Joseph of Arimathea

Joseph of Arimathea (Ancient Greek: Ἰωσὴφ ὁ ἀπὸ Ἀριμαθαίας) is a Biblical figure who assumed responsibility for the burial of Jesus after his crucifixion. He was a member of the Sanhedrin, and a rich disciple of Jesus. The historical location of Arimathea is uncertain, although it has been identified with several towns. According to Anglican tradition, Joseph, a tin merchant, visited Cornwall, accompanied by his nephew, the boy Jesus. He was sent, it was said, by Philip the Apostle to Britain. There he is credited with the founding the Church of Glastonbury; and the staff which he stuck into the ground took root and brought forth leaves and flowers, and became the parent of all the Glastonbury thorns from that day to this. He is typically identified as bringing the Holy Grail to Britain, although this deed is also attributed to his son, Josephus of Arimathea.

Gospel Narratives

Gospel of Matthew

27:57 When the even was come, there came a rich man of Arimathaea, named Joseph, who also himself was Jesus' disciple: 58 He went to Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. Then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered. 59 And when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, 60 And laid it in his own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock: and he rolled a great stone to the door of the sepulchre, and departed. 61 And there was Mary Magdalene, and the other Mary, sitting over against the sepulchre. (KJV)

Gospel of Mark

15:42 And now when the even was come, because it was the preparation, that is, the day before the sabbath, 43 Joseph of Arimathaea, an honourable counsellor, which also waited for the kingdom of God, came, and went in boldly unto Pilate, and craved the body of Jesus. 44 And Pilate marvelled if he were already dead: and calling unto him the centurion, he asked him whether he had been any while dead. 45 And when he knew it of the centurion, he gave the body to Joseph. 46 And he bought fine linen, and took him down, and wrapped him in the linen, and laid him in a sepulchre which was hewn out of a rock, and rolled a stone unto the door of the sepulchre. 47 And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses beheld where he was laid. (KJV)

Gospel of Luke

23:50 And, behold, there was a man named Joseph, a counsellor; and he was a good man, and a just: 51 (The same had not consented to the counsel and deed of them;) he was of Arimathaea, a city of the Jews: who also himself waited for the kingdom of God. 52 This man went unto Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. 53 And he took it down, and wrapped it in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in stone, wherein never man before was laid. 54 And that day was the preparation, and the sabbath drew on. 55 And the women also, which came with him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, and how his body was laid. 56 And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment. (KJV)

Gospel of John

19:38 And after this Joseph of Arimathaea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus: and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus. 39 And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight. 40 Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury. 41 Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. 42 There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand. (KJV)

Arimathea

Arimathea or Arimathaea (Koine Greek: Ἀριμαθαία, Arimathaía) was a city of Judea, and home of Joseph. There is no external evidence for Arimathea, and some liberal scholars suggest that it may have been a literary device used in the Gospel narrative. The Christian historian Eusebius of Caesarea, in his Onomasticon (144:28–29), identified it with Ramathaim-Zophim and wrote that it was near Diospolis (now Lod). Ramathaim-Zophim was a town in Ephraim, the birthplace of Samuel, where David came to him (1 Samuel 1). He briefly describes it as follows: "Armthem Seipha (Sofim). City of Elcana and Samuel. It is situated (in the region of Thamna) near Diospolis. The home of Joseph who was from Arimathea in the Gospels." Scholars of the Onomasticon have identified the Greek name Arimathea as deriving from the Hebrew place name of Ramathaim-Zophim (Biblical Hebrew: רמתיים-צופים, romanized: Ramaṯayim-ṣop̄im), which is attested in the Hebrew Bible and 1 Maccabees 11:34. It appeared in the Septuagint as Armathaim Sipha (Αρμαθαιμ Σιφα), in 1 Maccabees as Rathamin (Ραθαμιν), and in Josephus as Ramathan (Ῥαμαθὰν).

The town of Harmathemē (‘Αρμαθεμη) appears on the 6th-century Madaba Map. Casanowicz argues for its identification with Bani Zeid al-Gharbia in the West Bank. The Crusaders seem to have identified Ramla with Ramathaim and Arimathea. Ramla was a medieval town founded around 705–715 by the Umayyad Caliphate, and located on land in what had once been the allotment of the Tribe of Dan.

