JOSEPH OF ARIMATHIA

In

THE GOLDEN LEGEND

by Jacques de Voragine


According to a legend, Joseph of Arimathea would have filled the Chalice of the Holy Grail with the blood
which flowed from the wounds of Jesus Christ on the Mount of the Skull (Golgotha)...


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We also read that Titus, on entering Jerusalem, saw a very thick wall, and had it dug. When a hole had been drilled in it, an old man was found inside, venerable by his appearance and his white hair. Asked who he was, he replied that he was Joseph, of the city of Judea called Arimathea, that he had been shut up and walled up there for having buried J.-C.: and he added that from that time he had been nourished with heavenly food, and strengthened with divine light. Yet the Gospel of Nicodemus says that the Jews having recluse Joseph, J.-C. by raising him from there and led him to Arimathea. We can then say that after his deliverance, Josephus did not stop preaching J.-C. and that he was recluse a second time. The Emperor Vespasian having died, Titus, his son, succeeded him to the empire. It was, a prince filled with clemency, generosity and kindness such that, according to the words of Eusebius in his chronicle and the testimony of Saint Jerome, one day when he had not done a good deed, or had given nothing, he said: "My friends, I have wasted my day. »

Long after, Jews wanted to rebuild Jerusalem; When they went out early in the morning, they found several crosses traced by the dew, and they fled in fear. The next morning, says Miletus in his chronicle, each of them found crosses of blood imprinted on his clothes. More frightened still, they fled again, but having returned on the third day, they were consumed by a fiery vapor issuing from the bowels of the earth.


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Three other appearances took place on this same day of the resurrection; but the text of the holy books does not relate them. The first by which he appeared to Saint James the Just, that is to say to James son of Alphaeus; you will find it in the legend of this saint. The second, when, on that same day, J.-C. appeared to Joseph; it is thus told in the Gospel of Nicodemus. The Jews having heard that Joseph had asked Pilate for the body of Jesus, had placed it in his own tomb, were filled with indignation against him, seized his person and locked him up with great care in a well closed and sealed place, with the intention of killing him after the Sabbath day; but behold, Jesus, on the very night of his resurrection, took up the house in the air from the four corners, entered to Nicodemus, wiped his face, kissed him, and bringing him out, without the seals being broken, brought him to his house in Arimathea. The third, by which it is believed that J.-C: appeared before all the others to the Virgin Mary, although the evangelists are silent on this point. The Roman Church seems to approve this opinion since; on Easter Day, the station takes place at Sainte-Marie-Majeure. Now, if we do not believe him because none of the evangelists mention him, it is obvious that he never appeared to the Blessed Virgin after being resurrected, because no evangelist indicates either the place or the time of this apparition. But let us discard this idea that such a mother received such an affront from such a Son. Perhaps, however, the evangelists passed over this in silence because their object was only to produce witnesses of the Resurrection; Now, it was not becoming that a mother should be called to bear witness to her Son: for if the words of the other women, on their return from the sepulchre, seemed reveries, how much more would it have been cried that his mother was delirious for love of her son.