The tomb was sealed and the men went home
Commentary
As we come to Good Friday, I am reminded of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. He had faced the growing threat of Hitler -- who had designated himself as “Führer” of Germany (and soon the world). Most of us did not understand that that title had been applied to the Christ in the German churches. He helped in the founding of the Confessing Church because he saw the churches being co-opted by a madman. As a result, he was Public Enemy #1, so to speak, in Germany. His friends smuggled him out of the country and found him a teaching job here in America. But as the war expanded, and word came to the U.S. of the concentration camps, Bonhoeffer returned to Germany. He said that if he were to lead his churches after the war, it had to be that he had faced the same challenges as his parishioners. He died in prison, executed by the SS.
The book he is probably most known for is titled The Cost of Discipleship. In the introduction to the book he said:
Good Friday has changed since I was a young girl, going off to church with my mother and siblings to spend the same amount of time with the crucifixion as Jesus had. The city I grew up in was largely Catholic and Lutheran, so most stores, factories and other businesses closed down for those three hours, and most of the population went to their respective churches. Today, even in my home city, most Good Friday worship happens at night, so that working people can attend the service. The world goes on as though this day means nothing. Perhaps that is true in the minds of those who own the businesses, as well as those who work there.
On the other hand, it’s been a long time -- thankfully -- since I’ve attended a service where the pastor described in gruesome detail the suffering of one being crucified. I remember more than once someone fainting in the midst of such a description. Not that I want to minimize the suffering Jesus endured; but I think dwelling on the details, and browbeating people to make them see that we caused Jesus’ suffering, does nothing to draw us closer to God. It’s like trying to frighten someone into loving you. And it causes us to forget the nature of the One the church refers to as “Merciful” “Loving Father” and “Healer.”
That we continuously fail to love our fellow humans as much as we love ourselves is without question. That we deserve to suffer endlessly for that inability cuts us out of the love that Jesus said God has for all of us. But then, Good Friday centers on the paradoxes of our faith.
How can the incarnate God cry out that his Father has abandoned him?
The early church was perplexed by the death of God on the cross; if Jesus was in any way God, how could he die? Maybe he just looked like he was dying.
Furthermore, did God demand a human sacrifice when he had forbidden Abraham’s immolation of Isaac? It literally took centuries for the Church to come to some agreement, and even then, there was a split between Orthodox churches and the Roman Catholic Church over the language of the creeds.
What we do know can be said simply: “God was in Christ, reconciling himself to the world.”
“[I]f anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. [Italics are mine.] And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. (1 Corinthians 5:18-20)
That is what makes this Good Friday: that God came in flesh and erased our sin.
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
This is the fourth and last of the “Servant Songs” of Isaiah. It is probably the basis for much of what Paul has to say about Jesus’ death on the cross. The description of the Servant’s suffering surely does resemble that of Jesus. (And the suffering of the prophets as well.)
Despite the emphasis on the suffering of the Servant, the passage begins with a triumphant shout: “See, my servant shall prosper; he shall be exalted and lifted up and shall be very high.” Not just as high as a cross, which only had to be high enough to be certain the man’s feet didn’t reach the ground, but high as the mountains of Israel, like Mount Zion, about which Isaiah has much to say (as does the Old Testament in general).
Then Isaiah plunges into the depths of the Servant’s suffering -- beaten beyond recognition, despised and rejected, he endured others’ turning their backs so as not to see his pain. [Much like the homeless in our cities.] While the nation went on dancing, the Servant went looking for the sheep gone astray. Yet he did not complain, and if we read on into chapter 54, we see that God says he let his anger get the best of him, and the people suffered too much during the Exile.
And in that piece, there lies a clue that the average understanding of the meaning of the crucifixion may be off-base. The New Interpreter’s Bible says in the footnotes to this section that the Servant was, more than likely, the nation of Israel, carried away into Babylon, and the suffering they experienced there was more than God had intended. They were to suffer, not just for their sins, but for the sins of the world, to convert the other nations to worshipping the God of Israel, the Great I Am.
If that is the case, we need to carry Isaiah’s understanding of the Servant into our modern-day faith. In picking up and carrying the cross, as Jesus said his followers must, we become the Suffering Servant. And upon rereading the passage from Corinthians above, we see that same idea. We are to carry the message that God does not want us to suffer overmuch; God loves us and came to earth to save us from the suffering that results from sin.
