Lukas 24:37

37 But having been startled and having been terrified, they were thinking they saw a ruach (spirit).

Lukas 24:37 Meaning and Commentary

Luke 24:37

But they were terrified and affrighted
At the sight of him, and at his sudden appearance among them, without being heard, or seen before, and the doors shut and bolted; they could not tell how to account for it, that it should be Jesus himself risen from the dead in his own body, though they had been just speaking of his resurrection, and had had a confirmation of it from the disciples that went to Emmaus: and supposed that they had seen a spirit;
that what they saw was a phantom, or apparition, or a spirit, that had assumed, and appeared in, the shape of Jesus, and was not he himself.

Lukas 24:37 In-Context

35 And they were explaining the things on the derech and how he was made known to them in the hisgalus of the betziat halechem.

36 And while they were speaking these things, he stood in the midst of them, and he says to them, Shalom Aleichem.

37 But having been startled and having been terrified, they were thinking they saw a ruach (spirit).

38 And he said to them, Why have you been troubled, and why do doubts arise in your levavot?

39 You see my hands and my feet that I am myself. Touch me and see, because a ruach does not have basar and atzamot (bones) as you see me having.