Catholic Caucus: Daily Readings, 03-21-08; Solemn Observance; Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion

Reading 1
Is 52:13—53:12

See, my servant shall prosper,
he shall be raised high and greatly exalted.
Even as many were amazed at him
so marred was his look beyond human semblance
and his appearance beyond that of the sons of man
so shall he startle many nations,
because of him kings shall stand speechless;
for those who have not been told shall see,
those who have not heard shall ponder it.

Who would believe what we have heard?
To whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
He grew up like a sapling before him,
like a shoot from the parched earth;
there was in him no stately bearing to make us look at him,
nor appearance that would attract us to him.
He was spurned and avoided by people,
a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity,
one of those from whom people hide their faces,
spurned, and we held him in no esteem.

Yet it was our infirmities that he bore,
our sufferings that he endured,
while we thought of him as stricken,
as one smitten by God and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our offenses,
crushed for our sins;
upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole,
by his stripes we were healed.
We had all gone astray like sheep,
each following his own way;
but the LORD laid upon him
the guilt of us all.

Though he was harshly treated, he submitted
and opened not his mouth;
like a lamb led to the slaughter
or a sheep before the shearers,
he was silent and opened not his mouth.

Oppressed and condemned, he was taken away,
and who would have thought any more of his destiny?
When he was cut off from the land of the living,
and smitten for the sin of his people,
a grave was assigned him among the wicked
and a burial place with evildoers,
though he had done no wrong
nor spoken any falsehood.
But the LORD was pleased
to crush him in infirmity.

If he gives his life as an offering for sin,
he shall see his descendants in a long life,
and the will of the LORD shall be accomplished through him.

Because of his affliction
he shall see the light in fullness of days;
through his suffering, my servant shall justify many,
and their guilt he shall bear.
Therefore I will give him his portion among the great,
and he shall divide the spoils with the mighty,
because he surrendered himself to death
and was counted among the wicked;
and he shall take away the sins of many,
and win pardon for their offenses.

Responsorial Psalm
Ps 31:2, 6, 12-13, 15-16, 17, 25

R. (Lk 23:46) Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
In you, O LORD, I take refuge;
let me never be put to shame.
In your justice rescue me.
Into your hands I commend my spirit;
you will redeem me, O LORD, O faithful God.
R. Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
For all my foes I am an object of reproach,
a laughingstock to my neighbors, and a dread to my friends;
they who see me abroad flee from me.
I am forgotten like the unremembered dead;
I am like a dish that is broken.
R. Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
But my trust is in you, O LORD;
I say, “You are my God.
In your hands is my destiny; rescue me
from the clutches of my enemies and my persecutors.”
R. Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
Let your face shine upon your servant;
save me in your kindness.
Take courage and be stouthearted,
all you who hope in the LORD.
R. Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.

Reading II
Heb 4:14-16; 5:7-9

Brothers and sisters:
Since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens,
Jesus, the Son of God,
let us hold fast to our confession.
For we do not have a high priest
who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses,
but one who has similarly been tested in every way,
yet without sin.
So let us confidently approach the throne of grace
to receive mercy and to find grace for timely help.

In the days when Christ was in the flesh,
he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears
to the one who was able to save him from death,
and he was heard because of his reverence.
Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered;
and when he was made perfect,
he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.

Gospel
Jn 18:1—19:42

Jesus went out with his disciples across the Kidron valley
to where there was a garden,
into which he and his disciples entered.
Judas his betrayer also knew the place,
because Jesus had often met there with his disciples.
So Judas got a band of soldiers and guards
from the chief priests and the Pharisees
and went there with lanterns, torches, and weapons.
Jesus, knowing everything that was going to happen to him,
went out and said to them, “Whom are you looking for?”
They answered him, “Jesus the Nazorean.”
He said to them, “I AM.”
Judas his betrayer was also with them.
When he said to them, “I AM,"
they turned away and fell to the ground.
So he again asked them,
“Whom are you looking for?”
They said, “Jesus the Nazorean.”
Jesus answered,
“I told you that I AM.
So if you are looking for me, let these men go.”
This was to fulfill what he had said,
“I have not lost any of those you gave me.”
Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it,
struck the high priest’s slave, and cut off his right ear.
The slave’s name was Malchus.
Jesus said to Peter,
“Put your sword into its scabbard.
Shall I not drink the cup that the Father gave me?”

So the band of soldiers, the tribune, and the Jewish guards seized Jesus,
bound him, and brought him to Annas first.
He was the father-in-law of Caiaphas,
who was high priest that year.
It was Caiaphas who had counseled the Jews
that it was better that one man should die rather than the people.

Simon Peter and another disciple followed Jesus.
Now the other disciple was known to the high priest,
and he entered the courtyard of the high priest with Jesus.
But Peter stood at the gate outside.
So the other disciple, the acquaintance of the high priest,
went out and spoke to the gatekeeper and brought Peter in.
Then the maid who was the gatekeeper said to Peter,
“You are not one of this man’s disciples, are you?”
He said, “I am not.”
Now the slaves and the guards were standing around a charcoal fire
that they had made, because it was cold,
and were warming themselves.
Peter was also standing there keeping warm.

The high priest questioned Jesus
about his disciples and about his doctrine.
Jesus answered him,
“I have spoken publicly to the world.
I have always taught in a synagogue
or in the temple area where all the Jews gather,
and in secret I have said nothing. Why ask me?
Ask those who heard me what I said to them.
They know what I said.”
When he had said this,
one of the temple guards standing there struck Jesus and said,
“Is this the way you answer the high priest?”
Jesus answered him,
“If I have spoken wrongly, testify to the wrong;
but if I have spoken rightly, why do you strike me?”
Then Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.

Now Simon Peter was standing there keeping warm.
And they said to him,
“You are not one of his disciples, are you?”
He denied it and said,
“I am not.”
One of the slaves of the high priest,
a relative of the one whose ear Peter had cut off, said,
“Didn’t I see you in the garden with him?”
Again Peter denied it.
And immediately the cock crowed.

Then they brought Jesus from Caiaphas to the praetorium.
It was morning.
And they themselves did not enter the praetorium,
in order not to be defiled so that they could eat the Passover.
So Pilate came out to them and said,
“What charge do you bring against this man?”
They answered and said to him,
“If he were not a criminal,
we would not have handed him over to you.”
At this, Pilate said to them,
“Take him yourselves, and judge him according to your law.”
The Jews answered him,
“We do not have the right to execute anyone,“
in order that the word of Jesus might be fulfilled
that he said indicating the kind of death he would die.
So Pilate went back into the praetorium
and summoned Jesus and said to him,
“Are you the King of the Jews?”
Jesus answered,
“Do you say this on your own
or have others told you about me?”
Pilate answered,
“I am not a Jew, am I?
Your own nation and the chief priests handed you over to me.
What have you done?”
Jesus answered,
“My kingdom does not belong to this world.
If my kingdom did belong to this world,
my attendants would be fighting
to keep me from being handed over to the Jews.
But as it is, my kingdom is not here.”
So Pilate said to him,
“Then you are a king?”
Jesus answered,
“You say I am a king.
For this I was born and for this I came into the world,
to testify to the truth.
Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”
Pilate said to him, “What is truth?”

When he had said this,
he again went out to the Jews and said to them,
“I find no guilt in him.
But you have a custom that I release one prisoner to you at Passover.
Do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?”
They cried out again,
“Not this one but Barabbas!”
Now Barabbas was a revolutionary.

Then Pilate took Jesus and had him scourged.
And the soldiers wove a crown out of thorns and placed it on his head,
and clothed him in a purple cloak,
and they came to him and said,
“Hail, King of the Jews!”
And they struck him repeatedly.
Once more Pilate went out and said to them,
“Look, I am bringing him out to you,
so that you may know that I find no guilt in him.”
So Jesus came out,
wearing the crown of thorns and the purple cloak.
And he said to them, “Behold, the man!”
When the chief priests and the guards saw him they cried out,
“Crucify him, crucify him!”

Pilate said to them,
“Take him yourselves and crucify him.
I find no guilt in him.”
The Jews answered,
“We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die,
because he made himself the Son of God.”
Now when Pilate heard this statement,
he became even more afraid,
and went back into the praetorium and said to Jesus,
“Where are you from?”
Jesus did not answer him.
So Pilate said to him,
“Do you not speak to me?
Do you not know that I have power to release you
and I have power to crucify you?”
Jesus answered him,
“You would have no power over me
if it had not been given to you from above.
For this reason the one who handed me over to you
has the greater sin.”
Consequently, Pilate tried to release him; but the Jews cried out,
“If you release him, you are not a Friend of Caesar.
Everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar.”

When Pilate heard these words he brought Jesus out
and seated him on the judge’s bench
in the place called Stone Pavement, in Hebrew, Gabbatha.
It was preparation day for Passover, and it was about noon.
And he said to the Jews,
“Behold, your king!”
They cried out,
“Take him away, take him away! Crucify him!”
Pilate said to them,
“Shall I crucify your king?”
The chief priests answered,
“We have no king but Caesar.”
Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.

So they took Jesus, and, carrying the cross himself,
he went out to what is called the Place of the Skull,
in Hebrew, Golgotha.
There they crucified him, and with him two others,
one on either side, with Jesus in the middle.
Pilate also had an inscription written and put on the cross.
It read,
“Jesus the Nazorean, the King of the Jews.”
Now many of the Jews read this inscription,
because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city;
and it was written in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek.
So the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate,
“Do not write ‘The King of the Jews,’
but that he said, ‘I am the King of the Jews’.”
Pilate answered,
“What I have written, I have written.”

When the soldiers had crucified Jesus,
they took his clothes and divided them into four shares,
a share for each soldier.
They also took his tunic, but the tunic was seamless,
woven in one piece from the top down.
So they said to one another,
“Let’s not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it will be,"
in order that the passage of Scripture might be fulfilled that says:
They divided my garments among them,
and for my vesture they cast lots.
This is what the soldiers did.
Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother
and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas,
and Mary of Magdala.
When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved
he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.”
Then he said to the disciple,
“Behold, your mother.”
And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.

After this, aware that everything was now finished,
in order that the Scripture might be fulfilled,
Jesus said, “I thirst.”
There was a vessel filled with common wine.
So they put a sponge soaked in wine on a sprig of hyssop
and put it up to his mouth.
When Jesus had taken the wine, he said,
“It is finished.”
And bowing his head, he handed over the spirit.

Here all kneel and pause for a short time.

Now since it was preparation day,
in order that the bodies might not remain on the cross on the sabbath,
for the sabbath day of that week was a solemn one,
the Jews asked Pilate that their legs be broken
and that they be taken down.
So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first
and then of the other one who was crucified with Jesus.
But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead,
they did not break his legs,
but one soldier thrust his lance into his side,
and immediately blood and water flowed out.
An eyewitness has testified, and his testimony is true;
he knows that he is speaking the truth,
so that you also may come to believe.
For this happened so that the Scripture passage might be fulfilled:
Not a bone of it will be broken.
And again another passage says:
They will look upon him whom they have pierced.

After this, Joseph of Arimathea,
secretly a disciple of Jesus for fear of the Jews,
asked Pilate if he could remove the body of Jesus.
And Pilate permitted it.
So he came and took his body.
Nicodemus, the one who had first come to him at night,
also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes
weighing about one hundred pounds.
They took the body of Jesus
and bound it with burial cloths along with the spices,
according to the Jewish burial custom.
Now in the place where he had been crucified there was a garden,
and in the garden a new tomb, in which no one had yet been buried.
So they laid Jesus there because of the Jewish preparation day; for the tomb was close by.

March Devotion: Saint Joseph

Since the 16th century Catholic piety has assigned entire months to special devotions. Due to the solemnity of Saint Joseph on March 19, this month is devoted to this great saint, the foster father of Christ. "It greatly behooves Christians, while honoring the Virgin Mother of God, constantly to invoke with deep piety and confidence her most chaste spouse, Saint Joseph. We have a well grounded conviction that such is the special desire of the Blessed Virgin herself." --Pope Leo XIII

FOR OUR WORK
Glorious Saint Joseph, pattern of all who are devoted to toil, obtain for me the grace to toil in the spirit of penance, in order thereby to atone for my many sins; to toil conscientiously, putting devotion to duty before my own inclinations; to labor with thankfulness and joy, deeming it an honor to employ and to develop, by my labor, the gifts I have received from Almighty God; to work with order, peace, moderation, and patience, without ever shrinking from weariness and difficulties; to work above all with a pure intention and with detachment from self, having always before my eyes the hour of death and the accounting which I must then render of time ill-spent, of talents unemployed, of good undone, and of my empty pride in success, which is so fatal to the work of God. All for Jesus, all through Mary, all in imitation of thee, 0 Patriarch Joseph! This shall be my motto in life and in death. Amen.

OFFERING TO SAINT JOSEPH
O great Saint Joseph, thou generous depositary and dispenser of immortal riches, behold us prostrate at thy feet, imploring thee to receive us as thy servants and as thy children. Next to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, of which thou art the faithful copy, we acknowledge that there is no heart more tender, more compassionate than thine.

What, then, have we to fear, or, rather, for what should we not hope, if thou dost deign to be our benefactor, our master, our model, our father and our mediator? Refuse not, then, this favor, O powerful protector! We ask it of thee by the love thou hast for Jesus and Mary. Into thy hands we commit our souls and bodies, but above all the last moments of our lives.

May we, after having honored, imitated, and served thee on earth, eternally sing with thee the mercies of Jesus and Mary. Amen.

FOR THE INTERCESSION OF SAINT JOSEPH
O Joseph, virgin-father of Jesus, most pure spouse of the Virgin Mary, pray every day for us to the same Jesus, the Son of God, that we, being defended by the power of His grace and striving dutifully in life, may be crowned by Him at the hour of death.

Prayer Source: Prayer Book, The by Reverend John P. O'Connell, M.A., S.T.D. and Jex Martin, M.A., The Catholic Press, Inc., Chicago, Illinois, 1954

St. Joseph
St. Joseph was an ordinary manual laborer although descended from the royal house of David. In the designs of Providence he was destined to become the spouse of the Mother of God. His high privilege is expressed in a single phrase, "Foster-father of Jesus." About him Sacred Scripture has little more to say than that he was a just man-an expression which indicates how faithfully he fulfilled his high trust of protecting and guarding God's greatest treasures upon earth, Jesus and Mary.

The darkest hours of his life may well have been those when he first learned of Mary's pregnancy; but precisely in this time of trial Joseph showed himself great. His suffering, which likewise formed a part of the work of the redemption, was not without great providential import: Joseph was to be, for all times, the trustworthy witness of the Messiah's virgin birth. After this, he modestly retires into the background of holy Scripture.

Of St. Joseph's death the Bible tells us nothing. There are indications, however, that he died before the beginning of Christ's public life. His was the most beautiful death that one could have, in the arms of Jesus and Mary. Humbly and unknown, he passed his years at Nazareth, silent and almost forgotten he remained in the background through centuries of Church history. Only in more recent times has he been accorded greater honor. Liturgical veneration of St. Joseph began in the fifteenth century, fostered by Sts. Brigid of Sweden and Bernadine of Siena. St. Teresa, too, did much to further his cult.

At present there are two major feasts in his honor. On March 19 our veneration is directed to him personally and to his part in the work of redemption, while on May 1 we honor him as the patron of workmen throughout the world and as our guide in the difficult matter of establishing equitable norms regarding obligations and rights in the social order.

Excerpted from The Church's Year of Grace, Pius Parsch.

St. Joseph is invoked as patron for many causes. He is the patron of the Universal Church. He is the patron of the dying because Jesus and Mary were at his death-bed. He is also the patron of fathers, of carpenters, and of social justice. Many religious orders and communities are placed under his patronage.

Patron: Against doubt; against hesitation; Americas; Austria; Diocese of Baton Rouge, Louisiana; California; Belgium; Bohemia; bursars; cabinetmakers; Canada; Carinthia; carpenters; China; Church; confectioners; craftsmen; Croatian people (in 1687 by decree of the Croatian parliament) dying people; emigrants; engineers; expectant mothers; families; fathers; Florence, Italy; happy death; holy death; house hunters; immigrants; interior souls; Korea; laborers; Diocese of La Crosse, Wisconsin; Archdiocese of Louisville, Kentucky; Diocese of Manchester, New Hampshire; Mexico; Diocese of Nashville, Tennessee; New France; New World; Oblates of Saint Joseph; people in doubt; people who fight Communism; Peru; pioneers; pregnant women; protection of the Church; Diocese of San Jose, California; diocese of Sioux Falls, South Dakota; social justice; Styria, Austria; travelers; Turin Italy; Tyrol Austria; unborn children Universal Church; Vatican II; Viet Nam; Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston West Virginia; wheelwrights; workers; working people.

Symbols: Bible; branch; capenter's square; carpenter's tools; chalice; cross; hand tools; infant Jesus; ladder; lamb; lily; monstrance; old man holding a lily and a carpenter's tool such as a square; old man holding the infant Jesus; plane; rod.

Things to Do:

You must have a table that is simply overflowing with good Italian food on this day! The feast of San Giuseppe began in the Middle Ages when Sicily was suffering from a severe drought and the desperate people begged St. Joseph for rain. When they received rainy weather in response, they held a huge "feste" in Saint Joseph's honor. Even today, Sicilians go to Mass before their St. Joseph's day dinner and then process to their festive tables, decked out in flowers, breads, and all sorts of Italian foods. The priest blesses the food, and everyone shouts "Viva la tavola di San Giuse!" (which your children will readily do with great gusto). After the meal is done, everyone present is given something to take home, in the generous spirit of this day. Try some of our delicious recipes linked here. We especially recommend the traditional Minestrone. Italian sausage is always a favorite, as well. And you should have bread of all kinds — this recipe for Italian Decorative Breads can provide the traditional shape of your choice (St. Joseph's staff, his beard, etc). Also a traditional must with children is St. Joseph's Sfinge, (Cream Puffs), for which we have several recipes on this site. Plan a St. Joseph's potluck for this day with other Catholic families — invite a parish priest and ask his blessing over the food before you begin the meal. If you do not have the time or resources to do this, plan a smaller affair with your own family, complete with prayers to St. Joseph, a little procession with candles for the older children and your favorite hymns, and then the father of the family ought to say a special blessing over the food before you begin.

Check out this wonderful site that explains the St. Joseph Altar more in detail, includes recipes, history, and allows virtual offerings.

For further reading:

Viva San Giuseppe: A guide for Saint Joseph Altars. This wonderful booklet is available for $5.00 plus $1.50 postage. All proceeds from the sale of this book will be used to assist the Sisters of St. Joseph in their ministries. Make your check payable to St. Joseph Guild, 1200 Mirabeau Ave., New Orleans, LA 70122.
The St. Joseph Altar Traditions of South Louisiana (Louisiana Life Series; No. 4) by Ethelyn Gay Orso, small booklet with photographs, available for purchase at online bookstores, such as Amazon.
Brand new beautifully illustrated hardcover book, Saint Joseph Altars by Kerri McCaffety (Photographer), also available at bookstores.
Read the section of Directory on Popular Piety and Liturgy on St. Joseph.
Read Pope Leo XIII's encyclical on Devotion to St. Joseph.
Interested in history? Read this article on the history of devotions to St. Joseph, Finding St. Joseph, by Sandra Miesel.

Pray this prayer and litany in honor of St. Joseph with your family rosary tonight.

Here is a link to several meditations on St. Joseph — choose the one that is perfect for you and your family!

Here are some ideas for teaching children about St. Joseph.

Young girls ought to pray to St. Joseph for their future spouse.

Prayer to St. Joseph

Pope Pius X composed this prayer to St. Joseph, patron of working people, that expresses concisely the Christian attitude toward labor. It summarizes also for us the lessons of the Holy Family's work at Nazareth.

Glorious St. Joseph, model of all who devote their lives to labor, obtain for me the grace to work in the spirit of penance in order thereby to atone for my many sins; to work conscientiously, setting devotion to duty in preference to my own whims; to work with thankfulness and joy, deeming it an honor to employ and to develop by my labor the gifts I have received from God; to work with order, peace, moderation, and patience, without ever shrinking from weariness and difficulties; to work above all with a pure intention and with detachment from self, having always before my eyes the hour of death and the accounting which I must then render of time ill spent, of talents wasted, of good omitted, and of vain complacency in success, which is so fatal to the work of God.

All for Jesus, all through Mary, all in imitation of you, O Patriarch Joseph! This shall be my motto in life and in death, Amen.

Celebration of St. Joseph moved by Vatican for 2008

The Role and Responsibility of Fatherhood - St. Joseph as Model

St. Joseph - Foster Father of Jesus

St. Joseph the Worker, Memorial, May 1

Nothing Will Be Denied Him (St. Joseph)

The Heart of a Father [St. Joseph]

Quemadmodum Deus - Decree Under Blessed Pius IX, Making St. Joseph Patron of the Church

St. Joseph [Husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary], Solemnity, March 19

MORE THAN PATRON OF HOMES, IT'S TIME FOR ST. JOSEPH TO GAIN HIGHEST OF RECOGNITION [Fatherhood]

(Saint) Joseph the Patriarch: A Reflection on the Solemnity of St. Joseph

How I Rediscovered a "Neglected" Saint: Work of Art Inspires Young Man to Rediscover St. Joseph

The Heart of St. Joseph

The Importance of Devotion to St. Joseph

St. Francis de Sales on St. Joseph (Some Excerpts for St. Joseph's Day 2004)

St. Joseph: REDEMPTORIS CUSTOS (Guardian Of The Redeemer)

St. Joseph's Humility (By St. Francis de Sales)

March 19 - Feast of St. Joseph - Husband of Mary - Intercessor of civil leaders

St. Joseph's Spirit of Silence

Father & Child (An Evangelical Minister preaches on St. Joseph)

Catholic Devotions: St. Joseph the Worker

HOMILIES PREACHED BY FATHER ALTIER ON THE FEAST OF SAINT JOSEPH, THE WORKER.

Feast of St. Joseph the Worker (May 1st.)- Discussion

From: Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9

Our Confidence is Based on Christ’s Priesthood

[14] Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens,
Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. [15] For we have not a high
priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every
respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sinning. [16] Let us then with
confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find
grace to help in time of need.

Christ Has Been Made High Priest by God the Father

[7] In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud
cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard
for his godly fear. [8] Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what
he suffered; [9] and being made perfect he became the source of eternal salvation
to all who obey him, [10] being designated by God a high priest after the order of
Melchizedek.

