John 20:15

John 20:15, in plain English

Jesus asks her, 'Why are you crying? Who are you looking for?' She thinks He's the gardener and asks if He moved the body. She's talking to the answer without knowing it.

Why it's here

There's beautiful symbolism here: Jesus in the garden, mistaken for a gardener. The first Adam lost everything in a garden; the new Adam restores everything in a garden.

Who's speaking

Jesus speaks to Mary for the first time after rising.

Where it sits in the story

Mary pours out her heart to someone she thinks is a stranger. 'If you moved Him, tell me where.' She's asking Jesus where Jesus is. And He's about to reveal Himself in the most personal way possible.

The scholarly reading

Jesus asks Mary why she weeps and whom she seeks; she mistakes Him for the gardener and asks about the body's whereabouts.

Language and setting

The 'gardener' (kepourus) identification carries rich symbolism: Jesus is the new Adam in the garden, the true gardener restoring what the first Adam lost in Eden. Mary's error is theologically productive: the garden of death becomes the garden of new creation.

Voice

Jesus and Mary exchange words.

Significance

Jesus' question echoes the angels' but adds 'Whom are you seeking?'—His first words in the garden of Gethsemane (18:4). Mary's misidentification of Jesus as the gardener carries Edenic symbolism: the new Adam stands in the new garden.

13“Woman, why are you weeping?” they asked.

14When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there. But she did not recognize that it was Jesus.

15“Woman, why are you weeping?” Jesus asked. “Whom are you seeking?”

16Jesus said to her, “Mary.”

17“Do not cling to Me,” Jesus said, “for I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go and tell My brothers, ‘I am ascending to My Father and your Father, to My God and your God.’”

Read all of John 20 — Mary weeping in a garden hears her name spoken by a voice she thought she'd lost forever. Then Jesus walks into a locked room: peace.