Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Religious Studies – Anthology
105
Similar discrepancies occur in the reports of what was seen at the empty tomb.
John’s Mary Magdalen saw first two angels sitting in the tomb and then Jesus,
whom she was not allowed to touc h. Matthew’s two Marys saw one seated angel,
and then Jesus. Mark’s three women saw a young man in a white robe, and Mary
Magdalen alone saw Jesus. Luke’s group of women saw two men in brilliant c lothes
who suddenly appeared at their side, but not Jesus himself, who was seen only by
t wo disc iples on the road to Emmaus. All four gospels desc ribe Jesus subsequently
appearing to the full group of disc iples, but while Matthew and Mark set these
appearanc es in Galilee, the Luke and John gospels suggest that the setting was
Jerusalem. Luke also indirec t ly mentions an earlier appearanc e of Jesus to Simon
Peter, one which seems to have gone unnoticed elsewhere in the gospels. But it is
one of Paul’s let t ers whic h gives t he fullest informat ion of all:
... he [Jesus] appeared first to Cephas [Peter] and secondly to the Twelve.
Next he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same
time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died; then he
appeared to James and then to all the apostles; and last of all he appeared
to me too ...(1 Corinthians 15: 5–8)The doc umentation is an almost hopeless jumble of c onfusion, sc arc ely helped by
the fac t that the ever enigmatic Mary Magdalen, the only witness mentioned in
every account except Paul’s – for whom women didn’t c ount – was obviously so
unbalanc ed that she had needed to be cured by Jesus of ‘seven devils’. The lack of
a proper ending to the Mark gospel, as revealed by the Sinait ic us and Vatic anus
manuscripts, merely adds to the problem. Yet had someone wholly invented the
resurrec t ion st ory one might have expec ted them to do so more c onvinc ingly than,
for instance, representing women as the prime witnesses, when women’s testimony
c arried a part ic ularly low weight in Jewish Law. And in t heir own way t he garblings
and inc onsistenc ies have the same quality as the memories of witnesses after a
road ac c ident, whic h are, after all, personal and often highly c onfused versions of
the same true story.
Any number of theories have been advanc ed in an attempt to explain what really
happened, but all may be reduced to permutations of six basic hypotheses:
1 The women went to the wrong tomb.
2 Unknown to the disc iples, some independent person removed the body.
3 The disciples themselves removed the body and invented the whole story.
4 The disciples saw not the real Jesus, but halluc inations.
5 Jesus did not ac tually die on the c ross, but was resuscitated, or in some other
way survived.
6 Jesus really did rise from the grave.