*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:

14-16. The text now reverts to its main theme (cf. 2:17), that is, the priesthood of
Christ. It highlights the dignity of the new high priest, who has passed through
the heavens; and His mercy, too, for He sympathizes with our weaknesses. We
have, therefore, every reason to approach Him with confidence. “The believers
were at that time in a storm of temptation; that is why the Apostle is consoling
them, saying that our High Priest not only knows, as God, the weaknesses of
our nature: as man, He has also experienced the sufferings that affect us, al-
though He was free from sin. Since He knows our weaknesses so well, He can
give us the help we need, and when He comes to judge us, He will take that
weakness into account in His sentence” (”Interpretatio Ep. Ad Haebreos, ad loc.”).

We should respond to the Lord’s goodness by staying true to our profession of
faith. The confession or profession of faith referred to here is not simply an exter-
nal declaration: external confession is necessary but there must also be commit-
ment and a spirit of fidelity. A Christian needs to live up to all the demands of his
calling; he should be single-minded and free from doubts.

15. “If we should some time find ourselves sorely tempted by our enemies, it will
greatly help us to remember that we have on our side a high priest who is most
compassionate, for He chose to experience all kinds of temptation” (”St. Pius V
Catechism”, IV, 15, 14). In order to understand and help a sinner to get over his
falls and cope with temptation, one does not oneself need to have experience of
being tempted; in fact, only one who does not sin knows the full force of tempta-
tion, because the sinner gives in prior to resisting to the end. Christ never yielded
to temptation. He therefore experienced much more than we do (because we are
often defeated by temptation) the full rigor and violence of those temptations which
He chose to undergo as man at particular points in His life. Our Lord, then,
allowed Himself to be tempted, in order to set us an example and prevent us from
ever losing confidence in our ability to resist temptation with the help of grace (cf.
notes on Matthew 4:1-11 and paragraph).

“There is no man”, St. Jerome comments, “who can resist all tests except He
who, made in our likeness, has experienced everything but sin” (”Comm. In Ioan-
nam”, II, 46). Christ’s inlessness, often affirmed in Sacred Scripture (Romans 8:3;
2 Corinthians 5:21; John 8:46; 1 Peter 1:19; 2:21-24), follows logically from His
being God and from His human integrity and holiness. At the same time Christ’s
weakness, which He chose to experience out of love for us, is a kind of invitation
from God to pray for strength to resist sin. “Let us adore Christ who emptied Him-
self to assume the condition of a slave. He was tempted in every way that we are,
but did not sin. Let us turn in prayer to Him, saying, ‘You took on our human
weakness. Be the eyes of the blind, the strength of the weak, the friend of the
lonely’” (”Liturgy of the Hours”, Christmas Day, Evening Prayer I).

16. The “throne” is the symbol of Christ’s authority; He is King of the living and
the dead. But here it speaks of a “throne of grace”: through the salvation worked
by Christ, the compassionate Priest and Intercessor, God’s throne has become
a judgment seat from which mercy flows. Christ has initiated for mankind a time
of forgiveness and sanctification in which He does not yet manifest His position
as Sovereign Judge. Christ’s priesthood did not cease to operate with His death;
it continues in Heaven, where He forever pleads on our behalf, and therefore we
should have confident recourse to Him.

“What security should be ours in considering the mercy of the Lord! ‘He has but
to cry for redress, and I, the Ever-Merciful, will listen to him’ (Exodus 22:27). It
is an invitation, a promise that He will not fail to fulfill. ‘Let us then with confidence
draw near to the throne of grace, and we may receive mercy and find grace to
help in time of need’. The enemies of our sanctification will be rendered powerless
if the mercy of God goes before us. And if through our own fault and human weak-
ness we should fall, the Lord comes to our aid and raises us up” ([St] J. Escriva,
“Christ Is Passing By”, 7).

7-9. This brief summary of Christ’s life stresses his perfect obedience to the Fa-
ther’s will, his intense prayer and his sufferings and redemptive death. As in the
hymn to Christ in Philippians 2:6-11, the point is made that Christ set his power
aside and, despite his being the only-begotten Son of God, out of obedience
chose to die on the cross. His death was a true self-offering expressed in that
“loud voice” when he cried out to the Father just before he died, “into thy hands
I commit my spirit” (Lk 23:46). But although Jesus’ obedience was most obvious
on Calvary, it was a constant feature of “the days of his flesh”: he obeyed Mary
and Joseph, seeing in them the authority of the heavenly Father; he was obedient
to political and religious authorities; and he always obeyed the Father, identifying
himself with him to such a degree that he could say, “I have glorified thee on
earth, having accomplished the work which thou gavest me to do [...]. All mine
are thine and thine are mine” (Jn 17:4, 10).

The passage also points to Jesus prayer, the high point of which occurred in
Gethsemane on the eve of his passion. The reference to “loud cries and suppli-
cations” recalls the Gospel account of his suffering: “And being in an agony he
prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling
down upon the ground” (Lk 22:44).

Hebrews 5:7-9 is probably referring not so much to his prayer in the Garden, still
less to any prayer of Christ asking to be delivered from death, but to our Lord’s
constant prayer for the salvation of mankind. “When the Apostle speaks of these
supplications and cries of Jesus,” St John Chrysostom comments, “he does not
mean prayers which he made on his own behalf but prayers for those who would
later believe in him. And, due to the fact that the Jews did not yet have the ele-
vated concept of Christ that they ought to have had, St Paul says that ‘he was
heard’, just as the Lord himself told his disciples, to console them, ‘If you loved
me, you would have rejoiced, because I go to the Father; for the Father is greater
than I’ [...]. Such was the respect and reverence shown by the Son, that God the
Father could not but take note and heed his Son and his prayers” (”Hom. on Heb”,
11).

7. “In the days of his flesh”, a reference to the Incarnation. “Flesh” is synonymous
with mortal life; this is a reference to Christ’s human nature—as in the prologue to
St John’s Gospel (elf. Jn 1:14) and many other places (Heb 2:14; Gal 2:20; Phil
1:22-24; 1 Pet 4:1-2) including where mention is made of Jesus being a servant
and capable of suffering (cf. Phil 2:8; Mt 20:27-28). Jesus’ human nature “in the
days of his flesh” is quite different from his divine nature and also from his human
nature after its glorification (cf. 1 Cor 15:50). “It must be said that the word ‘flesh’
is occasionally used to refer to the weakness of the flesh, as it says in 1 Cor
15:50: ‘flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God’. Christ had a weak and
mortal flesh. Therefore it says in the text, ‘In the days of his flesh’, referring to
when he was living in a flesh which seemed to be like sinful flesh, but which was
sinless” (St Thomas Aquinas, “Commentary on Heb”, 5, 1). So, this text under-
lines our Lord’s being both Victim and Priest.

“Prayers and supplications”: very fitting in a priest. The two words mean much
the same; together they are a form of words which used to be employed in peti-
tions to the king or some important official. The plural tells us that there were lots
of these petitions. The writer seems to have in mind the picture of the Redeemer
who “going a little farther fell on his face and prayed, ‘My Father, if it be possible,
let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Mt 26:39).
St Thomas comments on this description of Christ’s prayer as follows: “His action
was indeed one of offering prayers and supplications, that is, a spiritual sacrifice:
that was what Christ offered. It speaks of prayers in the sense of petitions be-
cause ‘The prayer of a righteous man has great power’ (Jas 5:16); and it speaks
of supplications to emphasize the humility of the one who is praying, who falls
on his knees, as we see happening in the case of him who ‘fell on his face and
prayed’ (Mt 26:39)” (”Commentary on Heb”, 5, 1).

To emphasize the force of Christ’s prayer, the writer adds, “with loud cries and
tears”. According to rabbinical teaching, there were three degrees of prayer,
each stronger than the last—supplications, cries and tears. Christian tradition
has always been touched by the humanity of the Redeemer as revealed in the
way he prays. “Everything that is being said here may be summed up in one
word—humility: that stops the mouths of those who blaspheme against Christ’s
divinity saying that it is completely inappropriate for a God to act like this. For,
on the contrary, the Godhead laid it down that [Christ’s] human nature should
suffer all this, in order to show us the extreme to which he truly became incar-
nate and assumed a human nature, and to show us that the mystery of salvation
was accomplished in a real and not an apparent or fictitious manner” (Theodoret
of Cyrus, “Interpretatio Ep. ad Haebreos, ad loc.”). Christ’s prayer, moreover,
teaches us that prayer must 1) be fervent and 2) involve interior pain. “Christ had
both [fervor and pain], for the Apostle by mentioning ‘tears’ intends to show the
interior groaning of him who weeps in this way [...]. But he did not weep on his
own account: he wept for us, who receive the fruit of his passion” (St Thomas,
“Commentary on Heb., ad loc.”).

“He was heard for his godly fear.” St John Chrysostom’s commentary is very
apposite: “’He gave himself up for our sins’, he says in Gal 1:4; and elsewhere
(cf. 1 Tim 2:6) he adds, ‘He gave himself as a ransom for all’. What does he mean
by this? Do you not see that he is speaking with humility of himself, because of
his mortal flesh? And, nevertheless, because he is the Son, it says that he was
heard for his godly fear” (”Hom. on Heb.”, 8). It is like a loving contention between
Father and Son. The Son wins the Father’s admiration, so generous is his self-
surrender.

And yet Christ’s prayer did not seem to be heeded, for his Father God did not save
him from ignominious death—the cup he had to drink—nor were all the Jews, for
whom he prayed, converted. But it was only apparently so: in fact Christ’s prayer
was heard. It is true that, like every one, the idea of dying was repugnant to him,
because he had a natural instinct to live; but, on the other hand, he wished to die
through a deliberate and rational act of his will, hence in the course of the prayer,
he said, “not my will, but thine, be done” (Lk 22:42). Similarly Christ wanted to
save all mankind—but he wanted them to accept salvation freely (cf. “Commentary
on Heb., ad loc.”).

8. In Christ there are two perfect and complete natures and therefore two diffe-
rent levels of knowledge—divine knowledge and human knowledge. Christ’s human
knowledge includes 1 ) the knowledge that the blessed in heaven have, that is, the
knowledge that comes form direct vision of the divine essence; 2) the knowledge
with which God endowed man before original sin (infused knowledge); and 3) the
knowledge which man acquires through experience. This last-mentioned knowledge
could and in fact did increase (cf. Lk 2:52) in Christ’s case. Christ’s painful expe-
rience of the passion, for example, increased this last type of knowledge, which is
why the verse says that Christ learned obedience through suffering. There was a
Greek proverb which said, “Sufferings are lessons.” Christ’s teaching and example
raise this positive view of suffering onto the supernatural level. “In suffering there is
concealed’ a particular ‘power that draws a person interiorly close to Christ’, a
special grace [...]. A result of such a conversion is not only that the individual
discovers the salvific meaning of suffering but above all that he becomes a com-
pletely new person. He discovers a new dimension, as it were, ‘of his entire life
and vocation’” (John Paul II, “Salvifici Doloris”, 26).

In our Lord’s case, his experience of suffering was connected with his generosity
in obedience. He freely chose to obey even unto death (cf. Heb 10:5-9; Rom 5:19;
Phil 2:8), consciously atoning for the first sin, a sin of disobedience. “In his suf-
fering, sins are canceled out precisely because he alone as the only-begotten
Son could take them upon himself, accept them ‘with that love for the Father which
overcomes’ the evil of every sin; in a certain sense he annihilates this evil in the
spiritual space of the relationship between God and humanity, and fills this space
with good” (”Salvifici Doloris”, 17). Christ “learned obedience” not in the sense that
this virtue developed in him, for his human nature was perfect in its holiness, but in
the sense that he put into operation the infused virtue his human soul already
possessed. “Christ knew what obedience was from all eternity, but he learned
obedience in practice through the severities he underwent particularly in his pas-
sion and death” (St Thomas Aquinas, “Commentary on Heb., ad loc.”).

Christ’s example of obedience is something we should copy. A Christian writer
of the fifth century, Diadochus of Photike, wrote: “The Lord loved (obedience) be-
cause it was the way to bring about man’s salvation and he obeyed his Father
unto the cross and unto death; however, his obedience did not in any sense dimi-
nish his majesty. And so, having—by his obedience—dissolved man’s disobedience,
he chose to lead to blessed and immortal life those who followed the way of obe-
dience” (”Chapters on Spiritual Perfection”, 41).

9. Obviously Christ as God could not increase in perfection. Nor could his sacred
humanity become any holier, for from the moment of his Incarnation he received
the fullness of grace, that is, he had the maximum degree of holiness a man could
have. In this connection Thomas Aquinas points out that Christ had union (that is,
the personal union to the Son of God gratuitously bestowed on human nature):
clearly this grace is infinite as the person of the Word is infinite. The other grace
is habitual grace which, although it is received in a limited human nature, is yet
infinite in its perfection because grace was conferred on Christ as the universal
source of the justification of human nature (cf. “Summa Theologiae”, III, q. 7, a.
11). In what sense, then, could Christ be “made perfect”? St Thomas provides the
answer: Christ, through his passion, achieved a special glory—the impassibility
and glorification of his body. Moreover, he attained the same perfections as we
shall participate in when we are raised from the dead in glory, those of us who
believe in him (cf. “Commentary on Heb., ad loc.”). For this reason our Redeemer
could exclaim before his death, “It is finished” (Jn 19:30)—referring not only to his
own sacrifice but also to the fact that he had completely accomplished the re-
deeming atonement. Christ triumphed on the cross and attained perfection for
himself and for others. In Hebrews the same verb is used for what is translated
into English as “to be made perfect” and “to finish”. Christ, moreover, by obeying
and becoming a perfect victim, truly pleasing to the Father, is more perfectly posi-
tioned to perfect others. “Obedience” is essentially docility to what God asks of
us and readiness to listen to him (cf. Rom 1:5; 16:26; 2 Cor 10:5; Heb 4:3).
Christ’s obedience is a source of salvation for us; if we imitate him we will truly
form one body with him and he will be able to pass on to us the fullness of his
grace.

“Now, when you find it hard to obey, remember your Lord: ‘factus obediens usque
ad mortem, mortem autem crucis”: obedient even to accepting death, death on a
cross!’” ([St] J. Escriva, “The Way”

*********************************************************************************************
Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.

From: John 18:1-19:42

The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ according to John

The Arrest of Jesus

[1] When Jesus had spoken these words, he went forth with his disciples
across the Kidron valley, where there was a garden, which he and his
disciples entered. [2] Now Judas who betrayed him, also knew the place; for
Jesus often met there with his disciples. [3] So Judas, procuring a band of
soldiers and some officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, went
there with lanterns and torches and weapons. [4] Then Jesus, knowing all
that was to befall him, came forward and said to them, “Whom do you seek?”
[5] They answered him, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus said to them, “I am he.”
Judas, who betrayed him, was standing with them. [6] When he said to them,
“I am he,” they drew back and fell to the ground. [7] Again he asked them,
“Whom do you seek?” And they said, “Jesus of Nazareth.” [8] Jesus ans-
wered, “I told you that I am he; so, if you seek me, let these men go.” [9] This
was to fulfill the word which he had spoken, “Of those whom thou gayest me I
lost not one.’ [10] Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the
high priest’s slave and cut off his right ear. The slave’s name was Malchus.
[11] Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink
the cup which the Father has given me?”

Jesus Before Annas and Caiaphas. Peter’s Denials

[12] So the band of soldiers and their captain and the officers of the Jews
seized Jesus and bound him. [13] First they led him to Annas; for he was
the father-in-law of Caiaphas who was high priest that year. [14] It was
Caiaphas who had given counsel to the Jews that it was expedient that
one man should die for the people.

[15] Simon Peter followed Jesus, and so did another disciple. As this
disciple was known to the high priest, he entered the court of the high
priest along with Jesus, [16] while Peter stood outside at the door. So the
other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out and spoke to the
maid who kept the door, and brought Peter in. [17] The maid who kept the
door said to Peter, “Are not you also one of this man’s disciples?” He said,
“I am not.” [18] Now the servants and officers had made a charcoal fire,
because it was cold, and they were standing and warming themselves;
Peter also was with them, standing and warming himself.

[19] The high priest then questioned Jesus about his disciples and his
teaching. [20] Jesus answered him, “I have spoken openly to the world; I
have always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all Jews come
together; I have said nothing secretly. [21] Why do you ask me? Ask those
who have heard me, what I said to them; they know what I said.” [22] When
he had said this, one of the officers standing by struck Jesus with his hand,
saying, “Is that how you answer the high priest?” [23] Jesus answered him,
“If I have spoken wrongly, bear witness to the wrong but if I have spoken
rightly, why do you strike me? [24] Annas then sent him bound to Caiaphas
the high priest.

[25] Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. They said to him,
“Are not you also one of his disciples? He denied it and said, “I am not.” [26]
0ne of the servants the high priest, a kinsman of the man whose ear Peter
had cut off, asked, “Did I not see you in the garden with him? [27] Peter again
denied it; and at once the cock crowed.

The Trial before Pilate: Jesus is King

[28] Then they led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the praetorium. It
was early. They themselves did not enter the praetorium, so that they might
not be defiled, but might eat the passover. [29] So Pilate went out to them
and said, “What accusation do you bring against this man?” [30] They
answered him, “If this man were not an evildoer, we would not have handed
him over.” [31] Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and judge him by
your own law.” The Jews said to him, “It is not lawful for us to put any man
to death.” [32] This was to fulfill the word which Jesus had spoken to show
by what death he was to die.

[33] Pilate entered the praetorium again and called Jesus, and said to him,
“Are you the King of the Jews?” [34] Jesus answered, “Do you say this of
your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?” [35] Pilate
answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed
you over to me; what have you done?” [36] Jesus answered, “My kingship is
not of this world; if my kingship were of this world, my servants would fight,
that I might not be handed over to the Jews; but my kingship is not from the
world.” [37] Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You
say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I have come into the
world, to bear witness the truth. Every one who is of the truth hears my
voice.” [38] Pilate said to him, “’What is truth?”

After he had said this, he went out to the Jews again, and told them, “I
find no crime in him. [39] But you have a custom that I should release one
man for you at the Passover; will you have me release for you the King of
the Jews?” [40] They cried out again, “Not this man, but Barabbas!” Now
Barabbas was a robber.

The Scourging at the Pillar and the Crowning with Thorns

[1] Then Pilate took Jesus and scourged him. [2] And the soldiers plaited a
crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and array him in a purple robe; [3]
they came up to him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” and struck him with
their hands. [4] Pilate went out again, and said to them, “Behold, I am
bringing him out to you, that you may know that I find no crime him.” [5] So
Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said
to them, “Here is the man! [6] When the chief priests and the officers saw
him, they cried out, “Crucify him, crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Take
him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no crime in him.” [7] The Jews
answered him, “We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because
he has made himself the Son of God.” [8] When Pilate heard these words,
he was the more afraid; [9] he entered the praetorium again and said to Jesus,
“Where are you from?” But Jesus gave no answer. [10] Pilate therefore said
to him, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to re-
lease you, and power to crucify you?” [11] Jesus answered him, “You would
have no power over me unless it had been given you from above; therefore he
who delivered me to you has the greater sin.”

Pilate Hands Jesus Over

[12] Upon this Pilate sought to release him, but the Jews cried out, “If you
release this man, you are not Caesar’s friend; every one who makes himself
a king sets himself against Caesar.” [13] When Pilate heard these words, he
brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat at place called The
Pavement, and in Hebrew, Gabbatha. [14] Now it was the day of Preparation
for the Passover; it was about the sixth hour. He said to the Jews, “Here is
your King!” [15] They cried out, “Away with him, away with him, crucify
him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests
answered, “We have no king but Caesar.” [16] Then he handed him over
to them to be crucified.

The Crucifixion and Death of Jesus

[17] So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the
place called the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha. [18]
There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, and
Jesus between them. [19] Pilate also wrote a title and put it on the cross;
it read, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.” [20] Many of the Jews
read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city;
and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek. [21] The chief priests
of the Jews then said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The King of the Jews,’ but,
‘This man said, I am King of the Jews.”’ [22] Pilate answered, “What I have
written I have written.”

[23] When the soldiers had crucified Jesus they took his garments and made
four parts, one for each soldier; also his tunic. But the tunic was without seam,
woven from top to bottom; [24] so they said to one another, “Let us not tear it,
but cast lots for it to see whose it shall be.” This was to fulfill the scripture,
“They parted my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.

[25] So the soldiers did this. But standing by the cross of Jesus were his
mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary
Magdalene. [26] When Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he
loved standing near, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!”
[27] Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that
hour the disciple took her to his own home.

[28] After this Jesus, knowing that all was now finished said (to fulfill
the Scripture), “I thirst.” [29] A bowl full of vinegar stood there; so they
put a sponge full of the vinegar on hyssop and held it to his mouth. [30]
When Jesus had received the vinegar, he said “It is finished”; and he
bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

Jesus’ Side is Pierced. His Burial

[31] Since it was the day of Preparation, in order to prevent the bodies
from remaining on the cross of the sabbath (for that sabbath was a high
day), the Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they
might be taken away. [32] So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the
first, and of the other who had been crucified with him; [33] but when they
came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his
legs. [34] But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once
there came out blood and water. [35] He who saw it has borne witness—his
testimony is true, and he knows that he tells the truth—that you also may
believe. [36] For these things took place that the scripture might be
fulfilled, “Not a bone of him shall be broken.” [37] And again another
scripture says, “They shall look on him whom they have pierced.”

[38] After this Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly,
for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus,
and Pilate gave him leave. So he came and took away his body. [39] Nico-
demus also, who had at first come to him by night, came bringing a mixture
of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds’ weight. [40] They took the body
of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as is the burial custom
of the Jews. [41] Now in the place where he was crucified there was garden,
and in the garden a new tomb where no one has ever been laid. [42] So
because of the Jewish day of Preparation, as the tomb was close at hand,
they laid Jesus there.

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Commentary

1. The previous chapter, dealing as it did with the glory of the Son of God
(cf. Jn 17:1, 4, 10,22,24), is a magnificent prologue to our Lord’s passion
and death, which St John presents as part of Christ’s glorification: he
emphasizes that Jesus freely accepted his death (14:31) and freely allowed
himself to be arrested (18:4, 11). The Gospel shows our Lord’s superiority
over his judges (18:20-2 1) and accusers (19:8, 12); and his majestic
serenity in the face of physical pain, which makes one more aware of the
Redemption, the triumph of the Cross, than of Jesus’ actual sufferings.

