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Passage Research

John 20 — Sermon Preparation

The empty tomb, Jesus's appearance to Mary Magdalene, to the disciples, and to doubting Thomas, who declares 'My Lord and my God.' Below is a research summary for John 20, drawn from openly licensed scholarly databases — original-language morphology, classic sermons from the church fathers through the Puritans, and ancient geography data.

31
verses
614 / 163
Greek words / lemmas
32
classic sermon excerpts
8
preachers & commentators

John 20 in the Greek

Distinctive vocabulary of this chapter, based on original-language morphology.

GreekTransliterationStrong'sCountKJV renderings
μνημεῖονmnēmeîonG34199grave, sepulchre, tomb
μαθητήςmathētḗsG310111disciple
ἄλλοςállosG2436more, one, other
ΘωμᾶςThōmâsG23814Thomas
πιστεύωpisteúōG41006believe, commit, put in trust with
κεῖμαιkeîmaiG27494be, lay, lie
εἷςheîsG15206a, abundantly, man, one

How preachers through history handled this text

32 public-domain excerpts on John 20, from the church fathers to the Puritans.

Spurgeon10Calvin6Matthew Henry6Alexander MacLaren4Augustine2Chrysostom2John Flavel1+1 more

“If Christ gave his life a ransom, and had not taken it again, it would not have appeared that his giving it was accepted as satisfaction. It was a great trial to Mary, that the body was gone. Weak believers often make that the matter of complaint, which is really just ground of hope, and matter of joy. It is well when those more honoured than others with the privileges of disciples, are more active than others in the duty of disciples; more willing to take pains, and run hazards, in a good work. …”

— Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible (Concise), on John 20:1–10 (Public Domain)

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