The Self-Donation of God. Jack D. Kilcrease
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Similarly, Mark writes that they “crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left” (v. 27). The unusual emphasis that Mark places on the location of Jesus might have been intended to provide typological value. Jesus’s location between the thieves seems to echo the Day of Atonement when both the blood and the divine presence hidden under the cloud of incense stood between the two cherubim on the ark of the covenant (Lev 16:15). Later, we will find similar uses of this typology in John’s gospel and Paul’s Letter to the Romans.
In the final moment of his crucifixion, Jesus cries out in the words of Psalm 22, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Much like in his pleading in Gethsemane, Jesus’s cry to the Father is met with silence. Jesus’s two cries to the Father (in Gethsemane and on the cross) parallel God’s two pronunciations of him as his Son. The silence of the Father and the condemnation of the Son seem to contradict his earlier words. Nevertheless, Jesus’s cry to the Father does not indicate the failure of his faith. What should be remembered is that all the Psalms were part of the temple liturgy and therefore are in a sense all concerned with the praise of God for his goodness.240 Psalms of lamentation also assume the existence of and trust in divine grace. One does not lament if one does not consider God to be gracious and good. Lamentation is faith’s response to appearances that contradict its trust in God’s goodness and graciousness. Those who do not believe God is good and gracious do not lament because the world is precisely as a nonexistent or malevolent deity would have it. Therefore, in his lamentation Jesus maintains his faith in God’s Word to him, in spite of divine hiddenness and condemnation.241
Following Jesus’s cry of lament, he dies and the curtain of the temple (probably the holy of holies) is torn (eschisthē) from top to bottom.242 This parallels the ripping of the heavens at the beginning of the gospel not only because of the use of the same Greek word, but also because the curtain covering the holy of holies was at that time embroidered to represent the heavens.243 Hence both represent a ripping of the heavens.
The significance of this ripping has often been debated by scholars. Frequently, the event has been interpreted to mean that sinners now have access to God.244 In light of the fact that sinners were quite literally separated from God in the Old Testament by the veil, this interpretation seems to have much value. Donald Juel offers two other suggestions that are consistent with our earlier argument regarding the schizomenous inclusio. First, Juel claims that sinners are not only separated from God by the veil, but that God himself is segregated from sinners. The torn veil therefore signifies God’s own willingness to identify with sinful humanity in the person of his Son.245 The culmination of this is God’s own death in solidarity with sinners on the cross. The moment this death occurs, the veil is torn and God’s identification with sinners is complete.
Secondly, Juel also connects the ripping of the veil with the coming destruction of the temple, predicted in Mark 13. When the temple’s curtain is torn, Jesus’s prediction of the temple’s coming destruction becomes a present reality.246 People mock Jesus on the cross by asking if this is the fate of one who would have destroyed the temple (15:29). This is ironic for several reasons. First, Jesus only predicted the destruction of the temple (Mark 13); he did not actually threaten to destroy it. Mark insists all threats of destruction attributed to Jesus are false testimony (14:57–59). The mockery of Jesus is ironic for the second reason. His death on the cross causes the ripping of the veil and thereby begins the process of the temple’s destruction. The one who appears weak, is, in fact, all-powerful, even on the cross.
The inauguration of the destruction of the temple also suggests that Mark believes Jesus has taken over the functions of the temple. The temple was a microcosm of creation and functioned as a means to renew creation. It was also the location where sin was forgiven by bloody sacrifice. Through his death, Jesus works as the forgiveness of sin by bloody sacrifice, and by his resurrection he renews creation.247 The new creation that Jesus brings cannot exist alongside the old creation in some neutral fashion. Judgment of sin means the destruction of the old cult insofar as it represents the old creation. In this new creation, God overcomes his separation from sinners and therefore rips the old order to pieces chizomenous). Similarly, the separation between Israel and the Gentiles is abrogated. Upon his death, Jesus is confessed by the Gentile Centurion to be the Son of God.
The Synoptic Gospels: Matthew248
Matthew begins his gospel by telling his audience about Jesus’s human and divine identity. His divine identity is revealed in that the name “Jesus” means “God is our salvation.”249 Matthew’s intention to identify with this name Jesus as divine is clear insofar as he then reports the angel’s explanation of the name: “for he will save his people from their sins” (Matt 1:21). If Jesus is the agent of salvation, then he himself therefore must be God. If this were not enough, the evangelist then tells his audience that this fulfills the prophecy that a virgin will conceive and give birth to Immanuel, “God with us” (1:23).250
Throughout the gospel, Jesus reveals himself as the true savior God of Israel in five separate theophanies. First, in chapter 5, he promulgates the Word of God on a mountain (v. 1). Moses came down from the mountain and gave the Torah after speaking with God at the summit. Jesus stands on top of the mountain and directly promulgates the Word of God to the people as God himself. In chapter 17, Jesus is transfigured, which as we have noted in the last section, must necessarily represent a theophany. The third theophany occurs as Jesus stands on the Mount of Olives, where we are told that God’s glory rested when it left the temple (Ezek 11:23). It is also the location where Zechariah prophesied that God will stand before the final battle that will destroy Jerusalem (Zech 14:4). This fits well with Jesus’s discourse in this section, which describes the destruction of Jerusalem. He ends the discourse by saying “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away” (24:35) an echo of Isaiah 40:8: “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.” The fourth theophany occurs on Golgotha as Jesus is crucified. The darkness and earthquakes that accompany his death are direct parallels with Amos’s description (Amos 8:9) of the Day of the Lord, that is, God’s own epiphany in judgment. It is also somewhat reminiscent of the coming of God to commune with Israel as seen in Exodus 20, wherein the old covenant was ratified. In keeping with this, Jesus’s death ratifies the “new testament” in his “blood.” The fifth and last theophany is on a mountain in Galilee after the resurrection, when Jesus commissions the disciples as they “worship” or “prostrated” (prosekynēsan) themselves before him (Matt 28:17). In this context, such an action can only be understood as divine worship.251 Indeed, Jesus states, “All authority in heaven and on earth have been given to me” (v. 18). This means that Jesus transcends merely human dominion on the earth (Gen 1:28), and also possesses all authority in heaven, which according to his earlier statement in the gospel, is “God’s throne” (Matt 5:35).
From this pattern, the question arises: why five theophanies? To begin to answer the question, it should be observed that Matthew’s five theophanies parallel his five great discourses (5:3—7:27, 10:5–42, 13:3–52, 18:2–35, 23:2—25:46).