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Last week, we began to look at what Jesus endured before being nailed to the cross; yes, nailed. We pick up the story by noting that evidence of nailing the feet on either side of the stipes comes from a fortuitous 1968 archeological excavation of a burial cave in Giv’at ha-Mivtar.
The discovery yielded the remains of an individual crucified by the Romans, including the right calcaneum (heel bone) through which the crucifixion nail was driven, complete with the nail (still present piercing the bone) through and through. It is important to note that these were no small nails.
The dimensions of the nail that penetrated the heel bone measured 11.5 cm (4.53”) long with a square diameter of 1 cm (3/8”). Dr. Willam Edwards and colleagues said the likely “damage to the peroneal nerve and its branches of the medial and lateral plantar would have been substantial by the nails.” Likewise, nails driven through the wrist “would crush or sever the sensorimotor median nerve in the wrist, resulting in paralysis of the hand.” Once hanging upon the cross, the victim would immediately be faced with the inability to exhale air from the lungs due to the natural slumping weight of the body pulling down on the arms, placing the respiratory muscles in the abdomen in a fixed inhalation state.
To overcome this state and allow for exhalation, the victim would begin a cycle of pulling up by his nailed wrist and pushing up with the feet (also nail pierced) in order to bring the arms down enough to regain momentary control of the intercostal respiratory muscles and the diaphragm needed to exhale.
The difficulty and pain associated with this position only allowed the victim to remain in the exhale position for a moment before he slumped back down, arms fully extended. For a victim on the cross, there is either this cycle of rising to exhale and slumping back to inhale, or the victim quickly dies from asphyxiation. There is no static resting period; the victim is in constant motion to remain alive; that’s part of the torture.
When apparent death did come upon Jesus, critic David Mirsch claims that the Roman soldiers merely pierced his side to ascertain if he was alive or dead. At this point, Jesus was not cycling up and down; he was motionless.
The Gospel accounts indicate that the centurion standing before Jesus “saw” that he had died, indicating a motionless state. Even had Jesus been rendered to a comatose state by drugs, as Mirsch contends, death by asphyxiation from this motionless state would have overtaken him in a very short time. Under the swoon hypothesis of Mirsch, Jesus was removed from the cross after six hours of this asphyxiant cycling, unconscious and near death. Even if Jesus had been removed from the cross very soon after having been nailed to it, He would still have an enormous amount of bodily trauma to recover from in just three short days.
It’s important to realize that the paralytic damage to the hands and feet of Jesus due to the nails would be magnified by the removal of Jesus from the cross. A non-traumatic, non-damaging method of removing a body nailed to a cross is not forthcoming. Additionally, had Jesus presented himself to the disciples in this manner, he would likely have had no use of his paralytic hands. However, more physiological trauma was to begin as the pulmonary system of Jesus would begin to respond. Dr. Davis writes, “Then another agony began: a deep crushing pain in the chest as the pericardium, the sac surrounding the heart, slowly filled with serum and began to compress the heart.” As evening approached, the Roman soldiers broke the legs of the two thieves being crucified with Jesus to hasten their death, but when they came to Jesus, they found him already dead. As a measure of assurance, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’s side and released blood and water (John 18:34).
The water is considered by medical experts to be evidence of hypovolemia (decreased blood volume), as well as pleural and pericardial effusions (fluid accumulation around the heart) associated with impending acute heart failure. The blood, in contrast, may have originated from the right atrium, ventricle, or a hemopericardium (blood leaking into the pericardial sac).
The surprise of Pilate at the quick death of Jesus on the cross is not surprising to physicians. Considering the evidence, many physicians suggest Jesus died suddenly of cardiac rupture brought on by the trauma of scourging and the crucifixion associated with hypovolemia (low blood volume), hypoxemia (low blood oxygen), and an altered coagulable state (clot forming) that could have produced a cardiac blockage and caused cardiac rupture. Such were the horrors of a Roman cross.
Gloria in excelsis Deo.
Ty B. Kerley, DMin., is an ordained minister who teaches Christian apologetics and relief preaches in Southern Oklahoma. Dr. Kerley and his wife, Vicki, are members of the Waurika church of Christ and live in Ardmore, OK. You can contact him at [email protected].
