NOTES for Mar 16:1-8

There is one point in common for both of today’s readings. In the Gospel of Mathew Jesus says: ‘As the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.’ (Mat. 24:27). And Paul writes in his letter to Corinthians: ‘God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.’ (2 Cor. 4:6) The New Covenant is not a secret knowledge available just for a few chosen ones. It is not an exclusive association hostile to aliens. Nor is it a list of requirements that sets up a scale of good and evil based on the depth of the person’s fall into the abyss. The New Covenant is not an ideology intended to mould the souls and minds of its disciples. It’s not even a life-pattern that brings you flowers and fruits in return for rejecting something. It is the light that shines as a lightning from one end of heaven to the other. The light that illuminates and reveals everything – truth and lie, good and evil, life and death. The light beaming from the face of Jesus Christ. And is not just that it can be hard to live without this light in a world that is dark, frightful and cold. Reality proves there is simply no life at all outside of this Light.

Mark describes the Resurrection as an event completely unexpected by everyone, including the disciples themselves. The women going to the tomb are concerned with only one problem: the stone that usually closed the entrance was too heavy for them, and they would not have been able to roll it away by themselves. They are not expecting any miracles anymore. Their Teacher is dead, and He went to His death voluntarily, so everything is over.

In reality, however, events unfold from the very beginning in a way completely different from what they expected. The very stone about which they had thought so much, and which seemed to them to be the main problem, caused them no trouble at all: it had already been moved away from the entrance. Everything that followed also proved entirely unexpected, unlike anything that could be expected according to the logic of our fallen world. Instead of death, the women who came to the tomb find life; instead of burial rites, for which they had come, they receive the news of the Resurrection.

The logic of the Kingdom has always been unlike the logic of the fallen world, and from the very beginning of its entry into the world this logic of the Kingdom has bewildered people who were not ready to meet it. And no one is ready, not even someone who personally heard about the Kingdom from the One who brought it into the world. Why, one might ask, should the women be frightened when they hear of their Teacher's resurrection? They must have heard about resurrection on the last day not only from Him, but also from others. Faith in the general resurrection was widespread among believing Jews, if not everywhere, then at least very widely. Only some representatives of the priestly elite and "liberal" thinking aristocrats did not believe in it, and all of them were more an exception to the general rule.

One could, of course, think that the women were simply frightened, as the apostles were later frightened when they saw the risen Jesus and took Him for a ghost, a shadow that had come out of the tomb. It is also possible that they were frightened when they saw the angel and understood who stood before them, since meetings with God's messengers were not always considered safe. But above all, they were frightened because they simply were not inwardly ready for something they knew about in principle and did not doubt as a reality when speaking of it "in general."

They believed in resurrection "in general," as everyone did, but they were not ready to believe in its reality here and now. Hence the fear, the flight, and, most importantly, the silence. It is impossible to bear witness to what has not yet truly entered one's own life, to what has not yet been understood and fully lived through. Later the time of witness would come, but not at once. It would come after Pentecost, when the Spirit of God would help the witnesses of the Resurrection understand what they had become witnesses of.

Those who came to the tomb were horrified when they saw the stone rolled away and the angel announcing the news of the Resurrection. Even after his words "do not be alarmed," they continue to feel fear to such a degree that at first they say nothing to anyone.

A meeting with the Higher always shakes a person; it evokes entirely natural fear even in those who were frightened neither by the possible anger of rulers nor by the hostility of "public opinion." But precisely the One who is higher than everything natural constantly says: "do not be afraid!" For He has brought joy.

The joy of the Resurrection, which remains joyful news, however incomprehensible it may seem.

The angel whom the women who have come to the Teacher's tomb meet gives them astonishing news: "He is risen." Thus a fact comes into the world that lies at the foundation of the Christian faith. I want to stress: not the idea of God-manhood, not the beauty of Jesus' moral teaching, but a fact. And Christianity is not theological constructions, but the acceptance of this fact into one's own biography. See how the content of the verse we have read helps this.

