Luke 24:13-35

Luke 24:13-35 (NRSV)

¹³ Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, ¹⁴ and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. ¹⁵ While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, ¹⁶ but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. ¹⁷ And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?” They stood still, looking sad. ¹⁸ Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only stranger in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” ¹⁹ He asked them, “What things?” They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, ²⁰ and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. ²¹ But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things took place. ²² Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, ²³ and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. ²⁴ Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him.” ²⁵ Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! ²⁶ Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?” ²⁷ Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

²⁸ As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. ²⁹ But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” So he went in to stay with them. ³⁰ When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. ³¹ Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. ³² They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” ³³ That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. ³⁴ They were saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” ³⁵ Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

            Luke 24:13-35 is the story of the appearance of the risen Lord on Easter Sunday to two disciples on the road to Emmaus. The source is material unique to Luke. This marvelous story of Christ's resurrection appearance to two of his followers at the dinner table is one of the most unique gifts given to us in Luke's gospel. Mark 16:12 says that after the Resurrection, Jesus "appeared in another form" to two of the disciples "as they were walking in the country," but only Luke gives us the whole story, which begins "that same day," the day of the Resurrection, when Jesus joined Cleopas and one other person as they walked from Jerusalem to Emmaus. 

Luke has filled the story with his theological motifs. Thus, as his Gospel heads us toward Jerusalem in the travel narrative, so this story occurs in and around Jerusalem. The risen Lord gradually reveals who he is to the disciples. It emphasizes the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy. It has a Eucharistic theme that begins here and continues in his story in Acts. His story-telling gifts are at their height. Christ appears unknown, as a wanderer, the role in which human beings loved to portray deity, in simple human form. The deity becomes a wanderer, clad as a traveler to wander among human beings. Deity reveals the divine mystery at particular points. However, as soon human beings recognized him, he disappears.[1] We see this basic outline in several stories in Genesis. The divine appeared to Abraham and he responded with building an altar (12:7-8). An appearance of the Lord establishes a covenant with Abraham (17:1). The Lord appeared to Abraham at the Oak of Mamre (18:1). The Lord appeared to Isaac at Beersheba (26:24). Jacob wrestles with “someone” who slowly reveals his divinity (32:22-32). 

This is one of the many “road” stories in the Bible. Jesus was on the road from Galilee to Jerusalem, and in Luke offered insights concerning discipleship. Paul was on the road to Damascus when he had his vision of the risen Lord. As this story goes, on Easter Sunday, two disciples were walking to a village, Emmaus, a town that remains undiscovered to us, about seven miles from Jerusalem. 

In Luke 24:13-16 we have the initial account of the meeting between the risen Lord and the two disciples. The risen Lord is in the role of a stranger the two disciples meet along the road. ¹³ Now on that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, introducing one of the difficulties in the text. If Emmaus is a town, which town is it? There is confusion because two different numbers appear in ancient manuscripts at the point at which Luke tells us how far away from Jerusalem Emmaus was. Some texts say "60 stadia," and others say "160," which works out roughly to be either 7 miles or 18 miles. Although there are many references to Emmaus in ancient sources, including Eusebius' Onomasticon (a catalog of identifications for biblical place names), none of these care to tell us how far Emmaus was from Jerusalem. Because of this, the unlikely village of Amwas (20 miles from Jerusalem) is currently a popularly recognized site for pilgrimage, even though other towns, such as Abu Ghosh, Mozah and el-Qubeibeh, have stronger claims to be the historical Emmaus. Ironically, the seemingly superficial mystery regarding the actual location of Emmaus fits in nicely with the deepest meaning of this passage. Emmaus may be here, or there, or anywhere. The site of the original episode is irrelevant. Christ will travel wherever his followers are going. Christ will appear wherever they break bread. As they were walking toward Emmaus ¹⁴ and talking with each other about all these things that had happened, including the crucifixion of Jesus and the discovery of the empty tomb. ¹⁵ While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, ¹⁶ but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. Such a story should remind us of some of the appearances of the divine to the Patriarchs, such as Genesis 12:7-8, 17:1, 18:1, 26:24, and 32:22-32. The analogy here is that the Lord appeared in such a common and ordinary way to significant individuals, in this case, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Since the early church did not have actual stories of the appearances, in the way they did his sayings, parables, healings, and exorcisms, Matthew, Mark, and Luke used the pattern of the appearances of the divine in the Old Testament for their stories. That is why Matthew, Luke, and John diverge as much as they do in recounting their stories. They have specific points they went to stress as they conclude their gospels. In this case, God did not allow these followers of Jesus to recognize who accompanied them. Throughout the whole journey, Jesus' identity remains hidden from them. Luke informs us that the stranger is Jesus, but the two travelers do not recognize him. A common literary device in the ancient Near East is for the audience to be privy to information of which the characters in the story are unaware. Thus, the stranger's supposed ignorance of current events is ironically contrasted with Jesus' followers' actual ignorance of his identity.

