Good Friday

On this day of sorrow and silence, we remember one who loved literally to death. Tradition holds that today is the anniversary of the Crucifixion of Jesus the Nazarene, betrayed by one the twelve, Judas Iscariot, for 30 silver coins. It is said that this morning, He was carried around Jerusalem until the final sentence was said: Death by Crucifixion  He was tortured, beaten by sticks, then flagellated and finally nailed to a cross, left there to suffocate His way to death.

Tradition and the Gospels that recount the events that happened today almost two thousand years ago hold that after sharing bread and wine with the twelve Apostles, Jesus went to pray to the Garden of Gethsemane. There, he prayed until he started sweating blood. He withstood many temptations until he was apprehended by the Sanhedrin, a council of the High Priests in Jerusalem, and sentenced to Death because of alleged blasphemy. From there, He answered questions from Pontius Pilate, the Roman Governor of Jerusalem, and the Roman Governor of Galilee, Herod Antipas. Both found him innocent. The Sanhedrin later pushed Pilate to an ultimatum, crucify the Nazarene, but only after some general clamor and possible rioting. Pilate decided to punish Jesus to flagellation at the stake, but not death. Unfortunately, that did not satisfy the High Priests. They wanted Him crucified. Pilate finally gives in and orders the Nazarene, alleged King of the Jews, to be nailed to a cross, by hands and feet, left there to die of suffocation. Three hours later, the soul of the Son of Man returns to His Father.

Crucifixion is probably one of the worst ways to die. It is one of the most perfected ways of mortal torture. The way it works is quite simple, you pin down the victim's limbs by nailing them in the wrists and ankles-in this way there is less blood flow and connection to the rest of the body, this leaves the rest of the body to fall and put more weight on the feet, and an extended stretch of the arms. Consequently less oxygen is led to the brain, therefore to be able to breathe appropriately, one has to push on the nail wounds, which hurts it even more. In a regular crucifixion, the slow and painful death can last up from 5 hours to almost 3 days. The fact that it only took 3 hours for Christ to leave His corpse on the cross is quite astonishing, but looking at what he went through before reaching Calgary Hill makes it more reasonable.