Bystanders at the Cross
Coventry Cathedral Lent Talks 2012
The Place of Forgiveness: the Cross in Luke’s Gospel
Rembrandt Three Crosses
Each week we are exploring the particular perspective of a different writer within the New
Testament on the cross. We began with Mark’s Gospel, the first account of the life of Jesus
to be written, and his vision of the cross as a place of desolation. Last week we looked at
Matthew’s account of the crucifixion, giving particular attention to how he presents the
cross as a place of hope by ‘flash-forwarding’ to the resurrection of Jesus. Next week we
shall look at John’s Gospel, and finally see what Paul the Apostle has to say. But this week
we look at Luke’s Gospel, and how he portrays the cross as a place of forgiveness.
Each week we are also looking at a piece of art which reflects the themes of the text we’re
exploring. For the last two weeks we have been looking at the Isenheim altarpiece, painted
by Matthias Grunewald around 1515, and the contrasting images of crucifixion and
resurrection. Today we move on about a hundred and fifty years to Rembrandt’s etching of
the Three Crosses, his dramatic image based on Luke’s text.
http://www.rijksmuseum.nl/aria/aria_assets/RP-P-1962-39?lang=en
Almighty God,
whose most dear Son Jesus Christ
went not up to joy
but first he suffered pain,
and entered not into glory
before he was crucified;
mercifully grant that we,
walking in the way of the cross,
may find it none other than the way of life and peace,
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
When Luke came to write his version of the story of Jesus, it was perhaps fifty-five or sixty
years since the events described had happened. Luke himself tells us, at the opening of his
Gospel, that ‘many’ had already described the events that ‘have been fulfilled among us’,
but that he had gone back to the best sources he could find: the ‘eyewitnesses and servants
of the word’, the latter group having, it seems, a special responsibility to preserve the
sayings of Jesus and the stories about him. He also aimed to write an ‘orderly account’,
reshaping the narrative and polishing up the language (Luke 1.1-3). Amongst the many
previous accounts, Luke certainly had access to Mark’s Gospel as his main source, and
perhaps also to Matthew’s.
Two features of Luke’s Gospel stand out in contrast to Mark’s. The first is the deliberate and
very measured sense of progress and journey. Alone amongst the Gospel-writers, Luke
wrote a sequel to his life of Jesus, the Acts of the Apostles, which takes the story on beyond
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the empty tomb and the ascent of Jesus into heaven to the further development of his
mission through the work of Peter, Paul and others, to a closing scene where the Good
News of Jesus is being freely proclaimed in the heart of the empire, Rome itself (Acts 28.3031). If the ending of Luke’s Gospel connects the story of Jesus to what will follow, the
opening in the holy of holies at the centre of the Jerusalem Temple, where the priest
Zechariah hears that his wife is to bear a son, John the Baptist, links the story of Jesus back
to the Old Testament. In fact Luke’s understanding of Jesus is as the central and decisive
figure in the drama of salvation which reaches back into the story of Israel, and reaches
forward to encompass Paul and generations of Christians yet unborn. The Old Testament
tells the story of salvation before Jesus, Acts the story of salvation after him. But the centre
and heart of the story is Jesus. In fact that’s what Luke means in the very first sentence of
his Gospel: ‘the events that have been fulfilled among us’ (Luke 1.1). He believes that there
is a divine mission, and that Jesus is the one who puts it into action. Therefore in the Gospel
there is an inexorable sense of Jesus moving to meet his destiny in Jerusalem, symbolised
particularly in his turning south from Galilee and ‘setting his face to Jerusalem’ (Luke 9.51).
The remaining chapters of the Gospel are a kind of triumphal progress, as Jesus in kingly
fashion sends out messengers ahead of him and travels the long and winding road to
Jerusalem, where the cross awaits.
