"At the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice: 'Eli, Eli! These words are rendered by St. Mark as "Eloi" instead of "Ili." This cry, of course, was not a cry of despair, but only an expression of the deepest sorrow of the soul of the God-Man. In order for the redemptive sacrifice to be accomplished, it was necessary that the God-Man should drink to the very bottom of the entire cup of human suffering. This required that the crucified Jesus should not feel the joy of His union with God the Father. All the wrath of God, which, by virtue of Divine truth, was to be poured out on sinful humanity, now seemed to be concentrated on Christ alone, and God seemed to have abandoned Him. Among the most grievous torments imaginable, physical and mental, this abandonment was the most painful, which is why this painful exclamation came out of the mouth of Jesus.

In Hebrew, "Elijah" was pronounced "Eliah." Therefore, the Lord's cry served as a new reason for mocking Him: "Behold, Elijah is calling." The sarcasm of this mockery was that before the coming of the Messiah, the Jews were waiting for the coming of Elijah. Mocking the Lord, they seemed to want to say: here He is even now, crucified and desecrated, still dreaming that He is the Messiah, and calling Elijah for His help. The first two Evangelists say that immediately one of the soldiers ran, took a sponge, filled it with vinegar and, putting it on a reed, gave him to drink. Obviously, it was a sour wine, which was the usual diet of Roman soldiers, especially in hot weather. According to St. John, the soldier put a sponge that absorbed the liquid on the cane, "hyssop", that is, the trunk of the plant bearing this name, since those hanging on the cross were quite high from the ground, and they could not simply be offered drink. The crucifixion produced an incredibly strong, painful thirst in the sufferers, and St. John reports that the Lord apparently said before this: "I thirst" (19:28-30), adding: "That the Scripture may be fulfilled." The Psalmist in 68 Ps. v. 22, depicting the suffering of the Messiah, actually predicted this: "And in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink." Having tasted the vinegar, according to the testimony of St. John, the Lord exclaimed: "It is finished!" that is: the work predestined in the Council of God has been accomplished — the redemption of the human race and its reconciliation with God through the death of the Messiah (John 19:30).

According to St. Luke, after this the Lord exclaimed: "Father! Into Thy hands I commend my spirit" (Luke 23:46), "and bowing my head, I gave up my spirit" (John 19:30). All three of the first Evangelists testify that at this moment of Jesus' death, "the veil of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom," that is, the veil that separated the sanctuary in the temple from the Holy of Holies was torn in two by itself. Since it was the time of the evening sacrifice – about 3 p.m. our time – it is obvious that another priest was a witness to this miraculous self-tearing of the veil.

This symbolized the termination of the Old Testament and the opening of the New Testament, which opened the entrance to the Kingdom of Heaven that had been closed to people until then. "The earth shook" – a strong earthquake occurred, as a sign of God's wrath on those who put to death His Beloved Son. From this earthquake "the stones were disintegrated," that is, the rocks were scattered, and the burial caves made in them were opened. As a sign of the Lord's victory over death — "many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were resurrected" — the bodies of the dead buried in these caves were resurrected, which on the third day, after the Lord's resurrection, appeared in Jerusalem to people who knew them.

All three Evangelists testify that these miraculous signs, which accompanied the death of the Lord, produced such a strong, shocking effect on the Roman centurion, that he said, according to the first two Evangelists: "Truly He was the Son of God!" and according to St. Luke: "Truly this man was a righteous man!"

According to the testimony of St. Luke, all the people gathered at Golgotha were also shocked: "He returned, beating his breast" – such abrupt transitions from one mood to another are natural in an excited crowd. All three Evangelists indicate that the witnesses of the Lord's death and the events that took place during it were "all who knew Him, and the women who followed Him from Galilee, who stood afar off and looked on," and among them, as St. Matthew and Mark list them by name, were: Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Josiah, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee, Salome.

What happened after the death of Jesus and before His burial is narrated only by St. John, who, as he immediately asserts, was himself a witness to all this, supplementing the first three Evangelists, as he always did. Since it was Friday, in Greek "paraskevi," which means "preparation," that is, "the day before the Sabbath," and that Sabbath was a "great day," since it coincided with the first day of the Passover, then, in order not to leave the bodies of those crucified on the crosses on this "great day," the Jews, that is, the enemies of the Lord, or the members of the Sanhedrin, asked Pilate to "break their legs," and having thus killed them, "they will take," that is, they will take it off and bury it before the evening, when it was already necessary to eat Pascha. According to the cruel Roman custom, the crucified, in order to hasten their death, broke their legs, that is, crushed their legs. Having received this permission from Pilate, the soldiers broke the legs of the robbers who were crucified with Jesus, who were still alive. "But when they came to Jesus, when they saw Him already dead, they did not break His legs; but one of the soldiers pierced His side with a spear, and immediately blood and water flowed out" (John 19:33-34; 1 John 5:8).

