Text: John 7:39-52
Jesus creates division, even among His enemies. It is that way now and it has always been that way.
Jesus – The Great Divider
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Monthly Archives: April 2019
The Pericope Adulterae
Article: My Favorite Passage that’s Not in the Bible by Daniel B. Wallace
(original source – https://bible.org/article/my-favorite-passage-thats-not-bible)
Daniel B. Wallace has taught Greek and New Testament courses on a graduate school level since 1979. He has a Ph.D. from Dallas Theological Seminary, and is currently professor of New Testament Studies at his alma mater.
His Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament (Zondervan, 1996) has become a standard textbook in colleges and seminaries. He is the senior New Testament editor of the NET Bible. Dr. Wallace is also the Executive Director for the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts.
One hundred and forty years ago, conservative biblical scholar and Dean of Canterbury, Henry Alford, advocated a new translation to replace the King James Bible. One of his reasons was the inferior textual basis of the KJV. Alford argued that “a translator of Holy Scripture must be…ready to sacrifice the choicest text, and the plainest proof of doctrine, if the words are not those of what he is constrained in his conscience to receive as God’s testimony.” He was speaking about the Trinitarian formula found in the KJV rendering of 1 John 5:7–8. Twenty years later, two Cambridge scholars came to the firm conclusion that John 7:53–8:11 also was not part of the original text of scripture. But Westcott and Hort’s view has not had nearly the impact that Alford’s did.
For a long time, biblical scholars have recognized the poor textual credentials of the story of the woman caught in adultery (John 7:53–8:11). The evidence against its authenticity is overwhelming: The earliest manuscripts with substantial portions of John’s Gospel (P66 and P75) lack these verses. They skip from John 7:52 to 8:12. The oldest large codices of the Bible also lack these verses: codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, both from the fourth century, are normally considered to be the most important biblical manuscripts of the NT extant today. Neither of them has these verses. Codex Alexandrinus, from the fifth century, lacks several leaves in the middle of John. But because of the consistency of the letter size, width of lines, and lines per page, the evidence is conclusive that this manuscript also lacked the pericope adulterae. Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus, also from the fifth century, apparently lacked these verses as well (it is similar to Alexandrinus in that some leaves are missing). The earliest extant manuscript to have these verses is codex Bezae, an eccentric text once in the possession of Theodore Beza. He gave this manuscript to the University of Cambridge in 1581 as a gift, telling the school that he was confident that the scholars there would be able to figure out its significance. He washed his hands of the document. Bezae is indeed the most eccentric NT manuscript extant today, yet it is the chief representative of the Western text-type (the text-form that became dominant in Rome and the Latin West).
When P66, P75, Sinaiticus, and Vaticanus agree, their combined testimony is overwhelmingly strong that a particular reading is not authentic. But it is not only the early Greek manuscripts that lack this text. The great majority of Greek manuscripts through the first eight centuries lack this pericope. And except for Bezae (or codex D), virtually all of the most important Greek witnesses through the first eight centuries do not have the verses. Of the three most important early versions of the New Testament (Coptic, Latin, Syriac), two of them lack the story in their earliest and best witnesses. The Latin alone has the story in its best early witnesses.
Even patristic writers seemed to overlook this text. Bruce Metzger, arguably the greatest textual critic of the twentieth century, argued that “No Greek Church Father prior to Euthymius Zigabenus (twelfth century) comments on the passage, and Euthymius declares that the accurate copies of the Gospel do not contain it” (Textual Commentary, 2nd ed., loc. cit.).
It is an important point to note that although the story of the woman caught in adultery is found in most of our printed Bibles today, the evidence suggests that the majority of Bibles during the first eight centuries of the Christian faith did not contain the story. Externally, most scholars would say that the evidence for it not being an authentic part of John’s Gospel is rock solid.
But textual criticism is not based on external evidence alone; there is also the internal evidence to consider. This is comprised of two parts: intrinsic evidence has to do with what an author is likely to have written; transcriptional evidence has to do with how and why a scribe would have changed the text.