The second feature of Luke’s Gospel which contrasts with Mark’s is the sense that Jesus is
surrounded by other people, who join him ‘on the road’. Though there are many crowds in
Mark’s Gospel, and there are disciples close to Jesus, the crowds are fickle and the disciples
flaky, running away when they are needed most. Jesus always seems on his own and
isolated. But in Luke’s Gospel we have a sense of the warmth of human relationships, as
Luke draws attention to the women who form part of the band of disciples, for example
(Luke 8.1-3). The most memorable parables, such as the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal
Son, come to us from Luke’s Gospel alone, often having closely observed human
relationships at their heart. Other people matter in Luke’s narrative. Jesus is the leader of
God’s mission to the world in this Gospel, rather than the isolated agent of God’s will.
These strands come together in Luke’s portrayal of the Crucifixion. As last week, with
Matthew’s account, it’s important especially to listen for the additions which Luke has made
to Mark’s, to hear the distinctive notes that he wants to sound as he recounts for us the
death of Jesus.
Luke 23.26-56
26 As they led him away, they seized a man, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming from
the country, and they laid the cross on him, and made him carry it behind Jesus. 27A
great number of the people followed him, and among them were women who were
beating their breasts and wailing for him. 28But Jesus turned to them and said,
‘Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your
children. 29For the days are surely coming when they will say, “Blessed are the
barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.” 30Then
they will begin to say to the mountains, “Fall on us”; and to the hills, “Cover us.”
31For if they do this when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?’
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32 Two others also, who were criminals, were led away to be put to death with him.
33When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there
with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. [34Then Jesus said, ‘Father,
forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.’] And they cast lots to
divide his clothing. 35And the people stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at
him, saying, ‘He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his
chosen one!’ 36The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine,
37and saying, ‘If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!’ 38There was also an
inscription over him, ‘This is the King of the Jews.’
39 One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, ‘Are
you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!’ 40But the other rebuked him, saying, ‘Do
you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? 41And
we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our
deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.’ 42Then he said, ‘Jesus, remember me
when you come into your kingdom.’ 43He replied, ‘Truly I tell you, today you will be
with me in Paradise.’
44 It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the
afternoon, 45while the sun’s light failed; and the curtain of the temple was torn in
two. 46Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, ‘Father, into your hands I commend
my spirit.’ Having said this, he breathed his last. 47When the centurion saw what had
taken place, he praised God and said, ‘Certainly this man was innocent.’ 48And when
all the crowds who had gathered there for this spectacle saw what had taken place,
they returned home, beating their breasts. 49But all his acquaintances, including the
women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these
things.
50 Now there was a good and righteous man named Joseph, who, though a member
of the council, 51had not agreed to their plan and action. He came from the Jewish
town of Arimathea, and he was waiting expectantly for the kingdom of God. 52This
man went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. 53Then he took it down, wrapped
it in a linen cloth, and laid it in a rock-hewn tomb where no one had ever been laid.
54It was the day of Preparation, and the sabbath was beginning. 55The women who
had come with him from Galilee followed, and they saw the tomb and how his body
was laid. 56Then they returned, and prepared spices and ointments. On the sabbath
they rested according to the commandment.
The early part of the Luke’s story is broadly the same as Mark’s: the details of crucifixion and
mocking, but Luke introduces three new notes: in the midst of the pain of the journey to the
cross, Jesus reaches out the women of Jerusalem and urges them to save their tears for
themselves, rather than him, prophetically seeing that Jerusalem itself will, in a few years’
time, be ransacked by Roman armies and the Temple itself destroyed (cf. Luke 19.41-44). He
calls for forgiveness of those who are crucifying him, and Luke records the penitence of one
of the thieves who is mocking Jesus and Jesus’ words to him. In Luke’s picture Jesus is
concerned not for himself but for others; through his compassion, forgiveness and healing
flow from this cross.
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Yet there is also irony here. Jesus calls on the Father to forgive, but the actions and the
mockery of those who torment him raises the question of whether they can receive this
forgiveness as it is offered. One of the thieves crucified with Jesus joins the tormentors,
even in his own pain. Forgiveness is available to him as it is to the other thief, but he does
not take up the offer. We have heard this note before, as Jesus on his way to Jerusalem
achingly cries out to ‘the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it!
