Announcements Of Death

Announcements Of Death

Announcements Of Death. —It is certain that we have words from Jesus concerning His death; for such ruthless criticism as that of Schmiedel ( Encyc. Bibl. ‘Gospels’), who admits only nine genuine sayings of the Master, is uncritical and unscientific. These words appear in the Synoptics as well as in the Fourth Gospel. The genuineness of the latter is here assumed, though there is a wide difference in character between it and the Synoptics.

The main point in the announcements of His death by Jesus rests on the time of their utterance. Hence the chronological grouping of these sayings of Jesus must be followed. If He spoke of His death only as a disappointed man after He saw the manifest hate of the rulers, there would be little ground for claiming Messianic consciousness concerning His death as an atonement for sin. And the heart of the whole problem turns on the Messianic consciousness. When did He become conscious of His death? Why did He expect a violent death? What did He think was to be accomplished by His death? Was His death a voluntary sacrifice, or merely a martyr’s crown? These and similar questions can be answered only by a careful and comprehensive survey of Christ’s own words upon the subject. It is noteworthy that Jesus put the emphasis in His career on His death rather than on His incarnation. That is so out of the ordinary as at once to challenge attention. Here is One who came to give life by dying. That is in deepest harmony with nature, but not in harmony with man’s view of his own life.

1. The first foreshadowings .—( a ) Jesus first exhibits knowledge of His death at the time of the Temptation, immediately after the Baptism and the formal entrance upon the Messianic ministry. The word ‘death’ or ‘cross’ is not mentioned between Jesus and Satan, but the point at issue was the easy or the hard road to conquest of the world. It is the unexpressed idea in this struggle for the mastery of men. Hence, before Jesus began to teach men, He had already wrestled with His Messianic destiny and chosen the path that led to the cross. This tone of high moral conflict is never absent from Jesus till the end. The Synoptic Gospels thus give the first account of Christ’s consciousness of His struggle to the death for the spiritual mastery of men.

( b ) Another* [Note:  John 2:2-9 and  Matthew 12:39 are passed over because of doubts (not shared by the present writer) as to their interpretation or genuineness. The case is strong enough without these disputed passages.] occasion for the mention of His death by our Lord grew out of the failure of Nicodemus to understand the new birth and the spiritual nature of the kingdom of God ( John 3:9). If the teacher of Israel could not apprehend these aspects of what took place in the kingdom on earth, now could he lay hold of the purposes of God in heaven ( John 3:12) about the work of the kingdom? One of the chief of these ‘heavenly things’ is the necessity of the death of Christ for the sin of the world. The brazen serpent of the older history serves as an illustration ( John 3:14), but ‘das göttliche “δεῖ” Todesschicksals’ (Schwartzkopff, Die Weissagungen Jesu Christi , p. 20) is grounded in the eternal love of God for the world ( John 3:16). The Son of Man ( John 3:14) who ‘must’ be lifted up is the Son of God ( John 3:16). It is not perfectly certain that  John 3:16 is a word of Jesus and not of the Evangelist, but at any rate it is a correct interpretation of the preceding argument. The high religious necessity for His death, of which Jesus is here conscious, could come to Him by revelation from the Father (Schwartzkopff; l.c. p. 22). The consciousness of Jesus is clear, but He finds in Nicodemus an inability to grasp this great truth. The word ‘lifted up’ (ὑψωθῆναι) refers to the cross, as is made plain afterwards ( John 8:28;  John 12:32 f.). Even when the multitudes heard Jesus use the word just before His death, they did not understand it ( John 12:34), though the Evangelist gives the correct interpretation in the light of the after history ( John 12:33). In itself the word could refer to spiritual glory (Paulus) or heavenly glory (Bleek), but not in view of the later developments. So then the cross is consciously before Jesus from the very beginning of His ministry.

