Matthew 27:57 - Ellicott's Commentary On The Whole Bible

A rich man of Arimathæa. — The place so named was probably identical with the Ramah of 1 Samuel 1:19, the birth-place of the prophet. In 1 Samuel 1:1 the name is given in its uncontracted form as Ramathaim-zophim, and in the LXX. version it appears throughout as Armathaim, in Josephus as Armatha, in 1Ma. 11:34 as Ramathem. It was a city of the Jews, in the narrower sense in which that word meant the people of Judæa (Luke 23:51). The site is more or less conjectural, but if we identify the Ramah, or Ramathaim, of 1 Samuel 1:1 with the modern Nebby Samuel, about four miles north-west of Jerusalem, we have a position which sufficiently fits in with the circumstances of the history. Of Joseph we are told by St. Mark (Mark 15:43) that he was “an honourable counsellor,” i.e., a member of the Sanhedrin, and that he was looking for the kingdom of God; by St. Luke (Luke 23:50-51), that he was “a good man, and a just” (see Note on Romans 5:7 for the distinction between the two words); by St. John (John 19:38), that he was “a disciple, but secretly for fear of the Jews.” He was apparently a man of the same class and type of character as Nicodemus, respecting our Lord as a man, admiring Him as a teacher, half-believing in Him as the Christ, and yet, till now, shrinking from confessing Him before men. For us the name has the interest of being one of the few New Testament names connected with our own country. He was sent, it was said, by Philip (the Apostle) to Britain. There, in the legend which mediæval chroniclers delighted to tell, he founded 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. We have to place the piercing of the side, narrated by St. John only (John 19:31-37), before Joseph’s application.