The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ Part 10

All was now ready for the last act, and the soldiers started their ghastly work.

It is not my intention to harrow up the feelings of my readers with minute descriptions of the horrors of crucifixion.[3] Nothing would be easier, for it was an unspeakably awful form of death. Cicero, who was well acquainted with it, says: "It was the most cruel and shameful of all punishments." "Let it never," he adds, "come near the body of a Roman citizen; nay, not even near his thoughts or eyes or ears." It was the punishment reserved for slaves and for revolutionaries, whose end was intended to be marked by special infamy.

The cross was most probably of the form in which it is usually represented--an upright post crossed by a bar near the top. There were other two forms--that of the letter T and that of the letter X--but, as the accusation of Jesus is said to have been put up over His head, there must have been a projection above the bar on which His arms were outstretched. The arms were probably bound to the cross-beam, as without this the hands would have been torn through by the weight. And for a similar reason there was a piece of wood projecting from the middle of the upright beam, on which the body sat. The feet were either nailed separately or crossed the one over the other, with a nail through both. It is doubtful whether the body was affixed before or after the cross was elevated and planted in the ground. The head hung free, so that the dying man could both see and speak to those about the cross.

In modern executions the greatest pains are taken to make death as nearly as possible instantaneous, and any bungling which prolongs the agony excites indignation and horror in the public mind. But the most revolting feature of death by crucifixion was that the torture was deliberately prolonged. The victim usually lingered a whole day, sometimes two or three days, still retaining consciousness; while the burning of the wounds in the hands and feet, the uneasiness of the unnatural position, the oppression of overcharged veins and, above all, the intolerable thirst were constantly increasing. Jesus did not suffer so long; but He lingered for four or five hours.

I will not, however, proceed further in describing the sickening details. How far all these horrors may have been essential elements in His sufferings it would be difficult to say. Apart from the prophecies going before which had to be fulfilled, was it a matter of indifference what death He died? Would it have served equally well if He had been hanged or beheaded or stoned? We cannot tell. Only, when we know the secret of what His soul suffered, we can discern the fitness of the choice of the most shameful and painful of all forms of death for His body.[4]

The true sufferings of Christ were not physical, but internal. Looking on that Face, we see the shadow of a deeper woe than smarting wounds and raging thirst and a racking frame--the woe of slighted love, of a heart longing for fellows.h.i.+p but overwhelmed with hatred; the woe of insult and wrong, and of unspeakable sorrow for the fate of those who would not be saved. Nor is even this the deepest shadow. There was then in the heart of the Redeemer a woe to which no human words are adequate. He was dying for the sin of the world. He had taken on Himself the guilt of mankind, and was now engaged in the final struggle to put it away and annihilate it. On the cross was hanging not only the body of flesh and blood of the Man Christ Jesus, but at the same time His mystical body--that body of which He is the head and His people are the members. Through this body also the nails were driven, and on it death took its revenge. His people died with Him unto sin, that they might live for evermore.

This is the mystery, but it is also the glory of the scene. Till He hung on it, the cross was the symbol of slavery and vulgar wickedness; but He converted it into the symbol of heroism, self-sacrifice and salvation. It was only a wretched framework of coa.r.s.e and blood-clotted beams, which it was a shame to touch; but since then the world has gloried in it; it has been carved in every form of beauty and every substance of price; it has been emblazoned on the flags of nations and engraved on the sceptres and diadems of kings.[5] The cross was planted on Golgotha a dry, dead tree; but lo! it has blossomed like Aaron's rod; it has struck its roots deep down to the heart of the world, and sent its branches upwards, till to-day it fills the earth, and the nations rest beneath its shadow and eat of its pleasant fruits.[6]

III.

At length the ghastly preparations were completed; and in the greedy eyes of Jewish hatred the Saviour, whom they had hunted to death with the ferocity of bloodhounds, was exposed to full view. But the first triumphant glance of priests, Pharisees and populace met with a violent check; for above the Victim's head they saw something which cut them to the heart.

