The Force of Forgiveness
Minka Shura Sprague

"Father forgive them," Jesus commands God from the cross, "for they know not what they do" (Lk 23:34). Sister Mary Michael had written me one Eastertide, her letter coming from the woods where she walks her life as a professed solitary religious. "You do Luke," she said. "Am I right that Jesus orders God?"

I turned to the Greek, diagrammed all seven words from the cross, checking tense and mood and voice for every verb. "Well, yes," my words in return carried surprise. The verb is an aorist imperative, a direct and definite command. I had never seen it as such, never heard it so proclaimed. I had always heard sweetness and generosity around these words. It had never occurred to me that Jesus' voice might carry an edge in the imperative mood. In the decade since then, I have always given Sister a footnote in my Introduction to New Testament classes. I always hear someone inhale sharply when I make the point her question raised - "why can't Jesus do this himself?"

From the cross, Jesus orders his family around. It is one thing to let the imperative mood carry the words that give his mother and "the disciple whom he loved" to one another (Jn 19:26-27). It is quite another thing to hear the Son of God issue a command to the Father with nary a "thy will be done." Surely it is more than manners, lost between the Mount of Olives and the Cross (Lk 23:34). Why can't Jesus do this himself?

Today, I am still astonished that Jesus does not offer forgiveness on his own. He remembers, however, how essential forgiveness is to all of creation. And he remembers who, above all and in all and through all, does forgive. Spinal column anchored fast, his limbs secure against the wood, he marshals the last bit of incarnated flesh that he can move. In breath traveling vocal cord and lung, he prays in the imperative mood, flings the force of forgiveness across heaven and earth. He knows - as we all have known since Noah that forgiveness is God's will, that it will be done. "Father orders the Son from the cross, "forgive them. They do not know what they do."

Forgiveness is a force, an energy. As energy forgiveness has power, is power. In New Testament language, the Greek word dynamic carries all these shades of meaning, and our scriptural authors all know this the Apostle, Luke, John, the writer of Ephesians, to name only a few. The force of God's power to forgive echoes in their words, In their stories and letters, the worst of human ways are told, confessed, bespoken. A faithful people hand over the answer to their prayers for crucifixion, to a government that understands itself to be in a time of "Roman Peace." As discipleship role models, we get Peter and Judas, one who is forgivable in the church's resurrection-life and one who is not. Even in Mark's spare account, the energy and force of God's forgiveness whistles in the empty tomb's wind. Since Noah, forgiveness is God's will.

For us to offer or receive forgiveness, our bodies and minds must empty, like the tomb. Emotions and feelings need time to be experienced, time to subside. Expectations are often unknown until they are not met. Secret desires are sometimes slow to rise, until leavened with disappointment. This is the kind of work for which bodies and our daily routine lives provide the space muscles, gastro-intestinal systems, patterns for sleep, oxygenated bloodstreams, meals created and consumed and cleaned-up. As much a physical enterprise as an attitude, the force of forgiveness requires a site for launching, a place to land. Our bodies and our minds can turn to understanding, compassion's cornerstone. in a body and mind grounded in compassion, the force of forgiveness can be offered or received. And if there is a mean-time - a time before we can forgive or a time when we, like Jesus, are immobilized we can admit we cannot yet do this ourselves, ask God to do this for us.

The Son's command to the Father anchors the cross to Noah's covenant in rainbow arc, this force of forgiveness flung g across heaven and earth. Forgiveness is God's will, it will be done; this is the energy, the force we pray to be with us always.

Minka Shura Sprague is Professor of New Testament Biblical Languages at New York Theological Seminary New York City.