Although Easter has been commercialized in the United States so that its main elements are marshmallow bunnies and chocolate eggs, which probably come from pagan spring fertility rituals (rabbits and eggs are about procreation), that’s not what it meant for the first Christians. That’s not what it should mean for us. Jesus’ resurrection validates his claim to be God and all his other claims. It also points to hope for believers. Death is not the end. Jesus Christ rose from the dead.

What do you know about Easter? According to the Oxford English Dictionary, it’s difficult to determine where Easter got its name However, that’s not important. What is important is what happened at the tomb Jesus’ body was laid in and what happened to his body.
 

The Tomb was Empty

We’re not certain about which tomb it was. There are two main candidates, but that doesn’t matter much, unless you’re a tour guide in Jerusalem. However, since some female disciples saw Jesus’ body being put into the tomb, they knew where it was.

What matters is that the tomb once contained Jesus’ body, but when the women looked inside on the morning after the Sabbath, it was empty, except the “cloth wrapping lying there” that Joseph used for Jesus’ body and the face cloth that would have been on Jesus’ head, but lying by itself and appeared folded up. See John 20:6-7.

What Happened to Jesus’ Body?

These details are important. They suggest that no one took the body. They would not have taken the time to lay the grave clothes back like they had been. Someone stealing Jesus’ body would not have bothered with that. In fact, they might not have unwrapped his body at all.

Rather, it gives the impression that somehow, the body had vanished and left the cloths behind where they fell when the body disappeared.

 There was a large stone over the front of the tomb. Most likely an angel moved it in order to enter the tomb. The stone was very heavy. Mark recorded that the women asked themselves, “’Who will roll away the stone for us’? For it was very large” (Mark 16:3). We can be sure the dead person inside did not do this.

Did Jesus really Die?

Some have claimed that Jesus didn’t really die, but only “swooned.” The gospel writers are clear that Jesus was dead. Suppose for a moment, however, that in spite of the wounds in Jesus’ hands and feet, the terrible condition of his back after being flogged with a Roman whip, designed to tear the victims’s flesh, and a lot of blood loss, Jesus survived. Would someone who had been flogged mercilessly and crucified, and had lost a good deal of blood, revive in the dark and have the strength to move the stone away from the tomb entrance? Not a chance.

When a Roman soldier put a spear through Jesus’ side, blood and water came out. That means that his heart ruptured. Jesus died from a broken heart. He was not swooning.

Women were the first to come to the tomb, not the oh-so-brave eleven disciples who deserted Jesus when he was arrested a few days beforehand. John named only Mary Magdalene. She was a model of devotion to Jesus.

Although she left the tomb to go tell the eleven that Jesus’ body was missing from the tomb, she apparently came back. After Peter and John had run to the tomb based on the report of the women, they returned.

Mary Magdalene was apparently beside herself with grief and worry. She stood outside the tomb, weeping. She looked inside the tomb again and saw two angels, who asked her why she was weeping. She explained that someone had taken Jesus’ body away and she didn’t know where it was.

As a small aside, some claim there is a contradiction between the gospels over whether the women saw one angel, two angels, or a young man (presumably an angel).

This isn’t a contradiction. Matthew 28:5-6 speaks of an angel of the Lord. That Matthew quotes the words that the angel said does not mean that only one angel was there. Rather, the focus is on the one angel who spoke to the women. Mark 16:5 says that there was a young man in the tomb who said to the women the same thing that the angel in Matthew and the angels in John’s Gospel said.

Mark 16:5. Do you know what an angel looks like? Read Isaiah 6, and  you’ll see a description of angels that is nothing like a human. If an angel shows up that looks like a human, that’s not a contradiction. It is merely how Mark’s source, the women, reported it to him. They reported what they saw. The angels were not wearing T-shirts that read, “Angel” on them. I also don’t suppose that any of them looked like Roma Downey.
 

 

Mary Magdalene’s Devotion to Jesus

Mary Magdalene turned from the tomb and looked around. She saw someone, whom she assumed was a gardener, but it was Jesus. He asked her, “Why are you weeping? Who are you looking for?” (John 20:15).

Mary explained again that Jesus’ body was missing, She said that if this person had taken away the body, and if he told her where it was, she would take it away. Even faced with Jesus’ death, Mary of Magdala was deeply devoted to Jesus.

Then she heard the most beautiful word she had ever heard: “Mary” (John 20:16).  She knew that voice. Somehow, this person was Jesus. She cried out, “Rabboni,” which means “my rabbi.” Apparently threw herself at him and hugged him somehow, because Jesus then told her to stoop clinging to him. There’s nothing romantic here.

Mary was heartbroken that Jesus was dead. Finding him to be alive changed everything for her. Her life wasn’t over. Her devotion to Jesus was not in vain. By caring so much about Jesus, she was granted the gift of being the first human to see him alive, risen from the dead. Jesus had delivered Mary from seven demons (Luke 8:2). I don’t know what it is like to be demon-possessed, but I’m sure Mary never forgot the living hell from which Jesus delivered her.

So what precisely happened?

