John Lightfoot on Luke 24:1-4

[And rested the sabbath day.] If our Saviour was taken down from the cross about sunset, as it was provided, Deuteronomy 21:23; Joshua 8:29, then had the women this interim of time to buy their spices and despatch other business before the entry of the sabbath day.

I. Between the suns. So they called that space of time that was between the setting of the sun and the appearance of any star.

II. Might they not have that space of time also that was between the first and second star? We may judge something from this passage: "In the evening of the sabbath, if he see one star and do any work, he is acquitted; but if he see two stars, let him bring his trespass-offering."

III. Might they not have some farther allowance in the case of funerals? We may judge from this passage: "they do all works necessary about the dead [on the sabbath day]; they anoint him, they wash him, provided only that they do not stir a limb of him," &c. It was not safe for those women to shew themselves too busy in preparing for his interment; especially seeing Jesus died as a malefactor, and was odious to the people: this might exasperate the people against them, and so much the more too, if they should, in the least measure, violate the sabbath day. But further, besides the honour they gave to the sabbath, it was not prudence in them to break it for a work which they thought they might as well do when the sabbath was done and over.