Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Luke 23:44
And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour.
44-49. Darkness. The Veil of the Temple rent. The End. Remorse of the Spectators.
44. it was about the sixth hour ] i.e. mid-day. This seems at first sight to contradict Joh 19:14, but there is fair ground to conjecture that ‘sixth’ was an early misreading for ‘third’ (written ). For other proposed solutions of the discrepancy see Life of Christ, ii. 385. The solution which asserts that St John used a different way of reckoning time is very precarious. St Luke omits the presence of the Virgin and the two other Marys and Salome at the Cross, and the words “Woman, behold thy son,” “Behold thy mother.” During the three hours’ darkness no incident is recorded, but we trace a deepening sense of remorse and horror in the crowd. The fact that the sun was thus “turned into darkness” was, at last, that ‘sign from heaven’ for which the Pharisees had mockingly asked.
over all the earth ] Rather, over all the land. There is no reason to believe that the darkness was over all the world. The Fathers (Origen, 100: Cels. ii. 33, 59, and Jerome, Chron.) indeed appeal to two heathen historians Phlegon and Thallus for a confirmation of it, but the testimony is too vague to be relied on, either as to time or circumstance. They both speak of an eclipse.
See the notes at Mat 27:45-50. Luk 23:44-45
There was a darkness over all the earth
The three hours darkness
What a call must that mid-day midnight have been to the careless sons of men! They knew not that the Son of God was among them; nor that He was working out human redemption.
The grandest hour in all history seemed likely to pass by unheeded, when, suddenly, night hastened from her chambers and usurped the day. Every one asked his fellow, What means this darkness? Business stood still: the plough stayed in mid-furrow, and the axe paused uplifted. It was the middle of the day, when men are busiest; but they made a general pause. Around the great death-bed an appropriate quiet was secured. I doubt not that a shuddering awe came over the masses of the people, and the thoughtful foresaw terrible things. Those who had stood about the cross, and had dared to insult the majesty of Jesus, were paralyzed with fear.
1. It may seem a trite observation that this darkness was altogether out of the natural course of things. Since the world began was it not heard that at high noon there should be darkness over all the land. It was out of the order of nature altogether. Some deny miracles; and if they also deny God, I will not at this time deal with them. He may make certain rules for His actions, and it may be His wisdom to keep to them; but surely He must reserve to Himself the liberty to depart from His own laws, or else He has in a measure laid aside his personal Godhead, deified law, and set it up above Himself.
2. Further, this miracle was not only out of the order of nature, but it is one which would have been pronounced impossible. It is not possible that there should be an eclipse of the sun at the time of the full moon. The moon at the time when she is in her full is not in a position in which she could possibly cast her shadow upon the earth. The Passover was at the time of the full moon, and therefore it was not possible that the sun should then undergo an eclipse. This darkening of the sun was not strictly an astronomical eclipse; the darkness was doubtless produced in some other way: yet to those who were present it did seem to be a total eclipse of the sun–a thing impossible.
3. Concerning this miracle, I have also further to remark that this darkening of the sun surpassed all ordinary and natural eclipses. It lasted longer than an ordinary eclipse, and it came in a different manner. According to Luke, the darkness all over the land came first, and the sun was darkened afterwards: the darkness did not begin with the sun, but mastered the sun. It was unique and supernatural.
4. Again, this darkness appears to have been most natural and fitting. Like the earthquake and the rending of the veil of the temple, it seems a proper attendant of the Lords passion.
1. What I see in that veil is, first of all, that it was a concealment for those guilty enemies. Did you ever think of that? It is as if God Himself said, I cannot bear it. I will not see this infamy! Descend, O veil! Down fell the heavy shades.
2. But further, that darkness was a sacred concealment for the blessed Person of our Divine Lord. So to speak, the angels found for their King a pavilion of thick clouds, in the which His Majesty might be sheltered in its hour of misery. It was too much for wicked eyes to gaze so rudely on that immaculate Person.
3. This darkness also warns us, even us who are most reverent. This darkness tells us all that the Passion is a great mystery, into which we cannot pry. God veiled the cross in darkness, and in darkness much of its deeper meaning lies; not because God would not reveal it, but because we have not capacity enough to discern it all.
4. Once again, this veil of darkness also pictures to me the way in which the powers of darkness will always endeavour to conceal the cross of Christ. We fight with darkness when we try to preach the cross.
1. The darkness is the symbol of the wrath of God which fell on those who slew His only begotten Son. God was angry, and His frown removed the light of day.
2. The symbol also tells us what our Lord Jesus Christ endured. The darkness outside of Him was the figure of the darkness that was within Him. In Gethsemane a thick darkness fell upon our Lords Spirit. His day was the light of His Fathers face: that face was hidden and a terrible night gathered around Him.
3. Again, I think I see in that darkness also what it was that Jesus was battling with; for we must never forget that the cross was a battle-field to Him, wherein He triumphed gloriously. He was fighting then with darkness; with the powers of darkness of which Satan is the head; with the darkness of human ignorance, depravity and falsehood.
1. The first sympathetic fact I see is this: all lights are dim when Christ shines not.
2. Next, see the dependence of all creation upon Christ, as evidenced by its darkness when He withdraws. It was not meet that He who made all worlds should die, and yet all worlds should go on just as they had done. If He suffers eclipse, they must suffer eclipse too; if the Sun of Righteousness be made to set in blood, the natural sun must keep touch with Him. There is no light for any man except in Christ; and till you believe in Him thick darkness shall blind you, and you shall stumble in it and perish.
3. Another practical lesson is this: If we are in the dark at this time, if our spirits are sunk in gloom, let us not despair, for the Lord Christ Himself was there. (C. H. Spurgeon)
The veiled cross
1. It indicated the going out of the worlds Light.
2. It represented the ignorance of the Gentiles, and the malignity of the Jews.
3. It reminds us of the mystery of the Atonement.
1. It increased the solemnity of the event.
2. It veiled His agony from those who were around.
3. It whispered warning to the impenitent. (A. Rowland, LL. B.)
Verse 44. Darkness over all the earth] See Clarke on Mt 27:45. The darkness began at the sixth hour, about our twelve o’clock at noon, and lasted till the ninth hour, which answered to our three o’clock in the afternoon. And it was about the sixth hour,…. Or twelve o’clock at noon; and so the Ethiopic version, when it was noon;
[See comments on Mt 27:45].
The Crucifixion. 44 And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. 45 And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. 46 And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost. 47 Now when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous man. 48 And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts, and returned. 49 And all his acquaintance, and the women that followed him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things. In these verses we have three things:– I. Christ’s dying magnified by the prodigies that attended it: only two are here mentioned, which we had an account of before. 1. The darkening of the sun at noon-day. It was now about the sixth hour, that is, according to our computation, twelve o’clock at noon; and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. The sun was eclipsed and the air exceedingly clouded at the same time, both which concurred to this thick darkness, which continued three hours, not three days, as that of Egypt did. 2. The rending of the veil of the temple. The former prodigy was in the heavens, this in the temple; for both these are the houses of God, and, when the Son of God was thus abused, they could not but feel the indignity, and thus signify their resentment of it. By this rending of the veil was signified the taking away of the ceremonial law, which was a wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles, and of all other difficulties and discouragements in our approaches to God, so that now we may come boldly to the throne of grace. II. Christ’s dying explained (v. 46) by the words with which he breathed out his soul. Jesus had cried with a loud voice when he said, Why hast thou forsaken me? So we are told in Matthew and Mark, and, it should seem, it was with a loud voice that he said this too, to show his earnestness, and that all the people might take notice of it: and this he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. 1. He borrowed these words from his father David (Ps. xxxi. 5); not that he needed to have words put into his mouth, but he chose to make use of David’s words to show that it was the Spirit of Christ that testified in the Old-Testament prophets, and that he came to fulfil the scripture. Christ died with scripture in his mouth. Thus he directs us to make use of scripture language in our addresses to God. 2. In this address to God he calls him Father. When he complained of being forsaken, he cried, Eli, Eli, My God, my God; but, to show that dreadful agony of his soul was now over, he here calls God Father. When he was giving up his life and soul for us, he did for us call God Father, that we through him might receive the adoption of sons. 3. Christ made use of these words in a sense peculiar to himself as Mediator. He was now to make his soul an offering for our sin (Isa. liii. 10), to give his life a ransom for many (Matt. xx. 28), by the eternal Spirit to offer himself, Heb. ix. 14. He was himself both the priest and the sacrifice; our souls were forfeited, and his must go to redeem the forfeiture. The price must be paid into the hands of God, the party offended by sin; to him he had undertaken to make full satisfaction. Now by these words he offered up the sacrifice, did, as it were, lay his hand upon the head of it, and surrender it; tithemi–“I deposit it, I pay it down into thy hands. Father, accept of my life and soul instead of the lives and souls of the sinners I die for.” The animus offerentis–the good will of the offerer, was requisite to the acceptance of the offering. Now Christ here expresses his cheerful willingness to offer himself, as he had done when it was first proposed to him (Heb 10:9; Heb 10:10), Lo, I come to do thy will, by which will we are sanctified. 4. Christ hereby signifies his dependence upon his Father for his resurrection, by the re-union of his soul and body. He commends his spirit into his Father’s hand, to be received into paradise, and returned the third day. By this it appears that our Lord Jesus, as he had a true body, so he had a reasonable soul, which existed in a state of separation from the body, and thus he was made like unto his brethren; this soul he lodged in his Father’s hand, committed it to his custody, resting in hope that it should not be left in hades, in its state of separation from the body, no, not so long as that the body might see corruption. 5. Christ has hereby left us an example, has fitted those words of David to the purpose of dying saints, and hath, as it were, sanctified them for their use. In death our great care should be about our souls, and we cannot more effectually provide for their welfare than by committing them now into the hands of God, as a Father, to be sanctified and governed by his Spirit and grace, and at death committing them into his hands to be made perfect in holiness and happiness. We must show that we are freely willing to die, that we firmly believe in another life after this, and are desirous of it, by saying, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. III. Christ’s dying improved by the impressions it made upon those that attended him. 1. The centurion that had command of the guard was much affected with what he saw, v. 47. He was a Roman, a Gentile, a stranger to the consolations of Israel; and yet he glorified God. He never saw such amazing instances of divine power, and therefore took occasion thence to adore God as the Almighty. And he bore a testimony to the patient sufferer: “Certainly this was a righteous man, and was unjustly put to death.” God’s manifesting his power so much to do him honour was a plain evidence of his innocency. His testimony in Matthew and Mark goes further: Truly this was the Son of God. But in his case this amounts to the same; for, if he was a righteous man, he said very truly when he said that he was the Son of God; and therefore that testimony of his concerning himself must be admitted, for, if it were false, he was not a righteous man. 2. The disinterested spectators could not but be concerned. This is taken notice of only here, v. 48. All the people that came together to that sight, as is usual upon such occasions, beholding the things which were done, could not but go away very serious for the time, whatever they were when they came home: They smote their breasts, and returned. (1.) They laid the thing very much to heart for the present. They looked upon it as a wicked thing to put him to death, and could not but think that some judgment of God would come upon their nation for it. Probably these very people were of those that had cried, Crucify him, crucify him, and, when he was nailed to the cross, reviled and blasphemed him; but now they were so terrified with the darkness and the earthquake, and the uncommon manner of his expiring, that they had not only their mouths stopped, but their consciences startled, and in remorse for what they had done, as the publican, they smote upon their breasts, beat upon their own hearts, as those that had indignation at themselves. Some think that this was a happy step towards that good work which was afterwards wrought upon them, when they were pricked to the heart, Acts ii. 37. (2.) Yet, it should seem, the impression soon wore off: They smote their breasts, and returned. They did not show any further token of respect to Christ, nor enquire more concerning him, but went home; and we have reason to fear that in a little time they quite forgot it. Thus many that see Christ evidently set forth crucified among them in the word and sacraments are a little affected for the present, but it does not continue; they smite their breasts, and return. They see Christ’s face in the glass of the ordinances and admire him; but they go away, and straightway forget what manner of man he is, and what reason they have to love him. 3. His own friends and followers were obliged to keep their distance, and yet got as near as they could and durst, to see what was done (v. 49): All his acquaintance, that knew him and were known of him, stood afar off, for fear lest if they had been near him they should have been taken up as favourers of him; this was part of his sufferings, as of Job’s (Job xix. 13): He hath put my brethren far from me, and mine acquaintance are verily estranged from me. See Ps. lxxxviii. 18. And the women that followed him together from Galilee were beholding these things, not knowing what to make of them, nor so ready as they should have been to take them for certain preludes of his resurrection. Now was Christ set for a sign that should be spoken against, as Simeon foretold, that the thoughts of many hearts might be revealed,Luk 2:34; Luk 2:35. Sixth hour. Midday. Ninth hour. See on Mt 27:46.
1) “And it was about the sixth hour,” (kai en ede hosei hora hekte) “And it was now (at this time) about (the) sixth hour,” of the daylight time, or high noon, midday.
2) “And there was a darkness,” (kai akotos egeneto) “And there came to be,” Divinely sent, not an eclipse of the moon, for it was the Passover week which came on full moon, Mat 27:45; Mar 15:33.
3) “Over all the earth until the ninth hour.” (eph’ holen ten gen heos horas enates) “Over all the land until (a) ninth hour,” about 3 p.m.; Mat 27:45; Mar 15:33; According to Hebrew usage this frequently meant all the land, especially of Judea and Palestine.
(44-46) And it was about the sixth hour.See Notes on Mat. 27:45-50; Mar. 15:33-37. We can only conjecturally account for the omission of the ELI, ELI, LAMA SABACHTHANI, so prominent in the other two reports; but it is at least conceivable, assuming the same sources of information as before, that the women who stood by the cross may have shrunk from repeating words so terrible, and have loved to dwell rather on those which seemed to them to speak, not of abandonment, but of an absolute and unshaken trust. It is remarkable that this, like the cry of apparent despair, is a quotation from the Psalms (Psa. 31:6).
44. Darkness over all the earth Over all the land, as it is translated in Matthew. Not the globe, (for it was night at the antipodes,) nor perhaps was even all Palestine covered, but the vicinity and adjacent country. Nor was it an eclipse, since the Passover was at full moon. As the darkness was not universal but local, so it was not astronomical but atmospheric.
Modern learning has rejected the quotations from old authors, such as Phlegon and Thallus, to prove the universality of the obscuration.
‘And it was now about the sixth hour, and a darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, the sun’s light failing.’
How remarkable it is that these three last hours of Jesus’ final agony are passed over in total silence in all the Gospels. Was there nothing that could have been said? It is as though they recognise that no one on earth could comment on these moments so that every comment had to be left to God. A veil of darkness is drawn over His last hours. But all make clear that God did comment. ‘A darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, the sun’s light failing.’ (No eclipse could take place at the time of the full moon, but it may well have been caused by a sirocco wind sweeping the sand in from the desert, or by the arrival of unusual cloud formations, or even by some phenomenon in space. Unusual darkenings of the sun have been witnessed to in the past). That was God’s comment, and all the evangelists clearly felt that they could not add to it, except to express His final words. Such thoughts were rather left to the hymnwriters to express. ‘But none of the ransomed ever knew, how deep were the waters crossed, or how dark was the night which the Lord passed through, e’er He found the sheep that was lost.’
