Veil Of The Temple (part 7)

Expanding on those thoughts then, in chapter twelve of Genesis, Abraham is introduced into the story of the covenant God that is being told through Scripture.  Through a covenant with Abraham, the record of which points to the singular seed of Abraham to come, as the Creator God begins to fulfill the promise of the seed to come that was given to Adam and Eve, that God commences what is recorded as His providential working through history to deal with the evil that had been introduced into the world by the rebellion of those that He had created.  That story progresses through his son Isaac and his grandson Jacob and on to Israel as a whole, is concentrated into the Creator God’s dealings with Judah, and comes to be consummated in Jesus as the promised seed fulfills the purported promise of the Gospel that had been set forth in Genesis chapter three --- crushing the serpent’s head while His own heel is bruised in the process.    

Though all of the previous covenant bearers had failed in some way, shape, or form, Jesus, the One to Whom Paul refers as the second Adam, did not fail.  He is demonstrated to have been faithful to the covenant.  He is shown to have rightly borne the divine image.  By willingly going into death, He entered into the curse which Adam had wrought.  Additionally, and much more specifically, as the Messiah/King of Israel (and therefore representative of the people) He takes upon Himself the cursing that had been promised to the covenant people, presumably exhausting its miserable supply.  His death, and the tearing of the veil in conjunction with that death, as it took those embroidered cherubim out of the way, can be understood to have symbolically re-opened mankind’s path to fellowship with their Creator.  The curse was broken.  Death would no longer reign.  New life was coming. 

Where the first Adam, and all that followed from him, were expelled from Eden, the second Adam, and all that follow Him through a unifying belief in Him as Lord and Savior and Redeemer, are now allowed to re-enter Eden.  Where the first Adam had rejected and given up his rightful dominion of the covenant God’s perfect creation, the second Adam re-claimed that dominion, ushered in the long-expected kingdom of God on earth with the Messiah as its King, and introduced the renewal of creation through the power of the Resurrection.  The veil had been torn. 

The first Adam, upon his failure to live up to His purpose, died in that failure, doing so in accordance with what it was that had been promised to him by the creative-and-covenant-making God.  The second Adam, completely fulfilling His purpose and faithfully carrying out the Creator God’s intention for His people Israel, was resurrected to a new life, also according to the Creator God’s promise.  This seems to be why the Apostle Paul can write, “For just as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22), insisting that all those that swear their allegiance to Jesus as King will be raised up with a new body, for a new creation, in the exact same way in which Jesus was raised, according to the promise of the faithful God on which Jesus relied and whom He revealed. 

The torn veil demonstrated that the covenant God had fulfilled His promise, and that new life in a new and changed world was coming.  Pointing to this, Matthew (and Matthew alone) follows up his report about the torn veil, writing that “the tombs were opened, and the bodies of many saints who had died were raised” (27:52).  Jesus’ death, as one would expect if it was the singular event that it has been made out to be, seems to have had the effect of reversing the curse of death.  For all time then, this raising of saints, as recorded and memorialized by Matthew, will be associated with the tearing of the temple’s veil.  Matthew does not leave it at that, but goes on to write, “They came out of the tombs after His Resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people” (27:53).  As Matthew tells his audience, though these “saints” were raised at Jesus’ death, when it is implied that the curse was clearly broken, which is established with the tearing of the veil, Matthew makes it a point to write that they did not come out of the tombs until after His Resurrection.