Church Fathers on Matthew 27:58

When the Evangelist had finished the order of the Lord’s Passion and death, he treats of His burial.

Arimathea is the same as Ramatha, the city of Helcana and Samuel, and is situated in the Chananitic country near Diospolis. This Joseph was a man of great dignity in respect of worldly station, but has the praise of much higher merit in God’s sight, seeing he is described as righteous. Indeed he that should have the burial of the Lord’s body ought to have been such, that he might be deserving of that office by righteous merit.

He is described as rich, not out of any ambition on the part of the writer to represent so noble and rich a man as Jesus' disciple, but to shew how he was able to obtain the body of Jesus from Pilate. For poor and unknown individuals would not have dared to approach Pilate, the representative of Roman power, and ask the body of a crucified malefactor.