The Resurrection (Luke 24:1–12)

The texts below are quoted verbatim from public-domain English translations; nothing is paraphrased.

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St. John Chrysostom (c. 347–407)

From his Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew (Homily 89, on Matthew 27:62–28:10), NPNF translation. Public domain. Chrysostom comments here on Matthew's account of the same events.

On how the enemies of Christ, against their will, established the truth:

Everywhere deceit recoils upon itself, and against its will supports the truth ... It was necessary for it to be believed that He died, and that He rose again, and that He was buried, and all these things are brought to pass by His enemies.

On the sealed and guarded tomb, which made the Resurrection incontrovertible:

For because it was sealed, there was no unfair dealing. But if there was no unfair dealing, and the sepulchre was found empty, it is manifest that He is risen, plainly and incontrovertibly.

On why the disciples could not have feigned a resurrection:

For if the chief of them endured not the speech of a woman keeping the door, and if all the rest too, on seeing Him bound, were scattered abroad, how should they have thought to run to the ends of the earth, and plant a feigned tale of a resurrection?

On why the angel rolled away the stone, and the women became witnesses:

After the resurrection came the angel. Why then came he, and took away the stone? Because of the women ... that they might believe that He was risen again, they see the sepulchre void of the body ... Therefore also He had led them to the sight, that they might become witnesses of both things, both of His tomb, and of His resurrection.

On Christ honoring, through the women, the sex that had been dishonored:

Mark how He Himself sends good tidings to His disciples by these women, bringing to honor, as I have often said, that sex, which was most dishonored, and to good hopes; and healing that which was diseased.

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St. Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376–444)

From his Commentary on Luke, as compiled in the Catena Aurea on Luke (Cyril's own text is fragmentary here). Public domain.

On the women, perplexed at the empty tomb, found worthy of the angels:

When then they found not the body of Christ which was risen, they were distracted by various thoughts, and for their love of Christ and the tender care they had shewn Him, were thought worthy of the vision of angels.

On the woman as the first herald of the Resurrection, and the reversal of the curse:

For woman who was once the minister of death, is now the first to receive and tell the awful mystery of the resurrection. The female race has obtained therefore both deliverance from reproach, and the withdrawal of the curse.

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Theophylact of Ohrid (c. 1055–1107)

From his Explanation of the Gospel of Luke, as compiled in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain.

On the Resurrection as naturally past belief, and the apostles' first response:

Now the miracle of the resurrection is naturally incredible to mankind. Hence it follows, And their words seemed to them as idle tales.

On Peter running to the tomb, and his wonder at the grave-clothes:

Peter, as soon as he heard this, delays not, but runs to the sepulchre; for fire when applied to matter knows no delay ... wondering in himself at the way in which it had happened, how the linen clothes had been left behind, since the body was anointed with myrrh.

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St. Athanasius the Great (c. 296–373)

From his On the Incarnation of the Word, as compiled in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain.

On why the Lord waited until the third day to rise:

He might indeed at once have raised His body from the dead. But some one would have said that He was never dead, or that death plainly had never existed in Him ... In order therefore to shew His body to be dead, He suffered the interval of one day, and on the third day manifested His body to be without corruption.

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St. Ambrose of Milan (c. 339–397)

From his Exposition of the Gospel of Luke, as compiled in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain.

On why the women, not permitted to teach, are sent to those at home:

It is not allowed to women to teach in the church, but they shall ask their husbands at home. To those then who are at home is the woman sent.

On the woman who once carried sin now carrying grace (preserved in Bede's citation of Ambrose):

For that the woman might not endure the everlasting reproach of guilt from men, she who had transfused sin into the man, now also transfuses grace.

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St. Bede the Venerable (c. 673–735)

From his Exposition of the Gospel of Luke, as compiled in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain.

On the women's zeal and love, and where the living is not to be sought:

By the women coming to the sepulchre very early in the morning, is manifested their great zeal and fervent love of seeking and finding the Lord ... But not in the sepulchre, which is the place of the dead, was He to be sought, who rose from the dead to life.

On the mystical meaning of the tomb, the spices, and the rolled-back stone:

For that sepulchre also bore the figure of the Altar of the Lord, wherein the mysteries of Christ's Body, not in silk or purple cloth, but in pure white linen ... ought to be consecrated ... But the spices which the women bring, signify the odour of virtue, and the sweetness of prayers by which we ought to approach the Altar. The rolling back of the stone alludes to the unclosing of the Sacraments which were concealed by the veil of the letter of the law.

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St. Gregory the Great (c. 540–604)

From his Homilies on the Gospels, as preserved in Bede's citation in the Catena Aurea on Luke. Public domain.

On the disbelief of the apostles as, in the end, our own strengthening:

Which was not so much their weakness, as so to speak our strength. For the resurrection itself was demonstrated to those who doubted by many proofs, which while we read and acknowledge we are through their doubts confirmed in the truth.