But, we may ask, what about verses 10-11? Unfortunately, the two key words, pain and an offering for sin are not clear. They are not the words ancient Hebrew usually used in the way they’re translated. What is translated in the NRSV as pain often means sickness. What is rendered as an offering for sin does not use the words usually applied to the sacrifice of a lamb on behalf of those who need to be forgiven. This is frustrating, to be sure. Nevertheless, we cannot equate this Servant Song with the events of the crucifixion, even though they can be laid side-by-side and we can see the similarities. The sufferings mentioned apply equally to the nation of ancient Israel -- and to our life today. It is equally a prophecy about the present-day church, dying in much of the Western world, and bearing little resemblance to what Jesus told us the church ought to be.
Hebrews 10:16-25 (or 4:14-16; 5:7-9)
The sermon to the Hebrew Christians reaches a central point in the tenth chapter. Today’s passage is begun oddly, in the middle of a thought in the text. Begin instead with verse 15, where the author says “…the Holy Spirit also testifies to us, for after saying...” “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days….” In verse 17, we read, “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more. Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.”
This harks back to the aftermath of the Flood in Genesis 8-9. Noah’s family was, according to the story, found to be righteous enough to be saved when God became fed up with the behavior of humans.1 When the flood waters receded, Noah built an altar and offered a multitude of burnt offerings. Seeing this, God said to Godself, “I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, for the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living creature as I have done.”
It is certainly no compliment to humans to know that God threw up his hands (so to speak) and gave up on perfecting us. But it makes the incarnation even more important. Throughout the Old Testament, humans continued to disobey God, even lying to God (an interesting thought) and each other. But God made no move ever again, according to those who wrote down these books, to destroy humankind. God remembered that we are all corrupted early in life and cannot change.
Does this mean we’re getting off free? No. But it means that God paid a terrible price to try to overcome the canyon that separates us from what God intended us to be. Taking on human flesh, God walked among us, learned how hard our lives can be; watched as corrupt officials took advantage of their positions; saw the consequences of judges and officials willing to take a bribe. In a way, it killed him. Certainly, the corruption of the Temple and the Sanhedrin led to the death of the God/man on a cross outside the city gate.
What the sacrifice of the cross means in an ecclesiastical sense is clearly expressed in the alternate text in Hebrews 4:14-16 and 5:7-9:
The High Priest was the only person allowed into the Holy of Holies, the most sacred part of the Temple, and the place where the ark of the covenant was originally kept. And, he could only enter that sacred space once a year, on the day that the nation gathered to confess their sins before God. Even the High Priest had to be careful; he had to wear bells on the hem of his robe, so that his approach was announced to God, and once inside, the priests outside could hear him moving around. There was a heavy drape across the entrance to this chamber, which kept the ark (the throne of God on earth) out of sight of everyone else. It was this curtain that was ripped from top to bottom at the moment of Jesus’ death, and this event symbolizes our access to God being opened so that we might go and talk to God ourselves.2
The writer points out that with Jesus taking the place of the High Priest, we have a person who understands our daily lives. One cannot expect anyone in a position that removes them from the daily push-and-shove of the common person to understand the pressures that so often lead us away from loving our co-workers and into lying, cheating or otherwise misbehaving. (4:15)
John 18:1--19:42
The words that John is referring to in verse 1 are those of the so-called “High Priestly Prayer” that Jesus prayed over his disciples at the Last Supper. At this point, he leads his disciples out of the Upper Room to the garden on the Mount of Olives, where John says they were used to gathering for study. In John’s gospel, they have barely arrived when Judas meets them, leading a “detachment of soldiers [apparently Roman] and police from the chief priests.” John wants us to know that Jesus’ arrest was brought about by the state and the temple working together. The people of the day expected treachery from Rome. But this coalition is unbeatable. And John wants us to know that the leaders of the Jews were part of the conspiracy against Jesus.
Throughout his gospel, John is critical of the behavior of the authorities, especially the Jewish authorities, who refuse to believe that Jesus is a prophet, even though the “multitudes” believed that Jesus was sent by God. But the authorities wanted peace at any price, even the death of an innocent man. To emphasize the guilt of the Jewish authorities, John claims that Pilate says specifically, “I find no case against him,” and “Take him yourselves and judge him according to your law.”
This last comment sounds like Pilate, at least by reputation. He wants nothing to do with this case. He recognizes that something is going on here that is pertinent to the Jews, not the Romans; something to do with their invisible god. His dis-ease makes him almost human in facing Jesus. “Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?” An important question. Only violent bandits, lying in wait for unwary travelers, or those convicted of treason against Rome, or slaves were crucified. But when the priests tell him that Jesus has claimed to be the Son of God, and therefore deserves death, Pilate really has no choice. Anyone seeking to be a king could be nothing but a traitor to Rome.