Chapters 18 and 19 cover the passion and death of our Lord—events so impor-
tant and decisive that all the books of the New Testament deal with them, in
some way or other. Thus, the Synoptic Gospels give us extensive accounts
of what happened; in the Acts of the Apostles these events, together with the
resurrection, form the core of the Apostles’ preaching. St Paul explains the
redemptive value of Jesus Christ’s sacrifice, and the catholic epistles speak
of his salvific death, as does the Apocalypse, where the Victor, enthroned in
heaven, is the sacrificed Lamb, Jesus Christ. It should also be noted that
whenever these sacred writings mention our Lord’s death they go on to refer
to his glorious resurrection.

St John’s Gospel locates these events in five places. The first (18:1-12) is
Gethsemane, where Jesus is arrested; after this (18:13-27) he is taken to
the house of Annas, where the religious trial begins and Peter denies Jesus
before the high priest’s servants. The third scene is the praetorium
(18:28-19:16), where Jesus is tried by the Roman procurator: St John gives
an extensive account of this trial, highlighting the true character of Christ’s
kingship and his rejection by the Jews, who call for his crucifixion. He then
goes on (19:17-37) to describe the events which occur after the procurator’s
unjust sentence; this scene centers on Calvary. St John then reports the
burial of our Lord in the unused tomb near Calvary belonging to Joseph of
Arimathea.

The climax of all these events is the glorification of Jesus, of which he
himself had spoken (cf. Jn 17:1-5)——his resurrection and exaltation to his
Father’s side.

Here is Fray Luis de Granada’s advice on how to meditate on the passion
of our Lord: “There are five things we can reflect on when we think about
the sacred passion. [...] First, we can incline our heart to sorrow and
repentance for our sins; the passion of our Lord helps us do this because
it is evident that everything he suffered he suffered on account of sins, so
that if there were no sins in the world, there would have been no need for
such painful reparation. Therefore, sins—yours and mine, like everyone
else’s—were the executioners who bound him and lashed him and crowned
him with thorns and put him on the cross. So you can see how right it is for
you to feel the enormity and malice of your sins, for it was these which really
caused so much suffering, not because these sins required the Son of God
to suffer but because divine justice chose to ask for such great atonement.

“We have here excellent motives, not only to abhor sin but also to love
virtues: we have the example of this Lord’s virtues, which so clearly shine
out during his sacred passion: we can follow these virtues and learn to
imitate then especially his great humility, gentleness and silence, as well
as the other virtues for this is one of the best and most effective ways of
meditating on the sacred passion—the way of imitation.

“At other times we should fix our attention on the great good the Lord does
us here, reflecting on how much he loved us and how much he gave us and
how much it cost him to do so. [...] At other times it is good to focus our
attention on knowledge of God, that is, to consider his great goodness, his
mercy, his justice, his kindness, and particularly his ardent charity, which
shines forth in the sacred passion as nowhere else. For, just as it is a greater
proof of love to suffer evils on behalf of one’s friend than to do good things for
him, and God could do both [...], it pleased his divine goodness to assume
a nature which could suffer evils, very great evils, so that man could be quite
convinced of God’s love and thereby be moved to love him who so loved man.

“Finally, at other times one can reflect [...] on the wisdom of God in choosing
this manner of atoning for mankind: that is, making satisfaction for our sins,
inflaming our charity, curing our pride, our greed and our love of comfort, and
inclining our souls to the virtue of humility [...], abhorrence of sin and love for
the Cross” (”Life of Jesus Christ”, 15).

1-2. “When Jesus had spoken these words”: this is a formula often used in
the fourth Gospel to indicate a new episode linked with what has just been
recounted (cf. Jn 2:12; 3:22; 5:1; 6:1; 13:21; etc.).

The Kidron (etymologically “turbid”) was a brook which carried water only
during rainy weather, it divided Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, on
slopes of which lay the garden of Gethsemane (cf. Mt 26:32; Lk 21:37;
22:39). The distance from the Cenacle, where the Last Supper took place,
to the garden of Gethsemane was little more than a kilometer.

3. Because Judea was occupied by Romans, there was a garrison stationed
at Jerusalem—a cohort (600 men) quartered in the Antonia tower, under the
authority of a tribune. In the Greek what is translated here as “a band of
soldiers” is “the cohort”, the name for the whole unit being used though
only part is meant: it does not mean that 600 soldiers came out to arrest
Jesus. Presumably the Jewish authorities, who had their own temple guard
—referred to here as “officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees”—must
have sought some assistance from the military. Judas’ part consisted in
leading the way to where Jesus was and identifying the man to be arrested.

4-9. Only the fourth Gospel reports this episode prior to Jesus’ arrest,
recalling the words of the Psalm: “Then my enemies will be turned back in
the day when I call” (Ps 56:9). Our Lord’s majesty is apparent: he surrenders
himself freely and voluntarily. This does not, however, mean that the Jews
involved are free from blame. St Augustine comments on this passage: “The
persecutors, who came with the traitor to lay hold of Jesus, found him whom
they sought and heard him say, ‘I am he’. Why did they not lay hold of him
but fell back to the ground? Because that was what he wished, who could do
whatever he wished. Had he not allowed himself to be taken by them, they
would have been unable to effect their plan, but neither would he have done
what he came to do. They in their rage sought him to put him to death; but
he also sought us by dying for us. Therefore, after he displayed his power to
those who had no power to hold him, they did lay hands on him and by
means of them, all unwitting, he did what he wanted to do” (”In Ioann. Evang.”,
112, 3).

It is also moving to see how Jesus takes care of his disciples, even though
he himself is in danger. He had promised that none of his own should perish
except Judas Iscariot (cf. Jn 6:39; 17:12); although his promise referred to
protecting them from eternal punishment, our Lord is also concerned about
their immediate safety, for as yet they are not ready to face martyrdom.

10-11. Once again we see Peter’s impetuosity and loyalty; he comes to our
Lord’s defense, risking his own life, but he still does not understand God’
plans of salvation: he still cannot come to terms with the idea of Christ
dying—just as he could not when Christ first foretold his passion (Mt 16:21-22).
Our Lord does not accept Peter’s violent defense: he refers back to what he
said in his prayer in Gethsemane (cf. Mt 26:39), where he freely accepted
his Father’ will, giving himself up to his captors in order to accomplish the
Redemption.

We should show reverence to God’s will with the same docility and meekness
as Jesus accepting his passion. “Stages: to be resigned to the will of God;
to conform to the will of God; to want the will of God; to love the will of
God” ([St] J. Escriva, “The Way”, 774).

13-18. Jesus is brought to the house of Annas, who, although he was no
longer high priest, still exercised great religious and political influence
(cf. note on Lk 3:2). These two disciples, St Peter and the other disciple,
probably John himself, are disconcerted; they do not know what to do, so
they follow Jesus at a distance. Their attachment to him was not yet
sufficiently supernatural; discouragement has displaced bravery and
loyalty—and will soon lead to Peter’s triple denial. However noble his
feelings, a Christian will be unable to live up to the demands of his faith
unless his life has a basis of deep piety.

19-21. During this first interrogation—preliminary to his later examination
by the Sanhedrin (Lk 22:66-71)—Jesus lays stress on the fact that he has
always acted openly: everyone has had an opportunity listen to him and to
witness his miracles—so much so that at times he has been acclaimed as
the Messiah (cf. Jn 12:12-19 and par.). The chief priests themselves have
seen him in the temple and in the synagogues; but not wishing to see (cf.
Jn 9:39-41), or believe (cf. Jn 10:37-38), they make out that his objectives
are hidden and sinister.

22-23. Again, we see Jesus’ serenity; he is master of the situation, as he
is throughout his passion. To the unjust accusation made by this servant,
our Lord replies meekly, but he does defend his conduct and points to the
injustice with which he is being treated. This is how we should behave if
people mistreat us in any way. Well-argued defense of one’s rights is
compatible with meekness and humility (cf. Acts 22:25).

25-27. Peter’s denials are treated in less detail here than in the Synoptic
Gospels, but here, as there, we can see the Apostles’ humility and sincerity
which lead them to tell about their own weaknesses. Peter’s repentance is
not referred to here, but it is implied by the mention of the cock crowing:
the very brevity of St John’s account points to the fact that this episode
was well known to the early Christians. After the resurrection the full
scope of Jesus’ forgiveness will be evidenced when he confirms Peter in
his mission as leader of the Apostles (cf. Jn 21:15-17).

“In this adventure of love we should not be depressed by our falls, not even
by serious falls, if we go to God in the sacrament of Penance contrite an
resolved to improve. A Christian is not a neurotic collector of good
behavior reports. Jesus Christ our Lord was moved as much by Peter’s
repentance after his fall as by John’s innocence and faithfulness. Jesus
understands our weakness and draws us to himself on an inclined plane.
He wants us to make an effort to climb a little each day” ([St] J. Escriva,
“Christ is Passing By”, ‘75).

28. The Synoptics also report the trial before Pilate, but St John gives a
longer and more detailed account: in 18:28-19:16 is the center of the five
parts of his account of the Passion (cf. note on 18:1). He describes the
events that take place in the praetorium, highlighting the majesty of Christ
as the messianic King, and also his rejection by the Jews.

There are seven stages here, marked by Pilate’s entrances and exits. First
(vv. 29-32) the Jews indict Jesus in a general way as an “evildoer”. Then
follows the dialogue between Pilate and Jesus (vv. 36-37) which culminates
in Christ stating that he is a King, after which Pilate tries to save our Lord
(vv. 38-40) by asking the people if they want him to release “the King of the
Jews”.

The centerpoint of the account (19:1-3) is the crowning with thorns, with
the soldiers mockingly doing obeisance to Christ as “King of the Jews”.
After this our Lord is led out wearing the crown of thorns and draped in the
purple robe (vv. 4- 7)—the shameful scene of the Ecce Homo. The Jews’
accusation now turns on Jesus’ making himself the Son of God. Once again,
Pilate, in the praetorium again, speaks with Jesus (vv.8-12) and tries to
probe further into his divine origin. The Jews then concentrate their hatred
in a directly political accusation: “Everyone who makes himself a king sets
himself against Caesar” (Jn 19:12). Finally (vv. 13-16), in a very formal
way, stating time and place, St John narrates how Pilate points to Jesus
and says: “Here is your King!” And the leaders of the Jews openly reject
him who was and is the genuine King spoken of by the prophets.

“Praetorium”: this was the Roman name for the official residence of the
praetor or of other senior officials in the provinces of the Empire, such as
the procurator or prefect in Palestine. Pilate’s usual residence was on the
coast, in Caesarea, but he normally moved to Jerusalem for the major
festival periods, bringing additional troops to be used in the event of civil
disorder. In Jerusalem, at this time and later, the procurator resided in
Herod’s palace (in the western part of the upper city) or else in the Antonia
tower, a fortress backing onto the northeastern corner of the temple espla-
nade. It is not known for certain which of these two buildings was the
praetorium mentioned in the Gospel; it was more likely the latter.

“So that they might not be defiled”: Jewish tradition at the time (”Mishnah”;
“Ohalot” treatise 7, 7) laid down that anyone who entered a Gentile or pagan
house incurred seven days’ legal defilement (cf. Acts 10:28); such defilement
would have prevented them from celebrating the Passover. It is surprising that
the chief priests had a scruple of this sort given their criminal inclinations
against Jesus. Once more our Lord’s accusation of them is seen to be well
founded: “You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel”
(Mt 23:24).

29-32. St John has omitted part of the interrogation which took place in the
house of Caiaphas and which is reported in the Synoptics (Mt 26:57-66 and
par.), which tell us that the meeting at Caiaphas’ terminated with Jesus hem
declared deserving of death for the blasphemy of proclaiming himself the Son
of God (cf. Mt 26:65-66). Under the Law of Moses blasphemy was punishable
by stoning (cf. Lev 24:16); but they do not proceed to stone him—which the
certainly could have done, even though the Romans were in control: they were
ready to stone the adulterous woman (cf.Jn 8:1-11) and a short time later
they did stone St Stephen (cf. Acts 7:54-60)—because they wanted to bring
the people along with them, and they knew that many of them regarded Jesus
a Prophet and Messiah (cf. Mt 24:45-46; Mk 12:12; Lk 20:19). Not daring to
stone him, they will shrewdly manage to turn a religious charge into a politics
question and have the authority of the Empire brought to bear on their side
they preferred to denounce Jesus to the procurator as a revolutionary who
plotted against Caesar by declaring himself to be the Messiah and King of
the Jews; by acting in this way they avoided risking the people’s wrath and
ensured that Jesus would be condemned by the Roman authorities to death
by crucifixion.

Our Lord had foretold a number of times that he would die in this way (cf.
Jn 3:14; 8:28; 12:32-33); as St Paul later put it, “Christ redeemed us from
the curse of the law, having become a curse for us—for it is written,
‘Cursed be every one who hangs on a tree”’ (Gal 3:13; cf. Deut 21:23).

33-34. There is no onus on Pilate to interfere in religious questions, but
because the accusation levelled against Jesus had to do with politics and
public order, he begins his interrogation naturally by examining him on the
main charge: “Are you the King of the Jews?”

By replying with another question, Jesus is not refusing to answer: he
wishes to make quite clear, as he has always done, that his mission is a
spiritual one. And really Pilate’s was not an easy question to answer,
because, to a Gentile, a king of the Jews meant simply a subverter of the
Empire; whereas, to a Jewish nationalist, the King-Messiah was a politico-
religious liberator who would obtain their freedom from Rome. The true
character of Christ’s messiahship completely transcends both these
concepts—as Jesus explains to the procurator, although he realizes how
enormously difficult it is for Pilate to understand what Christ’s Kingship
really involves.

35-36. After the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and the fish, Jesus
refused to be proclaimed king because the people were thinking in terms of
an earthly kingdom (cf. Jn 6:15). However, Jesus did enter Jerusalem in tri-
umph, and he did accept acclamation as King-Messiah. Now, in the passion,
he acknowledges before Pilate that he is truly a King, making it clear that his
kingship is not an earthly one. Thus, “those who expected the Messiah to
have visible temporal power were mistaken. ‘The kingdom of God does not
mean food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit’
(Rom 14:17). Truth and justice, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. That is the
kingdom of Christ: the divine activity which saves men and which will reach
its culmination when history ends and the Lord comes from the heights of
paradise finally to judge men” ([St] J. Escriva, “Christ is Passing By”, 180).

37. This is what his kingship really is: his kingdom is “the kingdom of
Truth and Life, the kingdom of Holiness and Grace, the kingdom of Justice,
Love and Peace” (Preface of the Mass of Christ the King). Christ reigns over
those who accept and practise the truth revealed by him—his Father’s love
for the world (Jn 3:16; 1 Jn 4:9). He became man to make this truth known
and to enable men to accept it. And so, those who recognize Christ’s
kingship and sovereignty accept his authority, and he thus reigns over them
in an eternal and universal kingdom.

For its part, “the Church, looking to Christ who bears witness to the truth,
must always and everywhere ask herself, and in a certain sense also con-
temporary ‘world’, how to make good emerge from man, how to liberate the
dynamism of the good that is in man, in order that it may be stronger than
evil, than any moral, social or other evil” (John Paul II, “General Audience”,
February 1979).

“If we [Christians] are trying to have Christ as our king we must be
consistent. We must start by giving him our heart. Not to do that and still
talk about the kingdom of Christ would be completely hollow. There would be
no real Christian substance in our behavior. We would be making an outward
show of a faith which simply did not exist We would be misusing God’s name
to human advantage. [...] If we let Christ reign in our soul, we will not become
authoritarian. Rather we will serve everyone. How l like that word: service! To
serve my king and, through him, all those who have been redeemed by his
blood. I really wish we Christians knew how to serve, for only by serving can
we know and love Christ and make him known and loved” ([St] J. Escriva,
“Christ is Passing By”, 181-182).

By his death and resurrection, Jesus shows that the accusations laid against
him were based on lies: it was he who was telling the truth, not his judges
and accusers, and God confirms the truth of Jesus—the truth of his words, of
deeds, of his revelation—by the singular miracle of his resurrection. To men
Christ’s kingship may seem paradoxical: he dies, yet he lives for ever; he is
defeated and is crucified, yet he is victorious. “When Jesus Christ him ap-
peared as a prisoner before Pilate’s tribunal and was interrogated by him...did
he not answer: ‘For this I was born, and for this I have come into the world, to
bear witness to the truth’? It was as if with these words [...] he was once more
confirming what he had said earlier: ‘You will know the truth, and truth will
make you free’. In the course of so many centuries, of so many generations,
from the time of the Apostles on, is it not often Jesus Christ himself that has
made an appearance at the side of people judged for the sake of truth? And
has he not gone to death with people condemned for the sake of truth? Does
he ever cease to be the continuous spokesman and advocate for person who
lives ‘in spirit and truth’? (cf. Jn 4:23). Just as he does not cease to be it
before the Father, he is it also with regard to the history of man” (J Paul II,
“Redemptor Hominis”, 12).

38-40. The outcome of the interrogation is that Pilate becomes convinced of
Jesus’ innocence (cf. Jn 19:4, 12). He probably realizes that the accusations
made against Jesus were really an internal matter in which the Jews were
trying to involve him; but the Jewish authorities are very irate. It is not easy
for him to find away out. He tries to do so by making concessions: first, he
has recourse to a passover privilege, offering them the choice between a
criminal and Jesus, but this does not work; so he looks for other ways to
save him, and here also he fails. His cowardice and indecision cause him to
yield to pressure and commit the injustice of condemning to death a man he
knows to be innocent.

“The mystery of innocent suffering is one of the most obscure points on the
entire horizon of human wisdom; and here it is affirmed in the most flagrant
way. But before we uncover something of this problem, there already grows
up in us an unrestrained affection for the innocent one who suffers, for
Jesus, [...] and for all innocent people—whether they be young or old—who
are also suffering, and whose pain we cannot explain. The way of the cross
leads us to meet the first person in a sorrowful procession of innocent people
who suffer. And this first blameless and suffering person uncovers for us in
the end the secret of his passion. It is a sacrifice” (Paul VI, “Address on
Good Friday”, 12 April 1974).

1-3. Christ’s prophecy is fulfilled to the letter: the Son of Man “will be
delivered to the Gentiles, and will be mocked and shamefully treated and
spit upon; they will scourge him and kill him, and on the third day he will
rise” (Lk 18:32f; cf. Mt 20:18f).

Scourging was one of the most severe punishments permitted under Roman
law. The criminal was draped over a pillar or other form of support, his naked
back exposed to the lash or “flagellum”. Scourging was generally used as a
preliminary to crucifixion to weaken the criminal and thereby hasten his
death.

Crowning with thorns was not an official part of the punishment; it was an
initiative of the soldiers themselves, a product of their cruelty and desire to
mock Jesus. On the stone pavement in the Antonia tower some drawings
have been found which must have been used in what was called the “king
game”; dice were thrown to pick out a mock king among those condemned,
who was subjected to taunting before being led off for crucifixion.

St John locates this episode at the center of his narrative of the events in
praetorium. He thereby highlights the crowning with thorns as the point
which Christ’s kingship is at its most patent: the soldiers proclaim him as
King of the Jews only in a sarcastic way (of. Mk 15:15, 16-19), but the
evangelist gives us to understand that he is indeed the King.

5. Wearing the insignia of royalty, Christ, despite this tragic parody, projects
the majesty of the King of Kings. In Rev 5:12 St John will say: “Worth is the
Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might
and honor and glory and blessing!”

“Imagine that divine face: swollen by blows, covered in spittle, torn by
thorns, furrowed with blood, here fresh blood, there ugly dried blood. And,
since the sacred Lamb had his hands tied, he could not use them to wipe
away the blood running into his eyes, and so those two luminaries of heaven
were eclipsed and almost blinded and made mere pieces of flesh. Finally, so
figured was he that one could not make out who he was; he scarcely seemed
human; he had become an altarpiece depicting suffering, painted by those
cruel artists and their evil president, producing this pitiful figure to plead his
before his enemies” (Fray Luis de Granada, “Life of Jesus Christ”,
4).

6-7. When Pilate hears the Jews accuse Jesus of claiming to be the Son
of God, he grows still more alarmed: his wife has already unnerved him by
sending him a message, after a dream, not to have anything to do with this
“righteous man”. But the shouting (v. 12) orchestrated by the Jewish
authorities pressurizes him into agreeing to condemn Jesus.

Although technically Jesus is crucified for supposedly committing a political
crime (cf. note on Jn 18:29-32), in fact it is on clearly religious grounds that he
is sent to death.

8-11. Pilate is impressed by Jesus’ silence, by his not defending himself, and
when the procurator says that he has power to release him or to condemn him,
our Lord then says something quite unexpected—that all power on earth comes
from God. This means that in the last analysis even if people talk about the
sovereignty of the king or of the people, such authority is never absolute; it is
only relative, being subject to the absolute sovereignty of God: hence no human
law can be just, and therefore binding in conscience, if it does not accord with
divine law.

“He who delivered me”—a reference to all those who have contrived our Lord’s
death, that is, Judas, Caiaphas, the Jewish leaders, etc. (cf. 18:30-35). They
are the ones that really sent Christ to the cross; but this does not exonerate
Pontius Pilate from blame.

13. “The Pavement”, in Greek “Iithostrotos”, literally a “pavement”, “flagged
expanse”, therefore a yard or plaza paved with flags. The Hebrew word “Gabba-
tha” is not the equivalent of the Greek “lithostrotos”; it means “height” or
“eminence”. But both words refer to the same place; however, its precise
location is uncertain due to doubts about where the praetorium was located:
cf. note on Jn 18:28.

Grammatically, the Greek could be translated as follows: “Pilate... brought
Jesus out and sat him down on the judgment seat”: in which case the
evangelist implies that Pilate was ridiculing the Jewish leaders by a mock
enthronement of the “King of the Jews”. This would fit in with Pilate’s
attitude towards the Jewish leaders from this point onwards (vv. 14-22) and
with the purpose of the inspired writer, who would see in this the
enthronement of Christ as King.

14. “The day of Preparation”, the Parasceve. The sixth hour began at midday.
Around this time all leavened bread was removed from the houses and replaced
by unleavened bread for the paschal meal (cf. Ex 12:15ff), and the lamb was
officially sacrificed in the temple. St John notes that this was the time at which
Jesus was condemned, thereby underlying the coincidence between the time
of the death sentence and the time the lamb was sacrificed: Christ is the new
Paschal Lamb; as St Paul says (cf. 1 Cor 5:7), “Christ, our paschal lamb, has
been sacrificed”.