( c ) It is possibly nearly a year before we have the next allusion by the Master to His death. Again in parabolic phrase Jesus calls Himself the bridegroom who will be taken away from the disciples ( Mark 2:20,  Matthew 9:15,  Luke 5:35). The Pharisees from Jerusalem ( Luke 5:17) are now in Galilee watching the movements of Jesus, so as to gain a case against Him. On this occasion they are finding fault because the disciples of Jesus do not observe stated seasons of fasting. The answer of Jesus is luminous in marking off the wide difference in spirit between a ceremonial system like Judaism and a vital personal spiritual religion like Christianity. There is a time to fast, but it is a time of real, not perfunctory, sorrow. Such a time will come to the disciples of Jesus when He is taken away. By itself this reference might allude merely to the death that would come to Christ as to other men, but the numerous other clear passages of a different nature preclude that idea here. Gould is right ( Internat. Crit. Com. on  Mark 2:20) in saying that ‘even as a premonition it is not premature,’ though there is more in it than this, for Jesus understood the significance of His death. Soon the historical developments confirm the prejudgment of Jesus, for the enmity of the historical conspiracy grows apace. At the next feast at which Jesus appears in Jerusalem ( John 5:1) the rulers make a definite attempt to kill Him as a Sabbath-breaker and blasphemer, also for claiming equality with God the Father ( John 5:18). This decision to kill Jesus soon reappears in Galilee ( Mark 3:6), and often in Jerusalem during the closing six months of the ministry.

( d ) The use of the cross as a metaphor, as in  Matthew 10:38 (see also  Mark 8:24,  Matthew 16:24,  Luke 14:27), would not of itself constitute an allusion to the death of Jesus, since death on the cross was so common at this time. But in the light of the many allusions by Jesus Himself to His death, the background of the metaphor would seem to be personal, and so to imply His own actual cross. He is Himself the supreme example of saving life by losing it. Meyer, in loco , considers that this verse was transferred from the later period; but this is unnecessary; for it is eminently pertinent that in the directions to the Twelve, who are now sent out on their first mission, they should be urged to self-sacrifice by the figure of His own death on the crass. In this same address occurs an apocalyptic saying that presupposes the death of Christ ( Matthew 10:23). It is not an anachronism (J. Weiss) to find self-sacrifice and self-realization in the words of Jesus about losing life and finding it ( Matthew 10:39), for Jesus Himself gives the historical background of this image in the sublime justification of His own death in His resurrection ( John 12:24).

( e ) It is just a year ( John 6:4) before the death of Jesus that He is addressing the Galilaean populace in the synagogue at Capernaum. He explains that He is the bread of heaven, the true manna, the spiritual Messiah. It is the climax of the Galilaean ministry, for but yesterday they had tried to make Him king ( John 6:15). To-day Jesus tests their enthusiasm by the supreme revelation of His gift of Himself ‘for the life of the world’ ( John 6:51), a clear allusion to His atoning death on the cross. Thus will it be possible for men to make spiritual appropriation of Christ as the living bread. The people and many of the so-called disciples fall back at this saying ( John 6:66), and thus justify the wisdom of Jesus in having said no more as yet concerning His death, and life by His death. For at the first dim apprehension of this basal truth the people left Him. But it was time for the truth to be told to the flippant multitudes. Here Jesus reveals His consciousness of the character and work of Judas as the betrayer, a very devil ( John 6:70 f.). The bald truth of the betrayal is not at this point told to the Twelve, for John’s comment is made afterwards; but Jesus expressly says that one of them is a devil. Jesus clearly knows more than He tells. There is this bitterness in His cup at the very time that the people desert Him. The shadow of the cross is growing closer and darker, but Christ will go on to meet His hour.

