PHYSICAL CAUSE OF THE DEATH OF CHRIST.

The death of Christ on the cross being the central fact of the Christian religion, with which all other facts and all its doctrines are in essential vital relation, it will be admitted that every fact and every consideration that tends to confirm and elucidate that momentous event must be of supreme interest and importance. It is, therefore, not a little surprising that, until the appearance of Dr. Stroud's work,¹ the result of prolonged labour and learned research, no adequate attempt should have been made to demonstrate the nature of the immediate, essential, physical cause of the death of the Saviour. No doubt the more accurate and advanced physiological science of recent times has given superior advantages for the investigation of a subject which was long held to be surrounded by difficulties and obscurity. That the conclusions to which Dr. Stroud has arrived are valid and incontrovertible will, we think, be admitted by all who are competent to judge both of the facts that he adduces and the soundness of the inductive reasoning by which he arrives at his conclusions.

As, however, there is reason to think that the light which has now been shed on this sacred subject is not so generally known as is desirable, we have deemed it not inappropriate to present our readers, as a supplement to the subjects of which we have already treated, with a short account of the physical cause of our Lord's death, as demonstrated mainly through the researches of Dr. Stroud.

That the question is not one of mere curious interest, but has important bearings both on Christian evidences and doctrine, will be manifest on the slightest reflection. We, however, restrict ourselves, as far as may be, to what, without irreverence, may be called the scientific or medical aspect of the subject, and desire in limine to acknowledge, with Dr. Stroud, in the fullest manner, the union of the Divine and human nature in Christ, and that it is only with what relates to His perfect human nature, which alone could be subject to suffering and death, that we have here to do. The accounts given us by the four Evangelists, although not the only, are the chief, sources of information afforded to us by the Scriptures, and the combined evidence derived from both the Old and the New Testament shows that the whole transaction was extraordinary and unique.

'Many centuries before the event, the voice of prophecy had proclaimed that the Saviour of mankind would suffer a death at once violent and voluntary, as a criminal, and as a victim, universally approved by God and man, yet loaded with the malediction of both. His death was to be directed by Jewish priests without power, and executed by Gentile rulers without authority, and He was to be condemned on a charge in which, notwithstanding their religious hostility, both parties could unite in attesting and rejecting His claims as the Messiah. He was to suffer the death of the cross, which commonly happened by slow exhaustion, and in Judea was usually hastened by breaking the legs, yet none of His bones were to be broken. His heart was at the same time to be pierced, and He was to die suddenly, as a sin-offering by the effusion of His life's blood, the appointed means of atonement, although the former was not essential to the punishment of crucifixion, and the latter was the very reverse of its usual effect. The actual accomplishment of all these intricate and apparently discordant conditions is formally asserted in various parts of the New Testament not as a casual coincidence, but as indispensably necessary to the fulfilment of prophecy, the veracity of which would have been forfeited had any one of them failed to take place.'²

The principal causes to which the death of Christ was attributed by the older commentators and others were (1) the ordinary sufferings attendant on crucifixion; (2) an unusual degree of bodily weakness; (3) the wound inflicted by the soldier's spear; (4) supernatural interposition.

I. That the death of Christ should very generally have been supposed, by those who derived their knowledge of crucifixion as a punishment from the evangelical records alone, to have resulted from the ordinary and necessary sufferings attending that mode of execution is not surprising. But to obtain correct notions on this subject we must have recourse to other historical sources of information. These, indeed, clearly show that crucifixion was a peculiarly painful, lingering, and ignominious form of punishment, but that the sufferings, though great, have, either through ignorance or design, been much exaggerated. Numerous instances may be adduced from both ancient and modern authors in proof of its lingering nature, especially from the Roman Martyrology. From Origen and others of the early Fathers it would appear that two days was the usual period during which crucified persons survived, when death was not hastened by additional means. This is the period during which St. Andrew the apostle is reported to have lived on the cross, and which time he is said to have spent in preaching to the people. Victor. Bishop of Amiternum, who was crucified with his head downwards, a position which must have been unfavourable to life, survived the same period.³

In other recorded instances the sufferers have survived three days, and some even longer, though subjected to additional torture. From the examination of numerous recorded cases it appears that, in the absence of any extra cruelty beyond simple crucifixion, death seldom occurred within two days.