First, we can assume that the angel rolled the stone away, not to let Jesus, out, but to let others see he was gone. No one saw it, but it seems that Jesus was restored to life in a new, resurrected body, and exited the cloths around him. John notes that the face cloth was by itself, rolled up. This again suggests that Jesus simply disappeared from it.

We do not get to know exactly what happened, but here is my theory. There are at least two realms, one spiritual and one physical, one heavenly and one earthly. Jesus, raised by the Father, stepped out of the material realm that we live in and went into the heavenly realm.

Greco-Roman Views of Death and the Afterlife

In Jesus’ day, non-Jews generally expected that when they died, they would become disembodied spirits under the control of the god Hades in the underworld. Epicurean philosophers believed that there was no afterlife and when you died, you ceased to exist.  Plato believed that if you had been a good philosopher, you would become a star in the sky. Joni Mitchel agreed by saying we are “starlight.”

Greeks and Romans had no belief in a resurrection. As proof of this, we can go to Acts 17:18. Paul was preaching about Jesus and anastasis. Those around him thought he meant that Jesus was divine and his consort was Anastasis,  which is the Greek word for resurrection. They all believed that when you are dead, you are dead. Some today scoff that the ancients didn’t understand death. This is modernist arrogance.

In fact, they knew all about death. If a man’s spouse or child died, the body was not taken to a mortuary. You needed to bury the body that very day. They knew what death looked like. They knew that dead people don’t come back to life.

Jewish Views on Death and the Afterlife

It’s important to bear in mind what people in the first century believed in order to better understand the New Testament.

There were at least two views among Jews. Many Jews in Jesus’ day believed that there would be a resurrection of the body, based upon passages like Dan 12:2 and Isa 26:19. However, the Sadducees, who were opposed to Jesus, rejected belief in the resurrection of the dead. They seem to have been materialists. When you die, that’s it.

That’s why it is ironic that Saddducees came to Jesus to ask about the resurrection. They did not believe in it. Instead, as their behavior seems to indicate, they thought this life is all there is and having power in it is very important.

They rejected belief in the resurrection of the dead, which is why they were sad you see. A Jewish writing from the third century A.D. said that by rejecting belief in the resurrection of the dead, the Sadducees excluded themselves from it.

Jews who believed that a resurrection would occur saw this as an event that would happen at the end of time. Many Jews would have agreed with Jesus and his disciples that there would be a general resurrection. Where they parted ways was the claim by Jesus’ followers that only one person, namely Jesus, had risen from the dead in the middle of time.

The New Testament authors, however, are quite clear that the resurrection of Jesus was bodily. He did not reappear after his death as a ghost or spirit.

They did not suffer some mass hallucination, which don’t take place. Rather, Jesus conquered death and came back from death in a new, incorruptible body. The Bible does not teach that souls are immortal, a belief that came from Plato.

Greeks would have been horrified at the thought of returning to bodily life. They saw the body as a prison. Yet for Jews, the body is a good gift from God and at the resurrection, they would get a new body. It’s essential that we affirm that on Easter, Jesus rose bodily from the dead. He willingly walked into the jaws of Roman “justice” and was killed. He rose triumphantly three days later.

As I wrote in a blog post previously, when Jesus showed up in the upper room, he did not float through the walls like a ghost. He simply appeared. My view, though I cannot give you a verse for it, is that Jesus stepped out of the spiritual realm into the material realm where we all live.

So what?

This is important for at least two reasons. First, suppose that I decided to claim that I was divine. I also made a lot of truth claims about human life. Though such claims are made by people today, how would you know if my claim was true? By doing the impossible, coming back to life in a new body and demonstrating it.

According to Luke 24:36-43, he invited the disciples to touch him and see his scars. Ghosts don’t have flesh and bone, he said. He also asked for food and ate in front of them. No one had ever risen from the dead like this.

The resurrection validated Jesus’ claim to be God and his claims about how to live for God. If someone else cliams to be divine, this would certainly be good evidence that they were not charlatans or out of their minds. Jesus was victorious over death. No one else has done that.

Second, because Jesus made promises about the future for those who follow him. we can have great hope. Life can be very hard. There’s no getting around that. Followers of Jesus have his promise that we will be with him and live with him into eternity. I’d be quite happy to trade in my body for a new one that works properly and won’t ever need a doctor. My wife says that when I go to be with Jesus, the first thing that will happen is that I will see him with a pair of good eyes. That’s worth waiting for.

If you trust in Jesus, what you do in this life matters. Death won’t be the end. It will in fact be the beginninig of a whole new life because Jesus is the true victor over death.

Do you want more onre this subject? I can’t recommend too highly N. T. Wight’s book, The Ressurectiono of the Son of God https://www.fortresspress.com/store/product/9780800626792/The-Resurrection-of-the-Son-of-God. Yes, it’s a big book. I’ve read all of it and there is a lot of useful content, even if you’re not a scholar. It addresses many topics you can find discussed by skeptics who have not done their homework on Youtube and other platforms. Reading it can build your faith. Belief that Jesus Christ rose from the dead is not a mere belief. It is the best historical explanation of what happened on Easter.

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