Intrinsically, the vocabulary, syntax, and style look far more like Luke than they do John. There is almost nothing in these twelve verses that has a Johannine flavor. And transcriptionally, scribes were almost always prone to add material rather than omit it—especially a big block of text such as this, rich in its description of Jesus’ mercy. One of the remarkable things about this passage, in fact, is that it is found in multiple locations. Most manuscripts that have it place it in its now traditional location: between John 7:52 and 8:12. But an entire family of manuscripts has the passage at the end of Luke 21, while another family places it at the end of John’s Gospel. Other manuscripts place it at the end of Luke or in various places in John 7.
The pericope adulterae has all the earmarks of a pericope that was looking for a home. It took up permanent residence, in the ninth century, in the middle of the fourth gospel.
If the question of its literary authenticity (i.e., whether it was penned by John) is settled, the question of its historical authenticity is not. It is indeed possible that these verses describe an actual incident in the life of Jesus and found their way into our Bibles because of having the ring of truth. On one level, if this is the case, then one might be forgiven for preaching the text on a Sunday morning. But to regard it as scripture if John did not write it is another matter. The problem is this: If John wrote his gospel as a tightly woven argument, with everything meeting a crescendo in the resurrection, would he be disturbed that some scribes started monkeying with his text? If we don’t respect the human author, then we could discount this issue. But if the Bible is both the Word of God and the words of men, then we are playing fast and loose with the human author’s purpose by adding anything—especially something as long as this passage—that takes a detour from his intentions. What preacher would be happy with someone adding a couple hundred words in the middle of his printed sermon as though such were from him? On another level, there is evidence that this story is a conflation from two different stories, one circulating in the east and the other circulating in the west. In other words, even the historicity of this pericope is called into question.
Yet, remarkably, even though most translators would probably deny John 7:53–8:11 a place in the canon, virtually every translation of the Bible has this text in its traditional location. There is, of course, a marginal note in modern translations that says something like, “Most ancient authorities lack these verses.” But such a weak and ambiguous statement is generally ignored by readers of Holy Writ. (It’s ambiguous because many readers might assume that in spite of the ‘ancient authorities’ that lack the passage, the translators felt it must be authentic.)
How, then, has this passage made it into modern translations? In a word, there has been a longstanding tradition of timidity among translators. One twentieth-century Bible relegated the passage to the footnotes, but when the sales were rather lackluster, it again found its place in John’s Gospel. Even the NET Bible (available at www.bible.org), for which I am the senior New Testament editor, has put the text in its traditional place. But the NET Bible also has a lengthy footnote, explaining the textual complications and doubts about its authenticity. And the font size is smaller than normal so that it will be harder to read from the pulpit! But we nevertheless made the same concession that other translators have about this text by leaving it in situ.
The climate has changed recently, however. In Bart Ehrman’s 2005 bestseller, Misquoting Jesus: The Story behind Who Changed the Bible and Why, the author discounts the authenticity of this pericope. What is remarkable is not that he does this, but that thousands of Bible-believing Christians have become disturbed by his assertions. Ehrman—a former evangelical and alum of Moody and Wheaton—is one of America’s leading textual critics. He has been on television and radio, in newspapers and magazines, and on the Internet. He has lectured at universities from sea to shining sea. What he wrote in his blockbuster book sent shockwaves through the Christian public.
I wrote a critique of Ehrman’s book that was published in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society. There I said, “keeping [John 7:53–8:11 and Mark 16:9–20] in our Bibles rather than relegating them to the footnotes seems to have been a bomb just waiting to explode. All Ehrman did was to light the fuse. One lesson we must learn from Misquoting Jesusis that those in ministry need to close the gap between the church and the academy. We have to educate believers. Instead of trying to isolate laypeople from critical scholarship, we need to insulate them. They need to be ready for the barrage, because it is coming. The intentional dumbing down of the church for the sake of filling more pews will ultimately lead to defection from Christ. Ehrman is to be thanked for giving us a wake-up call.”
