullness of his disciples' joy. Because he will be glorified straightway in God himself, he will henceforth be as near to them, as competent to teach and guide and protect them, as in the days of his flesh; nay, more so, for they will do greater works than he wrought before them, because he goes to the Father, ascending up to where he was before (John 14:18-21, 23, 28; John 16:14, 17). He will be "seated at the right hand of the majesty in the heavens," he will pass "through these heavens, that he may fill all things." Because he is "the Lamb in the midst of the throne," he will lead them to the living fountains of water. Because he is on the eternal throne, he can dwell in them and manifest himself to them. But go to my brethren. The new name, dearer than "slaves," than "servants," than "disciples," than "ministers," than "apostles," than "friends;" one that involves in itself an eternal inheritance. Observe that, though our Lord (Matthew 12:48, etc.) had prepared the way for this unspeakable privilege, it is not until he has put on the life eternal, the life of victory over death, that he freely confers this lofty designation upon that timid and dispirited band of special followers who had forsaken him and fled in his great humiliation. Peter especially (Mark 16:7) receives this significant assurance and (Luke 24:34) confirms its realization together with Paul (1 Corinthians 15:5). These eleven men are henceforth his brethren. And say to them, I am ascending; the process of ascension has begun; I am beginning to assume all the prerogatives of spiritual corporeity; I am clothing myself with my eternal form; I have laid down my life, that I might take it again, and use it for the highest blessedness of my brethren. I am ascending to my Father, and to your Father. Let it be observed that he does not say, "to our Father." "He who is Father of Christ and Father of men, is so in different ways. He is Father of Christ by nature and of men by grace" (Westcott). "He saith not 'our Father;' in one sense, therefore, is he mine, in another sense yours; by nature mine, by grace yours" (Augustine). To my God, and your God. The same remark may be made here. Christ does speak of "my God" from the throne of glory (Revelation 3:2, 12). His human consciousness of God has throughout been unique; his eternal consciousness of the Father's love dignified all his human relations with the Father, and became the true inspiration of all consciousness of God possessed by his disciples. "He appears in the presence [before the face] of God for us," and so we have access unto one Father and draw near to God. Nevertheless, he did not say to "our God," any more than to "our Father."
20:11-18 We are likely to seek and find, when we seek with affection, and seek in tears. But many believers complain of the clouds and darkness they are under, which are methods of grace for humbling their souls, mortifying their sins, and endearing Christ to them. A sight of angels and their smiles, will not suffice, without a sight of Jesus, and God's smiles in him. None know, but those who have tasted it, the sorrows of a deserted soul, which has had comfortable evidences of the love of God in Christ, and hopes of heaven, but has now lost them, and walks in darkness; such a wounded spirit who can bear? Christ, in manifesting himself to those that seek him, often outdoes their expectations. See how Mary's heart was in earnest to find Jesus. Christ's way of making himself known to his people is by his word; his word applied to their souls, speaking to them in particular. It might be read, Is it my Master? See with what pleasure those who love Jesus speak of his authority over them. He forbids her to expect that his bodily presence look further, than the present state of things. Observe the relation to God, from union with Christ. We, partaking of a Divine nature, Christ's Father is our Father; and he, partaking of the human nature, our God is his God. Christ's ascension into heaven, there to plead for us, is likewise an unspeakable comfort. Let them not think this earth is to be their home and rest; their eye and aim, and earnest desires, must be upon another world, and this ever upon their hearts, I ascend, therefore I must seek the things which are above. And let those who know the word of Christ, endeavour that others should get good from their knowledge.