2. The definite announcements .—( a ) The new departure at Caesarea Philippi. Just after the renewed confession by Peter that Jesus is the Messiah, St. Matthew says that ‘from that time began Jesus to show unto his disciples how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and the third day be raised up’ ( Matthew 16:21). St. Mark ( Mark 8:31) also says that ‘he began to teach them.’ Clearly, then, this was an epoch in the teaching of Jesus concerning His death. When He withdrew from Galilee this last summer, he devoted Himself chiefly to the disciples, and especially to preparing them for His departure. The specific teaching concerning His death follows, therefore, the searching test of their fidelity to Him as the Messiah. This is not a new idea to Jesus, as we have already seen. It has been the keynote of His mission all the time, but He had to speak of it in veiled and restrained language till now, when ‘he spake the saying openly’ ( Mark 8:32). Now Jesus told the details of His death, the place and the persecutors. He repeats the necessity (δεῖ) of His death as He had proclaimed it in  John 3:14. The disciples are still unprepared for this plain truth, and Peter even dares to rebuke Jesus for such despondency ( Matthew 16:22). The sharp rebuke of Peter by Jesus ( Matthew 16:23) shows how strong a hold the purpose to die had on His very nature. Peter had renewed the attack of Satan in the Temptation. The Gospels record the dulness of the disciples, thus disproving the late invention of these sayings attributed to Jesus. The principle of self-giving is a basal one for Jesus and for all His followers ( Luke 9:23-25). The disciples could not yet, any more than Nicodemus, grasp the moral necessity of the death of Jesus. They recoiled at the bare fact.

( b ) On the Mount of Transfiguration a week later, somewhere on the spurs of Hermon, Peter, James, and John get a fresh word from Jesus about His death ( Mark 9:9). It is not necessary to suppose that they understood or even heard the conversation of Jesus with Moses and Elijah about ‘his decease which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem’ ( Luke 9:31). Most likely they did not, if Peter’s remarks are a criterion ( Luke 9:32 f.). There is a fitness both from the manner of the deaths of Moses and Elijah, and from their respective positions in law and prophecy, that these two should talk with Jesus about His atoning and predicted sacrificial death. This exalted scene lifts the curtain a little for us, so that we catch some glimpse of the consciousness of Jesus concerning His death, as He held high converse with Moses and Elijah. But the remark of Jesus ( Matthew 17:9) was a caution to the three disciples to keep to themselves what they had seen till His resurrection, when they would need it. But the lesson of strength was lost on them for the present. Even the chosen three questioned helplessly with each other about the rising from the dead ( Mark 9:10). They could not understand a dying Messiah now or later till the risen Christ had made it clear.

( c ) In Galilee Jesus renewed His earnest words about the certainty of His death ( Mark 9:31,  Matthew 17:22 f.,  Luke 9:44). He concealed His presence in Galilee as far as possible ( Mark 9:30), but He was very insistent in urging, ‘Let these words sink into your ears: for the Son of Man shall be delivered up into the hands of men’ ( Luke 9:44). But it was to no purpose, for they understood it not ( Mark 9:32). St. Luke ( Luke 9:45), in fact, says that it was concealed from them, thus raising a problem of God’s purpose and their responsibility. They were sorry ( Matthew 17:23), but afraid to ask Jesus ( Luke 9:45). Hence Jesus has not yet succeeded in making the disciples understand His purpose to die for men. So then He will have no human sympathy, and will have to tread the path to Calvary alone.

( d ) At the feast of Tabernacles, or a few days afterwards, just six months before the end, in the midst of the hostile atmosphere of Jerusalem, Jesus emphasizes the voluntary character of His death for His sheep ( John 10:15). He does this to distinguish between Himself and the Pharisees, who have been vehemently attacking Him. They are robbers, wolves, and hirelings, while Jesus is the Good Shepherd. He is not merely caught in the maelstrom of historic forces, nor is He the victim of time and circumstance, for He has voluntarily put Himself into the vortex of sin ( John 10:17 f.). The Father has given the Son the power or right (ἐξουσία) to lay down and to take up His life again. It was a ‘commandment’ from the Father, but not to the exclusion of the voluntary nature of His death; just as the necessity of His death was an inward necessity of love, not an outward compulsion of law. It is in the realm of spirit that we find the true value of the death of Jesus for our sins ( Hebrews 9:14), and the moral grandeur of it is seen in the fact that He made a voluntary offering of His life for those who hated Him ( Romans 5:8).

