John20chapter 20

The first witnesses are the detail no one inventing a story in that culture would choose. A woman's testimony carried little weight in Jewish legal settings and was often not accepted at all, so building the central claim of the faith on Mary Magdalene's word was a liability, not a selling point. It is in every Gospel anyway.

The grave clothes are described with unusual care, and the description matters. The linen wrappings were lying there and the cloth that had been on his head was folded up in a place by itself — not unwound and thrown aside as a robbery would leave them, and not gone with the body.

The locked doors are explained in the text: for fear of the Jewish leaders. The disciples were the associates of a man executed for sedition, in a city where the authorities had just proved willing to act, during a festival with extra troops in town.

Thomas asks for the specific evidence a crucified body would carry — the mark of the nails in the hands and a wound in the side — and the wound in the side exists because a soldier checked that he was dead with a spear rather than breaking his legs. Thomas is asking to inspect the coroner's findings.