The practice of affixing to the apparatus of execution a description of the crime prevails in some countries to this day. In the Life of Gilmour of Mongolia there is a description of an execution which he witnessed in China; and in the cart which conveyed the condemned man to the scene of death a board was exhibited describing his misdeeds. The custom was a Roman one; and, besides, there was generally an official who walked in front of the procession of death and proclaimed the crimes of the condemned. No mention, however, of such a functionary appears in the Gospels; nor does the inscription appear to have been visible to all till it was affixed to the cross. It was fastened to the top of the upright beam; and Pilate made use of this opportunity to pay out the Jews for the annoyance they had caused him. He had parted from them in anger, for they had humiliated him; but he sent after them that which should be a drop of bitterness in their cup of triumph.

When they were still at his judgment-seat, his last blow in his encounter with them had been to pretend to be convinced that Jesus really was their king. This insult he now prolonged by wording the inscription thus: "This is Jesus, the King of the Jews." It was as much as to say, This is what becomes of a Jewish king; this is what the Romans do with him; the king of this nation is a slave, a crucified criminal; and, if such be the king, what must the nation be whose king he is?

So enraged were the Jews that they sent a deputation to the governor to entreat him to alter the words. No doubt he was delighted to see them; for their coming proved how thoroughly his sarcasm had gone home. He only laughed at their pet.i.tion and, a.s.suming the grand air of authority which became no man so well as a Roman, dismissed them with the words, "What I have written I have written."

This looked like strength of will and character; but it was in reality only a covering for weakness. He had his will about the inscription--a trifle; but they had their will about the crucifixion. He was strong enough to browbeat them, but he was not strong enough to deny himself.

Yet, though the inscription of Pilate was in his own mind little more than a revengeful jest, there was in it a Divine purpose. "What I have written I have written," he said; but, had he known, he might almost have said, "What I have written G.o.d has written." Sometimes and at some places the atmosphere is so charged and electric with the Divine that inspiration alights and burns on everything; and never was this more true than at the cross. Pilate had already unconsciously been almost a prophet when, pointing to Jesus, he said, "Behold the Man"--a word which still preaches to the centuries. And now, after being a speaking prophet, he becomes, as has been quaintly remarked, a writing one too; for his pen was guided by a supernatural hand to indite the words, "This is Jesus, the King of the Jews."

It added greatly to the significance of the inscription that it was written in Hebrew and Greek and Latin. What Pilate intended thereby was to heighten the insult; he wished all the strangers present at the Pa.s.sover to be able to read the inscription; for all of them who could read at all would know one of these three languages. But Providence intended something else. These are the three great languages of the ancient world--the representative languages. Hebrew is the tongue of religion, Greek that of culture, Latin the language of law and government; and Christ was declared King in them all. On His head are many crowns. He is King in the religious sphere--the King of salvation, holiness and love; He is King in the realm of culture--the treasures of art, of song, of literature, of philosophy belong to Him, and shall yet be all poured at His feet; He is King in the political sphere--King of kings and Lord of lords, ent.i.tled to rule in the social relations.h.i.+ps, in trade and commerce, in all the activities of men. We see not yet, indeed, all things put under Him; but every day we see them more and more in the process of being put under Him. The name of Jesus is travelling everywhere over the earth; thousands are learning to p.r.o.nounce it; millions are ready to die for it. And thus is the unconscious prophecy of Pilate still being fulfilled.

[1] One Evangelist says gall, another myrrh, and on this difference harmonists and their antagonists have spent their time; but surely it is not worth while.

[2] The distinction between the legitimate and the illegitimate use is not very easy to draw; but there is an obvious difference between destroying pain for an ulterior purpose and destroying it merely to save the feeling of the sufferer.

[3] On the details of crucifixion there is an extremely interesting and learned excursus in Zockler's _Das Kreus Christi_ (Beilage III.).

Cicero's Verrine Orations contain a good deal that is valuable to a student of the Pa.s.sion, especially in regard to scourging and crucifixion. Crucifixion was an extremely common form of punishment in the ancient world; but "the cross of the G.o.d-Man has put an end to the punishment of the crow."