Jesus, however, died suddenly after enduring the suffering of the cross only six hours, whilst the malefactors crucified along with Him lived till their legs were broken. Pilate therefore, knowing this, 'marvelled if He were already dead,' and enquired of the centurion 'whether He had been any while dead,' when Joseph of Arimathea came and craved the body of Jesus. The application which the Jews made to Pilate, 'that their legs might be broken,' lest the bodies should remain on the cross during the Sabbath, was evidently prompted by the belief that otherwise death would not have ensued soon enough to avoid the infringement of their law.

2. 'His last sufferings befell Him when in the flower of His age, at the period of His greatest vigour and maturity. Those in the garden -of Gethsemane, although intense, were of short duration, and He was supernaturally strengthened for the very purpose of enabling Him to support them. Those incidental to crucifixion were not more severe in His case than in that of others. His deportment throughout the whole scene, whether in the garden, before the tribunal of the Sanhedrim and of Pilate, or at Golgotha, evinced the utmost piety, fortitude and self-possession. The circumstance of Simon the Cyrenian being compelled to assist in bearing His cross by no means proves that mere weakness disabled Christ from bearing it alone. The contrary appears, from His immediately afterwards addressing the Jewish women who bewailed His fate, and bidding them weep not for Him, but for themselves and their children. On arriving at the fatal spot He refused the cup of medicated wine usually given as a cordial to crucified persons; and after praying for His executioners, assuring the penitent malefactor of eternal happiness, providing for the future support of His widowed mother, and actively concurring in the fulfilment of prophecy. He suddenly expired amidst loud and fervent ejaculations, which alone were sufficient to show that He retained all His faculties of mind and body to the last moment of His life.'⁴

3. The contention of Granville Penn and others, that the death of Christ resulted from the wound inflicted by the soldier's spear, is mainly supported by a various reading of the Vatican and some other MSS., which interpose between verses 49 and 50 of Matthew's account the words, 'But another taking a spear, pierced His side, and there came forth water and blood.' This reading, however, is not generally accepted, and is not adopted either by the A. V. or the R. V.,⁵ though given by the latter in a note. But 'though excluded by almost all the ancient MS. versions and Fathers, and rejected by the principal critics and editors of the Greek Testament,' it was adopted by Chrysostom. In the opinion of Dr. Stroud and others, 'it is an unwarrantable interpolation in Matthew's Gospel of words borrowed from that of John, and stamped with internal marks of inconsistency and falsehood.' But even Chrysostom, maintaining as he did that Christ laid down His life by His own power, represents the spear-wound as having been inflicted on the body after death, of which proof will be adduced when we come to speak of the true physical cause of the death.

How inconsistent are the words as interpolated in Matthew's account both with what precedes and what follows, a careful reader will see, and has been fully shown by Dr. Stroud, whereas their position in the narrative of John, who specially emphasises the fact that he was an eye-witness of the events, is perfectly consistent with his record. An additional reason against the spear-wound having been inflicted during life is afforded by the fact that the soldiers were not at liberty to interfere with the execution at their pleasure. It was only when they believed that Christ was already dead, and that there was no necessity for them to carry out the command to break the legs, that the spear was employed to make certain the fact of death having already taken place.

4. That none of the views to which we have alluded have been considered tenable is shown by the prevalence, from the earliest times to the present day, of the opinion that it is to supernatural agency that the death of Christ is to be attributed. Tertullian, Origen, and many others of the ancient Christian writers, and of the most eminent among modern commentators, have maintained that Christ by a voluntary supernatural power 'laid down His life,' 'dismissed His spirit,' 'resigned His spirit,' 'let go His soul and delivered it up into the hands of God,' 'that His life was not forcibly extorted from Him but freely resigned.' These and similar expressions have been employed by those who believe that it was not by the intervention of any physical cause that the human life of Christ was extinguished. That it was not through force of necessity, but that He died freely and voluntarily when His nature was in full strength, must, it is thought, have been the conviction of the centurion when he exclaimed, 'Truly this was the Son of God.' We need not say how many passages of Scripture may be cited which seem to support such views. Our Lord Himself says, 'No man taketh My life from Me, but I lay it down of Myself.'

That this long-prevalent view, which assigns the Lord's death to supernatural agency, is inconsistent with His own language when speaking to His disciples, and with the teaching of Scripture in many places both of the Old and New Testament, is manifest. But it is not within our scope to enter on the discussion of the theological questions which are involved in any attempt to harmonise the various all-important Scriptural statements relating to the death of Him who offered Himself a sacrifice for the sins of the world, and who by 'wicked hands was crucified and slain.'

