Palm and Passion Sunday
Matthew 26:14–27:66
This Sunday’s Reading
Gospel at the Procession with Palms
Matthew 21:1-11
Jesus enters Jerusalem as the crowd waves palm branches and shouts, “Hosanna!”
First Reading
Isaiah 50:4-7
The Lord’s Servant will stand firm, even when persecuted.
Responsorial Psalm
Psalm 22:8-9,17-20,23-24
A cry for help to the Lord in the face of evildoers
Second Reading
Philippians 2:6-11
Christ was obedient even to death, and God has exalted him.
Gospel Reading
Matthew 26:14—27:66
Jesus is crucified, and his body is placed in the tomb. (shorter form: Matthew 27:11-54)
Background on the Gospel Reading
Today we begin Holy Week, the days during which we journey with Jesus on his way of the cross and anticipate his Resurrection on Easter. Today’s liturgy begins with the procession with palms to remind us of Jesus’ triumphant entrance into Jerusalem.
The events of Jesus’ Passion are proclaimed in their entirety in today’s Liturgy of the Word. Those events will be proclaimed again when we celebrate the liturgies of the Triduum—Holy Thursday’s Mass of the Lord’s Supper, the Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion, and the Easter Vigil. In communities that celebrate the Sacraments of Initiation with catechumens, these liturgies take on special importance because they invite the catechumens and the community to enter together into the central mysteries of our faith. These days are indeed profound and holy.
In Cycle A, we read the Passion of Jesus as found in the Gospel of Matthew on Palm, or Passion, Sunday. (On Good Friday, we will read the Passion of Jesus from the Gospel of John). The story of Jesus’ Passion and death in Matthew’s Gospel focuses particularly on the obedience of Jesus to the will of his Father. As Jesus sends his disciples to prepare for Passover, he indicates that the events to come are the will of the Father (Matthew 26:18). In Jesus’ prayer in the garden, he prays three times to the Father to take away the cup of suffering, but each time, Jesus concludes by affirming his obedience to the Father’s will (Matthew 26:39-44). Even Matthew’s description of Jesus’ death shows Jesus’ obedience to the Father.
Another theme of Matthew’s Gospel is to show Jesus as the fulfillment of Scripture. Throughout the Passion narrative, Matthew cites and alludes to Scripture to show that the events of Jesus’ Passion and death are in accordance with all that was foretold. And if the events were foretold, then God is in control. In addition, Matthew is particularly concerned that the reader does not miss the fact that Jesus is the Suffering Servant of the Old Testament.
Jesus acts in obedience to the Father even in death, so that sins may be forgiven. Matthew makes this clear in the story of the Lord’s Supper. As Jesus blesses the chalice, he says: “. . . for this is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed on behalf of many for the forgiveness of sins.” (Matthew 26:28)
While the Gospels of Matthew and Mark have many parallels in their narrative of the Passion, there are a few details worth noting that are unique to Matthew. Only Matthew indicates the price paid to Judas for betraying Jesus. The story of Judas’s death is also found only in Matthew, as is the detail that Pilate’s wife received a warning in a dream and that Pilate washed his hands of Jesus’ death. Finally, Matthew’s Gospel alone mentions the earthquakes and other phenomena that happened after Jesus’ death.
Matthew places the responsibility for Jesus’ death on the Sanhedrin, the chief priests and elders who were responsible for the Temple. However, the animosity that those Jewish leaders and the Jewish people demonstrate toward Jesus is not to be interpreted in ways that blame the Jewish people for Jesus’ death. Throughout Matthew’s Gospel, the narrative reflects the tension that probably existed between the early Christian community and their Jewish contemporaries. At the Second Vatican Council, the Council Fathers made clear that all sinners share responsibility for the suffering and death of Jesus and that it is wrong to place blame for Jesus’ Passion on the Jewish contemporaries of Jesus or on Jewish people today.
