The empty tombBy Father Peter Choy Wai-man
According to the Gospels, when the women discovered Jesus’ tomb was empty, they initially suspected that someone had taken his body. After receiving the report, Peter and Jesus’ beloved disciple went to the tomb and found it empty, with the burial cloths and the napkin that had been on Jesus’ head neatly placed in separate places.
If somebody had moved Jesus’ body, why would they leave behind the burial cloth and napkin from the body? It would be reasonable to assume that a body wrapped in a burial cloth would be easier to transport. Furthermore, if grave robbers were targeting Jesus’ body, what would be its commercial value? In light of these inquiries, the disciples were compelled to search for a more plausible explanation for the empty tomb.
It turns out that no one witnessed the moment of the resurrection, but the New Testament preserves many testimonies of encounters with the Risen Christ. Summarising these testimonies, we can affirm that the resurrection is a continuation of life but a wholly transformed continuation. Therefore, it is not enough to visualise resurrection in terms of “coming back from the dead” because resurrection is not merely the regeneration of the same body. Similarly, it is not appropriate to depict resurrection as “out of the dead and into the living” because resurrection is not about an ethereal space that is elusive to historical experience.
Paul once used the metaphor of sowing seeds, pointing out that a person’s body after death is like a seed with a new shoot emerging. On one hand, it is the same seed, but on the other hand, it takes on a different form (1 Corinthians 15:36-38).
Mary Magdalene initially struggled to comprehend the concept of resurrection because she was anticipating the past Jesus in the tomb. When the Risen Christ appeared to her in a different form, she initially mistook him for a gardener. Later, when Jesus called her by name and brought back a series of memories of her past life, she recognised the Risen Christ, her Master.
The empty tomb is not just the place where Jesus was buried; rather, it symbolises the dark and difficult moments we encounter in life. In other words, the whole obscure world before us is like an empty tomb, inviting us to encounter the Risen Christ as we journey through life.
When we are willing to let go of the obsession with “rising from the dead” or the illusion of “coming out of the dead into the living,” we will realise that the Risen Christ is standing in every part of our lives, especially in the moments of grief, loss, pain, guilt, and powerlessness …, and that the vacant tomb becomes a launchpad to eternal life.
In the same way, Paul exhorts us that a person born again in the Lord is an empty tomb that calls forth faith because, in baptism, we have died and been buried with Christ. In Christ, the wrath, violence, malice, and criticism of the past are forgiven, healed, and made into a new creation. May the stones that clogged our hearts be removed so that people will “see” and “believe” in this empty tomb.
Happy resurrection!
