Overall Themes
1. The passion narrative is part of the Journey
These are aspects of Luke’s Passion Narrative that are special or exclusive to him. Together with Jesus’ predictions of his own death, the death of a prophet – 9:31, 51; 12:50; 13:32-33; 17:25, it forms the climax of a journey to the cross upon which Luke has taken us. It must end in Jerusalem, for as Jesus says, where else could a prophet be killed than in Jerusalem. Jerusalem is, for Luke the centre of God’s purposes still. Jesus was proclaimed Messiah and Saviour in Jerusalem first when he was a baby. At his Bar Mitzvah held in Jerusalem, he took upon himself the adult task of ‘being in His Father’s House, he has been greeted at a king by the crowds in Jerusalem a week earlier. He will die, rise and appear in Jerusalem. His disciples will say goodbye to Him in Jerusalem, before settling down to wait for the gift of the Holy Spirit, which they will receive in Jerusalem. The church will start in Jerusalem. The gospel will then go out from Jerusalem to all the ends of the earth.
2 Jesus dies an innocent man, a victim of injustice. Pilate states three times that Jesus is innocent, or has done nothing wrong. The thief on the cross declares that Jesus has done nothing wrong. Finally, in one of Luke’s most interesting redactions, the centurion at the foot of the cross declares that Jesus is innocent (as opposed to being the Son of God, as in Mark and Matthew).
The Jesus who is accused before Pilate by the chief priests and scribes of ‘perverting our nation’ (Luke 23:2) is one whose infancy and upbringing was totally in fidelity to the Law of Moses (2:22, 27, 39, 42). Similarly, the Jesus who is accused of ‘forbidding us to give tribute to Caesar’ is a Jesus who has only recently (20:25) declared concerning the tribute: ‘Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s’. All of this casts light on the affirmation made by various dramatis personae in the passion that Jesus is innocent (23:4, 14, 22, 41, & 47).
3. Jesus is in control of his fate , accepting it and triumphing in it as opportunities for forgiveness and renewal of those He came to save arise. However healso says his death fulfils scripture
The Jesus who calmly faces death is one who had already set his face deliberately to go to Jerusalem (9:51), affirming that no prophet should perish away from Jerusalem (13:33). In the Lucan account of the ministry, Jesus showed tenderness to the stranger (the widow of Nain) and praised the mercy shown to the Prodigal Son and to the man beset by thieves on the road to Jericho; it is not surprising then that in his passion Jesus shows forgiveness to those who crucified him.
And, of course, Jesus’ death and the manner of it fulfils Scripture. In his account of the last supper, Luke (alone) has Jesus quote Isa 53, identifying himself with the suffering servant, who is counted as a criminal (numbered among transgressors) although he is innocent, for his sheep. The risen Jesus explains that it was necessary for the Messiah to suffer all of these things in order to ‘enter into his glory’. And old Simeon’s prophecy to Mary is fulfilled as she suffers the pain of seeing her child on his cross, pain like a sword entering her heart.
4. Jesus also dies for the thieves on the cross and for those who crucify Him, although only two of them understands this. In one of the most famous sayings of Jesus reported only in Luke, he asks His Father to forgive those who are crucifying Him, on the grounds that they do not understand what they are doing. To the thief who takes pity on Him as He hangs, an innocent man, on the cross, the promise is greater. ‘Today you will be with me in Paradise.’ Jesus’ authority to forgive penitents has been a theme throughout the gospel -see the story of Zaccheus – and reaches it’s climax here.
As Jesus is dying he prays for his executioners (above), promises paradise to the penitent thief calls God ‘Father’. This is exclusive to Luke, and reflects the intimate and trusting relationship that Luke protrays between Jesus and the Father, seen most strongly in the words of Ps 31:5 quoted at 23:46 ‘Father into your hands I commit my spirit’ – a prayer said by Jews (and many Christians) as they settle down to sleep
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