( e ) As the time draws nearer, Jesus even manifests eagerness to meet His death ( Luke 12:49 f.). It is only some three months till the end. However we take τί, whether as interrogative or exclamation, we see clearly the mingled eagerness and dread with which Jesus contemplated His death. It is a fire that will burn, but also attracts. He had come just for this purpose, to make this fire. It will be a relief when it is kindled. It is a baptism of death that presses as a Divine compulsion upon Him, like the ‘must’ of the earlier time ( John 3:14,  Mark 8:31). Here we feel the inward glow of the heart of Christ as it bursts out for a moment like a flame from the crater, unable to be longer restrained. So Jesus had a double point of view about His death, one of joy and one of shrinking, but He did not go now one way and now the other. He will pursue His way steadily, and as the time draws nigh, His view of His death will amount to rapture ( John 17:1;  John 17:24). But Jesus was never more conscious and sane than when He spoke thus about His death. It was, in fact, His inner self speaking out. He thus gave us not only a new view of His own death, but a new view of death itself.

( f ) Jesus even tells His enemies that He expects to be put to death in Jerusalem ( Luke 13:33). They were posing as His friends, but were either representatives of Herod Antipas or of the Jerusalem Pharisees. Jesus asserted His independence of ‘that fox’ and of them, but announced the inward necessity (‘I must’) that He should ultimately at the right time meet the fate of other prophets in Jerusalem. His lament over Jerusalem reveals the depth of His love for that city, and demands a Judaean ministry such as that described by John.

( g ) It is not till the death of Lazarus that the disciples realize that Jesus may be put to death ( John 11:8); and then as a dread growing out of the last attempt of the Jews to kill Him at the feast of Dedication ( John 10:39). Thomas has the courage of despair ( John 11:16) in the gloomy situation, but Jesus speaks of His own glorification ( John 11:4;  John 11:40). One item in this glorification was the formal decision of the Sanhedrin to put Jesus to death ( John 11:53). With this formal decision resting over Him, Jesus withdrew to the hills of Ephraim, near where in the beginning He had refused Satan’s offer of a compromise, and had chosen His own way and the Father’s. Had He made a mistake?

3. Facing the end .—( a ) The relation between the death of Christ and the consummation of the kingdom. It is in the last journey to Jerusalem that the Pharisees ask when the kingdom of God comes ( Luke 17:20). They are thinking of the apocalyptic conception current in their literature. There are two difficulties thus raised. One is their utter failure to understand the nature of the kingdom, for it is inner and spiritual, not external (the Papyri show that ἐντός means ‘within,’ not ‘among’).* [Note: Cf., however, Expos. Times, xv. [1904], 387.] But, though the kingdom had already come in this sense, there would be in the end a fuller and completer realization of the work of the kingdom. It is in this sense that Jesus addresses the disciples in  Luke 17:25. The day when the Son of Man shall be revealed ( Luke 17:30) will be the end. ‘But first must be suffer many things, and be rejected of this generation.’ Thus Jesus separates His own death from the final stage of the Messianic work on earth. The other difficulty is raised by the disciples, and concerns the place where the Son will manifest Himself ( Luke 17:37). He will come when there are people for Him to come for.

