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Jesus’ Death: Sacrifice or Suicide?

By Writer Eli Kittim

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John 15.13:

“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”

But how does one do that voluntarily?

Philosophically speaking, unless God’s Sovereignty somehow orchestrates the events leading up to the death of Jesus, how else could Christ offer his life voluntarily?

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Thus, are we talking about a Messianic Sacrifice or a Suicide in the New Testament? There have been numerous academic studies that have addressed this question. The Canonical Epistles exclaim:

“And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma” (Eph. 5.2).

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So, the question arises: how exactly has Christ “given himself for us, [as] an offering and a sacrifice to God”?

Bear in mind that the term “sacrifice” has the meaning of a voluntary offering of a life. However, if other people planned and performed the execution of Jesus, then how is his atonement deemed a voluntary sacrifice?

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It seems to me that the only possible explanation for a voluntary sacrifice is Suicide: the laying down of one’s own life! In the New Testament gospels, Jesus himself implies that no one else actually kills him but rather that he offers (“takes”) his life voluntarily. Speaking about his life, he declares:

“No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord” (Jn 10.18)!

It can be paraphrased as follows: “no one takes my life from me; I take my own life.” Otherwise stated, if others had planned on killing Jesus through coercion, then that type of sacrifice would have occurred in an involuntary manner. Not to mention that others would have taken his life from him. Furthermore, the fact that Jesus foreknew it doesn’t necessarily make it voluntary, nor can it be described as an event that transpired according to his wishes. The fact that he was forced to drink the cup against his wishes demonstrates that even the foreknowledge of this event didn’t make his sacrifice voluntary! So what is it that allows him to lay down his life of his own accord?

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Remember the “Temptation of Christ,” which comprised three temptations? One is to gain the whole world and its kingdoms. The second is to satisfy his deepest wishes and desires. But in the third temptation (Lk 4.9-12) Satan tempts Jesus to commit suicide!

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If we consider the “typological” relationship of the Old Testament to the New Testament, we can see, for example, that Samson may be seen as a “type” of Christ in being a sort of savior and superhuman figure (e.g. the “Annunciation” in Lk 1:26–38 is seemingly modelled on the announcement of Samson’s birth in Judg. 13). The last act of Samson comprises his noble death, one that is positively characterized by martyrdom and Suicide in the Old Testament! The biblical narrator seems to commend Samson’s suicide by emphasizing that God strengthened Samson to carry out this massacre: “So those he killed at his death were more than those he had killed during his life” (Judg. 16.30)! This is a reference to the massacre in which Samson, in an act of revenge, pushed the two “pillars on which the house rested” (Judg. 16.29) on top of the Philistines and cried out: “Let me die with the Philistines” (v. 30). If Samson is a “type” of Christ, then we would expect something analogous taking place in the death of Christ, the “antitype”!

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Another “type” of “Messianic sacrifice” in the Old Testament occurs in Genesis 22, namely, the sacrifice of Isaac! If it had been carried out, it would have been tantamount to “shedding one’s own blood.” It would be akin to the act of killing one's self; aka suicide! In fact, Abraham is commended for attempting this act (Gen. 22.16-17), and then God mysteriously equates Abraham’s act with a “type” of global redemption:

“and by your offspring shall all the nations of the earth gain blessing for themselves, because you have obeyed my voice” (Gen. 22.18).

Let’s not forget that the redemptive sacrifice of Issac is a “type” and a foreshadowing of Christ’s Atonement, that is to say, Christ’s voluntary sacrifice!

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The same motif of “shedding one’s own blood” is prevalent in the Old Testament, as, for example, in the killing of Abel by Cain (Genesis 4:1–16). And similar to other messianic stand-ins who have committed murder, such as Moses and David, Cain is also a Messianic-type figure on which God grants divine protection through a special “mark” (Gen. 4.15).

