Bible for Catholic Nerds – The Passion Narrative

The Passion Narrative

Jericho is the last stop for those going to Jerusalem. In Jericho, Jesus met Zacchaeus, the chief tax collector, a man who seemed irredeemable, but instead, upon entering his home, his conversion took place. Salvation entered the life of Zacchaeus through the person of Jesus.

After leaving Jericho, Jesus ascended to Jerusalem. There are about 30 kilometers of very steep uphill road to the holy city, crossing the arid desert of Judea, the last stage before reaching the holy city. Jesus is received triumphantly and for a few days he has a preaching ministry in the temple, but immediately clashes with the authorities.

The evangelist Luke, whose story we are following at this point, follows the ancient tradition and is perfectly in line with the other two Synoptics, Matthew and Mark. Remember that a characteristic of Luke is the great insertion of the trip. From 9:51 Luke says that Jesus hardened his face and made the firm decision to go to Jerusalem and left. He arrives in Jerusalem in chapter 19.

There are 10 chapters that Luke dedicates to the journey, not actually describing the journey but offering the opportunity for a pedagogical journey during which Jesus educates his disciples. And during this journey, he met several people, and the evangelist catechistically narrates these encounters.

Once the journey to Jerusalem was over, the fundamental event in the life and mission of Jesus took place: his death and resurrection. The passion narrative occupies chapters 22 and 23 of the Gospel according to Luke and follows the traditional framework as witnessed above all by the evangelist Mark, the first and oldest to have written this narrative among those that we have. Luke, therefore, has inherited a story from tradition and reproduces it, but adds many details to it. Above all, he gives a particular tone to the entire narrative by presenting the face of Jesus as meek and serene.

In spite of everything, the tone of the Lucan account of the passion is a serene and tranquil one. There is no insistence on violence or anguish on Jesus’ part. The evangelist wants to highlight how Jesus knows how to face the difficulty fully mastered and able to handle that situation by offering more examples of benevolence and mercy, precisely towards the enemies who mistreat him.

The story of the passion begins with the preparation of the paschal supper during which Jesus institutes the Eucharist and then reveals the traitor and offers precious teaching of humility and service to his disciples. After supper, late in the day, they go out towards the place of Gethsemane, the Mount of Olives where Jesus used to retire to pray. And Luke offers a particular description of this prayer. He adds a new element: an angel comes to Jesus, an angel sent by the Father to comfort him.

What the evangelist means is that Jesus is not alone in this dramatic moment. It is not a desperate and anguished prayer but is comforted by the presence of the Father. He enters into the struggle. In Greek, he uses the word ‘agony’. Jesus’ prayer is qualified as agony, but not in the sense that Jesus is dying, gasping for breath… He is fully aware, and in his sound mind to understand what is about to happen to him. And the battle that takes place within him is a fight against the spirit of evil, against negative forces.

Luke says (as he’s the only one to mention it) “he prayed so fervently that his sweat became like drops of blood on the ground.” He does not say that Jesus sweated blood, but that his sweat was similar to drops of blood. In an intense prayer, Jesus sweats as if he were struggling, as if he were fighting against someone. It is a sweat that feels like drops of blood, and the reference to the ‘blood’ that will be abundantly shed later is intentional. But already before, in prayer, there is this total involvement. Jesus, according to the Evangelist Luke, is a man of prayer, a man who knows how to pray, who allows himself to be fully conformed to God’s plan.

While he is in this prayerful fight, the crowd arrives led by Judas. Jesus is arrested. Peter did not understand Jesus’ speech; he armed himself with a sword despite everything, and he wants to use it. He pulls out his sword and strikes one of the servants who was arresting Jesus. But Jesus performs a prodigious gesture: he heals the ear of the wounded man. Notice the difference: Peter does violence by cutting off the right ear of this enemy, and Jesus, by touching the ear that wounds him, shows he knows how to live with what he has taught others: doing good to those who persecute him.

The disciple’s mistake of using the force of violence to defend Jesus, doing evil by hitting the opponent with violence, is not the style of Jesus. It is not what he taught; it is not what he wants. It is an important gesture that Jesus picks up that cut ear and reattaches it. He does good to the one who is arresting him unjustly. It is a work of mercy. It is the attitude with which Jesus shows that he is on the side of man. He does not want to use his strength. He does not defend himself with divine power. He does not flee. He does not hide. He does not use any prodigious artifice. He does not fight, let alone strike his enemies.

This is God’s style. This is his mercy that works for the good of those who mistreat him. And it is this mercy that saves the world. Arrested, Jesus is taken to the house of the high priest. Peter follows him, and in front of a servant girl who repeatedly asks him if he belongs to the group of the Nazarene, Peter answers three times that he doesn’t know him. This is Peter’s traditional denial story.

Luke reproduces it but adds a splendid detail: the third time Peter says he does not know Jesus, the Lord turned and fixed his gaze on Peter, and Peter remembered what Jesus had said to him. He went outside crying bitterly. We give emphasis on this very delicate and important aspect. The Lord turned and looked at Peter.

We have already seen how Luke uses the term ‘Lord” to qualify Jesus in the story. And when he calls Jesus the ‘Kyrios’ in the story. He does so to emphasize the divinity of Jesus, his divine role. It is not simply the historical character of Jesus, it is the Lord himself who looks at Peter. Jesus was inside the chamber of the high priest, inside the palace, Peter is outside. How he looked at him from a window, in a passageway, does not interest us. It is the reconstruction of the chronicle that is important. That glance, that look of a friend that strikes Peter in the heart. He feels pierced by that look of Jesus. It is a look of goodness, but a look of reproach at the same time. It is therapeutic mercy.