In Luke 24:17-27 we find the conversation between the risen Lord and the disciples on the way to Emmaus. The risen Lord continues as the stranger. ¹⁷ And he said to them, “What are you discussing with each other while you walk along?” They stood still, looking sad. ¹⁸ Then one of them, whose name was Cleopas, who may be the cousin of Jesus Clopas, whose son Symeon became a follower of James according to Eusebius.  In that case, this story would be the reflection of an appearance of Jesus to a relative of the Lord.  We should note that one of the women at the cross is Mary, the wife of Clopas in John 19:25. Unfortunately, the name of Cleopas' companion is missing. Some have argued that we should assume it was Peter, based on Luke 24:34. Others have argued that it was Cleopas' wife. Others think that the name "Emmaus" which most people understand as the destination of the journey is really the name of the mystery companion. Cleopas answered him, “Are you the only stranger (a word not used in the Greek text) in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have taken place there in these days?” ¹⁹ He asked them, “What things?” They replied, “The things about Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet (ἀνὴρ προφήτης), titles for Jesus that will contrast sharply with the titles by the stranger, mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, ²⁰ and how our chief priests and leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and crucified him. ²¹ But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. As they tell their unknown to them companion of the events of which their companion is quite aware, the irony hits home. They assume ignorance on the part of their unknown companion, when, they are the ones ignorant of the situation. Further, they reveal how much Jesus meant to them. Redemption, in its fullest Old Testament context, includes intervention that could set you free if you found yourself a prisoner or a slave. Forms of the verb used here to mean "redeem" are used in the Septuagint to translate the Hebrew term go'el. A go'el is a near family member who has the right and responsibility to "redeem" you - to pay for your release - should you fall upon hard times, be sold into slavery, lose your land, or otherwise become destitute. Redemption, in its fullest Old Testament context, includes intervention that could set you free if you found yourself a prisoner or a slave. Such release was also part of the laws governing the Jubilee year (Deuteronomy 15), the arrival of which Jesus had announced previously in his first public sermon on Isaiah 61:1-5 (Luke 4:14-21). Here Luke surrounds Jesus' whole public life, from his first sermon in Nazareth, to his resurrection appearance on the road to Emmaus, with his followers' hopes that his coming would finally free Israel from slavery to Rome and restore it to its rightful place among the nations. At this point on the road, however, these hopes are dead, along with the great prophet who was to make them real. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day, a possible reference to Hosea 6:2, since these things took place. ²² Moreover, some women of our group astounded us. They were at the tomb early this morning, ²³ and when they did not find his body there, they came back and told us that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive. ²⁴ Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but they did not see him.” They toss off the story they had also dismissed in Luke 24:11, that the angels had appeared to the women who discovered the empty tomb, telling them that he was alive. Thus, at this point, the risen Lord and their unknown to them travelling companion seems to scold them for dismissing the women and their witness. ²⁵ Then he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! ²⁶ Was it not necessary that the Messiah (Χριστὸν) should suffer these things and then enter into his glory (δόξαν)?” Early interpretations of the death of Jesus have some variety among its first witnesses in the first century. Not all strata of the primitive Christian tradition view the death of Jesus as a salvation event. For example, verses 25-26 point to the early tradition behind the passion story that seems simply to have recognized the divine necessity of the innocent suffering and death of Jesus in fulfillment of the prophetic testimonies of scripture. Such a statement makes it unlikely that Jesus explained thoroughly the meaning of his death before it occurred. They had to work out scripturally its meaning. [2] ²⁷ Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures. The risen Lord engages in a re-education of the two, showing them signs in the Jewish scriptures that they have overlooked that the promised Jewish Messiah must suffer. The point here is that what happened to Jesus receives its meaning as we understand in the context of scripture. This passage does so in consistency with I Corinthians 15:3-4, that Christ died for our sins in accord with the scriptures and that God raised him on the third day in accord with the scripture. 

