“Jesus’s body”

Read Luke 23:47-56

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Many people watched the death of Jesus and were deeply disturbed by what they saw (48). Among the crowd were many women who were followers of Jesus and who’d come with him from Galilee (49; Mk.15:40-41). Women were held in low regard in Jewish society but all four gospels emphasise their important part in the story, as witnesses both to his death and his resurrection.

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The burial of Jesus’s body had to be done before sunset, when the Sabbath day began (54). Joseph of Arimathea was a Council member who had disagreed with their decision because he was a secret disciple of Jesus (51; Mt.27:57; Jn.19:38). Now that Jesus was dead he might well have stopped believing in him but instead he openly declared himself to be a follower of Jesus (52).

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Normally executed criminals were buried in a common grave so Joseph’s action displayed great respect and generosity (53; Is.53:9). The stone across the tomb entrance shows that Jesus was truly dead and buried (Mk.15:46). Likewise the women seeing his body laid there (55) makes clear that they knew the right tomb to go back to and that it would be just a body that they’d find (56). None of them had any expectation that he would rise again.