John portrays Pilate as being unnerved. The governor goes back inside his palace and asks Jesus, “Where are you from?” He’s not asking about territory or government. He’s asking Jesus to condemn himself by saying he is the King of the Jews, or the Son of God, or both. He wants Jesus to plainly convict himself. But Jesus will not cooperate. He refuses to answer. Pilate pulls rank: “I have the power to crucify you or release you, don’t you know that?”
“You have no power over me except what is given you from God.”
At the beginning of his Presidency, Barack Obama made a speech that won him scorn. He dared to say that none of us is where we are because of our own power. None of us, he said, have achieved anything strictly on our own. We all need help. He was speaking as President, but his teaching came straight from the Bible. This is the truth that those who want power or deal in power reject. None of us is a self-made person. In everyone’s life there are those people who showed up at the right time in the right place to make it possible for us to take the next step. In everyone’s life there are circumstances that we have presented to us that it is imperative for us to recognize so that we can accomplish what God is setting before us. Our lives are not written. We have choices. But God is constantly shepherding us, leading us, giving us the right people, the right abilities. This is why we can say that God always gives us the tools to accomplish what God asks us to do.
Jesus’ death is demanded, not by the Jewish people, but by the Jewish authorities. They see clearly the secular danger here. If this man is released, and the crowds cheer for him as they did when he entered the city less than a week before, there will be riots. There have already been riots. Not long before Jesus came on the scene, the Romans crucified every man and boy implicated in an uprising, and the crosses were placed all along the Jericho road. Even if this does not happen, they will lose their positions and their authority. The Romans will crush the rebellion, and who knows how far the Romans will go to suppress any rebellion against their authority? The only people with anything to lose in that scenario are those who stand out in the crowd. The mobs will rise up precisely because they have nothing to lose and much to gain.
Pilate also has much to lose. Being assigned to be governor over the Jews is pretty much the same as hitting rock bottom. The Romans considered the Jews to be dirty because they did not shave or go to the public baths. The Jews thought the Romans to be loose for the opposite reasons. The Jews never would bow to Roman gods, which made the Romans think they are atheists. The Jews demanded their own government, even though Rome had the ultimate power, The High Priest and the Teachers of the Law were allowed to fulfill their roles in the Jewish nation. Rome had learned it was easier that way. Pilate must have offended someone to wind up in Jerusalem.
At the very end of Jesus’ earthly life, John adds an interesting comment. The priests did not want men left hanging on crosses at the Passover, so they ask Pilate to end their lives. The easiest way to do this was to break their legs so that they could no longer hoist themselves up to catch their breath. Not to mention, a broken femur can drain the body’s blood very quickly. But when they came to Jesus, he was already dead. Since he had been on the cross just three hours, this was amazing. This is why we have the sworn statement in the text at this point that this information is from a witness of the event.
Then John adds, “None of his bones shall be broken.” This has long been referred to as part of the designation of Jesus as “the Lamb of God.” But the lamb that is being spoken of is not a lamb slaughtered for the forgiveness of sins. No, the only lamb being referred to in this way is the Passover Lamb. This lamb is far more important, far more valued, even, than the sacrificial lamb. The Passover Lamb is the one that makes a person part of the family of God. It is the lamb that is shared by as many relatives and friends as one can gather in the home. It is the celebration of our delivery from slavery, of our survival to become a nation under God’s rule.
After Jesus was declared dead, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus came to Pilate and asked for permission to take his body down from the cross. They had to ask permission, because part of the punishment for those crucified was that they were also not allowed burial. Their bodies were thrown into the open, burning pit of Gehenna, the garbage dump for Jerusalem.
They prepared his body for burial (but only in this gospel; in the others, they left the preparation for the women on the first day of the week; i.e., Sunday) and put him in a new tomb in which no one had been laid. This was important to the Jews, because anything that touched any dead body or the place where a dead body had been, was unclean. The disciples knew that Jesus had touched and been touched by people considered to be unclean, and was still able to work miracles, but these two Sanhedrin members did not. So he was buried in a new tomb, as yet unused.
And there his body rested. He was buried before sunset on Friday, which ended with sunset. He was in the tomb for all of Saturday (sunset Friday to sunset Saturday) and part of Sunday (sunset Saturday to sunset Sunday). Thus, three days. The tomb was sealed, and the men went home.
