The heroines are in the details: Rediscovering the women in the resurrection narratives

Abstract

The four earliest extant resurrection narratives record that women find the empty tomb first. This consensus suggests that although the resurrection narratives diminish the roles of women in these scenes, women undisputedly witness the resurrection. The details of women’s authority and leadership that remain in the narratives preserve their primacy. Isolating these details reveals a pattern of gendered redaction in the three endings of Mark and the four canonical resurrection narratives that diminishes, obscures, and excises women from these texts. This study rediscovers these women. Buttressed by early Christian art, the details of women’s authority and leadership evince new evidence for Historical Jesus reconstructions of these events, the priority of the longer ending of Mark, vestiges of women’s leadership in early Christian worship, and a strong affirmation for the reliability of women’s witness. Analyzing redaction that erases women reveals that the heroines are in the details. By recovering women’s narratives, this article contributes to the study of ancient Jewish and Christian Pseudepigrapha by giving a model of how to recover women’s narratives in other literature as well.

Introduction

For decades, scholars have recognized that the portrayal of women in the New Testament does not fully reflect their contribution to the early Jesus movement. ¹ Although much good work has been accomplished, gender remains undervalued in redaction criticism of early Christian literature. ² For example, women’s active participation in a scene is often considered later expansion rather than foundational information. While all four gospels record women finding the empty tomb first (Matt 28:1; Mark 16:1–2; Luke 24:1, 10; John 20:1), studies that attempt to discover an original, unembellished narrative behind these texts tend to eliminate women’s authority and leadership, asserting that details such as women’s speech were added later. ³ However, there is now ample evidence that details of women’s authority and leadership were points of redaction in the early Church that were obscured in or excised from texts, not added to them. ⁴

While several studies have examined women’s authority in early Christianity, ⁵ none has used women’s authority and leadership as a redaction-critical focus. This study fills that gap by isolating details of women’s authority and leadership in the resurrection narratives and comparing them across the three endings of Mark, the four canonical resurrection narratives, and in early Christian art. Isolating these details provides a method for identifying gendered redaction and how it affects the canonical resurrection narratives. This method resurrects the women who have been diminished, obscured, and even excised from these texts, which is not merely interesting but rather significantly impactful in several areas of study.

The details of women’s authority and leadership represent the remnants of an earlier memory behind the resurrection stories retold in the gospels, and they evince new evidence for Historical Jesus reconstructions of these events. Within these details are vestiges of the origins of women priests and their role in early Christian worship. The longer ending of Mark preserves the oldest memories across the three endings of Mark and across the four gospels, which reverses the current scholarly consensus regarding the priorities of the endings of Mark. A connection between the longer ending of Mark and Q supports this. Summarizing Jesus’ words to the eleven, Mark 16:14 preserves an affirmation of women’s witness and an exhortation to accept women’s teaching. This is a strong gospel challenge to patriarchal passages (e.g., 1 Cor 14:34–35; 1 Tim 2:11–12) with broadsweeping implications for the Church and cultures influenced by Christendom.

The following study demonstrates that “gender is not … a niche category, but … is a necessary area of critical examination” ⁶ influencing our understanding of early Christian sacred literature at every level of inquiry.

Background research

Although the four gospels are known to have been composed in the late first or early second centuries, the earliest extant complete manuscripts date to the fourth century. Before this, scribes felt free to modify New Testament manuscripts and also alter quotations of them extant in copies of treatises by church fathers. ⁷ Bruce M. Metzger and Bart D. Ehrman demonstrate that scribes both removed “heretical” content and inserted “orthodox” content to reflect later beliefs. ⁸ Ehrman explains that “… the [theological] controversies that ensued impacted the surviving literature on virtually every level.” ⁹ Women’s leadership was one such controversy. ¹⁰

There is evidence of female apostleship and leadership of house churches in the New Testament (Rom 16:7; Phil 4:2–3; 1 Cor 16:19). ¹¹ In the centuries following, women’s leadership roles expanded to also include priests, prophets, evangelists, and bishops who preached, taught, performed exorcisms, healed, and baptized. ¹² In the ensuing controversies, detractors accused women leaders and their supporters and followers of heresy, ¹³ while supporters defended women’s leadership with Galatians 3:28 and venerated Mary, the mother of Jesus, as both an example for and protector of women as religious leaders, including as priests. ¹⁴ As a result, this age was characterized by the scribal practice of diminishment and excision of women in early Christian texts, ¹⁵ leaving only faint traces of what once was.

In the New Testament, gendered redaction occurred at every level of transmission, from the construction of salvation theology, ¹⁶ to the minutia of the ordering of names. ¹⁷ For example, women’s names were erased in some versions of texts (e.g., Mark 15:47; 16:1; ¹⁸ Acts 17:34 ¹⁹ ), women were replaced by men (specifically Peter), ²⁰ the gender of women’s names was changed (e.g., Rom 16:3, 7, ²¹ 15; 2 Tim 4:19; ²² 1 Cor 1:14; 16:19; Acts 27:1, 3 ²³ ), and feminine pronouns were masculinized or pluralized or omitted to erase or obscure the presence of women (e.g., Col 4:15; ²⁴ John 11:1; Mark 6:22; ²⁵ Mark 15:40; ²⁶ and Mark 16:11 ²⁷ ). Such redactions of women’s authority and leadership were common and occurred early in the history of transmission. ²⁸ This scribal practice continued throughout the early church and also included effacement and replacement of women in artwork and inscriptions, ²⁹ as well as elimination of women from church histories. ³⁰

The same pattern of redaction is present in textual and material evidence outside of the New Testament in a cultural milieu that also produced a wide variety of religious literature. Academia labels and segregates this literature, however, by religious tradition (Jewish or Christian) or into collections of books (Jewish Pseudepigrapha, Dead Sea Scrolls, Christian Apocrypha, or Patristics). The effect of this literary segregation is a disciplinary siloing that frequently inhibits the findings in one field from informing the research in another. For example, Rosemary Radford Ruether notes that early efforts to explain Jesus’ identity fused apocalyptic messianism with Wisdom literature, where Jesus replaced the older figure of Woman Wisdom (Phil 2:6-11; Col 1:15-20; 1 Tim 3:16; Eph 2:14-16; Heb 1:3; 1 Pet 1:20, 3:18, 3:22; and John 1:1-11). ³¹ Eight years later, Claudia V. Camp noticed a similar pattern in the writings of Ben Sira, whom she argues also erased Woman Wisdom through “a range of rhetorical strategies, first to subtly attach the shame of women to Woman Wisdom and then to erase her from the cult, assuring an all-male utopia.” ³² Both scholars reveal a similar pattern of redaction toward an identical goal, yet Camp cites neither Ruether nor other New Testament scholars who also study this pattern. ³³ Consequently, her work is unconnected to a larger body of evidence regarding a pattern of redaction characteristic of the age and not just of Ben Sira.

