NOTES for Joh 20:24-31
The first thing that comes to mind about Thomas is that he was a person like many of us, combining faith with little faith. Thomas differs from us, however, in this: although he was called unbelieving, he possessed far greater faith than many of us who would like to liken our immoderate rational scepticism, which corrodes the soul, to Thomas’s desire to find firm grounds for faith. Let us not forget that Thomas was prepared to follow the Teacher to the end, and proved it by his whole life. But it is also true that he found it difficult to trust immediately every piece of news he heard; he wanted confirmation and proof.
There is truth in such caution. How many rumours circulate about “spiritual phenomena” produced by distorted hearsay or hallucinations, or even arising from a poisoned source? Christ, incidentally, did not reject Thomas’s wish to make certain by verifying matters personally, and gave him that opportunity.
There are icons in which Thomas literally puts his finger into Christ’s wound, but the Gospel text does not say that he used the opportunity offered to him. It tells us something else: immediately after Christ invited him to put his hand into His side, Thomas confessed Him as his Lord and God. Christ did not count Thomas’s doubts as a sin.
No doubt and no difficult question will remain forever without God’s answer. The important thing is that doubt should not become a means of self-assertion for a proud sophist who, like Pilate, rejects the possibility of knowing the truth, but should arise from an honest desire to overcome the difficulties on the way to it.