Scripture · Luke 23:56
Luke 24:5–7 · The women receive the Easter announcement
Why Seek Ye the Living Among the Dead?
As the women bowed their faces to the ground in terror, the two men asked them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; He has risen! Remember how He told you while He was still in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again.’”
Roses climb over the tomb as an angel raises one hand. John Roddam Spencer Stanhope surrounds the Easter announcement with growing things, while three women bring their questions and burial vessels into the encounter.
What does Why Seek Ye the Living Among the Dead? show?
One woman kneels in the foreground with her hands clasped. Behind her, another extends open palms toward the angel, while the woman at the far left carries a small golden container. A second container rests on the ground beside the flowers.
The angel’s orange-red wings fill the upper right, and the green robe falls in long folds toward bare feet. Thin gold haloes encircle the figures’ heads. Pink roses join the women and the messenger across the tomb’s stonework, allowing the signs of life in the garden to accompany the announcement.
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What does Luke 24:5–7 mean?
Luke 24:5–6 begins with the women terrified before two men in radiant clothing. They have come with spices, but the body is gone. The messengers ask why they seek the living among the dead and announce that Jesus has risen. Stanhope gives the announcement to one visible winged angel and gathers three women around that figure.
The messengers then tell the women to remember what Jesus said in Galilee about His suffering and rising again. The passage continues into verse 7, and verse 8 says that they remember. Easter changes their understanding of what they have found by returning them to a promise already spoken.
Luke 24:5–6 supplies Stanhope’s title and the announcement at the center of the women’s encounter with the angel.
Sources
Art Gallery of New South Wales — collection record. Owning museum’s exact image and current broad date range, with technical medium and stretcher measurements.
Luke 24 — Berean Standard Bible. The paired passage in its full chapter context.
Also from Luke:The Angel Appearing to ZachariasAnnunciation