There is some difficulty in reconciling what St John says about the sixth hour,
with the information given in Mark 15:25 about Jesus being crucified at the third
hour. Various explanations are offered, the best being that Mark is referring to
the end of the third hour and John to the beginning of the sixth hour both would
then be talking of around midday.

15. The history of the Jewish people helps us understand the tragic paradox
of the attitude of the Jewish authorities at this point. The Jews were very
conscious all along of being the people of God. For example, they proudly
asserted that they had no Father but God (cf. Jn 8:4). In the Old Testament
Yahweh is the true King of Israel (cf. Deut 33:5; Num 23:21; 1 Kings 22:19;
Is 6:5); when they wanted to copy the neighboring peoples and asked Samuel
for a king (cf. I Sam 8:5. 20), Samuel resisted, because Israel had only one
absolute sovereign, Yahweh (1 Sam 8:6-9). But eventually God gave in to their
request and himself designated who should be king over his people. His first
choice, Saul, was given sacred anointing, as were David and his successors.
This rite of anointing showed that the Israelite king was God’s vicar. When the
kings failed to meet the people’s expectations, they increasingly yearned for
the messianic king, the descendant or “Son” of David, the Anointed “par excel-
lence” or Messiah, who would rule his people, liberate them from their enemies
and lead them to rule the world (cf. 2 Sam 7:16; Ps 24:7; 43:5; etc.). For
centuries they strove heroically for this ideal, rejecting foreign domination.

During Christ’s time also they opposed Rome and Herod, whom, not being
a Jew, they regarded as an illegitimate king. However, at this point in the
Passion, they hypocritically accept the Roman emperor as their true and
only king. They also reject the “easy yoke” of Christ (cf. Mt 11:30) and bring
the full weight of Rome down upon him.

“They themselves submitted to the punishment; therefore, the Lord handed
them over. Thus, because they unanimously rejected God’s government, the
Lord let them be brought down through their own condemnation: for, rejecting
the dominion of Christ, they brought upon themselves that of Caesar” (St
John Chrysostom, “Hom. on St John”, 83).

A similar kind of tragedy occurs when people who have been baptized and
therefore have become part of the new people of God, throw off the “easy
yoke” of Christ’s sovereignty by their obstinacy in sin and submit to the
terrible tyranny of the devil (cf. 2 Pet 2:21).

17. “The place of a skull” or Calvary seems to have got its name from the
fact that it was shaped like a skull or head.

St Paul points to the parallelism that exists between Adam’s disobedience
and Christ’s obedience (cf. Rom 5:12). On the feast of the Triumph of the
Cross the Church sings “where life was lost, there life has been restored”,
to show how,just as the devil won victory by the tree of paradise, so he was
overpowered by Christ on the tree of the Cross.

St John is the only evangelist who clearly states that Jesus carried his own
cross; the other three mention that Simon of Cyrene helped to carry it. See
note on Mt 27:31 and Lk 23:26.

Christ’s decisiveness in accepting the cross is an example which we should
follow in our daily life: “You yourself must decide of your own free will to take
up the cross; otherwise, your tongue may say that you are imitating Christ,
but your actions will belie your words. That way, you will never get to know
the Master intimately, or love him truly. It is really important that we Chris-
tians convince ourselves of this. We are not walking with our Lord unless we
are spontaneously depriving ourselves of many things that our whims, vanity,
pleasure or self-interest clamor for” ([St] J. Escriva, “Friends of God”, 129).

As Simeon had prophesied, Jesus would be a “sign that is spoken against”
(Lk 2:34)—a standard raised on high which leaves no room for indifference,
demanding that every man decide for or against him and his cross: “he was
going therefore to the place where he was to be crucified, bearing his own
Cross. An extraordinary spectacle: to impiety, something to jeer at; to
piety a great mystery. [...] Impiety looks on and laughs at a king bearing,
instead of a scepter, the wood of his punishment; piety looks on and sees
the King bearing that cross for himself to be fixed on, a cross which would
thereafter shine on the brow of kings; an object of contempt in the eyes of
the impious, but something in which hereafter the hearts of the saints
should glorify, as St Paul would later say, But God forbid that I should
glory; save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” (St Augustine, “In Ioann.
Evang.”, 117, 3).

18. Knowing what crucifixion in ancient times entailed will help us
understand much better the extent of the humiliation and suffering Jesus
bore for love of us. Crucifixion was a penalty reserved for slaves, and
applied to the most serious crimes; it was the most horrific and painful
form of death possible; it was also an exemplary public punishment and
therefore was carried out in a public place, with the body of the criminal
being left exposed for days afterwards. These words of Cicero show how
infamous a punishment it was: “That a Roman citizen should be bound is
an abuse; that he be lashed is a crime; that he be put to death is virtually
parricide; what, then, shall I say, if he be hung on a cross? There is no
word fit to describe a deed so horrible” (”In Verrem”, II, 5,66).

A person undergoing crucifixion died after a painful agony involving loss of
blood, fever caused by his wounds, thirst, and asphyxiation, etc. Some-
times the executioners hastened death by breaking the person’s legs or
piercing him with a lance, as in our Lord’s case. This helps us understand
better what St Paul says to the Philippians about Christ’s humiliation on
the Cross: “he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant [or slave],
being born in the likeness of men... ; he humbled himself and became
obedient unto death, even death on a cross (Phil 2:7-8).

St John says little about the other two people being crucified, perhaps
because the Synoptic Gospels had already spoken about them (see notes
on Lk 23:39-43).

19-22. The “title” was the technical term then used in Roman law to indicate
the grounds on which the person was being punished. It was usually written
on a board prominently displayed, summarizing the official document which
was forwarded to the legal archives in Rome. This explains why, when the
chief priests ask Pilate to change the wording of the inscription, the procu-
rator firmly refuses to do so: the sentence, once dictated, was irrevocable:
that is what he means when he says, “What I have written I have written.”
In the case of Christ, this title written in different languages proclaims his
universal kingship, for it could be read by people from all over the world who
had come to celebrate the Passover—thus confirming our Lord’s words: “I am
a king. For this I was born, and for this I have come into the world” (Jn 18:37).

In establishing the feast of Christ the King, Pope Pius XI explained: “He is
said to reign ‘in the minds of men’, both by reason of the keenness of his
intellect and the extent of his knowledge, and also because he is Truth itself
and it is from him that truth must be obediently received by all mankind. He
reigns, too, in the wills of men, for in him the human will was perfectly and
entirely obedient to the holy will of God, and further by his grace and inspira-
tion he so subjects our free will as to incite us to the most noble endeavors.
He is King of our hearts, too, by reason of his ‘charity which surpasseth all
knowledge’, and his mercy and kindness which draw all men to him; for there
never was, nor ever will be a man loved so much and so universally as Jesus
Christ” (Pius XI, “Quas Primas”).

23-24. And so the prophecy of Psalm 22 is fulfilled which describes
accurately the sufferings of the Messiah: “They divide my garments among
them, and for my raiment they cast lots” (Ps 22:19). The Fathers have seen
this seamless tunic a symbol of the unity of the Church (cf. St Augustine,
“In Ioann. Evang.”, 118,4).

25. Whereas the Apostles, with the exception of St John, abandon Jesus in
the hour of his humiliation, these pious women, who had followed him during
his public life (cf. Lk 8:2-3) now stay with their Master as he dies on the
cross (cf. note on Mt 27:55-56).

Pope John Paul II explains that our Lady’s faithfulness was shown in four
ways: first, in her generous desire to do all that God wanted of her (cf. Lk
1:34); second, in her total acceptance of God’s Will (cf. Lk 1:38); third,
in the consistency between her life and the commitment of faith which she
made; an finally, in her withstanding this test. “And only a consistency
that lasts throughout the whole of life can be called faithfulness. Mary’s
‘fiat’ in the Annunciation finds its fullness in the silent ‘fiat’ that she repeats
at the foot of the Cross” (”Homily in Mexico Cathedral”, 26 January 1979).

The Church has always recognized the dignity of women and their important
role in salvation history. It is enough to recall the veneration which from the
earliest times the Christian people have had for the Mother of Christ, the
Woman “par excellence” and the most sublime and most privileged creature
ever to come from the hands of God. Addressing a special message to women,
the Second Vatican Council said, among other things: “Women in trial, who
stand upright at the foot of the cross like Mary, you who so often in history
have given to men the strength to battle unto the very end and to give witness
to the point of martyrdom, aid them now still once more to retain courage in
their great undertakings, while at the same time maintaining patience and
an esteem for humble beginnings” (Vatican II, “Message to Women”, 8
December 1965).

26-27. “The spotless purity of John’s whole life makes him strong before the
Cross. The other apostles fly from Golgotha: he, with the Mother of Christ,
remains. Don’t forget that purity strengthens and invigorates the character”
([St] J. Escriva, “The Way”, 144).

Our Lord’s gesture in entrusting his Blessed Mother to the disciple’s care,
has a dual meaning (see p. 19 above and pp. 35ff). For one thing it ex-
presses his filial love for the Virgin Mary. St Augustine sees it as a lesson
Jesus gives us on how to keep the fourth commandment: “Here is a lesson
in morals. He is doing what he tells us to do and, like a good Teacher, he
instructs his own by example, that it is the duty of good children to take
care of their parents; as though the wood on which his dying members were
fixed were also the chair of the teaching Master” (St Augustine, “In Ioann.
Evang.”, 119, 2).

Our Lord’s words also declare that Mary is our Mother: “The Blessed Virgin
also advanced in her pilgrimage of faith, and faithfully persevered in her
union with her Son unto the cross, where she stood, in keeping with the
divine plan, enduring with her only begotten Son the intensity of his suffering,
associating herself with his sacrifice in her mother’s heart, and lovingly con-
senting to the immolation of this victim who was born of her. Finally, she was
given by the same Christ Jesus dying on the cross as a mother to his disciple”
(Vatican 11, “Lumen Gentium”, 58).

All Christians, who are represented in the person of John, are children of
Mary. By giving us his Mother to be our Mother, Christ demonstrates his love
for his own to the end (cf. Jn 13:1). Our Lady’s acceptance of John as her
son shows her motherly care for us: “the Son of God, and your Son, from the
Cross indicated a man to you, Mary, and said: ‘Behold, your son’ (Jn 19:26).
And in that man he entrusted to you every person, he entrusted everyone to
you. And you, who at the moment of the Annunciation, concentrated the whole
program of your life in those simple words: ‘Behold I am the handmaid of the
Lord; let it be to me according to your word’ (Lk 1:38): embrace everyone, draw
close to everyone, seek everyone out with motherly care. Thus is accomplished
what the last Council said about your presence in the mystery of Christ and the
Church. In a wonderful way you are always found in the mystery of Christ, your
only Son, because you are present wherever men and women, his brothers and
sisters, are present, wherever the Church is present” (John Paul II, “Homily in
the Basilica of Guadalupe”, 27 January 1979).

“John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, brought Mary into his home, into his life.
Spiritual writers have seen these words of the Gospel as an invitation to all
Christians to bring Mary into their lives. Mary certainly wants us to invoke her,
to approach her confidently, to appeal to her as our mother, asking her to ‘show
that you are our mother”’ ([St] J. Escriva, “Christ is Passing By”, 140).

John Paul II constantly treats our Lady as his Mother. In bidding farewell to the
Virgin of Czestochowa he prayed in this way: “Our Lady of the Bright Mountain,
Mother of the Church! Once more I consecrate myself to you ‘in your maternal
slavery of love’. “Totus tuus”! I am all yours! I consecrate to you the whole
Church—everywhere and to the ends of the earth! I consecrate to you humanity;
I consecrate to you all men and women, my brothers and sisters. All peoples
and all nations. I consecrate to you Europe and all the continents. I consecrate
to you Rome and Poland, united, through your servant, by a fresh bond of love.
Mother, accept us! Mother, do not abandon us! Mother, be our guide!” (”Farewell
Address” at Jasna Gora Shrine, 6 June 1979).

28-29. This was foretold in the Old Testament: “They gave me poison for food,
and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink” (Ps 69:21). This does not mean
that they gave Jesus vinegar to increase his suffering; it was customary to offer
victims of crucifixion water mixed with vinegar to relieve their thirst. In addition
to the natural dehydration Jesus was suffering, we can see in his thirst an ex-
pression of his burning desire to do his Father’s will and to save a souls: “On
the Cross he cried out “Sitio”!, ‘I thirst’. He thirsts for us, for our love, for our
souls and for all the souls we ought to be bringing to him along the way of the
Cross, which is the way to immortality and heavenly glory” ([St] J. Escriva,
“Friends of God”, 202).

30. Jesus, nailed on the cross, dies to atone for all the sins and vileness of
man. Despite his sufferings he dies serenely, majestically, bowing his head
now that he has accomplished the mission entrusted to him. “Who can sleep
when he wishes to, as Jesus died when he wished to? Who can lay aside his
clothing when he wishes to, as he put off the flesh when he chose to?... What
must be hope or fear to find his power when he comes in judgment, if it can
be seen to be so great at the moment of his death!” (St Augustine, “ln loann.
Evang.”, 119, 6).

“Let us meditate on our Lord, wounded from head to foot out of love for us.
Using a phrase which approaches the truth, although it does not express its
full reality, we can repeat the words of an ancient writer: ‘The body of Christ
is a portrait in pain’. At the first sight of Christ bruised and broken—just a life-
less body taken down from the cross and given to his Mother—at the sight of
Jesus destroyed in this way, we might have thought he had failed utterly.
Where are the crowds that once followed him, where is the kingdom he fore-
told? But this is victory, not defeat. We are nearer the resurrection than ever
before; we are going to see the glory which he has won with his obedience”
([St] J. Escriva, “Christ is Passing By”, 95).

31-33. Jesus dies on the Preparation day of the Passover—the Parasceve—
that is, the eve, when the paschal lambs were officially sacrificed in the
Temple. By stressing this, the evangelist implies that Christ’s sacrifice took
the place of the sacrifices of the Old Law and inaugurated the New Alliance
in his blood (cf. Heb 9:12).

The Law of Moses required that the bodies should be taken down before
nightfall (Deut 21:22-23); this is why Pilate is asked to have their legs broken,
to bring on death and allow them to be buried before it gets dark, particularly
since the next day is the feast of the Passover.

On the date of Jesus’ death see “The Dates of the Life of our Lord Jesus Christ”
in “The Navarre Bible: St Mark” pp. 48ff.

34. The outflow of blood and water has a natural explanation. Probably the water
was an accumulation of liquid in the lungs due to Jesus’ intense sufferings.

As on other occasions, the historical events narrated in the fourth Gospel
are laden with meaning. St Augustine and Christian tradition see the sacra-
ment and the Church itself flowing from Jesus’ open side: “Here was opened
wide the door of life, from which the sacraments of the Church have flowed out,
without which there is no entering in unto life which is true life. [...] Here the
second Adam with bowed head slept upon the cross, that thence a wife might
be formed of him, flowing from his side while he slept. 0 death, by which the
dead come back to life! is there anything purer than this blood, any wound
more healing!” (St Augustine, “In Ioann. Evang.”, 120, 2).

The Second Vatican Council, for its part, teaches: “The Church—that is, the
kingdom of Christ—already present in mystery, grows visibly through the
power of God in the world. The origin and growth of the Church are symbo-
lized by the blood and water which flowed from the open side of the crucified
Jesus (Vatican II, “Lumen Gentium”, 3).

“Jesus on the cross, with his heart overflowing with love for men, is such an
eloquent commentary on the value of people and things that words only get
in the way. People, their happiness and their life, are so important that the
very Son of God gave himself to redeem and cleanse and raise them up”
([St] J. Escriva, “Christ is Passing By”, 165).

35. St John’s Gospel presents itself as a truthful witness of the events of
our Lord’s life and of their spiritual and doctrinal significance. From the
words of John the Baptist at the outset of Jesus’ public ministry (1:19) to
the final paragraph of the Gospel (21:24-25), everything forms part of a
testimony to the sublime phenomenon of the Word of Life made Man.
Here the evangelist explicitly states that he was an eyewitness (cf. also
Jn 20:30-31; 1 Jn 1:1-3).

36. This quotation refers to the precept of the Law that no bone of the
paschal lamb should be broken (cf. Ex 12:46): again St John’s Gospel is
telling, us that Jesus is the true paschal Lamb who takes away the sins
of the world (cf. Jn 1:29).

37. The account of the Passion concludes with a quotation from Zechariah
(12:10) foretelling the salvation resulting from the mysterious suffering and
death of a redeemer. The evangelist thereby evokes the salvation wrought
by Jesus Christ who, nailed to the cross, has fulfilled God’s promise of
redemption (cf. Jn 12:32). Everyone who looks upon him with faith receives
the effects of his Passion. Thus, the good thief, looking at Christ on the
cross, recognized his kingship, placed his trust in him and received the
promise of heaven (Cf. Lk 23:42-43).

In the liturgy of Good Friday the Church invites us to contemplate and adore
the cross: “Behold the wood of the Cross, on which was nailed the salvation
of the world”, and from the earliest times of the Church the Crucifix has
been the sign reminding Christians of the supreme point of Christ’s love,
when he died on the Cross and freed us from eternal death.

“Your Crucifix.—As a Christian, you should always carry your Crucifix with
you. And place it on your desk. And kiss it before going to bed and when
you wake up: and when your poor body rebels against your soul, kiss it
again” ([St] J. Escriva, “The Way”, 302).

38-39. Our Lord’s sacrifice produces its firstfruits: people who were previously
afraid now boldly confess themselves disciples of Christ and attend to his
dead Body with exquisite refinement and generosity. The evangelist mentions
that Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus used a mixture of myrrh and aloes
in lavish amount. Myrrh is a very expensive aromatic resin, and aloes a juice
extracted from the leaves of certain plants. They were used as an _expression
of veneration for the dead.

40. The Fourth Gospel adds to the information on the burial given by the
Synoptics. Sacred Scripture did not specify what form burial should take,
with the result that the Jews followed the custom of the time. After piously
taking our Lord’s body down from the cross, they probably washed it carefully
(cf. Acts 9:37), perfumed it and wrapped it in a linen cloth, covering the head
with a sudarium or napkin (cf. Jn 20:5-6). But because of the imminence of
the sabbath rest, they were unable to anoint the body with balsam, which the
women planned to do once the sabbath was past (cf. Mk 16:1; Lk 24:1).
Jesus himself, when he praised Mary for anointing him at Bethany, had fore-
told in a veiled way that his body would not be embalmed (cf. note on Jn 12:7).

41. Many of the Fathers have probed the mystic meaning of the
garden—usually to point out that Christ, who was arrested in the Garden of
Olives and buried in another garden, has redeemed us superabundantly from
that first sin which was committed also in a garden, the Garden of Paradise
They comment that Jesus’ being the only one to be buried in this new tomb
meant that there would be no doubt that it was he and not another that rose
from the dead. St Augustine also observes that “just as in the womb of the
Virgin Mary none was conceived before him, none after him, so in this tomb
none before him, none after was buried” (”In Ioann. Evang.”. 120, 5).

Among the truths of Christian doctrine to do with Christ’s death and burial
are these: “one, that the body of Christ was in no degree corrupted in the
sepulchre, according to the prediction of the Prophet, ‘Thou wilt not give
thy holy one to see corruption’ (Ps 16:10; Acts 2:31); the other... that
burial, passion and death apply to Christ Jesus not as God but as man,
yet they are also attributed to God, since, as is clear, they are predicated
with propriety of that Person who is at once perfect God and perfect man”
(”St Pius V Catechism”, I 5, 9).

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.

