Nakedness As Judgment
By Ian B. JohnsonA Few Examples Of The Many Scriptures In Which Compelled Nakedness Is Treated As A Form, Result Or Symbol Of God's Judgment
John 19.23-24, NIV:
When the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took His clothes, dividing them into four shares, one for each of them, with the undergarment remaining. This garment was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom. "Let's not tear it," they said to one another." Let's decide by lot who will get it." This happened that the Scripture might be fulfilled which said, "They divided My garments among themselves and cast lots for My clothing." So this is what the soldiers did.
Jesus was publicly stripped
naked to be crucified. Religious paintings of the crucifixion generally
protect our sensibilities by showing Jesus and the two criminals executed
with Him as wearing some sort of loin cloths, but this was simply not the
way Roman justice was done, and the passage quoted above pointedly confirms
this. The Romans certainly understood our "modern" criminal law concepts
of retribution and deterrence. Roman citizens found worthy of death were
generally beheaded quickly and privately, a punishment which prevented
them from repeating their crimes and which adequately satisfied the need
for retribution. However, in dealing with non-citizen criminals, and particularly
violent criminals and political prisoners who were not Roman citizens,
in order to more adequately deter others from offending against Roman authority,
the Romans often employed modes of execution which were deliberately slow
and intensely humiliating public spectacles — for instance, crucifixion
and gladiatorial contests. The shame of forced public nakedness in the
death of state criminals was an essential part of the "lesson" which the
Romans sought to teach the peoples subjugated under them, and Jesus would
not have been spared it.
Jesus, however, delivered
Himself into the hands of His enemies to be executed (John 10.15-18). Indeed,
He told the Roman governor, Pilate, that he would have no power to do anything
to Him if it had not been given him from above (John 19.11). This observation
leads immediately to two conclusions. The first, and more conservative,
is that nakedness, and even public nakedness, is not in itself a sin. Jesus
died sinless; otherwise, He is unable to save the rest of us (2 Corinthians
5.21; Hebrews 4.15). Yet He delivered Himself up to a form of execution
which required that He be lifted up on a pole naked in front of a jeering
crowd. He could have called out more than twelve legions of angels to deliver
Him from crucifixion, if such had been His will (Matthew 25.38). Certainly
He could also have called out a single angel to provide Him a supernatural
loincloth, yet nothing of the sort is mentioned in the Gospel accounts.
The more radical conclusion
is that Jesus' nakedness in His death was necessary to His work on the
Cross. Remember that God gave Adam and Eve clothing as an accommodation
to their defiled consciences. (If you don't remember this, review the article
on Adam and Eve). Adam, Eve, and all people since (except Jesus, of course)
have incorrectly associated sin, which is really spiritual, with their
bodies, and have sought physical privacy in order to hide the guilt of
their sin from God and others. And God has been willing to permit us to
do this, and even to assist us in doing it, because it made it easier for
us to come before Him. If we have confidence that our guilt is covered,
we will not fear so much to come into His presence. On the other hand,
as the Scriptures discussed below show, God has repeatedly used compelled
nakedness as a form of judgment or a picture of His judgment, a clear demonstration
that the sins of the people had also been uncovered along with their bodies.
Thus, clothing served the same function as the Old Testament sacrifices
— it was an atonement for sin, a reassurance God allows us that our sins
are covered.
However, the outward religious
observances of the Old Covenant were only able to give us partial assurance
that our sins were covered; these observances were never able to take away
sin (Hebrews 9.6-10). It took Jesus, the perfect High Priest, offering
Himself as the perfect sacrifice to do that (Hebrews 9.11-28). Moreover,
our salvation required that Jesus take upon Himself all of our sin and
become sin for us, suffering the full force of His Father's judgment against
our sin (Romans 5; 2 Corinthians 5.15-21). This, in turn, required that
Jesus not attempt to hide any of our sin or its guilt from God's righteous
judgment. If He had been clothed on the Cross, He would have been making
use of a means God allowed other people to use for the temporary and imperfect
covering of guilt, and some of our guilt would not have been fully exposed
to judgment. But as it is, we can be sure that all of our guilt was purged
by Jesus' death. Jesus not only bore all of our guilt, He also showed us
the right picture to prove it to our consciences.
Exodus 32.7-8, 25-26,
30-31, 35, KJ21:
And the Lord said unto Moses, "Go, get thee down; for thy people which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They have made themselves a molten calf and worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto and said, 'These are thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt!'" (vs. 7-8).
And when Moses saw that the people were naked (for Aaron had made them naked unto their shame among their enemies), then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, "Who is on the Lord's side? Let him come unto me" (vs. 25-26).
And it came to pass on the morrow that Moses said unto the people, "Ye have sinned a great sin. And now I will go up unto the Lord. Perhaps I shall make an atonement for your sin." And Moses returned unto the Lord and said, "Oh, this people have sinned a great sin, and have made themselves gods of gold" (vs. 30-31).
And the Lord plagued the people, because they made the calf which Aaron made (vs. 35).
Exodus 32.25, NASB:
Now when Moses saw that the people were out of control — for Aaron had let them get out of control to be a derision among their enemies.
In this passage, the sin of
the people is idolatry — making and worshipping the calf. This is stated
three times. Nakedness enters this story as a side observation: an element
of the worship of the calf was nakedness. This is never identified as a
sin in itself; rather, it is noted that this nakedness, which was compelled
as an element of false worship, had caused the people of God "shame among
their enemies." The issue here isn't shame before God because of nakedness,
as God never says He is ashamed of their naked bodies or that they should
be ashamed for Him to see them that way. The issue nakedness, or, in one
reputable translation, simply being "out of control," raised in this context
was "shame" (Heb.
shimitsah, scornful whispering) before their enemies.