And no wonder that they could not understand, for as another hymnwriter declares, ‘Tis mystery all, the immortal dies, who can explore His strange design? In vain the firstborn seraph tries, to sound the depths of grace divine. Tis mystery all, immense and free, but, O my God, it found out me.’
‘A darkness came over the whole land — the sun’s light failing.’ The significance of such an experience is described in Jer 15:9, ‘her sun went down while it was yet day’. And what did it indicate? It indicated that anguish and terror had fallen on her. It indicated that she was shamed and disgraced. And so did Jesus enter into the terror and anguish of sin and death, and bear shame and disgrace for us. ‘He Who knew no sin, was made sin for us (2Co 5:21).’ The significance of darkness is made clear in Luke in three ways:
The One Who was coming, was said to be coming to those who sat in darkness and the shadow of death (Luk 1:79), to those sat in helplessness and hopelessness, and here therefore He may be seen as entering into that darkness and death on their behalf so that He might deliver them from that helplessness and hopelessness that gripped them.
To be in darkness was the result of being out of the light (Luk 11:34-35), and thus we may see here that Jesus had for a while chosen to forfeit the light of God and had willingly taken on Himself the darkness that resulted, with the result that for a while the light of God had ceased to shine into His heart. This so that He might not only be reckoned among the transgressors, but might take our experience on Himself, in order to save us from it.
Those who came to arrest Him had been said to be operating in ‘the power of darkness’ (Luk 22:53). Thus here we may see Jesus as experiencing that ‘power of darkness’ in Himself. Compare how in Act 26:18 being turned from darkness to light parallels being turned from the power of Satan to God. But here the opposite was the case. Jesus was being turned from light to darkness in order that He might face up to Satan and deliver ‘many’ from his darkness, and bring them to the light.
So this was a darkness that indicated a state of death and hopelessness. It was a darkness that indicated that He was for a while forsaken by the light of God for our sakes. It was a darkness that indicated His being brought into the sphere of the tyranny of Satan, from which in the end He would emerge victorious having triumphed over him in the cross (Col 2:15). It is the darkness that is in mind in Isa 53:11 LXX (and in the same verse in a Hebrew text at Qumran which otherwise on the whole parallels MT) where it is said, ‘from the travail of His soul He will see light and will be satisfied’. And that was what He was undergoing, for us. He was enduring the travail and darkness of sin, and death, and Satan, in order that He might achieve light for all Who are His. No wonder it drew from Him that terrible cry, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken Me?’ He was forsaken that we might never be forsaken.
‘The sun’s light failing.’ In Luk 21:25 the sign in the sun was to be the indication of terrible judgments coming on the world. Here then were those same terrible judgments being met on Jesus Christ. It was an indication that He was suffering in Himself the eschatological judgments of the world. All mankind’s sin and suffering, past, present and future, was meeting on Him. It would be foolish of us to seek to add more. The expression of such things can only be left to God.
The Final Hours (23:44-49).
It was now half way through the day, and for Jesus the worst was yet to come. For now He entered into such an experience as was to tear at His very soul. But Luke passes it over in silence and we have to go to Matthew and Mark to learn briefly and dimly of what He experienced (Mar 15:34), although even then it is only revealed by a cry. All are dumb in the face of something that none can understand.
Indeed we should note how the Gospels limit their descriptions so as to remove all excessive emotion. They describe what happened almost matter-of-factedly. For their concentration is not on His sufferings, but on the fact that He was there in the purposes of God, and was fulfilling the will of God, so that every step was in accordance with the Scriptures . He was not seen as a martyr. He was seen as God acting in the world in a way which no one could fully understand, in a way partly explained by what He had done at the Last Supper, once it was more full understood. It was summed up in the words linking Him with the Servant of the Lord Who had died for the sins of His people, ‘He was reckoned with the transgressors’ (Luk 22:37; Mar 15:28; Isa 53:12).
Analysis.
a b And Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into Your hands I commend My spirit” (Luk 23:46 a).
c And having said this, He yielded up the spirit’ (Luk 23:46).
b And when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, “Certainly this was a righteous man” (Luk 23:47).
a And all the crowds who came together to this sight, when they beheld the things that were done, returned smiting their breasts, and all his acquaintance, and the women who followed with Him from Galilee, stood afar off, seeing these things (Luk 23:48-49).
Note that in ‘a’ darkness came on the earth and the veil of the Temple was rent , and in the parallel the crowds were in darkness of soul and beat their breasts. The reference to Galilee might suggest that Luke had in mind ‘the people (of Galilee) that sat in darkness’ (who will see a great light) (Isa 9:2). In ‘b’ Jesus commends His spirit into His Father’s hands, and in the parallel the centurion declares Him to be a righteous man. And centrally in ‘c’ Jesus yields up His spirit.
The death of Jesus:
v. 44. And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour.
v. 45. And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the Temple was rent in the midst.
v. 46. And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, He said, Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit; and having said thus, He gave up the ghost.
v. 47. Now when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous Man.
v. 48. And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts and returned.
v. 49. And all His acquaintance, and the women that followed Him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things.
It was the sixth hour according to Jewish, high noon according to modern reckoning, when the miracle here narrated came to pass. See Mat 27:45-56; Mar 15:33-41. Suddenly, not only in Judea, but over the whole earth that was just then enjoying the blessing of sunlight, an abnormal, inexplicable darkness fell, one that was mentioned even by heathen writers. The sun simply failed the people of the world; his light was shut off. All nature was mourning at the climax of the suffering of Jesus. This darkness was a picture of the greater, deeper darkness that had fallen into the soul of the Redeemer. He was literally forsaken by God, given over into the power of the spirits of darkness, to suffer the indescribable agonies of hell. Christ, in these three hours, had to bear and feel the full strength, the full terror of the divine wrath over the sins of the world. He was in prison and judgment, He poured out His soul in death, He endured the agonies of hell. What an incomprehensible humiliation! The eternal Son of God in the depths of eternal death! But this also was for our salvation, in order that we might be delivered from the pain of death and hell. For delivered we are, since Jesus in the midst of the agony of hell clung to His heavenly Father and conquered wrath, hell, and damnation. But when these terrible hours were over, the victory was gained. Not as one that was expiring in weakness, but as one that proclaimed Himself the Conqueror over all the foes of mankind, Jesus committed His soul into the hands of His heavenly Father. Thus He fulfilled the great work of atonement for the sins of the whole world, thus He died for us. It was a true death. The band which united soul and body was severed. But His death was His own voluntary deed. In His own power He laid down His life, Joh 10:18. He sacrificed Himself unto God. In dying, He, as the Stronger, vanquished death and took it captive forever. Christ loved us and gave Himself for us, He was delivered for our offenses, Eph 5:2; Rom 4:25. By His death He destroyed him that had the power of death, the devil, and delivered us from death and the devil, Heb 2:14-15.
But no sooner had He closed His eyes in death than all nature seemed to rise in a sudden uproar to avenge this crime committed upon the person of the Holy One of God. The wonderful veil, or curtain, which hung before the Most Holy Place in the Temple was torn down through the midst, and other great signs and wonders occurred which filled the people with dread. The centurion, the captain of the guard at the cross, was moved to give glory to God; he was convinced that Jesus was truly the Son of God, righteous in the absolute sense. And likewise all those that had come together near the place of the crucifixion and had remained to see this climax of the work of Christ, beat upon their breasts and turned to go back home, moved in a way which they could hardly explain to themselves. God had spoken, and men were filled with dread. The acquaintances of Jesus also stood at some distance, among them the women whom Luke had mentioned in a commending tone before, Luk 8:2-3. They saw everything that happened, and their hearts may well have been strengthened at such an exhibition of divine power. They remained even after the death of their Master and after all these great signs had come to pass; it was hard for them to leave the beloved body of their Lord.
Luk 23:44. Over all the earth Over all the land. See Mat 27:45 and Mar 15:33.
Luk 23:44-46 . See on Mat 27:45 ; Mat 27:50 f.; Mar 15:33 ; Mar 15:37 f. According to Luke, the connection of events was as follows: It was already about the sixth hour, when there is darkness over the whole earth till the ninth hour (yet the sun is still visible), then the sun also vanishes in darkness the veil is rent
Jesus utters His last cry, and dies.
] as Luk 19:43 ; Mar 15:25 .
] my spirit , comprehending the whole spiritual nature, contrasted with the dying body; Act 7:59 . Comp. in general, Hahn, Theol. d. N. T. I. p. 410.
Luk 23:46 . . . .] from Psa 31:6 , which words Jesus makes His own, committing His spirit wholly to the disposal of God; and this perfect surrender to God, whose control extends even to Hades (Luk 16:22 ; Wis 3:1 ; Act 2:27 ), is not out of keeping with Luk 23:43 .
This prayer is to be placed after the of Joh 19:30 , and corresponds to the of John. Probably, however, the idea was only by the more accurately explaining tradition moulded into the definite words , as Luke has them.
B. The End of the Conflict. Luk 23:44-56
1. The Repose of Death (Luk 23:44-46)
(Parallel with Mat 27:45-50; Mar 15:33-37; Joh 19:28-30.)
44And it was [now19] about the sixth hour, and there was [came, ] a darknessover all the earth [land] until the ninth hour. 45And the sun was darkened, and thevail of the temple was rent in the midst. 46And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend [commit] nay spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost [expired, ].
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Synoptical Remarks.The more the history of the Passion hastens towards its end, the more evidently does it appear that Luke sums up his narrative in few words. The commendation of Mary to John, the lamentation of our Lord upon the cross, the last refreshment of the Dying One, he passes over. On the other hand, he gives account of the rending of the veil in the temple immediately before our Saviours death, although from Matthew it appears that this took place simultaneously, or, indeed, even a moment later. In view of the rapid succession of events, it is, however, almost impossible to speak here of former and latter. We also owe to Luke alone the communication of the last, the seventh word on the cross, and the statement of the miracles during the dying of our Lord. He attaches himself, although he is very brief, more to Mark than to Matthew, and while he, like the other Synoptics, passes over in silence the breaking of the legs of the robbers and the piercing of our Saviours side, he coincides again, in the rather detailed description of His burial, with the other Evangelists.
Luk 23:44. A darkness.Respecting the cause, the character, and the historical certainty of this darkness, comp. Lange on Mat 27:46. Entirely without ground do the Jews, in the Gospel of Nicodemus, tell Pilate (Luke 11) that an ordinary eclipse took place. See Thilo, p. 592. The well-known testimony of Phlegon, to be sure, we also should not venture to use to prove therewith the credibility of this Evangelical account, since he speaks rather of a natural, although more than ordinarily deep darkening of the sun, as to which, moreover, it is still doubtful in which year of the 202d Olympiad it took place. Yet whoever holds our Lord for Him for whom He declared Himself, will, in this mourning of nature at the death of Jesus, be as far from finding anything incredible as anything insignificant. Unquestionably, there are mythical accounts of similar natural manifestations even at the death of Romulus, of Csar, and others; but what in the sphere of profane history is invention, may none the less in the sacred history be true. And if, in certain Rabbinical writings, the death of famous men is compared to the darkening of the mid-day sun, these expressions are, at all events, later than our Evangelical narratives, and may indeed, moreover, have very well originated from the analogy of the here-related fact. In a word, the idea so strikingly expressed in the familiar
Sol tibi signa dabit, solem quis dicere falsum audeat, &c.
has become reality. As respects, particularly, the account of Luke itself, it might, on a literal interpretation, seem as if he meant that the sun until the ninth hour, although there was already a deep darkness, yet had remained all the time visible, but that then, in the moment of Jesus death, the sun itself also became invisible. But, even supposing that the genuineness of the words . were above all doubt (De Wette disputes this, and Griesbach is also for omitting them), there would yet be no essential difficulty in connecting the thought thus, that (Luk 23:45) with the proper cause of … is stated. It often occurs that two phenomena are cordinated or arranged together, of which the second constitutes the natural ground of the first. Precisely the same interpretation appears, moreover, to lie at the basis of the reading which appears in B., C., L., cursives, Origen [Cod. Sin. has C. C. S.], . The participial clause indicates a causal connection, and on internal grounds it is not probable that Luke meant to give an account of a great darkness, during which the sun for three hours yet remained continually visible.
Luk 23:45. And the veil of the temple.Attempts have been made to explain these phenomena also naturally, as a mere result of the earthquake, of which Luke has given no particular account. But can we represent to ourselves an earthquake by whichnot from below up but from above downa curtain should be rent which was one finger thick, thirty ells long, woven of purple and scarlet, and, according to the testimony of Jewish scholars, renewed from time to time? How could anything of the kind take place without other buildings in the capital, and especially the temple, having suffered serious harm, and, indeed, without their having been converted by the convulsion into a heap of ruins? Quite as arbitrary is the conjecture that the curtain was old and worn out (Kuinoel), as well as the assumption that it was, perhaps, too tensely stretched and too tightly fastened both at the bottom and on the two sides (Paulus). Even in the last case, a rending through an earthquake would have been impossible without a simultaneous rending of the walls or roof of the temple. As to the rest, Luke is entirely silent as to the sleeping saints whose resurrection Matthew relates; but that John passes over all these miracles appears to be best explained from the character of his whole gospel, which has less reference to the outer revelation of the glory of the Logos than to the spiritual character of His whole manifestation and activity. Of Lukes account the same holds good, although in a lesser measure, which Lange has remarked in respect to that of Matthew: The Evangelist has gathered the reminiscences of these traits, and comprehended them in words which, in effect, have the resonance of a hymn, without thereby losing their historical character, for here the history itself took on the character of a hymn.
Luk 23:46. Father, into Thy hands.It is involved in the nature of the case that this utterance must be placed after the of John, since he also states the substance of it with a . According to Matthew and Mark also, the dying Christ cries out with a loud voice, but what He exclaims Luke alone relates to us. Here, too, we hear from His lips an utterance from the Psalms, Psa 31:5. (The reading of Tischendorf, , deserves the preference above the Recepta, , which appears to be borrowed from the Septuagint, Psa 31:5.) is to be understood here not in the weak sense of commend, but in its proper sense of commit, tradere. Into the Fathers mighty hand our Lord now commits, as a precious deposit, the spirit which is ready to depart from the body, and departs, therefore, with composure and hope, to the condition of separation (Paradise, Luk 23:43), preceding the Penitent Thief and all his fellow-redeemed.
Expired, .So also Mark, stronger still Matthew, , emisit spiritum. Even then, when He, according to the nature of the case, finds Himself in deepest dependence, He yet exhibits and uses His true freedom (Joh 10:18), and does what now is commanded by the course of nature so entirely with free choice, that the dying becomes not only His present lot, but also the supreme act of love and obedience.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. Comp. Lange on the parallels, and, respecting the significance and the purpose of the death of our Lord itself, Christian Dogmatics.
