Schulz, Gregory P. Why Are You Weeping? An exegetical and ontological remark on John 20:13 &15.
“Why are you weeping?” (John 20:13 & 15). First, the angels asked her. Then, Jesus asked Mary the very same question. Why? Well, it was the morning of that first Easter, after all! We know that the question was part and parcel of the historical events of His resurrection. Thus, this question was part of the historical happenings that first Easter Sunday. Mary was there, weeping at Jesus’ grave, three days after His death by crucifixion. This question is what the angels asked her. This question is what Jesus asked her. But this historical affirmation hardly exhausts the text. In view of John’s verbal parsimony and his stated purpose in writing his gospel (20:31), we recognize that there is more to it than that. Mary was being led to appropriate for herself the truth of Jesus’ rising from death and its impact on her very being as a human being. As are we right now, in the hearing of this text.