"Now the next day, that followed the day of the preparation, the chief priests and Pharisees came together unto Pilate, (63) Saying, Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, After three days I will rise again. (64) Command therefore that the sepulchre be made sure until the third day, lest his disciples come by night, and steal him away, and say unto the people, He is risen from the dead: so the last error shall be worse than the first. (65) Pilate said unto them, Ye have a watch: go your way, make it as sure as ye can. (66) So they went, and made the sepulchre sure, sealing the stone, and setting a watch."
As Matthew is the only Evangelist, which hath noticed this conversation which took place between Pilate and the Chief Priests and Pharisees; it will be proper to propose the observations which I beg to offer upon it here. And I venture, to persuade, myself, that, if the several circumstances, connected with the relation, are duly attended to, this plan proposed by the confederacy, of securing the body of Christ, tended to confirm the very truth, they meant to bring into question; and is in itself, if there were no other, a most decided testimony, in proof to the reality of the resurrection of Jesus.
For, first: by their application to Pilate for a watch, to guard the body of Christ, they prove that Jesus was truly dead, and laid in this new sepulchre. This is of no small consequence, in aid to all the other evidences we have of Christ's death and burial. And, secondly; they no less prove, by what passed, as related in the following Chapter, that the body of Jesus did not remain in the sepulchre, notwithstanding a guard of soldiers were purposely placed there to secure it. See Matthew 28:1
Here is a precious testimony, and from the mouth of Christ's enemies also, in confirmation of the resurrection which followed. And with respect to the story of the disciples taking away the body, it is in itself too childish and ridiculous to deserve even the relation of it. That a few poor timid disciples, who during their Lord's trial, and before any danger to themselves had even appeared, had all forsook Jesus and fled, should project such a scheme, as to come by surprise on a guard of Roman soldiers, who were placed at the sepulchre for no purpose but to watch the body of Jesus; and whose military discipline was the strictest in the world; and should actually take away the body, is one of the most extravagant suppositions, which ever entered the human mind.
And to heighten the representation still more, it is added, that this was done while the soldiers were asleep. Soldiers and centinels asleep! And so it seems, that the evidence these soldiers gave of this transaction, of what had happened, was while they were asleep. A new way of giving testimony!
Moreover, it is time to enquire, what possible motive these poor fishermen of Galilee could have to take away a dead body? Nothing can be more plain and evident than that the disciples of Jesus, at the time this transaction of Christ's death took place, knew not anymore than their enemies, what the resurrection from the dead should mean. They had no other notions of Christ, notwithstanding all that Jesus had said to them, than that of a temporal prince; and when by his death, the hopes they had conceived of this kingdom were over, they would in a few days have returned to their former occupation again. In fact they did so.
Besides, where could they have put the body? Was it stolen, and yet intended to be concealed? And if so what could be then accomplished by it? And can it be supposed for a moment, that when the soldiers all of them awaked from their sleep and found the body gone, and taken away by disciples; would the Roman soldiers, aided by the whole Jewish Sanhedrim, have suffered this handful of poor fishermen of Galilee to have remained a single hour, without giving up their plunder, and bringing them to immediate punishment.
I have not dwelt so circumstantially on this subject from any apprehension of its necessity, for my Reader's confirmation of the faith once delivered to the saints; but for the preciousness of anything, and everything connected with the resurrection of Jesus. Oh! the blessedness of knowing, and from divine teaching too; the certainty of that glorious truth, Christ is risen from the dead. And oh! when the conviction of that glorious truth is secured in the soul, by a testimony founded in the faithfulness of Jehovah; then in Christ's resurrection, the sure resurrection of his redeemed is included. Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power. Revelation 20:6.