I believe it’s time for us to own up to our tradition of timidity and recognize that this has not helped the Church in the long haul. It’s time to close the gap. I am calling for translators to remove this text from the Gospel of John and relegate it to the footnotes. Although this will be painful and will cause initial confusion, it is far better that laypeople hear the truth about scripture from their friends than from their enemies. They need to know that Christ-honoring, Bible-believing scholars also do not think that this text is authentic, and that such a stance has not shaken their faith one iota. No cardinal truth is lost if these verses go bye-bye; no essential doctrine is disturbed if they are cut from the pages of the Word of God. (Of course, if it is objected that since scholars are not absolutely sure that this text is inauthentic they therefore need to retain it in the text, it need only be said that such a policy practiced across the board would wreak havoc on our printed Bibles and would mushroom their size beyond recognizable proportions. In Acts alone, one textual tradition has 8.5% more material than has been traditionally printed in our Bibles, yet very few object to such variants being denied a place in the canon. Thus, to insist on having the pericope adulterae in a footnote is a nod toward its longstanding tradition in Bibles from the second millennium AD on.)
Of course, King James Only advocates will see things differently. Their claim is that modern translations are butchering the Bible by cutting out major texts. Not only is that quite an overstatement (since only two lengthy passages in the KJV NT are considered spurious by modern scholars—John 7:53–8:11 and Mark 16:9–20), but it also assumes what it needs to prove. Is it not possible that the KJV, based on half a dozen late manuscripts, has added to the Word of God rather than that modern translations, based on far more and much earlier manuscripts, have cut out portions of scripture? It is demonstrable that over time, the New Testament text has grown. The latest manuscripts have approximately 2% more material than the earliest ones. The problem is not that we have 98% of the Word of God; the problem is that we have 102%! Modern scholars are trying to burn off the dross to get to the gold. And one text that must go, in spite of our emotional attachment to it, is John 7:53–8:11.
One of the practical implications of this is as follows: When Christians are asked whether this beloved story should be cut out of their Bibles, they overwhelmingly and emphatically say no. The reason given: It’s always been in the Bible and scholars have no right to tamper with the text. The problem with this view is manifold. First, it is historically naïve because it assumes that this passage has always been in the Bible. Second, it is anti-intellectual by assuming that scholars are involved in some sort of conspiracy and that they have no basis for excising verses that exist in the printed text of the Bible. Without the slightest shred of evidence, many laypeople (and not a few pastors!) have a knee-jerk reaction to scholars who believe that these twelve verses are not authentic. What they don’t realize is that every Bible translation has to be reconstructed from the extant Greek New Testament manuscripts. No one follows just a single manuscript, because all manuscripts are riddled with errors. The manuscripts need to be examined, weighed, sifted, and eventually translated. Every textual decision requires someone to think through which reading is authentic and which is not. In the best tradition of solid Christian scholarship, textual critics are actually producing a Bible for Christians to read. Without biblical scholars, we would have no Bibles in our own languages. When laymen claim that scholars are tampering with the text, they are biting the hand that feeds them. Now, to be sure, there are biblical scholars who are attempting to destroy the Christian faith. And there are textual critics who are not Christians. But the great translations of our time have largely been done by honest scholars. Some of them are Christians, and some of them are not. But their integrity as scholars cannot be called into question when it comes to passages such as the pericope adulterae, since they are simply following in the train of Henry Alford by subjecting their conscience to the historical data.
The best of biblical scholarship pursues truth at all costs. And it bases its conclusions on real evidence, not on wishes, emotion, or blind faith. This is in line with the key tenets of historic Christianity: If God became man in time-space history, then we ought to link our faith to history. It must not be a leap of faith, but it should be a step of faith. The religion of the Bible is the only major religion in the world that subjects itself to historical inquiry. The Incarnation has forever put God’s stamp of approval on pursuing truth, wrestling with data, and changing our minds based on evidence. When we deny evidence its place and appeal to emotion instead, we are methodologically denying the significance of the Incarnation. Much is thus at stake when it comes to a text such as the story of the woman caught in adultery. What is at stake is not, as some might think, the mercy of God; rather, what is at stake is how we view the very Incarnation itself. Ironically, if we allow passages into the Gospels that do not have the best credentials, we are in fact tacitly questioning whether the Lord of the Gospels, Jesus Christ himself, became man, for we jettison historicity in favor of personal preference. By affirming a spurious passage about him we may be losing a whole lot more than we gain.