There are many vantage points from which to engage in Jesus’ Passion. In the characters of Matthew’s Gospel, we find reflections of ourselves and the many ways in which we sometimes respond to Jesus. Sometimes we are like Judas, who betrays Jesus and comes to regret it. We are sometimes like Peter, who denies him, or like the disciples, who fell asleep during Jesus’ darkest hour but then act rashly and violently at his arrest. Sometimes we are like Simon, who is pressed into service to help Jesus carry his cross. Sometimes we are like the leaders who fear Jesus or like Pontius Pilate, who washed his hands of the whole affair. Jesus dies so that our sins will be forgiven.
The events of Jesus’ Passion, death, and Resurrection are called the Paschal Mystery. No amount of study will exhaust or explain the depth of love that Jesus showed in offering this sacrifice for us. After we have examined and studied the stories we have received about these events, we are left with one final task—to meditate on these events and on the forgiveness that Jesus’ obedience won for us.
The way of humility
Pope Francis
Joyful acclamations at Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem, followed by his humiliation. Festive cries followed by brutal torture. This twofold mystery accompanies our entrance into Holy Week each year, as reflected in the two characteristic moments of today’s celebration: the initial procession with palm branches and the solemn reading of the Passion.
Let us enter into this movement, guided by the Holy Spirit, and thus obtain the grace we sought in our opening prayer: to follow in faith our Saviour’s example of humility, to heed his lesson of patient suffering, and thus to merit a share in his victory over the spirit of evil.
Jesus shows us how to face moments of difficulty and the most insidious of temptations by preserving in our hearts a peace that is neither detachment nor superhuman impassivity, but confident abandonment to the Father and to his saving will, which bestows life and mercy. He shows us this kind of abandonment by spurning, at every point in his earthly ministry, the temptation to do things his way and not in complete obedience to the Father. From the experience of his forty days in the desert to the culmination of his Passion, Jesus rejects this temptation by his obedient trust in the Father.
Today, too, by his entrance into Jerusalem, he shows us the way. For in that event, the evil one, the prince of this world, had a card up his sleeve: the card of triumphalism. Yet the Lord responded by holding fast to his own way, the way of humility.
Triumphalism tries to make it to the goal by shortcuts and false compromises. It wants to jump onto the carriage of the winner. It lives off gestures and words that are not forged in the crucible of the cross; it grows by looking askance at others and constantly judging them inferior, wanting, failures… One subtle form of triumphalism is spiritual worldliness, which represents the greatest danger, the most treacherous temptation threatening the Church (De Lubac). Jesus destroyed triumphalism by his Passion.
The Lord truly rejoiced with the people, with those young people who shouted out his name and acclaimed him as King and Messiah. His heart was gladdened to see the enthusiasm and excitement of the poor of Israel. So much so, that, to those Pharisees who asked him to rebuke his disciples for their scandalous acclamations, he replied: “If these were silent, the very stones would cry out” (Lk 19:40). Humility does not mean denying reality: Jesus really is the Messiah, the King.
Yet at the same time the heart of Jesus was moving on another track, on the sacred path known to him and the Father alone: the path that leads from “the form of God” to “the form of a servant”, the path of self-abasement born of obedience “unto death, even death on a cross” (Phil 2:6-8). He knows that true triumph involves making room for God and that the only way to do that is by stripping oneself, by self-emptying. To remain silent, to pray, to accept humiliation. There is no negotiating with the cross: one either embraces it or rejects it. By his self-abasement, Jesus wanted to open up to us the path of faith and to precede us on that path.
The first to follow him on that path was his mother, Mary, the first disciple. The Blessed Virgin and the saints had to suffer in walking the path of faith and obedience to God’s will. Responding with faith to the harsh and painful events of life entails “a particular heaviness of heart (cf. Redemptoris Mater, 17). The night of faith. Yet only from that night do we see the dawn of the resurrection break forth. At the foot of the cross, Mary thought once more of the words that the angel had spoken about her Son: “He will be great… The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end” (Lk 1:32-33). On Golgotha, Mary faced the complete denial of that promise: her Son was dying on a cross like a criminal. In this way, triumphalism, destroyed by the abasement of Jesus, was likewise destroyed in the heart of his Mother. Both kept silent.