Jesus saith unto her, touch me not,.... Not that his body was an aerial one, or a mere "phantom", which could not be touched; the prohibition itself shows the contrary; and besides, Christ's body was afterwards presented to Thomas, to be touched by him, and to be handled by all the disciples; and his feet were held by the women, which is what Mary would have now done: upon the discovery of him, she threw herself at his feet, and was going to embrace and kiss them, to testify her affection and joy, when she is forbid; not as unworthy of the favour, because she sought him among the dead, for which the angels reproved her and the rest; but either because he was not to be conversed with, as before his death, his body being raised immortal and glorious; or rather, because he had an errand to send her on to his disciples, which required haste; nor need she stay now to show her respect to him, since she would have opportunity enough to do that, before his ascension; which though it was to be quickly, yet not directly and immediately; and this seems to be the sense of our Lord's reason:
for I am not yet ascended to my Father; nor shall I immediately go to him; I shall make some stay upon earth; as he did, forty days before his ascension; when he intimates, she might see him again, and familiarly converse with him; at present he would have her stay no longer with him:
but go to my brethren; this he says, to show that their carriage to him, being denied by one of them, and forsaken by them all, and the glory he was raised unto, as all this made no alteration in their relation to him, so neither in his affection to them: Mary was a very proper person to be sent unto them, since she had lately been with them, and knew where they were all assembled together:
and say unto them; as from himself, representing him as it were:
I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God; God was his Father, not by creation, as he is to angels, and the souls of men, and therefore is called the Father of spirits; nor by adoption, as he is to the saints; nor with respect to the incarnation of Christ, for, as man, he had no father; or with regard to his office as Mediator, for as such he was a servant, and not a Son; but he was his Father by nature, or with regard to his divine person, being begotten of him, and so his own proper Son, and he his own proper Father; which hold forth the natural and eternal sonship of Christ, his equality with him, and distinction from him: and God was the Father of his disciples by adopting grace, in virtue of the covenant of grace made with Christ, and through their spiritual relation to him, as the natural and eternal Son of God: God the Father is the God of Christ as man, who prepared, formed, anointed, supported, and glorified his human nature; and in which nature, he prayed to him as his God, believed in him, loved and obeyed him as such; wherefore the Jew (o) very wrongly infers from hence, that he is not God, because the God of Israel was his God; since this is spoken of him as he is man: and he was the God of his disciples, in and by the covenant of grace made with Christ, as their head and representative; so that their interest in God, as their covenant God and Father, was founded upon his being the God and Father of Christ, and their relation to, and concern with him; and which therefore must be firm and lasting, and will hold as long as God is the God and Father of Christ: this was good news to be brought to his disciples; which, as it carried the strongest marks of affection, and expressions of nearness of relation; and implied, that he was now risen from the dead; so it signified, that he should ascend to God, who stood in the same relation to them, as to him; when he should use all his interest and influence on their behalf, whilst they were on earth; and when the proper time was come for a remove, that they might be with him, and with his God and Father and theirs, where they would be to all eternity.
(o) R. Isaac Chizzuk Emuna, par. 2. c. 58. p. 446.
But go to my brethren, and say unto them.--Comp. Notes on Matthew 28:10, and on John 15:15. There is a special force in the word "brethren" as spoken by the risen Lord, in that it declares the continuance of His human nature. (See Hebrews 2:11.)
I ascend unto my Father, and your Father.--The present is used of the future, which He regards as immediately at hand. The message to the brethren is an assurance that the going to the Father, of which He had so often spoken to them, was about to be realised. The victory over death has been accomplished. This appearance on earth is an earnest of the return to heaven. "Unto My Father," He now says, "and your Father." It is a more emphatic expression than "our Father" would have been. "I ascend unto My Father. Because He is My Father, He is also your Father, and you are My brethren. My victory over death was the victory of man, whose nature has in Me conquered death. My ascension into heaven will be the ascension of human nature, which in Me goes to the Father."
My God, and your God.--This phrase contains the same fulness of meaning, and adds the special thought of the continuity of the human nature of our Lord, which has already appeared in the word "brethren." (See Note above.)
(1) Some, Bengal and others, make the γάρ govern the whole clause that follows, and so give the meaning," Stay not to touch me, but haste to my disciples, and say," etc.; but this would render the first clause very obscure, unless the further supposition be made, as by Baur, Bush, Sears, and many others, that our Lord was just on the point of ascending to heaven, i.e. of one (nay, the first) of his many ascensions to the Father, after which the touching, in the sense either of worship or of verification, would be possible and rightful, and also the supposition that an "ascension" intervened between the appearance to the Magdalene and the other women, or at all events before the revelation to the disciples at Emmaus, to Simon Peter, or to the eleven, at all of which both verification of his personality, if net worship at his feet, was permitted or encouraged. This hypothesis is perilously near to an assumption of a succession of illusive visions of that which had nothing but subjective reality.