It is the duty of pastors for the sake of their faith to study the data, to know the evidence, to have firm convictions rooted in history. And we dare not serve up anything less than the same kind of meal for our congregations. We do not serve the church of Jesus Christ faithfully when we hide evidence from laypeople; we need to learn to insulate our congregations, but not isolate them. The Incarnation of Christ demands nothing less than this.
“Eli, Eli, Lama Sabachthani!”
BY F. W. KRUMMACHER (1796-1868)
Once, when a voice spoke from heaven to the people who were assembled around Jesus, the evangelist relates, that “some said it thundered; others, that an angel spoke to him.” No one exactly knew what to make of the wondrous sound, although all were affected, amazed, and thrilled by a secret awe. Such are our feelings on the present occasion, on hearing the echo of the cry, which sounds down from the cross; and I confess that my soul trembles at the idea of approaching the unfathomable depth of suffering, from whence the cry of “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani” proceeded. How much rather would I lie prostrate on my face in silence before this awful incident, than write or speak upon it! You know what happened to Luther, when he plunged himself in profound meditation on this most enigmatical and affecting part of the whole of our Savior’s sufferings. He continued for a long time without food, and sat wide awake, but as motionless as a corpse, in the same position, on his chair. And when at length he rose up from the depth of his cogitation; as from the shaft of a mysterious mine, he broke into a cry of amazement, and exclaimed, “God forsaken of God! Who can understand it?” Yes, who is there that is able? We find ourselves surrounded by an impenetrable darkness. But if the understanding has here reached the boundary of all human comprehension, yet faith finds a path amid these mysterious shades. A holy light precedes it, and that light is derived from the Savior’s Mediatorship. Enlightened by it, let us now contemplate, more closely, the awful cry of the dying Redeemer.
It is about twelve o’clock at noon that we again meet on Mount Calvary. The Savior has hung bleeding on the tree for nearly three hours. No change has meanwhile taken place in his vicinity, except that, in the little faithful group, we miss the disciple John and the mother of Jesus, the cause of which we know. A momentary silence has ensued in the crowd surrounding the place of execution. We may suppose that even on them the sublime behavior of the Divine Sufferer under his torture has not failed in producing feelings of emotion and shame. They look up to the cross with silent seriousness. The moaning of the two malefactors in their agony strikes their ears, and the trickling of the blood of the dying men is heard as it falls to the ground. From time to time, also, the grief and half-stifled sobs of the little faithful group is heard, whom we now, in spirit, join, asking with anxious hearts, if the Father of heaven will continue forever silent concerning his Son, and not at length make it known by some sign, which shall be obvious to all the world, that he, who was apparently rejected both by earth and heaven, was no transgressor, but in reality the Holy One of Israel, and his, the Father’s elect and well-beloved Son.
Lo, a sign appears! But what kind of one? Who could have anticipated anything of the sort? Our surprise increases to horror, our amazement to dismay. The sun, just arrived at the meridian, withdraws its beams, as if the earth were no longer worthy of its light, and begins visibly, in a clear sky, to grow dark. First, twilight commences, as at the decline of day; and this is followed by the obscurity of evening. Gloomy night at length spreads itself like a funeral pall, not only over the land of Judea, but over the whole of the enlightened part of the earth. The animal creation are terrified. The herds of the field crowd bellowing together. The birds of the air flutter, alarmed, to their retreats, and the masses of the people who surround the place of execution, hurry back with loud outcries, to Jerusalem, wringing their hands and beating their breasts. Trembling and lamentation extend into palaces and cottages, as if the world were menaced with destruction. The primitive fathers, as for instance, Origen and Eusebius, were acquainted with heathen records, some of which were from distant countries, such as that of Phlegon, a freedman of the Emperor Adrian, which mentions an eclipse of the sun at the same time with the crucifixion of Christ, and that one so entire, terrific, and wonderful had never before been seen in the world. An ancient tradition also states that Diogenes witnessed, in Egypt, the solar darkness which preceded the death of Jesus, and exclaimed, “Either the Deity himself suffers at this moment, or sympathizes with one that does.”
