Matthew 27:46

My Notes

What Does Matthew 27:46 Mean?

"And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Jesus quotes Psalm 22:1 from the cross — in Aramaic, his native language. The cry is loud (mega phōnē — a great voice, the last burst of strength from a dying man). The words are the most theologically dense sentence in Scripture: the Son of God, who has existed in eternal communion with the Father, experiences the sensation of divine abandonment. "My God, my God" — the relationship is claimed. "Why hast thou forsaken me?" — the relationship feels broken.

The cry is simultaneously the darkest moment of human history and the brightest moment of redemption: Jesus bears the weight of sin that produces the separation from God that sinners deserve — so they never have to.

Reflection Questions

• 1.What does Jesus crying in Aramaic (his most intimate language) reveal about the depth of the forsakenness?
• 2.How does 'my God' (possessive, claiming the relationship) coexist with 'why hast thou forsaken me' (experiencing abandonment)?
• 3.What does it mean for you personally that Jesus was forsaken so you never have to be?
• 4.When you feel forsaken by God, how does the cross change the meaning of that feeling?

Devotional

My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? The most agonized sentence ever spoken. From the lips of the person least deserving of forsakenness. Directed at the one whose presence has been his entire existence for all eternity. And spoken in the language he learned from Mary.

Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani. Aramaic. The language of home. The language of Nazareth dinner tables and Galilean fishing boats and childhood prayers at Mary's knee. Jesus doesn't cry out in Hebrew (the liturgical language) or Greek (the universal language). He cries in the language of his most intimate human identity. The forsakenness is felt at the deepest level of who he is — not as Messiah, not as Rabbi, but as the boy from Nazareth who learned to pray in Aramaic.

My God, my God. He still says "my." The possessive holds even in the abandonment. The relationship is claimed in the same breath that reports its apparent dissolution. I haven't stopped belonging to you. But you've stopped responding to me. You're still my God. And you've still forsaken me. Both.

Why? The question isn't theological ignorance. Jesus knows why. He told his disciples the cross was coming. He understands the substitutionary purpose. But knowledge doesn't eliminate experience. You can understand the purpose of surgery and still scream when the scalpel cuts. Jesus understands the theology of what's happening. He still feels the forsakenness as forsakenness.

The ninth hour. Three in the afternoon. The darkness that covered the land from noon to three is lifting (v. 45). The cry comes at the darkest point — and the darkness is more than atmospheric. It's the darkness of the Father turning his face from the Son who carries the sin of the world. The holy God looking away from the sin-bearing Son. Not because the Son did wrong. Because the Son is carrying wrong — all of it, everyone's, from every generation — and the holiness that can't look on sin turns away.

This is the moment that saves you. The forsakenness you deserved was absorbed by the one who didn't deserve it. The separation from God that your sin produced was experienced by the one who never sinned. Jesus was forsaken so you never have to be. The cry from the cross is the receipt for your redemption: paid in full. In Aramaic. In agony. At three o'clock on a Friday afternoon.

Commentary

Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.

Cross References

Related passages throughout Scripture