There was one resurrection; there are four narratives of it. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John tell the story, each in his own way. Each narrative is distinct and has its own character. When the four accounts are absorbed into the imagination, they develop rich melodies, harmonies, counterpoint. The four voices become a resurrection quartet.
Yet many people never hear the music. The reason, I think, is that the apologetic style for years has been to “harmonize” the four resurrection stories. But it never turns out to be harmonization. Instead of listening to their distinctive bass, tenor, alto, and soprano voices, we have tried to make the evangelists sing the same tune. Differences and variations in the resurrection narratives are denied, affirmed, doubted, and “interpreted.”
There is a better way. Since we have the four accounts that supplement one another, we can be encouraged to celebrate each one as it is, and to magnify the features that make it distinct from the others. Instead of melting them down into an ingot of doctrine, we can burnish the features that individualize them.
When we do that, our imagination expands, and the resurrection acquires the sharp features and hard surfaces of real life. Through the artistry of the four evangelists, the particularity and detail of local history, the kind we ourselves live in, becomes vivid.
I
The eye-catching sentence in Matthew’s narrative is, “There was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat upon it” (28:2). That is a detail no one else includes. What it tells us is that the resurrection is earthshaking. Matthew reports the resurrection event as something like the explosion of a bomb that throws out waves of energy. The earthquake becomes an image used to dramatize the historical impact of Christ raised from the dead.
The detail alerts us to consequences. When we hear that an earthquake has occurred, we want to know how it affected the community. We are curious about the lives lost and the lives saved, about the acts of selfishness and heroism. Matthew’s earthquake detail gets us interested in what happens. As the waves of resurrection energy spread, what will be the results? How will men respond?
As the earthquake-impact of the resurrection moves into human history, Matthew notes six responses: “the guards trembled and became like dead men” (28:4); the women “departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples” (v. 8); the women “came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him” (v. 9); the elders bribed the soldiers and told them to “tell people, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep’ ” (v. 13); the soldiers “took the money and did as they were directed” (v. 15); the eleven “when they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted” (v. 17).
These responses range across a spectrum that includes terror, lying, bribery, reverent fear, doubt, great joy, and worship. Not one of them is trivial. The resurrection did not produce the same thing in everyone present, but no one was unaffected by it. It made a profound impact on everyone in the vicinity.
Matthew gives about equal space to each response. Yet he holds up one above the others: worship. The women in verse 9 and the eleven in verse 17 respond by worshiping. The lying and bribery responses of the elders and soldiers are sandwiched between these and provide a contrast that sets them off even more clearly. Worship, says Matthew, is the most appropriate response that can be made to the resurrection.
Matthew’s words support his perspective. Imperatives are response-demanding words, and Matthew uses a lot of them. When a man has a command addressed to him, he has to do something, either positively or negatively. Matthew’s choice of words shows how the waves of resurrection energy moved through the interstices of human response: “do not be afraid” (28:5); “come, see the place where he lay” (v. 6); “go quickly and tell his disciples” (v. 7); “do not be afraid” (v. 10); “go and tell my brethren” (v. 10); “tell people” (v. 13); “go therefore and make disciples” (v. 19).
No event in history rivals the resurrection in its impact on the human will. The way a person responds to it is the most characteristic and significant response he will ever make. With great skill Matthew makes us see that as he constructs his story around the earthquake-impact of Jesus’ resurrection.
Ii
Mark’s Gospel is a rapid-fire narration of what Jesus said and did as he gave “his life as a ransom for many” (10:45). Mark scraps all the preliminaries (for instance, he does not describe Jesus’ birth) and in a breathless, hurried journey involves us in the action. “Straightway” and “immediately” are characteristic words in English translations. Caught up in the action, we are eager to find what happens next.
Mark carries this style into chapter sixteen—his account of the resurrection. Three women come to the tomb and find it empty. An angel tells them that Jesus is risen and gives them instructions on what they are to do. Mark then gives us one of his most dramatic scenes: “They went out and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid” (16:8).
That isn’t quite what I would expect as a response to the resurrection. I want to know what comes next. How will the story end?
The experience of the women who come to the tomb, grieving deeply, and expecting to carry out the burial amenities, is the material Mark uses to tell the resurrection story. Their simple devotion is interrupted by two surprises: the stone is rolled away from the tomb, and the tomb is empty. In that surprised condition they receive an angelic message. The message has four simple statements of fact: Jesus is risen; he is not there; the tomb is empty; he is going on ahead to Galilee. Then it has two commands: do not be amazed; go, tell his disciples and Peter. Finally, there is a promise: you will see him. A foundation of fact supports a double command that is motivated by a single promise. Subjectively, surprise prevails; objectively, the divine message predominates. The combination produces the pivotal experience: “They went out and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”
Psychologically, that is a situation that simply must be resolved. There is an overwhelming personal necessity to complete the story. Mark draws us into the center of the action and lets us feel for ourselves the emotion that accompanies the sudden realization that Jesus was actually risen from the dead. It is impossible to look at it analytically or objectively. The story needs to be completed. Our participation is evoked.