We, my readers, also stand amazed at this terrific phenomenon, in which even the blindest cannot mistake the finger of the Almighty. But what does this gigantic hieroglyphic on the pillars of the world denote? Some have supposed it to convey a symbolical manifestation of the wrath of God against the murderers of Jesus. But such an interpretation is not in accordance with the event that is taking place on Calvary, and in which God, by the giving up of his only-begotten Son, evinces, not merely his judicial severity and avenging justice, but especially his compassion for the murderers. The inference has also been drawn from the darkness that nature must have suffered in the death of Christ. But there seems little ground even for this explanation, since Christ, by his vicarious death, became, in an especial manner, the prop, support, and renovator of nature.
It has also been supposed that the nocturnal darkness typified the fact that with Christ, the light of the world was extinguished. But it was just in Christ’s vicarious death that the light of consolation and of real life rose upon the world. A sympathy also of the irrational creation with the pangs of its Lord and Master, has been spoken of; but there is no room here for such poetic speculations. The sun did not obscure itself, but it was the Almighty who clothed it in that mourning-dress.
The import of the sudden darkness lies incomparably deeper than the above-mentioned attempts at explaining it. Even the mournful cry of the sufferer does not leave us for a moment to doubt that the darkness stood in immediate relation to his sacred person, and the situation in which he was at the time. It is true, indeed, that the miraculous event, according to the purpose of God, was intended to intimate to the world the wondrous nature of the fact about to be chronicled in its history, that the Eternal Son, the source of all life, became himself a prey to death. But the chief object of the appalling phenomenon was to shadow forth, by a stupendous figure, the mysterious position and inward state at the time, of him who bled on the cross. The Lord withdrew himself from the eyes of men behind the black curtain of appalling night, as behind the thick veil of the temple. He hung there full three hours on the cross, his thorn crowned head thoughtfully drooping on his bosom, involved in that darkness. He is in the Most Holy Place. He stands at the altar of the Lord. He performs his sacrificial functions. He is the true Aaron, and at the same time the Lamb; but the sacrificial fire that burns around him, I have no need to mention.
That which, during this time, passed between him and his Father, lies, for the present, sealed as with seven seals, hidden in the depths of eternity. We only know so much, that behind that veil, he was engaged in the most arduous conflict, gained the most brilliant victory, and adorned his representative obedience with its final crown. We know that the grave of our sins was then dug; the handwriting that was against us taken out of the way; the curse which impended over us blotted out; and the wall which separated us from our God removed. Call the sight of the Redeemer weltering in his blood, and in total darkness, heart-rending if you will; we know not a more delightful scene than that in heaven or on earth. The man on the cross is to us the fairest star in the horizon of the world. We behold it, and feel delivered from every evil. When Moses came forth from the darkness in which God dwelt, his face shone in such a manner, that the astonished Israelites could not bear the sight. The radiance which we wear upon our brow from the darkness of Calvary, as far as we enter believingly into it, is milder and more pleasant; for it is the radiance of a peace of which the world is ignorant, and the reflection of an inward and triumphant joy of which even the angels might envy us.
But I hear you say, “Explain to us the meaning of the awful darkness; decipher the terrific and ambiguous hieroglyphic, and unfold to us the state it indicates.” Listen, then. That phenomenon signifies the withdrawing of another sun than the earthly one—the obscuring of an inward world. It shadows the going down of a day of comfort and joy. It points to a night of the soul, in which the last bright star is about to disappear. Imagine to yourselves, if possible, a man free from sin, holy; no, of divine nature, who calls the Almighty his light, God’s nearness his paradise, and God’s love his bliss. Imagine him deprived of all this; no longer refreshed with any experience of the gracious presence of his heavenly Father, and although exclaiming, “Whom have I in heaven but you?” banished into dreadful and horrifying visions of hell, and surrounded by nothing but images of sin and death. Imagine such a one, and then say if his state is not strikingly depicted by the midnight darkness which overspreads the earth.