How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under
her wings. But you would not’ (Luke 13.34). To be close the compassion of God as Jesus is,
to be part of his mission, is no easy option; it brings with it the pain of rejection and the
sadness of seeing people turn away.
There’s also a fascinating little textual detail here to prompt us to reflection. The first part of
Luke 23.34, ‘Father forgive them’ is not present in some of the early manuscript copies of
the Gospel which have survived (you’ll notice that it’s in square brackets above). Yet both
the language and the theme are very strongly of a piece with the rest of the Gospel, and in
fact the story of the stoning of Stephen in Acts which is clearly patterned on the death of
Jesus includes a parallel prayer for forgiveness (Acts 7.60). What’s going on here? The most
compelling suggestion is that this prayer was part of the original Gospel as Luke wrote it, but
that in the Second Century some scribes decided to omit it because they found the offer of
forgiveness to those who had crucified the Son of God as impossible to believe. If there was
an unforgiveable sin, surely this was it? What happened to this text was probably also
wrapped up with later antagonism within the Church to the Jews, as if the Church could
withdraw the offer of forgiveness that Jesus had made. It is after all hard to think of a better
or more graphic example of loving your enemies than praying for those who are nailing you
to a cross.
Luke records, like Mark, the darkness. But where Mark’s crucifixion is overwhelmed by
darkness, somehow Luke’s is not. It is as if Jesus shines in the midst of it. Luke tells us that
the sun’s light failed – in other words an eclipse - but Jesus illuminates the whole scene. And
when he dies his last words are not a cry of dereliction but an expression of serene trust:
‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.’ The words come from Psalm 31 (Ps 31.5), but
this is also a child’s prayer usually uttered before sleep, in case the child did not wake in the
morning. The words are uttered to the Father, whose loving care seems still to surround this
scene, in contrast to Mark’s stark ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ Somehow
the darkness is transcended.
Part of that transcending is the fact that Jesus is not isolated on this cross, but surrounded
by others. The penitent thief will be with him today in paradise (Luke 23.43), the bystanders
are deeply affected by what they see and return home in sorrow, grieving and mourning
(Luke 23.48) and the watching women of whom Mark and Matthew have told us are joined
by others – perhaps even some of the disciples (Luke 23.49). The portrayal is of Jesus still
surrounded by followers, not desolate and alone.
And the centurion’s role is a little different too. Mark has him, rather ambiguously you will
remember, saying ‘Truly, this man son of God was’; Matthew tells us that he watches with
terror or awe; Luke affirms that he praises God, but that he says ‘Certainly, This man was
innocent’ (Luke 23.47). The word for innocent could also be translated ‘righteous’ – the
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effect is to recognise, from a non-Jewish perspective, that the the man on the cross is
indeed close to God. But it also reminds us of the Jewish Book of Wisdom, written only a
few decades before the New Testament, which developed the idea of the suffering servant
of God and which affirms that:
the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch
them. 2 In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to have died, and their departure was
thought to be an affliction, 3 and their going from us to be their destruction; but
they are at peace. 4 For though in the sight of men they were punished, their hope is
full of immortality. 5 Having been disciplined a little, they will receive great good,
because God tested them and found them worthy of himself; 6 like gold in the
furnace he tried them, and like a sacrificial burnt offering he accepted them. 7 In the
time of their visitation they will shine forth, and will run like sparks through the
stubble. 8 They will govern nations and rule over peoples, and the Lord will reign
over them for ever. (Wisdom 3.1-8)
Luke, through the words of the centurion points to the vindication of the one who has been
faithful to God and trusted in him to the end. On that journey towards resurrection and new
life he is joined by those who accept the offer of forgiveness, as the penitent thief does.
Now let’s look at Rembrandt’s artistic treatment of this passage. His etching Three Crosses
dates originally from 1653. The opportunity for artistic risk and challenge, especially with
biblical pictures, was quite limited in Protestant 17th-century Holland, where Rembrandt
lived. Catholic artists like Rubens had much more freedom. Rembrandt’s audience wanted
straightforward realistic pictures. And amongst the Dutch middle class there was an
appetite for prints, original artworks by leading artists, but costing a fraction of the price
they would charge for a painting. Etching, literally scratching with a stylus on a copper plate,
was a new medium, and one which the adventurous Rembrandt embraced wholeheartedly.
