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Levity had diabolical revelry while the blessed Lord Jesus meekly suffered injustice the most outrageous, and cruelty the most refined. At its height it was rebuked -

I. BY A HORROR OF DARKNESS.

1. This was preternatural.

(1) It was not the result of an ordinary eclipse of the sun. The Passover was celebrated at full moon, when such an event could not have taken place. A solar eclipse never continues beyond a quarter of an hour. This darkness continued three hours.

(2) It may have been produced by the intervention of dense clouds. Such an intervention would have been unusual in Judaea in the spring of the year during the brightest hours of the day. But whatever may have been the secondary causes, they were commissioned by the same Providence that sent the plague of darkness upon the Egyptians (cf. Exodus 10:21-23).

(3) It was no chance that so intimately connected this darkness with the event of the Crucifixion. It was "over all the land," viz. of Judea, where Christ suffered, and prevailed during the latter three hours of his suffering. It terminated also with the termination of those sufferings. To explain such coincidences as purely accidental is but to substitute a miracle of chance for a miracle of Providence. What is gained?

2. It was portentous.

(1) It expressed the moral anguish of spirit which Jesus then endured for us. For in those three dreadful hours he was enduring the punishment of our offences. This experience of Divine anger drew from him the pathetic exclamation, "Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?"

(2) It expressed the present triumph of the powers of darkness over the Sun of Righteousness (cf. Genesis 3:15 Luke 22:53). An extraordinary illumination heralded the birth of Christ, an extraordinary darkness signalized his death.

(3) It indicated the spiritual darkness of the Jewish people, who obstinately closed their eyes upon the Light of the world, and filled up the measure of their iniquity by crucifying the Just One. It presaged also the desolation which in consequence they were destined to suffer.

(4) It expressed a mourning spread over nature for the horrible crime then perpetrated by men. This sentiment is put into the mouth of Dionysius the Areopagite, who, witnessing a wonderful eclipse of the sun at Heliopolis, in Egypt, said to his friend Apollophanes, "Either God himself suffers or sympathizes with the sufferer."

II. BY THE RENDING OF THE TEMPLE'S VEIL.

1. This also was preternatural.

(1) The matter of fact cannot be disputed. For it occurred at the time of the evening sacrifice, while the priest was offering incense in the holy place, and on the occasion of a great festival when the people in vast numbers were praying without. The testimony of Matthew might therefore have been readily contradicted had it not been true. It is too late in the day to attempt to contradict it now.

(2) We are not informed how the wonder was effected, whether by lightning or by invisible hands; but the veil was thick and strong, and could not have been "rent from the top to the bottom" by any ordinary force. God can work his miracles immediately or by secondary causes.

(3) That this was a Divine thing is evident from its coincidence with the moment of the Redeemer's yielding up his spirit. To say this was a mere accident is but to make the miracle of chance all the more stupendous.

2. This too was portentous.

(1) Paul teaches us to regard the rending of the veil of the temple as emblematical of the rending of the body of our Lord, the sacrificial efficacy of which opened to the guilty the way of access to God, and opened to all who believe, the way into his glorious presence in the future life.

(2) It intimated also the abolition of the Jewish ceremonial Law, which, by its interposition of imperfect and mystic rites, had obstructed free and direct approach to God.

(3) It signified the revealing and unfolding of the mysteries of the Old Testament, so as to make the face of Moses to shine in the radiance of the gospel. In Christ we discover the true Propitiatory, or Mercy seat. He is that Ark of the covenant who contains in his heart the unbroken tables of the Law. He is that precious golden pot of incorruptible Manna, the very Bread of life from heaven.

III. BY THE PORTENTS FROM THE EARTH.

1. The earthquake.

(1) Travellers have observed marks of extraordinary convulsions in these rocks. The fissures lie across the natural cleavage. Though earthquakes are produced by natural causes, yet are they under the control and direction of Providence.

(2) This earthquake attested God's approbation of the Sufferer, as it expressed also his anger against his persecutors (cf. Amos 8:8; Nahum 1:6). So as the rending of the veil intimated the removal and abolition of the Jewish Church, this rending of the rocks imported the ruin that was coming upon the nation.

