WHAT DOES HIS DEATH MEAN?

The death of Christ on the cross is the only event which every day attracts more attention and admiration than any other events in the history of the world. Myriads of eyes cast their glance daily at the cross and profess their faith in the good shepherd who sacrificed his very life for the sheep that they may have life: life in abundance. For a non-believer who reads the life of Christ as a mere history cannot find anything beyond the enmity of the Jews and the fickle character of the Roman Governor behind the death of Jesus. A close reflection on the passion, crucifixion and the death of Jesus indeed unveils a meticulously calculated intent of the religious authorities of the time. They wanted to put an end to his teachings once and for all, as the teachings of Christ were opposed to their religious practices. 

They thought that the crucifixion, a sign of disgrace and curse, would finally be the end of the Galilean. On the road to Calvary, Jesus faced the bitterest moments of his life obediently and embraced death on the cross voluntarily. The last phase of the life of Christ was filled with disgraceful experiences unimaginable to humanity. The apostles who had been with Jesus for three years, the disciples who had been following him attracted by his teachings, people who were fed, cured and forgiven by him, people who had been witnesses to his miracles asked to themselves in despair: why had Jesus, the righteous, to die? He had been their hope and they believed that he would liberate them giving a new life. Their hope in the Messiah was shattered and they were scattered after the crucifixion of their Master. For the religious authorities the death of Jesus in the most disgraceful way was the complete failure of a highly influential religious leader of the time.

In our search to find a theological explanation for the ridiculous and cruel end of Jesus’ life, we will be immediately confronted with the Pauline understanding of the death of Jesus. As a staunch religious leader, he searched for a profound meaning for the brutal destiny of Christ. Death on the cross was the punishment given to the most wretched criminals. Dying outside the city gate signified a death without God. In the case of Jesus, he was crucified outside the city gate. Thus, his death suggested a sinner’s death: a sinner far away from God’s grace. However, Paul sees something more in the Saviour’s death than the roman cruelty, beyond the roman spear and nail. He looks, beyond the Jewish malice, up to the Sacred Fountain form where he drinks and quenches his thirst. For him, the salvivic value of Christ’s death finds expression on the cross.

There is no Christology without cross. St. Paul in his first epistle to the Corinthians expounds that Christ died for our sins. It was in tune with the early Jewish-Christian interpretation of the death of their Messiah that Jesus shared the fate of God’s servant, of whom Isaiah spoke in his four hymns (42:1-4; 49:1-6; 50:4-9; 52:13-53:12). His religious upbringing has played a pivotal role in the formulation of his theological thought regarding the passion and death of Christ. In the Jewish tradition, any pious Jew tried to find an answer from the scripture itself for anything that was beyond the human grasp. With this intellectual and religious backing like any other Jew he too believed that there is a reason for the suffering. Paul developed a theology of redemption centred on the vision of risen Christ on the road to Damascus, which changed Saul into Paul. For him Jesus died to expiate the sins of mankind. Jesus took up the cross on himself willingly in order to open up to all men the road that leads to the Father extending everyone salvation proclaimed by him during his public ministry. The expiatory role of Jesus’ death is a very significant Pauline contribution to the followers of Christ who had lost hope in the promises of Jesus and his role in the salvation of the world.

Further, St. Paul sees on the cross the divinity of Jesus which transcends our fragile human nature. The death of Christ on the cross is the door, which leads the sinful man to the process of divinization. The so-called folly of the cross is the strength of Jesus and not the weakness. The humility of Jesus on the cross, exalted the weakness of the sinful humanity transforming it into a glorified humanity. In other words, Jesus died on the condemned cross to make the weak powerful, to make the sinners holy and to elevate us to the dignity of the children of God. Thus, Jesus on the cross is the most sublime expression of the liberating, merciful and divine love of the Father oriented towards the salvation of the whole mankind.

The Lukan answer to the “why?” of Jesus’ suffering and death is complimentary to the Pauline understanding of the salvific value of the suffering and death of Christ. Luke, in his turn, explains Jesus’ death in a more appealing and acceptable way to a non-Jewish community, who could not grasp the idea of an expiatory death by proxy. For Luke, the death of Jesus is the divine manifestation of the merciful Will of the Father who wishes to save everyone from the clutches of sin and death. Through Jesus, the Father offered a new life to all. It is an offer open to everybody. In this process of extending the prodigal love of the Father to the children living in utter darkness and adversity, in sin and disorder, Jesus comes out victorious despite terrific suffering and disgraceful death on the Cross, defeating all the evil powers and penetrating into the human history giving it a new meaning and hope. From the death of Christ on the Cross, emerged a new life. Out of this reality the new Easter People are born.

