METAPHYSICAL INTERPRETATION OF JOHN CHAPTER 19
19:1Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him. 19:2And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and arrayed him in a purple garment; 19:3and they came unto him, and said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they struck him with their hands. 19:4And Pilate went out again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring him out to you, that ye may know that I find no crime in him. 19:5Jesus therefore came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple garment. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold, the man! 19:6When therefore the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify him, crucify him! Pilate saith unto them, Take him yourselves, and crucify him: for I find no crime in him. 19:7The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.
19:8When Pilate therefore heard this saying, he was the more afraid; 19:9and he entered into the Praetorium again, and saith unto Jesus, Whence art thou? But Jesus gave him no answer. 19:10Pilate therefore saith unto him, Speakest thou not unto me? Knowest thou not that I have power to release thee, and have power to crucify thee? 19:11Jesus answered him, Thou wouldest have no power against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath greater sin. 19:12Upon this Pilate sought to release him: but the Jews cried out, saying, If thou release this man, thou art not Caesar's friend: every one that maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar. 19:13When Pilate therefore heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment-seat at a place called The Pavement, but in Hebrew, Gabbatha. 19:14Now it was the Preparation of the passover: it was about the sixth hour. And he saith unto the Jews, Behold, your King! 19:15They therefore cried out, Away with him, away with him, crucify him! Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar. 19:16Then therefore he delivered him unto them to be crucified.
19:17They took Jesus therefore: and he went out, bearing the cross for himself, unto the place called The place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha: 19:18where they crucified him, and with him two others, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst. 19:19And Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross. And there was written, JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS. 19:20This title therefore read many of the Jews, for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city; and it was written in Hebrew, and in Latin, and in Greek. 19:21The chief priests of the Jews therefore said to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am King of the Jews. 19:22Pilate answered, What I have written I have written.
19:23The soldiers therefore, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also the coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. 19:24They said therefore one to another, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith,
They parted my garments among them,
And upon my vesture did they cast lots.19:25These things therefore the soldiers did. But there were standing by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 19:26When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! 19:27Then saith he to the disciple, Behold, thy mother! And from that hour the disciple took her unto his own home.
19:28After this Jesus, knowing that all things are now finished, that the scripture might be accomplished, saith, I thirst. 19:29There was set there a vessel full of vinegar: so they put a sponge full of the vinegar upon hyssop, and brought it to his mouth. 19:30When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up his spirit.
THE CONTEST FOR supremacy between the intellectual forces, represented by Pilate, and the pseudospiritual, represented by the Jews, is portrayed in John 19. Both contenders realize that it is a momentous occasion, and they seek to shift the responsibility for the destruction of the coming King Jesus and His rule. The rabble (sense consciousness) arrays Him in mock royal robes and a crown and cries, "Hail, King of the Jews!" Thus the sense man jeers at religion. To the ruling intellect Jesus has committed no wrong, and it beholds Him as a morally good man, saying, "Behold, the man!" When the Jews renew their cry of "Crucify him" because He claims to be the Son of God and a temporal ruler who is against Caesar, Pilate is troubled and appeals to Jesus, who replies that His rule is from above. When the Jews urge that Jesus is scheming to undermine and destroy Caesar's temporal rule Pilate becomes alarmed and calls a rehearing at Gabbatha (in Hebrew, a knoll or hill). We see at once that this signifies a high plane of human understanding.
Here Pilate (the intellect) again shifts the burden of rule to the Jews (the claimed spiritual authority) and says, "Shall I crucify your King?" The
Jews betray their allegiance to temporal things by replying, "We have no king but Caesar." The decision to crucify Jesus was a combination of intellect and pseudo Spirit and was carried out, as indicated, by the co-operation of those taking part. "Then therefore he [Pilate] delivered him unto them [the Jews] to be crucified," and "the soldiers therefore ... crucified Jesus."
The Crucifixion took place at Golgotha, "The place of a skull" (the front brain, the seat of the will and conscious understanding, the throne of the mind, where all ideas are tested and either enthroned or cast out). In the crucifixion of Jesus both Pilate and the Jews (both the intellect and the ruling spiritual ideas) unite in casting out the claim that man is the Son of God. Although Jesus (representing the spiritual man) was not allowed to establish His conscious rule in the front brain, He left a great unified doctrine of truth (represented by the seamless garment that the soldiers found they could not separate). So for two thousand years this Truth has endured and is now being made king in the conscious minds of those who believe. Before the Son of God is enthroned the tables must be turned, the intellect and the pseudospiritual must be crucified, and the great I AM elevated to the high place.
Jesus paid the supreme tribute to woman when on the cross He recognized her and designated her as the mother and preserver of love, to abide in the home of His beloved disciple John.
Jesus became one of our human family for a purpose, to make it possible for us to attain spiritual
consciousness, which we could not do without the example of someone who had attained the goal. That we are sons of God is merely an idea until it has been demonstrated and enthroned in consciousness. Man is a child of evolution, the evolution of the perfect man implanted in us as by the Father-Mind. We were on the way to final demonstration of the Son of God when we lost our way in the delusions of sense. A guide and helper became absolutely necessary. Jesus assumed this dangerous and humiliating role. He had to become one of us in flesh and intellect, and it is this flesh-and-intellect man whose career is represented as being consummated in the offer of vinegar made to Him at His last human breath on the cross. So it was not Jesus the man of great ideas that was crucified; it was the flesh-and-intellect man, who cried out, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"
19:31The Jews therefore, because it was the Preparation, that the bodies should not remain on the cross upon the sabbath (for the day of that sabbath was a high day), asked of Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. 19:32The soldiers therefore came, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other that was crucified with him: 19:33but when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs: 19:34howbeit one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and straightway there came out blood and water.19:35And he that hath seen hath borne witness, and his witness is true: and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye also may believe. 19:36For these things came to pass, that the scripture might be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken.19:37And again another scripture saith, They shall look on him whom they pierced.
The "Preparation" refers to the observances preliminary to the celebration of the Jewish Sabbath, or to the festival the day before the Sabbath. Among the Jews there was a law to the effect that a lifeless body should not remain upon the cross on the Sabbath, as this was a day set aside for rest and freedom from all troubled or contentious thoughts. Hence Jesus' body was ordered removed.
The Jews asked that the legs of Jesus might be broken and also those of the malefactors that were crucified with Him. Crushing the bones destroyed the last vestige of life in the body. Jesus appeared to be dead, but the inference is that He still retained contact with the bone marrow from which the blood or life is produced.
The fact that the demand of the Jews was not executed shows the higher law was at work and not a bone of Jesus' body was broken. The Scripture prophecy was carried out even to the piercing of His side, the place nearest the heart, the abode of love.
This whole Scripture reveals how those established in the intellect will seek to kill out the Christ, and also how they are ultimately defeated in His victory over death.
19:38And after these things Joseph of Arimathaea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, asked of Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus: and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore, and took away his body.
19:39And there came also Nicodemus, he who at the first came to him by night, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds. 19:40So they took the body of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths with the spices, as the custom of the Jews is to bury. 19:41Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden; and in the garden a new tomb wherein was never man yet laid. 19:42There then because of the Jews' Preparation (for the tomb was nigh at hand) they laid Jesus.
Jesus rested in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. Arimathea represents an aggregation of thoughts of lofty character, a high state of consciousness in man. Joseph represents a state of consciousness in which we increase in character along all lines. We not only grow into a broader understanding but we also increase in vitality and substance. Jesus' resting in Joseph's tomb symbolizes the truth that Jesus was resting in the consciousness of vitality and substance, was growing into a broader understanding, and was in truth gathering strength for the great demonstration over death to follow.
