Those who were present last year
at the same talk on the Sufferings of Christ, perhaps may remember that at the
time, having read the Gospel of the Evangelist Matthew on the Sufferings of the
Savior, we talked here about the Gethsemane prayer of the Savior, how He, in
order to redeem sinners, took upon Himself the sinfulness of all mankind. Just
now we heard the account of the Savior’s Sufferings from the Evangelist John
the Theologian. Let us emphasize now the characteristic uniqueness of this
particular account. It is known that the first three Gospel readings, those of
Evangelists Matthew, Mark and Luke, are significantly alike, while the Gospel of
St. John differs significantly from the first three. Many things which they say
are not found in St. John’s Gospel. And on the contrary, many things which they
do not say, he cites and at times in great detail.
The Evangelist Matthew, the
Evangelist Mark and the Evangelist Luke speak about the prayer in the Garden of
Gethsemane. We began today’s Gospel reading from the moment when the Gethsemane
prayer had ended and the Savior of the world, strengthened by this prayer for
that great podvig for which He came, comes out to meet His betrayer and
that crowd of armed people together with the enemies of Christ who had come to
take Him (speaking in contemporary language, to arrest Him). The Evangelist
John does not speak of the Gethsemane prayer, he merely hints at it, saying in
the very beginning that Jesus, “knowing what would happen to Him, came out to
meet them.” Judas was here and a militarized guard, and the enemies of the
Savior — the publicans and the Pharisees, members of the Sanhedrin.
And then the Savior addresses
them saying, “Whom do you seek?” They answered, “Jesus of Nazareth.” The Lord
responded briefly, “It is I.” But upon this response they drew back and fell to
the ground. Rarely, rarely did the Lord Jesus Christ in such a manner allow
people to feel His fearful, limitless, divine power, and here He merely spoke
two words, and it was as if a terrible lightning of divinity flashed in this
brief answer and they all crumbled to the ground. They rise up disoriented,
and the Lord again poses the same question; they repeat their response. Then
the Lord says to them once again: “I have already told you that it is I.” But
evidently He said this in a quite ordinary tone, and immediately out of concern
for His apostles, He says, “Leave them be; let them go.” We also know how
Simeon Peter attempted to defend Him, striking the servant of the high priest,
cutting off his ear, but the Lord said to Peter to put his sword in its sheath
and Himself healed the wounded servant.
Saint John the Evangelist says
that the Savior was led from the Garden of Gethsemane first to the high priest
Annas and there the high priest questioned him about His teaching and about
His disciples. But the Lord responded in His characteristic manner, saying
that by questioning Him, the high priest had violated the established order of
prosecution. According to those times, first the witnesses were to be
questioned and only then the accused. Had there been no one present there who
had heard the teachings of the Savior, what things He had said, then the high
priest would have been right. But he immediately addresses the Savior, and the
Lord, gently and tactfully pointing out the incorrectness, says, “I never said
anything in secret. I always spoke where Jews had assembled. Why do you
question me? Ask those who heard. They heard those things which I spoke.”
Gently and tactfully the Lord steers the high priest onto the correct path of
prosecution, but one of the servants of the high priest, desiring to show
loyalty to his chief, feigning disdain at the insolence of the response, struck
the Savior on the cheek, saying: “Do you answer the high priest in this manner?”
The answer of our Savior was simple; the Lord meekly responded to this: “If I
spoke evil, bear witness of the evil, but if I spoke well, why do you smite
me?” Incidentally, a tradition has been preserved among the writings of the
holy fathers, that the one who smote the Savior was the same one whom He had
healed of paralysis. This is how he thanked his Divine Healer!
Then the Savior was led to
Caiaphus, the high priest, who was the chief priest. It is during these hours,
as we know, that Peter’s terrible denial occurs. Apostle Peter, who just
recently had made oath and sworn that he would even die for his Teacher, is
gripped here with fear of a servant woman, is frightened of the persistent
questioning and with an oath denies knowing Him thrice. The apostle and evangelist
John, almost immediately after this, speaks of how the Savior was sent to the
Prætorium to Pilate so that he be interrogated by the ruler himself in the
judgment hall. The head of the regime comes out and asks: “What charge do you
levy against this Man; what is He accused of?” The Jews answered this question
on the one hand rudely with a shade of insolence, on the other hand they
emphasized their own helplessness. “If He were not an evil doer we would not
have brought Him to you.” The Gospel says that to this unsubstantiated
statement, Pilate merely responded: “Take Him and judge Him according to your
own law.” It was then that they announced that “it was not lawful” for them to
put anyone to death, to kill him or have him killed, thereby demonstrating
that they had already reached a verdict but lacked the means to carry it out
themselves and therefore were asking the prosecutor to do this. Then Pilate
entered into his Prætorium and the Savior is brought to him. He asks Him: “Are
You the King of the Jews?” The Savior answers the question with a question.