( b ) Jesus uses the word ‘crucify’ before He reaches Jericho on this last journey to Jerusalem ( Matthew 20:19). Stapfer scouts this item as put in post eventum ( Jesus Christ during His Ministry , p. 202), because it is expressly used by Christ only twice before His death (see also  Matthew 26:2); but the Master particularizes beforehand other details, such as the mocking, scourging, spitting, delivering to the Gentiles (these all now mentioned for the first time,  Mark 10:33 f.,  Matthew 20:19,  Luke 18:32 f.). Besides, now for the first time also Jesus claims that His death will be in fulfilment of the prophetic writings concerning the Son of Man ( Luke 18:31). See later  Matthew 21:42,  John 13:18,  Mark 14:27,  Luke 22:37;  Luke 24:27. Jesus is not, however, playing a part just to fulfil the Scripture, but He sees this objective confirmation of the inner witness of His spirit to the Father’s will concerning His death. Besides, on this occasion Jesus had made a special point of talking about His coming death, taking the Twelve apart ( Matthew 20:17 f.), and explaining that He does so now because they are near Jerusalem. There was an unusual look on the Master’s face, so much so that the disciples were amazed and afraid ( Mark 10:32). But with all this pain, they were hopelessly dull on this subject ( Luke 18:34).

( c ) There is strange pathos in the next occasion Jesus had for speaking concerning His death. James and John and their mother ( Matthew 20:20,  Mark 10:35) seem hardly able to wait for the Master to cease telling about His death before they come and ask for the chief positions in the temporal kingdom for which they are still looking. It was a shock to Jesus. Waiving their ignorance, He asked if they could drink His cup of death and take His baptism of blood ( Matthew 20:22,  Mark 10:38). They actually said that they were able. And James was the first of the Twelve to die a martyr’s death, and John the last; for Jesus had said that they would have His cup and baptism ( Mark 10:39).

( d ) It was on the same occasion, as Jesus proceeded to give the disciples a needed lesson in true greatness and taught the dignity of service, that He set forth in plain speech the purpose of His death ( Matthew 20:28,  Mark 10:45). Certainly Jesus had the right to tell the purpose of His voluntary death. Λύτρον is obviously ‘ransom,’ but it need not be said that this word exhausts all the content in the death of Christ. Jesus Himself elsewhere spoke of the vital connexion between Himself and the believer ( John 15:1 ff.). This view of the redemptive death of Christ is further emphasized by the symbol of Baptism and also of the Supper, in both of which the vital aspect of mystic union is expressed. Ἀντί is here used to express the idea of substitution, though ὑπέρ is more common in this sense in the Nt ( John 11:50) and in the earlier Greek ( Alcestis , for instance). It is a ransom instead of many.

A distinction needs to be made between the atoning death of Christ as a basis for reconciliation and the consummation of reconciliation in the individual case by the Holy Spirit’s work in the heart. The doctrine of the substitutionary atoning death of Jesus, with vital and mystic union of the believer with Him, is not a rabbinic and legal refinement of St. Paul. He simply echoes the words of the Master more at length, while true to the heart of the matter.

( e ) The request of the Greeks during the last week brought forth one of the deepest words of Jesus concerning the necessity of His death ( John 12:23-25). He gives, in fact, the philosophy of grace about His death, which is, in truth, the same as the law of nature. It is the law of self-giving. Thus the wheat grows, and thus will Jesus establish the kingdom. By His death the middle wall of partition between Jew and Gentile, and between both and God, will be broken down ( Ephesians 2:14-18). The agitation of Jesus on this occasion is surpassed only by that in the Garden of Gethsemane, and the cause is the same. In facing His death He shrinks from it, but instantly submits to the Father ( John 12:26 f.), and is comforted by the Father’s voice. To the multitude Jesus boldly announces that His lifting up (on the cross) will be the means of drawing all men (Gentile as well as Jew) to Him ( John 12:32). And it has been so. Jesus gloried in His own cross as the means of saving the lost world.

( f ) In the famous controversy with the Jewish rulers in the temple on the last Tuesday, Jesus identified Himself as the rejected Stone in the Messianic prophecy in  Psalms 118:22, and pronounced condemnation on those who collided with the rejected Stone ( Matthew 21:44). At every turn during these last days the death of Jesus is in the back ground of His words and deeds; especially is this true of the great eschatological discourse (Matthew 24 f.), as well as of the third lament over Jerusalem ( Matthew 23:37-39), and the previous defiance of His enemies ( Matthew 23:32).

( g ) It is on Tuesday night (beginning of Jewish Wednesday) that Jesus definitely foretells the time of His death ( Matthew 26:2). It will be at the feast of the Passover, which begins after two days. Strangely enough, on this very night the rulers were in conference, and had decided, owing to the popularity of Jesus with the multitude at the feast, as shown by the triumphal entry and the temple teaching, to postpone the effort to kill Him till after the feast ( Matthew 26:3-5). And so it would have been but for the treachery of one of Christ’s own disciples, who this very night, after the doleful announcement by Jesus of His near death, and after a stern rebuke for his covetous stinginess ( John 12:6 f.), went in disgust and showed the Sanhedrin how to seize Him during the feast ( Luke 22:6). But Jesus saw in the beautiful act of Mary a prophecy of His burial ( John 12:7).

( h ) Jesus is fully conscious that the Paschal meal which He is celebrating is His last, is, in fact, taking place on the very day of His death ( John 13:31-33;  John 13:38). The material is now so rich and full, as the great tragedy draws near, that it can only be alluded to briefly. He is eager to eat this meal before He suffers ( Luke 22:15 f.). He knows that now at last His hour has come ( John 13:1), and that He will conquer death ( John 13:3). The contentious spirit of the Twelve at such a time occasions the object-lesson in humility. Jesus points out the betrayer, who leaves the room; comforts the disciples, and warns them of their peril, though all fail to grasp the solemn fact or the moral greatness of the tragedy that is coming swiftly on them, actually producing two swords for a fight under the new policy of resistance now announced by Jesus ( Luke 22:36-38).

Pfleiderer ( Evolution and Theology , p. 179) seeks to reconstruct the whole story of Jesus’ attitude towards His death by the answer of Jesus, ‘It is enough.’ He forgets that this answer may be neither irony nor sober earnest, but rather an inability to make the disciples understand more about the matter before the time. It is chimerical for Pfleiderer to set up his view of this one passage against all the clear words of Jesus, and say that Jesus did not expect to die.

( i ) When Jesus introduces the Supper just after the Passover meal, He speaks a strong word about His death. He calls the cup of this new ordinance ‘my blood of the covenant’ ( Mark 14:24,  Matthew 26:28); and it is the ‘new’ covenant, i.e. of grace ( 1 Corinthians 11:25,  Luke 22:20). Not only so, but the blood of Jesus is shed for many ( Mark 14:24,  Matthew 26:28), as He had previously said ( Matthew 20:28,  Luke 18:31); and St. Matthew has the further clause ‘unto remission of sins’ ( Matthew 26:28).

H. Holtzmann ( Hand-Com., in loco ) would expunge this phrase, while Spitta ( Urchristentum , p. 266 ff.) demes that Jesus made any reference to His death on this occasion. Hollmaun admits that He spoke of His death, but rejects the liturgical observance commanded in  1 Corinthians 11:25 f. Bruce ( Kingdom of God , p. 247) bluntly calls all this ‘criticism carried to an extreme in the interest of a theory.’

There is just doubt as to the true text of  Luke 22:19 f., but this in no way affects any of the points above mentioned. Certainly expiation of sin by the shedding of His blood is the idea of Jesus here. The world had long been familiar with blood sacrifice, but the new thing in His vicarious sacrifice is that it has real efficacy and is not mere type and shadow. The blood is the life, and Jesus gave Himself, a sinless and free self, the representative Man and God’s own Son. The moral value of this voluntary and vicarious blood-offering comes from the worth of the spiritual self of Jesus. Jesus could see that this atoning sacrifice was in  Isaiah 53:10, but it was also inwrought in His very consciousness.