2. The last word of our Lord on the cross impresses on all the rest, as also on His whole life, the seal. With composed, clear spirit, He proceeds, the immaculately Pure, into eternity. With childlike trust He gives His spirit into the Fathers guardian hand; with joyful hope He looks towards the rest and joy of death. Only after He, in the sixth word on the cross, has rendered account of His completed work, does He give us, finally, in addition, knowledge of His personal expectation. A word of Scripture is the torch which lights Him down into the valley of the shadow of death; He dies with the Scriptures on His lips, in which He has ever lived. Therefore, also, it is not necessary to ascribe to the 31st Psalm a direct Messianic signification; our Lord simply takes a word of Scripture on His lips as an expression of His own inward state, while He, doubtless not casually, passes over in silence that which the poet immediately adds: Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth. What 3. The darkening of the sun in the moment of the dying of Jesus, points us to a deep hidden connection between the realm of nature and that of grace, which has yet been but little investigated by theologians. Not only as sorrowing, as it were, with her greatest Son (Hase), does nature veil herself in a mourning garment, but where the Incarnate Lord, through Whom all things were made, grows pale in death, there does convulsed nature depose concerning His greatness an unequivocal testimony. And as respects the rending of the curtain, the Epistle to the Hebrews (Luk 9:8) refers us clearly enough to the symbolical significance of this fact. Apparently their terror at the occurrence occasions the first involuntary information on the side of the Jews, since otherwise they would have been glad to keep it hidden. Various Jewish traditions respecting the miracles which at this very time, about forty years before the destruction of Jerusalem, came to pass in the sanctuary, we find collected in Sepp, l.c. iii., p. 586; they permit the faint traces of the truth of a fact to be recognized, whose actual occurrence stands more exactly detailed in the gospels. As respects, finally, the objection that in the Holy Scriptures, besides here, there exist no further actual allusions to the miracles here mentioned at the death of our Lord, we can in part very well acknowledge this without deriving therefrom any unfavorable inference in reference to the Evangelical narratives, but must also refer to Revelation 11, where it speaks of the wakening of the two witnesses, a revelation connected therewith, the opening of the heavenly temple (= the rending of the veil), and other miracles, which involuntarily remind us of what is here related.
4. The dying of Stephen, Huss, Luther, and others, even in their last words, an echo of the last words of our Lord. HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
When even the creation is stirred, be not thou slumbering, O my heart.Light and darkness in the dying hour of our Lord united upon Calvary: 1. Gloomy night in nature, and therein the light of Providence; 2. gloomy night of suffering, and therein the light of Jesus greatness; 3. gloomy night of death, and therein the light of a living hope.The rent veil; of what it gives testimony: 1. That, a. a new economy is begun, b. a perfect atonement effected, c. a blessed fellowship founded; 2. to what it incites: a. to believing beholding, b. to courageous approach (Heb 10:19), c. to holy self-surrender.Jesus death: 1. The lowest depth of His humiliation: 2. the beginning of His exaltation.Let us go with Him, that we may die with Him, Joh 11:16.A pilgrimage to Calvary on the mortal day of our Lord: 1. What seest thou there? 2. what feelest thou there? 3. what confessest thou there? 4. what promisest thou there?The ninth hour; the high significance of this moment: 1. For our Lord; 2. for His friends and foes; 3. for the world; 4. for the Father.Ye do show forth the Lords death, 1Co 11:20.Calvary a school for Christian life, suffering, and dying.Christ has: 1. Died; 2. died for us; 3. died for us that we also might die with Him.
Starke:Darkness is finally punished with darkness; consider this, ye children of darkness.Since Christ has died, we need no expiatory sacrifice more.Christ from the deepest abandonment passing over into the highest composure.No longer in the hands of His enemies, but in those of the Father.The saint prays not only in the beginning and the continuance, but also at the end of his suffering.Canstein:Jesus dies, like a true corn of wheat, to bring forth much fruit, Joh 12:24.Die willingly where God wills, for Jesus died not in a sumptuous canopied bed, but poor and naked on the cross.Brentius:The souls of the righteous are in Gods hands, and no torment touches them. What would we more?Heubner:As Jesus did all that He did for us, so also for us was this prayer; He has committed our souls also with His own to the Father.Steinmeyer:The last word on the cross proclaims: 1. The glory of a blessed death; 2. the glory of the dying Son of God; 3. the glory of His high-priestly sacrificial death.Draseke:The death of Jesus as culmination and completion of His life. He shows: 1. A supreme composure of soul; 2. supreme love to man; 3. supreme Mediatorial power; 4. supreme Filial glory.Tholuck:How the Lord dies: 1. With inner freedom; 2. with clear consciousness; 3. with perfect trust.Arndt:Luk 23:46 as cap-stone of the last words. Taken together: 1. The first two, words of compassion; 2. the two following, words of comfort for those outwardly and inwardly forsaken; 3. the last three, words of strengthening for those wrestling with death.Krummacher:Father, into Thy hands. The How and Why of the death of Jesus.Harms:The word for you to be weighed: 1. The faith which the word demands; 2. the repentance which it effects; 3. the consolation which it brings with it.Schmidt:How holy and awful the dying of the Saviour is.Van der Palm:1. Jesus death the fulfilment of all Gods promises; 2. Jesus death the main substance of the Apostolic preaching; 3. Jesus death the completion of His teaching and the crown of His life; 4. Jesus death our life.
[19]Luk 23:44. may here be confidently received into the text. [Found in B., C.1, L. Cod. Sin. omits it. Tregelles brackets it. Lachmann, Tischendorf, Meyer, Alford adopt it. Has dropped out of the MSS. from its resemblance to the preceding which is found in nearly all the MSS. that omit , instead of or , which those have that read C. C. S.]
“And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. (45) And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. (46) And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost. (47) Now when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous man. (48) And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts, and returned. (49) And all his acquaintance, and the women that followed him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things.”
I have no power to conceive, and much less to describe, the awful prodigies which attended the cross of Christ. The cries of Jews; the darkness which at mid-day covered the land; the rending of the vail of the temple in twain from the top to the bottom; the yawning of the graves; the dead bodies of saints which had mouldered to dust arising, going into the holy city, and appearing unto many; the Centurion himself compelled to acknowledge Christ for the Son of God; and the rabble which came to the sight of Christ crucified, smitten at what they saw and heard, returning under horrors; these are events soon recorded, but never to be fully contemplated. For my own part, I would pray for continual grace to take my stand by faith at the foot of the cross, and with the Evangelists in my hand, go over again and again the marvellous subject, according to the plain, simple, and unvarnished manner in which those holy and inspired men have related it. And I would above all contemplate Him, who by that death procured my life; until, like Paul, I found grace to say as Paul said, and to feel as Paul felt; to know nothing among men save Jesus Christ, and him crucified; and from the same heartfelt conviction as his, knowing it is the power of God, and the wisdom of God, for salvation to everyone that believeth. 1Co 1:241Co 1:24 .
But, Reader! with all these high objects before us, let us take one view more of the Lord Jesus on the cross, and look over the heads of men and devils to behold what is the highest and most momentous object to contemplate in the whole, I mean the hand of God the Father in this wonderful transaction. The Scriptures of God teach us, that it pleased Jehovah to bruise him: it was He that put him to grief. Isa 53:10 . Here then was the grand part which put a finishing wound to the soul agonies and bodily pains of Christ. It was the hand of God which pierced most deeply in the Redeemer’s heart. This clenched the work. This drove the nail of bitterness home to the head. The iron entered into his soul. Psa 105:18 .
Angels are incompetent to explain the mysterious subject; and surely it never can be the province, of man. But, it appears from the whole tenor of revelation on those deep things of God, that the whole burden of sin, and the curse due to sin, meeting together, and with the whole wrath of Jehovah against sin, like a mighty cataract in the sluices of divine displeasure, were poured forth on the person of Christ. The darkness at mid-day intimated somewhat of it, For this darkness, which was altogether supernatural, could not be, as hath been said by some, as if to shew the Father’s anger against those who crucified Christ; for Christ himself, by his cry on the cross, most fully proved the contrary. My God! My God! (said the Holy Sufferer), why hast thou forsaken me! But this part is abundantly plain, that Christ was now expiating sin by the sacrifice of himself. And as such, the whole weight of sin, and the punishment due to sin, fell upon him. And as the damned in hell have eternal darkness, unvisited by the light of God’s countenance, the Son of God in our nature while sustaining the judgment due to his Church for sin, shall be in darkness and unvisited by that light whose absence he had never known before, He is now sustaining what is his Church’s due. He shall therefore feel the effect. But wherefore not go into hell then to endure this? No, there was no necessity. It is not the place, but the extremity, which constitutes the fulness of misery. When, therefore Christ was lifted up upon the cross, he was suspended between heaven and earth, as one unworthy of either. Indeed Christ might be said to be then in the territories of Satan, for he is called the prince of the power of the air, when hanging on the tree, and according to the law cursed. Eph 2:9 ; Gal 3:13 . And it is worthy remark, that Christ called his sufferings by this name. The sorrows of death (said Jesus) compassed me; the pains of hell gat hold upon me. Psa 116:3 . And elsewhere by the same spirit of prophecy the Lord said, All thy waves and billows have gone over me. Psa 42:7 .
XXIX
THE THREE HOURS OF DARKNESS AND FOUR MORE SAYINGS
Harmony, pages 212-214 and Mat 27:45-56 The last chapter closed as we were discussing Christ’s third voice from the cross, saying to the penitential thief, “To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise.” And the discussion closed with this question: Where is Paradise? Upon this subject two views prevail: One is that between death and the final resurrection the souls of disembodied saints go to an intermediate place; the other view is that there is no intermediate place. And it is the second view that the author firmly holds. In Dr. J. R. Graves’ book The Middle Life he takes the position that Paradise is a half-way station; that Hades is divided into two compartments, one called Paradise, in which the saints lodge, and the other called Tartarus, in which the souls of the wicked lodge. That neither the wicked nor the righteous immediately upon death go to their heaven or hell, is the “intermediate place” theory. It is also connected with an additional theory that when Christ died his soul went to that intermediate place, and while there preached to the spirits that were imprisoned there. The author does not subscribe to that at all.
In determining where Paradise is, we consult, not the Greek classics (as Dr. Graves does), but the New Testament usage. This usage makes Paradise the antitype of the earthly garden of Eden, which has its tree of life. The antitype of that is the true Paradise. We have these instances of the use of the word in the New Testament: In Luk 18 the first use of it. It is not mentioned again in the Gospels, but we come to it in 2Co 12 . There Paul tells us how he knew such an one about fourteen years ago, whether in the body or out of the body, he could not tell, but he knew such an one caught up to the third heaven and into the Paradise of God. There is nothing in that passage to make Paradise an intermediate place. Both the other two instances are in Revelation. In the letter to the churches Jesus says to one of them, “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.” Then by turning to the last chapter of Revelation you find where that tree of life is: it is in the midst of the Paradise of God. But where is that? The chapter commences: “I saw a pure river of water of life, coming out from the throne of (Sod and of the Lamb, and on either side of it was the tree of life.” Then in the same last chapter, it says, “Blessed are they that wash their robes . . . that they may have the right to the tree of life,” or, as it is expressed in an earlier passage in Revelation, “These are they who have washed their robes and made them white . . . that they may have a right to the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.”
These are the instances of the usage of the word in the New Testament, abundantly settling where Paradise is. There are other passages you may use in making it certain. For instance, in the letter to the Hebrews, Paul tells us where are the spirits of the Just made perfect. He says, “You are come unto Mount Zion, the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the first-born who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of Just men made perfect, and to Jesus the Mediator of a new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better than that of Abel.” So that wherever God is, and the heavenly Jerusalem, and the true Mount Zion is, and where the angels are, there are the disembodied spirits of the saints and this is no half-way house.
Look at it by this kind of proof: Who will deny that after the resurrection of Christ he ascended into the highest heavens? That is abundantly taught. Stephen, when he was dying, saw him there. And Paul says, “To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.” Where the Lord is, there Paul’s soul would go, as soon as he died. He says in 2Co 5:1 , “We know that if the earthly house of our tabernacle be dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” So, I do not believe that there is any stopping place for any saint or sinner immediately upon the death of the body, but his soul goes to its final place. We can get at it in this way: when Lazarus died the poor man was carried by angels to Abraham’s bosom. Where is Abraham? Jesus says, “Many shall come from the east and from the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven.” This is no half-way place. So Paradise is a place. Jesus also said, “I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go to prepare a place for you I will come again and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. . . . In my Father’s house are many mansions, etc.”
We are now on page 212 of the Harmony. It is the sixth hour, which is twelve o’clock. There was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour. That darkness lasted three hours. And the word “land” means the whole of this earth. It does not mean a little section of it, either. Every one of the three Gospel writers uses a particular word which means the whole of the earth. It could not be over all the earth and be an eclipse; for an eclipse is not seen at the same time from all points of the compass. Then, again, no total eclipse ever lasted three hours. I witnessed a total eclipse once, and there were a few minutes when the shadow of the moon covered the sun completely, but in a very few minutes a little rim of light was shown, and it kept slightly passing. More and more of the sun appeared until directly all the darkness was gone. I have a full discussion of these three hours of darkness in my sermon on “The Three Hours of Darkness.”
For three hours that darkness lasted; and there was death silence. About the ninth hour, which would be three o’clock, the silence was broken, and we have the fourth voice of Jesus: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Physical death is the separation of the soul from the body, and spiritual death is the separation of the soul from God. So just before that darkness passed away, closing the ninth hour, Christ died the spiritual death. Right on the very verge of that deeper darkness came another voice. His words were, “I thirst.” This shows that his soul was undergoing the pangs of hell, Just as the rich man lifted up his eyes in hell, being in torment, and said, “I pray thee, Father Abraham, send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.” This anguish was not from loss of blood, as in the case of a bleeding soldier. Any old soldier and I am one can testify that the fiercest pang which comes to the wounded is thirst. The flow of the blood from the open wound causes extreme anguish of thirst in a most harrowing sense. On battlefields, where the wounded fall in the range fire of both armies, a wounded man cannot get away, and nobody can go to him, and all through the night the wounded cry out, “Water, water, water!” After I myself was shot down on the battlefield it was two miles to where any water could be obtained, I had to be carried that distance, and the thirst was unspeakable. How much more the anguish of Christ enduring the torment of hell for a lost world!