(2) Olshausen and Schleiermacher give the utterly naturalistic view, that the Lord's spiritual body was so tender that he could not bear a vigorous grasp or physical touch. Still worse,
(3) Paulus supposed that he was still suffering from his cruel wounds, which, of course, would only imply an apparent death on the cross, and is a denial of the Resurrection altogether.
(4) Meyer's view seems to imply that Mary wondered whether he had only a glorified spirit without bodily form, and she wished to verify the latter by handling his Person, and "Jesus gives her by his verbal assurance the certainty she seeks, adding, For I am not yet ascended to the (my) Father; therefore as yet I am not a glorified spirit who has again come down from heaven, whither he had ascended." This is very subtle, and is equivalent to our Lord's saying, "Do not you, Mary, seek that kind of bodily tangible proof;" "I am not yet a glorified spirit, and have not yet the glorified body which you imagined." The difficulty of this interpretation is not what Godet says, "Jesus glorified does not become pure spirit," but that Mary is credited with a breadth and depth of apprehension so far in advance of her apparent despondency and her small amount of faith in the dignity of her Lord.
(5) Many take the μὴ μου ἄπτου, "Hold me not fast," as though ἄπτομαι were equal to κρατεῖν, "to hold fast," or to hold for purposes of enjoyment, and imply that Mary rushed to "embrace" our Lord (Hengstenberg and Bruckner), to clasp him by the knees or feet; that Jesus warned and repulsed the effort, implying that he repressed the exuberance of the joy which she manifested, pointing to a much higher and holier contact that would be possible when his glorification would be complete. Augustine ('Tract. in Io.,' 121:3), "' Touch me not,' that is, Believe not thus on me according to thy present notions. For how could it be otherwise than carnally that she still believed on him whom she was weeping over as a man? For I am not yet ascended to my Father.' There shalt thou touch me when thou believest me to be God in no wise unequal to the Father." Leo the Great ('Sermo,' 74. 100. 4, quoted by P. Schaff): "I am unwilling that you should approach me (carnaliter) by any mere physical touch, that you should recognize me by the physical senses (sensu carnis). I am drawing you to sublimer things; I am preparing greater things for you. When I shall have ascended to the Father, then you will handle me more perfectly and truly, being ready, as you then will be, to apprehend what you do not touch, and to believe that which you do not perceive." Many of the most able of modern expositors adopt this view or some modification of it (Calvin, Melancthon, Lampe, De Wette, and Tholuck); Luthardt now sees a difficulty in this interpretation, from the twofold sense thus attributed to the word ἄπτεσθαι, and falls back on the earlier view, "Cling not to me, but go and tell my disciples," etc. Godet, however, puts it thus: "I have not yet reached the state by means of' which I shall be able to live with you in the communion which I promised you;" and many of the ecclesiastical divines discover in the words an allusion to sacramental communion which will be possible in the future, when the dispensation of the Holy Spirit shall have beau inaugurated. The ascension of which he speaks is not of one definitive act, but of a continual state (ἀναβέβηκα, not ἀνέβην), and so the idea of the repeated ascensions is precluded. The difficulty arises from the permission the Lord gave to the eleven to prove by tangible evidence, by visible signs, the reality of his resurrection, showing them by way of identification the marks upon his person of the great agony. But there is no need to suppose that Mary was refused one touch when she seemed wishful to cling to his feet, and thus redouble the conviction already wrought in her by sight and hearing of his new mode of being. Ἄπτεσθαι has this double meaning, "to handle" and "to hold fast." The key of the passage is in the οὔπω, "not yet have I ascended to the Father;" and the reasonable, nay, the imperative, inference is that when he shall have ascended to the Father, there will be ample opportunity for that spiritual communion with him which will make him for ever present with his Church. The goal of all Christ's teaching (as recorded by John) is his return to the Father, and the consequent fullness of his disciples' joy. Because he will be glorified straightway in God himself, he will henceforth be as near to them, as competent to teach and guide and protect them, as in the days of his flesh; nay, more so, for they will do greater works than he wrought before them, because he goes to the Father, ascending up to where he was before (John 14:18-21, 23, 28; John 16:14, 17). He will be "seated at the right hand of the majesty in the heavens," he will pass "through these heavens, that he may fill all things." Because he is "the Lamb in the midst of the throne," he will lead them to the living fountains