Information AboutCrucifixion |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT CRUCIFIXION | |
| ancient rome | |
| christianity | |
| sorrowful mysteries | |
| jesus | |
| corporal punishments | |
| execution methods | |
| torture | |
| human body positions | |
| cross symbols | |
| christian hagiography | |
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Crucifixion is an ancient method of Execution , where the condemned is tied or nailed to a large wooden Cross and left to hang until dead. This form of execution was widely practiced in Ancient Rome and in neighbouring Mediterranean cultures; similar methods were invented in the Persian Empire ."The first recorded instances of crucifixion are found in Persia, where it was believed that since the earth was sacred, the burial of the body of a notorious criminal would desecrate the ground. The birds above and the dogs below would dispose of the remains." Smith, Damian Barry, ''The Trauma of the Cross: How the Followers of Jesus Came to Understand the Crucifixion'', p. 14. Paulist Press: Mahwah, New Jersey, 1999. Crucifixion was used by the Romans until about AD 313 , when Christianity was legalized in the Roman Empire and soon became the official state religion; however, it has been used in various places in modern times. A Crucifix , an image of Christ crucified on a cross, is for most Christians the main symbol of their religion, but some Protestant Christians prefer to use a Cross without the figure (the "corpus" - Latin for "body") of Christ. DETAILS OF CRUCIFIXION Crucifixion was rarely performed for ritual or symbolic reasons, but usually to provide a death that was particularly painful (hence the term ''excruciating'', literally "out of crucifying"), gruesome (hence dissuading against the crimes punishable by it) and public (hence the metaphorical expression "to nail to the cross"), using whatever means were most expedient for that goal. Crucifixion methods varied considerably with location and time period. The Greek and Latin words corresponding to "crucifixion" applied to many different forms of painful execution, from Impaling On A Stake to affixing to a tree, to an upright pole (what some call a ''crux simplex'') or to a combination of an upright (in Latin, ''stipes'') and a crossbeam (in Latin, ''patibulum''). Seneca The Younger wrote: "I see crosses there, not just of one kind but made in many different ways: some have their victims with head down to the ground; some impale their private parts; others stretch out their arms on the gibbet" ( Dialogue "To Marcia on Consolation", 6.20.3 ). If a crossbeam was used, the condemned man was forced to carry it on his shoulders, which would have been torn open by records that the city of Rome had a specific place for carrying out executions, situated outside the Esquiline Gate, Annales 2:32.2 and had a specific area reserved for the execution of slaves, which would certainly be by crucifixion. Annales 15:60.1 Upright posts would presumably be fixed permanently in that place, and the crossbeam, with the condemned man perhaps already nailed to it, would then be attached to the post. The person executed may sometimes have been attached to the cross by ropes, but nails were certainly used, as indicated not only by the New Testament accounts of the crucifixion of Jesus, but also in a passage of Josephus , where he mentions that, at the Siege Of Jerusalem (70) , "the soldiers out of rage and hatred, ''nailed'' those they caught, one after one way, and another after another, to the crosses, by way of jest."Jewish War V.II Objects, such as nails, used in the execution of criminals were sought as Amulets .Mishna, Shabbath 6.10, quoted in Crucifixion in Antiquity Cross shape .]] The gibbet on which crucifixion was carried out could be of many shapes. Josephus describes multiple tortures and positions of crucifixion during the Siege Of Jerusalem (70) as Titus crucified the rebels;Josephus, ''Wars of the Jews'', 5.11.1 and Seneca The Younger recounts: "I see crosses there, not just of one kind but made in many different ways: some have their victims with head down to the ground; some impale their private parts; others stretch out their arms on the gibbet."Seneca, Dialogue "To Marcia on Consolation", in ''Moral Essays'', 6.20.3, trans. John W. Basore, The Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1946) 2:69 At times the gibbet was only one vertical stake, called in Latin ''crux simplex'' or ''palus''. This was the simplest available construction for torturing and killing the criminals. Frequently, however, there was a cross-piece attached either at the top to give the shape of a T (''crux commissa'') or just below the top, as in the form most familiar in Christian symbolism (''crux immissa'')."The ... oldest depiction of a crucifixion ... was uncovered by archaeologists more than a century ago on the Palatine Hill in Rome. It is a second-century graffiti scratched into a wall that was part of the imperial palace complex. It includes a caption - not by a Christian, but by someone taunting and deriding Christians and the crucifixions they underwent. It shows crude stick-figures of a boy reverencing his "God," who has the head of a jackass and is upon a cross with arms spread wide and with hands nailed to the crossbeam. Here we have a Roman sketch of a Roman crucifixion, and it is in the traditional cross shape" ( Clayton F. Bower, Jr: Cross or Torture Stake? ). Some second-century writers took it for granted that a crucified person would have his arms stretched out, not connected to a single stake: Lucian speaks of Prometheus as crucified "above the ravine with his hands outstretched" and explains that the letter T (the Greek letter tau) was looked upon as an unlucky letter or sign (similar to the way the number thirteen is looked upon today as an unlucky number), saying that the letter got its "evil significance" because of the "evil instrument" which had that shape, an instrument which tyrants hung men on (ibidem). Other forms were in the shape of the letters X and Y. The earliest writings that speak specifically of the shape of the cross on which Jesus died describe it as shaped like the letter T (the Greek letter tau), (c. 130–202), '' Adversus Haereses '' II, xxiv, 4 {Link without Title} ). Location of the nails In popular depictions of crucifixion (possibly derived from a literal reading of the translated description in the Gospel Of John , of Jesus' wounds being 'in the hands'), the condemned is shown supported only by nails driven straight through the feet and the palms of the hands. This is possible only if the condemned was also tied to the cross by ropes, or if there was a foot-rest or a ''sedile'' to relieve the weight: on their own, the hands could not support the full body weight, because there are no structures in the hands to prevent the nails from ripping through the flesh due to the weight of the body. The Science of the Crucifixion | ||
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