Hannah Tervanotko’s work, by contrast, takes an interdisciplinary approach by analyzing the figure of Miriam in the Hebrew Bible as well as the LXX, Jewish Pseudepigrapha, Josephus, and Philo. She demonstrates that the earliest sources depict Miriam as an independent leader, who is reinterpreted in later sources to diminish her agency in a pattern that reflects the socio-historical context of the later texts. ³⁴ Tervanotko’s work demonstrates how cross-disciplinary research is able to breach the artificial barriers of academia, facilitating a richer understanding of the overall time period and each distinct discipline. ³⁵

Understanding how gendered redaction manifested in pseudepigraphical and other non-canonical books aides our understanding of its impact in early Christianity. ³⁶ For example, Ally Kateusz documents the erasure of women in the Dormition tradition. In her redaction critical studies on variants of the second-century Dormition narrative, ³⁷ Ally Kateusz demonstrates that the longest and most detailed narratives of women’s authority and leadership are extant in the earliest texts, evincing that scribes diminished, obscured, or excised them over time. ³⁸ One example involves a pericope describing Mary leading the apostles in prayer after they tell her about their experiences with the Holy Spirit. Mary’s liturgical authority in this scene is redacted in later versions. The longest and oldest surviving manuscript of the Six Books Dormition narrative, “Transitus Mariae” in the Smith Lewis codex (the fifth century CE undertext of a palimpsest), depicts Mary with a high level of liturgical authority: she stands with raised hands and leads a prayer aloud while the apostles prostrate in front of her. ³⁹ Later, shorter versions of this pericope change details that diminish Mary’s authority by depicting her on the same level as the apostles: in the sixth-century “Departure of My Lady Mary from This World,” the apostles stand with Mary; ⁴⁰ in the fourteenth century Ethiopic Six Books, she prostrates with the apostles. ⁴¹ Homilies on this pericope further diminish Mary by removing her from the scene. In a homily dated from the mid-sixth century CE, the men leave before Mary’s prayer, while in a seventh-century CE homily, Mary leaves and Peter prays instead. ⁴² The earliest manuscript, the Smith Lewis codex, contains the most details of Mary’s authority and leadership. The redaction of this pericope is one example of a general pattern of redaction in the Dormition tradition that demonstrates that the details of women’s authority and leadership are preserved among the oldest memories.

What further differentiates Katuesz’s approach is that she buttresses her manuscript work with material evidence from early Christian artwork, which is a unique interdisciplinary contribution to redaction criticism. ⁴³ Kateusz argues that art functions as a conservative text, preserving elements of women’s authority and leadership after they have been removed from manuscripts. ⁴⁴ For example, manuscript redaction obscured or excised women’s possession and use of spices and incense censers. ⁴⁵ In an eighth-century Dormition wall painting of Mary’s deathbed, Mary is surrounded by women swinging incense censers “as if for a funeral liturgy,” whereas an ivory plaque from the tenth century depicts the same scene with men surrounding Mary’s deathbed and only Peter swinging a censer. ⁴⁶ The earliest Six Books Dormition manuscript describes women around Mary’s deathbed, not men, but without censers. The wall painting preserves the women at the deathbed and possibly preserves an even older version of the Six Books Dormition, in which the women swing censers in this scene. ⁴⁷

Elements of women’s authority and leadership that were redacted include women’s names, titles, presence, speech, action, posture, leadership, authority, and possession of spices, incense, and censers. Scribes consistently changed, shortened, or omitted these details over time, sometimes replacing women with men (e.g. Peter) or omitting their stories altogether. ⁴⁸ These details are typically preserved in the earliest texts and art in the Dormition tradition and thus represent the oldest memories about these women. As a result, Kateusz’ findings provide a useful lens for reconsidering the early Christian resurrection narratives.

Methodology

This study measures whether the details of women’s authority and leadership were points of redaction in the New Testament resurrection narratives. In order to measure this, these details are compared in the three endings of Mark (the abrupt ending [16:1–8], the shorter ending, and the longer ending [16:9–20])—one story with multiple recensions—as well as in the four gospel resurrection narratives—the same story in four different traditions. These stories all feature women in positions of leadership and authority, but obscure their prominence.

There have been several excellent studies of women in the four New Testament resurrection narratives. ⁴⁹ This study differs from theirs in several key ways, which allows me to draw different conclusions. First, in my comparison of the four gospel resurrection narratives, I buttress my redaction-critical work with material evidence from early Christian artwork.

Second, I argue that the details of women’s authority and leadership have preserved elements of an earlier memory of the story that is retold in the gospels; in other words, the heroines are in the details. This method enables the expansion of the hermeneutic of remembrance ⁵⁰ to also include what exists in the texts. ⁵¹ Focusing on these extant details enables a novel reconstruction, not necessarily of the original story, but of an earlier memory, which could either reflect a historical reminiscence or the earliest theological reinterpretation of Jesus’ death to include resurrection. This study does not take up this debate, but instead seeks to illuminate what remains of the earlier memory behind the four gospels.

Third, I argue that these details are found in both the long and short narratives. While Kateusz argues that the longest, most detailed narratives about women are the oldest, ⁵² she also discovered an exception in which a late shorter text preserved a unique detail evincing an earlier longer text behind both manuscripts. ⁵³ Therefore, it is the presence of the details and not necessarily the length of the text that matters. Although the axiomatic rule in New Testament text criticism is lectio brevior potior, recent text-critical scholarship calls for contextual evaluation rather than submission to a rule. ⁵⁴ For these reasons, I jettison the maxims in favor of evidence which reveals that both long and short texts preserve details of women’s authority and leadership in the New Testament resurrection narratives.

Finally, despite the scholarly consensus that the most reliable ending of Mark is the abrupt ending (16:8), I include the longer ending of Mark (16:9–20) as equally authoritative at the outset of this study for the following reasons. (1) Even though the scholarly consensus designates the longer ending as a later composition, it could still preserve an older memory of the resurrection narratives. ⁵⁷ (2) Nicholas Zola determined that the longer ending was included in Tatian’s Diatessaron (170 ce) whereas the abrupt ending was not, ⁵⁸ which would date the longer ending earlier than our earliest copies of the abrupt ending (א, B: fourth century CE). Likewise, Joan Taylor argued that the first-century Jewish-Christian theologian, Cerinthus, preferred Mark, and that the longer ending aligns with Cerinthian theology. This connection would have made it objectionable to orthodox redactors and early enough to have priority. ⁵⁷ (3) The longer ending “is preserved in 99 percent of the over 1,600 manuscripts of Mark…[and] no second-century writing clearly attests to a version of Mark ending with 16:8.” ⁵⁸ This widespread attestation suggests that it was an authoritative ending in the early church and thus may shed light on patterns of gendered redaction.

Analysis of the three endings of Mark

The summary of inclusions and omissions for the three endings of Mark are found in Table 1, beginning with Mark 16:7. ⁵⁹ This study only analyzes the verses of the longer ending pertaining to women (16:9–14).

Table 1.

The three endings of Mark.

