Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took His garments
One event with many revelations
I.
The SPOLIATION OF DEATH. Christ is crucified. Death has completed its work. What had it done?
1. It had not destroyed His existence. He had gone in His full personality, and in the plenitude of His powers to His God and ours.
2. It had not destroyed His character. Death cannot rob us of this. It is the only property we can carry out of this world. What then does it take from us?
(1) Our material frames. Here was Christ’s body torn from Him--the body through which He looked out at the universe, through which He received His sensations, by which He delivered His sublime doctrines and wrought His marvellous deeds. A precious thing is the body, and yet death takes it from every man, however much he may appreciate it.
(2) Our material property. The garments of Christ were His only earthly property, but of them He was stripped. No doubt He valued them, not merely on account of their utility, but on account of those hands of love that had woven and presented them. Such is the spoliation of death. “We brought nothing into the world,” &c.; “Naked came we,” &c. All of the earth which men struggle for and gain they must lose.
II. THE DESECRATIONS OF AVARICE--gambling over the garments of the Son of God. If aught of this earth were sacred, these were; yet avarice seizes them, gambles over them, and turns them to its sordid ends. Avarice has ever traded in the sacred, and now more than ever. It not only trades in corn, manufactures, &c., but in philanthropic and religious institutions. Preaching has become a trade; temples, houses of merchandise; charitable societies, organs of worldly greed.
III. THE CULMINATION OF WICKEDNESS. Where can you see
1. Baser ingratitude than in putting to death One who “went about doing good”?
2. More outrageous injustice than in torturing One who was exquisitely tender and overflowing with mercy? Truly the Crucifixion is the culmination of sin! And yet it is marvellous that the most consummate production of human wickedness should be made by God the instrument by which to banish it from the world. Thus sin frustrates its own purpose. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
Now the coat was without seam.
More exactly the tunic, or undergarment. It reached from the neck to the feet, while the outer “garment” was a square rug thrown round the body. Ordinarily the tunic consisted of two pieces connected at the shoulder by clasps; but that worn by Jesus was made in one piece. This seems to have been the rule with the priestly tunic. (Archdn. Watkins.)
Legend of the Holy Coat
This relic is alleged to have been discovered in the fourth century by Helena, the mother of Constantine, and by her deposited at Treves, at that time the capital of Belgie Gaul and residence of the later Roman emperors. Concealed in a crypt from the Normans in the ninth century, it was rediscovered in 1196, and then exhibited, and, not exhibited again till 1512, when Leo X. appointed it to be shown once every seven years. The Reformation and wars prevented the observance for some time, but the celebration was attended in 1810 by a concourse of 227,000 persons, and by a larger number in 1844, when Archbishop Arnoldi announced a centenary. Net only were miraculous cures asserted to have been wrought by this relic, but this celebration is memorable for the reaction which it produced, leading to the secession of Johann Rouge and the German Catholics from the Church of Rome. The dimensions given on an engraving, published at Treves in 1844, are, from the extremity of each sleeve, 5 feet 5 inches; length from collar to lowermost edge, 5 feet 2 inches. In parts it is tender or threadbare; and some stains upon it are reported to be those of the Redeemer’s blood. It is a loose garment of coarse material, dark brown in colour, probably the result of age, and entirely without seam or decoration. (Biblical Museum.)
Let us not rend it.--Bengel observes that we never read of our Lord “rending” His own garments in desperate sorrow, like Job, Jacob, Joshua, Caleb, Jepthah, Hezekiah, Mordecai, Ezra, Paul, and Barnabas (see Gen_37:29; Num_14:6; Jdg_11:35; 2Ki_19:1; Est_4:1; Job_1:20; Act_14:14). (Bp. Ryle.)