1 The word sin in Hebrew does not refer to specific acts. No one carries a burden of many sins. There is only sin -- a singular verb, referring to the breakdown of the relationship of God and humans.
2 Hebrews 4:16 -- “Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
The book he is probably most known for is titled The Cost of Discipleship. In the introduction to the book he said:
"Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves... grace without discipleship.... Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again.... It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a [person] the only true life."As we contemplate on the death of Christ, it is good to remember those words.
Good Friday has changed since I was a young girl, going off to church with my mother and siblings to spend the same amount of time with the crucifixion as Jesus had. The city I grew up in was largely Catholic and Lutheran, so most stores, factories and other businesses closed down for those three hours, and most of the population went to their respective churches. Today, even in my home city, most Good Friday worship happens at night, so that working people can attend the service. The world goes on as though this day means nothing. Perhaps that is true in the minds of those who own the businesses, as well as those who work there.
On the other hand, it’s been a long time -- thankfully -- since I’ve attended a service where the pastor described in gruesome detail the suffering of one being crucified. I remember more than once someone fainting in the midst of such a description. Not that I want to minimize the suffering Jesus endured; but I think dwelling on the details, and browbeating people to make them see that we caused Jesus’ suffering, does nothing to draw us closer to God. It’s like trying to frighten someone into loving you. And it causes us to forget the nature of the One the church refers to as “Merciful” “Loving Father” and “Healer.”
That we continuously fail to love our fellow humans as much as we love ourselves is without question. That we deserve to suffer endlessly for that inability cuts us out of the love that Jesus said God has for all of us. But then, Good Friday centers on the paradoxes of our faith.
How can the incarnate God cry out that his Father has abandoned him?
The early church was perplexed by the death of God on the cross; if Jesus was in any way God, how could he die? Maybe he just looked like he was dying.
Furthermore, did God demand a human sacrifice when he had forbidden Abraham’s immolation of Isaac? It literally took centuries for the Church to come to some agreement, and even then, there was a split between Orthodox churches and the Roman Catholic Church over the language of the creeds.
What we do know can be said simply: “God was in Christ, reconciling himself to the world.”
“[I]f anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. [Italics are mine.] And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. (1 Corinthians 5:18-20)
That is what makes this Good Friday: that God came in flesh and erased our sin.
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
This is the fourth and last of the “Servant Songs” of Isaiah. It is probably the basis for much of what Paul has to say about Jesus’ death on the cross. The description of the Servant’s suffering surely does resemble that of Jesus. (And the suffering of the prophets as well.)
Despite the emphasis on the suffering of the Servant, the passage begins with a triumphant shout: “See, my servant shall prosper; he shall be exalted and lifted up and shall be very high.” Not just as high as a cross, which only had to be high enough to be certain the man’s feet didn’t reach the ground, but high as the mountains of Israel, like Mount Zion, about which Isaiah has much to say (as does the Old Testament in general).
Then Isaiah plunges into the depths of the Servant’s suffering -- beaten beyond recognition, despised and rejected, he endured others’ turning their backs so as not to see his pain. [Much like the homeless in our cities.] While the nation went on dancing, the Servant went looking for the sheep gone astray. Yet he did not complain, and if we read on into chapter 54, we see that God says he let his anger get the best of him, and the people suffered too much during the Exile.
And in that piece, there lies a clue that the average understanding of the meaning of the crucifixion may be off-base. The New Interpreter’s Bible says in the footnotes to this section that the Servant was, more than likely, the nation of Israel, carried away into Babylon, and the suffering they experienced there was more than God had intended. They were to suffer, not just for their sins, but for the sins of the world, to convert the other nations to worshipping the God of Israel, the Great I Am.
If that is the case, we need to carry Isaiah’s understanding of the Servant into our modern-day faith. In picking up and carrying the cross, as Jesus said his followers must, we become the Suffering Servant. And upon rereading the passage from Corinthians above, we see that same idea. We are to carry the message that God does not want us to suffer overmuch; God loves us and came to earth to save us from the suffering that results from sin.
But, we may ask, what about verses 10-11? Unfortunately, the two key words, pain and an offering for sin are not clear. They are not the words ancient Hebrew usually used in the way they’re translated. What is translated in the NRSV as pain often means sickness. What is rendered as an offering for sin does not use the words usually applied to the sacrifice of a lamb on behalf of those who need to be forgiven. This is frustrating, to be sure. Nevertheless, we cannot equate this Servant Song with the events of the crucifixion, even though they can be laid side-by-side and we can see the similarities. The sufferings mentioned apply equally to the nation of ancient Israel -- and to our life today. It is equally a prophecy about the present-day church, dying in much of the Western world, and bearing little resemblance to what Jesus told us the church ought to be.