In the footsteps of Mary, countless holy men and women have followed Jesus on the path of humility and obedience. Today, World Youth Day, I would like to mention all those young saints, especially the saints “next door” to us, known only to God; sometimes he likes to surprise us with them. Dear young people, do not be ashamed to show your enthusiasm for Jesus, to shout out that he is alive and that he is your life. Yet at the same time, do not be afraid to follow him on the way of the cross. When you hear that he is asking you to renounce yourselves, to let yourselves be stripped of every security, and to entrust yourselves completely to our Father in heaven, then rejoice and exult! You are on the path of the kingdom of God.
Festive acclamations and brutal torture; the silence of Jesus throughout his Passion is profoundly impressive. He also overcomes the temptation to answer back, to act like a “superstar”. In moments of darkness and great tribulation, we need to keep silent, to find the courage not to speak, as long as our silence is meek and not full of anger. The meekness of silence will make us appear even weaker, more humble. Then the devil will take courage and come out into the open. We need to resist him in silence, “holding our position”, but with the same attitude as Jesus. He knows that the battle is between God and the prince of this world, and that what is important is not putting our hand to the sword but remaining firm in faith. It is God’s hour. At the hour that God comes forth to fight, we have to let him take over. Our place of safety will be beneath the mantle of the holy Mother of God. As we wait for the Lord to come and calm the storm (cf. Mt 4:37-41), by our silent witness in prayer we give ourselves and others “an accounting for the hope that is within [us]” (1 Pet 3:15). This will help us to live in the sacred tension between the memory of the promises made, the suffering present in the cross, and the hope of the resurrection.
Pope Francis
Palm Sunday 2019
Announcing a “God on the Cross”. For all!
Romeo Ballan, MCCJ
On the threshold of Holy Week, which begins today (Gospel), there is a question: “Who is he?” (Matt. 21:10). The people of the city in turmoil were asking the same question, as Jesus was entering Jerusalem amid the applause of supporters, sitting not on a strong horse or a racehorse but on a borrowed donkey… That entrance was a missionary event, an epiphany of Jesus to the people. A fleeting moment of triumph, just for one day, but at least served to raise questions about Jesus’ identity. The crowd had a ready answer: “This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth in Galilee” (Mt 21:11). A right answer, but on their lips was a somewhat ephemeral response, judging by their behaviour on the following days. A sincere desire to deepen the understanding of the identity of that amazing prophet from Nazareth would have been better. Like, for instance, the expressed desire of some Greek pilgrims who had gone up to Jerusalem and said to Philip: “We want to see Jesus” (Jn 12:21).
The replies to the initial question are found in various texts of this special Week. A first answer is given by Jesus himself, prompted by the request of those Greeks: He is the grain of wheat that falls to the ground and dies to bear much fruit (cf. Jn 12:24); He is the Master who invites all to follow Him to share his fate (cf. Jn 12:26); He is the Lord who can say: “And when I am lifted up from the earth, I shall draw all men to myself” (Jn 12:32). The universal destiny of his death on the cross, lifted up from the earth, is also clearly stated in the variations of the ancient codes: I will draw ‘all’, ‘all men’, ‘every man’… His salvation is offered, as a gift, for all those who, with a sincere heart, “will look on the one whom they have pierced” (Jn 19:37), that is, for those who, with faith, compassion and love, look at Christ lifted on the cross (cf. Nb 21:8; Zc 12:10). This is the surprising situation of the Roman centurion and of the other pagan soldiers who, when they saw what happened, exclaimed: “Truly this was the Son of God!” (Mt 27:54). “Jesus is really the Son of God, for the reason that he stayed on the Cross instead of coming down (cf. Mt 27:40.42); and while the Jews rejected him, the pagans recognized him. The pagans saw what the Jews failed to see” (Bruno Maggioni).