[4] Zockler maintains that crucifixion, while the most shameful, was not absolutely the most painful form of death.

[5] The appreciation of the significance of the Cross has gone on in two lines--the Artistic and the Doctrinal--both of which arc followed out with varied learning in Zockler's _Kreus Christi_.

The English reader may with great satisfaction trace the artistic development in Mrs. Jameson's _History of our Lord as exemplified in Works of Art_, where the following scheme is given of the varieties of treatment:--

"_Symbolical_, when the abstract personifications of the sun and moon, earth and ocean, are present.

"_Sacrificially symbolical_, when the Eucharistic cup is seen below the Cross, or the pelican feeding her young is placed above it.

"_Simply doctrinal_, when the Virgin and St. John stand on each side, as solemn witnesses; or our Lord is drinking the cup, sometimes literally so represented, given Him of the Father, while the lance opens the sacramental font.

"_Historically ideal_, as when the thieves are joined to the scene, and sorrowing angels throng the air.

"_Historically devotional_, as when the real features of the scene are preserved, and saints and devotees are introduced.

"_Legendary_, as when we see the Virgin fainting.

"_Allegorical and fantastic_, as when the tree is made the princ.i.p.al object, with its branches terminating in patriarchs and prophets, virtues and graces.

"_Realistic_, as when the mere event is rendered as through the eyes of an unenlightened looker-on.

"These and many other modes of conception account for the great diversity in the treatment of this subject; a further variety being given by the combination of two or more of these modes of treatment together; for instance, the pelican may be seen above the Cross giving her life's blood for her offspring; angels in att.i.tudes of despair, bewailing the Second Person of the Trinity; or, in an ideal sacramental sense, catching the blood from His wounds--the Jews below looking on, as they really did, with contemptuous gestures and hardened hearts; the centurion acknowledging that this was really the Son of G.o.d, while the group of the fainting Virgin, supported by the Marys and St. John, adds legend to symbolism, ideality, and history."

In the study of the doctrinal development nothing is so important as the exegesis of the New Testament statements about the Cross; and this has been done in a masterly way by Dr. Dale in his work on the Atonement. What may be called the Philosophy of the Cross (to borrow a happy phrase of McCheyne Edgar's) came late. It is usually reckoned to have commenced with Anselm; and since the Reformation every great theologian has added his contribution. Yet the work is by no means completed. Indeed, at the present day there is no greater desideratum in theology than a philosophy of the Cross which would thoroughly satisfy the religious mind. Shallow theories abound; but the Church of Christ will never be able to rest in any theory which does not do justice, on the one hand, to the tremendously strong statements of Scripture on the subject and, on the other, to her own consciousness of unique and infinite obligation to the dying Saviour. Perhaps the most satisfactory expression of the Christian consciousness on the subject is to be found in the hymns of the Church, from the Te Deum down through Scotua Erigena and Fulbert of Chartres to Gerhardt and Toplady.

See Schaff's _Christ in Song_.

A third line of development might be traced--the Practical--in martyrology, the history of missions, asceticism, and the like; and the spokesman of this branch of the truth is a Kempis, who, as Zockler says, teaches his disciples to know poverty and humility as the roots of the tree of the Cross, labour and penitence as its bark, righteousness and mercy as its two princ.i.p.al branches, truth and doctrine as its precious leaves, chast.i.ty and obedience as its blossoms, temperance and discipline as its fragrance, and salvation and eternal life as its glorious fruit.

[6] When the Northern nations became Christian they transferred to the Cross the n.o.bler ideas embodied in the mystic tree Igdrasil; and one of the commonest ideas of the mystical writers of the Middle Ages is the identification of the Cross as both the true tree of life and the true tree of knowledge.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE GROUPS ROUND THE CROSS

In the last chapter we saw the Son of Man nailed to the cursed tree.

