The Burial of Our Lord

Our Lord was buried for good reasons: (a) to establish beyond all question the fact of his death; Pilate made very sure ofthe fact of death before permitting the body to be taken from the cross and buried; (b) to make possible the glorious Resurrection from the grave, and thus to give hope and promise to mankind of the glory in store for those that do Christ’s will; (c) to indicate that we should be spiritually buried with our Lord, and hidden safe away from the rule of sin.

The body of our Lord was wrapped in burial bands,embalmed with a hundredweight of spices, and laid in a new grave which was hewn out of a rock. The burial was a work of reverence and love; it honored the sacred body, and was praiseworthy in all who took part in it. Such a burial put beyond all question any thought that Christ might not be truly dead.

There was in the perfect body of Christ no weakness that could result in decomposition or putrefaction, even after death. And scripture says (Psalm 15:10): “Nor wilt thou suffer thy holy one to see corruption.” There was, therefore, no dissolution of parts, no crumbling into elements, of the body of Christ in the tomb.

St. Augustine (De Trin. iv) says that thirty-six hours elapsed from the evening of our Lord’s burial to the dawn of the Ressurec-tion. The sacred body was in the tom bone day and two nights. As each part of a day was reckoned aday according to prevailing Jewish usage, we say that our Lord’s body was in the tomb for three days.