If none of the causes to which we have referred can be deemed to afford an adequate explanation of the immediate cause of our Lord's death, we naturally ask what other cause was there that can be both held to be sufficient and consistent with the circumstances of the case? To this Dr. Stroud has replied, Agony of mind, Producing rupture of the heart. The outline of the argument by which he has been led to this conclusion we give in his own words:

'In the garden of Gethsemane Christ endured mental agony so intense that, had it not been limited by Divine interposition, it would probably have destroyed His life without the aid of any other sufferings; but having been thus mitigated, its effects were confined to violent palpitation of the heart, accompanied with bloody sweat. On the cross this agony was renewed, in conjunction with the ordinary sufferings incidental to that mode of punishment; and having at this time been allowed to proceed to its utmost extremity without restraint, occasioned sudden death by rupture of the heart, intimated by a discharge of blood and water from His side, when it was afterwards pierced with a spear.'

The heart, which is the central and main power by which the circulation of the blood is effected, is a muscular organ consisting of four distinct chambers, through which the blood enters from all regions of the system and passes out to be distributed by the arteries throughout the body to the most remote parts. But though it is made up of muscular fibres it is not, like other muscles, under the control of the will. It is what is termed an 'involuntary muscle'; its requisite, ordained, regular action going on incessantly, so long as life lasts, uncontrolled by the will. Fixed only at its base, on which the rest of the organ moves, the free, uncontrolled action of its different compartments is secured by its being enclosed in an envelope, or sac, termed the ' pericardium,' the interior of which is lubricated by a thin clear secretion to obviate friction. But whilst its constant rhythmical action is maintained independent of the will, it manifests, more than any other organ of our body, that intimate connexion which exists between body and mind. Of this every one is more or less conscious. Hence the various current phrases employed to denote the effects of the passions and varying mental states on the heart's action, such as 'My heart jumps for joy,' 'My heart feels light;' 'it is oppressed, it is heavy, it is ready to break;' all indicating conscious disturbance of the heart induced by mental causes. Every physician knows that such phrases are not merely metaphorical, but that they really express actual derangements of the heart's action and condition, and often such as indicate danger to life. A fit of passion, sudden grief or joy, fear or terror, intense mental anxiety or strain, especially that which attends conflicting emotions, may through the medium of the heart so derange all the vital functions as to imperil and destroy life. The symptoms attending such disturbance vary with the character of the mental exciting causes, sometimes indicating dangerous over-excitement and action, and at others even more dangerous depression and failure of action. As the result of exciting passions we have forcible beating of the heart and rapid pulse, glowing features, glistening eye, quick breathing, giddiness, and headache. Depressing passions are attended by a feeble, scarcely discernible pulse, faint, tremulous action of the heart, pale features, profuse sweating, and gasping breath, ending in a swoon and final stoppage of the heart's action.

In all these dangerous forms of cardiac derangement there may be no actual structural disease of the heart, though every physician knows how difficult it often is to persuade a patient of this, who happens to be the frequent subject of palpitation and irregular action and sense of pain or discomfort about the heart, from various and especially moral causes. If, however, there be actual disease of the organ, any source of disturbed action becomes doubly dangerous, and many cases of sudden death occur from comparatively trivial exciting causes where the actual cardiac disease is of a very limited and apparently slight character. But the danger of actual rupture of the organ is greatest where, from impaired nutrition, its muscular power is seriously weakened; and of all causes inducing such disease none are more powerful than prolonged distressing and depressing mental states. The patient may often then be truly said to ' die of a broken heart.'

Assuming that the heart is in all respects sound and vigorous, the danger attending prolonged intense mental agony is yet great, for not only may rupture of the heart even then be the result, though effected in a somewhat different way, but the tension exerted on the whole circulating system may be such as to rupture the smaller vessels of the lungs or brain, or those supplying the surface of the body, and thus occasion hæmorrhage. There can be no doubt that death has often occurred in one or other of these ways, though it may be admitted that in the majority of cases there has been evidence of pre-existing cardiac disease.

