"TEACHER!!!"

 There are few words, or even whole paragraphs which could describe how the disciples were feeling that Sunday evening. They couldn't make up their mind if Mary the Magdalene had snapped or not. Peter, John, His mother, and one other besides her had seen the empty tomb. They had brought back the empty grave cloth with the strange ghostly image on it. They had wanted to hope, but so far,
     Mary had been the only one to have seen Him. And to be honest, she had burst into the house looking like she had lost her mind completely when she had told them. Her face, and her undone veil were soaked and streaked with tears. Her eyes were wild, but animated and so full of joy... No, that's not quite the right word. Excitement, shock, looking as though she could take on the entire Roman legion by herself and didn't care if she shouted it from Mt. Tzyon itself; these are what filled her eyes and her face as her whole body shouted at us before she did, "He's alive!" She left almost as quickly to find the others who hadn't returned to the house after His arrest and to tell them. Her whole demeanor and disposition had changed from when she had left that morning. She hadn't cared whether she was caught by the Roman soldiers. She hadn't cared if she had gotten them executed with her plan. She hadn't cared if she herself died, because in a way, she already had when He did. It was not the same woman who went out with the proper embalming spices that Sunday morning who returned. This woman would have shouted that she had seen the Teacher alive in the face of the High Priests, the Prefect, and even Caesar himself.
     The whole household of disciples was disturbed and unmoored since she had come in. They remembered what He had said, that He would rise after He was murdered. But they were too scared to hope. They hadn't seen Him themselves. It was just too painful, and they didn't want to be given that hope only to have it ripped away from them again. Yet there was His empty burial shroud, fighting to do just that. There was Mary the Magdalene, screaming it at them. Literally.
     And then there He was. Just as they were hearing from Cleopas about how the two of them had just walked and talked with Him for miles. They had left early that morning for Cleopas' house in Emmaus-Nicopolis, easily a half day's journey on foot from Jerusalem. The rest of the disciples hadn't expected to see them again that day. They had to have set out to return to Jerusalem less than an hour after arriving in Emmaus. They too had that same animated, excited, awestruck look in their eyes that they had seen in Mary's.
     "Epistata!" (Teacher!) Someone screamed in her native Greek even as they were debating, arguing past their fear of hope. And then all eyes turned to see what she was seeing, what her eyes, in shock, were registering and she didn't know or even care that she was holding her breath. She couldn't speak another word. She was frozen where she was. She couldn't even blink as that same easy smile and eyes the color of the sea returned her gaze lovingly as only He could.
     "Sh'lama Allawkhoun." He greeted them in Aramaic, His hands up in in a gentle gesture meant to calm them all down.
     Time just seemed to stop. There was no sensing it in that moment. There was no sensing anything else as some, like her, remained frozen to where they stood. Others rushed towards Him. Kefa, Peter, had been one of those latter. John had been one of the former, tears streaming down his face as he saw his best friend since childhood, whom he had watched bleed out and die two days before, and whom he had helped place on a cold stone slab in a tomb, standing whole and alive in front of him.
     "Sh'lama Allawkoun, my brothers." He repeated Himself in Aramaic. "It's Me, don't be afraid."
     And it was, from the absolute kindness and love in His eyes, to the good humored smile on his lips, from His chestnut colored hair, to His still somewhat thin frame. The marks from His torture and execution were still there on His head, and in the wrists of His outstretched hands. She hadn't seen it, but she had been told by those who had what had transpired.
     Here He was. Yeshua, her Teacher who meant everything to her, was alive right in front of her, His apostles, His other disciples, their children, and... his own mother.
     "Bari?" She asked as her hands clapped to her mouth and the sobbing began. She too had watched Him die, and had helped bury Him. She couldn't say any more.
     "Yes, Emi. It's Me."
     Slowly, and then quickly, she rushed towards her son and gripped Him so fiercely one might have thought He would break. But there was a strength to Him now, an energy surrounding Him that she doubted anything in the skies or on the ground or under it could break. It was an energy that had defeated Hades himself, and led him as a prisoner of war in triumph. It was an energy even the Olympian gods couldn't overpower or defeat. They were powerless to the Being who now stood among them trying to calm them all down in the face of something that shook heaven and earth.
     Yeshua had risen from the dead. The Teacher was alive!
     There are no real words to describe what was felt. And those feelings wouldn't be forgotten into the ages of ages. How does a soul forget this? The Teacher is alive!