NOTES for Luk 23:1-34

When the matter concerns murder, whether open or "legal," one often has to deal not only with active murderers, but also with murderers who are, so to speak, passive. With those who did not much want to kill, but... it happened that they killed. They took part. As if incidentally, to one degree or another. And such a participant can sometimes think that he had nothing to do with it, even up to the day of Judgment, when self-deception will no longer work.

This always happens in more or less the same way: by evading responsibility. Pilate and Herod evade it in just this way. Neither of them wants to confirm a death sentence. Pilate is uneasy - he understands that this Man whom they want to execute is innocent. Herod is afraid - who knows how the execution of a Man whom the people consider a great prophet will echo among the people... In the end, Pilate still has to make the decision. But he and Herod understand each other so well that they become friends: both are what one calls real politicians; both do not want problems; both think only about their own power, even though the scale of that power is not comparable. And neither wants to answer for anything. In any case, for anything unpleasant or delicate.

Herod shifts everything onto Pilate, and Pilate onto the crowd shouting, "Crucify Him!" This is very convenient - the voice of the people, nothing can be done... and besides, another option was even proposed: to release one of the condemned. But the people are against it; they want Jesus' execution. Everything is logical, if not for one "but": the choice of whom to execute and whom to release was Pilate's prerogative and his alone. But if one does not want to make a decision, if responsibility is a burden, then let the people decide. In truth, there was no people in that square. There was a crowd - a form and way of being of a people that also does not want to answer for anything. There each person is "like everyone else," and "everyone" is "as one." That very "one" who answers for nothing and is easy to manipulate because deep down, and sometimes on the surface, he would like to be manipulated. Then everything can be blamed on the manipulators - and he himself can again evade responsibility.

That is how the cross was prepared for the Messiah - not in infernal depths, but in a mixture of irresponsibility, petty fears, and "great" interests. In a shallow but murky pool, where, as everyone knows, devils have plenty of room.

Very recently we saw that Christ does not object to paying taxes to Caesar, but now false witnesses accuse Him precisely of forbidding people to pay the tax. The accusers themselves are by no means admirers of Roman power; they call a crime, and attribute to Christ, deeds they themselves would gladly have committed. Extremes, as often happens, meet, and those who present themselves as patriots and zealots for the faith of their fathers are ready to hand an inconvenient compatriot over to pagan occupiers for execution.

According to the evangelist's testimony, Pilate and Herod became friends with each other that day. It is strange to hear of friendship between rulers accustomed to being guided by principles other than personal sympathies. Just as strange is a friendship born in the commission of a crime. But perhaps even in their reconciliation the beneficial action of Jesus was felt? After all, the hostility of rulers affects their subjects through bloodshed and deprivation...

Pilate acts according to the "will of the people." That alone would have been enough for Christians to avoid using the pagan saying, "The voice of the people is the voice of God." Sadly, they do not avoid it, and to this day every superstition and false idea insists on its truth by appealing to the large number of those who share it. Those who see the truth often have to defend it while in the minority. But there is no need to fear this; Truth itself, knowing what it is to be in the minority, is our support.

Many people have no doubt heard this story. The remarkable actress Faina Georgievna Ranevskaya is walking through the theater, sees several young actresses whispering among themselves, and asks them: "Whom are we being friends against, girls?"

It is characteristic of us human beings, is it not, to be friends "against someone." One only has to find a common enemy. In Gospel times we see a similar plot. Pilate and Herod were enemies because each wanted undivided rule over Judea: one as the authorized representative of the emperor of Rome, the other as a representative of the Hasmonean dynasty. Let us note that from the point of view of the Law of Moses, both were illegitimate rulers.

And suddenly there appears the One who is called the Messiah, the King of the Jews, the Anointed One of God. Both Pilate and Herod have the opportunity to acknowledge Christ, and not even from hearsay, but in a personal meeting. Yet both prefer to reject Him, to regard Jesus as an "enemy," and in this to find a common interest.

In the history of the Church it has happened more than once that political interests led to the strangest alliances. Of course, they did not last long, for what is not from God falls apart.

Death for a human being is an unnatural event. And for every human being in any condition - even after the fall, and even for the last sinner. Because humanity was originally conceived as something deeply unique. Unique not as a species, since every living creature as a species is completely unrepeatable, but as a person. That is why death turns out to be something utterly unnatural for a human being. With animals, even the most highly organized, everything is different. An animal is not a person; it is only an expression and embodiment of its genus, species, subspecies - of what in the biblical Poem of creation is named by a Hebrew word that could be translated as "type" or "variety." The death of an individual animal changes nothing fundamental in the existence of the genus, species, or subspecies to which it belongs; the main thing is the preservation of the species as a whole.