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So, these acts of “shedding one’s own blood”——as in the case of Cain killing his brother Abel and especially that of Abraham and Isaac in which Abraham is celebrated as a person of great faith in sacrificing his only son (Heb. 11.17-19)——seem to foreshadow the atoning death and voluntary sacrifice of the Messiah!

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Here’s another controversial example that seems to fit the bill. It begins in the Book of Zechariah the prophet:

“Strike the shepherd, that the sheep may be scattered; I will turn my hand against the little ones” (Zech. 13.7).

But who is “the shepherd” in this verse referring to? Jesus claims that it is a reference to himself:

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (Jn 10.11).

Let’s now take a look at the controversial verse in Mt. 26.31, which is based on Zech. 13.7:

“Then saith Jesus unto them, All ye shall be offended because of me this night: for it is written, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered abroad.”

First, why would his followers be offended? Death, on behalf of one’s principles, at the hands of the state has always been viewed as a heroic and noble sacrifice since the death of Socrates! So, one wonders what the cause of the offense might be?

Second, whom does "I” refer to in Mt. 26.31? We already know that Jesus is the “shepherd” in question. So then, who “will smite the shepherd”? Some say God the father; others say, Jesus! If, in fact, this first person singular pronoun refers to Jesus, then according to one noted minister, Frederick K. C. Price, “That means he’s gonna kill himself” (i.e. commit suicide). In other words, the exegesis suggests that Jesus will smite himself!

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Given that there are no unnecessary words in the New Testament, and that they’re all there for a reason, the undercurrent of John’s gospel raises an important question: is Jesus going to kill himself?

“Then the Jews said, ‘Is he going to kill himself? Is that what he means by saying, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come'?" (Jn 8.22).

The Original Greek text reads:

ἔλεγον οὖν οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι · Μήτι ἀποκτενεῖ ἑαυτὸν ὅτι λέγει · Ὅπου ἐγὼ ὑπάγω ὑμεῖς οὐ δύνασθε ἐλθεῖν;

That’s a non sequitur. From a literary standpoint, the Jewish conclusion of a possible suicide does not logically follow the apparent context. How can suicide be inferred from Jesus’ statement: “Where I am going, you cannot come”? It cannot! Therefore, we have to assume that something else is going on in the text and that John is trying to give us a heads-up that a suicide might lay in store for him!

Certainly, the Greek phrase “ἀποκτενεῖ ἑαυτὸν” means “to kill himself” (i.e. to commit suicide)!

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Conclusion

The fact that Jesus lays down his own life (Jn 15.13) as a voluntary offering and sacrifice, and given that no one else takes his life from him but that he himself lays it down of his own accord” (Jn 10.18), seems to indicate that his death is a result of his own volition rather than that of the traditional set of circumstances that we’re familiar with.

What is more, there are quite a number of references to suicidal or quasi-suicidal deaths in the Old Testament that are then carried forward into the New Testament where, for example, Jesus himself is actually tempted by Satan to commit suicide (Lk 4.9)!

And then we read in John’s penetrating and revealing gospel that the Jews were indeed wondering whether or not Jesus was “going to kill himself?” (8.22)! So, over and above the New Testament’s theological import, we might rightfully ask ourselves: is Jesus’ Death a Sacrifice or a Suicide?

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Is Jesus a Jew?

By Author Eli Kittim

The term “Jew” means one of two things: either a “Jew” by religion, irrespective of one’s race, or a “Jew” by race, irrespective of one’s religion. The only category that can properly address Jesus’ *ancestry* is the second one, namely, a Jew by race, irrespective of one’s religion!

