1. From this it seems that the body of Christ was wounded; but if so, it was not glorified.
2. Likewise, if you say that the scars remained, it seems that it does not have full glory, because that is more perfectly healed in which no traces of imperfection remain; therefore it seems that the body of Christ was not perfectly glorified. If you say that they remained only for the sake of the disciples, then it seems that they were not true but false scars.
Augustine responds in the book On Six Solutions against the Pagans : "Let those who have proposed these questions know," he says, "that Christ showed the disciples not wounds but scars, which would then be false if no wounds had preceded them; nor are they from inability to heal, since they were left by divine dispensation and the art of the best physician." Augustine gives the example of a wounded soldier who does not wish to be healed by the physician without the marks of his wounds remaining.
Moreover, the reason why they were preserved was threefold, as Victor says: "Thus," he says, "He preserved the scars of the wounds not from inability to heal, but that He might bear about forever the triumph of His victory; and to establish faith in the resurrection, that He might demonstrate that the same body which dies rises again; and that to those redeemed by His death, He might indicate how mercifully they were helped, by setting forth and showing the signs of that same death." A fourth reason could be given: for the confusion of the damned; whence Apocalypse 1: Every eye shall see Him, and those who pierced Him.
65. Question III. Likewise, concerning what he says: And put your hand into my side, etc. — Therefore the body of Christ was palpable; but, as Gregory says, "everything palpable is corruptible": therefore that body was corruptible. — If you say, as Chrysostom says, that "this was of condescension, what was being done"; then it is objected: because if to be touched is against the nature of a glorified body, then it is manifest that in this he was not showing that he had a glorified body, but rather one not glorified.
And it is answered that this argument does not hold, because by entering through closed doors he showed it to be glorious, but through touch he showed it to be the same body that had suffered.
It can nevertheless be said otherwise, that just as something is visible in two ways — in one way, because it cannot escape sight, like a stone; in another way, because, although it can escape notice, it can also affect the sense — the first is in a certain way of weakness and belongs to a non-glorious body, the second is of power and belongs to a glorious body — so to be touched because it cannot escape touch is in a certain way of weakness and of a non-glorious body; but to be touched because it arrests the pressure of the hand as something solid, which indeed can by its own power pass through the hand, this is of great power. And this was in the glorious body, and especially in the body of Christ.
66. Question IV. Likewise, it is asked concerning what he says: Be not unbelieving, but faithful.
Gregory objects: "Since Paul says in Hebrews eleven: Faith is the evidence of things not appearing: faith is of those things which cannot appear; for things that appear do not have faith but recognition: therefore if Thomas saw the Lord, he no longer had faith but knowledge."
Gregory and Augustine respond that "he saw one thing and believed another: he saw a man and confessed God: whence he says: My Lord and my God ."
67. But then it is objected: 1. Because at least he saw him whom he had previously seen dead: therefore he knew the resurrection; he did not believe it.
2. Likewise, Thomas did not believe except because he saw: therefore "human reason provided the proof for his faith": therefore "his faith had no merit."
I respond: It must be said that because the Apostles knew of the deceptions of demons, they could have supposed that everything Christ was doing was from some spirit in an assumed body; and hence it was that some even doubted. And therefore I say that through that vision there was no certain knowledge, nor did they have through those showings compelling arguments which would remove the merit of faith, but only persuasive ones, which assist a weak mind not yet established in the faith.
68. Question V. Likewise, it is asked concerning what he says: Because you have seen me, Thomas, you have believed.
It seems that he ought to have said: because you have touched me, since it had not sufficed him that he should see.
To this Augustine responds in two ways: either because sight is truly understood as touch, since sight is commonly called sense; or because Thomas did not dare to touch. Whence he says: "He did not say you have touched, but you have seen, since sight is in a certain way a general sense; although it could be said that the disciple did not dare to touch."