St. Rights. John of Kronstadt

In the Book of Numbers11, the four-pointed cross was prefigured by (a) Moses' striking with a rod on a stone, which consequently poured out water for the thirsty people of Israel in the wilderness. Bl. Augustine says: "Moses struck [the stone] twice, because there are two trees in the cross."12 Severian of Gabala, in his fourth homily on the cross, says: "Moses struck the stone twice. Why twice? If he obeys the power of God, then what is the need for a second blow? And if it strikes without the assistance of the power of God, then neither the second, nor the tenth, nor the hundredth blow will be able to make barren nature fruitful. Thus, truly, if this action was purely divine and not mysterious, one blow, one wave, one word was enough. But two blows were made in order to prescribe the image of the cross. It is said that Moses struck twice, not in the same way, but in the form of a cross, so that even inanimate nature might revere the sign of the cross."

b) The brazen serpent hung by Moses in the wilderness on a banner. The Saviour Himself speaks of this foreshadowing: "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness..." (John 3:14). Severian of Gabala asks: "How did the image of the accursed animal bring health to a people who were in misfortune and struggling with disease? Would it not be more likely if he [Moses] had said thus: "If any of you be bitten, let him look to heaven or to the tabernacle of God, and receive salvation." But, considering this to be less, he placed only the image of the cross."13

In the Book of Judges, the four-pointed cross was foreshadowed by Samson, who clasped the pillars in the Philistine temple with both hands.14 "Note here too," says Blazh. Augustine, the image of the cross, since he stretched out both hands to the two columns, stretched them out as if to the two trees of the cross, but he killed the opponents by crushing them; likewise, His [the Lord's] sufferings became the cause of death for the persecutors."15 In the Book of Kings, the foreshadowing of the Life-Giving Cross was, as noted by Sts. the logs that the widow of Zarephath gathered to bake bread on them.16 Bl. Augustine says: "Here the sign of the cross is depicted not only by the tree, but even by the number of trees."17 In another place he says: "This widow had nothing left to her, and that was finished, and with her children she had to die. So she went out to gather two logs to bake bread for herself, and then Elijah saw her; then the man of God saw her, when she was looking for two logs. This woman foreshadowed the Church, and since the cross is made of two trees, she, threatened with death, sought that by which she could always exist."18

Thus, the prefigurations of the Holy Cross in the Old Testament had a likeness of a four-pointed cross, and by no means an eight-pointed one; therefore, the Life-Giving Tree itself must be four-pointed.

Turning from the images and the canopy to the thing itself, we really find that the Cross of our Saviour was in its form exactly the same as it was foretended, i.e. four-pointed. The crosses of the Romans, which alone were used during the earthly life of our Lord Jesus Christ for the execution of the cross, were predominantly four-pointed. Various material monuments and images of the Holy Cross, which have survived in one way or another from the first ten and subsequent centuries to the seventeenth century, when for the first time our so-called Old Believers made the titla and the pedestal essential accessories of the cross, irrefutably confirm that the appearance of the instrument of Christ's death was four-pointed. Thus, with God's help, let us begin to speak about the form of the holy cross and, first of all, about the material cross.

A. On the Material Cross

A) On the form of the original Cross, the First Life-giving, in fact, the Lord's. Having laid down His life for the life of the world, our Saviour accepted suffering and death from the representatives of this sinful, depraved, evil world – the Romans – the possessors of light, to whom the Jews betrayed Him. In Rome at that time the most cruel and painful punishment was in use – the crucifixion,19 which passed there along with the manners and customs of the peoples it conquered. The Jews themselves, whose malice had lifted up the Messiah to the tree, did not have the crucifixion: for some crimes, the law commanded that criminals should be hanged on a tree, but they were not nailed, and the corpses had to be taken down for burial at nightfall.20 From the Gospel history it is evident that Jesus Christ, through the malice of the Jewish Sanhedrin, was presented to Pilate's praetorium as a disturber of public peace and a villain,21 and the Roman governor, who had the weakness to yield to the frantic cries of the chief priests, scribes, and people to crucify Jesus, handed Him over to them, so that He might be crucified, of course, on such a cross as the Roman laws usually executed criminals. And the very circumstances of the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ show that He was crucified precisely on the cross, which was in use among the Romans at that time, with the customs that they had at that time. These are the circumstances of the crucifixion of criminals among the Romans. For the most part, the crucifixion was preceded by scourging,22 and our Lord suffered the same thing before the crucifixion: "But Jesus was beaten," it is said of Pilate, "I will deliver him up to them, that they may crucify him".23 For this reason, St. Matthew the Evangelist uses the very word that expresses this action – scourging – (????????????, (Latin fragellare – to scourge). Crucifiers were soldiers who carried out all the executions of the Romans.24 The criminal himself had to carry his cross to the place of execution, being subjected to ridicule and beatings25; the cross was placed first,26 and then the criminal was nailed to it – hence the expression: to be lifted up, lifted up on the cross.27 which became the property of the soldiers.29 There was no burial for criminals who had already been crucified.30 Sometimes, however, relatives were allowed to bury them.31 In case of need (at the onset of a feast, celebration, etc.), the life of the crucified could be shortened by breaking their legs, as well as by smoke and heat from brushwood burning under the cross,32 and finally, by a blow to the head or heart.

Comparing these circumstances of the crucifixion with what is said in the Gospel story about the crucifixion of the Saviour, together with the preceding and subsequent circumstances, we find that almost all of them were repeated over the Divine Sufferer; The Lord was scourged and crucified by Roman soldiers. He Himself carried His Cross to Golgotha, and, of course, He was exhausted, according to custom, by a great deal of ridicule; they took off all His clothes before His ascension to the cross, and since the clothes were very good and valuable, the soldiers cast lots to see who would take which of them; in Jesus Christ, because of the coming of the feast of the Passover, they wanted to break the legs, but since they found Him already dead, they left His bones in peace, and they broke them in the case of the evildoers crucified with Him. That the Saviour, before being led to the shame of execution, was indeed scourged, although this seems to us to be something new, which our ears, which are so well acquainted with all expressions concerning both the preceding and subsequent circumstances that accompanied the Passion of Christ, are not accustomed to comprehend, as we have noted above, is the very word of the Evangelist John – ??????????, from the Latin fragellum – scourge.

From all that has gone before, there is no doubt that our Lord was crucified by Roman soldiers on the Roman cross. What kind of cross did the Romans use to crucify criminals? In answering this question, we will enter, in accordance with the needs of our so-called Old Believers, into a detailed discussion of the type and composition of the cross, as well as of the kind of tree from which it was made, and, finally, of the fate of this tree after the removal of the Divine dead man from it.

The Romans mainly used crosses of three types:

a) A three-pointed cross like the letter T (tav)33. Its base was a straight pole or plank, about fifteen feet long, anchored in the ground; At the very top of it, for nailing the hands, a crossbeam34 was made, seven or eight feet long35.

b) A cross with a protruding straight end over the diameter visible in the letter tav, which made this end, according to Justin the Martyr, resemble a horn.36