Thoughts On Good Friday And Crucifixion

As I wrote earlier, today is Good Friday, which recalls the death of Jesus on a cross.  In past years, I would be traveling to Virginia to visit my parents for Easter weekend.  But as regular readers know, my parents are no longer here, so I no longer have my main reason for making the trip.  I have siblings in the same general area, but I can see them at various other times.  This means that for the first time in decades, I will not be traveling for Easter.

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One subject related to Good Friday that I've been wanting to address is the so-called "swoon theory", which is the idea that Jesus did not really die on the cross, but instead merely passed out or "swooned".  Since I don't believe this theory, I thought that it might be the subject of a "things I don't believe" post.  For some time, I thought that refuting the swoon theory would be easy.  According to a common but not universally accepted idea, a person nailed to a cross would have a very difficult time breathing due to his weight being supported by his arms which were extended out to his sides.  In order to breath, so the notion goes, the victim would have to straighten his legs a little, shifting his weight onto them and to some degree away from his arms.  This would explain why the Roman soldiers broke the legs of the two thieves crucified with Jesus, so as to hasten their deaths.  Since shifting your weight onto your legs to purportedly enable yourself to breath can only be done if you're conscious, if you swooned, you'd die anyway.

There are some problems with this idea.  While he was on the cross, Jesus said "I thirst" (John 19:28), "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46 and Mark 15:34) and "It is finished" (John 19:30).  In order to say all this, he had to still be able to breathe, even after six hours on the cross.  The actual cause of death, as noted in the Wiki article I linked early today, could be a variety of medical conditions, such blood loss (which may be increased by the breaking of the legs), asphyxiation, or pulmonary embolism.

While my initial reason for disbelieving the swoon theory is doubtful, there are some other reasons why the idea that Jesus merely fainted and survived his crucifixion is extremely unlikely if not impossible.  For one thing, Roman executioners could face death themselves if they allowed a condemned prisoner to survive.  When they decided not to break Jesus's legs, they had to be sure that he was dead, and fully knew the consequences of being wrong.  One of the soldiers pierced Jesus's side with a spear, which would have killed him if he were not already dead.  Since both water and blood flowed out of the resulting wound, the pericardium, which surrounds the heart, would have been pierced.  I think it's also worth noting that Jesus had been beaten, scourged, and crowned with thorns before carrying the crosspiece up to Calvary.  During this walk, he fell and had to be assisted by Simon of Cyrene, who was compelled to do so by the Romans (Matthew 27:31-33).  In other words, he had already endured a significant amount of physical torture even before he was nailed to the cross.

For some more detailed explanations, go to Compelling Truth, God On The Net and Thinking Matters.

There is also a theological reason why the swoon theory is impossible.  In order to accomplish his mission and atone for the sins of mankind, he had to die.  Not faint or pass out, but die.  He took our sins upon himself, and the wages of sin is death and nothing less.  This, of course, is not a matter of physical or medical evidence, but an article of faith.

May everyone out there have a safe Good Friday and a happy Easter weekend.