Nothing? Nothing at all?
'My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? Why are you so far from helping Me, and from the words of My groaning? O My God, I cry in the daytime, but You do not hear; and in the night season, and am not silent.'
Sorry, I've been out and didn't have time to reply.
I certainly have, three in fact.
Psalm 22:1, Matt. 27:46 and Mark 15:34. They seem perfectly clear to me. I can't imagine why anyone would want to contradict them.
The abandonment was obviously not permanent (Phil. 2:9 etc.), which of course gives us great hope that when the heavens are as brass to us and we have no feeling whatsoever of the presence of God, we should not despair because He sent His Son that way.
Thank you, brother, for that explanation. Your foundation is “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Your interpretation of this verse is Jesus crying out that the Father had separated himself from him on the cross. This seems to be eisegesis to me.
Here then is where I think we have departed on the topic of Jesus being separated from God. It is in the definition of “forsake.” The word can, I grant, mean to leave in a sense (to physically withdraw one’s presence and forsake someone to a situation). But separation is not really a part of that definition. To forsake someone can also mean to leave in a situation (not withdrawing one’s presence), and it is used this way often in scripture as well. So I can grant these two definitions, and we can see which applies.
This is why I believe “forsake” here means to allow suffering, or abandoning to suffering, rather than actually leaving or deserting.
First, on the cross Jesus is quoting Scripture. It was custom to quote a line but indicate a broader contest (we see this quite a bit in the Pauline epistles). Jesus is quoting the scripture that he is fulfilling (Psalm 22). Psalm 22 begins “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” but as the psalm progresses it becomes very apparent that God had not actually forsaken or abandoned him. It is, in the psalm, a plea to God and indeed a plea based on the fact that God will never abandon his righteous one. The Psalm itself denies such a separation.
Second, Matthew 27:46-49 does not indicate that the bystanders understood Jesus’ words in the context of being abandoned. Instead, their reaction appears to indicate that they understood his comments within the context of a plea for deliverance, and they awaited to see if that deliverance would come. It, of course, did as the Father justified the Son, but not in the context that the audience expected.
Third, Psalm 91:12 (as quoted in Lk. 4:9 and Mt. 4:6) also affirms the context that the audience seems to have attributed to Christ’s words on the cross. Jesus is not speaking of a separation, but is calling out to God as his Righteous One for deliverance, and he was delivered. God did not abandon his Holy One (Ps. 16:10). This is speaking of the flesh, of God redeeming Christ bodily (for that day he was in Paradise).
Fourth, in contrast to the notion that Jesus was suffering our punishment in the form of being separated from God (a “spiritual death”), Romans 8:3 tells us that the Father sent his own Son in the “likeness of sinful flesh and for sin he condemned sin in the flesh.” There is no need of this separation because our spiritual punishment is not a payment needing to be made before God can forgive. The issue is sinful flesh.
Fifth, God is immutable (Malachi 3:6; Num. 23:19; Ps. 102:25-27; Ps. 33:11; Isaiah 46:10; etc.). If you read those passages this refers to God’s spirit, his ontological nature. When we speak of God, he is always the same. Not the same in action, but the same in nature. John 10:30 tells us that he and the Father are One. John 1 tells us that Jesus was with God and he was God. The doctrine of immutability means that the Father and the Son and the Spirit will always be One. No separation.
Sixth, 2 Cor. 5:19 tells us that in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself. We cannot separate the Father from this equation. If that separation occurred, then there is a sense whereby God was reconciling the world to himself, but the mode is damaged if Jesus is somehow separated from the Father (and Spirit) at the cross.
Is there any verse of scripture that defends the interpretation of "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me" to mean that God separated from Jesus on the cross, or are we just to take it on "my theory depends on it" to interpret the passage? Can we not at least try to let scripture interpret scripture?