A careful study of what is recorded as having transpired in the garden of Gethsemane is of the utmost importance in connexion with our subject, and it should be remembered that this account is given by Luke the physician. In his Gospel, chap. xxii. verses 41-44, we read (R. V.): 'And He was parted from them about a stone's cast; and He kneeled down and prayed, saying, Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from Me: nevertheless not My will, but Thine, be done. And there appeared unto Him an angel from heaven, strengthening Him. And being in an agony He prayed more earnestly: and His sweat became as it were great drops of blood falling down upon the ground.'⁶ In these verses there are terms employed which are strictly medical, and not used elsewhere in the New Testament. The radical meaning of the Greek word rendered * agony' is struggling or contention, and is described by Galen, the Greek medical authority,⁷ as a mental conflict between anger and fear, the one tending to drive the blood outwards and the other inwards to the vital organs, with corresponding outward pallor and coldness. Speaking generally, it implies a conflict between divers and contrary mental states, e. g. an impulse to resist danger and fear to encounter it. Thus in our Lord's case it would be the fitting expression to denote the severe mental struggle ' between the terror of death and the judicial anger of the righteous Father.' ' Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Thine, be done.'

The Greek word which both the A.V. and the R.V. render 'great drops' is θρόμβοι, which, in a general sense, means a concrete mass or lump of the solid constituents of a liquid, such as milk or blood. In the technical sense, in which it is used by Hippocrates and other medical authorities, it means a drop or mass of coagulated blood. In medical phraseology of the present day, a 'thrombus' is a clot of blood blocking up the calibre of a blood-vessel.

The adverb ὡσεὶ, translated 'as it were,' would seem to imply that the drops which fell to the ground were not pure blood, but merely sweat (ἱδρὼς) mixed with the colouring particles of the blood, and thus only resembling blood, though some authorities say that the adverbs ὡς and ὡσεὶ do sometimes imply reality.

Sudden and abnormally profuse sweating, as the result of intense mental excitement and anxiety, is of sufficiently common occurrence to be well known, and there are numerous cases on record in which such sweating has been bloody. In the Ephemerides several examples are given of bloody tears, as well as sweat, occasioned by extreme dread of death. Tissot reports the case of a sailor who was so alarmed in a storm that, through fear of death, he fell down and his face sweated blood, which, during the whole continuance of the storm, returned like ordinary sweat as fast as it was wiped away.⁸ In a case cited by Schenck from a martyrology, a nun, who was threatened by armed soldiers with instant death, was so terrified and agitated that she discharged blood from every part of her body, and died of hæmorrhage in the sight of her assailants.⁹ It would be easy from modern medical records to adduce evidence of hæmorrhage similarly induced, from small vessels supplying internal organs, such as the brain, occasioning rapid death.

Now the record tells us that the Divine Sufferer, 'when exceeding sorrowful even unto death,' 'sore amazed and very heavy,' 'being in an agony. He prayed more earnestly,' and was rescued by supernatural inter-position from the danger by which He was then threatened — 'an angel from heaven strengthening Him.'¹⁰

The sufferings in Gethsemane, overwhelming as they were, and threatening immediate death, were, however, wholly mental — anguish of soul. As yet the Saviour had been subjected to no bodily suffering from the hand of man. It was otherwise in the succeeding hours, previous to and during crucifixion. Bodily suffering of no ordinary kind was then superadded, though, for reasons already adduced, not such as afford us a satisfactory explanation of the death as it is recorded to have taken place. Doubtless the mental agony lasted, even if in a mitigated degree, throughout the proceedings that ended in His being condemned to die; but when on the cross it reached its utmost intensity, and drew forth the bitter exclamation, ' My God! my God! why hast Thou forsaken Me?' The cup then again presented was drunk to the very dregs. No supernatural relief then interposing, the violence of the strain on the heart was such as to occasion the rupture of its walls, with sudden suppression of all circulation, and so preventing such hæmorrhagic signs as occurred in the garden. The immediate consequence of rupture of the heart would be the effusion of blood into the pericardium. The amount poured out would depend on the extent and character of the ruptured opening. In similar cases the amount effused has been at once so great as, by its pressure around the whole organ, combined with the shock, to produce instant death. In other instances the quantity first effused has been small, but repeated at each beat, the heart continuing to act for an hour or more before life has been extinct.

The suddenness of Christ's death leads to the belief that the rent was large, and the violence of the heart's contraction being great, as the result of its previous strong and healthy condition, the amount of blood effused would be large. The perfect consciousness of the Sufferer, as indicated by His knowledge of what yet remained of prophecy to be fulfilled, and the loud voice with which He cried when uttering His last words, immediately preceding the bowing of His head and resigning His spirit, contra-indicate gradual exhaustion of mind or body, whether from hæmorrhage or any other cause.

