Burials

Can you picture burying a loved one in a grave where someone else is already buried? Not in today's world, right? I mean even mausoleums have individual niches. But, that's not how it happened back in Bible days. When they write that the person was placed in a family tomb, that's what they mean. Multiple members of a family were in one tomb.

So, when you read that Jesus was placed in a new, unused tomb, that is something significant. Especially in a city that's been around for centuries.

Now the process they used in caring for the dead is interesting too. According to A Visual Guide to Bible Events, before the body was completely buried in the tomb it was placed on a preparation table first. Once on that table the linen and spices were applied to the body. Then when the process was completed the body was stored in a niche, called a kokh, while the soft tissue decomposed. It was a year or so later that they would place the family member's bones into a small box called an ossuary.

Do you know why they rubbed spices on the bodies of their dead relatives? I thought it was because they didn't embalm their dead like the Egyptians. And, because they visited the grave several times in the first week after someone died. But there was another reason. Apparently, in a sealed tomb poisonous gases would form as the body decomposed. And these spices would stop the formation of those gases.

Interesting, right? But why go back into the tomb? Why put the dead body in a box after it decomposed? Why not put the dead person in a box when he dies?

In a land with limited places to bury the dead, a family did all these preparations so that the body of their loved one could rise from the dead, when the dead are resurrected. (Matthew 22 mentions this future resurrection.) The followers of Jesus had every intention of making the body of Jesus ready for that resurrection.

Can you imagine how shocked they were to find the tomb empty? Think how you would feel if you arrived at the funeral home to make arrangements for a burial and you're told, "You're loved one isn't here anymore. He's alive." I'd be freaked out, wouldn't you?

Anyway, because Jesus was the only one to use this new tomb there could be no confusion as to whose body was missing that wonderful resurrection morning.