The key to understanding who is this Son of God, who becomes a grain of wheat and dies on the Cross to draw all men to himself, is given by John the evangelist in the Last Supper of Jesus with his disciples: “He loved them to the end” (Jn 13:1). It is a declaration of an excessive love, open to all in space and time. Words that invite us to live the Holy Week in a universal dimension, contemplating and proclaiming a Godon the crossfor all. St. Daniel Comboni had understood how important it was for his missionaries to be formed by this contemplation and recommended it in his Rule: “They will develop in themselves this most essential disposition (spirit of sacrifice) by keeping their eyes fixed on Jesus Christ, loving him tenderly and seeking always to understand more fully the meaning of a God who died on the cross for the salvation of souls.” (Writings, 2721).
The long narrative (Gospel) of the conviction and execution of an innocent person goes far beyond the usual nasty criminal events: It contains the ‘Good News’ of Christ the Saviour, crucified and risen, whom the missionaries preach everywhere in the world. The fundamental choices and attitudes of the disciples spring forth from this central core of the Gospel. Let me cite one example among many: the refusal of violence and the use of arms, as shown by Jesus to Peter: “Put your sword back, for all who draw the sword, will die by the sword” (v. 52). An emblematic statement for Christians, which already the apologist Tertullian (III century) commented by saying: “disarming Peter, Jesus took away the weapons from the hands of every soldier.”
The Song of the Servant (I Reading), who listens and does not turn away (v. 4.5), and especially the Christological hymn of the Philippians (II Reading) narrate the complete cycle of that God-man onthe cross: His divine pre-existence, the voluntary emptying of himself, his humbling to the death on the cross, his glorification by being given the name of Lord, before whom all are invited to bend their knees, “to the glory of God the Father” (v. 11). The glory of the Father is the goal toward which all the work of the missionary Church aims. In addition to filial obedience, the hymn of the Philippians “shows us also solidarity with our brothers and sisters: Christ became like us, took up our humble state, and indeed he showed solidarity with the worst criminals and with those condemned to death on a cross “(A. Vanhoye).
The message of the Passion, though it always remains an uphill battle, is able to perform the miracle of turning people’s hearts and lives. When we come to the Passion of Jesus, no one is a mere spectator. Everyone is an actor, has arole in today’s Passion which Jesus continues to live in his mystical Body, in the human family. Discarded the roles of negative characters (Judas, Pilate, the chief priests, the Sanhedrin, the crowd that is being manipulated…), we can choose the role of Simon the Cyrene (v. 32), Pilate’s wife (v. 19), the Centurion (v. 54), the pious women, Magdalene, Mary, John, Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus… The role of the Christian, and particularly of the missionary, is the role of Simon of Cyrene, in solidarity with the crucified people of history, bringing the salvation wrought by Jesus.
His crime to have loved and taught to love
Fernando Armellini
Introduction
Jesus is at table with the Twelve and, while they are having dinner, he turns to them, saying, “One of you will betray me.” Then they, deeply saddened, begin to ask him, one by one, “Surely not I, Lord?” Judas, the traitor, says, “Is it I, Rabbi?” Jesus replied, “You have said it” (Mt 26:20-25).
One should know if he is a traitor or not; what need is there to ask Christ? Judas is hypocritical until the end but why do the others ask, “Is it I?”
If things had gone just in this way, the response of Jesus that unmasks the traitor would have been followed by the immediate reaction of the eleven and the settling of accounts with the culprit. Instead, dinner quietly resumes.
One pastoral concern moves Matthew to place the question on the lips of everyone present. He wants every Christian to continue to ask the question: Am I a traitor?
Judas is the symbol of the anti-disciple, one who cultivates projects opposite to those of Jesus. He is one who is willing to betray his faith for the sake of money. He is ready to place himself at the head of those who struggle against the forces of good.
