Jesus on the Via Dolorosa, the Road to Calvary

In our daily meditations at groupbiblestudy.com, we reflect on the events that led to Christ's crucifixion. In the scene depicted in the Gospels, we witness rebellious men acting at their worst toward the Creator of the Universe. After Pontius Pilate washed his hands of the situation, the soldiers dressed Jesus in a scarlet or purple cloak, symbolizing a king, and placed a reed in His right hand instead of a scepter. They crowned Him with a crown of thorns and kneeled before Him, ridiculing Him, saying, "Hail, King of the Jews," mimicking the phrase "Hail, Caesar!” while also spitting on Him. With all the open wounds in His back, they then removed the purple robe, causing additional blood loss, before putting the Lord’s clothes back on Him (Matthew 27:27-31). Afterwards, they prepared Jesus for the crucifixion.

The Roman soldiers would usually tie the crossbeam, the patibulum, which typically weighed at least one hundred pounds, to the victim’s shoulders. At the front of the procession to the place of crucifixion, one soldier would carry a sign written in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek that read, “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews” (John 19:20). This sign indicated His "crime." The chief priests objected to this statement, demanding that it be changed to read, "He said He was the king of the Jews," but by this time, Pilate was so disgusted with the envy and hatred of Jesus by the Jewish elders that he replied, “What I have written I have written” (John 19:22). A guard of four soldiers led by a centurion escorted Christ to the public place where He would be crucified. They divided Jesus’ garments among themselves as a “benefit of the job.”

That day, the route was winding because Rome wanted as many people as possible to see an example of those who opposed the Roman Empire. John explains that they took Christ to the Place of a Skull, called Calvary or Golgotha in Aramaic (John 19:17). Some say the place was named because of the skulls of other victims left there, but this seems unlikely given the Jewish concern for cleanliness and the holiness of the land. It is more probable that it was a hillside shaped like a skull. Crucifixions were often carried out on main roads or outside city gates so that many witnesses would see and fear the same fate. The Lord was very weak, having had no sleep, scourged, beaten in the face by Roman soldiers, humiliated, spat upon, and struck on the head with a staff. Because of His weakened condition and the loss of blood from the scourging, Jesus needed help to carry the cross. Usually, victims of crucifixion would not undergo additional punishment before their execution.

26As they led him away, they seized Simon from Cyrene, who was on his way in from the country, and put the cross on him and made him carry it behind Jesus. 27A large number of people followed him, including women who mourned and wailed for him. 28Jesus turned and said to them, "Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me; weep for yourselves and for your children. 29For the time will come when you will say, 'Blessed are the barren women, the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!' 30Then " 'they will say to the mountains, "Fall on us!" and to the hills, "Cover us!" ‘31For if men do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?" 32Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. 33When they came to the place called the Skull, there they crucified him, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left (Luke 23:26-33).

In His weakened condition, the one-hundred-pound crossbeam, also known as the patibulum, was too much for Jesus to carry, so the Roman centurion compelled a traveler just arriving in Jerusalem for Passover, Simon from Cyrene, North Africa, to carry it. On the Via Dolorosa, the Way of Sorrows, Jesus was concerned for the women crying and wailing for Him. Christ told the mourners to weep for themselves and for the judgment that would follow. In a proverb (vs. 30-31), He compared Himself to a green tree full of life. Righteous green Jesus was not a natural object to be burned in the fire of judgment, but the dry, lifeless nation of Israel, rejecting mercy and grace, would have to face the fires of judgment at the destruction of Jerusalem that took place in 70 A.D. Keith Thomas.

The YouTube video of this talk with closed captions (subtitles) in 65 languages is found at the following link: https://youtu.be/98EY8UNmpmk

The written notes are at the following link: study 63. The Crucifixion of Christ