To many the Passion of Jesus Christ is a lesson in history where we sympathize with Christ for the sufferings he went through before he died. We find it hard to believe how the people can be so cruel as to inflict the most severe form of pain on a man who we know was innocent.

For Christians the Passion should be more than a lesson in history. It should become a lesson in life, teaching us how to stand up for truth and justice. The Passion we commemorate is based primarily on biblical accounts of the arrest, trial, and crucifixion of Jesus Christ. From these accounts we know Jesus was falsely accused, convicted and sentenced, not by fine or imprisonment, but to death by crucifixion, the severest form of sentence a man can possibly get. As if that was not enough, before he was crucified he was humiliated, severely persecuted, whipped, scourged, crowned with thorns, dragged up a hill carrying a heavy cross, stripped of his clothes and then nailed to the cross, watched by many, like a hardcore criminal.
   
What crime did Jesus commit that deserved to be punished in that most inhumane way? It was for proclaiming the TRUTH. Yes, Jesus was tortured, humiliated and killed not for lying, corruption, rape or murder but for telling the truth, the truth which caused so much fear among those in positions of power and comfort. He was a threat to their social security and had to be eliminated at costs. Throughout the journey of his passion, what was astonishing was the way Jesus humbly accepted his punishment which he knew was unfair and unjust. However he accepted all that willingly without fighting back or defending himself. He did not show even the slightest anger or retaliation for being victimized, falsely accused and sentenced by the kangaroo court that tried him. He did not get angry with those who accused him, Pilate who sentenced him and the Roman soldiers who executed him. Instead he had the great magnanimity to forgive all of them who took turns to insult torture and kill him. It was the highest level of humility that no ordinary man can have.

This was in keeping with what was written "He was oppressed, yet when he was afflicted he didn't open his mouth; as a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and as a sheep that before its shearers is mute, so he didn't open his mouth".( Isaiah 53:7). Jesus taught us to love our enemies and to offer the other cheek when struck on one. He demonstrated that he really meant what he said by accepting his Passion so willingly. We call ourselves Christians, the followers of Christ, but how Christ-like are we in accepting humiliation and pain for speaking the truth? How Christ-like are we when we are accused of offences we did not commit? Are we humble enough not to strike back? Do we forgive those who accuse us? What lesson does the Passion of Christ provide us in our own lives? We too in own small ways are often falsely accused, humiliated and punished for standing up for truth, by the authorities in the government, our places of work, families and even in the church. When we are denied our rights we fight back fiercely, sometimes with vengeance.

We organize protests, demonstrations, hurl verbal abuses ...we may even resort to violence and wars.  Many of us behave like those who made false accusations against Jesus and wanted to get rid of him. We too make false accusations against those who are against us in order to get them out of our way. We resort to all forms of tactics to succeed. We fail to realize that our efforts cause pain and suffering to the person involved and sometimes to his or her family. There may be others among us, especially those in positions of power, who behave like Pilate, refusing to stand up to public pressure for fear of losing our power. Due to our greed, we succumb to the wrongful demands of the public and wash our hands of the problems of those in need or those who stand for truth.   

Like the Roman soldiers who crucified Jesus, there are many among us, who carry out the "execution" of others without empathy or compassion. Even if we know it is wrong, we carry it out anyway for fear of the authorities or some material reward. As we make the final Way of the Cross and read the Passion of Christ this Good Friday, let us reflect on its relevance in our own lives, of Jesus’ actions during his agonizing times. Let his Passion not be just a lesson in history to commemorate Christ’s suffering at the hands of his own people. His Passion is not only something to sympathize or be sorrowful about but a real lesson for us as we encounter the many challenges in our own lives. Christ’s humility and forgiveness even towards his adversaries is infinite. That is an invitation to us. That kind of love is not just what Christianity is meant to be what humanity is about. The Cross is a sign of love, freedom and hope not sorrow and despair as we often make it to be. Let us pick it up on this Good Friday with the One who transforms it into an instrument of transformation and infinite love.

compiled from catholic online.com