Hebrews 10:16-25 (or 4:14-16; 5:7-9)
The sermon to the Hebrew Christians reaches a central point in the tenth chapter. Today’s passage is begun oddly, in the middle of a thought in the text. Begin instead with verse 15, where the author says “…the Holy Spirit also testifies to us, for after saying...” “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days….” In verse 17, we read, “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more. Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.”
This harks back to the aftermath of the Flood in Genesis 8-9. Noah’s family was, according to the story, found to be righteous enough to be saved when God became fed up with the behavior of humans.1 When the flood waters receded, Noah built an altar and offered a multitude of burnt offerings. Seeing this, God said to Godself, “I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, for the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth; nor will I ever again destroy every living creature as I have done.”
It is certainly no compliment to humans to know that God threw up his hands (so to speak) and gave up on perfecting us. But it makes the incarnation even more important. Throughout the Old Testament, humans continued to disobey God, even lying to God (an interesting thought) and each other. But God made no move ever again, according to those who wrote down these books, to destroy humankind. God remembered that we are all corrupted early in life and cannot change.
Does this mean we’re getting off free? No. But it means that God paid a terrible price to try to overcome the canyon that separates us from what God intended us to be. Taking on human flesh, God walked among us, learned how hard our lives can be; watched as corrupt officials took advantage of their positions; saw the consequences of judges and officials willing to take a bribe. In a way, it killed him. Certainly, the corruption of the Temple and the Sanhedrin led to the death of the God/man on a cross outside the city gate.
What the sacrifice of the cross means in an ecclesiastical sense is clearly expressed in the alternate text in Hebrews 4:14-16 and 5:7-9:
The High Priest was the only person allowed into the Holy of Holies, the most sacred part of the Temple, and the place where the ark of the covenant was originally kept. And, he could only enter that sacred space once a year, on the day that the nation gathered to confess their sins before God. Even the High Priest had to be careful; he had to wear bells on the hem of his robe, so that his approach was announced to God, and once inside, the priests outside could hear him moving around. There was a heavy drape across the entrance to this chamber, which kept the ark (the throne of God on earth) out of sight of everyone else. It was this curtain that was ripped from top to bottom at the moment of Jesus’ death, and this event symbolizes our access to God being opened so that we might go and talk to God ourselves.2
The writer points out that with Jesus taking the place of the High Priest, we have a person who understands our daily lives. One cannot expect anyone in a position that removes them from the daily push-and-shove of the common person to understand the pressures that so often lead us away from loving our co-workers and into lying, cheating or otherwise misbehaving. (4:15)
John 18:1--19:42
The words that John is referring to in verse 1 are those of the so-called “High Priestly Prayer” that Jesus prayed over his disciples at the Last Supper. At this point, he leads his disciples out of the Upper Room to the garden on the Mount of Olives, where John says they were used to gathering for study. In John’s gospel, they have barely arrived when Judas meets them, leading a “detachment of soldiers [apparently Roman] and police from the chief priests.” John wants us to know that Jesus’ arrest was brought about by the state and the temple working together. The people of the day expected treachery from Rome. But this coalition is unbeatable. And John wants us to know that the leaders of the Jews were part of the conspiracy against Jesus.
Throughout his gospel, John is critical of the behavior of the authorities, especially the Jewish authorities, who refuse to believe that Jesus is a prophet, even though the “multitudes” believed that Jesus was sent by God. But the authorities wanted peace at any price, even the death of an innocent man. To emphasize the guilt of the Jewish authorities, John claims that Pilate says specifically, “I find no case against him,” and “Take him yourselves and judge him according to your law.”
This last comment sounds like Pilate, at least by reputation. He wants nothing to do with this case. He recognizes that something is going on here that is pertinent to the Jews, not the Romans; something to do with their invisible god. His dis-ease makes him almost human in facing Jesus. “Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?” An important question. Only violent bandits, lying in wait for unwary travelers, or those convicted of treason against Rome, or slaves were crucified. But when the priests tell him that Jesus has claimed to be the Son of God, and therefore deserves death, Pilate really has no choice. Anyone seeking to be a king could be nothing but a traitor to Rome.
