Pilate’s question, the seven sentences from the cross and which Gospel has which, the torn veil, the centurion, and the word finished
The Cross in Four Accounts
Every Gospel slows down at the cross, and every Gospel sees it differently. Mark’s Jesus dies with a psalm of abandonment; Luke’s forgives his executioners and commends his spirit; John’s says it is finished, as if completing a task. The seven last words exist only when the four are laid together, and laying them together is the one thing this series has warned against. Here it is done on purpose, so the seams show.
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Lesson 11 of 12 · Friday
Jesus was condemned twice, by the high priest for saying yes to the question of the seventh lesson and by Pilate for a charge Pilate said three times he did not believe, and was crucified outside the wall on the morning of Passover, between two others, under a placard naming him king. The four accounts agree on all of that and diverge on almost every word he spoke. Mark and Matthew record one sentence from the cross, the first line of Psalm 22, my God, why have you forsaken me. Luke has three others, none of them that one: forgiveness for the soldiers, Paradise for a thief, and the Father’s hands. John has three more: his mother given to a disciple, I thirst, and it is finished. The seven last words are a harmony, made by the church from four accounts that each chose differently, and a reader should know which Gospel each came from, because each Gospel’s choice is its whole reading of the death. What all four record is the moment after: a veil torn, a centurion speaking, and the body taken down before the Sabbath.
Two trials
Before the high priest Jesus answers the question he had silenced at Caesarea Philippi; before Pilate he answers a different one.
But he stayed quiet, and answered nothing. Again the high priest asked him, “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” Jesus said, “I am. You will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of the sky.” — Mark 14:61–62 · WEB
Read the comment on The Arrest, the Trial, and the Rooster
Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed? I am. You will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of the sky. The silence of the seventh lesson ends here, in the one room where saying yes could not raise an army; the answer joins Psalm 110 to Daniel 7, and the high priest tears his robe and calls it blasphemy. Before Pilate the charge is changed to one Rome can act on, king of the Jews, and John records the exchange the others do not: are you a king then? For this reason I have come into the world, that I should testify to the truth. And Pilate said, what is truth, and went out and said he found no basis for a charge (John 18:37-38). Luke has Pilate say it three times; Matthew has him wash his hands; Mark has him give way to the crowd. All four know Pilate did not believe the charge and crucified him anyway, and all four have the placard read king of the Jews, in three languages according to John, so that the charge he did not believe was the truth he had asked about.
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The seven words, with their sources
“Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.” Dividing his garments among them, they cast lots.” Luke 23:34 · WEB
Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing: Luke only, said while the soldiers divide the clothes; some early manuscripts lack it, and a reader will find a note in most Bibles.
“Jesus said to him, “Assuredly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”” Luke 23:43 · WEB
Assuredly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise: Luke only, to the one criminal who asked to be remembered.
“Therefore when Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing there, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” From that hour, the disciple took her to his own home.” John 19:26–27 · WEB
Woman, behold your son; behold your mother: John only, to Mary and to the disciple he loved, who took her to his own home.
“At the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is, being interpreted, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”” Mark 15:34 · WEB
Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Mark and Matthew, the only sentence they record, in Aramaic and then translated.
“When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, “It is finished!” Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” John 19:30 · WEB
It is finished! John only, after the sour wine; then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
“Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” Having said this, he breathed his last.” Luke 23:46 · WEB
Father, into your hands I commit my spirit: Luke only, from Psalm 31, a loud voice and then his last breath.
The sixth of the traditional seven, I thirst, is John’s as well (John 19:28), and John says it was said so that a psalm would be fulfilled. Set the list in columns and the pattern is plain. Mark’s Jesus dies with a question; Luke’s dies trusting and forgiving; John’s dies in command of the hour, giving away his mother and declaring the work done. None of the three is wrong and none is the whole. The church that kept four Gospels also made the seven words, and a reader should hold both: the harmony for devotion, the four for what each writer meant.
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Why have you forsaken me
At the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is, being interpreted, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” — Mark 15:34 · WEB
Read the comment on The Cross, and the Torn Veil
At the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? It is the first line of Psalm 22, a psalm that goes on to describe pierced hands and feet, divided garments and lots cast for them, and ends in praise among the nations. Two readings have stood side by side. One hears the whole psalm in its first line, so that the cry is a believer’s prayer that ends in vindication; the other hears the line as it was screamed, a real abandonment, and holds that Mark, who records nothing else from the cross, meant it to be heard so. Both are honest. Mark leaves the cry untranslated first, in the language it was said in, so that the bystanders can mishear it as a call to Elijah, and then translates it, so that the reader cannot.
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It is finished
τελέω teléō G5055
from τέλος; to end, i.e. complete, execute, conclude, discharge (a debt):--accomplish, make an end, expire, fill up, finish, go over, pay, perform.
To bring to an end, to complete, to accomplish; and in the papyri, to pay in full, to discharge a debt, where receipts carry the word in the form John uses. Tetelestai: it has been completed, and stays so. John’s Jesus does not die asking a question; he dies announcing that a task is done, and John has built the Gospel toward the word, from "my food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work" in chapter 4 to "I have finished the work you gave me" in the prayer of chapter 17. What was finished, John does not itemize. The Gospel has been the itemization.
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The veil and the centurion
All four record what happened when he died, and three of them record a Roman speaking.
When the centurion, who stood by opposite him, saw that he cried out like this and breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” — Mark 15:39 · WEB
Read the comment on The Cross, and the Torn Veil
When the centurion, who stood by opposite him, saw that he cried out like this and breathed his last, he said, truly this man was the Son of God. Mark has waited his whole Gospel for a human being to say the title from his first line, and the one who says it is the officer in charge of the execution, looking at the body. Matthew’s centurion says the same after an earthquake; Luke’s says, certainly this was a righteous man, which is Luke’s whole reading of the death in a word. The veil of the temple, Mark says, was torn in two from top to bottom, the same verb as the heavens at the Jordan; what was torn open at the beginning is torn open at the end, and the room where God was said to dwell stands open to the court. John has no veil and no centurion. He has a soldier’s spear, blood and water, and a witness who says he saw it so that you may believe (John 19:34-35).
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What the cross asks
It asks to be read four times. Mark asks the reader to stand at the foot of a cross where the only words are a scream from a psalm, and to hear the centurion. Luke asks the reader to watch a man forgive and trust while dying. John asks the reader to see a king finishing what he came for. Matthew asks the reader to feel the earth move. A theory of what the cross accomplished is a later thing, and the Gospels give the materials for several; what they give first is four eyewitness-shaped accounts of one afternoon, and they ask to be believed before they are explained.
Read Mark 15:33-39, Luke 23:39-47 and John 19:25-30. Write down the last thing Jesus says in each, and the first thing someone else says after he dies. Then say in one sentence what each writer wanted you to feel at that moment.
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