	Abrupt Ending Mark 16:7–8	Shorter Ending Mark 16:7–8, shorter ending	Longer Ending Mark 16:7–8, shorter ending, 9–14
EMPTY TOMB	yes	yes	yes
Women instructed to tell disciples	yes & Peter	yes & Peter	yes & Peter
Women’s emotional response	terror, fear amazement	terror, fear amazement	terror, fear amazement
Women leave the tomb	yes	yes	yes
Women tell the news to the disciples	NO	NO yes	NO yes
Women’s words recorded	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Who the women tell	OMIT	Peter and those with him	Peter and those with him
Women are believed	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
FIRST APPEARANCE	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Time stamp	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Recipient	OMIT	OMIT	Mary Magdalene from whom he cast out seven demons
Location	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Jesus speaks to her	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
She speaks to Jesus	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Mary instructed to tell brothers	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Emotional state of others before the news	OMIT	OMIT	mourning, weeping
She tells others	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Who she tells	OMIT	OMIT	those who had been with him
Words recorded	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Was she believed?	OMIT	OMIT	NO
SECOND APPEARANCE	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Time stamp	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Recipients	OMIT	OMIT	two of them
Location	OMIT	OMIT	the country
Jesus speaks to them	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
They speak to Jesus	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Report to others	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Who do they tell?	OMIT	OMIT	the rest
Were they believed?	OMIT	OMIT	NO
JESUS APPEARS TO THE ELEVEN	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Recipients	OMIT	OMIT	the eleven
Location	OMIT	OMIT	at the table
Eleven’s response	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Jesus’ first words	OMIT	OMIT	he rebukes them for hardness of heart because they did not believe those who saw him after he had risen

The first marker of women’s authority and leadership is whether the women relay the news of the empty tomb. In the abrupt ending, the women do not tell anyone because they are afraid (16:8). However, in the shorter ending, they tell the news to “those around Peter” ⁶⁰ (τοῖς περὶ τὸν Πέτρον ⁶¹ ). ⁶² These conflicting accounts are similar to conflicts present in different manuscripts of the Dormition narrative. Stephen J. Shoemaker explains that they “reflect an imperfect blending of two separate traditions.” ⁶³ In this case, the shorter ending preserves the earlier memory because the women recount the events of the empty tomb.

The next marker is the presence or absence of resurrected-Jesus appearance narratives. While the abrupt and shorter endings omit these narratives, the longer ending contains three examples that feature or elevate women’s authority. The first appearance narrative in the longer ending (16:9–11) features Mary Magdalene. However, several manuscripts preserve feminine plural pronouns in this story, ⁶⁴ evincing another imperfect blend of two separate traditions. Given the common scribal practice of changing the gender of pronouns (see above), there could have been an even older narrative behind these verses in which other women accompanied Mary Magdalene. The second appearance narrative (16:12–13) features “two of them” (δυσὶν ἐξ αὐτῶν)—masculine plural—which retains the possibility that at least one of these witnesses was a woman. ⁶⁵ The first and second appearances were reported, but not believed (16:10–11, 13). The third appearance elevates the authority of women because Jesus rebukes the eleven for not believing the people (including women) who reported the first appearances (16:14). This statement is evidence within the New Testament—from the mouth of Jesus—for an early perspective that valued women’s witness. ⁶⁶

The final marker of gendered redaction among the three endings is whether or not Peter is mentioned by name. It is widely acknowledged that Peter’s appearance in the resurrection narratives corroborates the women’s—presumptively unreliable—witness ⁶⁷ and diminishes the authority of Mary Magdalene. ⁶⁸ This pattern is consistent when comparing the three endings of Mark. The longer ending, which has the most details of women’s authority and leadership, does not mention Peter. These are as follows: 16:10: “those who had been with him” (τοῖς μετ’ αὐτοῦ γενομένοις); 16:13: “the rest” (τοῖς λοιποῖς); and 16:14: “the eleven” (τοῖς ἕνδεκα). The shorter and abrupt endings, however, mention Peter by name. Observe: 16:7: “his disciples and Peter” (τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ); and shorter ending: “those around Peter” (τοῖς περὶ τὸν Πέτρον). One way of explaining the discrepancy is that the abrupt and shorter endings of Mark reflect the first attempts to interpolate Peter into these scenes before it was acceptable to add him as a firsthand eye-witness to the empty tomb or the resurrected Jesus (cf. Luke 24:12, 34 and John 20:3–10).

These observations are not unique to the longer ending, but align with similar themes in the Gospel of Mark. ⁶⁹ Mark distinguishes between the twelve and the other disciples (including women). ⁷⁰ The longer ending continues this pattern by mentioning the eleven (16:14), whereas the abrupt and shorter endings do not (16:7: “his disciples and Peter” [τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ]; the shorter: “those around Peter” [τοῖς περὶ τὸν Πέτρον]). Moreover, Mark presents the twelve as incompetent and deserving of rebuke from Jesus, which is contrasted with stories about slaves, children, gentiles, and women who model exemplary discipleship. ⁷¹ In the longer ending, this theme continues with the rebuke of the eleven and the elevation of women’s reliability (cf. Mark 14:3–9), whereas in the abrupt ending, this theme is reversed, introducing a completely new concept of incompetent women disciples. ⁷²

In conclusion, the shorter ending, in which the women relay the news of the empty tomb, preserves an older memory than the abrupt ending. Between the three endings, I contend that the longer ending preserves the oldest memory of the Markan resurrection narratives because it features and elevates women’s authority and leadership by: (a) retaining first appearance narratives where women witness the resurrected Jesus and tell others about it; (b) not mentioning Peter by name; (c) recording Jesus’ rebuke of the eleven; and (d) Jesus’ affirmation of women’s reliability. It is unlikely that we will ever recover the original ending of Mark. Perhaps the reason why so many manuscripts retain the longer ending (99% of over 1,600 manuscripts) ⁷³ is that, more so than the abrupt or shorter endings, it was, in fact, an older memory. ⁷⁴

Analysis of the four gospel resurrection narratives

The details of women’s authority and leadership in the four gospel resurrection narratives reflect various stages of redaction. In the following comparisons, the descriptions are listed in order from the most details to the least. While Luke records the most named women, Mark describes more details than the other three gospels most of the time, supporting the two-source hypothesis. ⁷⁵ This study also expands the two-source hypothesis by demonstrating that all three endings of Mark preserve the oldest memories of both the empty tomb and first three appearance narratives across the four gospels. Specifically, these comparisons demonstrate that the abrupt ending (16:1–8) preserves an older memory than the other three gospels about the women’s possession of spices and purpose at the empty tomb. The shorter ending preserves an even older memory than the abrupt ending about the women relaying the news of the empty tomb. The longer ending (16:9–20), preserves the oldest memory between the three endings of Mark and the other three gospels because of the language used to describe the eleven, the inclusion of women witnesses who relay the news of the resurrected Jesus, and Jesus’ affirmation of the women’s reliability in response to the eleven’s doubt. In addition, a similarity between Q and the longer ending of Mark is explicated, further connecting this ending with the two-source hypothesis.