John portrays Pilate as being unnerved. The governor goes back inside his palace and asks Jesus, “Where are you from?” He’s not asking about territory or government. He’s asking Jesus to condemn himself by saying he is the King of the Jews, or the Son of God, or both. He wants Jesus to plainly convict himself. But Jesus will not cooperate. He refuses to answer. Pilate pulls rank: “I have the power to crucify you or release you, don’t you know that?”
“You have no power over me except what is given you from God.”
At the beginning of his Presidency, Barack Obama made a speech that won him scorn. He dared to say that none of us is where we are because of our own power. None of us, he said, have achieved anything strictly on our own. We all need help. He was speaking as President, but his teaching came straight from the Bible. This is the truth that those who want power or deal in power reject. None of us is a self-made person. In everyone’s life there are those people who showed up at the right time in the right place to make it possible for us to take the next step. In everyone’s life there are circumstances that we have presented to us that it is imperative for us to recognize so that we can accomplish what God is setting before us. Our lives are not written. We have choices. But God is constantly shepherding us, leading us, giving us the right people, the right abilities. This is why we can say that God always gives us the tools to accomplish what God asks us to do.
Jesus’ death is demanded, not by the Jewish people, but by the Jewish authorities. They see clearly the secular danger here. If this man is released, and the crowds cheer for him as they did when he entered the city less than a week before, there will be riots. There have already been riots. Not long before Jesus came on the scene, the Romans crucified every man and boy implicated in an uprising, and the crosses were placed all along the Jericho road. Even if this does not happen, they will lose their positions and their authority. The Romans will crush the rebellion, and who knows how far the Romans will go to suppress any rebellion against their authority? The only people with anything to lose in that scenario are those who stand out in the crowd. The mobs will rise up precisely because they have nothing to lose and much to gain.
Pilate also has much to lose. Being assigned to be governor over the Jews is pretty much the same as hitting rock bottom. The Romans considered the Jews to be dirty because they did not shave or go to the public baths. The Jews thought the Romans to be loose for the opposite reasons. The Jews never would bow to Roman gods, which made the Romans think they are atheists. The Jews demanded their own government, even though Rome had the ultimate power, The High Priest and the Teachers of the Law were allowed to fulfill their roles in the Jewish nation. Rome had learned it was easier that way. Pilate must have offended someone to wind up in Jerusalem.
At the very end of Jesus’ earthly life, John adds an interesting comment. The priests did not want men left hanging on crosses at the Passover, so they ask Pilate to end their lives. The easiest way to do this was to break their legs so that they could no longer hoist themselves up to catch their breath. Not to mention, a broken femur can drain the body’s blood very quickly. But when they came to Jesus, he was already dead. Since he had been on the cross just three hours, this was amazing. This is why we have the sworn statement in the text at this point that this information is from a witness of the event.
Then John adds, “None of his bones shall be broken.” This has long been referred to as part of the designation of Jesus as “the Lamb of God.” But the lamb that is being spoken of is not a lamb slaughtered for the forgiveness of sins. No, the only lamb being referred to in this way is the Passover Lamb. This lamb is far more important, far more valued, even, than the sacrificial lamb. The Passover Lamb is the one that makes a person part of the family of God. It is the lamb that is shared by as many relatives and friends as one can gather in the home. It is the celebration of our delivery from slavery, of our survival to become a nation under God’s rule.
After Jesus was declared dead, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus came to Pilate and asked for permission to take his body down from the cross. They had to ask permission, because part of the punishment for those crucified was that they were also not allowed burial. Their bodies were thrown into the open, burning pit of Gehenna, the garbage dump for Jerusalem.
They prepared his body for burial (but only in this gospel; in the others, they left the preparation for the women on the first day of the week; i.e., Sunday) and put him in a new tomb in which no one had been laid. This was important to the Jews, because anything that touched any dead body or the place where a dead body had been, was unclean. The disciples knew that Jesus had touched and been touched by people considered to be unclean, and was still able to work miracles, but these two Sanhedrin members did not. So he was buried in a new tomb, as yet unused.
And there his body rested. He was buried before sunset on Friday, which ended with sunset. He was in the tomb for all of Saturday (sunset Friday to sunset Saturday) and part of Sunday (sunset Saturday to sunset Sunday). Thus, three days. The tomb was sealed, and the men went home.
1 The word sin in Hebrew does not refer to specific acts. No one carries a burden of many sins. There is only sin -- a singular verb, referring to the breakdown of the relationship of God and humans.
2 Hebrews 4:16 -- “Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