Interpretation of scripture does require sensitivity and insight. Throughout the 1800s, many preachers, especially in the south, used scriptures like Ephesians 6:5, Colossians 3:22 and Titus 2:9 to tell slaves that they were to obey their masters and submit their lives to them. Their perspective was that of those who wanted to preserve the institution of slavery. Their eyes closed to the surrounding verses that urged masters to treat slaves in a way that acknowledged that both master and slave as having the same heavenly Father. The same preachers could have urged masters to treat slaves respectfully, reminding them that God shows no partiality and therefore both master and slave are responsible for acting in a way consistent with developing Christian virtue. They could have shown the desire of Paul to have Philemon release his slave to Paul so that he could serve the gospel by being with Paul. They closed their eyes to scripture that said since they were one in Christ Jesus, there is no longer slave or free (Galatians 3:28). Created human distinctions are insignificant in comparison to mutually serving the one God who shows no partiality. I am suggesting that the risen Lord was the companion of these preachers as well, but they did not listen to the sinful expression that master-slave relation had in America and its defilement of the values of the New Testament. They would have benefitted from engaging the Bible with people they would have considered strangers, such as abolitionists, instead of just gathering with friends who also had a vested interest in continuing the institution of slavery. 

Carravagio

In Luke 24:28-32 we have the meal the risen Lord had with his disciples in Emmaus. The meal has Eucharistic overtones. The stranger becomes the guest of the two disciples.  ²⁸ As they came near the village to which they were going, he walked ahead as if he were going on. ²⁹ But they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, because it is almost evening and the day is now nearly over.” So he went in to stay with them. the risen Lord quickly transitions to be the host of the meal. ³⁰ When he was at the table with them, he took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. ³¹ Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight. At the breaking of bread, the primitive Christian community was aware of continuing table fellowship with its crucified and risen Lord. In this case, the risen Lord appeared to his disciples to share a common meal with them. The resurrection of Jesus is the basis of the certainty that Jesus really has the power to be present to his disciples in the form of the bread they break and eat.[3] ³² They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” 

In Luke 24:33-35 Luke tells us of the return of the two disciples to Jerusalem. ³³ That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem; and they found the eleven and their companions gathered together. ³⁴ They were saying, “The Lord (Κύριος) has risen indeed, and he has appeared to Simon!” ³⁵ Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he had been made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

I want to say something gently but firmly. If we go down the path of saying that a modern time-traveler could go back and capture all this on videotape, we will have missed the point. The story is not that type of story. We are not to think of Luke as a reporter who is describing an event that occurred on a specific day. We need to think of it more like a metaphorical narrative designed to draw us into our own conversation with the risen Lord and recognition of what he means to us. Often unknown to us, the risen Lord is our companion in our journey toward our Emmaus. Yet, we also have moments of recognition of this companion in our life journey. The intent of Luke is to tell a story about how the risen Lord comes to his followers repeatedly, though not exclusively, in the Eucharist. The truth of this story will become real as we share its experience of the risen Lord. We could extend the same method to all the stories of the risen Lord we find in the canonical gospels. Matthew, Luke, and John have unique theological perspectives that we find them communicating directly in the stories of the appearances. They could that this approach because they had no tradition upon which they relied for the says, parables, healings, and exorcisms of Jesus. They had in mind giving to the followers of Jesus ways of understanding the continuing presence of the risen Lord with them. The miracle of the resurrection of Jesus is incredible, even for the ancients. They wanted to show it was true that God acted in this way and that if accepted it would transform the way they experienced life. The followers of Jesus throughout the centuries continue to experience their risen Lord as a living reality after his death.