Negative criticism has been very much concerned with the question whether blood and water could flow from the dead body of Jesus, and have argued that this is impossible, since blood cannot flow from a dead frozen body, because it remains in a liquid state in a dead body for a very short time, not more than an hour, and that the separation of the watery liquid begins only with the onset of decomposition, and even in some diseases. as, for example, in typhoid fever, fever, etc. All these arguments are unfounded. After all, we do not know all the details of the Lord's crucifixion and death, and therefore we cannot judge these details. But it is a well-known fact that the crucified are in a feverish state. And the piercing of the rib itself undoubtedly took place very soon after death, and in any case not more than an hour later, for evening was coming, and the Jews were in a hurry to finish their evil deed. In addition, there is no need to consider this outflow of blood and water as a natural phenomenon. St. John himself, who emphasizes it in his Gospel, apparently notes it as a miraculous phenomenon ("And he who saw testified, and his testimony is true" – 19:35). The purest Body of the God-Man could not have been subjected to the usual law of decomposition of the human body, but probably from the very moment of death began to enter into that state which ended with His resurrection in a new, glorified, spiritualized form. Symbolically, this is the outflow of blood and water of Sts. The Fathers explain, as a sign of the mysterious way of uniting the faithful with Christ in the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist: "By water we are born, but by blood and body we are nourished" (Bl. Theophylact and St. Chrysostom). St. John, who stood by the cross and saw all this, testifies both that he speaks the truth, and that he himself is not deceived when he affirms this: "And truly is his testimony" (John 19:35).

The outpouring of water and blood from Christ's pierced side is a sign that Christ has become our Redeemer, having cleansed us with water in the sacrament of Baptism and with His Blood, which He will give us to drink in the sacrament of Communion. That is why the same Ap. John in his 1st Conciliar Epistle says: "This is Jesus Christ, who came by water and blood and by the Spirit, not only by water, but by water and blood; and the Spirit bears witness to Him, because the Spirit is truth. For three bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. And three bear witness on the earth: the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three are one" (1 John 5:6-8).

"For this happened," that is, not only the piercing of the rib, but also the fact that the Lord's legs were not broken, "that the Scripture may be fulfilled: let not His bone be broken." This was foretold in Book II. Exodus 12:46: The Passover lamb who transformed the Lord Jesus Christ was to be eaten without breaking the bones, and everything that remained was to be given over to the fire. "Also in another place the Scripture predicts: They will look upon Him Whom they have pierced" — this is borrowed from Book II. Zechariah 12:10. In this passage, Jehovah in the person of the Messiah is represented as having been pierced by his people, and this same people, when they look at the pierced one, is represented as bringing repentance before Him with weeping and weeping. These words were gradually fulfilled in the Jews, by whom the Lord was put to death, and will be fulfilled until the end of the world, before which the universal conversion of the Jews to Christ will take place, as St. Paul predicts. Paul in Romans 11:25-26.

The Burial of the Lord Jesus Christ

(Matt. 27:57-66; Mark 15:42-47; Luke 23:50-56; John 19:38-42).

All four Evangelists tell about the burial of the Lord in complete agreement, and each gives his own details. The burial took place at nightfall, but Saturday had not yet come, although it was approaching, that is, it must have been an hour or two before sunset, from which Saturday had already begun. This is clearly indicated by all four Evangelists: Matt. 27:57, Mark. 15:42, Luke. 23:54 and John. 19:42, and St. Mark and Luke especially emphasize. Joseph came from Arimathea, a Jewish city near Jerusalem, a member of the Sanhedrin, as St. Mark testifies, a pious man, a secret disciple of Christ, according to the testimony of St. John, who did not participate in the condemnation of the Lord (Luke 23:51). Coming to Pilate, he asked him for the body of Jesus for burial. According to the custom of the Romans, the bodies of the crucified remained on the crosses and became the prey of birds, but it was possible, with the permission of the authorities, to bury them. Pilate expressed surprise that Jesus had already died, since the crucified were sometimes hanging for several days, but after checking through the centurion, who certified the death of Jesus, he ordered the body to be handed over to Joseph. According to the narration of St. John, Nicodemus also came, who had previously come to Jesus at night (see John 3), who brought a mixture of myrrh and scarlet about 100 pounds. Joseph bought the shroud, a long and valuable cloth. They took down the body, anointed it, according to custom, with incense, wrapped it in a shroud and laid it in a new burial cave in the garden of Joseph, located not far from Golgotha. As the sun was already sinking towards the west, everything was done, though diligently, but very hastily. Having rolled the stone to the door of the sepulchre, they departed. All this was watched by women who had previously stood on Golgotha.

St. Chrysostom, and after him and Bl. According to St. Theophylact, "Mary, James and Josiah's mother" mentioned by the Evangelists is the Most Holy Mother of God, "since James and Josiah were the children of Joseph by his first wife. And since the Mother of God was called the wife of Joseph, she was rightly called the mother, that is, the stepmother of his children." However, others are of the opinion that it was Mary, the wife of Cleopas, a cousin of the Mother of God. All of them sat opposite the entrance to the cave, as St. Matthew testifies (27:61), and then, according to the testimony of St. Luke, they returned, prepared incense and ointments, so that at the end of the Sabbath day of rest they would come and anoint the Body of the Lord, according to the Jewish custom (Luke 23:56). According to the story of St. Mark, these women, called "myrrh-bearers," bought the fragrances not on the very day of the Lord's burial, but after the Sabbath, that is, on Saturday evening. You can't see a contradiction here. On Friday evening, there was obviously very little time left before sunset. Partially, what they managed to cook, they cooked on Friday, and what they did not have time, they finished on Saturday evening.