In The Room Without A Light

We have seen that the synoptic Gospels offer different slants on the crucifixion of Jesus. Does this surprise you? Give some reasons for your answer.

Can you see parallels to the crucifixion of Jesus and events in your country, the world or your personal life? Express some of these ideas in your portfolio.

At first glance I didn’t think I was surprised by the different accounts of the crucifixion of Jesus in the synoptic Gospels: I’ve played “broken telephone” as a child, I’ve heard rumours morph with each retelling as an adolescent, and I’ve learned that if you ask seven adults to describe the same sunset you will hear seven different responses. So, differences in stories are not completely unexpected in my world.

I’ve also never been very concerned with the historicity of the text: I’m a wilful person, and I’m inclined to believe what my own taste and experience supports, rather than be particularly concerned with silly facts and figures. If it’s not true for me, it’s not true. And if it is true for me, then never mind anyone who tries to convince me otherwise. (When I was in high school I quite liked the idea that people in the olden days used to believe the earth is flat: that notion provided far more amusement for me than just being ‘normal’ and agreeing that the earth was round because everybody else said so. I was all for instituting a local flat-earth society, even though I knew that the earth is indeed round. Or, to be technically accurate, it is spherical. Bulgy-spherical, a bit pudgy around the waist and elongated at the poles, almost-but-not-quite rugby ball-like. But you know what I mean! And I was fascinated by how worked up people could get in trying to convince me of the error of my flat­-earth thinking! And most of the round­-earth apologists never appreciated that I was being ‘aspris’, as my Standard 9 Afrikaans teacher Mrs Heese would say.)

However, on closer examination of the material presented in Study Unit 2, I have gained a better understanding of the context of the Gospels and the purpose that each author had for writing his particular account of the Jesus story. So I can say that I am pleasantly surprised to gain a fuller appreciation of aspects of the crucifixion story that had, until now, completely evaded me.

Luke’s version is all about communicating compassion and forgiveness: Jesus, who was innocent, had compassion and chose to forgive even though he suffered terribly, was insulted and mocked. Although I have no scriptural basis for this theory, I like to think that Luke must have experienced Jesus’ compassion and forgiveness himself, and as a result of this experience he was able to empathise with other sinners and to look at a situation through the eyes of understanding and forgiveness, to see the potential for good in people and to call forth that goodness by being compassionate and forgiving, and to encourage others to do the same. Luke’s story also teaches about trusting in God’s faithfulness and power, and not looking for retribution against those who have hurt us.

Mark’s focus is on establishing Jesus’ identity as the Son of God: for him this was vital in exposing that the emperor was not the Son of God, and thus exposing that the ways of the emperor were not the ways of God. He shows us a strong contrast between worldly empires built on abuse of power and domination, and Jesus’ kingdom of non­violence and acceptance of suffering: even the suffering caused by feeling desperately abandoned by one’s companions and by God.

Parallels to the crucifixion of Jesus that I can see:

In my country, there is the story of Methodist bishop Paul Verryn, who with the help of volunteers and staff, provided food, shelter and hope to thousands of destitute asylum seekers – mostly Zimbabwean, and definitely deserving of help! – at the Central Methodist Mission in downtown Johannesburg until he was suspended by his church in late January 2010 to face two disciplinary charges.

The first charge was for initiating a court action to have an independent curator appointed to ensure the interests of the destitute orphaned children living in the church. Serious allegations had been made that some of the volunteers at the church were abusing some of the children living there, and the government’s social services department thought they could solve the problem by simply removing the children from the church and placing them in foster care or orphanages without first taking the time to understand the plight or specific needs of these makwerikweri children who would quite likely be the victims of xenophobia (whether or not this would be accompanied by violent attacks) wherever they were placed. When the children persistently ran away and refused to go with the social workers because they were afraid, the government castigated Verryn for refusing to co-operate: he was supposed to round the children up like sheep and deliver them to the social workers. Instead Verryn realised the complexity of the situation, felt called to be a gate to the sheepfold and saw a real need for an independent curator who would understand the needs of the children and act as a reasonable go-between to ensure that the children received appropriate help from social services. However, the church claimed that Verryn had no authority to institute court proceedings to appoint a curator – probably because Verryn’s actions made church relations with the government quite difficult because the church was publicly embarrassing the government.

The second charge was for speaking to the media when he had been instructed by church authorities not to do so. There was a great deal of interest from the media about the matter, and the public have a right to know how challenges are being handled by government – especially when it seems that government is not serving the needs of the people. Personally I think Verryn had every right to explain the situation and why he wanted an independent curator. Again, the church had its own interests to protect, so they preferred to gag Verryn instead of supporting his apostolate.

For me, this story parallels the crucifixion because in the face of the necessary and quite admirable work that Verryn was doing for the oppressed (despite the considerable resistance he encountered from all quarters, and the personal sacrifices he was making), the charges brought against him and the resulting suspension by his own church are the equal of the mocking inscription on Jesus’ cross. To me it comes off as if they’re saying “This guy thinks he’s doing God’s work, but he’s a bit confused. We didn’t give him a mandate to get into anything political; he was supposed to stick to the requisite photo­-op soup kitchen that would keep our funders happy. And why he felt the need to bring Zimbabweans into the mix is anybody’s guess, we’ve got plenty of hungry locals who would have been a lot less trouble. Fool! Thanks for messing with the status quo and complicating everybody’s lives!”