The Many Appearances of the Risen Jesus


First appearance

The first person to see Jesus alive was Mary Magdalene, a woman in the band of followers who had accompanied Him to Jerusalem (Mark 16:9; John 20:1-18). It is surprising—indeed, no less than astounding—to read in the Gospels that Mary was the first witness. Why? First, she was a woman, and the Jews did not attach much credit to female testimony.1 Second, she had a dubious background. She had been possessed by seven devils (Luke 8:2). As a result, she had no doubt descended to crazy, immoral, or sinister behavior. If the Gospel writers wanted their readers to believe that Jesus actually rose from the dead, they certainly could have devised a more convincing story. Yet rather than omit Mary or conceal Mary's past, Mark is not ashamed to remind us who she was.

Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had cast seven devils.

Mark 16:9

Why, in their zeal to prove that Jesus actually rose from the dead, did the Gospel writers offer a witness with so little credibility? Since stories crafted as religious propaganda would have omitted Mary, her prominence in the Gospel accounts of the Resurrection shows two things: (1) the Gospel writers had respect for truth, and (2) the truth in their judgment was that Mary was in fact the first to see the risen Jesus.

His encounter with Mary was not at random, but deliberate. No doubt for at least two reasons He gave her an honored place among witnesses of the Resurrection.

  1. Unlike many of the men who followed Jesus, the women stayed as close to Him as they could throughout the ordeal of His trial and punishment. They accompanied Him to the cross and stood by during the Crucifixion. After He died, they watched as His body was removed from the cross and laid in the tomb (Luke 23:55). Matthew suggests that some of the women, including Mary Magdalene, kept vigil at the tomb throughout Friday night and perhaps the next day as well (Matt. 27:61). Mary's privilege as the first to see Jesus was therefore a reward for her faithfulness.
  2. Mary was still in a state of emotional turmoil on Sunday morning (John 20:11-15). Her grief had not yet subsided. Perhaps it was more severe than anyone else's. So, we may imagine that Jesus appeared to her first because she had the greatest need of comfort. As always, He was attentive to the special needs of each person and was quick to help the weakest. As Isaiah prophesied of the coming Messiah,

    A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench.

    Isaiah 42:3 (cf. Matthew 12:20)

Other appearances

Yet Mary was by no means the only person who saw the risen Christ, however. Paul, in his First Epistle to the Corinthians, gives a partial list of other witnesses.

1 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand;

2 By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.

3 For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures;

4 And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:

5 And that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve:

6 After that, he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once; of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.

7 After that, he was seen of James; then of all the apostles.

8 And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.

1 Corinthians 15:1-8

The list is partial because it mentions only the men. Paul knew that many readers would unfairly consider the testimony of women to be rather dubious.

When rehearsing these post-Resurrection appearances, he gives them in chronological order. Christ appeared to Peter, then to the Twelve, then to five hundred brethren at one time, then to James, then to all the apostles, and lastly—after a long interval—to Paul himself. Though Paul limits his case to male witnesses, he can assure his readers that there were more than five hundred people who saw the risen Christ.

The Gospel writers note several of His appearances that Paul overlooks. When we enlarge our view to include their testimony, we discover that Jesus was seen on at least ten occasions within a few weeks after His death.2

  1. Mary Magdalene saw Him on the Sunday morning following His crucifixion (Mark 16:9; John 20:14-18).
  2. Several other women saw Him a short while later (Matt. 28:9-10).
  3. On the same Sunday, He appeared to Peter (Luke 24:34; 1 Cor. 15:5).
  4. Two disciples on the road to Emmaus saw Him late Sunday afternoon (Mark 16:12-13; Luke 24:13-32).
  5. In the evening of the same day, He came to the eleven remaining disciples (excepting Thomas) as they met in the Upper Room (Mark 16:14; Luke 24:36-48; John 20:19-23; 1 Cor. 15:5).
  6. He came again to the Eleven eight days later—that is, on the next Sunday (John 20:26-30).
  7. After His disciples returned to Galilee, seven met Him on the shore of the sea (John 21:1-22).
  8. He appeared to a gathering of more than five hundred followers (Matt. 28:16-17; 1 Cor. 15:6). Most likely this event was the same as His appearance on a mountain in Galilee (Matt. 28:16-17).
  9. Sometime in the next few weeks, He revealed Himself to His brother James (1 Cor. 15:7).
  10. Six weeks after the Resurrection, at the time of His ascension to heaven, He was seen by approximately 120 people including the Eleven. The day before, He met some of them in Jerusalem and led them out of the city eastward to the village of Bethany. The purpose was apparently to gather more of His followers. Then the whole company walked back toward the city until they crossed the Mount of Olives. Within sight of the eastern wall, they stopped for the night. On the following morning, after admonishing them to evangelize the whole world, He rose into the clouds (Luke 24:49-53; Acts 1:4-15; 1 Cor. 15:7).3

Paul's encounter with the risen Christ took place at his conversion more than a year later (Acts 9:1–22).