The next voice is inarticulate, and that means that he had no joined words. We say a woman shrieks: that is inarticulate; but if she clothes her feelings in words, that is articulate. The record says, “And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, It is finished.” So there is a cry from Jesus which had no words. “It is finished,” that is, the work of expiation of sin, toward God; and the work of deliverance from the power of Satan is accomplished. All of the animals that were slaughtered upon the Jewish altars as types are found there in the Antitype, “It is finished.” The Old Testament is finished ; the old ceremonial, sacrificial law is nailed to the cross of Christ. Paul says, “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances against us, he nailed them to his cross.” On the cross he triumphed over Satan. “It is finished.” Because it is finished, Paul also says, “Let no man judge if you should eat anything that would be unclean according to the Mosaic law; that is nailed to the cross.” The Mosaic law forbade the eating of swine. But now you can eat swine if you want to. [It is far better, however, to eat fruits and vegetables than flesh foods of any kind. Editor.] “Let no man judge you in meat or drink.” And then he mentions the weekly sabbath, Saturday, and the lunar sabbath. The whole sabbatic cycle is nailed to the cross of Christ. If the Jew, then, after the death of Christ comes and says you must be circumcised according to the ordinances of Moses, you tell him that the handwriting of the ordinances of the Mosaic law were blotted out and nailed to the cross of Jesus Christ. You do not have to be circumcised in order to become a Christian. If he tells you that you should offer up sacrifices of lambs, or goats, or bullocks, you tell him, “No, that is nailed to the cross of Christ.” “Sacrifice and offerings thou wouldst not, but a body thou hast prepared for me”; and “through the eternal Spirit he made one offering once for all.”
“It is finished.” Whenever you preach on that and tell exactly what was finished, you have finished a great sermon. Expiation for sin was made; the penal demands of the law were satisfied; the vicarious Substitute for sinners died in their behalf; and the claims of the law on the sinner that believes in Jesus Christ were fully met. Therefore, no man can “lay any charge to God’s elect.” The debt, all of it, has been Paid.
His last voice on the cross was, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit,” that is, as soon as he died, his spirit went immediately to the Father, and not to that half-way place you have heard about. There can be no more important thing than this: Where was Christ’s soul between the death of his body and the resurrection of it, and why did he go to that place? Christ’s soul was-with the Father immediately upon his death. As quick as lightning his soul was with God. Now, why did he go there? The answer to this question will come in after the completion of our study on the resurrection. Remember we want to know why Christ’s soul, just as soon as he died, went to heaven.
He went to heaven as High Priest to offer on the mercy seat, in the holy of holies, his blood which was shed upon the earth on the altar on earth in order that on the basis of that blood he might make atonement for his people.
That is one reason. In Lev 16 we have the whole thing presented to us in type. The goat that was offered was slain, and just as soon as it was slain the high priest caught the blood in the basin he had, just as it flowed from the riven heart of the sacrifice. He then hastened with it, without delay, behind the veil into the holy of holies, and sprinkled it upon the mercy seat to make atonement, based upon the sacrifice made upon the altar. There was no moment of delay.
Now, when the true Lamb of God came and was slain, he being both High Priest and Sacrifice, he must immediately go into the presence of God in the true holy of holies, and sprinkle that blood upon the mercy seat. Therefore, Paul says, “When you come to the heavenly Jerusalem, Mount Zion, to God, and to angels, and to the spirits of the just made perfect, you also come to the blood of sprinkling,” there in the holy of holies, where Christ sprinkled that blood.
How long did Christ’s spirit stay up there? Three days the interval between his death and his resurrection. Why did he come back? He came back first to assume his resurrection body. He came back after his body. Second, in that risen body he received the homage of all the angels: “And when God bringeth again into the world his only begotten Son, he said, Let all the angels of God worship him.” He is the Son of God by the resurrection, as Psa 2 declares: “Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.” Paul quotes that to show that it is applied to the resurrection body of Jesus Christ. The angels worshiped Jesus in his eternal divinity, and they recognized him in his humanity. But there was a special reason why every angel of God should be called upon to worship the glorified Jesus Jesus in his risen and glorified body. So that is certainly one reason why he returned.
Another reason was to further instruct his people to clarify and confirm their faith, which he did. And the fourth reason was that he might, with all authority in heaven and on earth, commission them to do their work. I will show in subsequent discussions that he did that when he came back. If you do not know why Jesus came to the earth; if you do not know why he died; if you do not know where his spirit was between his death and resurrection, and why that spirit went to that place; if you do not know when he returned, why he returned, and how long he stayed after he returned; when he ascended into heaven; what he is doing in heaven in his risen body, and how long he will stay up there in his risen body, then you have not yet got at the gospel, and you do not know how to preach.
Still another reason why Jesus came back was to breathe on his apostles, that is, to inspire them, which means “to breathe,” to give inspiration to them, and to commission them. How long did he stay? Forty days. In that forty days he finished his instruction upon every point. Then when he went back he did not go as a disembodied soul. He went reunited, soul and body. And why? To be made King of kings and Lord of lords.
Another reason: As the High Priest of his people to ever live and make intercession for them in heaven; to receive from the Father the Holy Spirit, that he might send him down upon the earth to baptize his church. In other words, the old Temple was ended, its veil was rent in twain from top to bottom, and the new Temple, his church, set up, and as the old Temple had been anointed, the new Temple was to be anointed. All of which I discuss particularly in Acts of this INTERPRETATION.
How long will he stay up there? He will stay as long as his vicar, the Holy Spirit, works on earth; until all of his enemies have been put under his feet; until the times of the restitution of all things; until after the millennium, when Satan is loosed, and the man of sin is revealed, who is to be destroyed by the breath of the Lord when he comes. He will stay up there until he comes; until the salvation of the last of his people, and no more people are to be saved. As we learn from 2 Peter, he will stay up there until he comes to raise the dead, be married to his people, to raise the wicked dead, to judge the world in righteousness, and then to turn the kingdom over to the Father. You must know that Christ died with a view of taking the place of the sinner, in his stead, the iniquities of the sinner being put on him. He who knew no sin is made sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. By his death he comes in the sinner’s place to satisfy the penal claims of the law, and to propitiate God. That is the Godward side of his death. What is the devilward side of his death? The devilward side is fully presented in the sermon on “The Three Hours of Darkness.” He died that by his death he might destroy the devil that he might overcome him.
So we have gotten to the last voice, and Jesus is dead. The very moment that he died the whole earth shook; it quaked; there was an earthquake; the rocks were rent, the graves were opened, and the veil of the Temple was rent in twain from top to bottom. We are told by some writers that this veil of the Temple was seventy feet long, thirty feet wide, and four inches thick, closely woven, hard woven. Two yoke of oxen could not tear it, and yet the very minute that Christ died, commencing at the top, it split wide open, clear to the bottom, thus signifying that the way into the most holy is open for everybody.
So you see that is the one reason why he went to heaven between his death and his resurrection to open up a new and living way for his saints to follow him where he has forerun has already passed.
The rending of the veil of the Temple signifies that the old Temple is now empty. They can go on if they want to, but they do not offer sacrifices any longer, and if they did God would not recognize them; and in future years it will be destroyed utterly. In A.D. 70 it was destroyed, and there has been none since, and no Jew today ever offers a lamb or a sheep upon any altar. There is an abrogation utterly of the Old Testament economy, i.e., all of the ceremonial part of it.
Among the things that Jesus came back to earth for was to provide a new sabbath for his people. The Mosaic sabbath commemorated the creation the Christian sabbath commemorates redemption, and as God on the seventh day rested from his work of creation, Christ on the first day of the week rested from the work of redemption. His body came out of the grave, and from that time on it was the day upon which his people met to celebrate his resurrection the first day of the week. He himself met them several times upon the first day of the week, during those forty days. On the first day of the week he poured out the Holy Spirit. He ordered that collections be taken that money be laid aside for collection on the first day of the week. We learn that the Lord’s Supper was observed at Troas on the first day of the week; that John was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day, which is the first day of the week. So he comes to provide a new sabbath for his people. But we will discuss all this later.
While the graves were opened in that earthquake, the bodies lay exposed. Many of the saints whose bodies were lying there came to life, that is, after the resurrection. They lay there exposed three days, but after his resurrection, after he became “the first fruits of them that slept,” these bodies came to life and went into the city and were recognized. Then Jerusalem waked up and looked right into the face of their dead that had been buried but a short time before. Here is what the record says: “And the tombs were opened; and many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised; and coming forth out of the tombs after his resurrection, they entered into the holy city and appeared unto many.”
These voices, that darkness) that earthquake, that veilrending, that grave-opening, made a profound impression upon those who were there. The centurion, the captain of the hundred, who was conducting a section of the army the officer in charge) whose business it was to see that he was crucified said) “Truly this was the Son of God.” That is the impression it made upon his mind. No such things happened on the death of any other human being; therefore, one of the great French infidels said that Socrates died like a philosopher, but Jesus Christ died like a god. The effect upon the women is thus described and here are the very women who organized that first Ladies’ Aid Society: “And there were also women beholding from afar, among them were both Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joses, and Salome: who, when he was in Galilee, followed him, and ministered unto him: and many other women which came up with him unto Jerusalem.” How were the people affected? “And all the multitudes that came together to this sight, when they beheld the things that were done, returned smiting their breasts.”
Now he is dead, and the next event to notice is, Why he did not hang on the cross longer? This is the explanation, Harmony page 215: “The Jews, therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath (for the day of that sabbath was a high day) asked of Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.” A sabbath did not necessarily mean the seventh day. Any high day could be a sabbath, and the Jews wanted those who were crucified to die soon. A crucified man might linger several days. So Pilate, out of deference to the Jewish law, commanded their legs to be broken, so as to bring about an earlier death. Now, when they came to break the legs of Jesus, to their surprise, he was already dead. There was nothing in the mere physical anguish in the crucifixion to bring about the death of Jesus Christ. He died under the hand of God. He died by the stroke of the sword of the law: “Awake, O sword, against the Shepherd: let him be smitten and let the flock be scattered.” He died of a broken heart, evidenced by the fact that when the soldiers, to make sure that he was dead, ran a spear in his side, behold, water gushed out, an indication, physicians say, of death from heartbreaking. N ow, while he is hanging there, Joseph of Arimathaea, a member of the Sanhedrin, and Nicodemus, another member of the Sanhedrin, who came to Christ by night, obtained permission to take his body down and bury it. They had become disciples. It is a very precious thought to me that that same Nicodemus who came to Jesus by night, and was so puzzled about regeneration, has at last been born again, and become a disciple of Jesus Christ. They had not consented to what the others did in condemning Jesus, so they take him down and wrap his body with spices in a fine linen shroud and put him in a new tomb, belonging to Joseph of Arimathaea; in which no other one has ever lain, and shut him up in a big stone vault. This stone was hewn out like the vaults you see in New Orleans, and some in Waco. It was not a burial by the piling of dirt on him, but it was the placing of him in a rock vault.
QUESTIONS 1. What was the third voice from the cross?
2. What two views prevail on the location of Paradise and to which one does the author hold?
3. What other theory closely connected with “intermediate place” theory?
4. What are the uses of the word “Paradise” in the New Testament?
5. Where is Paradise and how do you prove it from these scriptures and others cited?
6. How long was the darkness over all the land at the crucifixion, and what is the meaning of the word “land” in this connection?
7. How do you prove that this darkness was not an eclipse of the sun?
8. Has the earth ever known such another period of darkness?
9. When and what was the fourth voice from the cross and what was its meaning?
10. What is meant by death, both physical and spiritual?
11. What was the fifth voice and its meaning? Illustrate.
12. What was the sixth voice and what its significance?
13. What was the seventh voice and what its meaning and broad application?
14. What was the last voice from the cross and what was its significance?
15. Briefly, why did Christ’s spirit go immediately to heaven when he died and of what was this act of Christ the antitype?
16. What does Paul say about this?
17. How long was Jesus up there and why did he return?
18. How long did he stay here after his return, and what was he doing while here?
19. Why then did he go back to the right hand of the Father?
20. How long will he stay there and for what will he come back?
21. What great supernatural events attended the death of Christ?
22. Describe the veil of the Temple which was rent in twain at his death and what is the special significance of this great event?
23. Explain the opening of the graves and the coming forth of the saints.
24. Who were present at the crucifixion and what was the effect on each class?
25. Why did not Christ hang on the cross longer, what caused his early death and what the proof?
26. Who took Jesus down from the cross, where did they bury him and what the manner of his burial?
44 And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour.
Ver. 44. See Mat 27:25 ; Mar 15:33 .
44 46. ] Our account is very short and epitomizing containing however, peculiar to itself, the last word of our Lord on the cross .
The impression conveyed by this account, if we had no other, would be that the veil was rent before the death of Jesus; but the more detailed account of Matthew corrects this.
Luk 23:44-49 . After crucifixion (Mat 27:45-56 , Mar 15:33-41 ).
Luk 23:44 . : though Lk. writes for Gentiles this phrase need not mean more than over the whole land of Israel.
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Luk 23:44-49
44It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth hour, 45because the sun was obscured; and the veil of the temple was torn in two. 46And Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” Having said this, He breathed His last. 47Now when the centurion saw what had happened, he began praising God, saying, “Certainly this man was innocent.” 48And all the crowds who came together for this spectacle, when they observed what had happened, began to return, beating their breasts. 49And all His acquaintances and the women who accompanied Him from Galilee were standing at a distance, seeing these things.
Luk 23:44 “It was now about the sixth hour” There is some confusion over whether this is Roman time or Greek time. Here is my comment from Mar 15:1 :
Mark, like all Jewish writings, does not focus on specific times. It is probable that the Jews of Jesus’ day divided the night and day into twelve hours each (cf. Joh 11:9), with three four-hour segments. The twenty-four hour day comes from Babylon. The Greeks and Jews borrowed it from them. The sundial was divided into twelve segments.
In chapter 15 Mark has several time markers:
1. sunrise, Mar 15:1 (around 6 a.m. depending on the time of the year)
2. third hour, Mar 15:25 (around 9 a.m.)
3. sixth hour, Mar 15:33 (around noon)
4. ninth hour, Mar 15:34 (around 3 p.m.)
5. evening, Mar 15:42 (sunset, around 6 p.m.)
“and darkness fell over the whole land” This is one of the OT judgment signs, either in a covenantal sense (cf. Exo 10:21; Deu 28:28-29) or an apocalyptic sense (cf. Joe 2:2; Amo 8:9-10; Zep 1:15). This is a symbol of God the Father taking His presence away from His Son, who bore the sin of all humanity. This is what Jesus feared most in Gethsemane (expressed by “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?” in Mar 15:34). Jesus became a sin offering and bore the sin of all the world (cf. 2Co 5:21). He experienced personal separation from the Father. Darkness was a symbol of God the Father turning away from His Son.
Luk 23:45 “the sun being obscured” We get the English word “eclipse” from this Greek word, but it was technically not an eclipse, rather an act of God. There are several Greek manuscript variants of the unusual phrase, but none change the obvious meaning of the text.
“the veil of the temple was torn in two” Mar 15:38 tells us that it was torn from top to bottom (God’s action). The way to intimacy with God had been fully opened for all. A Talmudic tradition says the “doors of the Temple opened automatically” during the crucifixion. Here is a quote from my commentary on Mar 15:38 (see www.freebiblecommentary.org ):
“There were two curtains to the inner shrine of the Temple, one in the Holy Place and a second before the Holy of Holies. If the second was ripped no one would have seen it except the priests, unless the first one was regularly pulled back and tied to the sides. These curtains are described in Exo 26:31-37. In Jesus’ day, in Herod’s remodeled Temple, this curtain was 60′ by 30′ and about 4″ thick! If the outer one was ripped all worshipers in the different outer courts would have seen it. This seems to show that the way to intimate fellowship with God has been reestablished by Christ’s death (cf. Gen 3:15; Exo 26:31-35). In Mat 27:51-53 other miracles are recorded as attesting signs.”
