Matthew chapter 27 verses 57-60
Verse 57
“When the even was come” – this suggests a lapse of, say, three hours after the death of the Lord Jesus – “there came a rich man” (only mentioned by Matthew) – he therefore had a great deal to lose – “of Arimathaea”. Luke adds that this was “a city of the Jews” (Lk 23.51): this is generally identified with Ramathaim–zophim on Mount Ephraim, the birthplace of Samuel (1 Sam 1.1). The verse continues, “named Joseph, who also himself was Jesus’ disciple” (lit had been a disciple to Jesus), although we do not read of him before this event. He suddenly appears here in the gospel record. John in his gospel adds, “but secretly for fear of the Jews” (Jn 19.38), but the cross as the hymn says: ‘It makes the coward spirit brave’.
Verse 58
“He went to Pilate” – Pilate himself had the authority to dispose of the bodies of the crucified. Generally, they were thrown into malefactors’ graves. Joseph’s fear became a holy boldness. He can no longer remain silent and secret, he must now come out and own his true convictions. The death of Christ thus brought Joseph of Arimathaea a deliverance from the fear of man. We further read, “and begged the body of Jesus”; he was a rich man, but he became a beggar. “Then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered”; in the parallel passage in Mark’s gospel, we are told that Joseph “craved the body (Gk. soma) of Jesus” (Mk 15.43) – it belonged to a Person – and that Pilate “gave the body (Gk. ptoma = corpse) to Joseph”. Believers would never refer to His body as ‘a corpse’.
Verse 59
So, we read of a clean linen cloth, a new tomb, a great stone – these tell the story of the burial of the Saviour. “And when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth”. Joseph provided “the clean linen cloth” (made of fine linen); it reminds us of the fine-twined linen from which the inner curtains of the tabernacle were made (Ex 26.1). The body that had been “wrapped…in swaddling clothes, and laid…in a manger” (Lk 2.7), was now “wrapped in a clean linen cloth” and laid in Joseph’s tomb.
Verse 60
The passage continues, “and laid it in his own new tomb” (this phrase is peculiar to Matthew). Joseph gave his tomb as a freewill offering. Did he realise it was but a loan, that it was being borrowed? For only three days would it be required and then it would be returned to him. The words that follow are, “which he had hewn out in the rock”. All the writers of the synoptic gospels dwell on this fact of the tomb being hewn and not a natural cavern as so many graves were at that time. Like almost all Eastern graves, it was an opening made in the vertical face of the rock.
It was a “new tomb”, not newly hewn, but rather “new” in the sense of fresh, unused and undefiled by any dead body. There can be no doubt who came out of the tomb, for none other had ever lain there. A clean, linen cloth, the new tomb, and now a great stone, “he rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre”. The tomb was closed by a great stone, shaped like a mill stone and standing on its edge in a channel also carved out of stone. In this way, as the custom was, the dead was separated from the living; “and departed” – when Joseph rolled the stone against the door of the tomb, he departed; when “the angel of the Lord…came and rolled back the stone from the door”, he “sat upon it” (Mt 28.2).
It has been well said that Joseph of Arimathaea accomplished his life’s work in an afternoon. Thus, was Isaiah 53 verse 9 fulfilled, “and they made (appointed, assigned) his grave with the wicked” (Revised Version). Man proposes; that is the intention of the rulers was that the Lord Jesus should be buried with the wicked – the malefactors at Golgotha. Note that one feature of an ignominious punishment among the Jews was the denial of an honourable burial. Isaiah continues, “but he was with the rich (a rich man, singular) in his death” – God disposes.
The Lord Jesus thus rested in Joseph’s tomb on the seventh day of the week. He had similarly rested following the creation of the heavens and the earth. Then He rested because his creative work was finished, “he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made” (Gen 2.2); this was a rest of achievement. Now He rested because His redemptive work was complete. Praise His Name!
David E West.