"Eli, Eli, Lama Sabachthani?"

Abstract

The problem of the translation of the last words of Our Lord, spoken in His native tongue, has not been eased by the arbitrary action of the Evangelist in identifying them with the words of the Psalmist (Ps. 22:2), "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?"' It has tended to control the readings, which betray not only a fair range of variety but also a double strand, one of which-the ?aoOavpl group-bears the distinct impress of the Psalmist's word (':~_TY). Theologically, the identification has caused the gravest difficulties, as the complete breakdown of faith, which it reflects as it stands, has forced the apologist to many strange devices, which reach their culmination in the eschatological view, that He was a deluded apocalyptic at last disillusioned-substantially the view of those who stood by in mockery to "see whether Elijah cometh to take him down" (Mark 15:36; cf. Matt. 27:49). It is quite possible, of course, that the truth lies in this view, or in the view that in the combined effects of the agonies of thirst and crucifixion, with the ebbing of the Sufferer's physical strength, momentary despair overwhelmed Him. Against either of these hypotheses it may be urged, however, that they are unnecessary assumptions, their homiletic appeal to the contrary notwithstanding. The view obtains no support from the Lukan or Johannine tradition, although it is known that both were acquainted with, and used, Mark. Their omission by Luke, in fact, amounts to a positive objection to the validity of the interpolated identification. That he saw the difficulty of the Aramaic words merely transliterated into Greek may perhaps be deduced from his summary of the Markan passage (Luke 23:45), where (possibly under the influence of Joel 2:31, used later by him in Acts (2:17-21) he is led to depart from the guidance of Ps. 22, which he had used earlier (Luke 23:34, 35). In place of Ps. 22:1 he appears to have taken 'XEl as a corrupt form of iXlov and identified o-aax~avel or ~a•apaoavl with cKXLWbVro(23:45a); otherwise he passed over the passage-a 1 The reading in the Massoretic text is 'I gy -