In order to understand what immediately followed on the wound by the soldier's spear, it is necessary to explain what is meant by coagulation of the blood, although the laws by which this is governed, being connected with the principle of life, are still obscure. In the living and healthy state the blood is a uniform fluid consisting largely of water^ containing albumen and fibrin, along with certain saline constituents and numerous organised particles termed ' red globules,' which give to it its colour and play an important part in the vital functions that it fulfils. The appearance of this uniform red fluid while flowing, or as first shed, is known to all; and this appearance it presents so long as it is contained within the heart and blood-vessels during life. But on the failure of these conditions it undergoes a remarkable change. When discharged from its containing cavities and vessels, it soon loses its vitality and separates into distinct portions. The fibrin spontaneously concretes into a spongy mass, in which the red globules are entangled, and which floats or sinks in the fluid portion termed serum, containing the water and the albumen with the other constituents. Thus in a short time blood drawn from the arm into a basin presents the appearance of blood and water, but the technical terms for which would be crassamentum and scrum. The time required for this coagulation and separation of the constituents of the blood is very short, after it has passed out of the heart or any of the containing vessels. We cannot say precisely what length of time elapsed between the utterance of the Saviour's last words and the piercing of His side by the spear; but whilst it could not have been more than two hours, calculating the time before sunset, it was not sufficient for the coagulation of blood that might still have been retained in the heart or large vessels, but was amply sufficient had it been poured into the pericardium through rupture of the walls of the heart; for we know that in such circumstances the time required for coagulation would not differ materially from that required when out of the body.

We conclude, therefore, with the writer whose line of argument we have followed,¹¹ 'that it may with certainty be affirmed that between the agony of mind which the Saviour endured in the garden of Gethsemane, and the profuse sweat mixed with clotted blood which so rapidly followed it, violent palpitation of the heart must necessarily have intervened; this being the only known condition which could have been at once the effect of the former occurrence, and the cause of the latter. In like manner, when on the cross this agony was renewed, and by the addition of bodily suffering was increased to the utmost intensity, no other known condition could have formed the connecting link between that mental anguish and His sudden death, preceded by loud exclamations, and followed by an effusion of blood and water from His side when afterwards pierced with a spear, than the aggravation even to rupture, of the same violent action of the heart, of which the previous palpitation and bloody sweat were but a lower degree and a natural prelude. If, whilst every other explanation hitherto offered has been shown to be untenable, the cause now assigned for the death of Christ, namely, rupture of the heart from agony of mind, has been proved to be the result of an actual power in nature, fully adequate to the effect, really present without counteraction, minutely agreeing with all the facts of the case, and necessarily implied by them, this cause must, according to the principles of inductive reasoning, be regarded as demonstrated.'

We must refer to the latter portions of Dr. Stroud's able treatise those who are anxious to satisfy themselves how far the view here set forth harmonises with the statements of Scripture on the doctrine of the Atonement, with the types and prophecies relating to the death of Christ, with the narratives and symbols of the New Testament, and generally with Scriptural doctrine, in relation to this central fact of Christianity.

1) Treatise on the Physical Cause of the Death of Christ and its relations to the Principles and Practice of Christianity, by W. Stroud, M.D., London, 1847.

2) Stroud, p. 29.

3) Jacobus Bosius, Crux Tritimphans et Gloriosa. pp. 8, 9, 43 et seq. See also numerous detailed references given by Dr. Stroud from both ancient and modem writers, and, among others, from Ellis in his History of Madagascar.

4) Stroud, p. 71.

5) Nor by Segond in the New French Version.

6) Καὶ γενόμενος ἐν ἀγωνίᾳ ἐκτενέστερον προσηίνχετσ ἐγένετο δὲ ὁ ἱδρὼς αὐτῦ ὡσεὶ θρόμβοι αἵματος καταβαίνοντες ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν,, v. 44.

7) De Symptom Caus. ii, 5, torn. vii. p. 192.

8) Tissot's Traité des Nerfs, &c., pp. 279, 280.

9) J. Schenck a Grafenberg Observ. Med. &c.., lib. iii. p. 458.

10) The terms used by the Evangelists in their descriptions, especially by Mark, are, in the opinion of competent judges, the strongest which the Greek language could supply.

11) Stroud, pp. 155, 156.