The Eighth Station of the Cross
Why Did Jesus Speak with the Women of Jerusalem on This Spot?
Location - the Via Dolorosa
Map Coordinates - 31.779229, 35.230549
Merged Gospels story - 278
It has been traditionally believed that Jesus’ journey to the cross took place on a Friday. So why do we call this Good Friday if such a terrible thing happened on that day? That’s because the ancient definition of the word “good” means “holy”. So “Good Friday” actually means “Holy Friday” – that being the Friday before Easter - the day that Jesus fulfilled His destiny to die as a sacrifice for our sins.
The Eighth Disc.
The Eighth Station commemorates an event that is recorded in the Bible, where Jesus spoke to the women of Jerusalem who were following Him during His march to Calvary. This is the place where it is believed that Jesus spoke to these women, as recorded in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 23:28-31. During this encounter Jesus prophesied, as He had done several times before, about the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans.
To these women, Jesus said,
“Daughters of Jerusalem, stop weeping for Me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children. For behold the days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.’ Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us,’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us.’ For if they do these things in the green tree, what will happen in the dry?” (LK 23:28-31)
Jesus’ statement “…stop weeping for me”, along with Lukes comment, “And following Him there was a great crowd of people, and of women who were also mourning and lamenting Him,” clearly indicates that the people of Jerusalem loved Jesus, and that it was the Jewish rulers only who despised Him.
Why did Jesus prophesy at this moment?
It seems strange that Jesus would take time out from His march toward death to prophesy about the destruction of Jerusalem? Why did He do this? It’s because the destruction of Jerusalem and the death of Jesus are indelibly connected. You see, the judgement that God brought on the Jews, and in a broad sense the entire country, is a result of their rejection of Christ as the Messiah, and specifically, God judgement for His murder. The destruction of Israel forty years later, in 70 AD, is the direct result of what Jesus was about to suffer at the hand of the Jews on Good Friday. To the women of Jerusalem, Jesus, in a somewhat cryptic sense, was telling them that Jerusalem would be destroyed as a result of the Jews rejection of Himself.
The Conquerer’s Stone.
“Jesus Christ Conquers”
Beneath the metal disk on the wall is a carved stone set at eye level. It is marked by a cross with Greek letters that form an abbreviation for the words “Jesus Christ conquers”.