To understand the problem which the Sadducees propose to Jesus one must realise that they only accepted as revealed the first five books of Moses - the Pentateuch of the Old Testament. So they rejected teaching from the later books. Hence, among other things, they did not believe in a life after death which only appears in the later Old Testament books. So they propose to Jesus a question which they feel will be an unanswerable problem for Jesus but which would be irrelevant to their beliefs. And it was indeed part of the Law that a brother was expected to marry the widow of an older brother so that she could have sons by him.

Jesus deals with their challenge in two ways. First, by saying that after death, marriage has no meaning; all such relationships disappear - except that we remain children of God. In His second argument, Jesus cleverly quotes from the Law of Moses, which the Sadducees accept, where God speaks of Himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. How could God speak in this way, if they no longer existed? "He is the God, not of the dead, but of the living." And so they are reduced to silence - much to the delight of their enemies, the Pharisees. However, we ought also to realise that we do not bring people to Christ simply by besting them in arguments. The real way is by the compelling example of our words, our actions and our attitudes reflecting His love and tolerance.