Easter 2006

Easter 2006:

"Our lectionary gives us a choice between two gospel accounts. The Marcan one is limited to the first ending. This affirms that Jesus is risen and gives the risen Jesus a physical location in Galilee. The young man in the tomb promises that there will be appearances there, but the fact that the women do not tell anyone leaves the reader in some suspense as to whether any appearances would occur. It is a startling ending for those expecting the resurrection stories to be the capstone of the narrative. It must have been felt to be quite unsatisfactory in the early church as well, since a second ending was added.

It would make more sense for the new ending to have replaced the earlier one, since it directly contradicts it. In the first ending, three women, including Mary Magdalene, enter the tomb and see a young man who tells them Jesus has gone to Galilee where he will appear to the disciples. He instructs the women to tell the disciples, but they are too afraid to do so. With that negative comment, the story ends

In the second ending Jesus appears to Mary Magdalene. She tells the disciples, who still do not believe until Jesus appears directly to them. There is nothing about Galilee. This second account must have been added by someone familiar with the stories in the other gospels. It points to them without recounting them.

If we focus on the ending that must have been original to the gospel, we can get little clue as to how Mark understood the appearances. Clearly for him the dead body has been enlivened and physically gone elsewhere. Yet the fact that Mark says nothing more about the resurrection, draws no lesson from it, and leaves the only witnesses silent about what they have seen and heard suggests that the resurrection does not have the importance for him that it had for Paul and Peter. When one compares his abrupt account of the women at the empty tomb with his detailed story of the betrayal, the trial, and the crucifixion, one wonders whether he had reacted against the proliferation of stories about the risen
Jesus. He seems to have wanted his readers to be drawn into the account of suffering rather than feeling it cancelled or transcended by the resurrection.
We might say that Mark’s thinking belongs, more than any other New Testament writer, to the theology of the cross rather than the theology of glory.

This leaves us with John. Here as in Mark, the resurrection experience begins with that of the empty tomb. But this is followed by a full account of Jesus’ appearance to Mary Magdalene who faithfully reports to the disciples. If we ask how John understands the nature of the resurrected Jesus, we notice that Mary does not easily recognize him. It is when he speaks that she knows him. Especially puzzling is the statement of Jesus to Mary: “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to my Father.”

A striking feature of John, that is present in other traditions as well, is that the first witness to the resurrection was Mary Magdalene. This contradicts Paul, who gave Peter pride of place. In the imagination of the early church, if not also in historical fact, a woman was the first believer in the risen Jesus and the first to proclaim his resurrection. How odd that so many Christians could think for so long that women must be excluded from the preaching role!

It is hard to say what consequences follow for John from the resurrection. John’s gospel may be interpreted as reading back into the earthly ministry of Jesus his status as resurrected Lord. But just for that reason, the resurrection does not come as a surprise or a contrast. Jesus’ nature and authority are such that one would hardly expect death to hold him.

The last verse in this chapter states the purpose of writing the book and implicitly the understanding of the meaning of the stories recounted. “These are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.” Jesus’ teaching, his miracles, his death and his resurrection all together and jointly constitute evidence that he was the Messiah, the Son of God. John does not single out the resurrection.

What does the resurrection mean to us? Do we see it, with Paul, as the assurance that if we share in Jesus’ faithfulness, our destiny is also to share in Jesus’ resurrected glory? I find this a moving understanding into which I can live and think."