“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?!” This lamentation by Jesus Christ while hanging on the cross, is quoted in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 27.
For a long time I could not understand what this meant. Did God really forsake his Son?
I heard many explanations trying to solve this enigmatic exclamation of Jesus in his dying hour. Some said that because the sin of the world was placed on the Jesus, he in fact “became sin for us”, God who despises sin, therefore removed Himself from his Son. And so the explanations go on.
My personal opinion is not that Jesus were forsaken by his Father, or that Jesus succumb in his dying moments under his human-nature. Instead, I believe that Jesus was making a very clear reference to an Old Testament prophecy that foretold in shocking detail this very scene happening.
In Jesus called out “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me,” he was in fact reciting directly the first line of Psalm 22. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?” (Psalm 22:1). The Jews standing close by, familiar with the Hebrew Psalms, would immediately have recognised this line from the famous Psalm. They would also have made the obvious connections.
In Psalm 22:7, 8 it is written: “All they that see me laugh me to scorn: they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord that he would deliver him: let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him.” Recounting the Crucifixion Matthew writes: “And they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads... Likewise also the chief priests mocking him, with the scribes and elders, said... He trusted in God: let him deliver him now, if he will have him...” (Matthew 27:39-43).
Psalm 22:16 says: “For dogs have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet.” This is a clear reference to Jesus’ crucifixion.
Verse 18 says: “They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture.” Matthew (27:35) recounts: “And they crucified him, and parted his garments, casting lots...”
It is my understanding that when Jesus cried out “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me”, he was deliberately reminding the spectators of Psalm 22 that described the death of the Messiah. Those that knew this psalm would easily have made the connection, seeing that Jesus’ crucifixion (piercing of hands and feet), even the gambling over his clothes, were foretold by Scripture centuries in advance.
Jesus Christ’s exclamation was clearly not merely a hopeless lament; rather it was a deliberate quote from a Messianic Prophecy foretelling the last moments of his death. Even in his hour of death, He was proving his claim as the Messiah.
