Nicodemus is a New Testament figure venerated as a saint in a number of Christian traditions. He is depicted as a Pharisee and a member of the Sanhedrin who is drawn to hear Jesus's teachings. Like Lazarus, Nicodemus is not mentioned in the synoptic Gospels, but only by John,

Some scholars have identified the Nicodemus of the New Testament with a 1st-century historic Nicodemus ben Gurion, while others consider the dates and apparent age discrepancy between the two make this unlikely. An apocryphal work under his name, the Gospel of Nicodemus, was produced in the mid-4th century, and is mostly a reworking of the earlier Acts of Pilate, which recounts the Harrowing of Hell.

Gospel narrative

thumb|270px|[[Nicodemus Visiting Christ, 1899 painting. Nicodemus (left) talking to Jesus, by Henry Ossawa Tanner]]

thumb|270px|Christus und Nicodemus, by [[Fritz von Uhde (1848–1911)]]

Nicodemus is mentioned in three places in the Gospel of John:

  • He first visits Jesus one night, in secret, to discuss Jesus's teachings. (John 3)
  • The second time Nicodemus is mentioned, he reminds his colleagues in the Sanhedrin that the law requires that a person be heard before being judged. (John 7)
  • Finally, Nicodemus appears after Jesus's crucifixion to provide the customary spices for anointing the dead,<!--Not "embalming spices". That was not what is done with myrrh.--> and assists Joseph of Arimathea in preparing the body of Jesus for burial. (John 19)

The first time Nicodemus is mentioned, he is identified as a Pharisee who comes to see Jesus at night. According to the scripture, Jesus went to Jerusalem for the Passover feast. While in Jerusalem he chased the moneychangers from the temple and overturned their tables. His disciples remembered then the words of Psalm 69: "Zeal for your house will consume me." After these events "many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing". When Nicodemus visits Jesus he makes reference to these events: "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him".

Jesus replies: "Unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." Then follows a conversation with Nicodemus about the meaning of being "born again" or "born from above" (): Nicodemus explores the notion of being literally born again from one's mother's womb, but most theologians recognise that Nicodemus knew Jesus was not speaking of literal rebirth. Theologian Charles Ellicott wrote that "after the method of Rabbinic dialogue, [Nicodemus] presses the impossible meaning of the words in order to exclude it, and to draw forth the true meaning. 'You cannot mean that a man is to enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born. What is it, then, that you do mean?" In this instance, Nicodemus chooses to first question with the literal (rather than the figurative) meaning of ; this literal sense of the word can then be firmly set aside to allow the real significance of the term to emerge.

Jesus expresses surprise, perhaps ironically, that "a teacher of Israel" does not understand the concept of spiritual rebirth:

In Chapter 7, Nicodemus advises his colleagues among "the chief priests and the Pharisees", to hear and investigate before making a judgment concerning Jesus, reminding them that Jewish law requires that a person must be heard before they can be condemned. Their mocking response argues that no prophet comes from Galilee. Nonetheless, it is probable that he wielded a certain influence in the Sanhedrin. identify him with Nicodemus ben Gurion, mentioned in the Talmud as a wealthy and popular holy man reputed to have had miraculous powers. Some later 20th- and 21st-century historians make the same connection. Other scholars reject this identification, arguing that the biblical Nicodemus is likely an older man at the time of his conversation with Jesus, while Nicodemus ben Gurion was on the scene forty years later, at the time of the First Jewish-Roman War.

Veneration

Nicodemus is venerated as a saint in Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and in Catholicism. The Eastern Orthodox and Byzantine Catholic Churches commemorate him on the Sunday of the Holy Myrrhbearers, which is celebrated on the Third Sunday of Pascha (i.e., the second Sunday after Easter). Pious tradition holds that his relics were found on 2 August, along with those of Saint Stephen the Protomartyr; Gamaliel; and Gamaliel's second son, Abibon (also, "Abibas"; "Abibo"). This event is commemorated on that date in the Eastern churches, while the Catholic General Roman Calendar marks the anniversary of the translation of Nicodemus' remains, rather than their discovery, which by the same tradition occurred the following day, 3 August. In the Roman Martyrology, Nicodemus' feast day is 31 August, celebrated jointly with Saint Joseph of Arimathea, and generally followed in the Roman Rite tradition.

