Seeing and Believing
Who folds up grave clothes before leaving a tomb?
(So I thought to myself, “You know, making my posts All Revelation All the Time may be achieving diminished marginal returns. Or in plain English, “People would probably like a break from doom and gloom.” The doom and gloom will wait patiently for us, but in the meantime I’m recording a belated Easter meditation. I’m doing some serious digging in John’s Gospel for a crazy idea which crossed my mind, and the passage below is a rewarding place to explore.)
Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed, for as yet they did not understand the Scripture that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples went back to their homes. (John 20:1-10)
Unlike the resurrection narratives written by Matthew and Luke, John has focused his attention on events in which he was present. As he does consistently through the fourth gospel, John refers to himself obliquely, with the arresting title, “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” ( A subject for another time, that.)
John began is record of Jesus’ public ministry with a wedding to which Jesus had been invited. When it was reported that the wine was gone, Jesus ordered six very large jars with water. As they were taken to the steward, they became wine. No one knew how the new wine had been procured, except the twelve disciples and the servants who carried the jars.
What is of most importance for John, however, was this:
This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana of Galilee, and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him. (John 2:11)
It is therefore not surprising that at the end of his gospel, John returns to the subject of believing. For this was his own moment of discovery, and he takes pains to explain how it was that “he saw and believed.”
The thing is, there was not a whole lot to be seen. In fact, there were but two things. Peter and John saw “the linen cloths lying there, and the face cloth…not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself.”
That was it. No Jesus. No explanatory note from the authorities. Just the linens.
John does not make clear whether Peter also believed at that moment; indeed, John assures the reader that none of the disciples had the interpretive knowledge of the (Old Testament) Scriptures to provide an explanation for what had happened.
So John’s believing was not because he saw Jesus, nor was it a deduction based on the knowledge of Scripture. What does that leave? “The face cloth, not lying iwht the linen cloths, but folded up in a place by itself.”
I don’t claim to know John’s mind, but I have a guess as to what might have crossed his mind. Who, if they took the body, would have done so without the grave cloths? And who, if they were plundering the tomb, would have laid hold of the head cloth, folded it up neatly, and set it in its own place?
The list of probable suspects matching those questions would have been quite few. Or none. No one who was in haste would have left the tomb in this disposition.
That was what John “saw.” The grave cloths, and especially the folded head cloth. For John, seeing was believing; but believed without seeing Jesus. What he saw was a “footprint” of Jesus, a sign that someone had transformed the grave into temporary lodging. And had made up the bed.
There were, of course, subsequent appearances of Jesus. John, in fact, counts three of them, apart from the appearance to Mary. And in these appearances the subject of believing is front and center. That appearance was meant for Thomas, to whom Jesus said,
Put your finger here, and see my hands, and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe….Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.
It was Frank Morrison who, now decades ago, wrote the best-selling book, Who Moved the Stone, which expressed the question which for him had but one answer. John’s narrative leaves us with another question for there seems to be only one answer.
Who folds the grave cloths?