The true disciple does not illude himself to be immuned from this danger. He knows his own frailty; he knows that can easily become self-deluded and, perhaps in good faith transforms himself a traitor, siding against the Master, playing the game of the enemies of life.
Only the constant comparison with the word of God and the supreme gesture of his love can prevent naive, arrogant certainties and tragic illusions.
First Reading: Isaiah 50:4-7
Explaining the first reading of the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, we talked about a mysterious character who comes in the scene in the second part of the book of Isaiah. It is about the “Servant of the Lord.” In today’s reading, this “Servant” reappears and speaks.
It initially describes the mission given to him. He is sent to proclaim a message of consolation to the downtrodden and without hope (v. 4). He only and always speaks words of comfort to those lost in evil ways and not able to find back the right way, for those wrapped up and grope in darkness.
He then clarifies the way with which he will fulfill his mission (vv. 4-5). The Lord gave him an ear to listen and a mouth able to communicate. What he heard was not pleasant, but he did not accept compromises. He did not pull back and knew how to resist (v. 5).
Finally, he recounts what happened to him and what were the consequences of his coherence. He faithfully communicated the message heard. He was beaten, insulted, slapped, spat in the face but he did not react. He continued to trust in the Lord (v. 7).
Listening particularly to the last part of the reading, one is spontaneously induced to take this Servant as Jesus (Christians have made this link immediately after Easter). As “Servant of the Lord” Jesus kept listening to the Father and spoke only words of consolation and hope. He gave comfort to the disheartened and marginalized. He ended like the Servant as spoken in the book of Isaiah (cf. Mt 27:27-31).
The risk is to pause to contemplate and admire the faithfulness of Jesus, to be moved in the face of what he has suffered, to feel outrage at the injustices he went through and to conclude that, even today, some hero faithful to God can repeat the same dramatic experience of the Servant of the Lord.
Not any hero, but every believer is called to carry out the mission of the “Servant” of Christ: to keep listening to the word of God, to translate into action what was heard and be willing to bear the consequences.
Second Reading: Philippians 2:6
The community of Philippi was very good and Paul was proud of it. However, as if often happens, there was even a bit of envy among Christians. Someone was trying to attract attention to oneself and impose one’s will on others. This situation caused Paul to make a heartfelt recommendation in the first part of the letter: “Make me very happy; have one love, one spirit, one feeling; do nothing through rivalry or vain conceit. Do not seek your own interest but rather that of others” (Phil 2:2-4).
To better impart this teaching in the minds and hearts of the Philippians, Paul presents the example of Christ. He does this by quoting a beautiful hymn, known in many Christian communities of the first century.
The hymn tells the story of Jesus in two stanzas.
He already existed before becoming man. Becoming incarnate “he emptied himself” of his divine greatness. He accepted to take on the nature of a slave of death. He was not clothed in our humanity as an outer garment which he could get rid of. He assumed our human likeness: weakness, ignorance, fragility, passions, feelings and mortal condition. He appeared to our eyes in the humility of the most despised of men, a slave, one to whom the Romans reserved the ignominious punishment of the cross (vv. 6-8).
But the path he has traveled has not ended with the humiliation and death on the cross.
The second part of the hymn (vv. 9-11) sings the glory to which he is raised: the Father raised and held him up as a model for every person. He gave him the power and dominion over all creation. The entire humanity will end up to be united with him and at that time the plan of God will be accomplished.
Gospel: Matthew 26:14–27:66
All the evangelists devote much space to the story of the passion and death of Jesus. The facts are basically the same, though narrated in different ways and with different perspectives. Each evangelist presents his own episodes and details of choice, underscoring different aspects. These reveal their particular interest in certain aspects of catechesis, considered significant and urgent for their particular community.
Today’s version of the passion is that of Matthew. In our comment, we will highlight only its characteristic aspects.
