The Gospels recount that Saint Thomas, one of Jesus' disciples, would not believe that Jesus had risen from the dead unless he saw him and touched his wounds. At his next appearance Christ, rather than rebuking Thomas, invited him to touch the wounds to ascertain that he was really present, and to believe.
Thomas's sceptical spirit also manifested itself on the occasion of the Assumption of the Virgin, as described in medieval lives of the Virgin, when she lowered her girdle to him from Heaven as material proof of her ascent.