Analysis of the empty tomb narratives

Table 2 summarizes the inclusions and omissions for the empty tomb narratives. If women are replaced by men in the narrative, the change is indicated (e.g., Peter instead of yes). If something is implied but not narrated, it is considered omitted.

Table 2.

The empty tomb narratives.

EMPTY TOMB	Mark 16:1–8 Abrupt Ending	Shorter Ending	Matthew 28:1–8	Luke 24:1–12	John 20:1–23
Sabbath	yes		yes	OMIT	OMIT
Early, first day of the week	yes, sun had risen		yes, dawn	yes, dawn	yes, still dark
Location = Jesus’ tomb	yes		yes	yes	yes
Named women	Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, Salome		Mary Magdalene, other Mary	Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, other women with them	Mary Magdalene
Possession of spices	yes		OMIT	yes	OMIT
Purpose for visiting the tomb	anointing Jesus’ body		to see	OMIT	OMIT
Women speaking to one another	yes		OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Stone is rolled away	yes		yes	yes	yes
Earthquake	OMIT		yes	OMIT	OMIT
Presence of angel	young man		angel	two men	two angels
Angel’s posture	sitting		sitting	standing	sitting
Location of angel	inside, on the right		outside, on the stone	inside, beside the women	inside, where Jesus’ body was
Women enter the tomb	yes		OMIT	yes	Peter & beloved disciple
Women’s posture	OMIT		OMIT	bow faces to ground	stoop from outside
Women look into the tomb	OMIT		OMIT	Peter (stoops)	yes & beloved disciple (stoops)
Women find the body missing	OMIT		OMIT	yes	yes
Linens found	OMIT		OMIT	Peter	Beloved disciple & Peter
Women’s emotions	alarmed		Guards fear, shook, like dead men	terrified	weep
Angel speaks to women	yes		yes	yes	yes
Women speak to angel	OMIT		OMIT	OMIT	yes
Angel affirms women looking for Jesus	yes		yes	Why do you look for the living among the dead?	Woman, why are you weeping?
Angel affirms resurrection	yes		yes	yes	OMIT
Angel invites women to look	yes		yes	OMIT	OMIT
Women look at where Jesus lay	OMIT		OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
Angel reminds women of Jesus’ past words	yes		This is my message for you	yes	OMIT
Women instructed to tell disciples	yes & Peter		yes	OMIT	OMIT
…about the resurrection	OMIT		yes	OMIT	OMIT
…that Jesus will meet them in Galilee	yes		yes	OMIT	OMIT
Women’s emotional response	terror, fear, amazement		fear, joy	Peter: amazed	weeping
Women leave the tomb and run	yes		yes	Peter: runs to the tomb	yes
Women tell the news	NO	yes	Guards	yes	yes
Women speak	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Who the women tell	OMIT	Peter & those with him	Guards tell chief priests	The eleven & all the rest The apostles	Peter & the beloved disciple
Women are believed	OMIT	OMIT	Guards are believed	NO	unclear—the men check

All four canonical empty tomb narratives record that women were at the tomb first. Uniquely, Luke 24:10 records five or more women, followed by Mark 16:1 with three, Matthew 28:1 with two, and John 20:1 with one. ⁷⁶ Mary Magdalene is named in all four narratives almost certainly because the tradition of her eye-witness was too strong to omit her. ⁷⁷ The other named women are as follows: Salome (Mark 16:1), Mary the mother of James (Mark 16:1 and Luke 24:10), the other Mary (Matt 28:1), Joanna and the other women with them (Luke 24:10). Even if Mary the mother of James and the other Mary are the same person, combining all the names into one group indicates that the fewest number of women at the empty tomb was five.

Within these verses are two more examples of Shoemaker’s “imperfect blending of two separate traditions.” ⁷⁸ First, Salome does not appear in all of the manuscripts of Mark 16:1, ⁷⁹ evincing gendered redaction of women’s names in Mark. Salome’s inclusion represents an older memory than her exclusion. Second, the conjugation of the verb Mary Magdalene uses in her speech in John 20:2—“we do not know” (οὐκ οἴδαμεν) ⁸⁰ — creates a contradiction in the story. This plural verb represents an older memory of more women accompanying Mary Magdalene to the tomb than John names. ⁸¹

The next marker of gendered redaction is the women’s possession of spices and their purpose at the tomb. ⁸² In Mark 16:1, they went with “spices” (ἀρώματα) and a purpose: to anoint Jesus’ body. Luke 24:1 retains the “spices” (ἀρώματα), but drops the purpose. Matthew 28:1 omits the spices and downgrades the purpose: they only go “to see” (θεωρῆσαι). John 20:1 omits both the spices and the purpose for visiting the tomb. ⁸³ The shift in the narratives from an active purpose with spices to neither purpose nor spices renders the women more and more passive in the narratives across the gospels. These changes obscure and/or eliminate the women’s authority and leadership in this scene.

While the most detailed account of the spices and purpose—including speech—is in Mark’s gospel, those details do not make sense: ⁸⁴ Mark 16:3 records the women discussing the impossibility of moving the stone to anoint the body with spices, and Mark 16:4 implies that they could not have moved it themselves because it was “very large” (ἦν γὰρ μέγας σϕόδρα). Why would they go to the tomb to anoint the body with spices if they knew they could not move the stone to complete this task? Perhaps an earlier memory described the women going to the tomb with spices for a purpose that did not require removing the stone. Perhaps this earlier memory included speech about using the spices for a liturgical purpose.

This is plausible because women functioned as liturgical officiants in Second Temple Judaism and contemporaneous Greek and Roman contexts. ⁸⁵ Women, more often than men, provided leadership in the cult of the dead in the ancient world in which they led funerary liturgies (rituals, meals, lamentations) and also at other times, such as visits to tombs and, in Christian contexts, during eucharistic meals in cemetaries. ⁸⁶ According to Kathleen E. Corley, “the earliest evidence for Christian liturgical practice is funerary.” ⁸⁷ The association between the women’s presence at the empty tomb and mourning rituals has already been made. ⁸⁸ Although Corley argues against this connection, ⁸⁹ she does not include the detail of spices or censing in her study. In fact, Katuesz reveals however, evidence from the Dormition tradition of women leading funerary liturgies while swinging incense censers (i.e. spices). ⁹⁰ It is possible, then, that the women in the gospels went early to the tomb with spices for censing in order to perform a funerary or lamentation liturgy rather than for anointing Jesus’ body. Furthermore, Corley neglects to consider the possibility that what was intended as a lamentation liturgy was interrupted by the empty tomb and became a celebration of resurrection (either as a historical remembrance or theological reinterpreation). The significance of retaining the funerary elements of the liturgy would have served to emphasize the celebration of the resurrection.

