The Return from the Sepulchre.
Joseph of Arimathea is put in Prison.
The Sabbath was close at hand, and Nicodemus and Joseph returned to
Jerusalem by a small door not far from the garden, and which Joseph had
been allowed by special favour to have made in the city wall. They told
the Blessed Virgin, Magdalen, John, and some of the women, who were
returning to Calvary to pray there, that this door, as well as that of
the super-room, would be opened to them whenever they knocked. The
elder sister of the Blessed Virgin, Mary of Heli, returned to the town
with Mary the mother of Mark, and some other women. The servants of
Nicodemus and Joseph went to Calvary to fetch several things which had
been left there.
The soldiers joined those who were guarding the city gate near
Calvary; and Cassius went to Pilate with the lance, related all that he
had seen, and promised to give him an exact account of everything that
should happen, if he would put under his command the guards whom the
Jews would not fail to ask to have put round the tomb. Pilate listened
to his words with secret terror, but only told him in reply that his
superstition amounted to madness.
Joseph and Nicodemus met Peter and the two Jameses in the town. They
all shed many tears, but Peter was perfectly overwhelmed by the
violence of this grief. He embraced them, reproached himself for not
having been present at the death of our Saviour, and thanked them for
having bestowed the rites of sepulture upon his sacred body. It was
agreed that the door of the supper-room should be opened to them
whenever they knocked, and then they went away to seek some other
disciples who were dispersed in various directions. Later I saw the
Blessed Virgin and her companions enter the upper-room; Abenadar next
came and was admitted; and by degrees the greatest part of the Apostles
and disciples assembled there. The holy women retired to that part of
the building where the Blessed Virgin was living. They took some food,
and spent a few minutes more in tears, and in relating to one another
what each had seen. Then men changed their dresses, and I saw them
standing under the lamp, and keeping the Sabbath. They ate some lambs
in the supper-room, but without observing any ceremony, for they had
eaten the Paschal lamb the evening before. They were all perturbed in
spirit, and filled with grief. The holy women also passed their time in
praying with the Blessed Virgin under the lamp. Later, when night had
quite fallen, Lazarus, the widow of Naim, Dina the Samaritan woman, and
Mara of Suphan, came from Bethania, and then, once more, descriptions
were given of all that had taken place, and many tears shed.
[According to the visions of Sister Emmerich, the three women named
in the text had been living for some time at Bethania, in a sort of
community established by Martha for the purpose of providing for the
maintenance of the disciples when our Lord was moving about, and for
the division and distribution of the alms which were collected. The
widow of Naim, whose son Martial was raised from the dead by Jesus,
according to Sister Emmerich, on the 28th Marcheswan (the 18th of
November), was named Maroni. She was the daughter of an uncle, on the
father's side, of St. Peter. Her first husband was the son of a sister of
Elizabeth, who herself was the daughter of a sister of the mother of
St. Anne. Maroni's first husband having died without children, she had
married Elind, a relation of St. Anne, and had left Chasaluth, near
Tabor, to take up her abode at Naim, which was not far off, and where she
soon lost her second husband.
Dina, the Samaritan woman, was the same who conversed with Jesus by
Jacob's well. She was born near Damascus, of parents who were half Jewish
and half Pagan. They died while she was yet very young, and she being
brought up by a woman of bad character, the seeds of the most evil
passions were early sown in her heart. She had had several husbands,
who supplanted one another in turn, and the last lived at Sichar,
whither she had followed him and changed her name from Dina to Salome.
She had three grown-up daughters and two sons, who afterwards joined
the disciples. Sister Emmerich used to say that the life of this
Samaritan woman was prophetic--that Jesus had spoken to the entire sect of
Samaritans in her person, and that they were attached to their errors
by as many ties as she had committed adulteries.
Mara of Suphan was a Moabitess, came from the neighbourhood of
Suphan, and was a descendant of Orpha, the widow of Chelion, Noemi's son.
Orpha had married again in Moab. By Orpha, the sister-in-law of Ruth,
Mara was connected with the family of David, from whom our Lord was
descended. Sister Emmerich saw Jesus deliver Mara from four devils and
grant her forgiveness of her sins on the 17th Elud (9th September) of
the second year of his public life. She was living at Ainon, having
been repudiated by her husband, a rich Jew, who had kept the children
he had had by her with him. She had with her tree others, the offspring
of her adulteries.
'I saw,' Sister Emmerich would say,--'I saw how the stray branch of the
stock of David was purified within her by the grace of Jesus, and
admitted into the bosom of the Church. I cannot express how many of
these roots and offshoots I see become entwined with each other, lost
to view, and then once more brought to light.']
Joseph of Arimathea returned home late from the supper-room, and he
was sorrowfully walking along the streets of Sion, accompanied by a few
disciples and women, when all on a sudden a band of armed men, who were
lying in ambuscade in the neighbourhood of Caiphas's tribunal, fell upon
them, and laid hands upon Joseph, whereupon his companions fled,
uttering loud cries of terror. He was confined in a tower contiguous to
the city wall, not far from the tribunal. These soldiers were pagans,
and had not to keep the Sabbath, therefore Caiphas had been able to
secure their services on this occasion. The intention was to let Joseph
die of hunger, and keep his disappearance a secret.
Here conclude the descriptions of all that occurred on the day of
the Passion of our Lord; but we will add some supplementary matter
concerning Holy Saturday, the Descent into Hell, and the Resurrection.