There He hung for hours, exposed, helpless, but conscious, looking out on the sea of faces a.s.sembled to behold His end. On the occasion of an execution a crowd gathers outside our jails merely to see the black flag run up which signals that the deed is done; and in the old days of public executions such an event always attracted an enormous crowd. No doubt it was the same in Jerusalem. When Jesus was put to death, it was Pa.s.sover time, and the city was filled with mult.i.tudes of strangers, to whom any excitement was welcome. Besides, the case of Jesus had stirred both the capital and the entire country.[1]

The sight which the crowd had come to see was, we now know, the greatest ever witnessed in the universe. Angels and archangels were absorbed in it; millions of men and women are looking back to it to-day and every day. But what impressions did it make on those who saw it at the time? To ascertain this, let us look at three characteristic groups near the cross, whose feelings were shared in varying degrees by many around them.

I.

Look, first, at the group nearest the cross--that of the Roman soldiers.

In the Roman army it seems to have been a rule that, when executions were carried out by soldiers, the effects of the criminals fell as perquisites to those who did the work. Though many more soldiers were probably present on this occasion, the actual details of fixing the beam, handling the hammer and nails, hoisting the apparatus, and so forth, in the case of Jesus, fell to a quaternion of them. To these four, therefore, belonged all that was on Him; and they could at once proceed to divide the spoil, because in crucifixion the victim was stripped before being affixed to the cross--a trait of revolting shame.[2] A large, loose upper garment, a head-dress perhaps, a girdle and a pair of sandals, and, last of all, an under garment, such as Galilean peasants were wont to wear, which was all of a piece and had perhaps been knitted for Him by the loving fingers of His mother--these articles became the booty of the soldiers. They formed the entire property which Jesus had to leave, and the four soldiers were His heirs. Yet this was He who bequeathed the vastest legacy that ever has been left by any human being--a legacy ample enough to enrich the whole world. Only it was a spiritual legacy--of wisdom, of influence, of example.

The soldiers, their ghastly task over, sat down at the foot of the cross to divide their booty. They obtained from it not only profit but amus.e.m.e.nt; for, after dividing the articles as well as they could, they had to cast lots about the last, which they could not divide. One of them fetched some dice out of his pocket--gambling was a favourite pastime of Roman soldiers--and they settled the difficulty by a game.

Look at them--chaffering, chattering, laughing; and, above their heads, not a yard away, that Figure. What a picture! The Son of G.o.d atoning for the sins of the world, whilst angels and glorified spirits crowd the walls of the celestial city to look down at the spectacle; and, within a yard of His sacred Person, the soldiers, in absolute apathy, gambling for these poor shreds of clothing! So much, and no more, did they perceive of the stupendous drama they were within touch of. For it is not only necessary to have a great sight to make an impression; quite as necessary is the seeing eye. There are those to whom this earth is sacred because Jesus Christ has trodden it; the sky is sacred because it has bent above Him; history is sacred because His name is inscribed on it; the daily tasks of life are all sacred because they can be done in His name. But are there not mult.i.tudes, even in Christian lands, who live as if Christ had never lived, and to whom the question has never occurred, What difference does it make to us that Jesus died in this world of which we are inhabitants?

II.

Look now at a second group, much more numerous than the first, consisting of the members of the Sanhedrim.

After condemning Jesus in their own court, they had accompanied Him through stage after stage of His civil trial, until at last they secured His condemnation at the tribunal of Pilate. When at last He was handed over to the executioners, it might have been expected that they would have been tired of the lengthy proceedings and glad to escape from the scene. But their pa.s.sions had been thoroughly aroused, and their thirst for revenge was so deep that they could not allow the soldiers to do their own work, but, forgetful of dignity, accompanied the crowd to the place of execution and stayed to glut their eyes with the spectacle of their Victim's sufferings. Even after He was lifted up on the tree, they could not keep their tongues off Him or give Him the dying man's privilege of peace; but, losing all sense of propriety, they made insulting gestures and poured on Him insulting cries.

Naturally the crowd followed their example, till not only the soldiers took it up, but even the thieves who were crucified with Him joined in.