First of all, the news is brought by an angel, a messenger from God, which means the information he transmits has a supernatural level of truth. He begins with the words: "Do not be amazed." This is how God begins practically every contact of His with a human being, making it clear that His almightiness will not be directed against the person. "You seek Jesus of Nazareth": the matter is not an abstract idea, but a completely concrete Man who lived a real earthly life. "Who was crucified": without death, more precisely without sacrifice, still more precisely without an execution voluntarily accepted for my sins, Jesus has no relation to me, to my biography. "He is risen": this is the center of the message, meaning Christ's victory over death, every death, and therefore mine too. "He is not here": Christ cannot be "caught" by any place, including a tomb. He is free and able to free us.

But all this is not merely an abstraction, not a purely spiritual event: "See the place where He was laid." All this happens in time and space, where our own life also unfolds, now able to receive Christ's resurrection.

In the Gospel of Mark, the account of the Resurrection is much shorter than in the other Gospels; it fits into only twenty verses. And the basis of the account here, paradoxically, is the theme of unbelief or distrust toward the testimony of those who saw the Risen One (v. 8, 11, 13). It would seem that the apostles could and should have been glad to hear the news of the Resurrection, because only recently, just three days earlier, it had seemed to them that everything was already over and there was nothing more to wait for. Of course, there was an element of surprise and of the incredible in what was happening. But there was probably something else as well: unpreparedness to accept such a long-awaited surprise. Long-awaited indeed: most believing Jews of the Gospel era believed in the general resurrection on the last day and in the Last Judgment. In addition, Jesus had spoken to His disciples more than once about His death and about His Resurrection, which was to follow that death. And this very thing was least able to fit into the apostles' consciousness; that is why the news of the Resurrection turned out to be unexpected for them. Here, apparently, a general trait of fallen human nature shows itself: inconstancy. Of course, in principle none of the apostles would ever have doubted the general resurrection or the Last Judgment. Probably, in principle, even the resurrection of their Teacher would not have seemed impossible or incredible to them. But when it happened, it turned out that all this was precisely "in general" and "in principle." And not at all because the apostles' faith was weaker than the faith of their contemporaries or ours. It is simply that when centuries pass between a promise and its fulfillment, faith in what was promised becomes somewhat abstract. It ceases to be a concrete reality expected from day to day, as the first Christians expected the Second Coming promised by the Savior. What becomes the object of spiritual attention is not the promised event, but the expectation itself. It becomes the goal and content of religious life. And then it often turns out that, when what was promised arrives, those least ready for its arrival are precisely those who prepared for it longest and most actively. But when what has been awaited for so long does happen, each person has, as it were, to see and experience anew the new reality entering the world, a reality that brings an end to everything that came before, including the waiting itself. This is the last boundary; beyond it is the Kingdom.

Mark depicts the events after Christ's Resurrection very briefly. Almost every episode in this account is described in more detail in the other Gospels. Mark wants to emphasize the most important thing. So the disciples are hiding from persecution, overcome by grief and despair. Only certain women, who did not leave Jesus in the hour of His death, now want to pay Him their last duty and complete the burial they had not finished because of the Sabbath rest. It is to them, His most faithful followers, that the Angel announces the stunning, fearful, and at the same time joyful news: He has risen. He is not here. But the disciples cannot believe Mary Magdalene, to whom Jesus appeared, or the two other disciples who saw Him. They are so absorbed in their grief and despair that their hearts close themselves to hope, even though Jesus had repeatedly predicted His Resurrection to them. Finally, Jesus Himself appears among them and rebukes them for hardness of heart and unbelief. By His appearing He scatters their grief and fear.

The risen Savior sends the disciples to proclaim to "all creation" the joyful news of the new life that began with His Resurrection. He says that through faith and baptism a person already in this life enters salvation: liberation from slavery to fear, sin, death, and eternal condemnation. Christ names the miraculous signs and gifts now possessed by the new humanity, reborn and raised to life in God. The authority of Christ's disciples over death, illness, and dark powers is testimony to the presence of Christ Himself among them. Even now He lives among us and in us, blessing the preaching of the Gospel of Life.