In fact, artwork preserves this very form of Easter liturgy, namely women censing at Jesus’ tomb. An ivory pyxis in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (500 ce) portrays five women at the altar of Jesus’ tomb in the Anastasis, aligning with the findings above regarding the minimum number of women at the tomb being five. Two are holding incense censers, and three have their arms raised in a liturgical pose (Figures 1[a] and [b]). ⁹¹ Kateusz demonstrates that this scene depicts the liturgy at the shrine of Jesus’ tomb, built by Constantine in 326 CE. ⁹² She provides proof of a long tradition of women censing at Jesus’ tomb. The fifth-century Six Books Dormition palimpsest (the contents of which date to the second century) ⁹³ describes Mary censing at her son’s tomb daily, and Kateusz further surmises that this story “may reflect the author’s knowledge of actual women censing at the tomb.” ⁹⁴ Furthermore, the tradition of women censing at the altar of Jesus’ tomb in the Anastasis is recorded in Egeria’s fourth-century diary, ⁹⁵ sixth- and seventh-century souvenir ampoules, and in a Typikon preserved in Codex Stavrou 43, a Greek liturgical manuscript dated 1122 CE which describes in great detail this Easter liturgical tradition, including “women with censers, called myrrhophores or myrrhbearers.” ⁹⁶

Figure 1.

The Women at the Altar of Jesus’ Tomb in the Anastasis. Five women lead the liturgy at the altar of Jesus’ tomb in the Anastasis. Two swing incense censers (left), and three have their arms raised in a liturgical pose for prayer (right). ⁹⁷

There is further evidence in early Christian artwork for a different memory in the tradition of Matt 28:1–7 in which two women bring objects to the tomb, instead of just going to “see.” One of the wooden panels of the exterior doors of the Basilica di Santa Sabina all’Aventino in Rome (420–430 ce) is the earliest known Christian artwork of the empty tomb narrative: two women find the empty tomb and meet an angel (Figure 2). There are three notable differences between this scene and Matthew’s description. First, the guards are not present. Second, the angel is standing, which I will address below. Third, the women are both carrying something, presumably spices, which are not in Matt 28:1. This carving presents more details of women’s authority and leadership which suggests that it represents an earlier memory of this scene in Matthew’s tradition. ⁹⁸

Figure 2.

Two standing women carrying objects (which may be spices) encounter a standing angel at the empty tomb. The angel’s hand gesture indicates that he speaks to them. The women’s raised hands indicate an active role in the scene. Wood carving. Basilica di Santa Sabina all’Aventino in Rome (420–430 CE). ⁹⁹

The spices were an important detail related to the women’s purpose and speech at the tomb that morning. In sum, I argue that an earlier memory of this scene included women going to Jesus’ tomb with censers to perform a lamentation liturgy, but they were interrupted by the tomb being empty. The memory became a tradition that was passed down as a lamentation-turned-resurrection liturgy. Corley demonstrates that such oral traditions originate with women and the working class very close to the time of burial. She argues that the passion narratives began as an ancient oral lamentation, going back to the first few days after Jesus’ death, predating the empty tomb tradition and the creed in 1 Cor 15:3–8. ¹⁰⁰ If, as I argue, the empty tomb narratives are also associated with lamentation oral traditions, then they would also predate the creed in 1 Cor 15:3–8. This sequence of events would account for the spices, the women’s purpose, and their speech. It would also explain why the earliest Christian liturgical practices were funerary in form, and why an all-women liturgical tradition arose in which multiple women censed at the tomb of Jesus on Easter. The latter would additionally resolve why the detail of the spices was an important marker of redaction in the gospel resurrection narratives. ¹⁰¹

I now return to the issue of the angel standing alongside the women on the Saint Sabina Door in Figure 2. In ancient artwork and narrative, two standing figures in a scene indicates a relative equality between them. The relatively equal status of the women and the angel in Figure 2 does not occur in the gospel narratives. The posture of the women in relation to the men/angel(s) diminishes the women’s status across the four gospels. Mark, again, preserves the highest status of the women. When one figure is sitting and another standing, the standing figure’s status is diminished: in Mark 16:5, the women encounter a man sitting inside the tomb. If a figure is removed from a scene (from inside to outside), they are diminished in status: in Matt 28:2, the women encounter a sitting angel outside the tomb (they do not even look into the tomb). If one figure is sitting and another bows their face to the ground or stoops, the figure with lower posture is further diminished in status: in Luke 24:4–5, the women bow their faces to the ground before sitting men inside the tomb. In John 20:11–12 Mary stoops from outside the tomb to look in and sees two sitting angels. ¹⁰² The standing women with the standing angel on the Saint Sabina door represents an alternative tradition with more details of women’s authority, suggesting that it preserves an older memory of this scene.

Women are also diminished in this scene by the incremental insertion of men into the narratives at the empty tomb. Mark alone has the least disruptive insertions of men, which means it preserves the oldest memories of the women’s authority. Mark simply refers to Peter by name (“his disciples and Peter” [τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ]) in the conversation with the angel, but does not otherwise include men. Matthew 28:4 includes male guards in this scene. Luke inserts men twice. In Luke 24:4, two men greet the women at the empty tomb instead of one. Luke 24:12 adds Peter as a witness to the empty tomb: Peter runs there after the women’s report and stoops (from outside?) to look in. John further diminishes the women and clearly relies on Luke. ¹⁰³ Whereas Luke narrates the women entering the tomb and Peter stooping to look in from outside, John depicts Peter and the beloved disciple entering into the tomb (20:6, 8), while Mary stoops to look in from outside (20:11). In addition, instead of responding to the empty tomb with agency as she does in the other gospels, Mary runs to find the men (John 20:2), ¹⁰⁴ as if she does not know what to do without male guidance. John 20:12 also increases the number of angels from one to two. Furthermore, the men in both Luke 24:12 and John 20:5–7 find linen cloths in the tomb, a detail not occurring in any account of women’s encounter with the empty tomb.

The women’s response to these events is also a point of redaction in which Mark preserves the most details alongside Luke. In Mark 16:5 they are “alarmed” (ἐξεθαμβήθησαν) and in Luke 24:5 they are “terrified” (ἐμϕόβων). However, Matt 28:4 gives the emotional reaction to the male guards (fear, shaking, “became like dead men” [ἐγενήθησαν ὡς νεκροί]), whereas the women lack a response to the empty tomb in Matthew, making them flat characters. John 20:2, 11–12, diminish Mary because she does not react on her own terms to these events, but instead seeks men or weeps about death rather than reacting to the unusual events of the empty tomb.

In all of the gospels, the man/angel speaks to the women. Mark, again, preserves the most details, but this time alongside Matthew. Mark and Matthew depict the women as competent, whereas Luke and John depict them as incompetent. In Mark 16:6 and Matt 28:5, the man/angel affirms that the women are looking for Jesus, the man/angel affirms the resurrection (also Luke 24:5), and the man/angel invites the women to look where the body lay. In Luke 24:5 and John 20:13, by contrast, the men/angels ask a question of the women that implies they are doing something wrong. The men in Luke say, “Why do you look for the living among the dead?” (τί ζητεῖτε τὸν ζῶντα μετὰ τῶν νεκρῶν) and the angels in John say, “Woman, why are you weeping?” (γύναι, τί κλαίεις). That being said, John is the only gospel to record Mary speaking to the angels (20:13).