Jn 18
#	Douay-Rheims	Vulgate
1	When Jesus had said these things, he went forth with his disciples over the brook Cedron, where there was a garden, into which he entered with his disciples.	haec cum dixisset Iesus egressus est cum discipulis suis trans torrentem Cedron ubi erat hortus in quem introivit ipse et discipuli eius
2	And Judas also, who betrayed him, knew the place: because Jesus had often resorted thither together with his disciples.	sciebat autem et Iudas qui tradebat eum ipsum locum quia frequenter Iesus convenerat illuc cum discipulis suis
3	Judas therefore having received a band of soldiers and servants from the chief priests and the Pharisees, cometh thither with lanterns and torches and weapons.	Iudas ergo cum accepisset cohortem et a pontificibus et Pharisaeis ministros venit illuc cum lanternis et facibus et armis
4	Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, went forth and said to them: Whom seek ye?	Iesus itaque sciens omnia quae ventura erant super eum processit et dicit eis quem quaeritis
5	They answered him: Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus saith to them: I am he. And Judas also, who betrayed him, stood with them.	responderunt ei Iesum Nazarenum dicit eis Iesus ego sum stabat autem et Iudas qui tradebat eum cum ipsis
6	As soon therefore as he had said to them: I am he; they went backward and fell to the ground.	ut ergo dixit eis ego sum abierunt retrorsum et ceciderunt in terram
7	Again therefore he asked them: Whom seek ye? And they said: Jesus of Nazareth.	iterum ergo eos interrogavit quem quaeritis illi autem dixerunt Iesum Nazarenum
8	Jesus answered: I have told you that I am he. If therefore you seek me, let these go their way,	respondit Iesus dixi vobis quia ego sum si ergo me quaeritis sinite hos abire
9	That the word might be fulfilled which he said: Of them whom thou hast given me, I have not lost any one.	ut impleretur sermo quem dixit quia quos dedisti mihi non perdidi ex ipsis quemquam
10	Then Simon Peter, having a sword, drew it and struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his right ear. And the name of thee servant was Malchus.	Simon ergo Petrus habens gladium eduxit eum et percussit pontificis servum et abscidit eius auriculam dextram erat autem nomen servo Malchus
11	Jesus therefore said to Peter: Put up thy sword into the scabbard. The chalice which my father hath given me, shall I not drink it?	dixit ergo Iesus Petro mitte gladium in vaginam calicem quem dedit mihi Pater non bibam illum
12	Then the band and the tribune and the servants of the Jews took Jesus and bound him.	cohors ergo et tribunus et ministri Iudaeorum conprehenderunt Iesum et ligaverunt eum
13	And they led him away to Annas first, for he was father-in-law to Caiphas, who was the high priest of that year.	et adduxerunt eum ad Annam primum erat enim socer Caiaphae qui erat pontifex anni illius
14	Now Caiphas was he who had given the counsel to the Jews: That it was expedient that one man should die for the people.	erat autem Caiaphas qui consilium dederat Iudaeis quia expedit unum hominem mori pro populo
15	And Simon Peter followed Jesus: and so did another disciple. And that disciple was known to the high priest and went in with Jesus into the court of the high priest.	sequebatur autem Iesum Simon Petrus et alius discipulus discipulus autem ille erat notus pontifici et introivit cum Iesu in atrium pontificis
16	But Peter stood at the door without. The other disciple therefore, who was known to the high priest, went out and spoke to the portress and brought in Peter.	Petrus autem stabat ad ostium foris exivit ergo discipulus alius qui erat notus pontifici et dixit ostiariae et introduxit Petrum
17	The maid therefore that was portress saith to Peter: Art not thou also one of this man's disciple? He saith I am not.	dicit ergo Petro ancilla ostiaria numquid et tu ex discipulis es hominis istius dicit ille non sum
18	Now the servants and ministers stood at a fire of coals, because it was cold, and warmed themselves. And with them was Peter also, standing and warming himself.	stabant autem servi et ministri ad prunas quia frigus erat et calefiebant erat autem cum eis et Petrus stans et calefaciens se
19	The high priest therefore asked Jesus of his disciples and of his doctrine.	pontifex ergo interrogavit Iesum de discipulis suis et de doctrina eius
20	Jesus answered him: I have spoken openly to the world. I have always taught in the synagogue and in the temple, whither all the Jews resort: and in secret I have spoken nothing.	respondit ei Iesus ego palam locutus sum mundo ego semper docui in synagoga et in templo quo omnes Iudaei conveniunt et in occulto locutus sum nihil
21	Why askest thou me? Ask them who have heard what I have spoken unto them. Behold they know what things I have said.	quid me interrogas interroga eos qui audierunt quid locutus sum ipsis ecce hii sciunt quae dixerim ego
22	And when he had said these things, one of the servants standing by gave Jesus a blow, saying: Answerest thou the high priest so?	haec autem cum dixisset unus adsistens ministrorum dedit alapam Iesu dicens sic respondes pontifici
23	Jesus answered him: If I have spoken evil, give testimony of the evil; but if well, why strikest thou me?	respondit ei Iesus si male locutus sum testimonium perhibe de malo si autem bene quid me caedis
24	And Annas sent him bound to Caiphas the high priest.	et misit eum Annas ligatum ad Caiaphan pontificem
25	And Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. They said therefore to him: Art not thou also one of his disciples? He denied it and said: I am not.	erat autem Simon Petrus stans et calefaciens se dixerunt ergo ei numquid et tu ex discipulis eius es negavit ille et dixit non sum
26	One of the servants of the high priest (a kinsman to him whose ear Peter cut off) saith to him: Did not I see thee in the garden with him?	dicit unus ex servis pontificis cognatus eius cuius abscidit Petrus auriculam nonne ego te vidi in horto cum illo
27	Again therefore Peter denied: and immediately the cock crew.	iterum ergo negavit Petrus et statim gallus cantavit
28	Then they led Jesus from Caiphas to the governor's hall. And it was morning: and they went not into the hall, that they might not be defiled, but that they might eat the pasch.	adducunt ergo Iesum a Caiapha in praetorium erat autem mane et ipsi non introierunt in praetorium ut non contaminarentur sed manducarent pascha
29	Pilate therefore went out to them, and said: What accusation bring you against this man?	exivit ergo Pilatus ad eos foras et dixit quam accusationem adfertis adversus hominem hunc
30	They answered and said to him: If he were not a malefactor, we would not have delivered him up to thee.	responderunt et dixerunt ei si non esset hic malefactor non tibi tradidissemus eum
31	Pilate therefore said to them: Take him you, and judge him according to your law. The Jews therefore said to him: It is not lawful for us to put any man to death.	dixit ergo eis Pilatus accipite eum vos et secundum legem vestram iudicate eum dixerunt ergo ei Iudaei nobis non licet interficere quemquam
32	That the word of Jesus might be fulfilled, which he said, signifying what death he should die.	ut sermo Iesu impleretur quem dixit significans qua esset morte moriturus
33	Pilate therefore went into the hall again and called Jesus and said to him: Art thou the king of the Jews?	introivit ergo iterum in praetorium Pilatus et vocavit Iesum et dixit ei tu es rex Iudaeorum
34	Jesus answered: Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or have others told it thee of me?	et respondit Iesus a temet ipso hoc dicis an alii tibi dixerunt de me
35	Pilate answered: Am I a Jew? Thy own nation and the chief priests have delivered thee up to me. What hast thou done?	respondit Pilatus numquid ego Iudaeus sum gens tua et pontifices tradiderunt te mihi quid fecisti
36	Jesus answered: My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would certainly strive that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now my kingdom is not from hence.	respondit Iesus regnum meum non est de mundo hoc si ex hoc mundo esset regnum meum ministri mei decertarent ut non traderer Iudaeis nunc autem meum regnum non est hinc
37	Pilate therefore said to him: Art thou a king then? Jesus answered: Thou sayest that I am a king. For this was I born, and for this came I into the world; that I should give testimony to the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.	dixit itaque ei Pilatus ergo rex es tu respondit Iesus tu dicis quia rex sum ego ego in hoc natus sum et ad hoc veni in mundum ut testimonium perhibeam veritati omnis qui est ex veritate audit meam vocem
38	Pilate saith to him: What is truth? And when he said this, he went out again to the Jews and saith to them: I find no cause in him.	dicit ei Pilatus quid est veritas et cum hoc dixisset iterum exivit ad Iudaeos et dicit eis ego nullam invenio in eo causam
39	But you have a custom that I should release one unto you at the Pasch. Will you, therefore, that I release unto you the king of the Jews?	est autem consuetudo vobis ut unum dimittam vobis in pascha vultis ergo dimittam vobis regem Iudaeorum
40	Then cried they all again, saying: Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber.	clamaverunt rursum omnes dicentes non hunc sed Barabban erat autem Barabbas latro

Jn 19
#	Douay-Rheims	Vulgate
1	Then therefore Pilate took Jesus and scourged him.	tunc ergo adprehendit Pilatus Iesum et flagellavit
2	And the soldiers platting a crown of thorns, put it upon his head: and they put on him a purple garment.	et milites plectentes coronam de spinis inposuerunt capiti eius et veste purpurea circumdederunt eum
3	And they came to him and said: Hail, king of the Jews. And they gave him blows.	et veniebant ad eum et dicebant have rex Iudaeorum et dabant ei alapas
4	Pilate therefore went forth again and saith to them: Behold, I bring him forth unto you, that you may know that I find no cause in him.	exiit iterum Pilatus foras et dicit eis ecce adduco vobis eum foras
5	(Jesus therefore came forth, bearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment.) And he saith to them: Behold the Man.	ut cognoscatis quia in eo nullam causam invenio et purpureum vestimentum et dicit eis ecce homo
6	When the chief priests, therefore, and the servants had seen him, they cried out, saying: Crucify him, Crucify him. Pilate saith to them: Take him you, and crucify him: for I find no cause in him.	cum ergo vidissent eum pontifices et ministri clamabant dicentes crucifige crucifige dicit eis Pilatus accipite eum vos et crucifigite ego enim non invenio in eo causam
7	The Jews answered him: We have a law; and according to the law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.	responderunt ei Iudaei nos legem habemus et secundum legem debet mori quia Filium Dei se fecit
8	When Pilate therefore had heard this saying, he feared the more.	cum ergo audisset Pilatus hunc sermonem magis timuit
9	And he entered into the hall again; and he said to Jesus: Whence art thou? But Jesus gave him no answer.	et ingressus est praetorium iterum et dicit ad Iesum unde es tu Iesus autem responsum non dedit ei
10	Pilate therefore saith to him: Speakest thou not to me? Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and I have power to release thee?	dicit ergo ei Pilatus mihi non loqueris nescis quia potestatem habeo crucifigere te et potestatem habeo dimittere te
11	Jesus answered: Thou shouldst not have any power against me, unless it were given thee from above. Therefore, he that hath delivered me to thee hath the greater sin.	respondit Iesus non haberes potestatem adversum me ullam nisi tibi esset datum desuper propterea qui tradidit me tibi maius peccatum habet
12	And from henceforth Pilate sought to release him. But the Jews cried out, saying: If thou release this man, thou art not Caesar's friend. For whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar.	exinde quaerebat Pilatus dimittere eum Iudaei autem clamabant dicentes si hunc dimittis non es amicus Caesaris omnis qui se regem facit contradicit Caesari
13	Now when Pilate had heard these words, he brought Jesus forth and sat down in the judgment seat, in the place that is called Lithostrotos, and in Hebrew Gabbatha.	Pilatus ergo cum audisset hos sermones adduxit foras Iesum et sedit pro tribunali in locum qui dicitur Lithostrotus hebraice autem Gabbatha
14	And it was the parasceve of the pasch, about the sixth hour: and he saith to the Jews: Behold your king.	erat autem parasceve paschae hora quasi sexta et dicit Iudaeis ecce rex vester
15	But they cried out: Away with him: Away with him: Crucify him. Pilate saith to them: shall I crucify your king? The chief priests answered: We have no king but Caesar.	illi autem clamabant tolle tolle crucifige eum dixit eis Pilatus regem vestrum crucifigam responderunt pontifices non habemus regem nisi Caesarem
16	Then therefore he delivered him to them to be crucified. And they took Jesus and led him forth.	tunc ergo tradidit eis illum ut crucifigeretur susceperunt autem Iesum et eduxerunt
17	And bearing his own cross, he went forth to the place which is called Calvary, but in Hebrew Golgotha.	et baiulans sibi crucem exivit in eum qui dicitur Calvariae locum hebraice Golgotha
18	Where they crucified him, and with him two others, one on each side, and Jesus in the midst.	ubi eum crucifixerunt et cum eo alios duos hinc et hinc medium autem Iesum
19	And Pilate wrote a title also: and he put it upon the cross. And the writing was: JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.	scripsit autem et titulum Pilatus et posuit super crucem erat autem scriptum Iesus Nazarenus rex Iudaeorum
20	This title therefore many of the Jews did read: because the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city. And it was written in Hebrew, in Greek, and in Latin.	hunc ergo titulum multi legerunt Iudaeorum quia prope civitatem erat locus ubi crucifixus est Iesus et erat scriptum hebraice graece et latine
21	Then the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate: Write not: The King of the Jews. But that he said: I am the King of the Jews.	dicebant ergo Pilato pontifices Iudaeorum noli scribere rex Iudaeorum sed quia ipse dixit rex sum Iudaeorum
22	Pilate answered: What I have written, I have written.	respondit Pilatus quod scripsi scripsi
23	The soldiers therefore, when they had crucified him, took his garments, (and they made four parts, to every soldier a part) and also his coat. Now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.	milites ergo cum crucifixissent eum acceperunt vestimenta eius et fecerunt quattuor partes unicuique militi partem et tunicam erat autem tunica inconsutilis desuper contexta per totum
24	They said then one to another: Let us not cut it but let us cast lots for it, whose it shall be; that the scripture might be fulfilled, saying: They have parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture they have cast lots. And the soldiers indeed did these things.	dixerunt ergo ad invicem non scindamus eam sed sortiamur de illa cuius sit ut scriptura impleatur dicens partiti sunt vestimenta mea sibi et in vestem meam miserunt sortem et milites quidem haec fecerunt
25	Now there stood by the cross of Jesus, his mother and his mother's sister, Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalen.	stabant autem iuxta crucem Iesu mater eius et soror matris eius Maria Cleopae et Maria Magdalene
26	When Jesus therefore had seen his mother and the disciple standing whom he loved, he saith to his mother: Woman, behold thy son.	cum vidisset ergo Iesus matrem et discipulum stantem quem diligebat dicit matri suae mulier ecce filius tuus
27	After that, he saith to the disciple: Behold thy mother. And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own.	deinde dicit discipulo ecce mater tua et ex illa hora accepit eam discipulus in sua
28	Afterwards, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, said: I thirst.	postea sciens Iesus quia iam omnia consummata sunt ut consummaretur scriptura dicit sitio
29	Now there was a vessel set there, full of vinegar. And they, putting a sponge full of vinegar about hyssop, put it to his mouth.	vas ergo positum erat aceto plenum illi autem spongiam plenam aceto hysopo circumponentes obtulerunt ori eius
30	Jesus therefore, when he had taken the vinegar, said: It is consummated. And bowing his head, he gave up the ghost.	cum ergo accepisset Iesus acetum dixit consummatum est et inclinato capite tradidit spiritum
31	Then the Jews (because it was the parasceve), that the bodies might not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day (for that was a great sabbath day), besought Pilate that their legs might be broken: and that they might be taken away.	Iudaei ergo quoniam parasceve erat ut non remanerent in cruce corpora sabbato erat enim magnus dies ille sabbati rogaverunt Pilatum ut frangerentur eorum crura et tollerentur
32	The soldiers therefore came: and they broke the legs of the first, and of the other that was crucified with him.	venerunt ergo milites et primi quidem fregerunt crura et alterius qui crucifixus est cum eo
33	But after they were come to Jesus, when they saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs.	ad Iesum autem cum venissent ut viderunt eum iam mortuum non fregerunt eius crura
34	But one of the soldiers with a spear opened his side: and immediately there came out blood and water.	sed unus militum lancea latus eius aperuit et continuo exivit sanguis et aqua
35	And he that saw it hath given testimony: and his testimony is true. And he knoweth that he saith true: that you also may believe.	et qui vidit testimonium perhibuit et verum est eius testimonium et ille scit quia vera dicit ut et vos credatis
36	For these things were done that the scripture might be fulfilled: You shall not break a bone of him.	facta sunt enim haec ut scriptura impleatur os non comminuetis ex eo
37	And again another scripture saith: They shall look on him whom they pierced.	et iterum alia scriptura dicit videbunt in quem transfixerunt
38	And after these things, Joseph of Arimathea (because he was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews), besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus. And Pilate gave leave. He came therefore and took away the body of Jesus.	post haec autem rogavit Pilatum Ioseph ab Arimathia eo quod esset discipulus Iesu occultus autem propter metum Iudaeorum ut tolleret corpus Iesu et permisit Pilatus venit ergo et tulit corpus Iesu
39	And Nicodemus also came (he who at the first came to Jesus by night), bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight.	venit autem et Nicodemus qui venerat ad Iesum nocte primum ferens mixturam murrae et aloes quasi libras centum
40	They took therefore the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloths, with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.	acceperunt ergo corpus Iesu et ligaverunt eum linteis cum aromatibus sicut mos Iudaeis est sepelire
41	Now there was in the place where he was crucified a garden: and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein no man yet had been laid.	erat autem in loco ubi crucifixus est hortus et in horto monumentum novum in quo nondum quisquam positus erat
42	There, therefore, because of the parasceve of the Jews, they laid Jesus: because the sepulchre was nigh at hand.	ibi ergo propter parasceven Iudaeorum quia iuxta erat monumentum posuerunt Iesum

(*) In vv 4-5, breakdown differs; the part in parentheses is an extrapolation of "et purpureum vestimentum" which of itself is incomplete.

Catena Aurea John 18

1. When Jesus had spoken these words, he went forth with his disciples over the brook Cedron, where was a garden, into the which he entered, and his disciples.
2. And Judas also, which betrayed him, knew the place: for Jesus often resorted there with his disciples.
AUG. The discourse, which our Lord had with His disciples after supper, and the prayer which followed, being now ended, the Evangelist begins the account of His Passion. When Jesus had spoken these words, He came forth with His disciples over the brook Cedron, where was a garden, into which He entered, and His disciples. But this did not take place immediately after the prayer was ended; there was an interval containing some things, which John omits, but which are mentioned by the other Evangelists.

AUG. A contention took place between them, which of them was the greater, as Luke relates. He also said to Peter, as Luke adds in the same place, Behold, Satan has desired to have you, that he might sift you as wheat, &c. And according to Matthew and Mark, they sang a hymn, and then went to Mount Olivet. Matthew lastly brings the two narratives together: Then went Jesus with His disciples to a place which is called Gethsemane. That is the place which John mentions here, Where there was a garden, into the which He entered, and His disciples.

AUG. When Jesus had spoken these words, shows that He did not enter before He had finished speaking.

CHRYS. But why does not John say, When He had prayed, He entered? Because His prayer was a speaking for His disciples' sake. It is now night time; He goes and crosses the brook, and hastens to the place which was known to the traitor; thus giving no trouble to those who were lying in wait for Him, and strewing His disciples that He went voluntarily to die.

ALCUIN. Over the brook Cedron, i.e. of cedars. It is the genitive in the Greek. He goes over the brook, i.e. drinks of the brook of His Passion. Where there was a garden, that the sin which was committed in a garden, He might blot out in a garden. Paradise signifies garden of delights.

CHRYS. That it might not be thought that He went into a garden to hide Himself, it is added, But Judas who betrayed Him knew the place: for Jesus of often resorted there with; His disciples.

AUG. There the wolf in sheep's clothing permitted by the deep counsel of the Master of the flock to go among the sheep, learned in what way to disperse the flock, and ensnare the Shepherd.

CHRYS. Jesus had often met and talked alone with His disciples there, on essential doctrines, such as it was lawful for others to hear. He does this on mountains, and in gardens, to be out of reach of noise and tumult. Judas, however went there, because Christ had often passed the night there in the open air. He would have gone to His house, if he had thought he should find Him sleeping there.

THEOPHYL. Judas knew that at the feast time our Lord was accustomed to teach His disciples high and mysterious doctrines, and that He taught in places like this. And as it was then a solemn season, he thought He would be found there, teaching His disciples things relating to the feast.

3. Judas then, having received a band of men and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees, comes there with lanterns and torches and weapons.
4. Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, went forth, and said to them, Whom do you seek?
5. They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus says to them, I am he. And Judas also, which betrayed him, stood with them.
6. As soon then as he said to them, I am he, they went backward, and fell to the ground.
7. Then asked he them again, Whom do you seek? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth.
8. Jesus answered, I have told you that I am he: if therefore you seek me, let these go their way:
9. That the saying might be fulfilled, which he spoke, Of them which you gave me have I lost none.

GLOSS. The Evangelist had strewn how Judas had found, out the place where Christ was, now he relates how he went there. Judas then, having received a band of men and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees, comes there with lanterns and torched and weapons.

AUG. It was a band not of Jews, but of soldiers, granted, we must understand, by the Governor, with legal authority to take the criminal, as He was considered, and crush any opposition that might be made.

CHRYS. But how could they persuade the band? By hiring them; for being soldiers, they were ready to do anything for money.

THEOPHYL. They carry torches and lanterns, to guard against Christ escaping in the dark.

CHRYS. They had often sent elsewhere to take Him, but had not been able. Whence it is evident that He gave Himself up voluntarily; as it follows, Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon Him, went forth, and said to them, Whom do you seek?

THEOPHYL. He asks not because He needed to know, for He knew all things that should come upon Him; but because He wished to show, that though present, they could not see or distinguish Him: Jesus says to them, I am He.

CHRYS. He Himself had blinded their eyes. For that darkness was not the reason is clear, because the Evangelist says that they had lanterns. Though they had not lanterns, however, they should at least have recognized Him by His voice. And if they did not know Him, yet how was it that Judas, who had been with Him constantly also, did not know Him? And Judas also which betrayed Him stood with them. Jesus did all this to show that they could not have taken Him, or even seen Him when He was in the midst of them, had He not permitted it.

AUG. As soon then as He said To them, I am He, they went backward. Where now is the band of soldiers, where the terror and defence of arms? Without a blow, one word struck, drove back, prostrated a crowd fierce with hatred, terrible with arms. For God was hid in the flesh, and the eternal day was so obscured by His human body, that He was sought for with lanterns and torches, to be slain in the darkness. What shall He do when He comes to judge, Who did thus when He was going to be judged? And now even at the present time Christ says by the Gospel, I am He, and an Antichrist is expected by the Jews: to the end that they may go backward, and fall to the ground; because that forsaking heavenly, they desire earthly things.

GREG. Why is this, that the Elect fall on their faces, the reprobate backward? Because every one who falls back, sees not where he falls, whereas he who falls forward, sees where he falls. The wicked when they suffer loss in invisible things, are said to fall backward, because they do not see what is behind them: but the righteous, who of their own accord cast themselves down in temporal things, in order that they may rise in spiritual, fall as it were upon their faces, when with fear and repentance they humble themselves with their eyes open.

CHRYS. Lastly, lest any should say that He had encouraged the Jews to kill Him, in delivering Himself into their hands, He says every thing that is possible to reclaim them. But when they persisted in their malice, and showed themselves inexcusable then He gave Himself up into their hands: Then asked He them again, Whom do you seek? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered, I have told you that I am He.

AUG. They had heard at the first, I am He, but had not understood it; because He who could do whatever He would, willed not that they should. But had He never permitted Himself to be taken by them, they would not have done indeed what they came to do; but neither would He what He came to do. So now having strewn His power to them when they wished to take Him and could not, He lets them seize Him, that they might be unconscious agent, of His will; If you seek Me, let these go their way.

CHRYS. As if to say, Though you seek Me, you have nothing to do with these: lo, I give Myself up: thus even to the last hour does He show His love for His own.

AUG. He commands His enemies, and they do what He commands; they permit them to go away, whom He would not have design

CHRYS. The Evangelist, to show that it was not their design to do this, but that His power did it, adds, That the saying might be fulfilled which He spoke, Of them which you have given Me, have I lost none. He had said this with reference not to temporal, but to eternal death: the Evangelist however understands the word of temporal death also.

AUG. But were the disciples never to die? Why then would He lose them, even if they died then? Because they did not yet believe in Him in a saving way.

10. Then Simon Peter having a sword drew it, and smote the high priest's servant, and cut off his right ear. The servant's name was Malchus.
11. Then said Jesus to Peter, Put up your sword into the sheath: the cup which my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?

CHRYS. Peter trusting to these last words of our Lord's, and to what He had just done, assaults those who came to take Him: Then Simon Peter having a sword drew it, and smote the high priest's servant. But how, commanded as he had been to have neither scrip, nor two garments, had he a sword? Perhaps he had foreseen this occasion, and provided one.

THEOPHYL. Or, he had got one for sacrificing the lamb, and carried it away with him from the Supper.

CHRYS. But how could he, who had been forbidden ever to strike on the cheek, be a murderer? Because what he had been forbidden to do was to avenge himself, but here he was not avenging himself, but his Master. They were not however yet perfect: afterwards you shall see Peter beaten with stripes, and bearing it humbly. And cut off his right ear: this seems to show the impetuosity of the Apostle; that he struck at the head itself.

AUG. The servant's name was Malchus; John is the only Evangelist who mentions the servant's name; as Luke is the only one who mentions that our Lord touched the ear and healed him.