This does not preclude local preferences and traditions from being applied, as dioceses, national churches and religious institutes may have their own days of observance approved. For example, at the St. Nicodemus and St. Joseph of Arimathea Church, which the Franciscan Order established in Ramla in the 19th century, permission from the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem was obtained to celebrate the feast day of the two saints on the Saturday of the third week of Easter, so that the link between their role in the burial of Jesus and Easter solemnities would be highlighted in the Holy Land. The church has a painting above its altar, attributed to Titian, The Deposition from the Cross, which shows the two saints.

Days of observance

  • Eastern Christianity (including Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and Eastern-rite Catholics):
  • Discovery of the saint's relics: 2 August
  • As a Holy Myrrhbearer: Third Sunday of Pascha (Easter)
  • Roman-rite Catholicism:
  • Translation of the saint's relics: 3 August
  • Feast day: 31 August

Legacy

Art

thumb|270px|Entombment, by [[Titian]]

Nicodemus figures prominently in medieval depictions of the Deposition or Descent from the Cross in which he and Joseph of Arimathea are shown removing the dead Christ from the cross, often with the aid of a ladder.

Both of these sculptures date from at least a millennium after Nicodemus's life, but the ascriptions attest to the contemporary interest in Nicodemus as a character in medieval Europe.

Persuaded: The Story of Nicodemus by David Harder is a fictionalized account of the life of Nicodemus. According to the author, he used episodes and timetables sourced from all four gospels and the Acts of the Apostles to develop his novel's timeline of events. Scripture quoted within the novel is taken from the Passion Translation version of the Bible.

Music

In 18th-century Lutheranism, prescribed readings were assigned throughout the year; the gospel text of the meeting of Jesus and Nicodemus at night was assigned to Trinity Sunday. Johann Sebastian Bach composed several cantatas for the occasion, of which , composed in 1715, stays close to the gospel based on a libretto by the court poet in Weimar, Salomo Franck.

In popular music, Nicodemus's name was used figuratively in Henry Clay Work's 1864 American Civil War-era piece "Wake Nicodemus!", an abolitionist song hailing the end of slavery, which at that time was popular in minstrel shows. In 1978 Tim Curry covered the song on his debut album Read My Lips. The song's layered connotations, its anti-slavery sentimentgave it a connection with "rebirths", and to John's "born again" Nicodemus. By extension, it became associated with the civil rights movement in the .

Ernst Pepping composed an (motet on gospel text) in 1937. In 1941, The Golden Gate Quartet, sang the Gospel "God Told Nicodemus", in the African-American Jubilee style. The Bob Dylan song "In The Garden", released on the 1980 album Saved, contains the lines "Nicodemus came at night so he wouldn't be seen by men / Saying, 'Master, tell me why a man must be born again'". The song "Help Yourself" by The Devil Makes Three, from their 2009 Do Wrong Right album, contains a very informal retelling of the relationship between Nicodemus and Jesus.

Film and television

Nicodemus is portrayed by Diego Matamoros in the 2003 film The Gospel of John. In the 2025 animated film, Light of the World, Michael Benyaer voices Nicodemus.

The figure of Nicodemus appears in several television productions:

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  • In the 1952 series, The Living Bible, Forrest Taylor appears in the role of Nicodemus
  • In the 1965 film, The Greatest Story Ever Told, Joseph Schildkraut plays the character of Nicodemus
  • Sir Laurence Olivier portrayed Nicodemus in Franco Zeffirelli's 1977 series, Jesus of Nazareth
  • Erick Avari plays Nicodemus in the 2019 web series The Chosen
  • In the 2018–2019 Brazilian television series Jesus, actor depicts Nicodemus

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Social influence

The Reformation and religious conflict

During the struggle between Protestants and Catholics in Europe, from the 16th century to the 18th, a person professing a creed different from the locally approved one often risked severe penalties—in many cases, capital punishment. There developed the use of "Nicodemite", usually a term of disparagement, referring to a person who is suspected of public misrepresentation of their actual religious beliefs.

