Burial of Jesus

After the crucifixion, Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy member of the Sanhedrin and secret disciple of Jesus, asked Pontius Pilate for the body. Nicodemus, who had previously visited Jesus by night (John 3), brought about 75 pounds of myrrh and aloes for burial.

Together they wrapped Jesus’s body in linen cloths with the spices according to Jewish custom and laid him in Joseph’s own new tomb, cut from rock and never before used, located in a garden near Golgotha. They rolled a large stone against the entrance. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses watched where he was laid (Mark 15:47). The burial fulfilled Isaiah’s prophecy: “They made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death” (Isaiah 53:9).