CHRYS. He wrought this miracle both to teach us, that we ought to do good to those who suffer and to manifest His power. The Evangelist gives the name, that those who then read it might have the opportunity of inquiring into the truth of the account. And he mentions that he was the servant of the high priest, because in addition to the miracle of the cure itself, this shows that it was performed upon one of those who came to take Him, and who shortly after struck Him on the face.

AUG. The name Malchus signifies, about to reign. What then does the ear cut off for our Lord, and healed by our Lord denote, but the abolition of the old, and the creating of a new, hearing in the newness of the Spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter? To whomsoever this is given, who can doubt that he will reign with Christ? But he was a servant too, has reference to that oldness, which generated to bondage: the cure figures liberty.

THEOPHYL. Or, the cutting off of the high priest's servant's right ear is a type of the people's deafness, of which the chief priests partook most strongly: the restoration of the ear, of ultimate reenlightenment of the understanding of the Jews, at the coming of Elias.

AUG. Our Lord condemned Peter's act, and forbade him proceeding further: Then said Jesus to Peter, Put up your sword into the sheath. He was to be admonished to have patience: and this was written for our learning.

CHRYS. He not only restrained Him however by threats, but consoled him also at the same time: The cup that My Father gives Me, shall I not drink it? Whereby He shows that it was not by their power, but by His permission, that this had been done, and that He did not oppose God, but was obedient even to death.

THEOPHYL. In that He calls it a cup, He shows how pleasing and acceptable death for the salvation of men was to Him.

AUG. The cup being given Him by the Father, is the same with what the Apostle says, Who spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all. But the Giver of this cup and the Drinker of it are the same, as the same Apostle says, Christ loved us, and gave Himself for us.

12. Then the band and the captain and officers of the Jews took Jesus, and bound him,
13. And led him away to Annas first; for he was father in law to Caiaphas, which was the high priest that same year.
14. Now Caiaphas was he, which gave counsel to the Jews, that it was expedient that one man should die for the people.

THEOPHYL. Every thing having been done that could be to dissuade the Jews, and they refusing to take warning, He suffered Himself to be delivered into their hands: Then the band and the captain and officers of the Jews took Jesus.

AUG. They took Him Whom they did not draw nigh to; nor understood that which is written in the Psalms, Draw nigh to Him, and be you lightened. For had they thus drawn nigh to Him, they would have taken Him, not to kill Him, but to be in their hearts. But now that they take Him the way they do, they go backward. It follows, and bound Him, Him by Whom they ought to have wished to be loosed. And perhaps there were among them some who, afterwards delivered by Him, exclaimed, you have broken My chains asunder.

But after that they had bound Jesus, it then appears most clearly that Judas had betrayed Him not for a good, but a most wicked purpose: And led Him away to Annas first.

CHRYS. In exultation, to show what they had done, as if they were raising a trophy.

AUG. Why they did so, he tells us immediately after: For he was father in law to Caiaphas, which was the high priest that same year. Matthew, in order to shorten the narrative, says that He was led to Caiaphas; because He was led to Annas first, as being the father in law of Caiaphas. So that we must understand that Annas wished to act Caiaphas's part.

BEDE. In order that, while our Lord was condemned by his colleague, he might not be guiltless, though his crime was less. Or perhaps his house lay in the way, and they were obliged to pass by it. Or it was the design of Providence, that they who were allied in blood, should be associated in guilt. That Caiaphas however was high priest for that year sounds contrary to the law, which ordained that there be only one high priest, and made the office hereditary. But the pontificate had now been abandoned to ambitious men.

ALCUIN. Josephus relates that this Caiaphas bought the high priesthood for this year. No wonder then if a wicked high priest judged wickedly. A man who was advanced to the priesthood by avarice would keep himself there by injustice.

CHRYS. That no one however might be disturbed at the sound of the chains, the Evangelist reminds them of the prophecy that His death would be the salvation of the world: Now Caiaphas was he which gave counsel to the Jews, that it was expedient that one man should die for the people. Such is the overpowering force of truth, that even its enemies echo it.

15. And Simon Peter followed Jesus, and so did another disciple: that disciple was known to the high priest, and went in with Jesus into the palace of the high priest.
16. But Peter stood at the door without. Then went out that other disciple, which was known to the high priest, and spoke to her that kept the door, and brought in Peter.
17. Then says the damsel that kept the door to Peter, Are not you also one of this man's disciples? He said, I am not.
18. And the servants and officers stood there, who a made a fire of coals, for it was cold: and who had made a fire of coals; for it was cold: and they warmed themselves: and Peter stood with them, and warmed himself.

AUG. The temptation of Peter, which took place in the midst of the contumelies offered to our Lord, is not placed by all in the same order. Matthew and Mark put the contumelies first, the temptation of Peter afterwards; Luke the temptation first, the contumelies after. John begins with the temptation: And Simon Peter followed Jesus, and so did another disciple.

ALCUIN. He followed his Master out of devotion, though afar off, on account of fear.

AUG. Who that other disciple was we cannot hastily decide, as his name is not told us. John however is accustomed to signify himself by this expression, with the addition of, whom Jesus loved. Perhaps therefore he is the one.

CHRYS. He omits his own name out of humility: though he is relating an act of great virtue, how that he followed when the rest fled. He puts Peter before himself, and then mentions himself, in order to show that he was inside the hall, and therefore related what took place there with more certainty than the other Evangelists could. That disciple was known to the high priest, and went in with Jesus into the palace of the high priest. This he mentions not as a boast, but in order to diminish his own merit, in having been the only one who entered with Jesus. It is accounting for the act in another way, than merely by greatness of mind.

Peter's love took him as far as the palace, but his fear prevented him entering in: But Peter stood at the door without.

ALCUIN. He stood without, as being about to deny his Lord. He was not in Christ, who dared not confess Christ.

CHRYS. But that Peter would have entered the palace, if he had been permitted, appears by what immediately follows: Then went out that other disciple who was known to the high priest, and spoke to her who kept the doors, and brought in Peter.

He did not bring him in himself, because he kept near Christ. It follows: Then says the damsel that kept the door to Peter, Are not you also one of this Man's s disciples? He says, I am not. What say you, O Peter? Did you not say before, I will lay down my life for your sake? What then had happened, that you give way even when the damsel asks you? It was not a soldier who asked you, but a mean porteress. Nor said she, Are you this Deceiver's disciple, but, this Man's: an expression of pity. Are not you also, she says, because John was inside.

AUG. But what wonder, if God foretold truly, man presumed falsely. Respecting this denial of Peter we should remark, that Christ is not only denied by him, who denies that He is Christ, but by him also who denies himself to be a Christian. For the Lord did not say to Peter, you shall deny that you art My disciple, but, you shall deny Me. He denied Him then, when he denied that he was His disciple. And what was this but to deny that he was a Christian? How many afterwards, even boys and girls, were able to despise death, confess Christ, and enter courageously into the kingdom of heaven; which he who received the keys of the kingdom, was now unable to do? Wherein we see the reason for His saying above, Let these go their way, for of those which you hast given Me, have I lost none. If Peter had gone out of this world immediately after denying Christ, He must have been lost.

CHRYS. Therefore did Divine Providence permit Peter first to fall, in order that he might be less severe to sinners from the remembrance of his own fall. Peter, the teacher and master of the whole world, sinned, and obtained pardon. that judges might thereafter have that rule to go by in dispensing pardon. For this reason I suppose the priesthood was not given to Angels; because, being without sin themselves, they would punish sinners without pity. Passible man is placed over man, in order that remembering his own weakness, he may be merciful to others.

THEOPHYL. Some however foolishly favor Peter, so far as to say that he denied Christ, because he did not wish to be away from Christ, and he knew, they say, that if he confessed that he was one of Christ's disciples, he would be separated from Him, and would no longer have the liberty of following and seeing his beloved Lord; and therefore pretended to be one of the servants, that his sad countenance might not be perceived, and so exclude him: And the servants and officers stood there, who had made a fire of coals, and warmed themselves; and Peter stood with them, and warmed himself

AUG. It was not winter, and yet it was cold, as it often is at the vernal equinox.

GREG. The fire of love was smothered in Peter's breast, and he was warming himself before the coals of the persecutors, i.e. with the love of this present life, whereby his weakness was increased.

19. The high priest then asked Jesus of his disciples, and of his doctrine.
20. Jesus answered him, I spoke openly to the world; I ever taught in the synagogue, and in the temple, where the Jews always resort; and in secret have I said nothing.
21. Why do you ask me? ask them which heard me, what I have said to them: behold, they know what I said.

CHRYS. As they could bring no charge against Christ, they asked Him of His disciples: The high priest then asked Jesus of His disciples; perhaps where they were, and on what account He had collected them, he wished to prove that he was a seditious and factious person whom no one attended to, except His own disciples.

THEOPHYL. He asks Him moreover of His doctrine, what it was, whether opposed to Moses an the law, that he might take occasion thereby to put Him to death as an enemy of God.

ALCUIN. He does not ask in order to know the truth, but to find out some charge against Him, on which to deliver Him to the Roman Governor to be condemned. But our Lord so tempers His answer, as neither to conceal the truth, nor yet to appear to defend Himself: Jesus answered him, I spoke openly to the world; I ever taught in the synagogue, and in the temple, where the Jews always resort; and in secret have I said nothing.

AUG. There is a difficulty here not to be passed over: if He did not speak openly even to His disciples, but only promised that He would do so at some time, how was it that He spoke openly to the world? He spoke more openly to His disciples afterwards, when they had withdrawn from the crowd; for He then explained His parables, the meaning of which He concealed from the others. When He says then, I spoke openly to the world, He must be understood to mean, w within the hearing of many. So in one sense He spoke openly, i.e. in that many heard Him; in another sense not openly, i.e. in that they did not understand Him. His speaking apart with His disciples was not speaking in secret; for how could He speak in secret before the multitude, especially when that small number of His disciples were to make known what He said to a much larger?

THEOPHYL. He refers here to the prophecy of Esaias; I have not spoken in, secret, in a dark place of the earth.

CHRYS. Or, He spoke in secret, but not, as these thought, from fear, or to excite sedition; but only when what He said was above the understanding of the many.

To establish the matter, however, upon superabundant evidence, He adds, Why ask you Me? ask them which heard Me what I said to them; behold, they know what I said to them: as if He said, you ask Me of My disciples; ask My enemies, who lie in wait for Me. These are the words of one who was confident of the truth of what He said: for it is incontrovertible evidence, when enemies are called in as witnesses.

AUG. For what they had beard and not understood was not of such a kind, as that they could justly turn it against Him. And as often as they tried by questioning to find out some charge against Him, He so replied as to blunt all their stratagems, and refute their calumnies.

22. And when he had thus spoken, one of the officers which stood by struck Jesus with the palm of his hand, saying, Answer you the high priest so?
23. Jesus answered him, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smite you me?
24. Now Annas had sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.

THEOPHYL. When Jesus had appealed to the testimony of the people by, an officer, wishing to clear himself, and show that he was not one of those who admired our Lord, struck Him: And when He had thus spoken, one of the officers which stood by struck Jesus with the palm of his hand, saying, Answer you the high priest so?

AUG. This shows that Annas was the high priest, for this was before He was sent to Caiaphas. And Luke in the beginning of his Gospel says, that Annas and Caiaphas were both high priests.

ALCUIN. Here is fulfilled the prophecy, I gave my cheek to the smiters. Jesus, though struck unjustly, replied gently: Jesus answered him, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smite you Me?

THEOPHYL. As if to say, If you have any fault to find with what I have said, show it; if you have not, why do you rage? Or thus: If I taught any thing unadvisedly, when I taught in the synagogues, give proof of it to the high priest I but if taught aright, so that even you officers admired, why smite you Me, Whom before you admired?

AUG. What can be truer, gentler, kinder, than this answer? He Who received the blow on the face neither wished for him who struck it that fire from heaven should consume him, or the earth open its month and swallow him; or a devil seize him; or any other yet more horrible kind of punishment. Yet had not He, by Whom the world was made, power to cause any one of these things to take place, but that He preferred teaching us that patience why which the world is overcome? Some one will ask here, why He did not do what He Himself commanded, i.e. not make this answer, but give the other cheek to the smiter? But what if He did both, both answered gently, and gave, not His check only to the smiter, but His whole body to be nailed to the Cross? And herein He shows, that those precepts of patience are to be performed not by posture of the body, but by preparation of the heart: for it is possible that a man might give his cheek outwardly, and yet be angry at the same time. How much better is it to answer truly, yet gently, and be ready to bear even harder usage patiently.

CHRYS. What should they do then but either disprove, or admit, what He said? Yet this they do not do: it is not a trial they are carrying on, but a faction, a tyranny. Not knowing what to do further, they send Him to Caiaphas: Now Annas sent Him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.

THEOPHYL. Thinking that as he was more cunning, he might find out something against Him worthy of death.

AUG. He was the one to whom they were taking Him from the first, as Matthew says; he being the high priest of this year. We must understand that the pontificate was taken between them year by year alternately, and that it was by Caiaphas's consent that they led Him first to Annas; or that their houses were so situated, that they could not but pass straight by that of Annas.

BEDE. Sent Him bound, not that He was bound now for the first time, for they bound Him when they took Him. They sent Him bound as they had brought Him. Or perhaps He may have been loosed from His bonds for that hour, in order to be examined, after which He was bound again, and sent to Caiaphas.

25. And Simon Peter stood and warmed himself. They said therefore to him, Are not you also one of his disciples? He denied it, and said, I am not.
26. One of the servants of the high priest, being his kinsman whose ear Peter cut off, said, Did not I see you in the garden with him?
27. Peter then denied again: and immediately the cock crowed.

AUG. After the Evangelist has said that they sent Jesus bound from Annas to Caiaphas, he returns to Peter and his three denials, which took place in the house of Annas: And Simon Peter stood and warmed himself. He repeats what he had said before.

CHRYS. Or, He means that the once fervid disciple was now too torpid, to move even when our Lord was carried away: strewing thereby how weak man's nature is, when God forsakes him. Asked again, he again denies: They said therefore to him, Are not you also one of His disciples? He denied it, and said, I am not.

AUG. Here we find Peter not at the gate, but at the fire, when he denies the second time: so that he must have returned after he had gone out of doors, where Matthew says he was. He did not go out, and another damsel see him on the outside, but another damsel saw him as he was rising to go out, and remarked him, and told those who were by, i.e. those who were standing with her at the fire inside the hall, This fellow also was with Jesus of Nazareth. He heard this outside, and returned, and swore, I do not know the man. Then John continues: They said therefore to him, Are not you also one of His disciples? which words we suppose to have been said to him when he had come back, and was standing at the fire. And this explanation is confirmed by the fact, that besides the other damsel mentioned by Matthew and Mark in the second denial, there was another person, mentioned by Luke, w ho also questioned him. So John uses the plural. They said therefore to him.

And then follows the third denial: One of the servants of the high priest, being his kinsman whose ear Peter cut off, says, Did not I see you in the garden with Him? That Matthew and Mark speak of the party who here question Peter in the plural number, whereas Luke mentions only one, and John also, adding that that one was the kinsman of him whose ear Peter cut off, is easily explained by supposing that Matthew and Mark used the plural number by a common form of speech for the singular; or that one who had observed him most strictly put the question first, and others followed it up, and pressed Peter with more.

CHRYS. But neither did the garden bring back to his memory what he had then said, and the great professions of love he had made: Peter then denied again, and immediately the cock crew.

AUG. Lo, the prophecy of the Physician is fulfilled, the presumption of the sick man demonstrated. That which Peter had said he would do, he had not done. I will lay down my life for your sake, but what our Lord had foretold had come to pass, you shall deny Me thrice.

CHRYS. The Evangelists have all given the same account of the denials of Peter, not with any intention of throwing blame upon him, but to teach us how hurtful it is to trust in self, and not ascribe all to God.

BEDE. Mystically, by the first denial of Peter are denoted those who before our Lord's Passion denied that He was God, by the second, those who did so after His resurrection. So by the first crowing of the cock His resurrection is signified; by the second, the general resurrection at the end of the world. By the first damsel, who obliged Peter to deny, is denoted lust, by the second, carnal delight: by one or more servants, the devils who persuade men to deny Christ.

28. Then led they Jesus from Caiaphas to the hall of judgment: and it was early; and they themselves went not into the judgment hall, lest they should be defiled; but that they might eat the Passover.
29. Pilate then went out to them, and said, What accusation bring you against this man?
30. They answered and said to him, If he were not a malefactor, we would not have delivered him up to you.
31. Then said Pilate to them, Take you him, and judge him according to your law. The Jews therefore said to him, It is not lawful for us to put any man to death.
32. That the saying of Jesus might be fulfilled, which he spoke, signifying what death he should die.

AUG. The Evangelist returns to the part where he had left off, in order to relate Peter's denial: Then led they Jesus to Caiaphas to the hall of judgment: to Caiaphas from his colleague and father in law Annas, as has been said. But If to Caiaphas, how to the praetorium, which was the place where the governor Pilate resided;

BEDE. The praetorium is the place where the praetor sat. Praetors were called prefects and preceptors, because they issue decrees.

AUG. Where then for some urgent reason Caiaphas proceeded from the house of Annas, where both had been sitting, to the praetorium of the governor, and left Jesus to the hearing of his father in law: or Pilate had established the praetorium in the house of Caiaphas, which was large enough to afford a separate lodging to its owner, and the governor at the same time.

AUG. According to Matthew, When the morning came, they led Him away, and delivered Him to Pontius Pilate. But He was to have been led to Caiaphas at first. How is it then that He was brought to him so late? The truth is, now He was going as it were a committed criminal, Caiaphas having already determined on His death. And He was to be given up to Pilate immediately.

And it was early.

CHRYS. He was led to Caiaphas before the cock crowed, but early in the morning to Pilate. Whereby the Evangelist shows, that all that night of examination, ended in proving nothing against Him; and that He was sent to Pilate in consequence. But leaving what passed then to the other Evangelists, he goes to what followed.

AUG. And they themselves entered not into the judgment hall: i.e. into that part of the house which Pilate occupied, supposing it to be the house of Caiaphas. Why they did not enter is next explained: Lest they should be defiled, but that they might eat the Passover.

CHRYS For the Jews were then celebrating the passover; He Himself celebrated it one day before, reserving His own death for the sixth day; on which day the old passover was kept. Or, perhaps, the passover means the whole season.

AUG. The days of unleavened breed were beginning; during which time it was defilement to enter the house of a stranger.

ALCUIN. The passover was strictly the fourteenth day of the month, the day on which the lamb was killed in the evening: the seven days following were called the days of unleavened bread, in which nothing leavened ought to be found in their houses. Yet we find the day of the passover reckoned among the days of unleavened bread: Now the first day of the feast of unleavened bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying to Him, Where will you that we prepare for you to eat the passover?

And here also in like manner: That they might eat the passover; the passover here signifying not the sacrifice of the lamb, which took place the fourteenth day at evening, but the great festival which was celebrated on the fifteenth day, after the sacrifice of the lamb. Our Lord, like the rest of the Jews, kept the passover on the fourteenth day: on the fifteenth day, when the great festival was held, He was crucified. His immolation however began on the fourteenth day, from the time that He was taken in the garden.

AUG. O impious blindness! They feared to be defiled by the judgment hall of a foreign prefect, to shed the blood of an innocent brother they feared not. For that He Whom they killed was the Lord and Giver of life, their blindness saved them from knowing

THEOPHYL. Pilate however proceeds in a more gentle way: Pilate then went out to them.

BEDE. It was the custom of the Jews when they condemned any one to death, to notify it to the governor, by delivering the man bound.

CHRYS. Pilate however seeing Him bound, and such numbers conducting Him, supposed that they had not unquestionable evidence against Him, so proceeds to ask the question : And said, What accusation bring you against this Man? For it was absurd, he said, to take the trial out of his hands, and yet give him the punishment.

They in reply bring forward no positive charge but only their own conjectures: They answered and said to him, If He were not a malefactor, we would not have delivered Him up to you.

AUG. Ask the freed from unclean spirits, the blind who saw, the dead who came to life again, and, what is greater than all, the fools who were made wise, and let them answer, whether Jesus was a malefactor. But they spoke, of whom He had Himself prophesied in the Psalms, They rewarded Me evil for good.

AUG. But is not this account contradictory to Luke's, who mentions certain positive charges: And they began to accuse Him, saying, We found this fellow perverting the nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, saying that He Himself is Christ a King. According to John, the Jews seem to have been unwilling to bring actual charges, in order that Pilate might condemn Him simply on their authority, asking no questions, but taking it for granted that if He was delivered up to him, He was certainly guilty. Both accounts are however compatible. Each Evangelist only inserts what he thinks sufficient.

And John's account implies that some charges had been made, when it comes to Pilate's answer: Then said Pilate to them, Take you Him, and judge Him according to your law.

THEOPHYL. As if to say, Since you will only have such a trial as will suit you, and are proud, as if you never did any thing profane, take you Him, and condemn Him; I will not be made a judge for such a purpose.

ALCUIN. Or as if he said, you who have the law, know what the law judges concerning such: do what you know to be just.

The Jews therefore said to him, It is not lawful for us to put any man to death.

AUG. But did not the law command not to spare malefactors, especially deceivers such as they thought Him? We must understand them however to mean, that the holiness of the day which the' were beginning to celebrate, made it unlawful to put any man to death. Have you then so lost your understanding by your wickedness, that you think yourselves free from the pollution of innocent blood, because you e deliver it to be shed by another?

CHRYS. Or, they were not allowed by the Roman law to put Him to death themselves. Or, Pilate having said, Judge Him according to your law, they reply, It is not lawful for us: His sin is not a Jewish one, He has not sinned according to our law: His offense is political, He calls Himself a King. Or they wished to have Him crucified, to add infamy to death: they not being allowed to put to death in this way themselves.

They put to death in another way, as we see in the stoning of Stephen: That the saying of Jesus might be fulfilled, which He spoke, signifying what death He should die. Which was fulfilled in that He was crucified, or in that He was put to death by Gentiles as well as Jews.

AUG. As we read in Mark, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man shall be delivered to the chief priests, and to the scribes; and they shall condemn Him to death, and shall deliver Him to the Gentiles. Pilate again was a Roman, and was sent to the government of Judea, from Rome. That this saying of Jesus then might be fulfilled, i.e. that He might be delivered to and killed by the Gentiles, they would not accept Pilate's offer, but said, If is not lawful for us to put any man to death.

