Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

THE CLIMAX OF JESUS' MISSION §18.2
tially Peter and the other disciple) entered the tomb and saw for themselves.
Round this relatively stable core the story is retold with marked diversity. Some
of that variation is the result, no doubt, of the Evangelists' own interests: Mark
has left his auditors in suspense, with the women saying nothing to anyone
(Mark 16.8); 14 Matthew worked in (somewhat awkwardly) the story of the
guard 15 and assumed it appropriate to include another earthquake (28.2); 16 Luke
has changed the promise of an appearance in Galilee (16.7) to the reminiscence
of something said in Galilee (Luke 24.6-7); 17 John focuses on Mary of Magdala,
verse is to be regarded as a Markan insertion (e.g., Bultmann, History 285; C. F. Evans, Resurrection
and the New Testament [London: SCM, 1970] 78-79; R. H. Fuller, The Formation of the
Resurrection Narratives [London: SPCK, 1972] 53, 60-61) it clearly draws on very early tradition
attested by 1 Cor. 15.5-7 and the appearances in Galilee (§18.3[8] below; Pesch,
Markusevangelium 2.538-39).
14. The silence of the women is of a piece with the secrecy motif in Mark (1.44; 5.43;
7.36; 8.30) and even to the last reinforces the instruction of 9.9: only after the appearances
themselves (signalled in 16.7) can the story properly be told (cf. Räisänen, Messianic Secret
207-11). The effect is also to relativize the role of the women and to reinforce the role of the
disciples as the primary witnesses of and for the resurrection (Pesch, Markusevangelium 2.536;
D. R. Catchpole, Resurrection People: Studies in the Resurrection Narratives of the Gospels
[London: Darton, Longman and Todd, 2000] 20-8); see further below, n. 26. The motif is modified
by Luke 24.11 (it is the disciples who respond negatively to the reports of the women; similarly
Mark 16.11), but with the similar effect of making Peter the primary witness (24.12, 34).
J. D. Hester, 'Dramatic Inconclusion: Irony and the Narrative Rhetoric of the Ending of Mark',
JSNT 57 (1995) 61-86, argues that Mark's 'rhetorical irony' forces readers to find an interpretation
which rescues the story from failure.
15. Matt. 27.62-66; 28.4, 11-15. The story of the guard is generally regarded as an
apologetic addition: the silence of the other Evangelists is hard to explain otherwise; the difficulty
of integrating their presence with the earlier account of the women coming to the tomb is
obvious in the sequence 28.2-5 (what were the guard doing during 28.5-10?); and the reason
given for setting the guard (knowledge of Jesus' resurrection prediction and anticipation of the
disciples' resurrection proclamation: 27.63-64) speaks more of later apologetic concern —
perhaps to counter the alternative explanation (the disciples stole the body) already in circulation
and still in play at the time of Matthew (28.15). See, e.g., Davies and Allison, Matthew
3.652-53.
16. Again the silence of the other Evangelists probably indicates a Matthean storytelling
flourish— as in 27.51-54. It is away of indicating the eschatological significance of the
event (cf. Matt. 24.7 pars.; Zech. 14.4-5). Readers of the time would be familiar with the device
(used also in Scripture) of signalling epochal events by referring to such perturbations in
heaven or on earth (see, e.g., Brown, Death 1113-16, 1121-23).
17. It is hardly possible to evade the conclusion that Luke 24.6 ('Remember how he told
you, while he was still in Galilee') has modified Mark 16.7 ('he is going ahead of you to Galilee'),
especially when it is recalled that Luke omitted Mark 14.28 ('But after I have been raised
I will go before you into Galilee'), to which 16.7 obviously refers back. The reason is clear too:
Luke has chosen to omit any reference to or account of resurrection appearances in Galilee
(note particularly Luke 24.49; Acts 1.4); see further vol. 2.
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