(3) The phenomenon occurring at that critical moment when Jesus dismissed his spirit, significantly evinced that the dreadful act of rejecting and crucifying the Christ provoked the desolation.

(4) It may also be taken as a token and earnest of that mighty convulsion of nature which will attend Christ's coming to the judgment (cf. Hebrews 12:26).

2. The opening of the tombs.

(1) This showed that the power of death and the grave was vanquished by the death and resurrection of Christ. When our Lord gave up the ghost it was not life but death itself that died. This was the great death out of which life was educed. He triumphed over death in the "place of a skull" - where the trophies of death lay around. His Divinity was proved, for he imparted life to the bodies of the sleeping saints (see John 5:25).

(2) "This opening of the graves was designed both to adorn the resurrection of Christ, and to give a specimen of our resurrection, which also is in virtue of his" (Flavel).

(3) It was a strong confirmation of the resurrection of Christ. For those who came forth from the tombs after his resurrection "appeared to many" to whom our Lord himself did not appear. Returning with Jesus to heaven, they were also pledges to angels and spirits of men of the general resurrection to come. See now -

IV. THE EFFECT UPON THE SPECTATORS.

1. Upon the Jews.

(1) The horror of darkness interrupted their raillery. It struck them with terror. Guilt trembles in darkness. It did not change their hearts.

(2) Until near the close of this period of horror, Jesus suffered silently in the sorrowfulness of his soul for the sin of the world, and distressed with the awful loneliness of being forsaken of his God. This was the worst part of his sufferings, and extorted from him that loud pathetic cry. This roused again the courage of his revilers to say, "This Man calleth Elijah." They misunderstood him, as carnal men do evermore, substituting trust in the human for trust in the Divine.

(3) Jesus then said, "I thirst" (see John 19:28). This moved one standing by to fix a sponge soaked in vinegar on a hyssop stalk, and put it to his mouth, but the kindness was interrupted by others who, in the same obdurate spirit, said, "Let be; let us see whether Elijah cometh to save him." The heart is desperately wicked.

(4) The prodigies which followed made them "smite their breasts" (see Luke 23:48). The wicked will wail amid the convulsions of the last day (cf. Isaiah 2:19-21; Revelation 1:7).

2. Upon the soldiers.

(1) They had reviled him before (see Luke 23:36), but now they "fear exceedingly," and the centurion in particular is thoughtfully affected, for he makes a true confession.

(2) In his reflections he thought upon the manner of the death of Christ (see Mark 15:39), for his death was evidently a voluntary act.

(a) Luke tells us that the last utterance was, "Father, unto thy hands I commend my spirit." This he uttered with a loud or great voice. Then immediately he "yielded up his spirit." His strength was unbroken. He died as the Prince of life.

(b) The circumstance of his expiring sooner than was usual with crucified persons (see Mark 15:44), as well as the loudness of his voice in the very act of his dying, showed the voluntariness of his death (see John 10:17, 18).

(c) Our Lord is nowhere said to have fallen asleep (cf. ver. 52), but always to have died. "Abraham, Isaac, Ishmael, Jacob, breathed their last; Ananias, Sapphira, Herod, expired; Jesus gave up the ghost, dismissed or delivered up his own spirit" (A. Clarke). In the manner of his death, then, behold the manner of his love.

(d) Christ's loud voice was like the trumpet blown over the sacrifices.

3. Upon the women.

(1) They followed him in love. They had ministered to him. They seem now to have been the only disciples, excepting John, present at the Crucifixion. They were "afar off." This expression may only intimate that they had come from far, even from Galilee. For the mother of Jesus stood by the cross with John, and Mary of Magdala and others also were near. Yet when Christ suffered, his friends were but spectators. Even angels stood aloof when he trod the winepress alone.

(2) Their faith and love were strengthened. All that the centurion saw they also saw, and with wider and deeper conviction. - J.A.M.

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KJV: Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour.

WEB: Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour.