It was not physical pain, nor mental anguish alone, that caused Him to suffer such torture as to produce an extrusion of blood from every pore; but a spiritual agony of soul such as only God was capable of experiencing. No other man, however great his powers of physical or mental endurance, could have suffered so; for his human organism would have succumbed, and syncope would have produced unconsciousness and welcome oblivion.
In some manner, actual and terribly real though to man incomprehensible, the Savior took upon Himself the burden of the sins of mankind from Adam to the end of the world.
Modern revelation assists us to a partial understanding of the awful experience. From the terrible conflict in Gethsemane, Christ emerged a victor. The further tragedy of the night, and the cruel inflictions that awaited Him on the morrow, to culminate in the frightful tortures of the cross, could not exceed the bitter anguish through which He had successfully passed. It is probable that the determination to make the arrest that night was reached when Judas reported that Jesus was within the city walls and might easily be apprehended.
The Jewish rulers assembled a body of temple guardsmen or police, and obtained a band of Roman soldiers under command of a tribune; this band or cohort was probably a detachment from the garrison of Antonia commissioned for the work of the night on requisition of the chief priests.
They were equipped with lanterns, torches, and weapons. While Jesus was yet speaking to the Eleven whom He had roused from slumber with the announcement that the betrayer was at hand, Judas and the multitude approached. The armed band hesitated, though their guide had given the signal agreed upon.
The man thus wounded was Malchus, a servant of the high priest. But how then shall the scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it must be? I sat daily with you teaching in the temple, and ye laid no hold on me. But all this was done, that the scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled.
Every one of them forsook Him, even as He had foretold. That they were really in jeopardy is shown by an incident preserved by Mark alone.
An unnamed young man, aroused from sleep by the tumult of the marching band, had sallied forth with no outer covering but a linen sheet.
His interest in the arrest of Jesus and his close approach caused some of the guardsmen or soldiers to seize him; but he broke loose and escaped leaving the sheet in their hands. The Day of the Passover Feast. That He was crucified on Friday, the day before the Jewish Sabbath, and that He rose a resurrected Being on Sunday, the day following the Sabbath of the Jews, are facts attested by the four Gospel-writers.
From the three synoptists we infer that the last supper occurred on the evening of the first day of unleavened bread, and therefore at the beginning of the Jewish Friday. Much has been written by way of attempt to explain this seeming discrepancy.
Suffice it here to say that the apparent inconsistency may be explained by any of several assumptions. Thus, first, and very probably, the Passover referred to by John, for the eating of which the priests were desirous of keeping themselves free from Levitical defilement, may not have been the supper at which the paschal lamb was eaten, but the supplementary meal, the Chagigah.
This later meal, the flesh part of which was designated as a sacrifice, had come to be regarded with veneration equal to that attaching to the paschal supper. Secondly; it is held by many authorities on Jewish antiquities that before, at, and after the time of Christ, two nights were devoted yearly to the paschal observance, during either of which the lamb might be eaten, and that this extension of time had been made in consideration of the increased population, which necessitated the ceremonial slaughtering of more lambs than could be slain on a single day; and in this connection it is interesting to note that Josephus Wars, vi, ch.
In the same paragraph, Josephus states that the lambs had to be slain between the ninth and the eleventh hour 3 to 5 p. According to this explanation, Jesus and the Twelve may have partaken of the passover meal on the first of the two evenings, and the Jews who next day feared defilement may have deferred their observance until the second.
Some authorities assert that an error of one day had crept into the Jewish reckoning of time, and that Jesus ate the Passover on the true date, while the Jews were a day behind. At best, only inference, not conclusion, is possible. Luke records the prediction of treachery as following the administering of the sacramental bread and wine. John —5 states that the washing of feet occurred when supper was ended, and gives us good reason for inferring that Judas was washed with the rest verses 10, 11 , and that he later verses 26—30 went out into the night for the purpose of betraying Jesus.
To many it has appeared plausible, that because of his utter baseness Judas would not be permitted to participate with the other apostles in the holy ordinance of the Sacrament; others infer that he was allowed to partake, as a possible means of moving him to abandon his evil purpose even at that late hour, or of filling his cup of iniquity to overflowing.
Washing of Feet. John refers to the spot as a garden, from which designation we may regard it as an enclosed space of private ownership. That it was a place frequented by Jesus when He sought retirement for prayer, or opportunity for confidential converse with the disciples, is indicated by the same writer John , 2.
The Bloody Sweat. Many critical expositors deny that there was an actual extrusion of blood, on the grounds that the evangelist does not positively affirm it, and that the three apostles, who were the only human witnesses, could not have distinguished blood from sweat falling in drops, as they watched from a distance in the night, even if the moon, which at the passover season was full, had been unobscured. Modern scripture removes all doubt.
See further a specific prediction of the bloody sweat, Mosiah The Cup as a Symbol. See Psalm ; ; Isaiah , 22 ; Jeremiah , 17 ; In contrast, the opposite meaning is attached to the use of the term in some passages, e. Psalm ; ; ; Jeremiah Jesus the Christ. Chapter 2: Preexistence and Foreordination of the Christ. Chapter Continuation of the Perean and Judean Ministry.
Chapter The Last Supper and the Betrayal. The Bible offers differing accounts of Judas's death. The Gospel of Matthew describes him hanging himself after realizing the depths of his betrayal.
The Book of Acts, on the other hand, describes his death more like a spontaneous combustion. The historical tendency to identify Judas with anti-Semitic stereotypes led, after the horrors of the Holocaust, to a reconsideration of this key Biblical figure, and something of a rehabilitation of his image. Professor William Klassen, a Canadian biblical scholar, argued in a biography of Judas that many of the details of his treachery were invented or exaggerated by early Christian church leaders, especially as the church began to move away from Judaism.
First alluded to in writing by the second-century cleric Irenaeus, the Gospel of Judas is one of many ancient texts discovered in recent decades that have been linked to the Gnostics, a mostly Christian group who were denounced as heretics by early church leaders for their unorthodox spiritual beliefs.
In this version of events, Jesus asked Judas to betray him to the authorities, so that he could be freed from his physical body and fulfill his destiny of saving humanity. An ancient Coptic manuscript dating from the third or fourth century, containing the only known surviving copy of the Gospel of Judas.
Without Judas, you don't have the central component of Christianity—you don't have the Resurrection. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Article download …. Download PDF. Download RTF editable. Send via email. Share on Facebook. Share on Twitter. From: Words of Truth: Volume N1. Few will deny that the descent of the Holy Ghost Acts 2 was the commencement of the Church of God, builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
Most will admit that 1 Cor.
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