Another point of redaction in the conversation with the angel(s) involves the women’s past relationship with Jesus. Mark, now with Luke, preserves the most details. Mark and Luke indicate that the women had been part of Jesus’ inner circle by reminding them of Jesus’ past words to them (Mark 16:7: “just as he told you” [καθὼς εἶπεν ὑμῖν]; Luke 24:6: “remember how he told you” [μνήσθητε ὡς ἐλάλησεν ὑμῖν]). In Matt 28:7, however, the angel instead says, “This is my message for you” (emphasis added; ἰδοὺ εἶπον ὑμῖν). ¹⁰⁵ John omits this part of the conversation completely.

The women’s commissioning and their emotional response to it is a unique section where Matthew’s gospel preserves the oldest memory, indicating a diminishment of the priority of the abrupt ending of Mark (16:8). In Matt 28:7, the angel commissions the women to tell the news “to his disciples” (τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ) about both the resurrection and Jesus’ intent to meet them in Galilee. In Matt 28:8, they leave the tomb quickly at a run, filled with both fear and joy. In Mark 16:7, the man instructs the women to tell “his disciples and Peter” (τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ) only about Jesus’ future meeting with them in Galilee. In Mark’s abrupt ending (16:8), they flee at a run with terror, amazement, and fear. Luke and John both omit the commissioning. In John 20:2, Mary leaves at a run before she speaks to the angel and her emotional response (weeping) is not about this encounter. The subversion of the order of events diminishes Mary’s agency and authority at the empty tomb. Luke omits the women’s departure and emotional response, but narrates Peter running to the tomb and responding with amazement (24:12).

Whether the women relay the news was clearly an issue that later redactors obscured or excised. The shorter ending of Mark takes priority over the abrupt ending. The shorter ending of Mark and Luke 24:9–10 both narrate the women telling the news to an undisclosed number of people, but do not record their speech. Luke mentions that they were not believed (24:11). The abrupt ending of Mark (16:8) says that, out of fear, the women do not tell anyone. Matthew 28:8 records the women’s intent to tell the news, but the action is omitted and given to men—the guards—who relay the news of the empty tomb to the chief priests and are believed (28:11–12). While John 20:2 appears to have a marker of women’s authority by narrating Mary speaking, she says the same thing to Peter and the beloved disciple that she says to the angels (20:13). These words are not news of the resurrection, but confusion. They may represent a vestige of what was said to the angels, but not to the disciples.

Of note, though Peter and the beloved disciple are inserted as witnesses of the empty tomb in both Luke and John, they return home without telling anyone (Luke 24:12; John 20:10). By this redactional stage, the tradition of the women’s report (though excised) was so strong that the words could not be put in anyone else’s mouth. Perhaps if the redactors of Luke and John had put the women’s words in the men’s mouths, no one would have believed their gospels.

In sum, most of the details of women’s authority and leadership in the empty tomb narratives are found in the abrupt and shorter endings of Mark, with the shorter ending taking priority over the abrupt ending. Therefore, I argue that abrupt ending of Mark preserves the oldest memory behind the women’s possession of spices and purpose at the empty tomb and that the shorter ending of Mark preserves an even older memory than the abrupt ending about the women relaying the news of the resurrection.

Analysis of the first three appearance narratives

Table 3 summarizes the inclusions and omissions for the appearance narratives. This study examines the first three appearance narratives in the four gospels, ending with the first exchange between Jesus and the eleven in each one.

Table 3.

The first three appearance narratives.

	Mark 16:9–14	Matthew 28:9–18	Luke 24:13–39	John 20:14–20
FIRST APPEARANCE	yes	yes	OMIT	yes
Time stamp	yes	yes	OMIT	yes
Jesus appeared to	Mary Magdalene from whom he cast out seven demons	them: Mary Magdalene, other Mary	OMIT	Mary Magdalene
Location	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	the garden, near the tomb
Jesus’ posture	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	standing
Jesus is recognized	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	NO
Jesus speaks to the women	OMIT	yes	OMIT	yes
Women speak to Jesus	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Posture of the women	OMIT	took hold of his feet	OMIT	OMIT
Jesus’ response to women’s posture	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	Jesus instructs NOT to hold him
Women instructed to tell brothers	OMIT	yes	OMIT	yes
Women tell others	yes	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Words recorded	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT	yes
Women believed	NO	OMIT	OMIT	OMIT
SECOND APPEARANCE	yes	OMIT	yes	OMIT
Time stamp	after this	OMIT	the same day	OMIT
Jesus appeared to	two of them	OMIT	Cleopas and unnamed	OMIT
Location	the country	OMIT	Emmaus road seven miles from Jerusalem	OMIT
Jesus recognized at first	OMIT	OMIT	NO	OMIT
Jesus speaks to them	OMIT	OMIT	yes	OMIT
They speak to Jesus	OMIT	OMIT	yes	OMIT
Jesus’ response to the report that women at empty tomb were not believed	OMIT	OMIT	you are foolish for not believing the Scriptural predictions of the suffering and death of the Messiah	OMIT
Appearance to Peter (Simon) mentioned	OMIT	OMIT	yes	OMIT
Report to the disciples	yes	OMIT	yes	OMIT
They are believed	NO	OMIT	yes	OMIT
THIRD APPEARANCE	yes	yes	yes	yes
Jesus appeared to	the eleven	the eleven	the eleven and their companions	the disciples
Location	at the table	Galilean Mountain	Jerusalem	in a home with shut doors
Disciples’ response to Jesus’ appearance	OMIT	worship some doubt	startled, terrified, thought he was a ghost	OMIT
Jesus’ first words/actions	he rebukes them for hardness of heart because they did not believe those who saw him after he had risen	all authority has been given to me go and make disciples	peace be with you, why are you afraid and doubt, see my wounds, touch and see, not a ghost	peace be with you, shows hands and side

The first appearance of the risen Jesus features women. Matthew 28:11 records Mary Magdalene and the other Mary (28:1) seeing Jesus first, whereas Mark 16:9 and John 20:14 only include Mary Magdalene. Mark 16:9 describes Mary Magdalene as the one from whom Jesus cast out seven demons. While this has long been understood to mean she was a sinner, ¹⁰⁶ “healing from evil spirits was a first-century equivalent of medical science,” and thus denotes healing from illness. ¹⁰⁷ Ann Graham Brock argues that Luke (8:2) uses this designation to diminish Mary’s authority by indicating she was a beneficiary of his miracles rather than a leader of his community. ¹⁰⁸ However, in Mark 16:9 this title is given in the context of her being the first to witness the resurrected Jesus. Here it represents a detail of her past relationship with Jesus, buttressing the man’s words in Mark 16:7. Luke, who omits this story, had to move this designation and, as in other cases, diminishes Mary through both the omission of the first appearance and also this relocation.

