Today’s Scripture
Reading (November 29, 2017): John 19
The television series M*A*S*H was never afraid to take on tough issues. In one episode, Colonel Sherman
Potter is worried that he is getting too
old to do the surgery, just as the M*A*S*H gets a fresh batch of wounded that
have been hit with white phosphorus
rounds. The episode simultaneously took on our fear of aging and combined it
with what seems to be our increasing ability to cause bodily harm. The ugliness
of white phosphorus rounds was that the bullet hitting the body was only the
beginning of the destruction. Because of the white phosphorus, the bullets, once lodged in the body, would begin
to burn away the affected tissue. And if it was
exposed to air in a place like an operating
room, it could also burst into flame. All of this was just too much for an old country doctor who wanted to nothing more than to care for his neighbors, go
fishing, and didn’t care if he was paid
in chickens.
Our ability to cause harm has never been a question. We seem to be good
at learning new ways to kill people, or just to inflict bodily harm. In ancient
times, often the goal was not only the
death of the person who had received a death sentence, but they wanted to
maximize the pain experienced on the way to death.
The Assyrians experimented with ways to remove the skin of the victim while
also keeping them alive and suffering for the maximum time possible.
Crucifixion was another method of execution which allowed for the person to suffer much on their way to death. A good crucifixion could take days to accomplish its
intended purpose, killing the victim. And while the person died, they would
endure much suffering.
The word flogged in this passage might be
better translated as scourged. This
was not a flogging such as was experienced by slaves at the hand of their
masters trying to discipline them. In those cases, the master did not want to
cause permanent harm to the one he was beating. The slave was valuable, and injury would not advance the cause of the
master. But in the case of scourging, harm
was partially the point. A scourging involved beating the victim with strips of
leather that were embedded with glass and
metal that tore away at the flesh, often ripping chunks off of the one being scourged. The scourging scene in the
movie “The Passion of the Christ” has been
criticized as being unrealistically violent, but the truth is that it
probably didn’t go far enough. It is hard to reproduce the kind of violence
that the Romans inflicted on their victims in their scourgings.
Most victims probably passed out during the beating; the pain was simply too much. Some victims died in the
midst of their scourging. Many others were driven insane by the experience. And
while some died during the beatings, death was not the primary outcome. Pain
was. Often a scourging was a substitute for a crucifixion. The idea was that
pain could be visited on the victim’s while not taking the life itself.
Pilate has found Jesus innocent. But he is a political man, and he
knows that releasing Jesus would be a political mistake. And so Pilate hatches
a plan. Maybe Jesus could be scourged as a substitute for crucifixion; then the
violent appetites of the crowd might be satisfied without Pilate feeling that
he had the blood of a prophet on his hands. It is a hope, although as it turns out, a false one. Jesus is scourged, and then he is crucified. And
Pilate is remembered as the one who turned Jesus over to the wishes of the
crowd.
Tomorrow’s Scripture
Reading: Matthew 28
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