Old Testament Prophecy

Anglicans have traditionally interpreted Joseph's role as fulfilling Isaiah's prediction that the grave of the Suffering Servant would be with a rich man, although others have raised difficulties with this interpretation:

And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth.

Legends

Early Legends

Since the 2nd century, a mass of legendary detail has accumulated around the figure of Joseph of Arimathea in addition to the New Testament references. Joseph is mentioned in the works of early church fathers such as Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Tertullian, and Eusebius, who added details not found in the canonical accounts. The Narrative of Joseph of Arimathea, a medieval work, is even purportedly written by him directly, although it adds more details on the robbers at Jesus's crucifixion than Joseph himself. He also appears in the 2nd-century non-canonical text the Gospel of Peter. The Gospel of Nicodemus, a 4th or 5th century text, provides additional details about Joseph. For instance, after Joseph asked Pilate for the body of the Christ and prepared the body with Nicodemus' help, Christ's body was delivered to a new tomb that Joseph had built for himself. In the Gospel of Nicodemus, the Jewish elders express anger at Joseph for burying the body of Christ, saying:

And likewise Joseph also stepped out and said to them: Why are you angry against me because I begged the body of Jesus? Behold, I have put him in my new tomb, wrapping in clean linen; and I have rolled a stone to the door of the tomb. And you have acted not well against the just man, because you have not repented of crucifying him, but also have pierced him with a spear.

— Gospel of Nicodemus. Translated by Alexander Walker.

The Jewish elders then captured Joseph, imprisoned him, and placed a seal on the door to his cell after first posting a guard. Joseph warned the elders, "The Son of God whom you hanged upon the cross, is able to deliver me out of your hands. All your wickedness will return upon you."

Once the elders returned to the cell, the seal was still in place, but Joseph was gone. The elders later discover that Joseph had returned to Arimathea. Having a change in heart, the elders desired to have a more civil conversation with Joseph about his actions and sent a letter of apology to him by means of seven of his friends. Joseph travelled back from Arimathea to Jerusalem to meet with the elders, where they questioned him about his escape. He told them this story:

On the day of the Preparation, about the tenth hour, you shut me in, and I remained there the whole Sabbath in full. And when midnight came, as I was standing and praying, the house where you shut me in was hung up by the four corners, and there was a flashing of light in mine eyes. And I fell to the ground trembling. Then some one lifted me up from the place where I had fallen, and poured over me an abundance of water from the head even to the feet, and put round my nostrils the odour of a wonderful ointment, and rubbed my face with the water itself, as if washing me, and kissed me, and said to me, Joseph, fear not; but open thine eyes, and see who it is that speaks to thee. And looking, I saw Jesus; and being terrified, I thought it was a phantom. And with prayer and the commandments I spoke to him, and he spoke with me. And I said to him: Art thou Rabbi Elias? And he said to me: I am not Elias. And I said: Who art thou, my Lord? And he said to me: I am Jesus, whose body thou didst beg from Pilate, and wrap in clean linen; and thou didst lay a napkin on my face, and didst lay me in thy new tomb, and roll a stone to the door of the tomb. Then I said to him that was speaking to me: Show me, Lord, where I laid thee. And he led me, and showed me the place where I laid him, and the linen which I had put on him, and the napkin which I had wrapped upon his face; and I knew that it was Jesus. And he took hold of me with his hand, and put me in the midst of my house though the gates were shut, and put me in my bed, and said to me: Peace to thee! And he kissed me, and said to me: For forty days go not out of thy house; for, lo, I go to my brethren into Galilee.

— Gospel of Nicodemus. Translated by Alexander Walker

According to the Gospel of Nicodemus, Joseph testified to the Jewish elders, and specifically to chief priests Caiaphas and Annas that Jesus had risen from the dead and ascended to heaven, and he indicated that others were raised from the dead at the resurrection of Christ (repeating Matt 27:52–53). He specifically identified the two sons of the high-priest Simeon (again in Luke 2:25–35). The elders Annas, Caiaphas, Nicodemus, and Joseph himself, along with Gamaliel under whom Paul of Tarsus studied, travelled to Arimathea to interview Simeon's sons Charinus and Lenthius.

Another legend, as recorded in Flores Historiarum (c. 1235), is that Joseph is in fact the Wandering Jew, a man cursed by Jesus to walk the Earth until the Second Coming.