33. Then Pilate entered into the judgment hall again, and called Jesus, and said to him, Are you the King of the Jews?
34. Jesus answered him, Say you this thing of yourself, or did others tell it you of me?
35. Pilate answered, Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you to me: what have you done?
36. Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from here.
37. Pilate therefore said to him, Are you a king then? Jesus answered, you say that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Every one that is of the truth hears my voice.
38. Pilate says to him, What is truth?

CHRYS. Pilate, wishing to rescue Him from the hatred of the c Jews, protracted the trial a long time. Then Pilate entered into the judgment hall, and called Jesus.

THEOPHYL. i.e. Apart, because he had a strong suspicion that He was innocent, and thought he could examine Him more accurately, away from the crowd: and said to Him, Are you the King of the Jews?

ALCUIN. Wherein Pilate shows that the Jews had charged Him with calling Himself King of the Jews.

CHRYS. Or Pilate had heard this by report; and as the Jews had no charge to bring forward, began to examine Him himself with respect to the things commonly reported of Him.

Jesus answered him, Say you this thing of yourself, or did others tell it you of Me?

THEOPHYL. He intimates here that Pilate was judging blindly and indiscreetly: If you say this thing of yourself, He says, bring forward proofs of My rebellion; if you have heard it from others, make regular inquiry into it.

AUG. Our Lord knew indeed both what He Himself asked, and what Pilate would answer; but He wished it to be written down n for our sakes.

CHRYS. He asks not in ignorance, but in order to draw from Pilate himself an accusation against the Jews: Pilate answered Bred, Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you to me.

AUG. He rejects the imputation that He could have said it of Himself; Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you to me: adding, what have you done? Whereby he shows that this charge had been brought against Him, for it is as much as to say, If you deny that you are a King, what have you done to be delivered up to me? As if it were no wonder that He should be delivered up, if He called Himself a King.

CHRYS. He then tries to bring round the mind of Pilate, not a very bad man, by proving to him, that He is not a mere man, but God, and the Son of God; and overthrowing all suspicion of His having aimed at a tyranny, which Pilate was afraid of, Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world.

AUG. This is what the good Master wished to teach us. But first it was necessary to show the falsity of the notions of both Jews and Gentiles as to His kingdom, which Pilate had heard of; as if it meant that He aimed at unlawful power; a crime punishable with death, and this kingdom were a subject of jealousy to the ruling power, and to be guarded against as likely to be hostile either to the Romans or Jews. Now if our Lord had answered immediately Pilate's question, He would have seemed to have been answering not the Jews, but the Gentiles only. But after Pilate's answer, what He says is an answer to both Gentiles and Jews: as if He said, Men, i.e. Jews and Gentiles, I hinder not your dominion in this world. What more would you have? Come by faith to the kingdom which is not of this world. For what is His kingdom, but they that believe in Him, of whom He says, you are not of the world: although He wished that they should be in the world. In the same way, here He does not say, My kingdom is not in this world; but, is not of this world. Of the world are all men, who created by God are born of the corrupt race of Adam. All that are born again in Christ, are made a kingdom not of this world. Thus hath God taken us out of the power of darkness, and translated us to the kingdom of His dear Son.

CHRYS. Or He means that He does not derive His kingdom from the same source that earthly kings do; but that He has his sovereignty from above; inasmuch as He is not mere man, but far greater and more glorious than man: If My kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews. Here He shows the weakness of an earthly kingdom, has its strength from its servants, whereas that higher kingdom is sufficient to itself, and wanting in nothing. And if His kingdom was thus the greater of the two, it follows that He was taken of His own will, and delivered up Himself.

AUG, After showing that His kingdom was not of this world, He adds, But now My kingdom is not from here. He does not say, Not here, for His kingdom is here to the end of the world, having within it the tares mixed with the wheat until the harvest. But yet it is not from here, since it is a stranger in the world.

THEOPHYL, Or He says, from here, not, here; because He reigns in the world, and carries on the government of it, and disposes all things according to His will; but His kingdom is not from below, but from above, and before all ages.

CHRYS. Heretics infer from these words that our Lord is a different person from the Creator of the world. But when He says, My kingdom is not from here, He does not deprive the world of His government and superintendence, but only shows that His government is not human and corruptible.

Pilate therefore said to Him, Are you a King then? Jesus answered, you say that I am a King.

AUG. He did not fear to confess Himself a King, but so replied as neither to deny that He was, nor yet to confess Himself a King in such sense as that His kingdom should be supposed to be of this w world. He says, you say, meaning, you being carnal say it carnally. He continues, To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that 1 should bear witness to the truth. The pronoun here, in hoc, must not be dwelt long on as if it meant, in hâc re, but shortened, as if it stood, ad hoc, natus sum, as the next words are, ad hoc veni in mundum. Wherein it is evident He alludes to His birth in the flesh not to that divine birth which never had beginning.

THEOPHYL. Or, to Pilate's question whether He w as a King our Lord answers, To this end was I born, i.e. to be a King, That I am born from a King. proves that I am a King.

CHRYS. If then He was a King by birth, He has nothing which He has not received from another. For this I came, that I should bear witness to the truth, i.e. that I should make all men believe it. We must observe how He shows His humility here: when they accused Him as a malefactor, He bore it in silence; but when He is asked of His kingdom, then He talks with Pilate, instructs him, and raises his mind to higher things. That I should bear witness to the truth shows that He had no crafty purpose in what He did.

AUG But when Christ bears witness to the truth, He bears witness to Himself; as He said above, I am the truth. But inasmuch as all men have not faith, He adds, Everyone that is of the truth hears My voice: hears, that is, with the inward ear; obeys My voice, believes Me. Every one that is of the truth, has reference to the grace by which He calls according to His purpose. For as regards the nature in which we are created, since the truth created all, all are of the truth. But it is not all to whom it is given the truth to obey the truth. For had He even said, Everyone one that hears My voice is of the truth, it still would be thought that such were of the truth, because they obeyed the truth But He does not say this, but Everyone that is of the truth hears My voice. A man then is not of the truth, because he hears His voice, but hears His voice because he is of the truth. This grace is conferred upon him by the truth.

CHRYS. These words have an effect upon Pilate, persuade him to become a hearer, and elicit from him the short inquiry, What is truth had almost said to Him, What is truth?

THEOPHYL. For it had almost vanished from the world, and become unknown in consequence of the general unbelief.

38. And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews, and says to them, I find in him no fault at all.
39. But you have a custom, that I should release to you one at the passover: will you therefore that release to you the King of the Jews?
40. Then cried they all again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber.

AUG. After Pilate had asked, What is truth? he remembered a custom of the Jews, of releasing one prisoner at the passover, and did not wait for Christ's answer, for fear to losing this chance of saving Him, which he much wished to do. And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews.

CHRYS. He knew that this question required time to answer, and it was necessary immediately to rescue Him from the fury of the Jews. So he went out.

ALCUIN, Or, he did not wait to hear the reply, because he was unworthy to hear.

And, says to them, I find no fault in Him.

CHRYS. He did not say, He has sinned and is worthy, of death; yet release Him at the feast; but acquitting Him in the first place, he does more than he need do, and asks it as a favor, our, that, if they are unwilling to let Him go as innocent, they will at any rate allow Him the benefit of the season: But you have a custom, that I should release one to you at the passover.

BEDE. This custom was not commanded in the law, but had been handed down by tradition from the old fathers, viz. that in remembrance of their deliverance out of Egypt, they should release a prisoner at the passover. Pilate tries to persuade them: Will you therefore that I release to you the King of the Jews.

AUG. He could not dismiss the idea from his mind, that Jesus was King of the Jews; as if the Truth itself, whom he had just asked what it was, had inscribed it there as a title.

THEOPHYL. Pilate is judicious in replying that Jesus had done nothing wrong, and that there was no reason to suspect Him of aiming at a kingdom. For they might be sure that if He set Himself up as a King, and a rival of the Roman empire, a Roman prefect would not release Him. When then He says, Will you therefore that I release to you the King of the Jews? he clears Jesus of all guilt, and mocks the Jews, as if to say, Him whom you accuse of thinking Himself a King, the same I bid you release: He does no such thing.

AUG. Upon this they cried out: Then cried they all again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. now Barabbas was a robber. We blame you not, O Jews, for releasing a guilty man at the passover, but for killing an innocent one. Yet unless this were done, it were ere not the true passover.

BEDE. Inasmuch then as they abandoned the Savior, and sought out a robber, to this day the devil practices his robberies upon them.

ALCUIN. The name Barabbas signifies, The son of their master; i.e. the devil; his master in his wickedness, the Jews' in their perfidy.

Catena Aurea John 18

catena Aurea John 19

1. Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him.
2. And the soldiers plated a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe.
3. And said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they smote him with their hands.
4. Pilate therefore went forth again, and says to them, "Behold, I bring him forth to you, that you may know that I find no fault in him.
5. Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. And Pilate says to them, "Behold the Man!"

AUG. When the Jews had cried out that they did not wish Jesus to be released on account of the passover, but Barabbas, Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged Him. Pilate seems to have done this for no reason but to satisfy the malice of the Jews with some punishment short of death. On which account he allowed his band to do what follows, or perhaps even commanded them.

The Evangelist only says however that the soldiers did so, not that Pilate commanded them: And the soldiers plated a crown of thorns, and put it on His head, and they put on Him a purple robe, and said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they smote Him with their hands.

CHRYS Pilate having called Him the King of the Jews, they put the royal dress upon Him, in mockery

BEDE. For instead of a diadem, they put upon Him a crown of thorns, and a purple robe to represent the purple robe which kings wear. Matthew says, a scarlet robe, but scarlet and purple are different names for the same color. And though the soldiers did this in mockery, yet to us their acts have a meaning. For by the crown of thorns is signified the taking of our sins upon Him, the thorns which the earth of our body brings forth. And the purple robe signifies the flesh crucified. For our Lord is robed in purple, wherever He is glorified by the triumphs of holy martyrs.

CHRYS. It was not at the command of the governor that they did this, but in order to gratify the Jews. For neither were they commanded by him to go to the garden in the night, but the Jews gave them money to go. He bore however all these insults silently. Yet do you, when you hear of them keep stedfastly in your mind the King of the whole earth, and Lord of Angels bearing all these contumelies in silence, and imitate His example.

AUG. Thus were fulfilled what Christ had prophesied of Himself; thus were martyrs taught to suffer all that the malice of persecutors could inflict; thus that kingdom which was not of this world conquers the proud world, not by fierce fighting, but by patient suffering.

CHRYS. That the Jews might cease from their fury, seeing Him thus insulted, Pilate brought out Jesus before them crowned: Pilate therefore went forth again and says to them, Behold, I bring Him forth to you, that you may know that I find no fault in Him,.

AUG. Hence it is apparent that these things were not done without Pilate's knowledge, whether he commanded, or only permitted them, for the reason we have mentioned, viz. that His enemies seeing the insults heaped upon Him, might not thirst any longer for His blood: Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe: not the insignia of empire, but the marks of ridicule. And Pilate says to them, "Behold, the Man!" as if to say, If you envy the King, spare the outcast ignominy overflows, let envy subside.

6. When the chief priests therefore and officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. Pilate says to them, Take you him, and crucify him: for I find no fault in him.
7. The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made Himself the Son of God.
8. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid.

AUG. The envy of the Jews does not subside at Christ's disgraces; yea, rather rises: When the chief priests therefore and officers saw Him, they cried out, saying, Crucify Him, crucify Him.

CHRYS. Pilate saw then that it was all in vain: Pilate says to them, Take you Him, and crucify Him. This is the speech of a man abhorring the deed, and urging others to do a deed which he abhors himself. They had brought our, Lord indeed to him that He might be put to death by his sentence, but the very contrary was the result; the governor acquitted Him: For I find no fault in Him. He clears Him immediately from all charges: which shows that he had only permitted the former outrages, to humor the madness of the Jews.

But nothing could shame the Jewish hounds: The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by out law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God.

AUG. Lo, another greater outbreak of envy. The former was lighter, being only to punish Him for aspiring to a usurpation of the royal power. Yet did Jesus make neither claim falsely; both were true: He was both the Only-begotten Son of God, and the King appointed by God upon the holy hill of Sion. And He would have demonstrated His right to both now, had He not been as patient as He was powerful.

CHRYS. While they disputed with each other, He was silent, fulfilling the prophecy, He opens not His mouth; He was taken from prison and from judgment.

AUG. This agrees: with Luke's account, We found this fellow perverting the nation, only with the addition of, because He made Himself the Son of God.

CHRYS Then Pilate begins to fear that what had been said might be true, and that he might appear; to be administering justice improperly: When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid.

BEDE. It was not the law that he was afraid of, as he was a stranger: but he was more afraid, lest he should slay the Son of God

CHRYS. They were not afraid to say this, that He made Himself the Son of God: but they kill Him for the very reasons for which they ought to have worshipped Him.

9. And went again into the judgment hall, and say to Jesus, Where are you? But Jesus gave him no answer.
10. Then says Pilate to him, Speak you not to me? know you not that I have power to crucify you, and have power to release you?
11. Jesus answered, you could have no power at all against me, except it were given you from above therefore he that delivered me to you have the greater sin.
12. And from thenceforth Pilate sought to release him.

CHRYS. Pilate, agitated with fear, begins again examining Him: And went again into the judgment hall, and says to Jesus, Where are you? He no longer asks, What hast you done? But Jesus gave him no answer. For he who had heard, To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, and, My kingdom is not from here ought to have resisted, and rescued Him, instead of which he had yielded to the fury of the Jews. Wherefore seeing that he asked questions without object, He answers him no more indeed at other times He was unwilling to give reasons and defend Himself by argument, when His works testified so strongly for Him; thus showing that He came voluntarily to His work.

AUG. In comparing the accounts of the different Evangelists together, we find that this silence was maintained more than once; viz. before the High Priest, before Herod, and before Pilate. So that the prophecy of Him, As a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so opened He not His mouth was amply fulfilled. To many indeed of the questions put to, He did reply, but where He did not reply, this comparison of the sheep shows us that His was not a silence of guilt, but of innocence; not of self-condemnation, but of compassion, and willingness to suffer for the sins of others.

CHRYS. He remaining thus silent, Then says Pilate to Him, Speak you not to me? know you not that I have power to crucify you, and have power to release you? See how he condemns himself. If all depends upon thee, why, when you find no fault of offence, do you not acquit Him?

Jesus answered, you could have no power at all against Me, except it were given you from above: strewing that this judgment was accomplished not in the common and natural order of events, but mysteriously. But lest we should think that Pilate was altogether free from blame, He adds, Therefore he that has delivered Me to you has the greater sin. But if it was given, you wilt say, neither he nor they were liable to blame you speak foolishly. Given means permitted; as if He said, He has permitted this to be done; but you are not on that account free from guilt.

AUG. So He answers. When He was silent, He was silent not as guilty or crafty, but as a sheep: when He answered, He taught as a shepherd. Let us hear what He says; which is that, as He teaches by His Apostle, There is no power but of God; and that he that through envy delivers an innocent person to the higher power, who puts to death from fear of a greater power, still sins more than that higher power itself. God had given such power to Pilate, as that he was still under Caesar's power: wherefore our Lord says, you could have no power at all against Me, i.e. no power however small, unless it, whatever it was, was given you from above. And as that is not so great as to give you complete liberty of action, therefore he that delivered Me to you has the greater sin. He delivered Me into your power from envy, but you will exercise that power from fear. And though a man ought not to kill another even from fear, especially an innocent man, yet to do so from envy is much worse. Wherefore our Lord does not say, He that delivered Me to you has the sin, as if the other had none, but, has the greater sin, implying that the other also had some.

THEOPHYL. He that delivered Me to you, i.e. Judas, or the multitude. When Jesus had boldly replied, that unless He gave Himself up, and the Father consented, Pilate could have had no power over Him, Pilate was the more anxious to release Him; And from thenceforth Pilate sought to release Him.

AUG. Pilate had sought from the first to release: so we must understand, from thence, to mean from this cause, i.e. lest he should incur guilt by putting to death an innocent person.

12. But the Jews cried out, saying, If you let this man go, you are not Caesar's friend: whosoever makes himself a king speaks against Caesar.
13. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha.
14. And it was the preparation of the passover, and about the sixth hour: and he says to the Jews, Behold your King!
15. But they cried out, Away with him, away with him, crucify him. Pilate says to them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.
16a. Then delivered he him therefore to them to be crucified.

AUG. The Jews thought they could alarm Pilate more by the mention of Caesar, than by telling him of their law, as they had done above; We have a law, and by that law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God. So it follows. But the Jews cried out, saying, you let this Man go, you are not Caesar's friend; whosoever makes himself a king speaks against Caesar.

CHRYS. But how can you prove this? By His purple, His diadem, His chariot, His guards? Did He not wall; about with His twelve disciples only, and every thing mean about Him, food, dress, and habitation?

AUG. Pilate was before afraid not of violating their law by sparing Him, but of killing the Son of God, in killing Him. But he could not treat his master Caesar with the same contempt with which he treated the law of a foreign nation: When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha.

CHRYS He went out to examine into the matter: his sitting down on the judgment seat shows this.

GLOSS. The tribunal is the seat of the judge, as the throne is the seat of the king, and the chair the seat of the doctor.

BEDE. Lithostraton, i.e. laid with stone; the word signifies pavement. It was an elevated place.

And it was the preparation of the Passover.

ALCUIN. Parasceve, i.e. preparation. This was a name for the sixth day, the day before the Sabbath, on which they prepared what was necessary for the Sabbath; as we read, On the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread. As man was made on the sixth day, and God rested on the seventh; so Christ suffered on the sixth day, and rested in the grave on the seventh.

And was about the sixth hour.

AUG. Why then does Mark say, And it was the third hour, and they crucified Him? Because on the third hour our Lord was crucified by the tongues of the Jews, on the sixth by the hands of the soldiers. So that we must understand that the fifth hour was passed, and the sixth began, when Pilate sat down on the judgment seat, (about the sixth hour, John says,) and that the crucifixion, and all that took place in connection with it, filled up the rest of the hour, from which time up to the ninth hour there was darkness, according to Matthew, Mark, and Luke. But since the Jews tried to transfer the guilt of putting Christ to death from themselves to the Romans, i.e. to Pilate and his soldiers, Mark, omitting to mention the hour at which He was crucified by the soldiers, has expressly recorded the third hour; in order that it might be evident that not only the soldiers who crucified Jesus on the sixth hour, but the Jews who cried out for His death at the third, were His crucifiers. There is another way of solving this difficulty, viz. that the sixth hour here does not mean the sixth hour of the day; as John does not say, It was about the sixth hour of the day, but, It was the preparation of the passover, and about the sixth hour. Parasceve means in Latin, praeparatio. For Christ our passover, as says the Apostle, is sacrificed for as. The preparation for which passover, counting from the ninth hour of the night, which seems to have been the hour at which the chief priests pronounced upon our Lord's sacrifice, saying, He is guilty of death, between it and the third hour of the day, when He was crucified, according to Mark, is an interval of six hours, three of the night and three of the day.

THEOPHYL. Some suppose it to be a fault of the transcriber, who for the letter y, three, put s, six.

CHRYS. Pilate, despairing of moving them, did not examine Him, as he intended, but delivered Him up. And he says to the Jews, Behold your King!

THEOPHYL. As if to say, See the kind of Man whom you suspect of aspiring to the throne, a humble person, who cannot have any such design.

CHRYS. A speech that should have softened their rage; but they were afraid of letting Him go, lest He might draw away the multitude again. For the love of rule is a heavy crime, and sufficient to condemn a man. They cried out, Away with Him, away with Him. And they resolved upon the most disgraceful kind of death, Crucify Him, in order to prevent all memorial of Him afterwards.

AUG. Pilate still tries to overcome their apprehensions on Caesar's account; Pilate says to them, Shall I crucify your King? He tries to shame them into doing what he had not been able to soften them into by putting Christ to shame.

The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.

CHRYS. They voluntarily brought themselves under punishment, and God gave them up to it. With one accord they denied the kingdom of God, and God suffered them to fall into their own condemnation; for they rejected the kingdom of Christ, and called down upon their own heads that of Caesar.

AUG. But Pilate is at last overcome by fear: Then delivered he Him therefore to them to be crucified. For it would be taking part openly against Caesar, if when the Jews declared that they had no king but Caesar, he wished to put another king over them, as he would appear to do if he let go unpunished a Man whom they had delivered to him for punishment on this very ground. It is not however, delivered Him to them to crucify Him, but, to be crucified, i.e. by the sentence and authority of the governor. The Evangelist says, delivered to them, to show that they were implicated in the guilt from which they tried to escape. For Pilate would not have done this except to please them.

16b. And they took Jesus, and led him away.
17. And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha:
18. Where they crucified him, and two other with him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst.

GLOSS. By the command of the governor, the soldiers took Christ to be crucified. And they took Jesus, and led Him away.

AUG. They, i.e. the soldiers, the guards of the governor, as appears more clearly afterwards; Then the soldiers when they had crucified Jesus; though the Evangelist might justly have attributed the whole to the Jews, who were really the authors of what they procured to be done.

CHRYS. They compel Jesus to bear the cross, regarding it as unholy, and therefore avoiding the touch of it themselves. And He bearing His cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha, where they crucified Him. The same was done typically by Isaac, who carried the wood. But then the matter only proceeded as far as his father's good pleasure ordered, but now it was fully accomplished, for the reality had appeared.

THEOPHYL. But as there Isaac was let go, and a ram offered; so here too the Divine nature remains impassible, but the human, of which the ram was the type, the offspring of that straying ram, was slain. But why does another Evangelist say that they hired Simon to bear the cross?

AUG. Both bore it; first Jesus, as John says, then Simon, as the other three Evangelists say. On first going forth, He bore His own cross.

AUG. Great spectacle, to the profane a laughing-stock, to the pious a mystery. Profaneness sees a King bearing a cross instead of a scepter; piety sees a King bearing a cross, thereon to nail Himself, and afterwards to nail it on the foreheads of kings. That to profane eyes was contemptible, which the hearts of Saints would afterwards glory in; Christ displaying His own cross on His shoulders, and bearing that which was not to be put under a bushel, the candlestick of that candle which was now about to burn.

CHRYS. He carried the badge of victory on His shoulders, was conquerors do. Some say that the place of Calvary was where Adam died and was buried; so that in the very place on where death reigned, there Jesus erected His trophy.

JEROME. An apt connection, and smooth to the ear, but not true. For the place where they cut off the heads of men condemned to death, called in consequence Calvary, was outside the city gates, whereas we read in the book of Jesus the son of Nave, that Adam was buried by Hebron and Arbah.