Jesus looks with great affection at Peter, at that Peter who loves him in words but in deeds denies him. And the gaze of Jesus wounds the heart of Peter and heals him by making him cry bitterly. Here, once again, is an example of therapeutic mercy. With his gaze, Jesus makes Peter cry, and crying, Peter recognizes his mistake and asks for forgiveness and changes. It is precisely the moment in which the sinful disciple, who has a wrong idea, who makes wrong gestures, who focuses on himself, fails, transformed by the grace of Jesus.

Jesus is then brought before Pilate. Hearing that the prisoner is from Galilee, Pilate tries to get out of the way by sending Jesus to Herod. And this is another episode exclusive to Luke: the interrogation of Jesus before Herod Antipas, son of Herod the Great, the man responsible for the massacre of the innocents at the time of Jesus’ birth. Herod Antipas was the tetrarch of Galilee, the one who had John the Baptist killed.

On Passover days he was in Jerusalem where he had a luxurious palace. If Jesus is from Galilee, he is a subject of Herod and Pilate sends him so that Herod can do the judgment. “Herod was very glad to see Jesus; he had been wanting to see him for a long time,” says Luke. “He had heard about him [Jesus] and had been hoping to see him perform some sign.” Herod is described as a superficial man, a puppet, a man who has no real personality. He expects from Jesus some magician artifice. He is interested neither in his message nor in his person. He asks him a bunch of curious questions and Jesus does not say a word to him.

Jesus talks to Pilate, he goes to the house of sinners, befits everyone, but in front of Herod, ‘he gave him no answer’, not even a word. Herod takes offense and insults him, mocks him, and sends him back to Pilate without having found any fault, but without having had any satisfaction. Pilate reiterates for the umpteenth time that he finds no fault in him, but in the end, out of cowardice he yields and condemns Jesus according to the request of the Jews.

During the transportation of the condemned man to the place of execution, Luke adds the encounter with the women of Jerusalem who accompany him with affection, weeping over him, but Jesus does not want this weeping and advises them, “Do not weep for me; weep instead for yourselves and for your children.” Weep over your sins, a little as he did with Peter. He invites the women to weep, to weep over their sins, that is, to change their mentality, to understand where the evil really lies, and to realize that what Jesus is doing now is the moment of redemption. He is not looking for men and women to feel sorry for him, but he wants his work of mercy to bring about real changes in their lives.

In this dramatic and extreme moment, Luke puts two splendid prayers into Jesus’ mouth, introduced by the vocative Father. While they were nailing them on the cross, Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” He intercedes for sinners and his last words before dying is the handing over of one’s life into the hands of the Father: “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Luke changes that verse from Ps 22:2 used by Mark and Matthew: “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” because he fears that his Greek readers do not know how to place that verse as a text of salvation that contains a great hope and may seem, as, unfortunately, many commentators say, a desperate phrase.

And then to show that the prayer of Jesus is of great trust, he replaces it with another verse from Psalm 31:6: “Into your hands, I commend my spirit.” He adds the vocative ‘Father’ to show how Jesus relates to God as a true son. And there is an exclusive scene narrated only by Luke: the summit meeting in the life of Jesus.

One of the two bandits crucified with him does not insult him but asks for mercy. I avoid using the term ‘thief’ which is Latinism. “Latro – latronis” in Latin is not the ‘thief’ or the great thief, but the bandit, the outlaw, more likely we could say that he is a ‘Zealot,’ a man from the armed party who tried to change the world with violence. Recognizing that he was wrong, of having deserved that infamous condemnation of the cross, and recognizing that, instead, Jesus did not do anything wrong. And then he addresses him by calling him by name.

He is the only one in the gospel that addresses the master of Nazareth, the ‘Lord’, calling him ‘Jesus,’ “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” He trusts this crucified king and asks him, as a friend, ‘remember me.’ Jesus responds with an affirmation of confidence, of certainty: “Today you will be with me in paradise.” It is the ‘today’ of salvation, it is the announcement of the possibility of being with Jesus. ‘Paradise’ is the garden, a very rare word in the New Testament. It only appears here in the Gospels, once in Saint Paul, and once in the Revelation. “You will be with me” is Jesus’ guarantee. ‘You have entrusted yourself to me, you can rest assured you will be with me.’

And this is the meaning of his cross, of his redemptive death. When it’s all over, Luke describes the scene with masterly brushstrokes and original expressions: “When all the people who had gathered for this spectacle saw what had happened, they returned home beating their breasts; but all his acquaintances stood at a distance, including the women who had followed him from Galilee and saw these events.” In Greek it uses term ‘θεωρίαν’ – ‘theoría’, in English it is translated as ‘spectacle’.

The scene of the passion of Jesus, his crucifixion, is a spectacle; it is a thing to see, it is an extraordinary event. Everyone who had come to see that spectacle, thinking about what had happened, they would go home beating their chests a sign of repentance. From the cross of Christ comes the repentance of the crowd.

Those who observe his passion, those who read it, meditate on it, thinking about it, return home changed, beating their chests, recognizing themselves as sinners, like Peter, like the bandit, like all of humanity who needs this mercy, which on the cross fulfills the project and converts, that is, saves humanity.