The first and most important is that Matthew punctuates the whole story with repeated references to the fulfillment of the Scriptures. When it was evening, Jesus sat at table with the Twelve. While they were eating, Jesus utters a phrase, the key to understanding everything that will happen as a result: “The Son of man is going as it is written of him” (Mt 26:24).
Later, in the garden of Olives, when the guards approach to arrest him as if he were a bandit, he reacts by saying, “But all this has happened to fulfill the Scriptures of the prophets” (Mt 26:56).
Matthew notes that even the most marginal details of the passion—for instance, the betrayal of Judas forthirty pieces of silver—were announced by the prophets (Mt 27:9-10).
We especially have a parallel, wanted by this evangelist, between the passion of Jesus and the drama lived out in Psalm 22:
– Like Jesus on the cross (Mt 27:46) this man also turns to the Lord the cry: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Ps 22:2).
– He is the object of the same derision: “All who see me make a jest of me; they sneer and shake their heads: He put his trust in the Lord, let the Lord rescue him. If the Lord is his friend, let him help him” (Ps 22:8-9). It is exactly what happened at the foot of the cross and the insults addressed to Jesus were identical (Mt 27:39,41-43).
– Like Jesus (Mt 27:34,48) he thirsts: “My throat is dried up like a potsherd” (Ps 22:16).
– He is surrounded by evildoers and says, “They have pierced my hands and feet” (Ps 22:17). He continues: “They divide my garments among them, casting lots for my raiment” (Ps 22:19). At the foot of the cross, the soldiers that crucified him divided his clothing among themselves (Mt 27:35).
– Finally, like Jesus (Mt 27:50), he also emits a cry (Ps 22:25).
–Such corresponding incidents are numerous. We tend to suppose that the author of the psalm intended an accurate prediction, right down to the detail of what, one day, would happen to the Messiah. It’s not like that.
The striking similarities are due to the evangelist’s theological choice. He wanted to tell about the passion and death of Jesus, bearing in mind the schema set out in this psalm. He did it to assist his readership in going beyond mere record and grasp the deeper meaning of what was happening.
The other evangelists also quote the scriptures, but none with so much insistence. The reason is that Matthew wrote his Gospel to the Jews who had been educated in the catechesis of the rabbis to wait for a victorious, dominating, great and powerful messiah. Given the failure with which Jesus’ life ended, who could have the courage to present him as the messiah?
At the foot of the cross, the priests, scribes and elders challenge to Jesus: “Save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross” (Mt 27:40) is to be understood in this light. I am prone to believe in a winner, not a loser.
To the Jews and all those who, even today are shocked by a defeated Messiah, Matthew responds: the Old Testament’s prophecies announce a humiliated, persecuted Messiah that would be put to death. They present him as the companion of every suffering and oppressed person.
God has not miraculously saved Christ from a difficult situation. He has not obstructed the injustice and the death of his Son. He, instead, transformed his defeat into victory, his death into birth, his tomb into a womb from which he was taken to a life without end.
In him God has made it known that he does not overcome evil by hindering it with miraculous intervention, but by taking away its power to harm, even making it a time of growth for people. Letting him be guided and enlightened by the Scriptures—as Matthew tells us to do—it is difficult to assimilate this logic of God. It is difficult to accept that “unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much fruit” (Jn 12:24).
A second lesson on which Matthew particularly insists is the repudiation of violence and all use of weapons. Only he reports the words of Jesus to Peter, who tried to defend him with a sword: “Put your sword back into its place, for all who take hold of the sword will die by the sword” (Mt 26:52).
Tertullian, the famous apologist of the first to the second century, commented: “Disarming Peter, Jesus took away the weapons from the hands of every soldier.” A few decades later, the biblical scholar Origin echoed, “We Christians no longer grip the sword; we don’t anymore learn the art of war because through Jesus we have become children of peace.”
The early Christians had no doubt: the disciple of Christ must be willing, like the Master, to give his life for his brothers and sisters, never and not for any reason to kill them.
