Historical Evidence of the Crucifixion

1. Is there historical evidence of the crucifixion?

Is there historical evidence of the crucifixion? The crucifixion of Jesus Christ did not take place in obscurity. The writers of the four gospels were actual figures in history that wrote, from various perspectives, about the life, ministry, and death of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Their writings depicted eyewitness accounts of documented happenings in history. The variety of theories as to the events following the crucifixion and to what happened to the body of Jesus, only serves to further establish the fact of this heinous death. Such well-known legends as the swoon theory, that Jesus only passed out on the cross and was later resuscitated by the cool air of the tomb, and the case of the stolen body are strewn throughout literature chronicling the events of that time. The fact is, the death of Jesus Christ was never disputed. The Jews, both those who hated him and those who would become His future followers, witnessed His death. It was a public event that took place in front of the whole world. John 12:32-33 says, "'But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.' He said this to show the kind of death He was going to die." Joseph of Arimethea, himself a notable figure of the Jews of that day, requested the body of Jesus in order to give Him an honorable burial.

As to the validity of the mode of execution, it was established that by the first century, crucifixion was the Roman method for certain non-Roman criminals. It was initially employed as a form of punishment causing extreme pain and humiliation, so much so that the word "excruciating" was created for the express purpose of describing the unfathomable horror of the individual's suffering on a cross. Excruciating literally means, "out of the cross." How wonderfully this fit into the plan and will of God: "If a man guilty of a capital offense is put to death and his body is hung on a tree, you must not leave his body on the tree overnight. Be sure to bury him that same day, because anyone who is hung on a tree is under God's curse. . ." (Deuteronomy 21:22-23).

The massacre and shame that the Savior endured as one accursed was suffered for our benefit. He who never sinned suffered on our behalf, for our sins worthy of death; we were the accursed. The severity of the punishment was a stark reflection of God's holiness and His hatred of sin. While we as humans justify ourselves and compare ourselves to others who may not be as "good" as we are, God has indicated that the slightest infraction is an affront to His holiness.

1 John 5:17 says, "All wrongdoing is sin. . ." What a terrible weight Jesus carried, the load of our sins that so disfigured Him, that even the Father turned away? Matthew 27:46 "About the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, 'Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?' - which means, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?'"

Perhaps the greatest evidence of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ is the eternal results in the lives of those who have accepted Him. Those who have believed in what happened on Golgotha have been given the right to be called sons of God, and may now cry "Abba, Father." We can now have fellowship with the living God.

Jesus Christ was not the first or last person to be crucified. He was the only one, however, to be resurrected, and that from such a horrible death. He bore in His resurrection body, forever, the scars of His crucifixion in His hands and feet and side. We are told in God's Word that this will ever be a witness, for as the prophet foretold, "And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son" (Zechariah 12:10).

2. Crucifixion of Jesus - An Accurate Portrayal

The crucifixion of Jesus is detailed in all four of the New Testament Gospels. Not only do these four accounts accurately portray this historical event, they graphically depict a Roman practice that has been absolutely confirmed by the archaeological evidence.

2.1. Crucifixion of Jesus - The Roman Practice

In 1968, the historical veracity for the crucifixion of Jesus took another leap forward. A mass gravesite in Israel was uncovered that contained 35 male bodies, each of which died a brutal death around the time of the Jewish revolt against Rome in 70 AD. An inscription identified one of the men as Yohan Ben Ha'galgol. Studies of his bones performed by specialists from the Hadassah Medical School determined this man was in his late 20's and stood five feet six inches tall.

Dramatically, these studies also showed that the man had been crucified in a manner resembling the crucifixion of Jesus. A large spike had been driven through both feet, which were turned outward so the nail could be hammered inside the Achilles tendon. Spikes were also driven through his lower forearms, just below the wrists. The bone studies also revealed that the man's legs were crushed below the knees. In John 19:31-33, we read that Roman executioners expedited the death of crucifixion victims by breaking their legs - this caused them to suffocate quickly because they could no longer push up with their legs to inflate their lungs.

Another archaeological find dating to the first century AD is an unidentified heel bone discovered in a Jerusalem gravesite. Now held by the Israel Antiquities Authority and displayed in the Israel Museum, this dramatic fossil actually has a huge spike still imbedded in the heel. It appears that the executioners hit the bone when they nailed this victim to the cross, and couldn't remove the spike when they removed the body for burial.

2.2. Crucifixion of Jesus - More Indirect Evidence

The crucifixion of Jesus isn't mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls, but the ancient texts reveal that both Jews and Romans hated the practice of crucifixion because of its extreme cruelty. The scrolls also explain that crucifixion was a form of capital punishment reserved for slaves and those who were a threat to Rome. This explains why Pontius Pilate chose crucifixion as the penalty for Jesus Christ, since Jesus claimed a form of "Kingship" that threatened those in religious and political power.