The third hour of this appalling and universal gloom is drawing to a close. The sun again begins to cast off his obscuring veil. The Sufferer then breaks his long and anxious silence, and, like some cry of distress from the shaft of a mine, but at the same time, like the trumpet-sound of victory, the incomprehensible and heart-affecting exclamation breaks forth, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!” Under the influence of reverential awe, the evangelists give us this cry in the same language in which it was uttered by the Divine Sufferer. It is as if they were apprehensive lest a rendering of it into Greek might detract somewhat from its import. Like us, my readers, have all believers for eighteen hundred years stood amazed and astonished before these words, and have sought in vain to fathom their depth. You are aware that the words, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me!” form the commencement of the twenty-second Psalm, in which David, impelled and guided by the Holy Spirit, describes, while connecting with it his own sufferings, the lot of a Righteous One sojourning in a sinful world. His description, however, expands in the sequel so much, that the Psalmist’s personal state and circumstances lose themselves in it; and a child must perceive that more stupendous and important events than those in the life of David mingle in the expressions made use of by him. The portrait of a guiltless sufferer gradually increases to a sublimity, which has found its perfect antitype in the life of the holy Jesus. In the picture, features appear, of which we meet with only slight traces in David’s history, and which, therefore, call upon us to seek their literal fulfillment elsewhere. For the sufferer in the Psalms is not only represented as the offscouring of the whole world, not only do those who see him say to him, “He trusted in the Lord that he would deliver him; let him deliver him, seeing that he delighted in him”—not only must he agonizingly exclaim, “I am poured out like water; all my bones are out of joint; my tongue cleaves to my jaws, and you have brought me into the dust of death”—but he must also see what David never experienced, that his hands and feet were pierced, and that his enemies parted his garments among them, and cast lots upon his vesture. Besides this, his passion ends in such a manner as no other man’s sufferings; for a glorious crown of victory at length adorns the head of this tried and faithful One, yes, he receives the testimony that his sufferings shall result in nothing short of the salvation of the world, and the restoration, enlightening, and beatifying of the Gentiles. Who is so blind as not to perceive that this just man, who is so severely tried, and who comes forth so triumphantly from the conflict, as depicted by the Spirit in this twenty-second Psalm, is no other than the promised Messiah in the person of Jesus of Nazareth? This is beyond a doubt, even if the New Testament had not expressly given that Psalm such an application. Even one of the champions of modern infidelity, prophesying like Balaam, has called the twenty-second Psalm “the program of the crucifixion of Christ;” and another, against his will, is carried away to use these words, “One might almost think a Christian had written this Psalm.”
We will not entirely reject the idea that our Lord, in his distress of soul, bore this Psalm in mind. But if he uttered his exclamation with a conscious reference to it, he certainly did not do so simply in order that the words might be fulfilled; but only because that prophetic Psalm was now being fulfilled in him. That mournful cry, as it proceeded from his lips, was the genuine expression of the most perfect personal reality and truth. “But was Christ really forsaken of God while on the cross?” Not a moment, my dear readers. How could he be forsaken of God, who was essentially one with him, and when just at the moment of his unconditional obedient self-sacrifice on the cross, he was the object of his supreme and paternal good pleasure? But in the depths of suffering into which he had then sunk, and through which his cry of “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!” darts like a flash of lightning—such distress overpowered him, such horrible and death-like terror appalled him, and such infernal temptations roared around him, that a feeling came over him, as if he were exiled from the fellowship of God, and entirely given up to the infernal powers. Not only did all the horrors which were produced in the world from the dreadful womb of sin expand themselves before him, but he also entered, with his holy soul, in a manner incomprehensible to us, into the fellowship of our consciousness of guilt, and emptied the whole of the horrible cup of the wages of sin—that is, of the death involved in the curse, which was threatened in paradise.