Luk 23:46 “Jesus, crying out with a loud voice” This is paralleled in
1. Mat 27:50, but His words are not given
2. Mar 15:37, but His words are not given
3. Joh 19:30, where Jesus says, “It is finished”
“into Your hands I commit My spirit” This is a quote from Psa 31:5. The term “spirit” refers to the human person.
See Special Topic: Spirit (pneuma) in the NT at Luk 1:80.
“He breathed His last” The last exhalation was seen as the departing of the spirit (expiring). The same Hebrew word (ruah, BDB 924) denoted (1) breath; (2) spirit; and (3) wind. Therefore, this is a Semitic idiom for death (cf. TEV).
Luk 23:47 “when the centurion saw what had happened, he began praising God saying, ‘Certainly this man was innocent” Matthew (Mat 27:54) and Mark (Mar 15:39) have “a son of God.” Plummer catches the essence of this phrase when he translates “he was a good man and quite right in calling God His Father.” This is not a sign that this Roman guard was saved, but he recognized that Jesus was an extraordinary man and died in a very unusual manner. The NET Bible (p. 1882) has an interesting comment, “Here is a fourth figure who said that Jesus was innocent in this chapter (Pilate, Herod, a criminal, and now a centurion).” Here is my commentary from Mat 27:54 :
“There is no Article with son. This implied that although this soldier was surely impressed by all that happened he was not converted. He asserts Jesus was “a son of God,” not Lord. However in the parallel in Luk 23:47 he is proclaiming Jesus as righteous or innocent. The irony is that this Roman soldier saw what the Jewish leaders did not (cf. Mat 27:19; Joh 1:11).
This is literally “this man was a son of God.” The image of God in mankind has been restored! Intimate fellowship is again possible. However the absence of the article does not automatically mean it is not definite (cf. Mat 4:3; Mat 4:6; Mat 14:33; Mat 27:43; and Luk 4:3; Luk 4:9). This was a hardened Roman soldier. He had seen many men die (cf. Mat 27:54). This may be “the focal passage” of Mark because this Gospel was specifically written to Romans. It has many Latin words and very few OT quotes. Also Jewish customs and Aramaic phrases are translated and explained. Here is a Roman centurion professing faith in a crucified Jewish insurrectionist!
It is possibly purposeful that passers by, chief priests, and even fellow prisoners mock Jesus, but the Roman centurion responds in affirmation and awe!”
Luk 23:49 “all the crowd” This is obviously hyperbolic because the Jewish leaders were not grieved over Jesus’ death.
“beating their breasts” This was a sign of grief and/or repentance (cf. Luk 18:13, see SPECIAL TOPIC: GRIEVING RITES at Luk 10:13). Many of the crowd who stayed to the very end were Jesus’ supporters and friends (but no apostles except John, cf. Joh 19:20-27). The women who traveled with Jesus were also there (cf. Mar 15:40-41, see Special Topic at Luk 22:28).
There are several later Greek manuscript additions which intensify the grief. See Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, p. 182.
Luk 23:49 “and the women who accompanied Him from Galilee” It is possible that this large group of women was the financial base for Jesus and the disciples during His teaching ministry. See Special Topic: The Women Who Followed Jesus at Luk 8:3.
sixth hour: i.e. noon. See App-165.
was = came to be.
over. Greek. epi. App-104.
the earth = the land. Greek. ge. App-129.
ninth hour: i.e. 3pm. See App-165.
44-46.] Our account is very short and epitomizing-containing however, peculiar to itself, the last word of our Lord on the cross.
The impression conveyed by this account, if we had no other, would be that the veil was rent before the death of Jesus;-but the more detailed account of Matthew corrects this.
Luk 23:44. , the whole) Mid-day darkness arising from the sun obscured the whole upper hemisphere; and the moon, which was then in opposition to the sun, without deriving any light from the sun, left in obscurity the lower hemisphere.
Luk 23:44-56
13. THE BURIAL OF JESUS
Luk 23:44-56
44 And it was now about the sixth hour,-Parallel records of this are in Mat 27:45-50; Mar 15:33-37; Joh 19:28-30. It seems that Jesus was crucified or nailed to the cross about nine o’clock Friday morning, as Mark says that “it was the third hour, and they cricified him.” (Mar 15:25.) The first three hours that Jesus remained on the cross would bring the time to twelve noon; some think that only three of the sayings of Jesus were spoken during these hours, which seems to he correct. “About the sixth hour” or twelve o’clock noon, “a darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour.” That is, darkness came over the land of Palestine from twelve o’clock to three o’clock in the afternoon. The darkness began at “the sixth hour”; that is, twelve o’clock, and lasted until three o’clock in the afternoon. The heavy veil of the temple which separated the holy from the most holy place in the sanctuary of the temple was rent from top to bottom; this signified that a new, “living way” was consecrated, whereby all believers might come into the presence of God. It is not claimed that this darkness was caused by an eclipse, nor was it the natural darkness that precedes an earthquake; it was a miracle;this is the only way that we can account for it.
45, 46 the sun’s light failing:-we can only account for the physical phenomena that occurred by saying that a miracle was worked; the Son of God was dying and the physical elements were drooped in mourning of the awful occasion; after the darkening of the earth the sun and moon were obscured; during this time the veil of the temple was rent, which signified that the end of the temple service had come. This veil separated the temple into the two parts-holy and most holy. When this veil was rent, the distinction between the two places was destroyed, and that signified the services of the high priest and other priests were at an end. The high priest entered into the most holy place only once in the year to make an atonement for the people. (Exo 30:10; Lev 16:15-17; Heb 9:7.) So the rending of the veil destroyed the sanctity of these two divisions of the temple. Jesus, our great high priest, entered into the most holy place to make atonement through his blood for our sins. (Heb 9:12-14; Heb 9:25-26.)
47 And when the centurion saw what was done,-Matthew records that the centurion “and they that were with him watching Jesus” “feared exceedingly.” (Mat 27:54.) We do not know how much the centurion knew of God; he is recorded as glorifying God and saying: “Certainly this was a righteous man.” His conclusion was drawn from the physical phenomena which accompanied the death of Christ. Luke mentions several centurions who were good men. (Luk 7:2; Luk 23:47; Acts 10:1; 22:26, 27; 43.) He felt that Jesus was a righteous man when he saw the forgiving spirit and the earthquake and heard all that Jesus had said on the cross.
48, 49 And all the multitudes that came together-The people had been urged on to their course by the chief priests and rulers; it seems that some had been held back. When they saw the remarkable character they were troubled and left the scene smiting their breasts as an expression of extreme grief and deep mental anguish. Jesus had died earlier than some die on the cross. Sometimes the victim on the cross would not expire for one or two days; the Jews wanted to hasten the death of Jesus and the two who were crucified with him by breaking their bones. (Joh 19:31-32.) However, when they came to examine Jesus’ body they found that he was dead, and they broke the bones of the two malefactors to hasten their death, so that they would not remain on the cross over the Sabbath. It is strange that they would be so particular about the Sabbath when they were committing the high crime of crucifying the Son of God! They were fulfilling the statement that Jesus had made to them when he said that they were “blind guides, that strain out the gnat, and swallow the camel!” (Mat 23:24.) A study of those who were present at the crucifixion leads us to group them into four classes. They were as follows: (1) the centurion and his soldiers; (2) the Jewish leaders; (3) the women who were his disciples, and who “stood afar off”; (4) and the crowd or multitude that gathered around the cross. This group of women who had “followed with him from Galilee” appeared to be a different group of women from those who followed him as he bore his cross. (See verse 27.) This group of women included the mother of Jesus.
50-52 And behold, a man named Joseph,-Parallel records of the burial of Jesus are found in Mat 27:57-61; Mar 15:42-47; Joh 19:31-42. All of the records recite that Joseph of Arimathea was a disciple of Jesus. John records that he was a disciple, “but secretly for fear of the Jews” was not an open disciple. However, Mark records him as going to Pilate “boldly” and asking for the body of Jesus. He was a member of the Sanhedrin, a good, just, and rich man. He had not voted with the council to condemn Jesus; he alone is named as not agreeing to the verdict of the council, but it is probable that Nicodemus, who is present, must have voted against the decision of the Sanhedrin. It is not known whether Joseph or Nicodemus were present, though it is specifically stated that Joseph “had not consented to their counsel and deed.” The exact location of Arimathea is not known, but some think that it was about six miles north of Jerusalem. Luke describes the faith of Joseph by saying that he “was looking for the kingdom of God.” This shows that he expected the Messiah and expected the kingdom of God to be set up. His boldness in asking Pilate for the body of Jesus is put in contrast with his being a secret disciple of Jesus; it is hard to understand why he should be so timid during the life of Jesus, yet so bold as to ask Pilate for his body. John is the only writer who informs us that Nicodemus was with Joseph in the burial of Jesus. (Joh 19:38-39.) We have only three mentions of Nicodemus in the New Testament, and John is the only writer that mentions Nicodemus. (John 3:1-9;:50; 19:39.)
53 And he took it down, and wrapped it-Joseph had “asked” or made an urgent request of Pilate for the body of Jesus. He was aided by Nicodemus and perhaps by some servants, as he was a “rich man.” He took the body from the cross and “wrapped it in a linen cloth.” This was a “winding sheet” in which the body of the dead was wrapped; the mummies of Egypt were wrapped in “fine linen”; the body of Jesus was wrapped “in a clean linen cloth,” according to Matthew. Mark records that Joseph “bought a linen cloth” (Mar 15:46), and John records that Nicodemus brought “a, mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds” (Joh 19:39), and in this way they embalmed the body of Jesus and placed it in Joseph’s new tomb. Both Matthew and John state that it was a “new tomb”; this “new tomb” was hewn out of rock. The tombs of the Jews were generally cut out of solid rock; sometimes they were below the level of the ground, but often they were above the ground on the sides of hills and mountains. It seems that the tomb of Joseph was the family vault. Joseph being a rich man could give the body of Jesus such a burial. The prophecy of Isaiah was fulfilled here, “and they made his grave with the wicked, and with a rich man in his death.” (Isa 53:9.)
54 And it was the day of the Preparation,-The day before the Sabbath was called the day of Preparation; hence this was the sixth day of the week, or what we call Friday. Matthew and Mark say nothing about the “day of the Preparation,” but both Luke and John mention it. The Sabbath “drew on,” or literally “began to dawn,” meaning the evening light of the Sabbath, not the morning; it was the dawn at sunset, for the Sabbath began at sunset. The women of Galilee observed where and how the body of Jesus was placed. Luke does not here speak of the twelve-hour day which began with sunrise, but the twenty-four-hour day which began at sunset.
55 And the women, who had come with him-These women had followed from Galilee; they watched where the body of Jesus was placed. Evidently the Jews had also observed what Joseph and Nicodemus had done; they were little concerned now since Jesus was dead as to what would be done with his body. It seems that while Joseph and Nicodemus were burying the body the Jews had gone to Pilate and asked that a guard be placed around the tomb. Though Matthew did not speak of that day as being “the Preparation” day as did Luke and John, yet Matthew speaks of “the day after the Preparation.” (Mat 27:62.) This group of women from Galilee had often ministered to Jesus; they were standing afar off during the dreadful scene of the crucifixion, and are now observing the burial of his body.
56 And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments.-Luke (Luk 23:54) notes that “the sabbath drew on” after the burial on Friday afternoon; the Sabbath began at 6:00 P.M.; then Luke notes that the women rested during the Sabbath, which would be Friday night and Saturday. The spices and perfumes that they prepared would complete the proper embalming of the body; these were bought and prepared, but owing to the late hour, seemed to be laid aside until after the Sabbath. They rested on that day according to the commandment of Moses. (Exo 12:16; Exo 20:8-11; Deu 5:1-15.) The teachings of Jesus served to make them careful observers of the moral law as well as the law regulating the Sabbath. Some think that the two Marys remained too long at the tomb to make purchases on Friday. (Mar 15:47. ) Matthew (27:62-66) records the sealing and guarding of the tomb, the chief priests and Pharisees asking Pilate to make the sepulchre secure, and his granting their request.
Christ Crucified And The Veil Rent — Luk 23:44-56
And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, He said, Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit: and having said thus, He gave up the ghost. Now when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous Man. And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts, and returned. And all His acquaintance, and the women that followed Him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things. And, behold, there was a man named Joseph, a counsellor; and he was a good man, and a just: (the same had not consented to the counsel and deed of them;) he was of Arimathea, a city of the Jews: who also himself waited for the kingdom of God. This man went unto Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped it in linen, and laid it in sepulchre that was hewn in stone, wherein never man before was laid. And that day was the preparation, and the sabbath drew on. And the women also, which came with Him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, and how His body was laid. And they returned, and prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment- Luk 23:44-56.
Those who have followed carefully the various accounts of the death of our Lord Jesus Christ, know that there are certain details omitted in each of the Gospels which are given in the others, but all are in perfect agreement. You will have noticed that our blessed Lord hung for six awful hours on Calvary. He was nailed to the cross at the third hour: that is what we call nine oclock in the morning; He was taken down from the cross after the ninth hour: that is, after three oclock in the afternoon. During those first three hours the sun was shining; all nature seemed bright, as though utterly indifferent to what was taking place: the Creator of all things was dying upon a felons gibbet, rejected by those whom He had not only brought into being but also come to bless and to save. At the sixth hour-this answers to our twelve noon-the sun was, as it were, blotted out of the heaven. This was not an eclipse. It was the passover time, and it was impossible that there should be an eclipse when the moon was at the full. It was a supernatural darkness that spread over all the scene, not only over the land of Judaea, but possibly, at the same time, over all parts of the known world. The early Christians tell us (whether on reliable authority or not I cannot say, but it is interesting that the story has come down from early times) that a Greek philosopher was giving a lecture in the city of Alexandria of Egypt at the very hour the darkness spread over the land, and he stopped in the midst of his discourse and exclaimed, Either a god is dying or the universe is going into dissolution. He who is both God and Man was dying! He was dying at that awful hour for our sins. From the sixth to the ninth hour the darkness continued, and after it passed away the Lord bowed His head and died.
It is instructive to observe that during the first three hours Jesus never exhibited concern for Himself. He was perfectly calm, and though He was suffering excruciatingly He gave no evidence whatever of self-pity. He saw His blessed mother standing near the foot of the cross and John the beloved disciple near her; and He said to His mother, Behold thy son! and to John, Behold thy mother! And John led her away from the scene of her holy Sons dying agony; and, we are told in other records, cared for her for the rest of her life here on earth. Then our Lord looked upon the multitude, blaspheming, mocking, and ridiculing Him; and He recognized the wickedness of their hearts; yet He opened up for them a City of Refuge into which they might flee, as we have seen already, when He prayed, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. He heard the plea of the penitent thief and assured him of a place in Paradise. Thus in those first three hours He exhibited no perturbation of spirit, no concern for Himself but only tender consideration for others.