“Are you asking this of yourself or did others tell you of Me?” In other words,
are you asking this for your own sake or on the basis of what others had told
you. Was this question a mere formality based on what others had said about Me,
or are you yourself interested to know? Pilate responded to this haughtily,
like a Roman, like a high-placed Roman official, aware of his authority: “Am I
a Jew? Your nation and their leaders handed You over to me. What have You
done?” And then, in responding to the question whether He is King of the Jews
the Lord says: “My Kingdom is not of this world.” Let every person remember
this, every person who wishes to lower the Church onto a platform of some sort
of human organization, even if it be the most lofty, the most benevolent, but
nonetheless a human organization. “My Kingdom is not of this world!” the
Savior says categorically. “If My Kingdom were of this world then would My
servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Jews.” That is, if My
Kingdom were of this world, like every other kingdom, then I would have my
defenders who would not permit that which is occurring now. “But now is My
Kingdom not from hence” says the Lord.
We know how when the Lord was
speaking with Pilate He added these words, directing them now to his inner
sense, to his heart, to his conscience: “To this end was I born, and for this
cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth.” He
said this immediately after he gave Pilate an answer to his question: “Are you
the King of the Jews?” “Thou sayest that I am a king.” According to the
phraseology of those days this signified an affirmative answer: yes, I am a
king. But the Lord says: “For this purpose was I born and for this cause I came
into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth, and every one who is
of the truth shall hear My voice.” This appeal to Pilate’s moral sense, to his
heart, to his conscience passed him by. Standing before the Savior was a
representative of Roman skepticism, who had decisively disbelieved everything
and no longer believed in anything, but especially in some kind of truth!
Probably, when Pilate was hearing this, he was thinking: “He’s talking about
truth now! Does truth even exist?! Every one has his own concept of truth, and
even if it exists somewhere far off what does it matter?” Therefore, evidently
evading the issue he merely says: “What is truth?” and with that walked away
from his accused.
This is a tragic moment, my
beloved! The answer was standing in front of Pilate. A living incarnate answer!
The One Who said of Himself: “I am the way, the truth, the life.” But Pilate
could not see the truth in the Truth and with his skeptical answer he turned
away from the Living Truth; he walked away, however saying: “I find in Him no
fault” — that is to say, I do not find Him guilty of anything. Then he hears
the people demanding that Barrabas be released, as was the custom at Passover.
(St. John the Theologian does not mention this, but the other Evangelists
speak of this.) Pilate asks the people, “whom shall I release, Barrabas or
Jesus called the Christ?” Undoubtedly Pilate was convinced that the people
would say Jesus because Barrabas was a murderer, thief and rebel. But when they
shouted: “Not this One, but Barrabas,” then Pilate became perplexed. St. John
the Evangelist says that Pilate, upon hearing this, took Jesus and had Him
flogged. Flogging is a horrific punishment from which many died not being able
to endure it, yet Pilate had just said that he found no guilt in Him. Then for
what reason did he order Him to be flogged? Yet he ordered it…. Covered in
blood from head to foot, wearing a purple robe and a thorny crown, the Savior
stood before him after the flogging, and undoubtedly the cruel and harsh heart
of the pagan shuddered when he saw what his industrious soldiers had
done with their Victim…
And again, in the hopes that the
crowd would understand what was happening and take pity on the Innocent
Accused, such a mutilated and tortured Man, Pilate brings Him out before them
and says: “Behold the Man!” Look at Him, for He is a person just like us
people!... However not even this appeases the malice of the crowd, their insatiable
malice. And they then began to shout: “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” Then Pilate
says: “Ye take Him and crucify Him, for I find no fault in Him” i.e.,
what has already been done is not enough for you, so take and crucify Him yourselves;
I find no guilt in him at all. He seems to be saying: “I have already made a
concession toward you by ordering the flogging of a Man Whom I consider to be
innocent. But if you want to also crucify Him, then crucify Him yourselves.”
But they could not do this, so they say to Pilate: “We have a law and according
to our law He must die for He has called Himself the Son of God.” But this
caused a reaction which they evidently did not foresee. The Gospel says that
Pilate, having heard this word “he was the more afraid,” he became more
frightened, for at the time the Romans held a belief that the gods could appear
on earth in the form of a man. Pilate became afraid and again leads the Savior
into his judgment hall and asks Him, “where are You from?” At this moment when
the trial is underway, the Evangelist Matthew indicates that Pilate’s wife
sends him word that he “not do anything evil to this Righteous Man, for in my
sleep I suffered greatly because of Him.” And this, of course, added to
Pilate’s alarm. But when he asked Christ “whence art Thou?” the Lord did not
start to answer the question of the one who had turned away from the question
concerning truth and “Jesus gave no answer.” The pride of the high ruler spoke
out and he says: “Speakest thou not unto me? Knowest thou not that I have power
to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?” You are in my hands, You are
in my power and You don’t answer me?! The Lord Savior’s answer is touching:
“You had no power over me if it had not been given to you from on high, and
therefore those who delivered Me to you have a greater sin.” Notice how the
Lord does not wish to either compound, emphasize or increase Pilate’s guilt.