The term “Jew” is an abbreviation of the term “Judah” (Ioudaios” in Greek), and it implies a *descendant* from the tribe of *Judah.* There were only 2 tribes in the kingdom of Judah—-namely, the tribes of Judah and Benjamin (Ezra 1:5)—-which alone, strictly speaking,  represent the term “Jews.” Therefore, anyone who is from a different race/region cannot be technically called a “Jew.” Case in point: Jesus is a *Galilean* (Mk 1:9; Mt. 3:13; 4:15-17; 21:11), not a Judaean! It is well known amongst Biblical scholars and archaeologists that Galilee was heavily influenced by Greek culture. The scholar & Oxford classicist G.A. Williamson states that Galilee “was entirely Hellenistic in Sympathy.” He says that all of these facts are well-known to Christian scholars, yet they insist that “Christ was a Jew”. John’s gospel 7:41-43 confirms that Christ is from Galilee of the Gentiles, which infuriates the Jews because Jesus defies Jewish messianic expectations. John 7:52 describes the Jews’ rejection of a Gentile Messiah, when saying, “Search, and see that no prophet arises out of Galilee” (cf. Mt 4:15-16)!

The gospel genealogies prove nothing with respect to Jesus’ ethnicity. According to Bible scholar Bart Ehrman, the genealogies of Matthew & Luke are contradictory and don’t give us any historical evidence. Not to mention that both are explicitly based on Joseph, who is NOT Jesus’ biological father. As Mike Licona asserts, these genealogies are compositionally more theological than historical. Bottom line, we cannot rely on them to give us the historical pedigree of Jesus.

Thus, according to the internal & external evidence, Jesus is not a Jew; he’s a **Gentile**!

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What language would Jesus have spoken?

According to Bart Ehrman, studies show that only 3% of the population was literate in the land of Israel in the first century c.e. One would have to be a highly literate scholar to understand Hebrew, the language of the Scriptures. Most Bible scholars assume that the common language of the people was Aramaic. Thus, they conclude that Jesus would have spoken Aramaic.

That may have been the case in Palestine centuries earlier, but, largely due to the influences of the Hasmonaeans and the Herods, it appears as if Aramaic had entered a period of decline during the time of Jesus. The notion that Jesus spoke Aramaic has recently been challenged by Greek New Testament linguists (see Stanley E. Porter, “Did Jesus Ever Teach in Greek?”, Tyndale Bulletin 44.2 [1993] 199-235 https://tyndalebulletin.org/article/30458-did-jesus-ever-teach-in-greek.pdf Bart Ehrman himself admits that he’s not sure if Paul (Jesus’ contemporary) knew Aramaic. And there’s no archaeological evidence to support Aramaic as the dominant language in first century Palestine, especially in Galilee. The Herodian coinage is inscribed exclusively in Greek, not Aramaic. Currency is a good indicator of the language of a nation. African currencies are in African languages. Similarly, the currencies of the UK & the US are in English, and so on and so forth. In other words, you cannot have a currency in one language and a verbal communication in another (e.g. a national currency inscribed in Greek within an Aramaic speaking community is a contradiction in terms).

https://href.li/?https://tyndalebulletin.org/article/30458-did-jesus-ever-teach-in-greek.pdf

What is more, only 12% of the Dead Sea Scrolls were written in Aramaic! Remember that the community at Qumran fled the metropolitan areas that had become more or less Hellenized. So, the Essenes represent only a tiny fraction of the population that kept the traditions alive, including the Aramaic works. Moreover, the entire New Testament was originally written in Greek, not Aramaic, signifying the widespread use of Greek in first century Palestine. There is important literary evidence to substantiate this view. For example, the historian Flavius Josephus wrote in Greek, which is also the language of the Septuagint!

The internal evidence supports this view. For example, the literary Jesus supposedly speaks Aramaic "Eli Eli Lama Sabachthani?" and no one seems to understand him. They thought he was calling Elijah. If Aramaic was the everyday language of the people they would’ve understood what Jesus meant.

Which languages did Pilate write on the inscription above the cross? Was Aramaic one of them? No! In what language did Jesus converse with Pilate? How many languages did Pilate know? Greek and Latin. So was the conversation between them in Aramaic? Most definitely not! And, according to Bart Ehrman, there is no indication that they used an interpreter. Thus, the *literary narratives* of the New Testament also suggest that Jesus would have spoken Greek!

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