My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

[Homie]

This has probably been discussed before, but I've never heard any explanation or participated in a discussion about it. So here goes :

Why did Jesus say "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" when he was fully aware of Gods divine plan. And if he himself was God it seems even more strange that he yelled out to himself a question of why he had forsaken himself....uhh or something like that.

Has anybody ever figured out a plausible reason for this?
The whole passage:
Mat 27:46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Mat 27:47 Some of them that stood there, when they heard that, said, This man calleth for Elias.

And "Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani" seems a lot more similar to Elias (as also said the people watching), yet it is followed with "that is to say, My God, my God..."
Why?

Any help understanding is appreciated my brothers

(But for those with hostile attitudes: Please leave it alone and vent your anger elsewhere)

 

[Job_38]

My best guess that in His humanity, remember He is fully God and fully man, He just screamed in pain.

 

[kern]

It's a quote from Psalm 22(?). Read the entire psalm and you may get a better idea of what he was thinking.

-Chris

 

[Homie]

Thank you! I read the psalm and it really applies well to Jesus. The message is strong and in-line with what Jesus taught. It may very well be that he quoted the psalm (22), it is like the psalm is very much about Jesus.
Do we have a greek scholar here? Does "Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani" in fact mean "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?". We all know that Matthew refers to older scriptures, showing Jesus as the fulfilment of the prophesies.

 

[judge]

Hi homie!

I couldn't quite get the correct links happening. but I can direct you to a couple of interestring discussions on this verse.

First, go to www.pe$hitta.org  (replace the $ with an s)

Then go to the forums,

then hit the search key and tick the archive only option.

Search for two archived threads, one titled "Eli Eli lemana shabakthani ", and another titled  Mt. 27.46, Mk. 15.34.   (in this thread look particularly for the post by ValiantForTruth.

Hopefully you will find these threads helpful.

For those who don't look at the threads the thrust is that God did not forsake Jesus at all, but that this is a mistranslation of the Aramaic words into greek, and then english

 

[Andrew]

Jesus, for the first time, addressed his Father as God here. He lost the Father-Son relationship becos he was carrying our sins and was being punished for it. So God did forsake his Son at that moment.

This had to happen as one of the many divine exchanges:

¥ Becos Jesus was forsaken, "he will never leave us nor forsake us".
¥ Becos Jesus lost the Father-Son relationship, we can call God "Abba (means Daddy) Father!"

 

[Homie]

I read the article Mt. 27.46, Mk. 15.34. and I found it to be flawed. Basically he says that Jesus quotes psalm 22 (ok) but that it should be translated "My God, my God, why hast thou spared me?". First of all, this does not fit well into the context of psalm 22:
Psa 22:1 My God, my God, why hast thou spared me? why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?
Psa 22:2 O my God, I cry in the day time, but thou hearest not; and in the night season, and am not silent.

Here I replaced spared with forsaken, but it does not fit well with the rest of the psalm.

Secondly it makes no sense that Jesus would say "My God, my God, why hast thou spared me?", because God did not spare him, that was the whole point of the crucifixion, WE were spared because Jesus took the punishment WE deserved, Jesus was not spared.

Andrew, you make a good point but even though I find the article Mt. 27.46, Mk. 15.34 flawed, the author still makes a point by posting several scriptures that would contradict God forsaking Jesus.

This question still stands

homie
And "Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani" seems a lot more similar to Elias (as also said the people watching), yet it is followed with "that is to say, My God, my God..."
Why?

Any greek/arameic/hebrew scholars around?

 

[aggie03]

There is no inkling or slight of intuition that would lead a translator to render the the phrase with the word spared. The proper translation of the phrase reads "...why hast Thou forsaken Me?"

It is a quote from the 22nd psalm - which is speaking of several messianic prophecies - and indeed I also thought it interesting that this was the scripture that Christ quoted direcetly before He died. I think that there are a few reasons for this:

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us--for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE"-- in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we would receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

- Galatians 3:13,14 (NASB)

Christ became accursed, or condemned, or forsaken in the effect that He was bearing the sins of entire world on His shoulders. Because this sin was placed on Him (He did not actually sin) He became separated from Jehova God. Can you imagine the pain and torment and suffering this separation alone must have caused Jesus? Christ had to be forsaken by our sins so that through His suffering, death and ressurrection we might have the hope of heaven and eternal life through the cleansing power of His blood. So as far as whether the verse means forsaken or spared - it defenitely means forsaken, for if Christ had been spared we would be in a world of trouble.

