Did Simon or Jesus Carry the Cross To Calvary?
07 16 , 22:25 Filed in: Theology
To be clear, St. Simon of Cyrene didn't actually do this amazing act of intercession on his own. This is not to say Simon did not have a kind heart or felt no pity towards Christ but he did not actually do this on his own will. In fact, he was coerced by Roman soldiers to assist a wretchedly beaten 'criminal' on his way to death. The Roman soldiers wanting to get their job done was trying to hurry along the process, no doubt, and it would seem at random, St. Simon of Cyrene was chosen to assist Jesus. We also have to understand that the act of carrying the Cross was an act of terrible disgrace among the people. It would have been in his people's culture to desire to do all that he could to separate himself from the condemned man regardless of the soldiers' commands to assist Jesus. Nevertheless, St. Simon carried the Cross with Christ toward Golgotha. We should also bear in mind the spiritual properties of St. Simon's 'forced labor' as the Haydock Commentary comments:
The evangelists would not have been so particular in this part, had they not wished to inculcate, that all who desire to follow Christ, must also take up their cross and follow him. (St. Jerome and Jansenius) --- The latter says, in his Commentaries on the Gospels; as no one liked to carry the ignominious cross, the insolence of the soldiery compelled a stranger to carry it. By this we learn, that the cross is not taken up by many except with compulsion; but, when once taken up, they carry it with willingness. (Jansenius)
Simon of Cyrene
Jesus
1. (John 19:17) - "They took Jesus therefore, and He went out, bearing His own cross, to the place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha."
But WHO carried the Cross? Was it Jesus being assisted by St. Simon or was it St. Simon alone because Christ was too exhausted from His brutal Passion? Let us take a glimpse at the Haydock Commentary concerning Matthew 27:32:
St. John says that Christ went out carrying his own cross, while the other three evangelists state that they forced Simon of Cyrene to carry it for him. Both are true: for seeing Christ unequal to the weight, they compelled the other to take it up for him; not a part only, as some painters represent, but the whole, to Mount Calvary, as Jesus Christ had carried the whole before. (St. Augustine)
St. Augustine, which the Church approves his inspired definition thereof, asserts that BOTH Jesus and Simon carried the Cross. Bear in mind that Christ had undergone a horrific torture before hand and was recorded to have fallen at least three times that we are aware of. The physical strength of Jesus was exhausted, “or seeing Christ unequal to the weight, they compelled the other to take it up for him” and so Jesus was given assistance so that the Cross could be effectively carried to its destination. The passages in the Bible along with the assessments of the saints and Doctors of the faith conclude that Jesus obviously began the journey but possibly midway to Golgotha needed assistance for the rest of the way. And in a profound way, this actually gives dramatic purpose to even our own lives in terms of hardships or 'carrying our cross'.
Simon probably realized that his cross was to physically carry Jesus' physical cross and carry the cross that comes of being Jesus' disciple. Looking at it mystically, we realize that Jesus carried all Simon's crosses and our crosses up to Calvary.