of water. Because he is on the eternal throne, he can dwell in them and manifest himself to them. But go to my brethren. The new name, dearer than "slaves," than "servants," than "disciples," than "ministers," than "apostles," than "friends;" one that involves in itself an eternal inheritance. Observe that, though our Lord (Matthew 12:48, etc.) had prepared the way for this unspeakable privilege, it is not until he has put on the life eternal, the life of victory over death, that he freely confers this lofty designation upon that timid and dispirited band of special followers who had forsaken him and fled in his great humiliation. Peter especially (Mark 16:7) receives this significant assurance and (Luke 24:34) confirms its realization together with Paul (1 Corinthians 15:5). These eleven men are henceforth his brethren. And say to them, I am ascending; the process of ascension has begun; I am beginning to assume all the prerogatives of spiritual corporeity; I am clothing myself with my eternal form; I have laid down my life, that I might take it again, and use it for the highest blessedness of my brethren. I am ascending to my Father, and to your Father. Let it be observed that he does not say, "to our Father." "He who is Father of Christ and Father of men, is so in different ways. He is Father of Christ by nature and of men by grace" (Westcott). "He saith not 'our Father;' in one sense, therefore, is he mine, in another sense yours; by nature mine, by grace yours" (Augustine). To my God, and your God. The same remark may be made here. Christ does speak of "my God" from the throne of glory (Revelation 3:2, 12). His human consciousness of God has throughout been unique; his eternal consciousness of the Father's love dignified all his human relations with the Father, and became the true inspiration of all consciousness of God possessed by his disciples. "He appears in the presence [before the face] of God for us," and so we have access unto one Father and draw near to God. Nevertheless, he did not say to "our God," any more than to "our Father."
for I am not yet ascended to my Father; nor shall I immediately go to him; I shall make some stay upon earth; as he did, forty days before his ascension; when he intimates, she might see him again, and familiarly converse with him; at present he would have her stay no longer with him:
but go to my brethren; this he says, to show that their carriage to him, being denied by one of them, and forsaken by them all, and the glory he was raised unto, as all this made no alteration in their relation to him, so neither in his affection to them: Mary was a very proper person to be sent unto them, since she had lately been with them, and knew where they were all assembled together:
and say unto them; as from himself, representing him as it were:
I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God; God was his Father, not by creation, as he is to angels, and the souls of men, and therefore is called the Father of spirits; nor by adoption, as he is to the saints; nor with respect to the incarnation of Christ, for, as man, he had no father; or with regard to his office as Mediator, for as such he was a servant, and not a Son; but he was his Father by nature, or with regard to his divine person, being begotten of him, and so his own proper Son, and he his own proper Father; which hold forth the natural and eternal sonship of Christ, his equality with him, and distinction from him: and God was the Father of his disciples by adopting grace, in virtue of the covenant of grace made with Christ, and through their spiritual relation to him, as the natural and eternal Son of God: God the Father is the God of Christ as man, who prepared, formed, anointed, supported, and glorified his human nature; and in which nature, he prayed to him as his God, believed in him, loved and obeyed him as such; wherefore the Jew (o) very wrongly infers from hence, that he is not God, because the God of Israel was his God; since this is spoken of him as he is man: and he was the God of his disciples, in and by the covenant of grace made with Christ, as their head and representative; so that their interest in God, as their covenant God and Father, was founded upon his being the God and Father of Christ, and their relation to, and concern with him; and which therefore must be firm and lasting, and will hold as long as God is the God and Father of Christ: this was good news to be brought to his disciples; which, as it carried the strongest marks of affection, and expressions of nearness of relation; and implied, that he was now risen from the dead; so it signified, that he should ascend to God, who stood in the same relation to them, as to him; when he should use all his interest and influence on their behalf, whilst they were on earth; and when the proper time was come for a remove, that they might be with him, and with his God and Father and theirs, where they would be to all eternity.
(o) R. Isaac Chizzuk Emuna, par. 2. c. 58. p. 446.