From the time that the darkness overspread the scene no sound escaped the lips of Jesus, according to the record, until the three hours were drawing to a close; and then, we are told in two other Gospels, He cried out in agony, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? In those first three hours of darkness He was suffering at the hands of man: He endured without a murmur all the shame and ignominy that man could heap upon Him. But during the last three hours of darkness He was suffering at the hand of God-the God who made His soul an offering for sin. There He drank the bitter cup of judgment that our sins had filled- the cup from which He shrank in Gethsemane, which if we had to drink could not be exhausted throughout eternity. God hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him (2Co 5:21). In the first three hours He addressed God as Father: Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. But in these last three hours He did not use the term Father, until the darkness had passed. He address Him as God: Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? (Mar 15:34.) For it was God as Judge who was there dealing with His holy Son on our behalf as Christ took the sinners place. We read, And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. One critic tells us that Luke links up the rending of the veil with the darkness rather than with the death of Jesus, and that he was in too much of a hurry to get to the climactic scene and announce Christs victory, because the other Gospels record the veil as having been rent after Jesus gave up His spirit. Well, we do not blame Luke for being in a hurry to record the rending of the veil; but it was the Holy Spirit who was desirous to let us know that the veil has been rent! Throughout Old Testament times God had said, I will dwell in the thick darkness. The veil of the temple signified that no man could pass into the presence of God except as in the case of the high priest on the day of atonement, and that, not without blood. But when Christ died as the propitiation for sin the way was opened up into the Holy of holies. Now God can come out in unhindered love to man, and man can go into Gods presence, accepted in Christ. The rent veil speaks of redemption accomplished. Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus (Heb 10:19). One of our hymn-writers has written:
Through Thy precious body broken-
Inside the veil.
Oh, what words to sinners spoken-
Inside the veil.
Precious as the blood that bought us;
Perfect as the love that sought us;
Holy as the Lamb that brought us-
Inside the veil!
Lamb of God, through Thee we enter-
Inside the veil;
Cleansed by blood we boldly venture-
Inside the veil.
Not a stain; a new creation;
Ours is such a full salvation:
Low we bow in adoration-
Inside the veil!
Soon Thy saints shall all be gathered-
Inside the veil;
All at home-no more be scattered-
Inside the veil.
Nought from Thee our souls shall sever;
We shall see Thee, grieve Thee never;
Praise the Lamb, shall sound forever-
Inside the veil!
At the last Jesus prayed, saying, Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit: and having said this, He gave up the ghost. He dismissed His spirit. The work was done, and He went home to be with the Father. Our attention is next directed to the scene before the cross. We are told, When the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous Man. He was a Roman; he was in charge of the soldiers who were there on guard; he saw and heard all that took place, and his heart was stirred. According to other Gospels he added also, Truly this was the Son of God. Then we are told that, All the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts, and returned. A great throng was gathered there, not only enemies but also friends; but these last were powerless to interfere as they stood looking on in grief and sorrow. It must have been hard for them to believe that Jesus had actually died. They thought it was He who should have redeemed Israel, but now their hopes were blasted, and they turned away and went to their homes sorrowing and bewailing. All His acquaintance stood afar off, beholding these things. They had been watching Jehovahs Anointed die like a felon upon a cross of shame; but oh, the joy that awaited them when they were to learn of His glorious resurrection!
You will notice that as long as the Lord Jesus was standing in the sinners stead God allowed every kind of indignity to be heaped upon His blessed Son: they spat in His face; they slapped Him with the palms of their hands, a most insulting gesture; they flogged Him until His flesh was torn from His back and blood poured from every wound; they pressed a thorn-crown upon His head; and they put a gorgeous robe upon Him and knelt before Him, mocking Him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews; they took Him out to Calvary and nailed Him to the cross; and lastly, one of the soldiers pierced His side, but that was the final act ,of indignity that God permitted. The very spear that pierced His side drew forth the blood to save. After that it was as though God said, I gave My Son into your hands; you have shown all the hatred and bitterness of your hearts by the way you have treated Him. Now not another unclean hand shall touch Him. From that time on no enemy touched that sacred body.
And, behold, there was a man name Joseph, a counsellor; and he was a good man, and a just: (the same had not consented to the counsel and deed of them;) he was of Arimathea, a city of the Jews: who also himself waited for the kingdom of God. This man went unto Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. He and his servants tenderly and reverently took that body from the cross, washed away the blood-stains, wrapped the body in linen, and carried it to Josephs new tomb and left it there, intending, after the sabbath had passed, to embalm it according to the Jewish custom. And the women also, which came with Him from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, and how His body was laid. They then turned sadly away, intending to return and perform the last sacred rites after the sabbath. They prepared spices and ointments; and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment. The Christ-who was born of a virgin; who had grown up as a tender plant in the garden of the Lord, and had gone forth, anointed of Jehovah, healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom-had died at last on the cross for sinners; and now His body-lay in the tomb, and no one on earth knew whether or not redemption was an accomplished fact. If He had not come forth from that tomb then there would have been no evidence that the sin question had been settled. But His resurrected body was to be the proof of ^he efficacy of His work. Now, thank God, He is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them (Heb 7:25).
Chapter 54
The Rent Veil
In these two verses before us we have Lukes very brief account of our Saviours last three hours of agony upon the cursed tree, the last three hours of torture he endured for us as our Substitute, because he was made sin for us. Let us ever read these inspired narratives with reverence, with hearts broken over sin, and yet rejoicing at the forgiveness of sin obtained at such a price. May God the Holy Spirit sanctify our hearts and minds as we once more attempt to meditate upon our Lords sufferings, and seek to know and worship him who suffered all the hell of Gods holy wrath for us.
The Darkness
The Spirit of God here tells us that there was darkness over all the earth for three hours. This was not a natural solar eclipse, but a supernatural one, an eclipse specifically performed by God on this occasion. It was the eclipse that the prophet Amos prophesied. It shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord GOD, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day (Amo 8:9).
The darkness lasted for three hours. Men in other parts of the world, who had no idea what was going on in Jerusalem, spoke of it. A man named Dionysius, living in Egypt at the time, said, Either the Divine Being suffers, or suffers with him that suffers, or the frame of the world is dissolving. Apparently, this eclipse was a complete eclipse of the sun engulfing the entire world with darkness at one time! For three hours, from high noon until three oclock, the sun refused to shine. Thus the Lord God gives a vivid, symbolic display of four things.
1. The heinousness of the crime being committed: though our Saviour died and was slaughtered by the hands of wicked men exactly according to the purpose, will, and decree of God Almighty for the salvation of his elect, Gods decree did not in any way excuse their sin in crucifying him (Act 2:22-23).
2. The blackness, darkness, and blindness of mens hearts by nature: no impression was made upon these men, though God performed miracles unheard of, before or since, all around them. The fact is, mans heart by nature is so blind that no acts of providence, either in goodness or in judgment, can be seen by him, unless God takes the scales off his eyes.
3. The emptiness and darkness of Christless religion: Judaism had become mere ritualism. As such, it was altogether darkness. Religion without Christ, without life, without faith is darkness, no matter how orthodox it appears!
4. The darkness that passed upon and engulfed our Saviours holy soul when he was made sin for us: Matthew tells us, at about the ninth hour, about three oclock in the afternoon, which was about the time of the slaying and offering of the evening sacrifice, which was an eminent type of Christ, Jesus cried with a loud voice. He cried out as one in great distress, having been silent during the three hours darkness, patiently bearing all his souls sufferings, under a sense of divine wrath, the hiding of his Fathers face, and his conflicts with the powers of darkness; but now, in the anguish of his soul, he breaks out with a cry that pierces the darkness, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Here our Saviour speaks as a man, the man chosen, made, ordained, and anointed by God with the oil of gladness above his fellows. As a man, our Lord was upheld and strengthened by the Father, just as we are. As a man, he trusted God, loved him, and prayed to him, just as we do; only he did so perfectly, without sin. Though now the Father hid his face from him, still he expresses strong faith in him and love for him.
When he is said to be, forsaken of God, the meaning is not that he was separated from the love of God or did not know the reason for his abandonment. Our Surety now stood in our place bearing our sins. He, therefore, had to endure abandonment by God the Father to satisfy justice.
This cry, My God, my God, Why hast thou forsaken me? expresses the very soul of his sufferings as our Substitute. Indeed, all the wailing and howling of the damned in hell to all eternity will fall infinitely short of expressing the evil and bitterness of sin. But here we see how vile a thing sin is. When God found our sin upon his darling Son, he forsook him in wrath! Whenever we read these words, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?, we ought to immediately realize that we have been ransomed by an indescribably great price, that the Lord our God is infinitely holy and just, that he must and will punish all sin, and that the Lord God Almighty loves his people with an infinite, indescribable, everlasting love! And we should be convinced by our Saviours cry, from his deep agony of soul, that Gods elect shall never be forsaken, neither in this world nor in the world to come!
The Veil Rent
After that, the Lord Jesus cried again, with a loud voice, and yielded up the ghost. Our Lords strength was not abated. His last word was not the gasping breath of a failing life, but the triumphant shout of a conquering King. The Son of God voluntarily laid down his life for his sheep. He did not lose his spirit; he dismissed it. His work was finished. His mission was complete. Therefore, he laid down his life for his people, voluntarily, as our Surety, suffering vicariously as our Substitute. And he did so triumphantly, conquering sin, death, Satan, and hell for us.
Then, we read, and the veil in the temple was rent. Matthew is more detailed and more graphic in his account. He wrote, And, behold, the veil in the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom (Mat 27:51). The typical, symbolic veil was rent. And, at the same instant, the true veil was rent. What is the meaning of this rent veil? Why was it rent?
Try to picture what was happening in Jerusalem. Just a short distance from Mount Calvary stood Mount Moriah and the Jews temple. It is at the hour of the evening sacrifice. The sun has been darkened by the hand of God for three hours. Thousands were gathered in Jerusalem for the passover. Many were still at Calvary. Others had made their way to the temple. The priest in all his gorgeous robes is going through the now empty rituals of the Jews Passover. As he meanders around in the holy place, suddenly, the veil of the temple, separating the holy place from the most holy place, was ripped apart before his eyes, ripped from top to bottom, as if God himself had taken it in his hands and ripped it.
Can you imagine the shock of that pretentious priest? Can you imagine the shock of the people as they looked within the holy of holies? It was, except for the priest, utterly empty! The ark of the covenant was not there. The mercy-seat was not there. Though the temple was rebuilt after the Babylonian captivity, the ark of the covenant and the mercy-seat were never recovered and never brought into Solomons temple. J. C. Philpot points out:
There were five things in Solomons temple destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, which were not in the second temple, which was erected after the Babylonish captivity. Five memorials or tokens of Gods special presence were there wanting. One was the ark of the covenant; another, the fire from heaven upon the bronze altar; the third, the Shechinah, or cloud that rested upon the mercy-seat; the fourth, the Urim and Thummin which were in the breast-plate of the high-priest; and the fifth, the spirit of prophecy. For though there were the prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, at the time of, and shortly after, the restoration; yet the spirit of prophecy ceased with Malachi, and did not reappear until John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Lord Jesus.
For centuries, the Jewish priests faked keeping the passover! We can only imagine the criminally selfish motives behind their actions. But now their empty, sham religion was exposed to all.
Suddenly, as though the sky opened, we are lifted up and carried from the earth into heaven, from the carnal into the spiritual, from mortality into immortality, of which it is written by John when he was in the Spirit, I saw no temple therein, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. In that Temple all is full!
We have no need of a physical temple, for we are the temple of God. Seated now in the holy place with Christ, we understand and see clearly that Christ is all. Everything in the carnal, earthly, material temple spoke of him. Christ is our Priest and our Altar. He is the Lamb of God, our sacrificed Passover, and our Mercy-seat. The Lord Jesus Christ is the Shekinah-glory, the brightness of the glory of the triune God. Let us now turn aside, as Moses did at the bush, and see this great sight. What does it mean?
The Veil
The veil was rent, not consumed by fire. Had it been consumed with fire, we might miss the meaning of the picture. Our Lord by his death did not destroy the way of access to God. He opened it. Now, we go through the rent veil by his blood into the holiest. The new and living way, by which we come to God, is paved with gold and sprinkled with blood.
The veil was rent while the temple was still standing in Jerusalem. Had the earthquake, that rent the rocks and opened graves, struck down the temple or shattered its walls, men might have said that it was the earthquake that rent the veil. But now it is made clear to all that no natural convulsion of the earth threw the veil open, making the holy of holies as accessible as the outer court, which all might enter, and where all might worship.
The veil was rent in twain. It did not fall to pieces, and was not torn to shreds. The rent was clean and straight, made by the invisible hand of the invisible God. Perhaps this exact division into two parts symbolized the separation of Christs soul from his body in death. Perhaps it symbolized the throwing open of the great door between earth and heaven, as John saw in his vision, indicating the complete reconciliation of fellowship between God and his people by the blood of Christ (2Co 5:17-21; Rev 4:1-2).
The veil was rent from the top to the bottom. It was not rent from side to side, or from the bottom to the top, which might have suggested that it was simply worn out from usage. It was rent from the top to the bottom, showing that the power which rent it was from above, not from beneath. The rending of the veil was not of man, but of God. It was man that crucified the Lord of Glory, but it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief. Beginning with the roof and ending with the floor, the rent was complete; for God in heaven had done it. From the roof to floor, there remained not one fragment of the old veil. So from heaven to earth, from the throne of God, down to the dwelling of man, there is not one remnant, not one particle of a barrier between redeemed sinners and the God of Glory. He who openeth and no man shutteth has, with his own hand, and in his own boundless mercy, love, and grace, thrown open to the chief of sinners the throne of grace, and bids us come in and draw near (Heb 4:16).
The rent veil declares that Christ is the end of the law. He finished and fulfilled it. He satisfied and completed it. Now, we have free and open access to the throne of God. The rending of the veil was done, as if the temple itself mourned for and testified abhorrence at the crucifixion of Christ. The temple rent, as it were, its garments at the death of its Lord. The veil was rent to show that the Lord, who had taken up his residence in the most holy place between the cherubim, over the mercy-seat in thick darkness, had now moved out and left the house desolate. The rending of the veil signified the rending of Christs flesh, the breaking of his body for us, which was typified by the veil (Heb 10:20). The veil was rent to signify the clear, full revelation of God and his saving grace proclaimed in the gospel, proclaiming the way into the holiest of all, into heaven itself, where Christ is, who entered by his own blood, as our Forerunner (Heb 10:9-22).
The veil was rent in the presence of the Jewish priests. They were in the holy place, outside the veil, of course, officiating, lighting the lamps, or placing incense on the golden altar, or arranging the shewbread on the golden table. When they saw the solemn rending of the veil, they must have been terrified. I can picture them covering their eyes lest they should see the hidden glories of that holy chamber they were forbidden to enter. Perhaps Isaiahs words rang in their ears, Woe is me, for I am undone; I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell among a people of unclean lips; for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts (Isa 6:5).
