ray of hope and the final gesture of submission.
A high level of education and a sense of royal inheritance would have given Jesus his submission drawn from self esteem which would have militated against the rough handling and public abuse he appeared to have got. If he was, however, intent on making sure that he would not die by organising events around him and perhaps raising the crowds against his persecutors, all he needed was the courage of the resolve that it would not go horribly wrong. Jesus, however did begin to have doubts that it would work, taking into consideration the many times he had been let down on other issues before, by his own disciples. He did not want to die,of course, simply because that would not have been an aspiration that we can attribute to his nature. He felt for his mother and his family and he would not have wanted to destroy all their hopes in their love and fears for him. It is therefore very likely that the whole situation was well rehearsed beforehand with his uncle Joseph who could have known exactly what was going to happen, but the intensity of the torture could not have been foreseen. The arrival of Simon of Cyrene may not have been that coincidental and his intervention is curious, to say the least. Someone was intent on seeing that he got to the cross in one piece and in a reasonable state of health. There may have even been a variety of factions interested in carrying out this long drawn and gory public spectacle. It may also have had nothing to do with Jesus himself, although his final statements cast doubt on this.
The concept of a risen Messiah in tune with prophetic writings was just what was needed to halt the deteriorating process of cultural loss among the descendants of the tribes of
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