Calvary…torture, teaching and thieves

Calvary…torture, teaching, and thieves

     In the four Gospels, we read the accounts of Jesus’ mistreatment, suffering and death.  Mathew tells us that when Jesus went before the Sanhedrin “they spat in his face and struck him, while some slapped him, saying, ‘Prophesy for us, Messiah: who is it that struck you?’” (26:67-68)  After Jesus was taken to Pilate, Mark states “So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released Barabbas to them and, after he had Jesus scourged, handed him over to be crucified.  The soldiers led him away inside the palace, that is, the praetorium, and assembled the whole cohort. They clothed him in purple and, weaving a crown of thorns, placed it on him.  They began to salute him with, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’ and kept striking his head with a reed and spitting upon him. They knelt before him in homage.” (15:15-19).  Luke adds (23:36-37) “Even the soldiers jeered at him. As they approached to offer him wine they called out, ‘If you are King of the Jews, save yourself.’”  Even after His death, the denigration did not stop because “when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs, but one soldier thrust his lance into his side, and immediately blood and water flowed out.”  John (19:33-34)

     St. Augustine described the brutality of a crucifixion:  “For the crucified, hanging on the tree, nailed to the wood, were killed by a slow lingering death. To be crucified was not merely to be put to death; for the victim lived long on the cross, not because longer life was chosen, but because death itself was stretched out that the pain might not be too quickly ended.” (Saint Augustine, Tractates on John, 36.4.).   While the Romans were likely to think that nothing could exacerbate such a hideous torturous death, they were wrong.

     From his “vantage point” high on the cross, Jesus, as man, did not just look down at the present, but Jesus, as God, could also see the future.  A future where his sacrifice would be completely disregarded.  A future where we would choose self-will over God’s will.  A future increasingly separating from God.  The pain caused by those visions were infinitely more torturous!  His love would be rebuked, his forgiveness rejected, his suffering in vain.  I think that if a medical examiner had been called to the hill of Calvary on that “great” Friday, his report would have read that the cause of Jesus’ death was not suffocation, not loss of blood, but rather due to a broken heart.

     And yet, as He was dying, he was still teaching!  Luke (23:33-43) reports “When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him and the criminals there, one on his right, the other on his left.

They divided his garments by casting lots. The people stood by and watched; the rulers, meanwhile, sneered at him and said, ‘He saved others, let him save himself if he is the chosen one, the Messiah of God.’  Even the soldiers jeered at him. As they approached to offer him wine they called out, ‘If you are King of the Jews, save yourself.’  Above him there was an inscription that read, ‘This is the King of the Jews.’  Now one of the criminals hanging there reviled Jesus, saying, ‘Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us.’  The other, however, rebuking him, said in reply, ‘Have you no fear of God, for you are subject to the same condemnation?  And indeed, we have been condemned justly, for the sentence we received corresponds to our crimes, but this man has done nothing criminal.’

Then he said, ‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’  He replied to him, ‘Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.’”  This exchange has massive significance that can easily be overlooked.

     Jesus already had taught “How to get to heaven in six easy ways”:

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne, and all the nations will be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.  He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.  Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father.  Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’  Then the righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?  When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?  When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’  And the king will say to them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.’” (Mt. 25:31-40).   The “good thief” who himself was in great agony, thought first of someone else who was “ill and he cared for them,” but this time it was Jesus Himself!  In saying “This day you will be with me in Paradise,” Jesus teaches one last time how important it is to love, serve, and sacrifice for others in this life, regardless of the suffering we ourselves might be experiencing.  Jesus exemplifies this when, while experiencing the excruciating pain of the cross, says “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34)  And again “When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold, your son.’  Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.” (John 19:26-27)

     And while we are used to hearing that Jesus was crucified between two thieves, there were actually three thieves crucified on Calvary.  The greatest thief was the one in the middle who robbed death from the stranglehold of fear and preoccupation with this world that it had held over mankind ever since the disobedience of Eve and Adam brought death into the world.  Confirming what the empty tomb of Jesus had “stolen,” Paul (1 Cor. 15:50-55) would later write “This I declare, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I tell you a mystery.  We shall not all fall asleep, but we will all be changed, in an instant, in the blink of an eye, at the last trumpet.  For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.  For that which is corruptible must clothe itself with incorruptibility, and that which is mortal must clothe itself with immortality.  And when this which is corruptible clothes itself with incorruptibility and this which is mortal clothes itself with immortality, then the word that is written shall come about:

‘Death is swallowed up in victory.

Where, O death, is your victory?

Where, O death, is your sting?’”

James R. Sulliman, PhD