One of the issues close to Matthew’s heart is the universality of salvation.
Israel cannot consider herself the only and jealous depositary of the promises. She played the role that the Lord has entrusted to her: to prepare the coming of God’s Kingdom. Now she is expected to be first among the guests in the banquet hall (Mt 22:1-6).
Unfortunately, Israel has rejected the invitation. In the early Christian community, it is experienced as a painful laceration, like “a sword that pierces the soul” (Lk 2:35), as “a thorn in the flesh” (2 Cor 12:7).
There are two facts in the passion narrative that only Matthew refers to: the dream of Pilate’s wife and the procurator’s gesture of washing his hands, thus unloading all the blame of Jesus’ death sentence on the Jews (Mt 27:19,24). They express in a symbolic way the drama of this people and the responsibility that she has taken in not accepting the Messiah sent to her by God. The maximum expression of this refusal is the cry: “His blood be on us and on our children” (Mt 27:25).
The nonsensical interpretation of this phrase has had tragic consequences: hatred, absurd accusations, violence and a Christian persecution of the Jews.
The meaning attributed to it by Matthew is totally different. Upset by the misfortunes that had struck the people in the second half of the first century A.D. and culminating in the destruction of Jerusalem, he had isolated the cause of all evil: The Jews had chosen violence and rejected the reign of peace announced by Jesus.
The evangelist wants to warn of the danger of repeating the same mistake. Whoever walks away from Christ to pursue another messiah, trusts in violence, cultivates plans of domination that will always end up in disaster: He allows blood to fall on himself and on his own children.
Only Matthew tells of the extraordinary events that occurred after the death of Jesus: “The earth quaked, rocks were split, the dead were raised to life …” (Mt 27:51-56).
At that time, it was thought that the world was full of iniquity and all awaited the birth of a new world. It was said that, during the transition between the two eras of humanity, the sun would be darkened; the trees would shed blood; the stones would break uttering cries and the dead would be resurrected.
That which Matthew says, therefore, should not be understood as the true account of something that happened on April 7 year 30, but as the affirmation of a theologian who, at the time of Jesus’ death, is aware of the birth of a new world. His is a message of joy and hope, sent to all those who are in anguish and pain and feel enveloped in the darkness of death. The Kingdom of God began when, on the cross, the Lord revealed all his love and his interest in the fate of humankind.
Another incident reported only by Matthew is the death of Judas (Mt 27:3-10).
This disciple is the symbol of all those who, for a time, follow Jesus. Then they become aware that he does not realize their dreams of glory and their thirst for power. They abandon him and even turn against him.
The episode is narrated along the lines of the one true suicide in the Old Testament, that of Ahithophel, a betrayer of David (2 Sam 17:23). It presents shadows and mysteries that will never be clarified from the historical point of view.
If we free ourselves from the stereotypes for a moment, we can experience respect and compassion for the plight of this man. Peter and John and the other evangelists spoke about him in general terms. It seems that, within the group of the apostles, he had no friends. When he saw the only one who loved him go to his death, he must have felt terribly alone in carrying the weight of his mistake. He’s gone, unfortunately, to vent his remorse, his inner torment to the wrong people, the temple priests who used him. If he had turned to Christ, his life would have ended in another way.
Finally, only Matthew speaks of the guards placed in the custody of the tomb (Mt 27:62-66): they are a sign of the triumph of evil. Their presence testifies that the righteous one is defeated, the deliverer silenced, locked forever in a tomb.
It is our experience: evil always gives the impression of being assured of a final triumph, easily becoming the dream of the poor, the weak and the hope of the defenseless for justice.
God, however, ensures his unexpected intervention. His angel will roll back and sit on every stone that prevents the return to life (Mt 28:2). The soldiers, placed to defend injustice and iniquity, will flee in terror from his light (Mt 28:4).
Fernando Armellini
Italian missionary and biblical scholar
https://sundaycommentaries.wordpress.com
