聖書注解書

Let him deliver him now (ρυσασθω νυν). They add the word "now" to Matthew 27:21; Matthew 22:8. That is the point of the sneer at Christ's claim to be God's son thrown in his teeth again and at the willingness and power of God to help his "son." The verb θελω here may mean love as in the Septuagint (Psalms 18:20; Psalms 41:12) or "cares for" (Moffatt), "gin he cares ocht for him" (Braid Scots).

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The robbers also (κα ο ληιστα). Probably "even the robbers" (Weymouth) who felt a momentary superiority to Jesus thus maligned by all. So the inchoative imperfect ωνειδιζον means "began to reproach him."

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From the sixth hour (απο εκτης ωρας). Curiously enough McNeile takes this to mean the trial before Pilate (John 18:14). But clearly John uses Roman time, writing at the close of the century when Jewish time was no longer in vogue. It was six o'clock in the morning Roman time when the trial occurred before Pilate. The crucifixion began at the third hour (Mark 15:25) Jewish time or nine A.M. The darkness began at noon, the sixth hour Jewish time and lasted till 3 P.M. Roman time, the ninth hour Jewish time (Mark 15:33; Matthew 27:45; Luke 23:44). The dense darkness for three hours could not be an eclipse of the sun and Luke (Luke 23:45) does not so say, only "the sun's light failing." Darkness sometimes precedes earthquakes and one came at this time or dense masses of clouds may have obscured the sun's light. One need not be disturbed if nature showed its sympathy with the tragedy of the dying of the Creator on the Cross (Romans 8:22), groaning and travailing until now.

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My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me? (Θεε μου, θεε μου, ινα τ με εγκατελιπεσ;). Matthew first transliterates the Aramaic, according to the Vatican manuscript (B), the words used by Jesus: Eloi, eloi, lema sabachthanei; Some of the MSS. give the transliteration of these words from Psalms 22:1 in the Hebrew (Eli, Eli, lama Zaphthanei). This is the only one of the seven sayings of Christ on the Cross given by Mark and Matthew. The other six occur in Luke and John. This is the only sentence of any length in Aramaic preserved in Matthew, though he has Aramaic words like amen, corban, mammon, pascha, raca, Satan, Golgotha. The so-called Gospel of Peter preserves this saying in a Docetic (Cerinthian) form: "My power, my power, thou hast forsaken me!" The Cerinthian Gnostics held that the aeon Christ came on the man Jesus at his baptism and left him here on the Cross so that only the man Jesus died. Nothing from Jesus so well illustrates the depth of his suffering of soul as he felt himself regarded as sin though sinless (2 Corinthians 5:21). John 3:16 comes to our relief here as we see the Son of God bearing the sin of the world. This cry of desolation comes at the close of the three hours of darkness.

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Gave him to drink (εποτιζεν). Imperfect of conative action, offered him a drink of vinegar on the sponge on a reed. Others interrupted this kindly man, but Jesus did taste this mild stimulant (John 19:30) for he thirsted (John 19:28).

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Whether Elijah cometh to save him (ε ερχετα Ελειας σωσων αυτον). The excuse had a pious sound as they misunderstood the words of Jesus in his outcry of soul anguish. We have here one of the rare instances (σωσων) of the future participle to express purpose in the N.T. though a common Greek idiom. Some ancient MSS. add here what is genuine in John 19:34, but what makes complete wreck of the context for in verse Matthew 27:50 Jesus cried with a loud voice and was not yet dead in verse Matthew 27:49. It was a crass mechanical copying by some scribe from John 19:34. See full discussion in my Introduction to the Textual Criticism of the N.T.

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Yielded up his spirit (αφηκεν το πνευμα). The loud cry may have been Psalms 31:5 as given in Luke 23:46: "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." John (John 19:30) gives It is finished (τετελεστα), though which was actually last is not clear. Jesus did not die from slow exhaustion, but with a loud cry. He breathed out (εξεπνευσεν, Mark 15:37), sent back his spirit (Matthew 27:50), gave up his spirit (παρεδωκεν το πνευμα, John 19:30). "He gave up his life because he willed it, when he willed it, and as he willed it" (Augustine). Stroud (Physical Cause of the Death of Christ) considers the loud cry one of the proofs that Jesus died of a ruptured heart as a result of bearing the sin of the world.

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Was rent (εσχισθη). Both Mark (Mark 15:38) and Luke (Luke 23:45) mention also this fact. Matthew connects it with the earthquake, "the earth did quake" (η γη εσεισθη). Josephus (War VI. 299) tells of a quaking in the temple before the destruction and the Talmud tells of a quaking forty years before the destruction of the temple. Allen suggests that "a cleavage in the masonry of the porch, which rent the outer veil and left the Holy Place open to view, would account for the language of the Gospels, of Josephus, and of the Talmud." This veil was a most elaborately woven fabric of seventy-two twisted plaits of twenty-four threads each and the veil was sixty feet long and thirty wide. The rending of the veil signified the removal of the separation between God and the people (Gould).

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