Easter Monday – Gospel
8So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples. 9Suddenly Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. 10Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers and sisters to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”
11While they were going, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests everything that had happened. 12After the priests had assembled with the elders, they devised a plan to give a large sum of money to the soldiers, 13telling them, “You must say, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ 14If this comes to the governor’s ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” 15So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story is still told among the Judeans to this day.
Commentary on Matthew 28:8-15
The women who had come to the tomb early on Sunday morning to embalm the dead body of Jesus were amazed to find the stone rolled back from the entrance and the tomb empty. Their reactions are a mixture of anxiety and joy. They are anxious that the body may have been stolen, but there is also an expectant joy. Could it be that he is alive? This is in contrast with the Gospel of Mark (16:8) where he tells us that the women “said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”
And, while still wondering what could have happened, they run to tell the news to the disciples with “great joy” (obviously they were having optimistic thoughts) and, at that point they encounter Jesus, who greeted them with an Easter greeting of “Peace!” (Shalom!).
As they cling to Jesus’ feet (like Mary Magdalene in John’s Gospel, they do not want to lose him again), they are told not to be afraid, an admonition that will be heard frequently during these days, but to go to the disciples and instruct them to go to Galilee where they will see Jesus.
There are various, and to some extent, mutually conflicting versions of the resurrection story and of how and where the Risen Jesus was seen and by whom. There are basically two types of experiences. Appearances to individuals (Mary Magdalene, the Emmaus disciples, Peter and Thomas) help prove the fact of Jesus’ resurrection. Appearances to several disciples together are accompanied by a mandate to continue the work of Jesus.
In today’s reading, the women are to instruct the disciples that they will see Jesus in Galilee, their own place. Galilee is their home ground, the place where they were born, grew up and worked. That is where the Risen Jesus is to be found. And, it is in our ‘own place’ we will expect to see him, too.
Jesus is saying the same thing to us. We do not have to go to Jerusalem or Rome or Lourdes or Fatima to find him. If we cannot find him in the place where we live and work, we won’t find him in those other places either.
As well as the distinction between individual and collective post-resurrection appearances of Jesus, there are two other distinct traditions: 1) those appearances that take place in Galilee (in the north) and 2) those in Judea (at Jerusalem, in the south). Commentators have pointed out that these seeming inconsistencies provide a better witness than any artificial uniformity to the antiquity of the evidence and its historical value. The physical details are not that important; it is the meaning that is all-important.
Meanwhile, the leaders of the Jews put another twist on what is happening. They also are reporting that the tomb is empty. All sides agree that the tomb was empty; the disagreement was over the why. Obviously, they are wondering what could have happened, but cannot accept the possibility of resurrection. The guards are bribed and told to say that the disciples stole the body while they were asleep. Guards who sleep on the job would be punished, not bribed. And, if they were asleep, how did they know what happened?
But when people do not want to believe something, reason and logic can often go out the window. We see such rationalisations frequently in those who find it inconvenient to continue living a Christian life.
Those who take the Gospel seriously and try to live according to its vision have all the confirmation they need that it is the recipe for a happy and fulfilled life.
