Section 1117
4. A fourth article in Job’s confession of faith is, the resurrection of the same body
This he firmly believed, though he knew his body would be destroyed by worms, and his reins be consumed within him; otherwise he could not have said, or believed, or hoped, that he should see God in his flesh, and for himself; and, that his eyes should behold him, and not another. When he says, in another place, If a man die, shall he live again? which, according to the usual sense of such interrogations, without a negative particle, must be answered, No, he shall not live again; his meaning is, that he shall not live again in this world, he shall not live a natural mortal life again, supported in the manner it now is. And when he says of himself that in a little time he shall go to the land of darkness, and the shadow of death, from whence he should not return; (Job 10:21) he means, that he should return no more to his house, neither should his place know him any more, (Job 7:10) nor to a mortal state, or to the business and employments of this life; for, that being once laid in the grave, he should not rise again until the heavens be no more; (Job 14:22) that is, until the end of the world, when there will be an universal resurrection of good and bad. Job had no scruple upon his mind about the resurrection, nor do these passages imply any; no man more firmly believed it, or more clearly asserted it. Two things are to be observed in this article;
1. That he believed he should rise with true flesh; in my flesh shall I see God. The bodies of men at the resurrection will not be airy, etherial, or celestial bodies, destitute of flesh, blood, and bones; they will not be turned into spirits, but will be like the body of Christ after his resurrection; who said to his disciples, being terrified, supposing they had seen a spirit, Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have. (Luke 24:39, 40) It is true, the bodies of the saints will be raised spiritual ones; they will be subject and subservient to the soul or spirit, employed in spiritual service, and delighted with spiritual objects, and live without natural helps, as spirits; but then they will not be changed into spirits, or lose their former true nature and substance. The apostle indeed says, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; (53) by which he means, not flesh and blood simply considered, but as either sinful or mortal, or both; therefore this mortal must put on immortality, and this corruption must put on incorruption.
2. That he believed he should rise with the same body; otherwise, he should see God, not in his own flesh, but in another’s; not for himself, but for another; not with his own eyes, but with the eyes of another, a stranger, as the word signifies; [5309] a strange body, to which he was not united, in which he never dwelt, and which he never was acquainted with before. If the same body is not raised, it will not be properly a resurrection; nor are the figurative phrases just, by which it is sometimes expressed, as quickening the seed sown in the earth, awaking out of sleep, and the like. Besides, the places from whence the dead will be summoned; the subject of the resurrection; this vile and mortal body; the several instances of resurrections past, prove the identity of raised bodies: And indeed, it is inconsistent both with the justice and goodness of God, to punish or glorify other bodies than those we carried about with us here. [5310] But I proceed to,