How did crucifixion kill?
Pastor McCain's Cyberbrethren has an interesting entry on the specific cause of death in crucifixion.
It squares well with other things I've read on the subject. Contrary to what is often claimed, people crucified in the position archeology suggests was customary didn't suffocate, but in fact could breathe very easily. Nails driven through the ankles and wrists, though, would have caused unimaginable agony- and the immobility of the legs would eventually have resulted in death by embolism, just as the article Pr. McCain points to suggests.
Perhaps on reflection the title of this entry should be "How does crucifixion kill?" Despite our understandable desire to see this barbaric death as a part of the past (except insofar as it reconciles us to God through Christ's crucifixion), it has never truly disappeared. Saddam Hussein, for one, was very fond of it.
It squares well with other things I've read on the subject. Contrary to what is often claimed, people crucified in the position archeology suggests was customary didn't suffocate, but in fact could breathe very easily. Nails driven through the ankles and wrists, though, would have caused unimaginable agony- and the immobility of the legs would eventually have resulted in death by embolism, just as the article Pr. McCain points to suggests.
Perhaps on reflection the title of this entry should be "How does crucifixion kill?" Despite our understandable desire to see this barbaric death as a part of the past (except insofar as it reconciles us to God through Christ's crucifixion), it has never truly disappeared. Saddam Hussein, for one, was very fond of it.
Comments