The term is recorded from at least 1529, in relation to religious concealment or reticence. It is a reference to the clandestine night visit of Nicodemus to Jesus, suggesting an analogy between the undeclared belief of Nicodemus and the reluctance of some dissenters from (at first) Catholicism to risk being open about their true creed. To John Calvin, who opposed all veneration of saints, the fact of Nicodemus being a Catholic saint in no way exonerated this "duplicity". Calvin used the word in his 1544 referring to religious dissemblers in France—outwardly, conforming Catholics; inwardly, adherents of Protestantism. He was apparently not completely comfortable with the term's allusion to Nicodemus, however; subsequent editions of the work reduced the label's use and later French editions replaced the word with " ('false') Nicodemus" instead. While the epithet initially applied to crypto-Protestants, it later came to be used broadly for anyone suspected of exhibiting a false appearance of their religious adherence and concealing their genuine beliefs. Some point to the lyrics' use of the name Nicodemus as a figurative reference to the biblical figure. In the case of the song, Nicodemus is an enslaved African, long deceased, but acknowledged in the lyrics as both prophet and herald of freedom. The contrast in the lyrics between night and morning, and the enslaved Nicodemus' certainty in what the metaphorical "morning" would bring, have been seen as drawing a parallel to, and being inspired by, the story of the biblical figure. In one story, emancipation, and in the other, salvation, is to come "in the morning"; each Nicodemus has faith in their eventual advent. The lyrics say, in part:

Rosamund Rodman, a researcher and scholar of placenames, noted in a 2008 article that enslaved people who learnt to read generally did so in secret and at night, due to risks of punishment for this forbidden activity. The gospel's Nicodemus came to Jesus to learn from him, also in secret and at night, for fear of repercussions. Such connections and allusions lead Rodman to conclude that the town's name has its ultimate origin with the biblical figure. Religious affairs journalist Daniel Burke notes that, "To blacks after the Civil War, he was a model of rebirth as they sought to cast off their old identity as slaves".

On 16 August 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. invoked Nicodemus as a metaphor concerning the need for the United States to be "born again" in order to effectively address social and economic inequality. The speech, called "Where Do We Go From Here?", was delivered at the 11th Annual Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) Convention in Atlanta, Georgia.

<gallery mode="packed" heights="154px" caption="Nicodemus in art">

File:Crijn Hendricksz.jpeg|Jesus and Nicodemus, by Crijn Hendricksz

Accademia - Cristo in pietà sostenuto dalla Madonna, Nicodemo e san Giovanni Evangelista con le Marie - Cima da Conegliano.jpg|Nicodemus with Christ's body, by Cima da Conegliano, with Apostle John on the right and Mary to left.

File:Pietro Perugino cat39.jpg|Entombment, by Pietro Perugino, with Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimatea

File:William Brassey Hole Nicodemus.jpg| Nicodemus (right) talking to Jesus, by William Brassey Hole

File:Henry Ossawa Tanner - Nicodemus coming to Christ.jpg|Nicodemus coming to Christ, by Henry Ossawa Tanner

</gallery>

See also

  • Saint Nicodemus, patron saint archive
  • Christ's discourse with Nicodemus
  • Chapel of Saint Joseph of Arimathea and Saint Nicodemus, the Syrian Orthodox chapel within the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem

Notes

References

Biblical verses

Citations

Further reading

  • "St. Nicodemus" in Butler's Lives of the Saints
  • Cornel Heinsdorff: Christus, Nikodemus und die Samaritanerin bei Juvencus. Mit einem Anhang zur lateinischen Evangelienvorlage (Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte, Bd. 67), Berlin/New York, 2003.
  • "Wake Nicodemus!' (Work, Henry Clay)" International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP) / Petrucci Music Library