John 19:41

Joseph thinking that the hatred of the Jews would be appeased by His crucifixion, went with confidence to ask permission to take charge of His burial: And after this Joseph of Arimathea besought Pilate.

Arimathea is the same as Ramatha, the city of Elkanah, and Samuel. It was providentially ordered that he should be rich, in order that he might have access to the governor, and just, in order that he might merit the charge of our Lord’s body: That he might take the body of Jesus, because he was His disciple.

He was not of the twelve, but of the seventy, for none of the twelve came near. Not that their fear kept them back, for Joseph was a disciple, secretly for: fear of the Jews. But Joseph was a person of rank, and known to Pilate; so he went to him, and the favor was granted, and afterwards believed Him, not as a condemned man, but as a great and wonderful Person: He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus.

In performing this last office to our Lord, he showed a bold indifference to the Jews, though he had avoided our Lord’s company when alive, for fear of incurring their hatred.

Their ferocity being appeased for the time by their success, he sought the body of Christ. He did not come as a disciple, but simply to perform a work of mercy, which is due to the evil as well as to the good. Nicodemus joined him: And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight.

We must not read the words, at the first, first bringing a mixture of myrrh, but attach the first to the former clause. For Nicodemus at the first came to Jesus by night, as John relates in the former part of the Gospel. From these words then we are to infer that that was not the only time that Nicodemus went to our Lord, but simply the first time; and that he came afterwards and heard Christ’s discourses, and became a disciple.

They bring the spices most efficacious for preserving the body from corruption, treating Him as a mere man. Yet this show great love.

We must observe however that it was simple ointment; for they were not allowed to mix many ingredients together. Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.

Wherein the Evangelist intimates, that in paying the last offices of the dead, the custom of the nation is to be followed. It was the custom of the Jewish nation to embalm their dead bodies, in order that they might d keep the longer.

Nor does John here contradict the other Evangelists, who, though they are silent about Nicodemus, yet do not affirm that our Lord was buried by Joseph alone. Nor because they say that our Lord was wrapped in a linen cloth by Joseph, do they say that other linen cloths may not have been brought by Nicodemus in addition; so that John may be right in saying, not, in a single cloth, but, in linen cloths. Nay more, the napkin which was about His head and the bands which were tied round His body being all of linen, thought there were but one linen cloth, He may yet be said to have been wrapped up in linen cloths: linen cloths being taken in a general sense, as comprehending all that was made of linen.

Hence hath come down the custom of the Church, of consecrating the Lord’s body not on silk or gold cloth, but in a clean linen cloth.

But as they were pressed for time, for Christ died at the ninth hour, and after that they had gone to Pilate, and taken away the body, so that the evening was now near, they lay Him in the nearest tomb: Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulcher, wherein was never man yet laid. A providential design, to make it certain that it was His resurrection, and not any other person’s that lay with Him.

As no one before or after Him was conceived in the womb of the Virgin Mary, so in this grave was there none buried before or after Him.

In that it was a new sepulcher, we are given to understand, that we are all renewed by Christ’s death, and death and corruption destroyed. Mark too the exceeding poverty that He took up for our sakes. He had no house in His lifetime, and now He is laid in another’s sepulcher at His death, and His nakedness covered by Joseph. There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews’ preparation day; for the sepulcher was as nigh at hand.

Implying that the burial was hastened, in order to finish it before the evening, when, on account of the preparation, n which the Jews with us call more commonly in the Latin, Cena pure, it was unlawful to do any such thing.

The sepulcher was near, that the disciples might approach it more easily, and be better witnesses of what took place there, and that even enemies might be made the witnesses of the burial, being placed there as guards, and the story of His being stolen away showed to be false.

Mystically, the name Joseph means, apt for the receiving of a good work; whereby we are admonished that we should make ourselves worthy of our Lord’s body, before we receive it.

Even now in a certain sense Christ is put to death by the avaritious, in the person of the poor man suffering famine. Be therefore a Joseph, and cover Christ’s nakedness, and, not once, but continually by contemplation, embalm Him in your spiritual tomb, cover Him, and mix myrrh and bitter aloes; considering that bitterest sentence of all, Depart, you cursed into everlasting fire.

