Why did John describe the resurrection differently than the synoptics?

Question

Below are the passages describing Resurrection Sunday from each of the Gospels.

Matthew 28:1-9: "Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, 'Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you.' So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and said, 'Greetings!' And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, 'Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.'"

Mark 16:1-8: "When the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. And they were saying to one another, 'Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?' And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back—it was very large. And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, 'Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.' And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid"

Luke 24:1-7: "But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, 'Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.'"

But John describes Jesus himself appearing to Mary, following a footrace between John and Peter:

John 20:11-18: "But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?' Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, 'Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.' Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, 'Rabboni!' (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, 'Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."' Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, 'I have seen the Lord'—and that he had said these things to he."

So, to summarize, the Synoptics describe the Resurection as:

Mary Magdalene and possibly His mother visit the grave. They see the stone rolled away, and an angel waiting for them. The angel asks her/them why she/they were looking for "the living among the dead". He then tells them to share the good news.

In John's story:

John and Peter look inside the grave and believe that Jesus was alive, then hide from the Jews in their house. Mary cried outside the grave, but when looking inside sees two angels, who ask her who shes looking for and why she's crying. SHe turns around, and sees who she assumes to be the gardener and ask if he has taken the body. Jesus then opens her eyes and reveals Himself directly to her, causing her to rejoice and then share the good news.

What causes the discrepancy? Did John have a literary reason, did he talk to different witnesses or is there some other reason?

Answer 1

The apostle John was aged when he wrote that account. The other gospel accounts had been doing the rounds for a long time. Further, John had been given the astounding revelations as detailed in the last book of the Bible. By the time he was in his 90s, he was the only apostle left alive. The others had all been martyred. He had the greatest maturity of Christian experience of any of his contemporaries, and decades of pondering the significance of his risen Lord. The Church was going through awful persecution. Apostasy had started to creep in. Now, if that did not have a massive bearing on how he wrote, and what he selected to write about, nothing else would!

John's writing gave the mourning, sighing and suffering disciples much-needed fresh divine authority and guidance to and in the light of the glory of the evangel of God concerning his Son. All around were false cries of, "Look! Here Jesus is!" or "See! There Jesus is!". John, who had tarried long (as Jesus foretold he would) was finally used by the Holy Spirit to write the last documents that would enable the beleagured Church to press on faithfully till Jesus' sudden return.

John states at the beginning and the end of his gospel account the reason why he was writing as he did. . His Prologue (1:1-18) sets the scene, going right back to the start of creation (as per. Genesis 1:1) and identifying Jesus Christ as the One who made everything that was made - the logos who became flesh. None of the other synoptics had that clarity of understanding which John, by then, did. That is the scene which helps explain why John did not repeat previous details, homing in on points that had not yet been written down. His Prologue was unique. Its purpose was to let the light of the risen Christ shine more brightly on what they already knew and reinforce their grasp of just who this Jesus is.

Likewise with some details at his conclusion. Nobody else, for example, details the reaction of Thomas (who doubted at first that Christ had arisen from the grave). After writing about that, John writes:

"And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through his name." John 20:30-31 A.V.

It could be argued that the synoptics also detailed some of the signs Jesus performed, to convince readers that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. Yes, they did. But perhaps they were somewhat like like three burning wicks leading to John's gospel, which then exploded like dynamite.

There is no discrepancy. There is purpose, but I'm not going to spell it out; each individual must prayerfully approach such a gospel seeking the Holy Spirit to open their eyes to wonderful things in God's word, not least because this Jesus is the Word of God, as John states.