By abandoning God in favor of the calf and doing homage before the calf
in a manner which their watching enemies found disgraceful and which symbolically
denied God's willingness to provide a covering for their sins, they lost
their "witness" before their enemies. This was a part of God's judgment
for making the calf, a judgment which Israel executed upon themselves by
their own hands (as is usually the case), not an independent sin or cause
of judgment. And from that time forward, Israel's enemies have plagued
them.
Jeremiah 13.22, NASB:
If you say in your heart, "Why have these things happened to me?" Because of the magnitude of your iniquity your skirts have been removed and your heels have been exposed.
Here, the figurative lifting
of Judah's skirts and the exposure of the nation's vulnerability (its heels)
to the invader is clearly stated to be a divine judgment as a result
of their sins, not a sin in itself.
Lamentations 4.21-22,
KJ21:
Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the land of Uz. The cup also shall pass through unto thee; thou shalt be drunken and shalt make thyself naked. The punishment of thine iniquity is accomplished, O daughter of Zion; He will no more carry thee away into captivity. He will visit thine iniquity, O daughter of Edom; He will uncover thy sins.
Here, when Edom drinks the cup
of God's judgment, they will become intoxicated and make themselves naked
and thus will God uncover their sins. This figurative language clearly
shows the relationship between clothing and the perception that sins are
covered.
Ezekiel 16.4-6, 8-10,
15-16, 22, 35-38, KJV:
And as for thy nativity, in the day thou wast born thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee; thou wast not salted at all, nor swaddled at all. None eye pitied thee, to do any of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, to the lothing of thy person, in the day that thou wast born. And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee, when thou wast in thy blood, Live; yea, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live (vs. 4-6).
Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord God, and thou becamest mine. Then I washed thee with water; yea, I thoroughly washed away thy blood from thee, and I anointed thee with oil. I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with badgers' skin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk (vs. 8-10).
But thou didst trust in thine own beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy fornications on every one that passed by; his it was. And of thy garments thou didst take, and deckedst thy high places with divers colours, and playedst the harlot thereupon (vs. 15-16).
And in all thine abominations and thy whoredoms thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, when thou wast naked and bare, and wast polluted in thy blood (vs. 22).
Wherefore, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord: Thus saith the Lord God: because thy filthiness was poured out, and thy nakedness discovered through thy whoredoms with thy lovers, and with all the idols of thy abominations, and by the blood of thy children, which thou didst give unto them; Behold, therefore I will gather all thy lovers, with whom thou hast taken pleasure, and all them that thou hast loved, with all them that thou hast hated; I will even gather them round about against thee, and will discover thy nakedness unto them, that they may see all thy nakedness. And I will judge thee, as women that break wedlock and shed blood are judged; and I will give thee blood in fury and jealousy (vs. 35-38).
This demonstrates the same point
as the last passage. Clothing is plainly used here as a figure for atonement,
the covering of Israel's sin, and simultaneously as a figure for God's
protection and a mark of His marriage to Israel, as it is also in the next
passage. All of these things are to be stripped away in judgment.
Hosea 2.2-3, KJ21:
Plead with your mother, plead; for she is not My wife, neither am I her Husband. Let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts, lest I strip her naked and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst.
Amos 2.14-16, KJ21:
"Therefore the flight shall perish from the swift, and the strong shall not strengthen his force, neither shall the mighty deliver himself. Neither shall he stand which handleth the bow, and he that is swift of foot shall not deliver himself; neither shall he that rideth the horse deliver himself. And he that is courageous among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day," saith the Lord.
Here, clothing is the last symbol
of a man's ability to preserve himself. In judgment, men will lose their
weapons, their ability to fight, and even the clothes that cover their
nakedness.
Acts 19.13-17, NIV:
Some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon-possessed. They would say, "In the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out." Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this. One day the evil spirit answered them, "Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you?" Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding. When this became known to the Jews and Greeks living in Ephesus, they were all seized with fear, and the name of the Lord Jesus was held in high honor.
Part of the penalty for taking
the name of Jesus in vain, as an unbeliever trying to do "magic" with it,
was to be defeated by the evil spirits they were trying to cast out and
sent away naked and injured. The nakedness would have added to the humiliation
of these Jewish would-be exorcists and was also a symbolic reminder that
they had been stripped of their protection and were spiritually uncovered
as well. That it presented a powerful picture of the seriousness of misusing
Jesus' name is demonstrated by the reaction of the people of Ephesus when
they heard of it.
Hebrews 4.12-13, KJ21:
For the Word of God is living and powerful and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight, but all things are naked and open unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
All things are naked and open
before God. So much for the idea that clothing
really hides our
bodies, or our sinfulness, from God!
Revelation 3.14-17, KJ21:
And unto the angel of the church of the Loadiceans write: "These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God: I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot; I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of My mouth. Because thou sayest, 'I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing,' and knowest not that thou art wretched and miserable, and poor and blind and naked. I counsel thee to buy from Me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich, and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed and that the shame of thy nakedness may not appear, and anoint thine eyes with eye salve, that thou mayest see."
This language is figurative,
describing the spiritual state of the Laodiceans — who could certainly
have seen it for themselves if they were literally, physically naked. The
judgment involved in nakedness here is not the exposed body itself, but
the appearance of their own perception of shame before God as a result
of exposure. This underscores again that it is not exposure itself which
is the problem, but our reaction to it. Likewise, these two final passages
are figurative, and plainly focus on exposure of sin in judgment rather
than bodily exposure:
Revelation 16.15, KJV:
Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.
Revelation 17.15-16, NIV:
Then the angel said to me, "The waters you saw, where the prostitute sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations and languages. The beast and the ten horns you saw will hate the prostitute. They will bring her to ruin and leave her naked; they will eat her flesh and burn her with fire."
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