I keep trying to believe in the resurrection of Jesus. You see, I am not prone to believe in such things. I do not think aliens from another planet ever visited here. I do not think there is any such things as ghosts. Parapsychology is not worthy of my attention. Yet, I keep coming back to the first witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus and find myself trusting them. I have no other reason for accepting as truth that God raised Jesus from the dead, and therefore to view my life as companionship with the risen Lord, other than their witness. Yes, “he lives within my heart,” as the song says, but that is not a reason to believe, but rather, is the result of a belief. I cannot read off the resurrection of Jesus from my experience, from nature, from psychology, from philosophy, or from history. I can read it only as revelation from God. 

I want to say something else just as gently and firmly. This story, as well as other stories of the appearances of the risen Lord in Matthew and John, would have no validity were it not based upon the report of real events. The witness of the first followers of Jesus and of Paul is that the risen Lord appeared to them. They did not seek him. The risen Lord sought them. He appeared to Peter and to the Twelve. We can rightly understand these appearances as focusing upon the grace of forgiveness from God through the risen Lord to those who denied and deserted Jesus at the end of his life. He appeared to the 500, to James, and to all the apostles. We can rightly understand these appearances as the risen Lord imparting the outpouring of the Spirit upon the community that would be the first witnesses to what God had done in Jesus. The risen Lord, the Son of God, revealed (ἀποκαλύψαι, Galatians 1:16) himself to Paul in a way that that helped him to see the depth of his sin, the grace extended to him through Christ, the awakening he needed to see the Jewish scripture in a new way, and the power the Spirit would give him to witness to the nations (I Corinthians 15:5-8). We can reasonably conclude that the grace Paul received in the revelation of the risen Lord to him was something similar to the grace received in the revelation given to the disciples and the first witnesses. The risen Lord also appeared to John toward the end of the century in a unique way (Book of Revelation), calling upon followers to remain faithful amid persecution from the beast-like powers of this world. These appearances revealed or disclosed to the first witnesses the identity of Jesus of Nazareth as the promised Jewish Messiah. Its presupposition is the emptiness of the tomb. The tomb is not evidence of the veracity of the witnesses, but their witness does presuppose it. Without its emptiness, early opponents of their witness could have gone to the tomb and shown others the body. Its emptiness does not prove that God did something miraculous to the corpse of Jesus of Nazareth. We need to be clear at this point. No one was present to witness to the resurrection itself. We today accept the witness of the burial of Jesus, the emptiness of the tomb, and the appearances of the risen Lord. However, we also need to accept that a gap exists between the emptiness of the tomb and the appearances. The first witnesses understood what happened in that gap as the Father, the God of the Jewish people, raising Jesus of Nazareth from the dead through the life-giving power of the Spirit. We accept the trustworthiness of their witness. We also accept the trustworthiness of their interpretation of these events as the fulfillment of the promises found in the Old Testament, especially the psalms and the prophets, and the anticipated end of the ages in the general resurrection of the dead as promised in Jewish apocalyptic. We need to take seriously the Jewishness of Jesus. If we do, then we must take seriously that he called the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the Lord revealed to Moses, who guided a people through the tribal federation, the formation of sacral kingship, exile, and return to their home, as his Father. Jesus of Nazareth taught us as followers of Jesus to call upon the God of the Jewish people as our Father. The resurrection of Jesus by the Father, through the life-giving power of the Spirit, means that every culture and generation must take seriously the calling of the Jewish people as the people of God. The paradoxical beauty of taking this revelation seriously is that this God known through Jesus Christ shows no partiality. Through this revelation, in other words, we discover that the God of the Jewish people treats all nations, peoples, and cultures potential members of the people of God. Thus, the emptiness of the tomb as the presupposition of the report of the appearances and therefore the resurrection of Jesus suggests that the course of human history and therefore nature itself  will find its fulfillment in the redeeming act of God at the promised and hoped for end of history. Such a promise and hope fill our present with meaning and purpose as we join Jesus and the first witnesses in our witness to the world of what God has done in Jesus. On this basis, Christians legitimately reflect upon what God is like through what they see in Jesus. The promised future event of redemption of our finite and temporal life has occurred first in Jesus of Nazareth. The resurrection of Jesus clarifies for us the ambiguity one finds in the course of the life of Jesus. While human judgment led to the conclusion that he was a blasphemer of the Law and of the Jewish view of God, and even a political revolutionary who deserved the worst form of execution, the judgment of God is that he was the faithful servant of the Lord who suffered for others. We may call these appearances visions or apparitions, but they were convincing enough to the first witnesses that what they saw meant the promised resurrection of the dead in the consummation of time occurred within our history to Jesus of Nazareth. Since it occurred, the power of the Spirit the first followers of Jesus experienced with Jesus of Nazareth in his teaching, healings, and exorcisms continued in their community after his death. The risen Lord is now present through the outpouring of the Spirit in the community and in our lives. The continuing work of the Spirit is to set us in the direction of the fulfillment of the work of our lives in union with Christ. The fulfillment of our finite and temporal lives occurs through our participation in the life and eternity of God. [4]

