₅₇When it was evening, a rich man from Arimathea arrived; his name was Joseph, and he also was a disciple of Jesus. ₅₈He went into the presence of Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate gave orders for the body to be given to Joseph. ₅₉So Joseph took it, wrapped it in a new linen sheet, ₆₀and placed it in his own tomb, which he had just recently dug out of solid rock. Then he rolled a large stone across the entrance to the tomb and went away. ₆₁Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were sitting there, facing the tomb.

₆₂The next day, which was a Sabbath, the chief priests and the Pharisees met with Pilate ₆₃and said, “Sir, we remember that while that liar was still alive he said, ‘I will be raised to life three days later.’ ₆₄Give orders, then, for his tomb to be carefully guarded until the third day, so that his disciples will not be able to go and steal the body, and then tell the people that he was raised from death. This last lie would be even worse than the first one.”

₆₅“Take a guard,” Pilate told them; “go and make the tomb as secure as you can.”

₆₆So they left and made the tomb secure by putting a seal on the stone and leaving the guard on watch.

₃₈After this, Joseph, who was from the town of Arimathea, asked Pilate if he could take Jesus' body. (Joseph was a follower of Jesus, but in secret, because he was afraid of the Jewish authorities.) Pilate told him he could have the body, so Joseph went and took it away. ₃₉Nicodemus, who at first had gone to see Jesus at night, went with Joseph, taking with him about thirty kilogrammes of spices, a mixture of myrrh and aloes. ₄₀The two men took Jesus' body and wrapped it in linen with the spices according to the Jewish custom of preparing a body for burial. ₄₁There was a garden in the place where Jesus had been put to death, and in it there was a new tomb where no one had ever been buried. ₄₂Since it was the day before the Sabbath and because the tomb was close by, they placed Jesus' body there.