And go quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead; and, behold, he goes before you into Galilee; there shall you see him: lo, I have told you.
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Bede
AD 735
Beda in loc.: Otherwise; It may be understood that they began to come in the evening, but that it was the dawn of the first day of the week when they reached the sepulchre; that is, that they prepared the spices for anointing the Lord's body in the evening, but that they took them to the sepulchre in the morning. This has been so shortly described by Matthew, that it is not quite clear in his account, but the other Evangelists give the order more distinctly. The Lord was buried on the sixth day of the week, and the women returning from the sepulchre prepared spices and ointments as long as it was lawful to work; on the sabbath they rested, according to the commandment, as Luke plainly declares; and when the Sabbath was past and the evening was come, and the season of labour returned, with zealous devotion they proceeded to purchase such spices as they yet lacked, (this is implied in Mark’s words, “when the Sabbath was past,” that they might go and anoint Jesus, for which purpose they come early in the morning to the sepulchre.
Beda Hom. Aest. i: For from the beginning of the creation of the world until now, the course of time has followed this arrangement, that the day should go before the night, because man, fallen by sin from the light of paradise, has sunk into the darkness and misery of this world. But now most fitly night goes before day, when, through faith in the resurrection, we are brought back from the darkness of sin and the shadow of death to the light of life, by the bounty of Christ.
The earthquake at the Resurrection, as also at the Crucifixion, signifies that worldly hearts must be first moved to penitence by a health-giving fear through belief in His Passion and Resurrection.
Forasmuch as Christ is both God and man, therefore there lack not amidst the acts of His humanity the ministrations of Angels, due to Him as God. “And came and rolled back the stone;” not to open the door for the Lord to come forth, but to give evidence to men that He was already come forth. For He who as mortal had power to enter the world through the closed womb of a Virgin, He when become immortal, was able to depart out of the world by rising from a sealed sepulchre.
And rightly did the Angel appear standing, who proclaimed the Lord’s coming into the world, to show that the Lord should come to vanquish the prince of this world. But the Herald of the Resurrection is related to have been seated, to show that now He had overcome him that had the power of death, He had mounted the throne of the everlasting kingdom. He sate upon the stone, now rolled back, wherewith the mouth of the sepulchre had been closed, to teach that He by His might had burst the bonds of the tomb. Or the words, “entering into the sepulchre,” may mean entering into some enclosed place, which probably there might be in front of the rock out of which the sepulchre was hewn; and thus it might be the same Angel whom they saw sitting on the righthand, whom Matthew describes as sitting on the stone which he had rolled back.
The Lord is rightly seen by His disciples in Galilee, forasmuch as He had already passed from death to life, from corruption to in corruption; for such is the interpretation of Galilee, ‘Transmigration.’ Happy women! who merited to announce to the world the triumph of the Resurrection! More happy souls, who in the day of judgment, when the reprobate are smitten with terror, shall have merited to enter the joy of the blessed resurrection!