In summary, well more than five hundred people saw Jesus after His dead body had been deposited in a sealed tomb. The Resurrection is in fact the best-attested event in antiquity. We have affirmations of it in the writings of no less than five eyewitnesses: Matthew (Matt. 28), Mark (Mark 16:9–19), John (John 20–21), Peter (1 Pet. 1:3), and Paul (1 Cor. 15:8). Probably the Gospel writer Mark was an eyewitness, for he was present in the Garden on the night of Jesus' arrest (Mark 14:50–52). James and Jude, two more eyewitnesses (both were in the Upper Room at Pentecost, and Paul in First Corinthians 15:7 specifically names James as an eyewitness), do not in their epistles refer to the Resurrection, yet in speaking of Jesus as the living Lord (Jas. 2:1; 5:7–9; Jude 4, 21), they are surely expressing certainty that He rose from the dead. So, the number of eyewitnesses that can be called upon to validate the Resurrection as a historical fact is seven, the perfect number.

By comparison, any ancient event ignored by Scripture has meager confirmation in surviving records. These are not altogether void of eyewitness testimony. Josephus, who served as Roman spokesman during the siege of Jerusalem in AD 70, furnishes a lengthy story of the ensuing holocaust in his Wars of the Jews. Julius Caesar gives a detailed account of his ruthless bloodletting among the Gauls in his Gallic Wars. But many, many events that we confidently place in antiquity are not attested by the written testimony of any eyewitness. What we know about the Greek and Roman world generally depends on secondhand information relayed to us by one of the major historians, such as Tacitus, Josephus, Suetonius, or Plutarch. Our knowledge of some events is based on a surviving inscription or official document which seems to express the consensus of multiple eyewitnesses. But rarely in our study of antiquity, if we exclude anything reported in Scripture, do we find an event attested by two different sources, each providing the firsthand testimony of an actual eyewitness. To find an event attested by three would be a challenge. I myself know of none. But an event attested by more than three—even by seven—eyewitnesses? We can say with confidence that none exists. The strong evidential foundation underlying our belief in the Resurrection has no parallel in extrabiblical records of man’s history in the era of Christ, or indeed in all the millennia before modern times.


Harmony of the Four Gospel Accounts


To bolster their assertion that the Gospel accounts of the Resurrection have no historical basis, critics point to seeming discrepancies. For example, Matthew says that several women saw Jesus as they were running to tell the disciples about the empty tomb (Matt. 28:8-9). None of the other Gospels mentions this appearance. Also, whereas Mark says that these women fled from the sepulcher in so much fear that they told no one what they had seen (Mark 16:8), Luke says that they carried the information about the tomb straight to the eleven disciples (Luke 24:9). John, ignoring the other women, reports that after Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found the stone rolled away, she fetched John and Peter, and that after all three returned and looked inside the tomb, she met the Lord in the garden nearby (John 20:1-18).

But the discrepancies are merely superficial. Many commentators have shown that the disparate accounts can be blended into an entirely natural harmony. John Wenham's proposals for resolving the discrepancies are the most thoroughgoing and convincing.4

The Gospel record of the Resurrection must be read with the understanding that Easter Sunday brought forth a complicated and chaotic scene. Many people among both the friends and the foes of Christ were excitedly rushing about, seeking or carrying news. Since each Gospel writer pared down his narrative of this day to convenient simplicity, the four narratives differ and overlap at the same time. To get a full picture, we must fit them together. All the discrepancies disappear if we make three reasonable assumptions.

  1. Mary Magdalene went to the tomb before dawn with the other women, but as soon as they all spotted the open doorway, she parted from her companions. While they approached and entered the tomb, she fled to find Peter and John.5 After she returned, she met the Lord.6
  2. On this same morning the eleven disciples were separated into two groups. Peter and John were together in Jerusalem, where they had come to watch Jesus' trial (John 18:12-16). The other nine were in hiding outside the city, as they had been since their flight on the night of Jesus' arrest (Mark 14:50). They were probably at the house of Mary and Martha in Bethany.7
  3. Mark's statement that the women told no one means that they told no one in Jerusalem. As they rushed through the city, they said nothing to the curious on every hand about the amazing sights which had greeted them in the garden—the empty tomb, the great stone heaved aside, and the mighty angel who spoke of Jesus' resurrection. Rather, without dawdling in conversation, they went straight to Bethany, reserving their news for the main band of disciples. Along the way they met Jesus.8 A short while before, He had appeared to Mary outside the tomb, but He could traverse great distances in a moment. After the Lord dismissed the women, they fulfilled their errand. They found the disciples and gave them an account of what they had seen.9

Footnotes

  1. Charles R. Morrison, The Proofs of Christ's Resurrection; From a Lawyer's Standpoint (Andover, Mass.: Warren F. Draper, 1882), 116.
  2. Wilbur M. Smith, Therefore Stand, Shepherd Illustrated Classic ed. (New Canaan, Conn.: Keats Publishing, 1981), 387-388.
  3. Ed Rickard, In Perils Abounding: Commentary on Acts 1–14 (n.p.: The Moorings Press, 2020), 15.
  4. John Wenham, Easter Enigma, originally, Easter Enigma: Are the Resurrection Accounts in Conflict? (Exeter, Devon, UK: Paternoster Press, 1984; repr., Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan Publishing House, n.d.).
  5. Ibid., 82-83, 90-91; the nascent idea appears in Frank Morison, Who Moved the Stone? (repr., London: Faber and Faber Limited, 1958), 77-78.
  6. Wenham, 94-95.
  7. Morison, 79-87; Wenham, 58-60, 75.
  8. Wenham, 95-99.
  9. Ibid., 99.