Answer 2

The gospel texts should not be understood as historical accounts, this is not to say that they do not contain many historically accurate examples, e.g. it is beyond historical doubt that Jesus of Nazareth was a real person and that Pontius Pilate was a Roman procurator in Palestine at the time of Jesus' passion; additionally, there are historically accurate details such as the information that Jesus was born in the reign of Augustus. However, there are also examples of historically improbable elements, for example, in Mt.2 there are events that are seen to be modeled on the life of Moses (cf. Raymond Brown, Birth of the Messiah, 188-229). It is also commonly accepted that the ancients did not understand history in the same sense that moderns understand it, namely, as a scientific endeavor. Good examples can be found in many ancient histories such as Josephus' works; consider the stylized orations of Herod, which perfectly serve Josephus' overall narrative, a far cry from history as moderns understand it. The dangers of interpreting the Bible as a science textbook is perhaps, no better illustrated, than with the case of the Church contra Galileo. To the Bible's credit, there are many accurate scientific facts in the Bible, but it is ostensibly not a science text, and by extension it is not a history text.

According to Dei Verbum, one should understand them as always telling the gospel story in such a way as to be completely accurate about what Jesus said and did, i.e. the books do not lie or misinform. This is in accord with the idea that the scriptural traditions are the very bedrock of the faith.

The gospel texts are less like historical narratives than they are portraits of Jesus, e.g. imagine four paintings of Christ, all of which testify with fidelity to the image of Christ. Because they are each the composition of a different artist, each is different in sometimes irreconcilable ways, i.e. Jesus wears a red garment as opposed to blue, however each are also the same. The synoptic texts all aim to paint a similar portrait of Jesus in the style of a historical account, however, one must strain a bit to interpret them in the harmonization style, and there is little hope of extending this method to include the Johanan gospel text. The point, however, is that each gospel text was written by a specific author for a specific audience, separated by time and space, to address specific concerns; none of the texts were intended as universal accounts suitable for all purposes. For example, the Matthean gospel clearly addresses the Jewish people, while the Lucan text speaks to the Gentiles; the Johanan on the other hand departs from the synoptic tradition in that it attempts to theologize beyond the level of the synoptic texts.

Thus, the Johanan gospel seeks to address theological matters over providing an historically accurate account of the resurrection. Furthermore, the Johanan gospel was likely written at a later date than the synoptic works, and this is reflected in the more developed theological nature of the Johanan text, nowhere is this more pronounced, perhaps, than in the infamous prologue.

Now let us address the some of the differences. For example, in the Johanan narrative, the author speaks of hiding from the Jews, why is this important? Already in the first century, Christian communities were being alienated from the synagogues, where formerly they had been tolerated, thus one sees here in the Johanan text a desire to justify the Johanan congregation's estrangement from the Jewish peoples. As if to say: even Jesus' earliest followers were forced to hide from Jewish persecutors. Right at the outset of the passage one sees that the Johanan author stresses that men, John and Peter, noted apostles, are present to witness that Jesus' body is absent from the sepulcher, this is important as a theological point because given the early circulation and influence of the pseudepigraphal pastoral epistles, men were to posses primacy over women in the congregations. The Johanan gospel keeps with the tradition that the resurrection is first revealed to the women, however, it asserts that John and Peter did indeed witness the empty tomb.

Given the non-historical nature of the gospel accounts, it can be safely assumed that the Johanan author diverges from the synoptic accounts in his desire to address the theological concerns of the intended congregation. In many ways, theology is the main concern of the Johanan gospel over the synoptics, there are many pre-catholic traditions found there, including the passages where Jesus discusses the eating of his flesh and drinking of his blood.

Answer 3

OP: John and Peter look inside the grave and believe that Jesus was alive, then hide from the Jews in their house.

At this time after sunset on Saturday, making it Sunday per Jewish reckoning, John and Peter do not believe Jesus is alive.

Then went in also that other disciple, which came first to the sepulchre, and he saw, and believed. For as yet they [John and Peter] knew not the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead. John 20:8-9

They believed Mary's account that the body was gone (John 20:2). It wasn't there. But they didn't believe in the resurrection yet because they knew not the scripture. They leave. Mary remains. Jesus appears to her. After He says, don't cling, she leaves and tells the disciples again. They still don't believe.

Sunday morning the Synoptics pick up the story. Christ again appears to the women. They tell the disciples. The list of witnesses is growing.

So, to answer the OP, John and the Synoptics are telling the same story from two different time periods.