( j ) The very heart of Jesus is laid bare in John 14-17. The Master tries once more to prepare the Eleven for the tremendous fact of His death. Nothing in life or literature approaches the touch of Christ as He makes plain the awful truth of His separation, silences the doubt of Thomas, Philip, Judas, cheers them with the promise of another Paraclete, reminds them of their high dignity as His friends, exhorts them to courage against the world, and promises victory in spite of tribulation. In the prayer that follows, a halo is around the cross in the mind of Christ, for He asks for His glorification in death ( John 17:1;  John 17:5). He had already sanctified Himself to this mission ( John 17:17;  John 17:19), and now the hour is at hand.

( k ) And yet in Gethsemane Jesus Himself is ‘greatly amazed’ at His own agitation of spirit ( Mark 14:33). He needs the Father’s help, and for the moment has difficulty in finding Him fully, for Satan has renewed his temptation with fresh energy. For a moment Satan seemed indeed to triumph, but Jesus quickly surrendered to the Father’s will and won supreme mastery over Himself ( Mark 14:35 f.). But Ritschl is in error in saying that Jesus ‘is first of all a priest in His own behalf’ ( Justification and Reconciliation , p. 474). What broke the heart of Christ in Gethsemane was no thought of His own sin, but the sin of the world. Here in Gethsemane the heart of Jesus was touched to the quick by the essence of the redemptive sacrifice. The disciples gave Him no human sympathy, and Satan even sought to poison His heart toward the Father. The picture in Hebrews ( Hebrews 5:7-9) of the strong Son of God, having learned obedience through suffering, crying out to the Father for help, is the acme of soul agony. Jesus won the power to drink the cup, and in the dregs of the cup was the kiss of Judas. His hour has come at last, and His enemies take Him now only because He allows them. It is the hour and the power of darkness ( Luke 22:53). The hour and the power of light will come later. Once again He speaks of the necessity of His death that the Scriptures may be fulfilled ( Matthew 26:52-54).

( l ) In the trial it is a foregone conclusion that Jesus will be condemned, and on the cross He ‘sees what He foresaw.’ He knows that His public confession of His Messiahship means His death, but He asserts His ultimate triumph over His enemies ( Matthew 26:63 f.). He claims superiority over the world, and that He is now fulfilling His destiny ( John 18:36 f.). On the cross itself He practises the forgiveness of enemies which He had preached ( Luke 23:34), exercises saving power though dying ( Luke 23:43), is in some sense forsaken by the Father ( Mark 15:34), is conscious to the last of what He is performing ( John 19:28), and proclaims the completion of His Messianic work ( John 19:30) as He dies with submission to the Father ( Luke 23:46).

After the resurrection Jesus had a new standpoint from which to teach the disciples the significance of His death ( Luke 24:25-27;  Luke 24:32;  Luke 24:45). But it is not till they receive the new light from the Holy Spirit at Pentecost that the disciples fully appreciate the moral greatness of the death of Christ, and see the glory of the cross, with something of the dignity with which Jesus Himself went into the shadow.

Literature.—Schwartzkopff, Die Weissagungen Jesu Christi von seinem Tode, seiner Auferstehung und Wiederkunft (1895); Babut, La Pensée de Jesu sur la Mort (1897); Smeaton, Our Lord’s Doctrine of the Atonement (1871); Fairbairn, ‘Christ’s Attitude to His Own Death,’ Expositor (Oct. Dec. 1896; Jan. Feb. 1897); Denney, The Death of Christ (1902); Hollmaun, Die Bedeutung des Todes Jesu  ; Dale, The Atonement (1881); Ritschl, Justification and Reconciliation , (1900); Belser, Die Geschichte des Leidens und Sterbens, der Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt des Herrn (1903); Barth, Die Hauptprobleme des Lebens Jesu (1903); Baldensperger, Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu (1892); Schurer, Das Messianische Selbstbewusstsein (1903); Hoffmann, Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu nach den drei ersten Evangelien (1904); Appel, Die Selbstbezeichnung Jesu (1896); Bruce, Training of the Twelve , pp. 167 ff., 273 ff., 289 ff., 346 ff.

A. T. Robertson.