From Eyes to Icons : The Visual Poetics of the Empty Tomb in Greek Gospel Narratives

In the New Testament gospel accounts of the empty tomb, there is a strong emphasis on vision and sight. This emphasis is at times understood as a reference to the role of eyewitnesses and their testimonies in the formation of the gospel tradition. This study, however, reads the visual elements of the texts as part of their poetics, as part of their narrative and rhetorical setting.By looking at eight different Greek gospel narratives, both the New Testament gospels and four extracanonical gospels, this study offers an interpretation of the empty tomb stories where observing characters and descriptive elements within the stories are features that invite the readers of the text to partake in the narrated events themselves. Here, the divine messenger and the various characters’ visual responses are the main focus of the analyses of the different narratives. The gospel narratives that are part of this study are, beyond the four gospels of the New Testament, the Gospel of Peter, the Gospel of Nicodemus, Nonnus’ Paraphrase of the Gospel of John, and Eudocia’s Homeric Centos.The effect upon readers, or audiences of the text, is created by and in this study read through the rhetorical devices of ekphrasis and enargeia. Whereas some of the gospels are sparse in descriptive elements, others present elaborate descriptions of the scene and presents initiated responses to the things described as a way to present the appropriate actions after being confronted with what is seen. In addition to the ancient rhetorical categories, this study also utilises the narratological device of focalisation, as well as the theoretical concept of the ‘gaze’ to describe the visualisation processes and their epistemological concerns.This study concludes that the emphasis on vision and sight can be read as poetic devices that invite the reader to look at the empty tomb with ‘eyes of faith’ and that the narratives constitute parts of a formative visual practice within the beginnings of and late antique Christianity. Whereas various sights are at other times used to reframe political authority, the empty tomb narratives negotiate the absence of Jesus through engaging the emotions in seeing the empty tomb. In the narratives, a verbal icon is presented before the eyes of an audience in front of the text, confronting them with a vivid actuality of the story, and encouraging readers to respond to what they see.