Take One’s Cross

Killing and displaying enemies on poles was an ancient practice. The Egyptians stuck a pointed pole through the stomachs or chests of their enemies and posted the poles for all to see, called impaling. The bodies rotted and fell, or the birds ate their carcasses. After killing Saul and Jonathan, the Philistines displayed their dead bodies at Mt. Gilboa (2 Sam 1:17–27). The Assyrians, Babylonians, and Persians, too, practice impaling. At Xerxes’s command, Haman was impaled on a pole he built for Mordecai (Esth 8:7). Although Greeks in Greece didn’t practice impaling, their descendants in farther east did, including the Hasmoneans. At Sadducees’ request, Alexander Jannaeus (a Hasmonean king, a descendant of the Maccabees) captured and impaled eight hundred Pharisees. Rome perfected impaling. All the Roman historians – Cicero, Plautus, Seneca, Tacitus, and Plutarch – talked about emperors impaling their enemies. Around 73 BC, for example, Marcus Crassus captured, killed, and displayed six thousand slaves on the Appian Way (the road between Naples and Rome) for wanting freedom.

Although impaling was an old practice, describing the “cross” in a T-shape and calling it crucifixion (from Latin crux) came much later, between 200 to 400 AD. Until then, only single poles were used for impaling (although some were impaled upside down or impaled through their genitals. Even the word “cross,” stauros, meant “an upright pale or stake,” “such as used in fences or palisades” (Liddell & Scott, TDNT). And thinking of it as a fashion accessory for celebrities to wear is a modern development.

“Take one’s cross” meant “be ready to die, that is, a political enemy who would be put to death and impaled on a pole for others to see and mock.”

After describing his imminent death, Jesus said to the crowd and the disciples,

“If anyone wishes to follow after me, deny oneself, take the cross, and follow me.” (Mark 8:34)

In simple terms, “You will have to die with me.” This was a call of a revolutionary. When Judas Maccabees brought revolution after Antiochus IV Epiphanies defiled the temple by offering a pig on it, he made a similar cry. And the Zealots heeded his cry, followed him, fought along with him, and lost their lives.

Peter had just declared that Jesus was their Christ, the Messiah. Would he join the Messiah, fight for his cause, and die with him?

Jesus continued,

“Whoever wishes to save his/her soul will lose. It. Whoever loses his/her soul for me and the gospel will save it. What credit does a person have to gain the whole world and to lose one’s soul?” (8:35–36)

The word for “life” is zoe (from which we get zoology), and the word for “soul” is pseuche (from which we get psychology). Jesus wasn’t talking about losing one’s life but one’s soul. Although one would imagine taking a cross led to the loss of one’s physical life, a greater loss awaited those who lost their soul. Jesus explained:

“If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this idolatrous and sinful generation, I too will be ashamed of him/her when I come, along with all the holy angels, in the glory of my Father.” (8:38)

For the crowd and the disciples, losing their souls was to be ashamed of Jesus and his words before their peers. When they did, Jesus couldn’t side with them either. Losing Jesus’s testimony (i.e., soul death) was much more disastrous than losing one’s physical life. Jesus himself was going to the cross. Will they take their cross and die with him? Will we?