He already sees the limit of the power he has over the decree demanded by the
enemies, and yet here also it is as if the Lord is attempting to minimize,
reduce his guilt, He tries if not to justify but to somehow excuse him and
says: “your main sin is not the greatest, but he who delivered Me to you, he
has the main sin.” And this evidently moved Pilate and it is stated outright
that just from that moment, Pilate tried especially to let Him go, but he did
not find the courage within himself when he heard the accusation of the Jews
that “if you let Him go you will be no friend of Caesar’s.” Of course this
could not have been pleasant for Pilate to hear, for the cruel and suspicious
Tiberius was Caesar at the time. Pilate imagined what would happen to him when
it is reported to Tiberius that he had released the One Who called Himself King
of the Jews. At that point, he was completely gripped by fear; he still attempted
to resist and brought the Savior out again before the people and said: “Here is
your King!” And those high priests and publicans who so hated Roman rule, of
which they could not calmly hear, who had only one desire — to be freed from
this odious subordination, shouted as if they were loyal and faithful Roman
citizens: “We have no king but Caesar.” We have not nor do we know any king
besides Caesar. “Then delivered he Him therefore unto them to be crucified.”
As St. John the Evangelist
writes: “And they took Jesus and led Him away.” Carrying His cross, He walked
toward Golgotha, as tradition says, exhausted from all He had endured and the
terrible flogging, blood-drenched, He was losing His strength. He was falling
under the weight of the cross, until finally the soldiers compelled the
able-bodied Simon a Cyrenian to take His cross and carry it himself.
The Savior is crucified between
two thieves. The scribes and pharisees saw the sign which Pilate had fastened
to the cross: “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews,” and began to demand that
he change it, for it was an embarrassment and disgrace for the Jews that their
King should be nailed to the cross, executed so disgracefully. “No,” they say,
“write that He is an imposter. Do not write that He is King of the Jews, but
rather that He said ‘I am King of the Jews’.” In other words, He claimed He was
king. But they had already exasperated Pilate with their persistence and their
insatiable malice and he answered them: “What I have written I have written.”
We know how at the Cross of
Christ stood His most blessed Mother, His beloved disciple, the only one who
did not become afraid and did not flee but walked behind Him to the Cross, the
myrrh-bearing women who were loyal and devoted and were not unfaithful to Him.
We know, finally, how the terrible suffering of Christ ended, when the Lord
Jesus Christ, Who had endured incredible physical suffering (for the agony on
the cross was particularly terrible) fiery torments, but for Him it was
immeasurably more acute and torturous because He was without sin. It was not
within His nature to suffer so, just as it is not within the nature of a person
who is engulfed in fire to suddenly be covered with a layer of ice. For Him
sufferings were unnatural and therefore incomparably more torturous than for
all of us. He endured them without complaint and He endured an immeasurably
greater, terrible inner cross, suffering for the sins of the people,
which He took upon Himself, and for which His Father forsook Him... and
when this terrible, mystical abandonment of Him by the Father occurred, at that
moment on the Cross He exclaimed: “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?!”
Notice, He had always called Him Father, yet here He cries out: “My God, My
God!” He calls Him God, like the worst of sinners. As the holy hierarch
Innocent of Cherson said: “In these moments it was as if the divinity of the
Son of God was concealed within the soul of the Man Jesus, leaving Him as if He
were one of us, enduring this terrible agony... God the Father Himself and the
Holy Spirit alone know what He endured then... If before us one millionth part
of that suffering which He endured then were to be revealed, our hearts would
burst, unable to endure it...”
The suffering on the Cross nears
its end, in fulfillment of the prophecy. The Lord exclaims: “I thirst!” For
He, like any one being crucified, was tortured by unbearable thirst. But as it
was said in one sermon, this exclamation had a greater significance: “I thirst
for your salvation, O sinner! That it may be accomplished, finally!” He
accomplishes his feat for sinners, and the Savior of the world, experiencing
the last bitterness, tasting the vinegar mixed with gall, finally called out:
“It is finished (accomplished)!”
What was accomplished? That which
was spoken of yet in Paradise, which was foretold by the prophets, which was
prefigured by a multitude of Old Testament events but particularly all the
whole-burnt offerings of the Old Testament. How many prefigurative lambs were
slaughtered n the history of the Hebrew nation, until finally the Lamb of God
was slaughtered Who took upon Himself the sins of the entire world. That which
was accomplished was what the entire world had been waiting for, not only what
the Jewish nation was awaiting. The entire human race, without even realizing
it, was awaiting it as well. Finally the purpose for which the Son of God came
to earth was accomplished. He accomplished the salvation of the human race.
Amen.
Source: Living Orthodoxy, Vol. XXXV, No. 2; Mar - Apr
2015, #206, pp. 6-10.
