CROSSING THE BARRIER

Strange darkness, seems to have pervaded the world at this hour. It is a strange darkness as it was only three in the afternoon. Phlegon wrote that this darkness surpassed anything that had ever been seen. At mid-day the stars could be seen. At the same time, an earthquake caused much damage.  It was felt on Golgotha by the Jews who wanted to witness the death of the criminal Jesus, it was felt by the Romans on guard, and by the few friends of Jesus and His mother.

This same earthquake went down the Valley of Chedron, it passed the cemetery, it entered Jerusalem right through the Temple and into the Holy of Holies ... and the famous huge curtain was torn from the top downward. It then ended into the Dead Sea. Tertullian noted that he had found in the records of Rome a notation of world-wide darkness which the statesmen of the Empire could not explain. Nature was witnessing the last terrible scene; the sky could not bear it any longer and became unnaturally darkened. The whole of nature was in travail, refused to look upon ‘Him’, upon what was happening. And Christ uttered a terrible cry: “My God! My God! Why have You forsaken me?”

It is interesting to note that the words in the original were: “Eloi, Eloi, lammah sebaktani?” What makes it interesting is the fact that this line is made up mostly of ‘vowels’; three vowels in the first and second word, two in the third word and four in the final word. To sum it up we have these vowels: e-oi, e-oi –a- -a-    -e-a--a-i.  According to studies from the Holy Shroud of Turin, which have been going on for over fifty odd years, Christ on the Cross could ‘inhale’ some air, with great pain, into His lungs, but could not ‘exhale’ that same air, wind from His lung because of the horrendous pain He was feeling. He had to exert pressure on the foot nail to push Himself up, once to the right and once to the left. In this way He could ‘exhale’ therefore utter some words.

Being in tortuous position He only uttered vowels, but this being a line from a Psalm 22:2, every Jew knew, they could make up the sense of what he was uttering. Just try it out yourself, letting out air from your mouth whilst sounding the vowels: e-oi, e-oi, -a- - a, -e-a- -a-i. One can visualise, imagine what pain Christ went through to utter those last seven words.

There’s more to it. There is a mystery behind that cry which we cannot penetrate. Christ had taken this life of ours upon Him. He had done our work and faced our temptations and borne our trials. He had suffered all that life could bring. He had hnown the betrayal of friends; the hatred of foes; the malice of enemies. Up till now he had gone through every experience, except one; the consequence of sin.

Now if there is one thing sin does, is that it separates us from God. It puts between us and God, a barrier, an unscalable wall ... humanly speaking. That was the the one human experience through which Christ had never passed ... because He was without sin (St.Paul).  Maybe that this was the moment that experience came upon Him, again not because He had sinned, but in order to be completely identified with humanity He had to go through. Christ felt what it meant to be in sin, to be sin itself, and this experience must have doubled His agony. He realised that He had to ‘cross the barrier’ for our sake.