The Book of the Holy Rosary: Part II, Chapter X. Jesus Dies on the Cross
The Holy Scripture Narrative
“And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, they crucified Him there, and the robbers, the one on the right hand, and the other on the left. And Jesus said: Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.... And it was almost the sixth hour, and there was 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 Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying: Father, unto Thy hands I commend My spirit. And saying this, He gave up the ghost” (Luke xxiii. 33, 34, 44, 46).
The following commentary of the great St Augustine will briefly explain the principal circumstances of the crucifixion and death of Jesus Christ:—“That two thieves were crucified, the one on His right and the other on His left, shows that some would suffer, as it were, on His right hand, and others on His left—those on the right being they of whom it is said, ‘Blessed are those that suffer persecution for the sake of justice;’ and those on the left, to whom the Apostle’s words apply, ‘And though I should give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing’ (1 Cor. xiii. 3).
“That a title was placed over His Cross, on which it was written, ‘The King of the Jews,’ shows, notwithstanding that the Jews were putting Him to death, they could not help themselves from having Him for King over them, hereafter to manifest His power, and to render to them according to their works. As it is written in the Psalm, ‘I am set up by Him to be King over His holy mountain Sion’ (Ps. ii. 6).
“By the title being written in the three languages, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, it is signified that He was to reign not only over the Jews, but also over the Gentiles. In the same Psalm where it is said, ‘I am set up by Him to be King over Sion, His holy mountain,’ that is, where the Hebrew language prevailed, there is immediately added, as if subjoining the Greek and Latin title, ‘The Lord said unto Me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten Thee. Ask of Me, and I will give Thee nations for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession’ (Ps. ii.) Not that the Greek and Latin languages are the only languages known to the nations, but they are more excellent than any of the others—the Greek on account of its literature, and the Latin on account of the superior intelligence of the Romans. But although in these three languages the future subjugation to Christ of the whole body of the nations is shown, it is not any the more on this account written on His title, ‘King of the Gentiles,’ but ‘King of the Jews.’ ‘For the law,’ it is written, ‘shall go forth from Sion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem’ (Isa. ii. 3). And who are the speakers in the Psalm who say, ‘He hath subdued the people to us, and the nations under our feet’ (Ps. xlvi. 4), except they of whom the Apostle says, ‘For if the nations have been partakers with them in spiritual things, they ought also to minister to them in carnal things’ (Rom. xv. 27).
“In that His garments, which the soldiers carried off, were divided into four parts, by this are signified the four quarters of the globe, into which His sacraments were to find their way.
“By their casting lots for His vesture, which was woven without seam from the top downwards, rather than part it among themselves, is very clearly shown that some might come to have the visible sacraments, which are the garments of Christ, without their being possessed of an entirely sincere faith, which works through love a perfect union with God. ‘For the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given to us.’ This perfect union being imparted by the secret grace of God as it were by lot. Hence St Peter said to Simon Magus, who had obtained baptism without the grace of which we are speaking, ‘Thou hast neither part nor lot in this faith.’
“In that, when hanging on the Cross, He recognised His Mother, and commended her to the care of His beloved disciple, in this He suitably showed His human affections at the time when He was about to die as Man. His hour was not then come, at the time when He said to His Mother, as He was about to turn the water into wine, ‘Lady, what is there between thee and Me? My hour is not yet come.’ For He did not take from Mary that which He had as being God, but He took from her that which hung upon the Cross.
“When He said ‘I thirst,’ He was seeking for faith in His own people; but because He came to His own, and His own received Him not, for the sweetness of faith they gave Him the vinegar of treachery, and this upon a sponge—like sponges as they were themselves, swollen up, without solidity, full of the tortuous openings and lurking crevices of snares and deceits.
“In that He said, ‘It is finished, and bowing His head, He gave up the ghost,’ He showed not the compulsory, but the voluntary character of His death, by waiting until all things were fulfilled which had been foretold of Him in prophecy. For this also was written, ‘And in My thirst they gave Me vinegar to drink’ (Ps. lxxviii. 22). As one who possessed, as He had Himself testified, the power to lay down His life, He gave up His life by an act of humility, that is, ‘bowing down His head,’ to receive His life again in His resurrection, with His head lifted up. The patriarch Jacob showed in a figure the great power of this death and the bowing down His head in the benediction of Juda, ‘Lying down thou hast ascended up,’ ‘As a lion thou hast fallen asleep,’ by the ‘lying down’ signifying His death, and by the lion, His power.
“In that the legs of the two thieves were broken, while no bone of His was touched on account of His being already dead, the Gospels explain the reason. For it was necessary that the figure of the Pasch of the Jews should be fulfilled, it being a precept of the law as regards the Pasch, ‘that no bone of the lamb should be broken.’
“In that His side was pierced with a spear, and that there flowed forth from it both water and blood, are signified beyond doubt the sacraments from which the Church is formed, as Eve was taken from the side of Adam when he was thrown into a deep sleep, Adam being the figure of Him who was to come” (Augustine, Sermon ccxviii., Sermon to the People on the Passion and Death of Jesus).
In the preceding commentary of the great St Augustine, the devout reader will find perhaps the most concise, and at the same time the most complete, commentary on the prominent events of our Lord’s Passion. “The well is here very deep,” and since volumes have been written, and may be written, in order not to be lost in the multitude of pious meditations that press in upon the mind, we will endeavour to concentrate our thoughts on the three following truths:—1. That Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of God, known from all eternity, by His own will died on the Cross in the sight of all the people, a true and real death, inflicted upon Him from His own choice, by the hands of His enemies.
2. That the death of Jesus Christ has satisfied, and alone could satisfy, for the sin of Adam.
3. That by His death the way of salvation has been truly purchased for all men.
On the first of these truths, St Athanasius, the great Doctor of the Eastern Church, writes as follows:—“Our Divine Redeemer did not come to be the Author of His own death, but to receive death at the hands of man. For He who is the Life itself is not the Author of death. He did not therefore put off the body by a death of which He was Himself the cause, but He endured a death inflicted by the hands of men. For, notwithstanding that His body had been afflicted and had suffered in the sight of men, it was not becoming that He who was to heal the sins of others should suffer sickness in His own person. And even if, without submitting to any disease, He had put off His body apart in some remote place, He would not have been believed when speaking of His resurrection. For with what kind of reason could He have openly proclaimed His resurrection, if He had chosen to die in secret? What calumnies would not His unbelieving adversaries have invented and propagated, if His death had been in private? And, how else was it possible that the victory of Christ over death should have been made manifest, otherwise than by His being seen to undergo death in public in the sight of all men, He should thereby prove death to have been swallowed up in the incorruptibility of His body? But you will say, at least, He ought to have devised for Himself a more glorious death, and to have avoided the death of the Cross. But if He had done this, He would have made Himself suspected of not having power over every kind of death. In the same manner, then, as the combatant who overcomes everything that is opposed to him, thereby proves himself to be superior to all, so the Life itself who gives life to all men, chose the manner of His death for the express reason that, both in itself and in being inflicted by His enemies, it might be the most dreadful and shameful of all possible deaths. Such, then, was the abominable death of the Cross, and He chose it in order that, having destroyed it, the dominion of death might be thereby absolutely and entirely overthrown; for which reason His head was not cut off, as was that of John the Baptist, He was not sawn asunder, as Isaias, that He might preserve His body entire and indivisible in death, and not become a pretext for those who would divide the Church.