CHRYS. They crucified Him with the thieves: And two others with Him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst; thus fulfilling, filling the prophecy, And He was numbered with the transgressors. What they did in wickedness, was a gain to the truth. The devil wished to obscure what was done, but could not. Though three were nailed on the cross, it was evident that Jesus alone did the miracles; and the arts of the devil were frustrated. Nay, they even added to His glory; for to convert a thief on the cross, and bring him into paradise, was no less a miracle than the rending of the rocks.

AUG. Yea, even the cross, if you consider it, was a judgment seat: for the Judge being the middle, one thief, who believed, was pardoned, the other, who mocked, was damned: a sign of what He would once do to the quick and dead, place the one on His right hand, the other on His left.

19. And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.
20. This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin.
21. Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am King of the Jews.
22. Pilate answered, What I have written I have written.

CHRYS. As letters are inscribed on a trophy declaring the victory, so Pilate wrote a title on Christ's cross. And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross: thus at once distinguishing Christ from the thieves with Him, and exposing the malice of the Jews in rising up against their King: And the writing was, Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.

BEDE. Wherein was strewn that His kingdom was not, as they thought, destroyed, but rather strengthened.

AUG. But was Christ the King of the Jews only? or of the Gentiles too? Of the Gentiles too, as we read in the Psalms, Yet have I set My King upon My holy hill of Sion; after which it follows, Demand of Me, and I will give you the heathen for your inheritance. So this title expresses a great mystery, viz. that the wild olive-tree was made partaker of the fatness of the olive-tree, not the olive-tree made partaker of the bitterness of the wild olive-tree. Christ then is King of the Jews according to the circumcision not of the flesh, but of the heart; not in the letter, but in the spirit.

This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city.

CHRYS. It is probable that many Gentiles as well as Jews had come up to the feast. So the title was written in three languages, that all might read it: And it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin.

AUG. These three were the languages most known there: the Hebrew, on account of being used in the worship of the Jews: the Greek, in consequence of the spread of Greek philosophy: the Latin, from the Roman empire being established every where.

THEOPHYL. The title written in three languages signifies that our Lord was King of the whole world; practical, natural, and spiritual. The Latin denotes the practical, because the Roman empire; was the most powerful, and best managed one; the Greek the physical, the Greeks being the best physical philosophers; and, lastly, the Hebrew the theological, because the Jews had been made the depositories of religious knowledge.

CHRYS. But the Jews grudged our Lord this title: Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that He said, I am King of the Jews. For as Pilate wrote it, it was a plain and single declaration that he was King, but the addition of; that he said, made it a charge against Him of petulance and vain glory.

But Pilate was firm: Pilate answered, What I have written I have written.

AUG. O ineffable working of Divine power even in the hearts of ignorant men. Did not some hidden voice sound from within, and, if we may say so, with clamorous silence, saying to Pilate in the prophetic words of the Psalm, Alter not the inscription of the title? But what say you, you mad priests: will the title be the less true, because Jesus said I am the King of the Jews? If that which Pilate wrote cannot be altered, can that be altered which the Truth spoke? Pilate wrote what he wrote, because our Lord said what He said.

23. Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.
24a. They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the Scripture might be fulfilled, which said, They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots.

On Pilate giving sentence, the soldiers under his command crucified Jesus: Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took His is garments. And yet if we fool to their intentions, their clamors, the Jews were rather the people which crucified Him. On the parting and casting lots for His garment, John gives more circumstances than the other Evangelists. And made four parts, to every soldier a part: whence we see there were four soldiers who executed the governor's sentence. And also His coat: took, understood They took His coat too. The sentence is brought in so to show that this was the only garment for which they cast lots, the others being divided. Now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.

CHRYS. The Evangelist describes the tunic, to show that it was of an inferior kind, the tunics commonly worn in Palestine being made of two pieces.

THEOPHYL. Others say that they did not weave in Palestine, as we do, the shuttle being driven upwards through the warp; so that among them the woof was not carried upwards but downwards.

AUG. Why they cast lots for it, next appears: They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it whose it should be. It seems then that the other garments were made up of equal parts, as it was not necessary to rend them; the tunic only having to be rent in order to give each an equal share of it; to avoid which they preferred casting lots for it, and one having it all. This answered to the prophecy: That the Scripture might be fulfilled which says, They parted My raiment among them, and for My vesture they did cast lots.

CHRYS. Behold the sureness of prophecy. The Prophet foretold not only what they would part, but what they would not. They parted the raiment, but cast lots for the vesture.

AUG. Matthew in saying, They parted His garments, casting lots, means us to understand the whole division of the garments, including the tunic also for which they cast lots. Luke says the same: They parted His raiment, and cast lots. In parting His garments they came to the tunic, for which they cast lots. Mark is the only one that raises any question: They parted His garments, casting upon them what every man should take: as if they cast lots for all the garments, and not the tunic only. But it is his brevity that creates the difficulty. Casting lots upon them: as if it was, casting lots when they were parting the garments. What every man should take: i.e. who should take the tunic; as if the whole stood thus: Casting lots upon them, who should take the tunic which remained over and above the equal shares, into which the rest of the garments were divided. The fourfold division of our Lord's garment represents His Church, spread over the four quarters of the globe, and distributed equally, i.e. in concord, to all. The tunic for which they cast lots signifies the unity of all the parts, which is contained in the bond of love. And if love is the more excellent way, above knowledge, and above all other commandments, according to Colossians, Above all things have charity, the garment by which this is denoted, is well said to be woven from above. Through the whole, is added, because no one is void of it, who belongs to that whole, from which the Church Catholic is named. It is without seam again, so that it can never come unsown, and is in one piece, i.e. brings all together into one. By the lot is signified the grace of God: for God elects not with respect to person or merits, but according to His own secrets counsel.

CHRYS. According to some, The tunic without seam, woven from above throughout, is an allegory strewing that He who was crucified was not simply man, but also had Divinity from above.

THEOPHYL. The garment without seam denotes the body of Christ, which was woven from above; for the Holy Ghost came upon the Virgin, and the power of the Highest overshadowed her. This holy body of Christ then is indivisible: for though it be distributed for every one to partake of, and to sanctify the soul and body of each one individually, yet it subsists in all wholly and indivisibly. The world consisting of four elements, the garments of Christ must be understood to represent the visible creation, which the devils divide amongst themselves, as often as they deliver to death the word of God which dwells in us, and by worldly allurements bring us over to their Side.

AUG. Nor let any one say that these things had no good signification, because they were done by wicked men; for if so, what shall we say of the cross itself; For that was made by ungodly men, and yet certainly by it were signified, What is the length, and depth, and breadth, and height, as the Apostle says. Its breadth consists of a cross beam, on which are stretched the hands of Him who hangs upon it. This signifies the breadth of charity, and the good works done therein. Its length consists of a cross beam going to the ground, and signifies perseverance in length of time. The height is the top which rises above the cross beam, and signifies the high end to which all things refer. The depth is that part which is fixed in the ground; there it is hidden, but the whole cross that we see rises from it.

Even so all our good works proceed from the depth of God's incomprehensible grace. But though the cross of Christ only signify what the Apostle said, They that are Christ's have crucified the flesh, with the affections and lusts, how great a good is it? Lastly, what is the sign of Christ, but the cross of Christ? Which sign must be applied to the foreheads of believers, to the water of regeneration, to the oil of chrism, to the sacrifice whereby we are nourished, or none of these is profitable for life.

24b. These things therefore the soldiers did.
25. Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene.
26. When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he says to his mother, Woman, behold your son!
27. Then says he to the disciple, Behold your mother! And from that hour that disciple took her to his own home.

THEOPHYL. While the soldiers were doing their cruel work, He was thinking anxiously of His mother: These things therefore the soldiers did.

Now there stood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene.

AMBROSE. Mary the mother of our Lord stood before the cross of her Son. None of the Evangelists hath told me this except John. The others have related how that at our Lord's Passion the earth quaked, the heaven was overspread with darkness, the sun fled, the thief was taken into paradise after confession. John hath told us, what the others have not, how that from the cross whereon He hung, He called to His mother. He thought it a greater thing to show Him victorious over punishment, fulfilling the offices of piety to His mother, than giving the kingdom of heaven and eternal life to the thief. For if it was religious to give life to the thief, a much richer work of piety it is for a son to honor his mother with such affection. Behold, He says, your son; behold your mother. Christ made His Testament from the cross, and divided the offices of piety between the Mother and the disciples. Our Lord made not only a public, but also a domestic Testament. And this His Testament John sealed a witness worthy of such a Testator. A good testament it was, not of money, but of eternal life, which was not written with ink, but with tile spirit of the living God: My tongue is the pen of a ready writer. Mary, as became the mother of our Lord, stood before the cross, when the Apostles fled and With pitiful eyes beheld the wounds of her Son. For she looked not on the death of the Hostage, but on the salvation of the world; end perhaps knowing that her Son's death would bring this salvation, she who had been the habitation of the King, thought that by her death she might add to that universal gift.

But Jesus did not need any help for saving the v world, as you read in the Psalm, I have been even as a man with no help, free among the dead. He received indeed the affection of a parent, but He did not seek another's help. Imitate her, you holy matrons, who, as towards here only most beloved Son, has set you an example of such virtue: for you have not sweeter sons, nor did the Virgin seek consolation in again becoming a mother.

JEROME. The Mary which in Mark and Matthew is called the mother of James and Joses was the wife of Alpheus, and sister of Mary the mother of our Lord: which Mary John here designates of Cleophas, either from her father, or family, or for some other reason. She need not be thought a different person, because she is called in one place Mary the mother of James the less, and here Mary of Cleophas, for it is customary in Scripture to give different names to the same person.

CHRYS. Observe how the weaker sex is the stronger; standing by the cross when the disciples fly.

AUG. If Matthew and Mark had not mentioned by name Mary Magdalene, we should have thought that there were two parties, one of which stood far off, and the other near. But how must we account for the same Mary Magdalene and the other women standing afar off, as Matthew and Mark say, and being near the cross, as John says? By supposing that they were within such a distance as to be within sight of our Lord, and yet sufficiently far off to be out of the way of the crowd and Centurion, and soldiers who were immediately about Him. Or, we e may suppose that after our Lord had commended His mother to the disciple, they retired to be out of the way of the crowd, and saw what took place afterwards at a distance: so that those Evangelists who do not mention them till after our Lord's death, describe them as standing afar off. That some women are mentioned by all alike, others not, makes no matter.

CHRYS. Though there were other women by, He makes no mention of any of them, but only of His mother, to show us that v, e should specially honor our mothers. Our parents indeed, if they actually oppose the truth, are not even to be known: but otherwise we should pay them all attention, and honor them above all the world beside: When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, He says to His mother, Woman, behold your son!

BEDE. By the disciple whom Jesus loved, the Evangelist means himself; not that the others were not loved, but he was loved more intimately on account of his estate of chastity; for a Virgin our Lord called him, and a Virgin he ever remained.

CHRYS. Heavens! what honor does He pay to the disciple; who however conceals his name from modesty. For had he wished to boast, he would have added the reason why he was loved, for there must have been something great and wonderful to have caused that love. This is all He says to John; He does not console his grief, for this was a time for giving consolation. Yet was it no small one to be honored with such a charge, to have the mother of our Lord, in her affliction, committed to his care by Himself on His departure: Then says He to the disciple, Behold your mother!

AUG. This truly is that hour of the which Jesus, when about to change the water into wine, said, Mother, what have I to do with you? Mine hour is not yet come. Then, about to act divinely, He repelled the mother of His humanity, of His infirmity, as if He knew her not: now, suffering humanly, He commends with human affection her of whom He was made man. Here is a moral lesson. The good Teacher shows us by His example how that pious sons should take care of their parents. The cross of the sufferer, is the chair of the Master.

CHRYS. The shameless doctrine of Marcion is refuted here. For if our Lord were not born according to the flesh, and had not a mother, why did He make such provision for her? Observe how imperturbable He is during His crucifixion, talking to the disciple of His mother, fulfilling prophecies, airing good hope to the thief; whereas before His crucifixion, He seemed in fear. The weakness of His nature was strewn there, the exceeding greatness of His power here. He teaches us too herein, not to turn back, because we may feel disturbed at the difficulties before us for when we are once actually under the trial, all will be; light and easy for us.

AUG. He does this to provide as it were another son for His mother in his place; And from that hour that disciple took her to his own. To his own what? Was not John one of those who said, Lo, we have left all, and followed You? He took her then to his own, i. e not to his farm, for he had none, but to his care, for of this he was master.

BEDE. Another reading is, Accepy eam disciplus in suam, his own mother some understand, but to his own care seems better.

28. After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, I thirst.
29. Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a sponge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth.
30. When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.

AUG. He who appeared man, suffered all these things, He who was God, ordered them: After this Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished; i.e. knowing the prophecy in the Psalms, And when I was thirsty, they gave me vinegar to drink, said, I thirst: As if to say, you have not done all give me yourselves: for the Jews were themselves vinegar having degenerated from the wine of the Patriarchs and the Prophets.

Now there was a vessel full of vinegar: they had drunk from the wickedness of the world, as from a full vessel, and their heart was deceitful, as it were a sponge full of caves and crooked hiding places: And they filled a sponge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth.

CHRYS. They were not softened at all by what they saw, but were the more enraged, and gave Him the cup to drink, as they did to criminals, i.e. with a hyssop.

AUG. The hyssop around which they put the sponge full of vinegar, being a mean herb, taken to purge the breast, represents the humility of Christ, which they hemmed in and thought they had circumvented. For we are made clean by Christ s humility. Nor let it perplex you that they were able to reach His mouth when He was such a height above the ground: for we read in the other Evangelists, what John omits to mention, that the sponge was put upon a reed.

THEOPHYL. Some say that the hyssop is put here for reed, its leaves being like a reed. When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, He said, It is finished.

AUG. viz. what prophecy had foretold so long before.

BEDE. It may be asked here, why it is said, When Jesus had received the vinegar, when another Evangelists says, He would not drink. But this is easily settled. He did not receive the vinegar, to drink it, but fulfill the prophecy.

AUG. Then as there was nothing left Him to do before He died, it follows, And He bowed His head, and gave up the ghost, only dying when He had nothing more to do, like Him who had to lay down His life, and to take it up again.

GREG. Ghost is put here for soul: for had the Evangelist meant any thing else by it, though the ghost departed, in the soul might still have remained.

CHRYS. He did not bow His head because He gave up the ghost, but He gave up the ghost because at that moment He bowed His head. Whereby the Evangelist intimates that He was Lord of all.

AUG. For whoever had such power to sleep when he wished, as our Lord had to die when He wished? What power must He have, for our good or evil, Who had such power dying?

THEOPHYL. Our Lord gave up His ghost to God the Father, showing that the souls of the saints do not remain in the tomb, but go into the hand of the Father of all while sinners are reserved - for the place of punishment, i.e. hell.

31. The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the Sabbath clay, (for that Sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
32. Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with him,
33. But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they broke not his legs:
34. But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came thereout blood and water.
35. And he that saw it bare record, and his record is true: and he knows that he says true, that you might believe.
36. For these things were done, that the Scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken.
37. And again another Scripture says, They shall look on him whom they pierced.

CHRYS. The Jews who strained at a gnat and swallowed a camel after their audacious wickedness, reason scrupulously about the day: The Jews therefore because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the Sabbath.

BEDE. Parasceue, i. e. preparation: the sixth day was so called because the children of Israel prepared twice the number of loaves on that day. For that Sabbath day was an high day, i. e. on account of the feast of the passover.

Besought Pilate that their legs might be broken.

AUG. Not in order to take away the legs, but to cause death, that they might be taken down from the cross, and the feast day not be defiled by the sight of such horrid torments.

THEOPHYL. For it was commanded in the Law that the sun should not set on the punishment of anyone; or they were unwilling to appear tormentors and homicides on a feast day.

CHRYS. How forcible is truth: their own devices it is that accomplish the fulfillment of prophecy: Then came the soldiers and broke the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with Him.

But when they came to Jesus, an saw that He was dead already, they broke not His legs: but one of the soldiers with a spear pierced His side.

THEOPHYL. To please the Jews, they pierce Christ, thus insulting even His lifeless body. But the insult issues in a miracle: for a miracle it is that blood should flow from a dead body.

AUG. The Evangelist has expressed himself cautiously; not struck, or wounded, but opened His side: whereby was opened the gate of life, from whence the sacraments of the Church flowed, without which we cannot enter into that life which is the true life: And forthwith came thereout blood and water. That blood was shed for the remission of sins, that water tempers the cup of salvation. This it was which was prefigured when Noah was commanded to make a door in the side of the ark, by which the animals that were not to perish by the deluge entered; which animals prefigured the Church. To shadow forth this, the woman was made out of the side of the sleeping man; for this second Adam bowed His head, and slept on the cross, that out of that which came therefrom, there might be formed a wife for Him. O death, by which the dead are quickened, what can be purer than that blood, what more salutary than that wound!

CHRYS. This being the source whence the holy mysteries are derived, when you approach the awful cup, approach it as if you were about to drink out of Christ's side.

THEOPHYL. Shame then upon them who mix not water with the wine in the holy mysteries: they seem as if they believed not that the water flowed from the side. Had blood flowed only, a man might have said that there was some life left in the body, and that that was as why the blood flowed. But the water flowing is an irresistible miracle, and therefore the Evangelist adds, And he that saw it bare record.

CHRYS. As if to say, I did not hear it from others, but saw it with mine own eyes. And his record is true, he adds, not as if he had mentioned something so wonderful that his account would be suspected, but to stop the mouths of heretics, and in contemplation of the deep value of those mysteries which he announces.

And he knows that he says true, the you might believe.

AUG. He that saw it knows; let him that saw not believe his testimony. He gives testimonies from the Scriptures to each of these two things he relates. After, they brake not His legs, He adds, For these things were done, that the Scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of Him shall not be broken, a commandment which applied to the sacrifice of the paschal lamb under the old law, which sacrifice foreshadowed our Lord's. Also after, One of the soldiers with a spear opened His side, then follows another Scripture testimony; And again another Scripture said, They shall look on Him whom they pierced, a prophecy which implies that Christ will come in the very flesh in which He was crucified.

JEROME. This testimony is taken from Zacharias.

38. And after this Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus: and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore and took the body of Jesus.
39. And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight.
40. Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.
41. Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new sepulcher, wherein was never man yet laid.
42. There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulcher was nigh at hand.

CHRYS. Joseph thinking that the hatred of the Jews would be appeased by His crucifixion, went with confidence to ask permission to take charge of His burial: And after this Joseph of Arimathea besought Pilate.

BEDE. Arimathea is the same as Ramatha, the city of Elkanah, and Samuel. It was providentially ordered that he should be rich, in order that he might have access to the governor, and just, in order that he might merit the charge of our Lord's body: That he might take the body of Jesus, because he was His disciple.

CHRYS. He was not of the twelve, but of the seventy, for none of the twelve came near. Not that their fear kept them back, for Joseph was a disciple, secretly for: fear of the Jews. But Joseph was a person of rank, and known to Pilate; so he went to him, and the favor was granted, and afterwards believed Him, not as a condemned man, but as a great and wonderful Person: He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus.

AUG. In performing this last office to our Lord, he showed a bold indifference to the Jews, though he had avoided our Lord's company when alive, for fear of incurring their hatred.

BEDE. Their ferocity being appeased for the time by their success, he sought the body of Christ. He did not come as a disciple, but simply to perform a work of mercy, which is due to the evil as well as to the good. Nicodemus joined him: And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight.

AUG. We must not read the words, at the first, first bringing a mixture of myrrh, but attach the first to the former clause. For Nicodemus at the first came to Jesus by night, as John relates in the former part of the Gospel. From these words then we are to infer that that was not the only time that Nicodemus went to our Lord, but simply the first time; and that he came afterwards and heard Christ's discourses, and became a disciple.

CHRYS. They bring the spices most efficacious for preserving the body from corruption, treating Him as a mere man. Yet this show great love.

BEDE. We must observe however that it was simple ointment; for they were not allowed to mix many ingredients together. Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury.

AUG. Wherein the Evangelist intimates, that in paying the last offices of the dead, the custom of the nation is to be followed. It was the custom of the Jewish nation to embalm their dead bodies, in order that they might d keep the longer.

AUG. Nor does John here contradict the other Evangelists, who, though they are silent about Nicodemus, yet do not affirm that our Lord was buried by Joseph alone. Nor because they say that our Lord was wrapped in a linen cloth by Joseph, do they say that other linen cloths may not have been brought by Nicodemus in addition; so that John may be right in saying, not, in a single cloth, but, in linen cloths. Nay more, the napkin which was about His head and the bands which were tied round His body being all of linen, thought there were but one linen cloth, He may yet be said to have been wrapped up in linen cloths: linen cloths being taken in a general sense, as comprehending all that was made of linen.

BEDE. Hence hath come down the custom of the Church, of consecrating the Lord's body not on silk or gold cloth, but in a clean linen cloth.

CHRYS. But as they were pressed for time, for Christ died at the ninth hour, and after that they had gone to Pilate, and taken away the body, so that the evening was now near, they lay Him in the nearest tomb: Now in the place where He was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new sepulcher, wherein was never man yet laid. A providential design, to make it certain that it was His resurrection, and not any other person's that lay with Him.

AUG. As no one before or after Him was conceived in the womb of the Virgin Mary, so in this grave was there none buried before or after Him.

THEOPHYL. In that it was a new sepulcher, we are given to understand, that we are all renewed by Christ's death, and death and corruption destroyed. Mark too the exceeding poverty that He took up for our sakes. He had no house in His lifetime, and now He is laid in another's sepulcher at His death, and His nakedness covered by Joseph. There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulcher was as nigh at hand.

AUG. Implying that the burial was hastened, in order to finish it before the evening, when, on account of the preparation, n which the Jews with us call more commonly in the Latin, Cena pure, it was unlawful to do any such thing.

CHRYS. The sepulcher was near, that the disciples might approach it more easily, and be better witnesses of what took place there, and that even enemies might be made the witnesses of the burial, being placed there as guards, and the story of His being stolen away showed to be false.

BEDE. Mystically, the name Joseph means, apt for the receiving of a good work; whereby we are admonished that we should make ourselves worthy of our Lord's body, before we receive it.

THEOPHYL. Even now in a certain sense Christ is put to death by the avaritious, in the person of the poor man suffering famine. Be therefore a Joseph, and cover Christ's nakedness, and, not once, but continually by contemplation, embalm Him in your spiritual tomb, cover Him, and mix myrrh and bitter aloes; considering that bitterest sentence of all, Depart, you cursed into everlasting fire.

Catena Aurea John 19

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