Yet the oldest Greek manuscripts stop just at that point, at verse 8. Whether Mark deliberately stopped there or whether the ending of the original manuscript scroll became frayed through constant usage and simply wore off, nobody at this point knows. What everyone does know, though, is that no one, ancient or modern, is satisfied with the ending (or lack of ending). The vacuum has to be filled. An ending must be supplied. The manuscript history of Mark’s Gospel shows repeated attempts to “finish” the story.
This everywhere observable attempt to supply an ending to Mark’s resurrection narrative shows how well he told his story and how pivotal verse 8 is. The resurrection is not complete until it is concluded in personal history. When a person realizes that Christ is risen, he may experience fear, joy, doubt. But these reactions in relation to the facts, commands, and promise of the divine word must be incorporated in a personal conclusion. The resurrection requires a conclusion that only personal participation can supply.
Iii
In addition to the story of the women at the empty tomb on Easter morning (the story common to the other accounts), Luke tells two rather long stories about the risen Christ’s appearance: first to two men at Emmaus on Easter afternoon and evening, and then to all the disciples in Jerusalem that night.
These two stories are vehicles for gathering together material that will expand our understanding of the resurrection. Luke’s account prevents us from reducing the resurrection to an isolated event, however earth-shaking, or to a personal experience, however intense. He weaves its meaning into the fabric of what has gone before and what will follow. He sees all history to that point leading up to this event, and all future history flowing from it.
Luke’s method is to lace the stories with references to the ancient Scriptures and the recent past. Two men at Emmaus are “talking with each other all about these things that had happened” (24:14); when Jesus meets them, they rehearse the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth (vv. 19–24); Jesus offers an exposition relating Scripture (the past) and resurrection (v. 27); the two men recognize the relation between the past and the resurrection (v. 32); meeting with the eleven, Jesus refers them to “everything written about me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms” (v. 44); the resurrection is rooted in past prophecy: “thus it is written …” (v. 46); the concluding verses (vv. 47–53) project the resurrection event into the future where there will be repentance, forgiveness of sins, witness, the coming promise of power, great joy, and continuous praise.
Luke tells the resurrection story in a way that connects man’s past experience to the resurrection. Human history is a single story that has the resurrection as its theme and climax.
Luke’s account of the resurrection is the longest of the four. He includes more material and expands it more thoroughly than the other gospel writers. He wants us to understand the resurrection. He develops his material in a manner designed to expand our imagination so it can take in the immense scope of the resurrection. The resurrection, in other words, is comprehensive. It takes the scattered pieces of man’s historical-religious-cultural life and puts them all together.
Iv
The resurrection of Jesus is not easy to believe in. There are a lot of tricksters in the world and a lot of fakes. How do we know that the resurrection was not a hoax? There have, after all, been plenty of religious hoaxes in the world. Resurrection is a common theme in ancient religion. What evidence do we have that the resurrection of Jesus wasn’t just one among many?
John’s account of the resurrection is written to provide convincing evidence for dealing with these very legitimate questions. John’s story is designed to persuade: “These are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ” (20:31). “Believe,” in John’s lexicon, is a union of intellectual comprehension and life commitment. His purpose is to place before us information that will clear away honest doubts and impel us to commitment. In telling of the resurrection John takes special pains to emphasize the credibility of the resurrection by bringing out details that show its historical reality.
In verses 1–10 Peter and John, told by Mary that the tomb is empty, run to see for themselves. What they see causes them to believe. The arrangement of linen cloths and napkin provided the kind of visible evidence that was convincing to those first observers: “Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed” (20:8).
In verses 11–18, Mary, weeping outside the tomb, has a conversation with Jesus. At first she doesn’t recognize the One to whom she is talking, but identifying the risen Christ when he speaks her name, she turns and sees his tangible form. Note what she says to the others: “I have seen the Lord.”
In verses 19–23, the disciples are huddled in fear on the evening of the resurrection. Jesus appears to them. He reassures them of his resurrection reality by showing them the crucifixion marks in his hands and side. “Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.”
In verses 24–29 the disciples are again together, this time with Thomas, who had not believed the report the others gave. Jesus makes another appearance, offering himself in tangible form: “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side …” (v. 27).
The senses of seeing, hearing, and touching are represented in the four stories John gives us. In each story people moved from a state where they lacked belief to one where they believed on the basis of first-hand evidence. The stories provide a framework in which people can move through doubt and skepticism. Thanks to John, there is plenty of room in the Christian community for people to ask questions and express doubts.
John doesn’t shout at us that we have to believe, no matter what. He knows that the best belief includes an intelligent, searching mind. He doesn’t want man to believe blindly; he wants him to believe on the basis of good evidence. His Gospel is full of “signs” (we might almost call them “evidences”)—events in Jesus’ life that provide self-authenticating data that he is God’s Son, the Saviour of the world.
Eugene H. Peterson is pastor of Christ Our King United Presbyterian Church in Bel Air, Md. He has the B.A. from Seattle Pacific College, the S.T.B. from New York Seminary, and the M.A. from Johns Hopkins University.
