The crucified One was sinking deeper into the vast solitudes of agony, and suddenly the sunlight began to fade around Him, and darkness began to spread over the face of the earth (Mt 27:45). Amid this cosmic darkness, the Poor One of God was sinking into another interior darkness, dense and desolate, in whose currents He felt He was drowning.
Due to his bodily position on the cross, no muscle could rest. And so, to the physical pain was added an indescribable muscular fatigue. He was steadily losing what little capacity for endurance he had left, along with the last drops of blood. Through his suffering, Jesus’ capacity for suffering became increasingly dulled, and he entered a dark, general enervation. His eyes filled with fog, and because of the extremely high fever, his mind began to enter a confused cloud.
Sunk in this gloomy ocean, the Poor Man of God entered the most desolate night of his life: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” What was it? Bewilderment at God’s silence? A sudden dark night of the spirit?
Desolation spread its gray wings from one end of the infinite wasteland to the other. Like birds of prey, absence, emptiness, confusion, silence, and darkness descended upon Jesus’ soul: Why have you forsaken me?
Was his death a public and solemn disavowal by the Father of Jesus’ life and work? Would the Father, too, have sat at the door to watch the condemned man pass by? Had God disappeared, turning into a sidereal distance, a cosmic void, water vapor? Why have you forsaken me?
The Poor Man of Nazareth, poorer now than ever, floated over the infinite abysses like a solitary castaway. Where could he hold on? Nothing beneath his feet, nothing above his head. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? It was the silence of God that had fallen upon his soul with the pressure of a thousand atmospheres.
However, the crisis Jesus had experienced up to that moment was nothing more than a sensation. But feeling is one thing and knowing is another; emotion is one thing and certainty is another. Sensation is deceptive, certainty is infallible.
The awareness of his identity emerged from the dark mists, and little by little it took complete possession of the Poor Man of Nazareth’s vital sphere; and in his soul the final battle was fought, that of knowing versus feeling. Jesus was never so magnificent as in this final moment of his life.
It was as if he were saying: “My Father, I have just crossed the currents of confusion. I have come out of the confusing waves, from dark precipices. They have crushed the flower of certainty and given me bitter wine to drink, an inebriating wine. I have scattered my cries to the desert winds, and I am emerging from a desolate kingdom, whose only inhabitants are serpents.”
But it’s all over, my Father. The battle has come to an end, the drama is consummated. The nightmare I just suffered was nothing more than a horrible sensation. But what matters is not feeling but knowing. And now a blissful certainty has begun to flood my ultimate self with joy. In contrast, and against all mirages and sensations, in the center of my soul, certainty rises like a straight and shining sword: I know, my Father, I know that you are here, now, with me. And “into your hands I commit my life” (Luke 23:46).
Taken from the book: “The Poor Man of Nazareth,” Chapter VIII, section: “In the Deep Waters” by Father Ignacio Larrañaga.