It is not so with the human being. Here every concrete person matters. And that person's importance increases as the fullness of humanity grows. From the biblical point of view, humanity is above all likeness to God. If one could imagine a person who had completely lost the image of God - not figuratively, as people sometimes say of something similar with regard to those who have fallen very low, but literally - such a person would mean no more in God's eyes than any animal. But such a thing, thankfully, does not happen: when applied to a human being, the loss of the image of God is always only a figure of speech and never a statement of actual fact. In that case death inevitably becomes the destruction of the personal uniqueness and unrepeatability that a human being possesses as the image of God. It is no accident that in all times and among all peoples death has been viewed as an evil and an anomaly, as something that cannot define the human path completely. From this come all teachings about the afterlife, about the immortality of the soul, about death's inability and lack of right to gain full power over a person.

In Yahwism, and therefore in Judaism, there is no teaching about the afterlife, but there is the idea of universal resurrection. Yahwism and Judaism await the complete victory of the God of life over death. And yet the One who brought into the world the fullness of the life of the Kingdom passes through death. Not some imaginary or illusory death, but a fully real one. As full and absolute for Him as His life is full and absolute. For the God-man always exists in absolute reality, whether the reality of life or the reality of death. The absence of life is experienced by Him in the same fullness as its presence. And if the fullness of His life is the Kingdom, then the fullness of His death is Sheol, what in Greek is called Hades, hell, that complete absence of life, its underside, its inversion, which in fact stands opposed to the Kingdom. Into such a hell the Savior descends as He dies.

But with God only life in all its fullness is absolute. Death for Him cannot be not only absolute; it cannot even be a reality for Him. It is real only for the world separated from God, the world in which the Messiah's earthly ministry took place. And therefore Resurrection inevitably follows death - as the triumph of the fullness of God's life over that which by definition cannot triumph. Jesus knows of this triumph, but His knowledge does not make temporary death in a world separated from God any less real for Him. The disciples do not know of it - and despair seizes them. Meanwhile, the day of Resurrection is drawing near.

Unlike the other evangelists, Luke, in his description of the crucifixion and death of Jesus, places the main emphasis not on His suffering, but on God's mercy and forgiveness. Luke does not describe Jesus' agony and death pangs, His thirst, His despair, or His being abandoned by God. His last words are a traditional Jewish prayer before sleep. His final actions are a prayer for the forgiveness of His executioners and a promise of paradise to the robber who showed even a drop of humanity. In His answer to the weeping women, He shifts the emphasis from pity for Him to compassion for the people who await grief and trials.

The Crucifixion is one of the central themes of the Gospel, of Christian teaching, and of prayer. And in this image of the suffering Son of God we must learn to see the image of His boundless mercy, forgiveness, and trust. Then our contemplation of the Cross will become for us as well a source of strength to love and forgive.

What caused Peter's betrayal? Apostasy? Fear? Hardly: after all, only recently he had promised Jesus that he would die with Him if necessary. Peter was certainly a passionate and decisive man, but he was far from a boy who would throw words around and make careless promises. And he was certainly not cowardly; everything we know about him from the Gospel accounts testifies to that. Then what was it? Perhaps the suddenness and paradox of everything that was happening? Peter had certainly promised to be with Jesus to the end, as had all His other disciples. But what were they expecting? Jesus had more than once told them about His coming suffering and death, as well as His resurrection. But the apostles, it appears, never fully understood Him; everything became more or less clear to them only after the Resurrection, and finally clear, it seems, only after Pentecost. Even on the day of the Ascension they expected that now, at last, their Teacher would restore the "kingdom of Israel" and become the "real Messiah," the King whom many were expecting then. And at that time, during and immediately after the Last Supper, they seem to have been absolutely sure that the uprising was about to begin, that their Teacher would of course be in mortal danger, and that they were ready to stay with Him to the end, whatever happened. And suddenly there is no uprising; their Teacher surrenders without resistance; everything is over, completely and disastrously over. What should they do next? It is no surprise that everyone runs away. If everything ended before it began, then what is there to remain faithful to? To a Teacher who, as it seemed, had renounced all His plans? Only Peter had enough resolve for that; he stayed to see what would happen to Jesus next. And suddenly: but you were with Him! From one side, from another, from a third... And now for Peter: whether I was or was not, what difference does it make? What does it matter now, when everything is over? "I was not! I know nothing and no one; leave me alone!" That was the first and entirely natural reaction. And immediately, like lightning, a flash lit up his consciousness: I betrayed Him! I denied Him! This is what He warned me about! And at once came deep, burning repentance. Repentance that restores hope.