Joseph of Arimathea in Britain

The legend that Joseph was given the responsibility of keeping the Holy Grail is first recorded in Robert de Boron's Joseph d'Arimathie, written between 1190 and 1199. Joseph is imprisoned much as in the Gospel of Nicodemus, but it is the Grail that sustains him during his captivity. Upon his release he founds his company of followers, who take the Grail to the "Vale of Avalon" in Britain, though Joseph does not go. In subsequent romances such as Perlesvaus (c. 1230–1240), Joseph travels to Britain, bringing relics with him. According to the story told in the Lancelot-Grail cycle (c. 1210–1235), it is not Joseph but his son, Josephus of Arimathea, who is considered the primary holy man of Britain. Tradition typically says that Philip the Apostle sent Joseph to Britain.

Medieval interest in genealogy raised claims that Joseph was a relative of Jesus; specifically, Mary's uncle, or according to some genealogies, Joseph's uncle. A genealogy for the family of Joseph of Arimathea and the history of his further adventures in the east provide material for the Lancelot-Grail cycle and Perlesvaus. John of Glastonbury, who assembled a chronicle of the history of Glastonbury Abbey around 1350, claims that King Arthur was descended from Joseph, listing the following short pedigree through King Arthur's mother:

Helaius, the grandson of Joseph, begat Joshua, Joshua begat Aminadab, Aminadab begat a son who begat Igraine, from whom King Pendragon begat the noble and famous King Arthur, by which it is evident that King Arthur descended from the stock of Joseph.

Joseph's early arrival in Britain was used for political point-scoring by English theologians and diplomats during the late Middle Ages, and Richard Beere, Abbot of Glastonbury from 1493 to 1524, put the cult of Joseph at the heart of the abbey's legendary traditions. He was probably responsible for the drastic remodelling of the Lady Chapel at Glastonbury Abbey. A series of miraculous cures took place in 1502 which were attributed to the saint, and in 1520 the printer Richard Pynson published a Lyfe of Joseph of Armathia, in which the Glastonbury Thorn is mentioned for the first time, where when Joseph and his followers arrived, weary, on Wearyall Hill outside Glastonbury, he set his walking staff on the ground and it miraculously took root and blossomed as the "Glastonbury Thorn". Joseph's importance increased exponentially with the English Reformation, since his early arrival far predated the Catholic conversion of AD 597. During the English Reformation, Joseph stood for pure and Protestant Christianity. In 1546, John Bale, Bishop of Ossory, claimed that the early date of Joseph's mission meant that original British Christianity was purer than that of Rome, an idea which was understandably popular with Anglicans, notably Queen Elizabeth I herself, who cited Joseph's missionary work in England when she told Roman Catholic bishops that the Church of England pre-dated the Roman Church in England.

In 1989, folklore scholar A. W. Smith critically examined the legends around Joseph of Arimathea. Often associated with William Blake's poem "And did those feet in ancient time" and its musical setting, widely known as the hymn "Jerusalem", the legend is commonly held as "an almost secret yet passionately held article of faith among certain otherwise quite orthodox Christians" and Smith concluded "that there was little reason to believe that an oral tradition concerning a visit made by Jesus to Britain existed before the early part of the twentieth century". Sabine Baring-Gould recounted a Cornish story how "Joseph of Arimathea came in a boat to Cornwall, and brought the child Jesus with him, and the latter taught him how to extract the tin and purge it of its wolfram. This story possibly grew out of the fact that the Jews under the Angevin kings farmed the tin of Cornwall." In its most developed version, Joseph, a tin merchant, visited Cornwall, accompanied by his nephew, the boy Jesus. Reverend C.C. Dobson (1879–1960) made a case for the authenticity of the Glastonbury legenda. The case was argued more recently by the Church of Scotland minister Gordon Strachan (1934–2010), and by the archaeologist Dennis Price.

Veneration

Joseph of Arimathea is venerated as a saint in Anglicanism, Roman Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and Lutheranism. Although legend ties Joseph to Britain as well as the Holy Grail, he is not currently on the liturgical calendar of the Church of England, although he is on the calendars of some churches of the Anglican Communion, such as the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Church in North America, which commemorates him on 1 August.