The veil was rent before their eyes to declare that Christ, our Passover, the true Passover, has opened the way for man to come to God. It is as though the Lord God himself declared, It is okay for you to come in. It is no longer profanity for you to handle the holy things of the sanctuary, to gaze upon the sacrificial blood, approach the Mercy-Seat and sit down in the presence of the glory of God. Truly, the safest and the most blessed place for our needy souls is the Mercy-seat, Christ Jesus. He bids us come into the holy place and handle him (1Jn 1:1-2).
The veil was rent at the time of the evening sacrifice. About three oclock in the afternoon, as the sun began to set, the lamb was slain and laid upon the brazen altar. Just at the moment when its blood was shed, and the smoke arose from the fire that was consuming it, the veil was rent in twain. There was an unseen link between the altar and the veil, between the sacrifice and the rending, between the blood-shedding and the removal of the barrier. It was blood that had done the work. It was blood that had rent the veil and thrown open the door of access to God, the blood of the Lamb, without blemish, and without spot.
The veil was rent precisely at the moment when the Son of God died on the cross. His death did it! His death opened Gods heaven for our souls. His death opened for us the way of life and brought us into life. It was from the cross that the power emanated which rent the veil. From that place of weakness and shame and agony came forth the omnipotent command, Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors. Our Saviours triumphant cry, It is finished, upon Golgotha, was the appointed signal; and the instantaneous response was the rending of the veil. The pierced hands of our accepted Sacrifice rent the veil separating God and man. It was the cross of Christ that rent the veil and opened the new and living way into the holiest of all.
When the veil was rent, the cherubim embroidered on it were rent with it. Those cherubim symbolized the Church of Gods elect. Being embroidered into the veil, we see a picture of our identification with Christ in his death. We were nailed with him to the cross. We were crucified with him. With him, we died, and were buried, and rose again. In that rent veil we have the temple-symbol of the apostles doctrine concerning our union and oneness with Christ in life and death. I am crucified with Christ. Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
The rent veil declares that all the law is fulfilled, satisfied, and ended. Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. There is therefore, now, no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.
The broken body and shed blood of our Lord Jesus opened the sinners way into the holiest. These were the tokens of grace and of righteousness. The rending of the veil was not merely an act of Gods power. And it was not merely an act of his grace. Righteousness had done it. Righteousness had rolled away the stone. Righteousness had burst the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron. The barrier of separation has been righteously removed. We have a righteous as well as a gracious entrance into the holy place. God gives sinners a righteous as well as a gracious welcome at his throne!
That which the blood of bulls and goats could never do, Christ has done with his own precious blood! Thank God forever; his is better blood! It knocks but once, and the gate flies open. As soon as the blood touches the sword of fire, it is quenched. Not a moment is lost. The fulness of the time has come. God has unbarred the door! He has thrown open his mercy-seat to poor, needy sinners, and rushes to receive his banished ones!
The veil, then, has been rent in twain from the top to the bottom by the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. The way is open. The blood is sprinkled. The mercy-seat is accessible. And the voice of our Great High Priest, seated on that mercy-seat, bids us enter in, and to enter in boldly, without fear. Having, therefore, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh, and having an High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart, in the full assurance of faith.
Let us therefore enter in and find the mercy and grace we need in him. Entering in is our only security and our only joy. The only way we can enter in by Christ the Way is in the confident boldness of the full assurance of faith, trusting him alone as our all-sufficient, gloriously effectual Saviour. Not to come with such boldness is unbelief. Not to come in the full assurance of faith is presumption. To draw near with an evil conscience is to declare our belief that the blood of the Lamb is not of itself enough to give the sinner a good conscience and a fearless access to the throne of grace.
Do you ask, May I draw near, just as I am, by the blood of Christ? Yes, you may! How else could you come? If ever you see the blood upon the mercy-seat, that will give you the boldness and full assurance of faith by which you may enter in. Do you see it? Has God the Holy Spirit given you eyes to see? Then come boldly in the full assurance of faith. The Triune God looks on the blood, and says, Welcome. The mercy-seat is the place of pardon. No sinner who enters into the holy place, no sinner who comes to the throne of grace by the precious blood of Christ can ever be extracted from it.
The rent veil is liberty of access. The sprinkled blood is boldness, boldness for needy sinners. The rent veil has a voice. The blood is the voice. It speaks pardon, peace, salvation, and eternal life to sinners. Today, if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart! Make haste and enter in!
it: Mat 27:45, Mar 15:33
there: Exo 10:21-23, Psa 105:28, Joe 2:31, Amo 5:18, Amo 8:9, Hab 3:8-11, Act 2:20
earth: or, land
Reciprocal: 2Sa 22:10 – darkness Jer 4:28 – the heavens Mat 20:5 – sixth Mar 15:25 – the Act 3:1 – the hour Act 10:3 – about Rev 6:12 – the sun Rev 8:12 – and the third part of the sun
5
The sixth hour is the same as our noon, which was the hour that darkness settled over the land. The event was prophesied in Joe 2:30-31.
LET us observe in these verses, the miraculous signs which accompanied our Lord’s death on the cross. We are told that there was “a darkness over all the earth” for three hours. “The sun was darkened and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst.”
It was meet and right that the attention of all around Jerusalem should be arrested in a marked way, when the great sacrifice for sin was being offered, and the Son of God was dying. There were signs and wonders wrought in the sight of all Israel, when the law was given on Sinai. There were signs and wonders in like manner when the atoning blood of Christ was shed on Calvary. There was a sign for an unbelieving world. The darkness at mid-day was a miracle which would compel men to think.-There was a sign for the professing Church and the ministers of the temple. The rending of the veil which hung between the holy place and the holy of holies, was a miracle which would strike awe into the heart of every priest and Levite in Jewry.
Signs like these, on special occasions, let us remember, are a part of God’s ways in dealing with man. He knows the desperate stupidity and unbelief of human nature. He sees it necessary to arouse our attention by miraculous works, when He brings in a new dispensation. He thus compels men to open their eyes whether they will or no, and to hear His voice for a little season. He has done so frequently in the days that are past. He did so when He gave the law. He did so in the passage before us when He brought in the Gospel. He will do so once more when Christ comes again the second time. He will show a sneering, unbelieving world that He can suspend the laws of nature at His pleasure, and alter the framework of creation as easily as He called the earth into being. He will yet fulfill His words, “Yet once more, shake I not the earth only, but also the heavens.” “The moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the LORD of hosts shall reign in mount Zion.” (Heb 12:26; Isa 24:23.)
Let us observe, secondly, in these verses, the remarkable words which our Lord spoke when He died. We read that “When he had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost.”
There is a depth of meaning, no doubt, in these words which we have no line to fathom. There was something mysterious about our Lord’s death, which made it unlike the death of any mere man. He who spoke the words before us, we must carefully remember, was God as well as man. His divine and human nature were inseparably united. His divine nature of course could not die. He says Himself; “I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.” (Joh 10:17-18.) Christ died, not as we die when our hour is come,-not because He was compelled and could not help dying,-but voluntarily, and of His own free will.
There is a sense, however, in which our Lord’s words supply a lesson to all true Christians. They show us the manner in which death should be met by all God’s children. They afford an example which every believer should strive to follow. Like our Master, we should not be afraid to confront the king of terrors. We should regard him as a vanquished enemy, whose sting has been taken away by Christ’s death. We should think of him as a foe who can hurt the body for a little season, but after that has no more that he can do. We should await his approaches with calmness and patience, and believe that when flesh fails our soul will be in good keeping. This was the mind of dying Stephen; “Lord Jesus,” he said, “receive my spirit.” This was the mind of Paul the aged, when the time of his departure was at hand. He says, “I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day.” (Act 7:59; 2Ti 1:12.) Happy indeed are those who have a last end like this!
Let us observe, lastly, in these verses, the power of conscience in the case of the centurion and the people who saw Christ die. We are told that the centurion “glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous man.” We are told that the people who had come together to the sight, “smote their breasts and returned.”
We know not exactly the nature of the feelings here described. We know not the extent to which they went, or the after-fruit which they brought forth. One thing, at all events, is clear. The Roman officer felt convinced that he had been superintending an unrighteous action, and crucifying an innocent person. The gazing crowd were pricked to the heart by a sense of having aided, countenanced, and abetted a grievous wrong. Both Jew and Gentile left Calvary that evening heavy-hearted, self-condemned, and ill at ease.
Great indeed is the power of conscience! Mighty is the influence which it is able to exercise on the hearts of men! It can strike terror into the minds of monarchs on their thrones. It can make multitudes tremble and shake before a few bold friends of truth, like a flock of sheep. Blind and mistaken as conscience often is, unable to convert man or lead him to Christ, it is still a most blessed part of man’s constitution, and the best friend in the congregation that the preacher of the Gospel has. No wonder that Paul says, “By manifestation of the truth we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience.” (2Co 4:2.)
He that desires inward peace must beware of quarreling with his conscience. Let him rather use it well, guard it jealously, hear what it has to say, and reckon it his friend. Above all, let him pray daily that his conscience may be enlightened by the Holy Ghost, and cleansed by the blood of Christ. The words of John are very significant: “If our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God.” (1Jn 3:21.) That man is doing well who can say, “I exercise myself to have a conscience void of offence toward God and toward man.” (Act 24:16.)
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Notes-
v44.-[About the sixth hour.] According to the Jewish mode of reckoning, the day began at what we should call six o’clock in the evening. Our Lord was crucified at the third hour, answering to our nine o’clock. The darkness began at the sixth hour, answering to our twelve o’clock in the day. It should be observed, therefore, that the supernatural darkness mentioned here took place precisely at the brightest part of the day, between twelve o’clock and three. Six hours was the whole length of time during which Jesus hung on the cross before He gave up the ghost.
[There was a darkness.] This was a miraculous darkness. It could not have been an eclipse of the sun, because our Lord’s crucifixion took place at the passover, and the passover was always kept at the full moon when an eclipse of the sun is impossible.
[Overall the earth.] The marginal reading of this expression seems preferable,-“over all the land.” There seems no necessity for supposing that the darkness extended beyond Palestine. Our Lord’s ministry was specially directed to Israel, and the land of Israel was the land to which all miracles connected with His life and death were confined. See the same expression in Luk 21:23.
It is difficult to imagine any miraculous sign better calculated to arrest the attention of all people, and to strike awe into all minds than this sudden and unexpected darkness. It necessarily stopped all business, and obliged all men to be still, and think what could be its cause.
v45.-[The sun was darkened.] We are not meant to regard this as a sign, or miracle, distinct from the darkness spoken of in the preceding verse. It is simply an amplification of the same fact, and intended to show how deep and intense the darkness was.
[The veil of the temple was rent.] This miracle must have been as striking and terrible to the priests who ministered in the temple, as the darkness was to the inhabitants of Palestine. It signified the opening of the way into the holiest by Christ’s death,-the passing away of the Jewish dispensation,-and the revelation of the Gospel way of salvation to all mankind.
Doddridge remarks, “This being a high day, it is probable that Caiaphas the high priest might now be performing the solemn act of burning incense before the veil, which, if he did, it is astonishing that his obstinate heart should not be impressed with so awful and significant a phenomenon. There is no room to doubt that many of the other priests who had a hand in Christ’s death saw the pieces of the veil, which considering its texture and other circumstances, must as fully have convinced them of this extraordinary fact, as if they had been present.”
v46.-[Cried with a loud voice.] This expression, as well as all the verse, deserves particular notice. It shows that there was something peculiar and uncommon about our Lord’s death. A dying man’s voice is generally not “loud,” but feeble.
To this circumstance, as well as to the expression “He gave up the ghost,” all the best commentators, from Ambrose downwards, very properly direct our attention. It is evident, they tell us, that the Lord Jesus did not die because He was obliged, but because He chose voluntarily and of His own free will to submit to death. His death was “His own act.” He “offered Himself without spot to God.” (Heb 9:14.)
Alford, after Stier, remarks that “none of the evangelists say that Jesus died, although that expression is ever after used of His death, when stated as one great fact.” Matthew says that He “yielded up the ghost.” Mark, Luke, and John, though in different Greek words, say much the same, “He gave up the ghost.”
I add to this remark that in all the five Old Testament passages which our translators have rendered “giving up the ghost,” the Septuagint Greek translators have not used the expressions applied in the Gospels to our Lord’s death, nor anything like them. Gen 49:33; Job 10:18; Job 11:20; Job 14:10; Jer 15:9. I also remark that the Greek expression about Sapphira, which is rendered, “yielded up the ghost,” (Act 5:10,) is totally different from those used about our Lord’s death.
The remarks of Brentius on the whole verse are peculiarly valuable.
v47.-[This was a righteous man.] It may be doubted whether these words exactly convey the literal sense of the Greek expression. Alford would render it, “truly this man was innocent or just.”
v48.-[Beholding the things which were done.]-This expression seems to point to the darkness, and the earthquake which immediately followed our Lord’s death. These signs struck awe into the minds of the gazing mob, which had mocked our Lord a few hours before. There was no raillery or mocking after this.
Poole maintains that there is no proof that “the people” took part in mocking our Lord on the cross, but that it was confined to the Scribes and priests. Yet the expression of Matthew and Mark, about “those who passed by railing,” besides the priests, seems to make his theory doubtful.
v49.-[The women.] These would appear to be different from the women to whom our Lord spoke as he was carrying the cross. These came from Galilee. Those were “daughters of Jerusalem.”
Luk 23:44-46. THE CLOSING SCENE. See on Mat 27:45-53; Mar 15:33-38. Lukes account is very brief, passing over the tender scene narrated in Joh 19:26-27, the lamentation mentioned by Matthew and Mark, and the last refreshment recorded by all three, but it alone has preserved for us the last word on the cross.
Observe here, 1. What prodigies in nature happened and fell out at the crucifixion of our Saviour; the sun was darkened at the setting of the Sun of Righteousness; and the veil of the temple was rent; signifying that God was now about to forsake his temple; that the ceremonial law was now abolishing, and the partition wall between Jew and Gentile being now pulling down, all may have access to God through the blood of a Mediator.
Observe, 2. The last prayer of our Saviour before his death, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit; they are words full of faith, and comfort, fit to be the last breathings of every gracious soul in the world.
Learn hence, that dying believers are both warranted and encouraged by Christ’s example, believingly to commend their precious souls into the hands of God as a gracious father, Father, into thy hands.
Observe, 3. What influence our Saviour’s death had upon the centurion: He glorified God, saying, Verily, this was a righteous man.
Here note, that Christ had a testimony of his innocency and righteousness given unto him from all sorts of persons whatsoever: Pilate and Herod pronounced him innocent; Pilate’s wife proclaimed him a righteous person; Judas, the traitor, declared it was innocent blood; the thief on the cross affirmed he had done nothing amiss; and the centurion owned him to be a righteous man; yea, the Son of God. Mar 15:39 Only the Pharisees and chief priests, which were teachers of others; not ignorance, but obstinacy and malice, blinded and hardened them to their ruin and destruction; instead of owning and receiving him for their Saviour, they ignominiously put him to death as the vilest impostor.
