November 19, 2023
Majoring On The Minors
(Some information may be too graphic for small children)
“Then the Jews, because it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies would not remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a high day), asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.” John 19:31 (NASB)
Every time you ride on the highway you are bound to see a dead animal on the side of the road. Every time I see one, I kind of feel sorry for them. One day while riding from my house to church, I noticed a small baby deer lying on the side of the road dead. He had been hit by a car. As the cars passed by, I wondered if anyone thought the same thing. He lived a short time and died not very long after. In the Jews’ case, they weren’t trying to save a person the pain and agony by speeding their death up more quickly, but they were more concerned about their law when they had committed an atrocity against the Son of God. They used the excuses of the holy day arriving, and the opinion that the land might be desecrated if they remained on the crosses.
“Then the Jews, because it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies would not remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a high day.” MacArthur says, “It was getting late in the afternoon on the day of preparation (for the Sabbath; i.e., Friday). They were concerned that the bodies of Jesus and the two robbers not remain on the cross on the Sabbath, which began at sundown. The Romans usually left the bodies of crucified individuals to rot, or be eaten by scavenging birds or animals. That particular Sabbath was a high day (because it was the Sabbath of Passover week), heightening the Jewish leaders’ concern, which evidently stemmed from Deuteronomy 21:22-23. To leave the bodies exposed on the crosses would, in their minds, defile the land. Nothing more clearly illustrates the extreme hypocrisy to which their pernicious legalism had driven them. They were zealous to observe the minutiae of the law while at the same time killing the One who both authored and fulfilled it; they were scrupulously concerned that the land not be defiled, but were unconcerned about their own defilement from murdering the Son of God.”[1] As said before, those who were crucified sometimes endured for days. With the sundown coming, the Jews wanted to make sure that all were dead before bringing them down from the crosses. So they, “asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.” This gruesome act was completed with an iron mallet. “In the only known archeological find of a crucifixion, which came to light in 1968, the skeletal remains revealed that the lower legs had been shattered by a single blow.”[2] Without the strength of the legs to support the weight of the body, the arms would tire trying to hold the body upright. Over time, the arms would give out, and without support from the legs, the victim would soon suffocate.
We are not animals like the baby deer on the road. We are the pinnacle of Creation. We are God’s highest creation. When the Jews spoke to Pilate again, he had no idea Jesus was already dead. They wanted to speed the process up once again for their motives.
[1] (John MacArthur, 2006). 363.
[2] Blum, E. A. (1985). In J. F. Walvoord & R. B. Zuck (Eds.), The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures (Vol. 2, p. 340). Victor Books.