Luke 8:52

52. Not dead, but sleepeth It was hardly to be expected that such a commentator as Olshausen would quote this language in proof that this maiden was only in a state of suspended animation. What is more common in all languages and habits of human thought than the likening of death to sleep? If our Lord was really in this language endeavouring to state the literal fact, we have no doubt he would have had better success, and would have said outright, she is not dead, but is in a swoon, epilepsy, or a trance. Literally and physically an epilepsy is no more sleep than it is death. The disciples could have understood him no otherwise than saying, To you this is indeed death without hope of resurrection; but with me, in power and in purpose, it is but a sleep, from which she is now to be awakened.