I invite you to shift gears for a moment and reflect with me upon one dimension of the Emmaus road story. 

I think we can agree that Jesus devoted much of us life to walking. Every devout male in Galilee would travel to Jerusalem three times a year for the festivals, a 240-mile round trip from Nazareth. If Jesus followed that pattern every year between the ages of 5 and 30, he would have walked 18,000 miles (3 x 240 x 25). Some people have calculated that Jesus walked about 3,125 miles in his three-year public ministry. His disciples would have walked many of those miles with him. That adds up to about 21,525 miles. He did all this walking in sandals, which would have been a difficult task for me. I like sandals, but if I walk too long in them, they hurt. 

If there is anything the Emmaus Road story teaches us, it is that the disciples of Jesus are at their best when they keep walking with him. We tend to like stories of the road, of people travelling, discovering, and gaining insights. Do not look for instant results in this walk with Jesus. It took some time in this journey for the disciples to recognize Jesus among them. In the journey with Jesus, the process of learning is lifelong.

Disciples also know that they cannot walk the journey alone. Jesus sent his disciples out two by two (Luke 10:1-12), and it was two who traveled together on the road that day. Discipleship is a long-haul process, and we need each other along the way. 

Hail Guest, we ask not what thou art.

If friend we greet thee hand and heart;

If stranger such no longer be;

If foe, our love shall conquer thee.[5]

Most centrally, the Emmaus story makes the claim that the risen Christ journeys with us, whether we know that or not, realize that or not, even as it also affirms that there are moments of recognition in which we do realize that. Thus, I see the Emmaus Road is a story about how the risen Christ comes to his followers again, and again, and again. 

To see thee, O Christ, is the Beginning and the End,
Thou goest before me and thou bearest me.
Thou art the Journey and the journey's End.[6]

The followers of Jesus, both then and now, continued to experience Jesus as a living reality after his death. In the early Christian community, these experiences included visions or apparitions of Jesus. Paul and others (including the author of the book of Revelation) had them. The community experienced the power of the Spirit they had known in Jesus continuing to be and to operate. Yes, the risen Lord is still with those who seek to follow him. 

Christians throughout the centuries have continued to experience Jesus as a living spiritual reality, a figure of the present, not simply a memory from the past. The form such presence may vary, but its reality is not something we need to doubt.

Christians can rely on the faithfulness and truthfulness of the first witnesses to the appearances of the risen Lord and to the emptiness of the tomb. The various forms of their spiritual experiences, such as visions, mystical experience, and the sense of the presence of Jesus as a living spiritual reality, which occur in prayer, worship, Eucharist, encounters with people, or in the course of daily life, have validity because of the truthfulness of the first witnesses. The abiding truth of Easter has its basis in what happened in the opening months and years of the first Christian community.

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[1] Hermann Gunkel

[2] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 416-7.

[3] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 283, 304

[4] Marcus J. Borg and N. T. Wright (The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions [San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1999], pp. 134-135.) What I have done is to reflect both with and against Borg.

[5] --Sign on an old Welsh door.

[6] -King Alfred, as quoted by Alan Jones in Journey Into Christ.