The women’s posture in relation to Jesus is also a marker of redaction. Mark omits Mary’s posture, which mean that she could have been standing. In John 20:17, Jesus instructs Mary not to hold him, but we do not know where she is touching him. In Matt 28:9, the women take hold of Jesus’ feet, lowering their posture. Luke omits the entire story. A scene with the risen Jesus in the tradition of Matthew’s narrative is carved however, on the Saint Sabina door (Figure 3). The carving depicts two women encountering the risen Christ and standing along with him, not taking hold of his feet. Later, artwork does depict the women holding his feet, ¹⁰⁹ which indicates that this carving possibly represents an earlier version in Matthew’s tradition depicting women standing with the risen Jesus.

Figure 3.

Two standing women encounter the risen Jesus. Jesus’ hand gesture indicates that he speaks to them. The women’s raised hands indicate an active role in the scene. Wood carving. Basilica di Santa Sabina all’Aventino in Rome (420–430 CE). ¹¹⁰

In both John 20:15–17 and Matt 28:9–10, Jesus speaks to the women. John also records Mary’s response, which indicates that there was a memory of Mary Magdalene (and the other women) conversing with Jesus. In John, Jesus commissions Mary to tell the others about the ascension, while in Matthew, Jesus commissions them to tell the others to meet him in Galilee. Mark 16:10 and John 20:18 both narrate that Mary Magdalene told Jesus’ inner circle but neither record her words. Mark 16:11 relays that she was not believed. Given that Jesus’ resurrection is the foundation for Christianity, it is remarkably odd that no speech about the first encounter with the risen Christ was preserved in the canonical gospels. Mary Magdalene was known as a great teacher in other second-century texts ¹¹¹ so it follows that her speech would have been memorable and powerful. Perhaps it was too powerful in the mouth of a woman and so was excised from the canonical gospels.

Only Mark and Luke record a second appearance. Jesus appears in the country in Mark 16:12 and on the road to Emmaus in Luke 24:13. In Mark 16:12–13, the witnesses are unnamed and called “two of them” (δυσὶν ἐξ αὐτῶν). They report this encounter to “the rest” (τοῖς λοιποῖς) but are not believed. Luke 24:13–35 expands the story to name one of the two, Cleopas, which shifts the focus from an ambiguous masculine plural to one definitive male, thereby diminishing the second companion. While Claudia Setzer argues that we can only wonder about the gender of Cleopas’ companion, ¹¹² Sharon H. Ringe notes that Cleopas is the Greek form of Clopas, the name of Mary’s spouse in John 19:25. John and Luke could be referring to the same couple. ¹¹³ If this is the case, this second companion was most likely a woman. While James A. Kelhoffer surmises that the second appearance in Mark is a Lukan bridge, ¹¹⁴ the evidence suggests that Luke expanded Mark’s story in order to obscure this second companion. ¹¹⁵

Two more details expose this obscuration. In Luke 24:17–27, Cleopas and his companion converse with Jesus. They mention the women’s empty tomb report and that they were not believed. Jesus does not affirm the women’s reliability, but appeals to the Scriptures in 24:25–27:

“Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

ὦ ἀνόητοι καὶ βραδεῖς τῇ καρδίᾳ τοῦ πιστεύειν ἐπὶ πᾶσιν οἷς ἐλάλησαν οἱ προϕῆται· οὐχὶ ταῦτα ἔδει παθεῖν τὸν χριστὸν καὶ εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν δόξαν αὐτοῦ; καὶ ἀρξάμενος ἀπὸ Μωϋσέως καὶ ἀπὸ πάντων τῶν προϕητῶν διερμήνευσεν αὐτοῖς ἐν πάσαις ταῖς γραϕαῖς τὰ περὶ ἑαυτοῦ.

Instead of rebuking them for doubting the women’s reliability, Jesus does not mention the women’s testimony but rather points Cleopas and his companion to the Scriptures. Furthermore, when Cleopas and his companion tell the others, their news is overshadowed. In 24:34, the eleven and their companions say, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon” (ὄντως ἠγέρθη ὁ κύριος καὶ ὤϕθη Σίμωνι). This reveals another possible reason that Luke expands Mark’s story: to erase Mary Magdalene and replace her with Peter as the first witness of the risen Jesus. ¹¹⁶ This entire expansion is a literary embellishment based on the longer ending of Mark designed to obscure and excise women from the appearance narratives.

The third appearance narrative depicts the risen Jesus before his inner circle and his first interaction with them. In all four gospels, Jesus appears to a group, understood to be his inner circle: Mark 16:14 “the eleven” (τοῖς ἕνδεκα); Matt 28:16 “the eleven disciples” (ἕνδεκα μαθηταὶ); Luke 24:33 “the eleven and their companions” (τοὺς ἕνδεκα καὶ τοὺς σὺν αὐτοῖς); and John 20:19 “the disciples” (οἱ μαθηταὶ). In Mark and Matthew, this group is male-only. In Luke and John, the gender of those represented is unclear. In Mark 16:14, Jesus appears and the first thing he says is a rebuke: “He upbraided them for their lack of faith and stubbornness, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen” (ἐϕανερώθη καὶ ὠνείδισεν τὴν ἀπιστίαν αὐτῶν καὶ σκληροκαρδίαν ὅτι τοῖς θεασαμένοις αὐτὸν ἐγηγερμένον οὐκ ἐπίστευσαν). This is a powerful detail of women’s authority and leadership. It is the only time that overcoming disbelief affirms women’s reliability in the resurrection narratives. This detail is omitted in Matt 28:17, which mentions doubt, but does not address the issue. This detail is replaced in Luke 24:38–39 and John 20:20 with Jesus showing his wounds (and above, with Jesus appealing to Scripture in Luke 24:25). ¹¹⁷

This elevation of women’s authority in the longer ending of Mark is consistent with the Markan theme of exemplary female discipleship compared with the incompetent twelve. ¹¹⁸ Jesus defends female followers against the derogatory remarks of the male disciples in several passages (cf. Mark 5:21–34; 7:24–30; 14:3–9). It also continues a pattern of Mark bestowing more authority on his female disciples when compared with the other gospels. Setzer argues that Mark 15:41 describes women as habitual disciples of Jesus, whereas Matt 27:55–56 and Luke 23:49 change the verb tense or the verb (respectively) to diminish this discipleship by rendering it a one-time event or ambiguous (respectively). ¹¹⁹ Mark’s affirmation of the women’s reliability in the longer ending is also consistent with his elevation of Mary in his unique title for Jesus in 6:3, “Son of Mary” (ὁ υἱὸς τῆς Μαρίας). Contrary to the belief that this was a derogatory title, ¹²⁰ Tal Ilan demonstrates that this title was considered proper and typical and was used when the mother had superior lineage, was respected, and/or was more important than the father. ¹²¹ This is an old title ¹²² that was altered in Matt 13:55 (“son of a carpenter” [ὁ τοῦ τέκτονος υἱός]) and Luke 4:22 (“son of Joseph,” [υἱός ἐστιν Ἰωσὴϕ]) ¹²³ to replace Mary with Joseph, excising her from Jesus’ title.

