(11) Idle tales.--The one Greek word which is thus rendered occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It is applied strictly to the trifling, half-idiotic babble of dotage.
Verse 11. - And their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not. The utter incredulity of the friends of Jesus when these reports of his resurrection were brought to them is remarkable when contrasted with the evident dread of the Sanhedrin that something of grave moment would happen after three days had elapsed. The disciples were evidently amazed at their Master's rising from the dead. The chief priests and Jewish leaders would apparently have been surprised if something startling had not happened (see Matthew 27:63, etc., where an account is given of the measures these able but unprincipled men took, in their short-sighted wisdom, to counteract any fulfilment of the Crucified One's word - a fulfilment they evidently looked forward to as to no improbable contingency). The utter surprise of the disciples at the Resurrection, which in their Gospels they truthfully acknowledge, is no small side-proof of the genuineness of these records of the event.
24:1-12 See the affection and respect the women showed to Christ, after he was dead and buried. Observe their surprise when they found the stone rolled away, and the grave empty. Christians often perplex themselves about that with which they should comfort and encourage themselves. They look rather to find their Master in his grave-clothes, than angels in their shining garments. The angels assure them that he is risen from the dead; is risen by his own power. These angels from heaven bring not any new gospel, but remind the women of Christ's words, and teach them how to apply them. We may wonder that these disciples, who believed Jesus to be the Son of God and the true Messiah, who had been so often told that he must die, and rise again, and then enter into his glory, who had seen him more than once raise the dead, yet should be so backward to believe his raising himself. But all our mistakes in religion spring from ignorance or forgetfulness of the words Christ has spoken. Peter now ran to the sepulchre, who so lately ran from his Master. He was amazed. There are many things puzzling and perplexing to us, which would be plain and profitable, if we rightly understood the words of Christ.
And their words seemed to them as idle tales,.... As fabulous things, as mere whims, and the fancies of their brains: "as a dream", according to the Persic version; or, "as a jest", as the Arabic version renders it. They looked upon them as mere deceptions and delusions, and not real things; the Vulgate Latin, Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic versions read, "these words"; what they related concerning what they saw, and heard, at the sepulchre:
and they believed them not: for they had no thought, nor expectation of Christ's rising from the dead; they did not know that he was to rise again, according to the Scriptures; nor did they understand him when he told them of his rising again; and had no faith in it, nor hope concerning it, and could give no credit to it, when it was told them; and the Arabic version reads, "they did not believe it"; the word or report which the women delivered to them.
and they believed them not: for they had no thought, nor expectation of Christ's rising from the dead; they did not know that he was to rise again, according to the Scriptures; nor did they understand him when he told them of his rising again; and had no faith in it, nor hope concerning it, and could give no credit to it, when it was told them; and the Arabic version reads, "they did not believe it"; the word or report which the women delivered to them.