In 1878, a stone inscription was found in Nazareth containing a decree from Emperor Claudius of Rome. The official decree announced that graves must not be disturbed, nor bodies removed. The punishment for violators was death. Interestingly, this stone slab is dated to about 50 AD, and prior to this time, grave-robbing was not considered a capital offense. Claudius probably issued the decree as a result of the turmoil caused by the early preaching of the resurrection of Jesus, which actually caused major riots in 49 AD, when non-believing Jews declared that the body of Jesus had been stolen by his followers.

2.3. Crucifixion of Jesus - The Verdict

The crucifixion of Jesus as presented in the New Testament Gospels is totally consistent with the discoveries highlighted in this brief article. These finds provide indirect support for all the other direct evidence of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Grace is at the heart of the Christian faith. Nowhere is this more clearly seen than at the cross of Christ. It is grace that the Son of God took on flesh, and grace that he taught us

how to live — but it is especially grace that he died on the cross in our place.

Moreover, this climactic grace shown at the cross has a specific shape — it has edges. These edges help us see what exactly happened when Jesus died. And it’s important that we see because seeing leads to worship — you can’t worship what you don’t know.

3. Five biblical truths about what Jesus accomplished on the cross.

So in hopes of more clarity — fuel for worship — here are five biblical truths about what Jesus accomplished on the cross.

1. The death of Jesus was for his enemies.

God’s love is different than natural human love. God loves us when we’re utterly unlovable. When Jesus died, he died for the ungodly, for sinners, and for his enemies. Paul gets at how contrary this is to human nature when he writes, “For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps for a good person one would dare to die, but God shows his love for us in that while we were sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:7–8).

2. The death of Jesus purchased a people.

The death of Christ was effective in its purpose. And its goal was not just to purchase the possibility of salvation, but a people for his own possession. Hear Jesus’s words: “All that the Father gives to me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out… And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day” (John 6:36, 39).

If we say that Christ only purchased the opportunity of salvation for all men we gut biblical words such as redemption of their meaning. John Murray writes: “It is to beggar the conception of redemption as an effective securement of release by price and power to construe it as anything less than the effectual accomplishment which secures the salvation of those who are its objects. Christ did not come to put men in a redeemable position but to redeem to himself a people” (Redemption Accomplished and Applied, 63).

3. The death of Jesus is on our behalf.

Jesus’s death was substitutionary. That is, he died in our place. He died the death that we deserved. He bore the punishment that was justly ours. For everyone who believes in him, Christ took the wrath of God on their behalf. Peter writes, “[Jesus] himself bore our sin in his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed” (1 Peter 2:24).

4. The death of Jesus defines love.

Jesus’s death wasn’t just an act of love, it defines love. His substitutionary death is the ultimate example of what love means, and Jesus calls those who follow him to walk in the same kind of life-laying-down love. John writes, “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:16). John Piper explains: “Jesus’s death is both guilt-bearing and guidance-giving. It is a death that forgives sin and a death that models love. It is the purchase of our life from perishing and the pattern of a life of love” (What Jesus Demands from the World, 266).

5. The death of Jesus reconciles us to God.

Justification, propitiation, and redemption — all benefits of Christ’s death — have one great purpose: reconciliation. Jesus’s death enables us to have a joy-filled relationship with God, which is the highest good of the cross. Paul writes, “And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him” (Colossians 1:21–22).

Think about how this works in our relationships with other people. When we sin, not only do we hurt the person we sin against, we harm the relationship. It will never be the same until we seek forgiveness. So it is with our relationship with God. We enter this world sinful, and as a result, we’re alienated from God. Only forgiveness — forgiveness which was purchased at the cross — can heal the relationship so that we are able to enjoy fellowship with God.

4. Reasons Jesus Came to Die

Why did Jesus Christ suffer and die? Based on the best-selling book Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die, this tract explores 10 things that Jesus accomplished through his death on the cross.

Why did Jesus Christ suffer and die? I believe that is the most important question of the twenty-first century. Here are ten answers from the Bible.

Jesus came to die…

#10) To destroy hostility between races

The suspicion, prejudice, and demeaning attitudes between Jews and non-Jews in Bible times were as serious as the racial, ethnic, and national hostilities today. Jesus died to create a whole new way for races to be reconciled: he “has broken down…the dividing wall of hostility…making peace…through the cross” (Ephesians 2:14-16).

It is impossible to build lasting unity among races by saying that all religions can come together as equally valid. God sent his Son into the world as the only means of saving sinners and reconciling races. Only as the races find this reconciliation will they love and enjoy each other.

#9) To give marriage its deepest meaning

God’s design was never for marriages to be miserable, yet many are. That’s what sin does…it makes us treat each other badly. Jesus died to change that. He knew that his suffering would make the deepest meaning of marriage plain. That’s why the Bible says, “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” (Ephesians 5:25).

