READINGS

John 20:1-9

HOMILY

Some are frustrated that they only give us 1 to 9.

It’s only the first half of the diptych in which Mary Magdalene asks a question.

In the second half, she gets our question answered.

But this is what the Church asks us to look at today, so I’m going to go through with you step by step.

It is the beginning of, I think, the most wonderful page of literature that we’ve ever had.

It’s the account of creation; for the Christian account of creation is not in Genesis, the Christian account of creation is in John 20.

Genesis is the background necessary to understand what’s really going on.

Anyhow, “it was early on the first day of the week”.

Actually, it was early on day one, that’s what it says: day one, the beginning of creation.

And it was still dark.

In other words, it was before God had made light.

When Mary of Magdala came to the tomb, she probably didn’t come alone because when she goes to see the disciples she says ‘we’.

And the other Gospels all refer to her and two other women who went to the tomb.

But it seems as though John probably reconstructed this from the witness of Mary Magdalene, Mary of Magdala.

And that she is the person who is described here, her vision and her understanding of what’s going on.

She arrived and she saw that the stone had been removed.

It doesn’t say, she looked in.

Our first reaction is to assume skullduggery because she goes running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved; and she says:

they’ve taken the Lord out of the tomb and we don’t know where they have put him.

Where they have put him?

She asks this question, she explains this longing with anxiety first to Peter and the Beloved Disciple talking about ‘they’ – perhaps implying that it was some soldiers or some tricksters who did this.

Later, but not in today’s Gospel, she’ll say the same thing to two angels.

And then very shortly after she’ll actually say the same thing to Jesus, but she says not ‘where they have taken him away’ – ‘you have taken him’.

In other words, she is going through a process of understanding what’s gone on, which is going to culminate in the empty tomb turning into the Holy of Holies that is now open forever.

Simon Peter set out with the other disciple to go to the tomb. 

They ran together but the other disciple running faster reached the tomb first.

He bent down and saw the linen cloths lying on the ground but did not go in.

Okay, good move. Why?

He could see that something had happened, but he was a priestly family.

And he was himself clearly in with high priestly circles, since while Jesus was being tried, he was able to go in to the sanctuary, while Peter had to stay outside.

So we’re talking about quite an interesting reversal here.

So he is a member of a priestly family and should not enter into a tomb where there had been corruption, because that would have prevented him from exercising any priestly function.

It would have been seriously wrong for him as a priestly person to go into a place where there had been corruption – the corruption of death.

So he doesn’t go in, he waits.

Peter who was following now came up.

And here we have another while rather beautiful piece of Johannine irony: Peter trundled along later; presumably a slightly more middle-aged man, and he went right into the tomb.

Okay so quite typical Peter, but just by temperament we know that he is quite inclined to dash ahead, but also actually he has just been ordained High Priest and understood it – the new high priesthood.

But also he wasn’t part of the old high priesthood, so it didn’t matter for him the question of corruption.

Dare he goes in and he saw the linen cloths on the ground and also the cloth that had been over his head, which John the Beloved Disciple hadn’t seen.

This was not with the linen cloths but rolled up in a place by itself.

Here we’re into something really quite interesting.

The linen cloths on the ground is the first sign that we are not dealing with a thief. Why?

Well, you remember that immediately before Jesus is buried, a very large number of spices are produced: myrrh and aloe, and Jesus’s body is rubbed down with these, and then wrapped in the linen.

Now these spices formed quite a thick resin or gum.

In other words, it wouldn’t have been at all easy just to remove linen cloths.

They would have been sticky and weighed down, it wouldn’t be an easy thing for a robber to do.

And, in fact, why would a robber bother to take off the cloth especially if they were sticky.

So the first sign that something odd is going on are cloths left on the ground.

It suggests that the stickiness wasn’t part of a funeral rite.

In fact, those spices might have been part of the rite of how the Holy One came forth from that Holy of Holies, because the same spices were used for the High Priest emerging from the Holy Ones who had become an angel.

So here we have these apparently resin-less cloths on the floor.

And then Peter notices the napkin laid to one side.

In other words, it’s been placed deliberately, roll up, and no longer necessary.

This is an extraordinary thing.

The Holy One has been in the place.

He is born within himself, he’s taking his blood into the Holy of Holies.

And he’s normal.

He has left behind the earthly garments, he has rolled up because there’s no further use for the head covering.

It’s that that allows the other disciple to enter.

He also went in, he saw and he believed. Well, what did he believe?

In the first instance, he must have realized that there was no corruption in the place.

He must have realized what it says in Psalm 16:9-10:

therefore my heart is glad and my soul rejoices, my body also dwells secure; 

for thou didst not give me up to Hades nor let thy godly one thy Holy One see corruption.

In other words, he could see that this had been a place with no corruption.

What did he believe?

He believed that God had not let his Holy One know corruption.

That Jesus had returned to heaven.

Till this moment they had felt understand the teaching of scripture that he must rise from the dead.

Well again that’s very odd. What does it mean?

Here it seems they did understand something.

They understand that Jesus, who always said he’d come from heaven and now went back to heaven without knowing corruption.

But the extension of the cross to the tomb was giving himself up to death in the Holy Place.

And that he was no longer visible.

I suspect that their assumption was: okay, that’s happened.

I think that they would have been astounded to think that, in fact, he was going to rise and appear as a human to them, for quite a long time after this explaining what he’d been about.

It other words, from John’s and Peter’s point of view, already the promise had been fulfilled.

And what they were not expecting was the dramatic illustrations of what had really been going on, which would start to come alive over the next few hours, actually – along with Mary Magdalene and then later that evening with the disciples all gathered in the upper room.

Because the longing of the Lord to be with his disciples, those he loved, and to show them himself, and to manifest himself was so great that he kept on doing, just trying to convince them, to teach them, to allow them to see what happened.

It is this extra spillover which is so wonderful – the utter aliveness of God made visible to us.

And it’s these appearances which we’re going to be following over the next few weeks as we live through the Easter season.