Luk 23:44-45. About the sixth hour Answering to twelve oclock with us; there was darkness, &c. See on Mat 27:45. The noon-tide darkness, covering the sun, obscured all the upper hemisphere. And the lower was equally darkened, the moon being in opposition to the sun, and so receiving no light from it. Until the ninth hour Or three oclock in the afternoon. And the veil of the temple was rent, &c. See on Mat 27:51.
CXXXIII.
THE CRUCIFIXION.
Subdivision C.
DARKNESS THREE HOURS. AFTER FOUR MORE SAYINGS,
JESUS EXPIRES. STRANGE EVENTS ATTENDING HIS DEATH.
aMATT. XXVII. 45-56; bMARK XV. 33-41; cLUKE XXIII. 44-49; dJOHN XIX. 28-30.
c44 And it was now about the sixth hour, b33 And a45 Now bwhen the sixth hour was come, there was ca darkness came aover all bthe whole land afrom the sixth hour buntil the ninth hour. c45 the sun’s light failing [The darkness lasted from noon until three o’clock. It could not have been an eclipse, for the moon was always full on the first day of the passover. Whether the darkness was over the whole world, or simply all of Palestine, is uncertain, as, according to the usage of Bible language, the words would be the same]: b34 And at {aabout} the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli {bEloi, Eloi,} lama sabachthani? which is, {athat is,} [729] bbeing interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? [We can imagine what it would mean to a righteous man to feel that he was forsaken of God. But the more we feel and enjoy the love of another, the greater our sense of loss at being deprived of it. Considering, therefore, the near and dear relationship between the Son and Father, it is evident that we can never know or fathom the depth of anguish which this cry expressed. Suffice it to say, that this was without doubt the most excruciating of all Christ’s sufferings, and it, too, was a suffering in our stead. The words of the cry are found at Psa 22:1. Eli is Hebrew, Eloi Aramaic or Syro-Chaldaic for “My God.” The former would be used by Jesus if he quoted the Scripture, the latter if he spoke the language of the people.] 35 And some of them that stood by, {athis man} when they heard it, said, bBehold, he {athis man} calleth Elijah. d28 After this Jesus, knowing that all things are now finished, that the scripture might be accomplished, saith, I thirst. 29 There was set there a vessel full of vinegar: a48 And straightway one of them ran, and took a sponge, and filled it with {band filling a sponge full of} vinegar, aand put it on a reed, and gave him to drink. dso they put a sponge full of the vinegar upon hyssop, and brought it to his mouth. bsaying, {a49 And the rest said,} Let be; let us see whether Elijah cometh bto take him down. ato save him. [Jesus had now been upon the cross for six hours, and fever and loss of blood and the strain upon the muscles of his chest had rendered his articulation difficult and indistinct. For this reason some of those who stood by, though perfectly familiar with the language, misunderstood him and thought that he called upon Elijah. Immediately afterwards Jesus speaks of his thirst, and vinegar is given to him to remove the dryness from his throat. Those who give the vinegar and those who stand by, unite in saying “Let be.” This phrase has no reference to the vinegar; it is a general expression, meaning, “Let us do nothing to prevent him from calling upon Elijah, or to prevent Elijah from [730] coming.”] b37 And d30 When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, aJesus cried again with {buttered} a loud voice, dhe said, It is finished [He had come, had ministered, had suffered, and had conquered. There now remained but the simple act of taking possession of the citadel of the grave, and the overthrowing of death. By his righteousness Jesus had triumphed in man’s behalf and the mighty task was accomplished]: c46 And Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit [ Psa 31:5]: and having said this, dhe bowed his head, and gave up {ayielded up} bthe ghost. ahis spirit. [None of the Evangelists speaks of Jesus as dying; for he yielded up his spirit voluntarily– Joh 10:18.] 51 And behold, the veil of the temple was rent in two cin the midst. bfrom the top to the bottom. [The veil was the heavy curtain which hung between the holy and the most holy places in the sanctuary. By shutting out from the most holy place all persons except the high priest, who alone was permitted to pass through it, and this only once in the year, it signified that the way into the holiest–that is, into heaven–was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was standing ( Heb 9:7, Heb 9:8). But the moment that Jesus died, thus making the way manifest, the veil was appropriately rent in twain from top to bottom, disclosing the most holy place to the priests who were at that time offering the evening incense in the holy place.] aand the earth did quake; and the rocks were rent; 52 and the tombs were opened; and many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised; 53 and coming forth out of the tombs after his resurrection they entered into the holy city and appeared unto many. [The earthquake, the rending of the rocks, and the consequent opening of the graves, occurred at the moment Jesus died, while the resurrection and visible appearance in the city of the bodies of the saints occurred “after his resurrection,” for Jesus himself was the “first-born from the dead” ( Col 1:18). Matthew chooses to mention the last event here because of its association with the rending of [731] the rocks, which opened the rock-hewn sepulchres in which the saints had slept. There has been much speculation as to what became of these risen saints. We have no positive information, but the natural presumption is, that they ascended to heaven. These resurrections were symbolic, showing that the resurrection of Christ is the resurrection of the race– 1Co 15:22.] b39 And when the centurion, who stood by awatching Jesus, bover against him, saw that he so gave up the ghost, asaw the earthquake, and the things that were {cwhat was} done, he glorified God, saying, {bhe said,} cCertainly this was a righteous man. a54 Now the centurion, and they that were with him feared exceedingly, saying, Truly this bman was the Son of God. [The conduct of Jesus upon the cross and the disturbances of nature which accompanied his death convinced the centurion that Jesus was a righteous man. But knowing that Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, and this claim was the real cause for which the Jews were crucifying him, he concludes, since he concedes that Jesus is righteous, that he is also all that he professed to be–the Son of God. There is no just reason for minimizing his confession, as though he had said, “A son of the gods;” for he said nothing of that kind, and those err as to the use of Scriptural language who think so. Like the centurions of Capernaum ( Mat 8:10) and Csarea ( Act 10:1, Act 10:2), this Roman surpassed in faith those who had better opportunities. But in this faith he was not alone.] c48 And all the multitudes that came together to this sight, when they beheld the things that were done, returned smiting their breasts. [The people who had acted under the influence of the priests now yielded to superior influences and began to experience that change of sentiment which led so many to repent and confess Christ at Pentecost.] 49 And all his acquaintance, a55 And many women balso awere there beholding cthe women that {awho} had followed cwith aJesus from Galilee, ministering unto him: cstood afar off, abeholding from afar, cseeing these things. bamong [732] whom were both Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses, and Salome; athe mother of the sons of Zebedee. b41 who, when he was in Galilee, followed him, and ministered unto him; and many other women that came up with him unto Jerusalem. [John has already mentioned this group of women (see Act 16:29). The synoptists, who make mention of the women toward the close of the crucifixion, do not mention the mother of Jesus as any longer among them. It is likely that she had withdrawn with John, being unable longer to endure the sight. As to the ministering of these women, see p. 297, 298.]
[FFG 729-733]
JESUS EXPIRES AMID THE DARKNESS
Luk 23:44-46; Joh 19:28-30; Mar 15:33-37; Mat 27:45-50. And from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. Infidelity has ransacked astronomy to find a total solar eclipse at this time and thus account for the darkness. If you will think of one fact you will see the utter folly of such an effort. You know it was the time of the Jewish Passover, which always took place at the full moon of our April. You know this is a time when a solar eclipse is utterly impossible, as the moon is in the east and the sun is in the west, the eclipse necessarily taking place when they are both on the same side of the earth, as the moon must come between the earth and the sun in order to produce the eclipse. Luk 23:45 : And the sun was darkened. This settles the matter against the hypothesis of an eclipse, as the sun is not darkened in that case, but shining as brightly as if no intervening object casts a dark shadow on the earth. The revelation sustains the conclusion that the sun himself actually refused to shine.
He dies, the Friend of sinners dies! Lo, Salems daughters weep around! A solemn darkness veils the skies, A sudden trembling shakes the ground. Come, saints, and drop a tear or two For Him who groaned beneath your load: He shed a thousand drops for you
A thousand drops of richest blood.
Mat 27:46-49 : About the ninth hour, Jesus cried with a great voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? Thus the darkness, prevailed from twelve to three oclock, when our Lord expired with these words. A momentous crisis right here culminates, leading us down into the profoundest depths of the redemptive scheme.
He made Him sin who knew no sin, in order that we may be the righteousness of God in Him. (2Co 5:21.)
In this wonderfully terse statement of the vicarious atonement, be sure you recognize the fact that sin in both clauses is a noun. If you take it for a verb, you ruin the passage. In the Greek, you see on a glance that it is a noun in both instances; but not so in English, which is a loose, unmechanical language, splendid for universal use, but really unfit for a Divine revelation. Consequently, God in mercy made the intensely mechanical Greek, in order to reveal His wonderful truth to the world in such an explicit presentation that human ingenuity: can never evade its legitimate meaning. While Jesus knew no sin i. e., was always perfectly sinless and holy, God made Him sin as a substitute for a guilty world. E. V. gives it to be sin, as you see, italicizing to be, showing thereby that it is not in the original, which is true. To be is objectionable, too much savoring the idea that Jesus in some way had sin in Him, which is utterly incorrect and unsustained by the Scripture. I trow, this moment, when God turned His face away from Him, was the identical crisis when He laid on Him the sins of the whole world, and the above Scripture was verified.
God can not look upon sin under any circumstances; hence when He laid the sins of the whole world on His Own Son, He turned His face away from Him, when the humanity cried out as above. You see here that sin and righteousness are antithetical and coextensive, all sin being laid on Jesus and all the world receiving the righteousness of God i. e., being justified in Him this taking place in infancy, and explaining the fact of universal infantile salvation. This is also the sinners hope. As Jesus carried all of his sins on the cross, he has nothing to do but forsake all, receive the righteousness of God by faith, and become a disciple of our Lord.
And certain ones of those standing by hearing, said, He is calling for Elijah. As they did not understand the Hebrew word Eli, taking the sound, they mistook it for Elijah. And immediately one of them, running, and taking a sponge, and filling it with vinegar, putting it on a reed, gave Him drink. And the rest said, Let Him alone; let us see if Elijah is coming to save Him. They all knew well that Elijah never died, but was translated to heaven alive. Therefore, looking upon him as still alive, and thinking that Jesus was calling him, they did not know but he would ride down from heaven on his fiery chariot, as he had gone up from the land of Moab many centuries ago.
Luk 23:46. Calling with a great voice, Jesus said, Father, into Thy hands I will commit My spirit. And saying these things, He expired. Matthew and John say, He gave up His spirit; i. e., the human spirit left the body, going into Hades as above described, proclaimed His victory in hell, meeting the thief and all the Old Testament saints in the intermediate paradise, and returned the third morn, when He re-entered His body. As Jesus is both man and God, He has a perfect human soul and body, like Adam before he fell. O what a time the soul-sleeping heresy has with plain and unmistakable Scriptures like these, showing positively that Jesus had a human soul, which He gave up when He died, and it returned to His body in the resurrection, as they are under the necessity either to abandon their false doctrine or prove that Jesus had no soul, which you see flatly contradicts the Word of God, as here given! I hope, reader, if you have a creed of any kind you will throw it away, and take the Bible for your only guide. If your creed is true, you do not need it, as the Bible includes it; if untrue throw it away, lest it lead you to hell.
Luk 23:44-49. The Death of Jesus (Mar 15:33-41*, Mat 27:45-56*).
Luk 23:45. the suns light failing: the words do not necessarily imply an eclipse. The rending of the Temple veil is earlier than in Mk.
Luk 23:46. Instead of the cry, Eloi, eloi, etc., we have Father, into thy hands, etc., which is also from the Psalms (Psa 31:5).
Luk 23:47. The centurions words are given in such a form as to confirm the Roman opinion of Jesus innocence. His confession was in itself a glorifying of God.
Luk 23:49. The first word should be but; a contrast is drawn between the friends of Jesus and the crowd. According to Lk. the former were not solely women: perhaps he is influenced by prophecy, e.g. Psa 88:8; Psa 38:11.
Verse 44
Sixth hour; noon.
23:44 {13} And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour.
(13) Christ, even being at the point of death, shows himself to be God almighty even to the blind.
Jesus’ self-sacrifice to God 23:44-49 (cf. Matthew 27:45-56; Mark 15:33-41; John 19:28-30)
Luke included three things in this heart of the death scene. He gave two evidences of God’s displeasure with people for rejecting His Son, he recorded Jesus’ prayer of trust in the Father, and he noted three immediate reactions to Jesus’ death.
Luke arranged these unusual occurrences to show God’s displeasure with humankind for rejecting His Son. [Note: Marshall, The Gospel . . ., pp. 873-74.] The sixth and ninth hours were noon and 3:00 p.m. respectively. Darkness obscuring the sun represented judgment obscuring the beneficent light of God’s countenance (cf. Isa 5:30; Isa 60:2; Joe 2:30-31; Amo 5:18; Amo 5:20; Zep 1:14-18; Luk 22:53; Act 2:20; 2Pe 2:17; Rev 6:12-17). Evidently this was a local rather than a universal phenomenon. It could not have been a solar eclipse since Passover occurred at the full moon.
Luke moved the tearing of the temple veil up in his narrative whereas Matthew and Mark placed it after Jesus’ death as a consequence of that event. It symbolizes the opening of the way into God’s presence that Jesus’ death effected in those Gospels. However in Luke the reader sees it as a sign of God’s wrath. Specifically it seems to represent God’s judgment on Judaism for rejecting the Messiah. It was a portent of the judgment coming on Jerusalem that Jesus had predicted.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
I. First, let us view this darkness as A MIRACLE WHICH AMAZES US.
II. Secondly, I desire you to regard this darkness as A VEIL WHICH CONCEALS.
III. Now we pass on to speak of this darkness as A SYMBOL WHICH INSTRUCTS. The yell falls down and conceals; but at the same time, as an emblem, it reveals.
IV. I come to my fourth point, and my closing words will deal with THE SYMPATHY WHICH PROPHESIES. Do you see the sympathy of mature with her Lord–the sympathy of the sun in the heavens with the Sun of Righteousness? It was not possible for Him by whom all things were made to be in darkness, and for nature to remain in the light.
I. THE SUGGESTIONS OF THIS DARKNESS.
II. THE EFFECTS OF THE DARKNESS UPON THOSE WHO SURROUNDED THE CROSS.
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
David in a certain sense utters as his motto of life, that He uses as His dying device.
5. The last word on the cross an unequivocal argument for the personality of God, as well as for the personality of the human spirit and its individual immortality. Whoever could think that Jesus, with these words, breathed out His life forever into the empty air, such an one certainly knows nothing of the true, living spirit, and, consequently, nothing of the living God, and of the living power of the Crucified One. Ullmann.
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Fuente: Commentaries on the New Testament and Prophets
Fuente: Discovering Christ In Selected Books of the Bible
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Fuente: Ryle’s Expository Thoughts on the Gospels
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)