Objection 85: Christ told the thief on the cross that he would be with Him that day in Paradise. (See, Luke 23:43.)
The text reads thus: "Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise."
Ironically, believers in the immortal soul doctrine told us, in the previous objection, that when Jesus died he went down to hell to preach to spirits who had not believed Noah’s message. Now, they’re telling us He went immediately to heaven with the thief with whom He was crucified.
This latter assertion is no better grounded that the previous one. Comparing Revelation 2:7 with Revelation 22:1-2, we see that Paradise is where the throne of God is. Therefore, if Christ had gone to Paradise that Friday afternoon, He would have gone into the presence of God. But Christ Himself, on the resurrection morning, declared to Mary, as she fell at His feet to worship Him:
"Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God." John 20:17.
Christ’s statement corroborates the words of the angel to the women at the tomb: "Come, see the place where the Lord lay." Matt. 28:6. Note that it says “were the Lord lay,” not where “his body” lay.
Jesus had lain in the tomb for parts of three days, Friday, Sabbath, Sunday, in fulfillment of His prophetic statement “destroy this temple [i.e., take the life from my body] and I will rebuild it in three days.” John 2:19-21 (See, also, Mat. 26:61; 27:40; Mark 14:58; 15:29). He had not ascended to heaven on Friday nor on the Sabbath; He rested in the tomb on Sabbath. Only on Sunday Morning was Christ resurrected from the dead. This is why Christ said on Sunday Morning, "I am not yet ascended to my Father."
Are we to interpret Christ’s statement to the thief on Friday afternoon in a way that would make it inconsistent with what he told Mary on Sunday Morning? No, Christ did not contradict Himself.
We are dealing with an issue of punctuation. If we move the comma, we get this statement: "Verily I say unto thee today, thou shalt be with me in paradise." And the difficulty vanishes; Jesus’ Friday Afternoon statement to the thief becomes consistent with his Sunday Morning statement to Mary.
Punctuation in the Bible is quite recent. The early Greek manuscripts not only did not use the comma, which is the particular punctuation mark in this sentence, they did not even space the words, butranthemtogetherinaline. Modern translators use their best judgment in placing punctuation marks, but their work is certainly not inspired, nor infallible. We are not bound by these recent, non-inspired marks when endeavoring to determine the intent of the gospel writers who wrote some nineteen hundred to two thousand years ago.
Punctuation can make a huge difference in the meaning of a sentence. “The teacher says my boy is no good,” is the teacher’s comment about your boy. But add two commas and you have your boy’s comment about the teacher: "The teacher, says my boy, is no good." The words are the same, but the commas have made the meaning very different.
Cover of Lynne Truss’s “Eats, Shoots & Leaves”
Lynne Truss has written a book about punctuation entitled, “Eats, shoots & leaves.” If you want to describe the diet of a typical panda bear, you write that he, “eats shoots and leaves,” but if you insert one comma in the wrong place, you have a panda who is an anti-social gunslinger. This one comma has changed the meaning of two of the three words in this short phrase!
Now where ought the comma to be placed? To make Jesus’ Friday Afternoon statement to the thief on the cross consistent with his Sunday Morning statement to the women, we need to place the comma after “today.”
But why did Jesus even used the word today? Why not just say, “Thou shall be with Me in Paradise”? Because “today” was a very bad moment in time for both of them. They were both in the worst circumstances imaginable: condemned prisoners, hanging naked on crosses, being executed with as much pain, shame, and humiliation as the Roman Empire could impose them. And so Jesus said, “today, right now, in the midst of all this horror, I’m telling you that you will be with me in heaven.” Jesus was telling him to look past the pain and terror of that day to a future in paradise, not that paradise was happening, or was going to happen, that day.
So all factors point to moving the comma after “today.”
Here is my paraphrase: "I am telling you the truth right now, and hold onto it: you will be with me in paradise."