Matthew 27:57

Matthew 27:57. When evening was come. The first evening before sundown, at which time the bodies must be removed (Deuteronomy 21:23). Our Lord's death took place at three in the afternoon.

There came a rich man. Probably, to the company of women standing on Golgotha (Matthew 27:56). His going to Pilate is mentioned afterwards. The fact of his being a ‘rich man' is mentioned here, in allusion to Isaiah 53:9: ‘With the rich in His death.'

Of Arimathea. Either Ramah in Benjamin (Joshua 18:25; comp. Matthew 2:18) or Ramah (Ramathaim) in Ephraim, the birth-place of Samuel (1 Samuel 1:19). The form favors the latter view; the addition of Luke: ‘a city of the Jews' the former.

Named Joseph. One Joseph takes care of Jesus in His infancy, another provides for His burial. Jesus' disciple. ‘Secretly for fear of the Jews' (John 19:38). He was a member of the Sanhedrin, of high character, who had not consented to the murder (Luke 23:50-51). He seems to have feared that the body might be removed in a disgraceful manner, and his secret faith having been quickened, he took a decisive step. Ecclesiastical tradition makes him one of ‘the seventy' and the first who preached the gospel in England.