In this version of the Three Crosses, Luke’s account of the crucifixion is in view. The two
thieves are there (one blindfolded and arching his body away from the light), and so is the
centurion, kneeling before the cross. And even a scavenging dog makes an appearance, near
the front of the picture.
But copper plates wore away as prints were made from them. Periodically Rembrandt had
to return to the image and retouch it. This image has five states, each a subtly different one
from the last. The second state is a little darker, through wear on the plate. The third state is
lighter again, but the lines less sharp. It’s in the fourth state that Rembrandt seems to have
woken up to the possibilities of the new technology of etching. He produced a nightmare
vision, where Christ has aged, and the centurion has climbed back on his horse and is
reading a letter. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/31183/31183-h/31183-h.html (image 270)
The surrounding crowds have blurred into an indistinct chorus. The fifth state
http://www.smith.edu/artmuseum/layout/set/art_dialog/content/view/full/356 restored
some of the clarity, but restricting the light now to just the immediate centre of the picture.
Many commentators think that this latter image is based on Matthew’s Crucifixion. I wonder
if the nightmarish fourth state reflects Mark’s place of desolation. The light is dim, as if the
scene has been cast into the outer darkness. The scratches on the plate which Rembrandt
has introduced seem to show rain. The onlookers are unconcerned, the rider to the left of
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the cross who may be in charge is reading, and ignoring the agony displayed before him.
Jesus himself is in agony, stretched on the cross in his pain. It takes little imagination to hear
him cry again ‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?’
But in the earlier states a cone of bright light pours down from heaven and floods the
central figures with its illumination and the centurion kneels at Jesus’ feet. Jesus himself is
not in agony, but is full of calm acceptance and trust: ‘Into your hands I commend my spirit.’
This Jesus is palpably human, yet he is not racked by agony. He is full of peace and
forgiveness, and lights up the scene in a way which is reminiscent of how Rembrandt’s
contemporaries pictured the nativity, with light pouring forth from the crib into the night’s
darkness. Here the light almost bleaches out the bystanders it is so bright.
Rembrandt here has captured Luke’s distinctive response to Mark’s dark and threatening
scene. It is a scene which has moved beyond the raw agony of Mark, perhaps with the
passing of the years as the pain dims and the achievement of Jesus grew ever clearer with
the growth of the church and the proliferation of the experience of healing and forgiveness
in the lives of Jesus’ followers, flowing from the death of their Lord on the cross. The scene
now appears, with hindsight, as the quintessential moment of revelation, when the light of
God shone down on the earth in the triumph of the Son of God on the cross.
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I wonder who you identify with most in Luke’s portrayal of the crucifixion?
I wonder what Jesus’ words of forgiveness in this passage mean to you?
I wonder if you have an experience of forgiving or being forgiven that you could
share?
I wonder why you think ‘Father forgive’ might have been omitted by a scribe from
Luke’s Gospel?
I wonder which state of Rembrandt’s Three Crosses means most to you?
Music
The first movement of James Macmillan’s Seven Last Words from the Cross (1994)
1. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do (St. Luke)
Macmillan includes the following in the piece also:
The Palm Sunday Exclamation
Hosanna filio David
benedictus qui venit in nomine Domine
Rex Israel, Hosanni in excelsis
Hosanna to the Son of David
blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord,
The King of Israel, Hosanna in the highest.
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From the Good Friday Responories for Tenebrae
The life that I held dear I delivered into the hands of the unrighteous
and my inheritance has become for me like a lion in the forest.
My enemy spoke out against me,
‘Come gather together and hasten to devour him’.
They placed me in a wasteland of desolation,
and all the earth mourned for me.
For there was no one who would acknowledge me or give me help.
Men rose up against me and spared not my life.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/MacMillan-Seven-Last-Words-Cross/dp/B000A1=GMY
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