God’s design for marriage is for a husband to love his wife the way Christ loves his people, and for the wife to respond the way Christ’s people should. This kind of love is possible because Christ died for both husband and wife.

#8) To absorb the wrath of God

God’s law demanded, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). But we have all loved other things more. This is what sin is—dishonoring God by preferring other things over him, and acting on those preferences.

The seriousness of an insult rises with the dignity of the one insulted. Since our sin is against the Ruler of the Universe, “the wages of [our] sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Not to punish it would be unjust. So God sent his own Son, Jesus, to divert sin’s punishment from us to himself. God “loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation”—the wrath-absorbing substitute—“for our sins” (1 John 4:10).

Then God publicly endorsed Christ’s accomplishment by raising him from the dead, proving the success of his suffering and death.

#7) So that we would escape the curse of the law

There was no escape from the curse of God’s law. It was just; we were guilty. There was only one way to be free: someone must pay the penalty. “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us” (Galatians 3:13).

The law’s demands have been fulfilled by Christ’s perfect law-keeping, its penalty fully paid by his death. This is why the Bible teaches that getting right with God is not based on law-keeping: “A person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ” (Galatians 2:16). Our only hope is having the blood and righteousness of Christ credited to our account.

#6) To reconcile us to God

The reconciliation that needs to happen between man and God goes both ways. God’s first act in reconciling us to himself was to remove the obstacle that separated him from us—the guilt of our sin. He took the steps we could not take to remove his own judgment by sending Jesus to suffer in our place: “While we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son” (Romans 5:10). Reconciliation from our side is simply to receive what God has already done, the way we receive an infinitely valuable gift.

#5) To show God’s love for sinners

The measure of God’s love is shown by the degree of his sacrifice in saving us from the penalty of our sins: “he gave his only Son” (John 3:16). When we add the horrific crucifixion that Christ endured, it becomes clear that the sacrifice the Father and the Son made to save us was indescribably great!

The measure of his love increases still more when we consider the degree of our unworthiness. “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). Our debt is so great, only a divine sacrifice could pay it.

#4) To show Jesus’ own love for us

The death of Christ is also the supreme expression that he “loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). It is my sin that cuts me off from God. All I can do is plead for mercy.

I see Christ suffering and dying “to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28). And I ask, am I among the “many”? And I hear the answer, “Whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). Jesus paid the highest price possible to give me—personally—the greatest gift possible.

#3) To take away our condemnation

The great conclusion to the suffering and death of Christ is this: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). To be “in Christ” means to be in relationship to him by faith. Christ becomes our punishment (which we don’t have to bear) and our worth before God (which we cannot earn).

The death of Christ secures freedom from condemnation for those who believe that Christ has served their death sentence. It is as sure that they cannot be condemned as it is sure that Christ died!

#2) To bring us to God

“Gospel” means “good news,” and it all ends in one thing: God himself. The gospel is the good news that at the cost of his Son’s life, God has done everything necessary to captivate us with what will make us eternally and ever-increasingly happy—namely, himself. “Christ…suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18).

#1) To give eternal life to all who believe on Him

Jesus made it plain that rejecting the eternal life he offered would result in the misery of eternity in hell: “Whoever does not believe is condemned already....the wrath of God remains on him” (John 3:18, 36).

But for those who trust Christ, the best is yet to come. “No eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). We will see the all-satisfying glory of God. “This is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (John 17:3).

For all these reasons and more, Christ suffered and died. Why would you not embrace him as your Savior from sin and judgment, and live with God eternally?

WHAT DO YOU THINK? - We have all sinned and deserve God's judgment. God, the Father, sent His only Son to satisfy that judgment for those who believe in Him. Jesus, the creator and eternal Son of God, who lived a sinless life, loves us so much that He died for our sins, taking the punishment that we deserve, was buried, and rose from the dead according to the Bible. If you truly believe and trust this in your heart, receiving Jesus alone as your Savior, declaring, "Jesus is Lord," you will be saved from judgment and spend eternity with God in heaven.

What is your response?

Here is a suggested prayer. This is not a ritual based on specific words, but rather a prayerful guideline for your sincere step of faith. "Father, I know that I have broken Your laws and my sins have separated me from You. I am truly sorry, and now I want to turn away from my past sinful life toward You. Please forgive me, and help me turn away from sin. I believe that Your Son, Jesus Christ died for my sins, was resurrected from the dead, is alive, and hears my prayer. I invite Jesus to become the Lord of my life, to rule and reign in my heart from this day forward. Thank You for sending Your Holy Spirit to help me obey You, and to do Your will for the rest of my life. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen." Congratulations! Welcome to the family of God!

with regards

Abins Varghese

***** All the above sources are from various notes i just compiled it ********