Charles Spurgeon Commentary Matthew 9:24

"he said, Give place: for the damsel is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed him to scorn." — Matthew 9:24 (ASV)

He said unto them, Give place: for the maid is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed him to scorn.

They did not understand his expression; yet, apparently, sleep only differs from death in this respect, that the sleeper wakes again, and returns to consciousness. The Lord Jesus Christ did not mean that the maiden was not dead; but he meant that, as she was soon coming to life again, it was, as it were, only like the image of death.

To her, death was not a cul-de-sac, a dark cave without an opening at the further end; it was rather a tunnel through which she was passing back again into life.