The affirmation of women’s reliability in the longer ending of Mark also provides a point of contact with Q. Sara Parks demonstrates that Jesus has equal expectations of his followers in his earliest sayings:

These women in Q’s audience are expected to be: equally capable of understanding, internalizing, and implementing Jesus’ teachings; equally worthy recipients of the teachings; and equally important promulgators of the teachings. Whatever their gendered social tasks may be, everyone in the audience of Q’s parabolic messages is clearly understood as having identical capacity for receiving and applying Jesus’ lessons, as well as an identical potential value and responsibility as proponents of the lessons for others. ¹²⁴

In other words, women in Q were considered equally capable of learning and promulgating Jesus’ teachings, and therefore considered perfectly capable of witnessing, interpreting, and telling others about an event as important as the resurrection. The Markan Jesus’ rebuke of the eleven communicates that Jesus also expected his followers to have equal respect for each other’s teachings. This strong indication of women’s authority is omitted or replaced in the other three gospels.

Since the strongest details of women’s authority and leadership identified in this study are found in the longer ending of Mark, it preserves the oldest memory of the story that inspired these narratives.

Conclusion

There is extensive evidence of gendered redaction in the early Christian resurrection narratives that diminishes, obscures, and excises women and their actions from the texts. Isolating the details of women’s authority and leadership resurrects these women and provides a lens through which we can see what remains of the earlier memories redacted out of the gospels. This affects many aspects of biblical criticism and may affect other disciplines as well. Since the details of women’s authority and leadership represent the oldest memories in both the Dormition tradition and the gospel resurrection narratives, this suggests that the erasure of women’s authority and leadership is characteristic of the age and not just of either tradition individually. I hope that the results of this study will facilitate more cross-disciplinary research on redaction criticism, particularly with respect to gender.

This study reveals evidence of women’s leadership in the gospels, clearly illuminated in the following new historical Jesus reconstruction. At least five women visited Jesus’ tomb early on the third day: Mary Magdalene, Salome, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other Mary. They brought spices and perhaps censers with them for use in a lamentation liturgy or ritual. They were surprised when they discovered the stone rolled away. They entered the tomb and, though frightened and confused, they stood and conversed with someone who affirmed the resurrection and commissioned them to tell the others about it. They ran from the tomb with joy and relayed this news but were not believed. After this, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary encountered the risen Jesus. Standing together, they had a conversation with him. He commissioned them to tell the others, which they did, but were not believed. Two others, at least one of which was a woman, encountered the risen Jesus as well. They reported this to the rest but were not believed. Finally, the risen Jesus appeared to the eleven and he rebuked them for not believing the women’s testimonies.

Whether these earlier memories are historical remembrances or theological reinterpretations of Jesus’ death, they represent the origins of women priests. Only women interpret and report the news of the empty tomb which means that, even though their words were excised, women were the first Easter preachers. Furthermore, redactors attempted to transfer primary witness of the empty tomb to both Peter and the beloved disciple, but they did not put the women’s words in either of their mouths, even as late as the fourth century. This strongly suggests that the memories of the women’s speeches about the empty tomb were still so strong that their leadership could not be transferred to anyone else.

Furthermore, the detail of the possession of spices was heavily redacted to diminish, obscure, and excise women’s authority and leadership in these narratives. It is likely that the women brought incense censers with them to the tomb, and that what was intended for lamentation was repurposed for celebration of the resurrection. It is possible that this earlier memory behind the gospel resurrection narratives serves as the origin of women censing and leading Easter liturgies in the Anastasis (which was built in 326 CE). Since Easter is the most important Christian celebration, this evidence elevates the importance of the office of women’s priesthood and liturgical leadership in the early church. Moreover, the connection of these narratives with women’s lamentation makes them older than the creed in 1 Cor 15:3–8. Therefore, it is possible that early Christian worship originates with women.

Most of the details of women’s authority and leadership are preserved in the abrupt, shorter, and longer endings of Mark, evincing that Mark preserves the oldest memories of the story that inspired these narratives. This Markan priority supports the two source hypothesis, namely that Mark was written first, and that Matthew and Luke used Mark and Q along with their own source material. It also supports the hypothesis that John used the synoptics, specifically Luke. ¹²⁵ While a common argument regarding the longer ending of Mark is that it was composed later using the other gospels as source material, ¹²⁶ this method demonstrates that the first three appearance narratives in the other gospels were composed from the older memories preserved in the longer ending of Mark. Moreover, there is alignment regarding the view of women in both the longer ending of Mark and Q. Just as the women in Q were considered equally capable of learning and promulgating Jesus’ teachings, so the women in the longer ending of Mark were considered perfectly capable of reliably witnessing and interpreting the resurrection.

Furthermore, the priority of the endings of Mark is reversed: Mark’s longer ending preserves the oldest memories, followed by the shorter ending, followed by the abrupt ending. Whether the longer ending as we have it was a later composition or not, this study demonstrates that it also preserves some of the oldest memories of the first three appearance narratives across the four gospels. The current scholarly consensus that the abrupt ending has priority has resulted in the rejection of the longer ending by both the academy and the church. Scholars rarely study these verses and they are excluded from lectionaries and commentaries. This study demonstrates that both the shorter and longer endings must be reinstated as authoritative in both biblical criticism and church lectionary readings.

This is not just a matter for scholars, but also bears enormous significance for the preaching of Mark on Easter, which cycles through every lectionary once every three to four years. Mark 16:14 is the only attestation of Jesus dealing with doubt by affirming the reliability of women. Similar to the apocryphal Gospel of Mary depicting Levi rebuking Peter and defending Mary’s reliability, ¹²⁷ the canonical Markan Jesus rebukes the eleven for not believing women which means that others should accept their teaching regardless of their gender. Given the enormous attestation of the longer ending in the early church, ¹²⁸ this provides a canonical and “orthodox” perspective that valued women’s leadership. This debunks the New Testament studies axiom that women’s witness was not considered reliable in the ancient world. ¹²⁹ It supports the view that ancient culture was not a monolith of anti-woman sentiment; rather, multiple streams of thought about women existed alongside each other, ¹³⁰ some of which valued women’s leadership.

In the context of contemporary objections to women’s ordination and women teaching men in church, ¹³¹ the Markan Jesus affirms women teaching the eleven. This means that today, the longer ending of Mark supports women’s teaching and preaching in churches. Moreover, in the context of contemporary social justice issues like sexual assault, women’s testimonies are too easily dismissed, whether it’s one woman’s word about what happened to her body or the overturning of Harvey Weinstein’s first New York rape conviction on the basis of too many women’s testimonies. ¹³² With conservative Christianity on the rise ¹³³ including its adherence to abusive patriarchal structures, ¹³⁴ Mark 16:14 directly repudiates the oppression of women. When women speak out about abuse ¹³⁵ and rape, especially in the context of #MeToo and other movements for equality, Mark 16:14 indicates that Jesus says to believe women.