When Jesus was laid in the tomb, everything seemed to be definitively over. Yet his words continued to resonate amongst his followers, particularly how he would tear down the temple and rebuild it after three days. Had he not spoken here of the temple of his body?
The chief priests and the Pharisees also remembered these words, and that is why they asked Pilate to station guards at the tomb to prevent Jesus’s disciples from removing their master’s dead body, so that they could then tell the people that he had risen (cf. Mt 27:62–66).
