How Many Women Went to the Tomb? (Matthew 28:1, Mark 16:1, Luke 24:1, 10, John 20:1)

The argument

Some argue that the gospel resurrection accounts are contradictory concerning how many women went to the tomb. Here are the relevant passages:

Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. (Matthew 28:1)

When the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. (Mark 16:1)

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared... Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles. (Luke 24:1, 10)

Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. (John 20:1)

Who went to the tomb? Was it just Mary Magdelene? Was it just the two Marys? Or was it a group of at least five women (the two Marys, Salome, and "other women"), as Luke records?

A reasonable explanation

There were at least five women who went to the tomb, as Luke records. Matthew does not say that only the two Marys went to the tomb, Mark does not say that only those three women went to the tomb, and John does not say that only Mary Magdelene went to the tomb. In fact, it is clear from John's account that other women were with Mary, since she says in John 20:2, "They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him."

There is simply no necessary contradiction between the resurrection accounts concerning how many women went to the tomb.

General notes

The differences between the gospels point to their authenticity

What would actually be more suspicious is if all four gospel accounts were identical. This would mean that they collaborated, perhaps even conspired, with one another to produce a perfectly harmonized resurrection account.

However, what we see instead is four accounts that have significant differences between them, which points towards the fact that each author simply reported the events that he heard about himself. So, rather than producing doubt, the differences between the gospel accounts should actually make us more confident in the historicity of the resurrection accounts.

It is perfectly normal for eyewitness accounts to differ

Not every witness to an event recalls all of the details perfectly, or in the exact same way, so we should expect various accounts of the resurrection events to differ from one another.

The key is that there are no irreconcilable contradictions

As long as we can provide possibilities for how the various resurrection accounts could reconcile into one coherent narrative, then there would be no irreconcilable, or necessary contradiction. This would then allow us to continue believing in the inerrancy and infallibility of the Bible without any compromise.

"But, I'm not convinced by your explanations. I still think these are irreconcilable contradictions."

It's likely that non-believers won't accept the possible explanations that we provide concerning reconciling the apparent contradictions in the resurrection narratives. However, their refusal to accept these explanations is not based upon the fact that reasonable and possible explanations have been provided, but simply upon the fact that they don't want to believe that there are legitimately reasonable and possible explanations.

Their goal is simply to continue justifying their unbelief in the Bible, regardless of any fact or explanation provided to them. So, we can do our best to provide these reasonable and possible explanations to them, but if they blindly close their minds to them, then we have simply done all that we can do. We should inform them that they are being unreasonable and stubborn, and that they are simply trying to shut their minds to the truth.