And no one stood by him. No greeting of affection descended toward him from heaven. No vision of angels refreshed him in his great agony. The Father had really withdrawn himself from his inward consciousness. In the sphere of his feelings, the latter stood opposed to him. If the trials in Gethsemane brought the Lord Jesus to the extreme boundary of obedience—those of the cross brought him to the utmost extent of faith. Not a step, no, nor a line more was between him and despair. According to Psalm 69:15, the horrible idea entered his soul as with a vulture’s claws, that these floods of suffering might swallow him up, and the pit shut her mouth upon him. It was then that the cry of “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!” was wrung from his agitated bosom.
But be very careful, in explaining this expression, that you make no mistake. It is not a charging God with having forsaken him, but rather a powerful defense against infernal incitement to such an accusation. By the repetition of the words, “My God,” he makes it evident that solely by means of his naked faith he had struggled through all opposing feelings; and that God was still his God. Does he not, in these words, still cling with filial fondness to his heavenly Father, and say—although the words, “My God,” instead of “My Father,” leave us to infer a superiority of inward reverence in the presence of the Eternal Majesty—”Between you and me there can never be any separation!”
Perhaps some one may say, “But we hear him inquire why God had forsaken him?” That is true; but consider that the words do not, in the first place, ask the reason of his passion in general. Of this he was clearly conscious every moment on the cross. The question rather refers exclusively to the personal bearing of his heavenly Father toward him, especially during the three hours of darkness; and the inquiry is a filial one, synonymous with “Why are you so far from me, and hide your face from me?” But at the very moment in which he is threatened with the horrible idea that the hell which blazed around him might close over him, and when the nameless misery of being eternally rejected entered, as far as it was possible, into his consciousness, he fled from this horrible mental phantom, and from the fiery darts of the wicked one, holding the shield of faith against them, into the arms of God; and hence the following results as the real meaning of his mournful cry, “My God, why do you forsake me, and withdraw your aid from me? Have I acted contrary to your commands? Am I not still your child, your only-begotten Son; in whom is all your delight? And you are still my God; for how should you be able to forsake me? You can not; you will help me out of this distress. You will cause your face again to shine.” Thus, complaint—not accusation—a cry for help, and a victorious child-like confidence are the three elements which mingle in the exclamation, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!”
But let this suffice respecting a subject which, inaccessible to human comprehension, discloses, even to believing presentiment, only a small part of its sublime signification. But so much must be clear to every one, that without the doctrine of mediation, Christ’s mournful cry on the cross would be altogether inexplicable. But, viewed in connection with it, the words become the solemn announcement of our eternal redemption. May God in mercy grant that as such, they may find a mighty and increasing echo within us!
Thus, as far as it was possible—and with reference to the mysterious connection into which Christ as the second Adam entered with our race, we must not imagine the limits of this possibility too narrow—the Lord tasted the bitterest drop in the accursed cup—the being forsaken of God. The words, “My God, why have you forsaken me?” were certainly the warrior’s cry, with which he overpowered and victoriously overcame, by faith, the inward feeling of abandonment. But, nevertheless, it was a manifest proof that Christ had really to endure an arduous struggle with this horrible feeling.
If we now inquire what fruits have resulted to us from this conflict, the fact itself is encouraging and consolatory for us, that in our Lord’s inquiry why he was forsaken, the consciousness of his perfect righteousness before God is so clearly manifested. For in default of it, how could he have ventured the bold question to the thrice holy God, why he had forsaken him? But the most essential benefit which we derive from his conflict is a very different one. How did those mistake, who, beneath the cross, said to one another, in wretched misunderstanding of his words, “This man calls for Elijah!” Primarily, this remark was intended for anything but mockery. On the contrary, the feeling again broke in upon the murderers that the exalted one who was bleeding on the cross might be the Messiah. But as they knew from the prophecies of Isaiah and Malachi that Elijah, as the forerunner, was to precede the great one who was to come, the idea occurred to them that possibly the Divine Savior was invoking the aid of that powerful herald of God from the invisible world. But what a misunderstanding of the great Redeemer lay at the bottom of this idea of his crucifiers! It was not of himself that he thought; but of the sinners whom he was representing, when he exclaimed, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!” and his primary intention in it was to reconquer the heart of the living God for them. For if God forsook him, he had also forsaken them whom he represented. If God rejected the Surety’s work as insufficient, the redemption of the whole world was frustrated. It was chiefly this consideration which forced from our Lord the cry of “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” and hence his question contains this meaning in it also—”No, you do not forsake me, you accept my work, and I, therefore, cleave firmly to you as my God, and consequently, also, as the God of those whose cause I have undertaken.”
