Lesson 15: The Joseph of Arimathea Story
This is a sermon I recently offered that fits into the series. It asks what we know about Joseph of Arimathea. The quick answer is “not much.”
There are all sorts of legends, from his being Jesus’ uncle to his being the first to carry the Gospel to Britain. He is sometimes associated with the search for the holy grail and sometimes credited with miracles performed using vials of Jesus’ blood. Every one of these is preposterous.
Even the few sentences in the Bible are confusing. Joseph appears once in all four gospels. Two wrote that he was a member of the Jewish council that condemned Jesus, and one said he disagreed with the verdict. The other two gospels identify him as a disciple of Jesus, one adding he was a secret follower. He is also described as a respected rich man who was seeking the kingdom of God, which I assume means he was searching. He might well be all of these. You can surely harmonize the three portraits if you want. However, you come up with a mighty confusing picture.
The one common element is that Joseph buried Jesus in an unused tomb, but some scholars question even that. They note the Romans regarded the denial of burial as part of crucifixion’s horror. Bodies were left to rot or be eaten by birds and dogs. These scholars find it hard to believe that Pilate, who is known for his cruelty, would grant an exception to Joseph.
When you add to this that we have never been able to find a place named Arimathea, some wonder if Joseph was a real person at all. He might simply be a literary device concocted to counter the attack of critics who claimed Jesus was not resurrected because he didn’t die. The early church found ways to insist Jesus was crucified, died, and was buried. This might have been one of them.
Taking all this into consideration. we can still appreciate the role played by Joseph of Arimathea in the Bible. In a very dangerous situation, he gives Jesus the dignity of a proper burial.
After many years in the parish ministry, I have seen how important that is. We humans want the bodies of our loved ones treated with respect and handled with care. We choose our funeral directors very carefully. We ask religious leaders to offer dignified services that express our fond memories and offer prayers. We place memorials at the place of their interment. We return to remember and pray at those places.
That universal desire is reflected in the history of my small community of Gettysburg. In the aftermath of the great battle fought here, the armies departed in great haste leaving over 7000 dead men in our streets and fields. That combined with 3000 dead horses created such a great stench the townspeople hurriedly buried the dead in shallow mass graves.
Almost immediately efforts were made to remove the bodies of Union soldiers, place them in individual coffins, and grant them decent burials, some of them in the new national cemetery.
This was regarded as such important work that the names of those in charge have become part of our history. Basil Biggs, a freed African American, managed the efforts from the beginning. Eventually Samuel Weaver was given the responsibility to complete the work. Biggs and Weaver are our Joseph of Arimathea.
Our history also reflects humans have shown their disrespect by denying persons a decent burial. Even two hundred years ago, it was common to behead the corpses of your defeated enemies and hang their bodies from the city wall until they decomposed.
At Gettysburg, the bodies of Southern soldiers were left in the shallow mass graves. When the war ended, it did not take very long before an association was organized at great expense to come North, disinter the bodies, identify them, and take them South for proper burial. None are honored with burial in the national cemetery.
The Bible reports that Joseph of Arimathea placed himself in great danger so Jesus could be granted the respect due him. The gospel writers empathize the courage it took to stand up for Jesus at this time. They report the male disciples went into hiding after the arrest. Only the women found it safe to be at the execution with all its mockery and threats.
John notes three exceptions: the beloved apostle John, to whom Jesus spoke, Joseph, and Nicodemus. He indicates Joseph had been a secret disciple because he was afraid of the authorities. And we remember Nicodemus who was also secret admirer who came to Jesus by night in chapter 3. The demands of the situation brought both of them out of the closet.
But there was more than courage in their action. Many Renaissance painters have given us wonderful renderings of Jesus being lowered from the cross and Jesus being laid in the tomb. They picture the men and women involved showing great sorrow but also great love as they very gently with great reverence and care lower Jesus in a fine linen sheet from the Cross and lay him in the sepulture.
Whenever I find myself standing before any of these works, I feel my heart warm and utter under my breath, “Thank you!”
I got caught up examining Joseph’s need to step up to give Jesus a decent burial because we need that sort of thing in our time. Treating the dead with respect is simply an extension of treating the living with dignity. And we have lost a great deal of that.
Bullying has become a major problem, partially with the anonymity of social media but also from the model of our national leadership
Our most powerful leaders constantly mock others. Government officers wear masks as they rough up and arrest fellow citizens, even our elected representatives. People try to get their own way by humiliating others, rather than by reasoning with them.
Joseph of Arimathea can be our model as he steps out of the crowd to show dignity for Jesus. He forces us to remember that Christ taught us to care for one another with respect and love.
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