Where’s the Body?
THE GREAT VIGIL OF EASTER
Ezekiel 37:1-14 • Romans 6:3-11 • Mark 16:1-8
When Guru Nanak died, his followers argued over what to do with his body. According to tradition, Guru Nanak’s Hindu followers wanted to cremate his body, to free his soul more quickly. But Guru Nanak’s Muslim followers wanted to bury him, so his body could rest in wait for the day of resurrection. To settle the dispute, Guru Nanak told the Hindus to place flowers on the right side of his body, and the Muslims to place flowers on his left. If after he died, the flowers on his right stayed fresh, his followers should cremate him. If the flowers on his left stayed fresh, his followers should bury him.
As soon as Guru Nanak died, his followers covered his body with a sheet and waited. But, no matter how long they waited, the flowers on both sides of his body stayed fresh as ever. When his followers removed the sheet covering Guru Nanak, his body was nowhere to be found.
But his followers grew into a distinct religion called Sikhism, now the fifth-largest religion in the world, devoted to the transcendent oneness of God and to the egalitarian treatment of human beings.
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I don’t know for sure, but I wonder if there was a similar dispute between the followers of Jesus over what to do with his body. Perhaps Joseph of Arimathea wanted to entomb Jesus as quickly as possible. But Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome wanted to take their time and embalm him properly.
It appears that Joseph of Arimathea got his way first. Following ancient burial practices, Joseph wrapped the body of Jesus in a cloth, laid him on a shelf cut from the rock of a cave, and sealed him inside. Then, Joseph would have waited for the body to decompose, before gathering Jesus’ bones into a box.
It seems like Joseph was in a hurry to move the ossification process along. The gospel of Mark tells us Joseph was “waiting expectantly for the kingdom of God” (15:43)—a “waiting” that suggests eager anticipation, as if the kingdom could arrive any minute now.
It’s also likely that Joseph believed in an imminent day of resurrection. In the time of Jesus, Pharisees believed in a coming day of resurrection, and Sadducees didn’t. Later believers in the day of resurrection used imagery from Ezekiel’s vision of the valley of dry bones to envision what that day of resurrection would be like. Bone would join to bone with a rattling sound; sinew and muscle and skin would cover the bones; the breath of God would fill and revive the bones; and the bodies would rise to their feet like a mighty army. Joseph may have wanted the bones of Jesus good and ready for that day.
But the women who closely followed Jesus weren’t in such a hurry for his bones to dry. They wanted to massage the body of Jesus with oil, and to lather him with aromatic spices. They wanted to preserve Jesus, and to treat his body with all the care and reverence he deserved. Anointing the bodies of the dead with oil was a common practice, but it would have special poignancy for those who believed Jesus was the Messiah—the anointed one. Rubbing oil into the body of Jesus would show that these women had preserved their faith—faith in Jesus as the anointed leader of a kingdom that no one could take from them. A kingdom that was their true home.
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By evacuating his tomb before his bones dried, and before the women could reach him with their oils and spices, Jesus gives none of his followers the satisfaction they crave at first. No one gets to preserve his body and anoint him as Messiah. No one gets to hear the rattle of his bones or the rush of God’s breath reanimating him.
Instead, the empty tomb holds space for them. Without this space of wonder, even Jesus’ most devoted followers might have tried to cram the risen flesh of Jesus into the narrow rooms of their debatable opinions. The followers of Jesus might see his risen flesh only as proof that he is the Messiah, the anointed one. The risen flesh of Jesus would prove naysayers wrong. Other followers of Jesus might see his risen flesh only as proof that there is a day of resurrection—the Pharisees were right, the Sadducees wrong.
But the empty tomb seems to say that the resurrection of Jesus is so much bigger, so much more explosive than that.
Instead of giving his followers a body they can hold onto, the risen Christ appears to them in a variety of forms and visions for a season to come. Through these resurrection appearances, Jesus shows that his risen body is the only thing big enough to hold onto them. The risen flesh of Jesus doesn’t narrow the passageway to God’s acceptance and love. The mystery of the resurrected Jesus joins us all, living and dead, into one body that throws open gates, unbolts doors, extends loving and welcoming arms.
© 2024 The Rev. Dr. Lora Walsh
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church – Fayetteville, Arkansas