How can God be separated from God was always my next question, and I believe that it is answered with the following verses:

Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.  Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

- Philippians 2:5-8 (NASB)

Christ, being God, knew what was going to happen, what would occur and what would be necessary for our salvation to be possible.  In that effect, being God in the form of a man, He humbled Himself before Jehova God as a man and was obedient to the God's plan of salvation even to the point of dying on the cross - of becoming forsaken and separated for a time from Jehova God. 

"YOU HAVE MADE HIM FOR A LITTLE WHILE LOWER THAN THE ANGELS; YOU HAVE CROWNED HIM WITH GLORY AND HONOR, AND HAVE APPOINTED HIM OVER THE WORKS OF YOUR HANDS;"

Hebrews 2:7 (NASB)

But we do see Him who was made for a little while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus, because of the suffering of death  crowned with glory and honor, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.  For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings.  For both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all from one Father; for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren,

- Hebrews 2:9-11 (NASB)

Further, we can see that it was from the beginning the plan of Jehova God that Jesus would be lowered and made in the form of man, for a little while, carry out the things necessary for our salvation, and the be elevated again to His previous position.  All of these things fir together to form a puzzle of sorts that fits together prefectly when we apply all the verses to it and look at the sum of the word concerning this topic:

1.  Jehova God had a plan for our salvation from the beginning that included making Christ Jesus for a time lower than the angels.

2.  Christ, being God, knew this plan and what it would entail and humbled Himself before Jehova God in order that the plan might be carried out

3.  Christ was separated from God for a time, becoming acursed for us and tasting death (not merely physical death) for all that we through Him might live

4.  Christ was elevated again to his previous position after all these things had taken place and He had become the author of our salvation

If this helps, or if there are any other questions, please let me know and I'll see if I can help! 

 

[nikolai_42]

I'm no Aramaic scholar, nor do I really have any clue as to the Aramaic language, but there was (is?) a man whom I have read who apparently is one of the few aquainted with the old language. As such, he knows the quirks of the language and the thought process that goes along with it. There are some things in his parables, for example, where the people Jesus were speaking to, would implicitly understand that the Western speaker would have no clue about. The verse you were asking about is similar in that translation, apparently, doesn't come across properly in western thought.

For This Purpose was I Kept 

 I have never yet found a better explanation than Lamsa's.

 

[nikolai_42]

The full Lamsa article is here.

 

[Homie]

Thanks for your reply aggie03. And yes you can help some more

You speak of Jesus's previous position

Christ was elevated again to his previous position after all these things had taken place and He had become the author of our salvation

What was/is this previous position, exactly?

From this page http://www.pe****ta.org/forums/foru...uisance, it is suppose to be pe$hitta: $ = s) , the article judge referred to:

John 16:32:
Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered , every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me.

Jesus was talking about the time of His crucifixion and of His death. He said, "the Father is with me." Although Jesus knew everyone else would forsake him, he took comfort knowing that his heavenly Father would be with him. He knew God had always been with him, why would He forsake him at this crucial hour.

John 8:29:
And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him.

II Corinthians 5:19:
To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself....

If God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself how could He have left him?

The author says it all, how could God forsake Jesus (even for a moment) and not contradict these scriptures?

 

[Homie]

Great link nikolai. But something does not add up;
From the article:

Lama, or lemana means "why" or "for what purpose" and always introduces a question.

if this is true than this translation is false:

My God, my God, for this I was kept!

and this translation: "My God, my God, why hast thou spared me?"

homie
Secondly it makes no sense that Jesus would say "My God, my God, why hast thou spared me?", because God did not spare him, that was the whole point of the crucifixion, WE were spared because Jesus took the punishment WE deserved, Jesus was not spared.

have already been dismissed. So we are left with the one in the KJV. But nikolai's link makes a good point:

It is very interesting to note that the Greek version of Matthew contains these original Aramaic words of Jesus. For some reason the Greek translators decided to transliterate the original Aramaic of Jesus only for these few words. Why?

Even more puzzling is the fact that in the Greek text, these Aramaic words have been transliterated into Greek phonetics and then followed with the exact same phrase translated into Greek. Why did the Greeks record this passage in both Aramaic and Greek? Perhaps to assure that someday the correct translation would be fully understood?

 

[nikolai_42]

The second link I put up is the better one. The first one uses Lamsa's work as a basis for another man's translation.