But his heavenly Father did not suffer the cry of his Son to remain without his “Amen.” He uttered it symbolically, by immediately dispelling the darkness, and restoring to the sun its full mid-day splendor. The being thus forsaken, essentially belonged to the cup which our great High Priest was obliged to empty for us. Hence there can be no idea that those who are united to Christ by the bonds of a living faith, can be really forsaken of God. Even as for us, no somber cloud any longer darkens heaven, and as we at all times behold the face of God unveiled, and every moment may enjoy free access to his throne of grace, so God will never more depart from us, whatever else may forsake us. Though we may be abandoned by the world’s favor, the friendship of men, earthly prosperity, and bodily strength, though we may even be bereft, as may possibly be the case, of the feeling of God’s nearness, and the freshness of the inward life of faith; yet God himself always continues near and favorably inclined to us in Christ. However strangely he may sometimes act toward us, into whatever furnace of affliction he may plunge us, however completely he may withdraw himself from our consciousness, yet in every situation the blissful privilege belongs to us, not only courageously to approach him, and say, “Why do you forsake me, your child, for whom your Son has atoned?” but also to say to him with still bolder confidence, “You will not, can not, and dare not forsake me, because the merits of your only-begotten Son forever bind you to me.”
At this very time, the corpse of a pious female, who was one of the most costly pearls which, from this great city, will eventually adorn the Redeemer’s crown, is being carried to its final resting-place. Who knew her, except her children and a little group of like-minded friends, whom the Lord had conducted to her? Who, except these, ever heard her name? She lay two whole years in the concealment of a gloomy attic, sick of a grievous and painful disease, as if on thorns, but she was thought to be lying on a bed of roses, so full was she of heavenly peace and cheerful resignation. The cause of which was, that Christ had become her life. The more her body wasted, the more was her spirit visibly strengthened in God. The more her outward man decayed, the more gloriously did her inner man unfold and transfigure itself. If, occasionally, the flood of suffering penetrated into her soul, we never heard her sigh, much less despond. If her faith grew dark, her eyes were immediately directed to Calvary, and beneath the echo of “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani!” the cloud on her brow was rapidly dispelled. “He cannot forsake me,” said she, with a smile, “after forsaking him for me, who paid my ransom.” And once, when in the days of her last agony, compassion forced from me the words, “O that it might please the Lord in some measure to alleviate the cross of suffering!” she replied, waving her hand, and with solemn and serious emphasis, “O be silent! not one drop less! each of them is carefully measured out by his wisdom and love.” She left the world adorned with the heavenly chaplet of the firmest faith, the sincerest humility, the most persevering resignation and patience, and the most self-denying love, a triumphant conqueror over death and the grave. She now sings the great “Hallelujah” with the host of those glorified spirits who have come out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. God has wiped away the tears from her eyes, and placed in her hand the palm of a never-fading triumph. As her last will, she left behind her the earnest request that nothing might be said at her grave, except what had reference to the grace of Christ and the power of his blood. Nor will we boast of anything else over her tomb than the mercy of God in Christ, and add the prayerful wish that our last end may be like hers!
I have inserted this incident in order to give my readers a fresh proof that God has still his people among us, and that he still sues for souls in the midst of us, as well as to afford them an instance how the mystery of the cross in general, and that of God’s abandonment of the Mediator in particular, should be taken advantage of. May we be enabled to appropriate, in this manner, the fruits of the cross of Christ, and may the words of the hymn be increasingly realized in our happy experience—
“O, the sweet wonders of that cross
On which my Savior loved and died!
Its noblest life my spirit draws
From his dear wounds and bleeding side.”
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From The Suffering Savior: Meditations on the Last Days of Christ
by F. W. Krummacher