But we wish to show that His instantaneous bodily disappearance from the cross was not better fitted to serve the purposes of the whole economy of salvation (than His remaining upon it was). For the mere letter and narrative of the events which happened to Jesus do not present the whole view of the truth. For each one of them can be shown, to those who have an intelligent apprehension of Scripture, to be a symbol of something else. Accordingly, as His crucifixion contains a truth, represented in the words, “I am crucified with Christ,” and intimated also in these, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified to me, and I unto the world;” and as His death was necessary, because of the statement, “For in that He died, He died unto sin once,” and this, “Being made conformable to His death,” and this, “For if we be dead with Him, …

9. And not without reason is the number six understood to be put for a year in the building up of the body of the Lord, as a figure of which He said that He would raise up in three days the temple destroyed by the Jews. For they said, “Forty and six years was this temple in building.” And six times forty-six makes two hundred and seventy-six. And this number of days completes nine months and six days, which are reckoned, as it were, ten months for the travail of women; not because all come to the sixth day after the ninth month, but because the perfection itself of the body of the Lord is found to have been brought in so many days to the birth, as the authority of the church maintains upon the tradition of the elders. …

11. But little [comparatively] was the humiliation ( humilitas ) of our Lord on our behalf in His being born: it was also added that He deemed it meet to die in behalf of mortal men. For “He humbled Himself, being made subject even unto death, yea, the death of the cross:” lest any one of us, even were he able to have no fear of death [in general], should yet shudder at some particular sort of death which men reckon most shameful. Therefore do we believe in Him Who Under Pontius Pilate Was Crucified and Buried . For it was requisite that the name of the judge should be added, with a view to the cognizance of the times. …

60. Matthew proceeds thus: “And when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock: and he rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre, and departed.” Mark’s version is as follows: “And he bought fine linen, and took Him down, and wrapped Him in the linen, and laid Him in a sepulchre which was hewn out of a rock, and rolled a stone unto the door of the sepulchre.” Luke reports it in those terms: “And he took it down, and wrapped it in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in stone, wherein never man before was laid.” So far as these three narratives are concerned, no allegation of a want of harmony can possibly be raised. John, however, tells us that the burial of the Lord was attended to not only by Joseph, but also by Nicodemus. …

69. This being the case, therefore, let us, so far as the Lord may help us, take all these incidents, which took place about the time of the Lord’s resurrection, as they are brought before us in the statements of all the evangelists together, and let us arrange them in one connected narrative, which will exhibit them precisely as they may have actually occurred. It was in the early morning of the first day of the week, as all the evangelists are at one in attesting, that the women came to the sepulchre. By that time, all that is recorded by Matthew alone had already taken place; that is to say, in regard to the quaking of the earth, and the rolling away of the stone, and the terror of the guards, with which they were so stricken, that in some part they lay like dead men. …

Orth. In the first place, the tomb itself suffices to settle the question, for to a tomb is committed neither soul nor Godhead whose nature is uncircumscribed; tombs are made for bodies. Furthermore this is plainly taught by the divine Scripture, for so the holy Matthew narrates the event, “When the even was come there came a rich man of Arimathæa named Joseph who also himself was Jesus’ disciple: he went to Pilate and begged the body of Jesus. Then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered, and when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock: and he rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre and departed.” See how often he mentions the body in order to stop the mouths of them who blaspheme the Godhead. The same course is pursued by the thrice blessed Mark, whose narrative I will also quote. …

21. Christ Himself is a virgin; and His mother is also a virgin; yea, though she is His mother, she is a virgin still. For Jesus has entered in through the closed doors, and in His sepulchre, a new one hewn out of the hardest rock, no man is laid either before Him or after Him. Mary is “a garden enclosed…a fountain sealed,” and from that fountain flows, according to Joel, the river which waters the torrent bed either of cords or of thorns; of cords being those of the sins by which we were beforetime bound, the thorns those which choked the seed the goodman of the house had sown. She is the east gate, spoken of by the prophet Ezekiel, always shut and always shining, and either concealing or revealing the Holy of Holies; and through her “the Sun of Righteousness,” our “high priest after the order of Melchizedek,” goes in and out. …

32. Of this garden I sang of old to My spouse in the Canticles, and spoke to her thus. I am come into My garden, My sister, My spouse ; ( now in the place where He was crucified was a garden ;) and what takest Thou thence? I have gathered My myrrh; having drunk wine mingled with myrrh, and vinegar, after receiving which, He said, It is finished. For the mystery has been fulfilled; the things that are written have been accomplished; sins are forgiven. …