1. Additional minor theories have been offered, but it is beyond the scope of this paper to visit them all.

2. James E. Talmage, Jesus the Christ (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1981), 668–69.

3. William Stroud, Treatise on the Physical Death of Jesus Christ and Its Relation to the Principles and Practice of Christianity (London: Hamilton and Adams, 1847), 73–156.

4. Origen (A.D. 185–254), cited in John Wilkinson, “The Incident of the Blood and Water in John 19:34,” Scottish Journal of Theology 28 (1975): 159–60.

5. For related discussions see Pierre Barbet, A Doctor at Calvary: The Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ as Described by a Surgeon (Garden City, N.Y.: Image Books, 1963), 139–42; Wilkinson, “The Incident of the Blood and Water in John 19:34,” 159–64; and Frederick T. Zugibe, “Death by Crucifixion,” Canadian Society of Forensic Science Journal 17 (1984): 4.

6. Doron Zahger and Eliyahu Milgalter, “Clinical Problem Solving: A Broken Heart,” New England Journal of Medicine 334 (1996): 319–21.

7. David A. Ball, “The Crucifixion and Death of a Man Called Jesus,” Journal of the Mississippi State Medical Association 30 (1989): 80–82.

8. The interested reader is referred to several studies that describe this type of respiratory pattern in volunteers undergoing mock crucifixion: Hermann Moedder, “Die Todesursache bei der Kreuzigung,” Stimmer der Zeit 144 (1948): 52–59; Frederick T. Zugibe, “Two Questions about Crucifixion,” Bible Review 5 (April 1989): 36; Zugibe, “Death by Crucifixion,” 7; and Ball, “Crucifixion and Death of a Man Called Jesus,” 77–83. At first glance, the studies of Zugibe appear to contradict the hypothesized respiratory pattern seen during crucifixion. However, a careful review of his study reveals that his mock crucifixions were done such that the body was kept in a raised position throughout the study. Furthermore, whenever cramping or discomfort in the study subject occurred, Dr. Zugibe would support the weight of the body at the level of the thighs and allow the subject to rest. This maneuver would serve to prevent the development of the very phenomenon he was trying to study. The balance of evidence therefore supports the development of severe respiratory embarrassment during crucifixion. Equally instructive are horrific eyewitness accounts of victims of torture during the first and second world wars. The Austro-German and Nazi armies used a practice known as aufbinden as a torture tehnique. The victim was suspended by the wrists such that the feet scarcely touched the ground. The chest wall was stretched by the body’s weight such that the victim could not exhale without lifting the body up by the arms. If the victim was prevented from doing so, he or she would rapidly die of asphyxia. Barbet, Doctor at Calvary, 75–76; and R. W. Hynek, Science and the Holy Shroud (Chicago: Benedictine, 1936). For more on theories that support asphyxia as the cause of Christ’s death, see Barbet, Doctor at Calvary, 81–83; R. Bruce-Chwatt, “Death on the Cross,” World Medicine 29 (1984): 17–19; Nicholas P. De Pasquale and George E. Burch, “Death by Crucifixion [letter],” American Heart Journal 66 (1963): 434–35; Charles D. Johnson, “Medical and Cardiological Aspects of the Passion and Crucifixion of Jesus, the Christ,” Bolletin Association Medicine Puerto Rico 70 (1978): 101.

9. C. Truman Davis, “The Crucifixion of Jesus: The Passion of Christ from a Medical Point of View,” Arizona Medicine 22 (1965): 187; W. D. Edwards, W. J. Gabel, and F. E. Hosmer, “On the Physical Death of Jesus Christ,” Journal of the American Medical Association 255 (1986): 1463; J. E. Holoubek and A. B. Holoubek, “Execution by Crucifixion: History, Methods and Cause of Death,” Journal of Medicine 26 (1995): 11–15; A. A. Le Bec, “The Death of the Cross: A Physiological Study of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ,” Catholic Medical Guardian 3 (1925): 126–32; R. Lumpkin, “The Physical Suffering of Christ,” Journal of the Medical Association of the State of Alabama 47 (1978): 8–10; S. M. Tenney, “On Death by Crucifixion [letter],” American Heart Journal 68 (1964): 286–87; Zugibe, “Two Questions about Crucifixion,” 40–41; Zugibe, “Death by Crucifixion,” 11–13.

10. Le Bec, “Death of the Cross,” 130–31; J. R. Whitaker, “The Physical Cause of the Death of Our Lord,” Catholic Medical Guardian 13 (1935): 87–88.

11. Hugh J. Schonfield, The Passover Plot: New Light on the History of Jesus (New York: Bantam, 1965); J. G. Bourne, “The Resurrection of Christ: A Remarkable Medical Theory,” [London] Sunday Times (January 24, 1965); C. C. P. Clark, “What Was the Physical Cause of the Death of Jesus Christ?” Medical Record 38 (1890): 543; W. B. Primrose, “A Surgeon Looks at the Crucifixion,” Hibbart Journal 47, no. 4 (1949): 382–88.

12. For a review of the judicial irregularities associated with Christ’s trials before the Jewish Sanhedrin, see R. Bucklin, “The Legal and Medical Aspects of the Trial and Death of Christ,” Medicine, Science and the Law 10 (1970): 14–26.

13. Margaret Lloyd Davies and Trevor A. Lloyd Davies, “Resurrection or Resuscitation?” Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of London 25 (April 1991): 167–70.

14. See Schonfield, The Passover Plot; Bourne, “The Resurrection of Christ: A Remarkable Medical Theory”; Clark, “What Was the Physical Cause of the Death of Jesus Christ?” 543; Primrose, “Surgeon Looks at the Crucifixion,” 382–88.

15. Lloyd Davies and Lloyd Davies, “Resurrection or Resuscitation?” 168.

16. Alfred Edersheim, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah 2 vols. (New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green, 1899), 2:614–15; Talmage, Jesus the Christ, 668–69.

17. Death may be averted by applying cardiopulmonary resuscitation, or CPR, as a temporizing measure to mechanically force blood through the heart by compressing it between the sternum and spinal column. It is estimated that CPR may deliver approximately 10 percent of normal cardiac output, which may be enough to perfuse the brain for a short period of time. If coordinated cardiac activity can be restored through the timely administration of an electrical shock, normal pumping action may be restored in some instances.

18. Zugibe, “Death by Crucifixion,” 8–11.

19. Latter-day prophets have indicated that the pains of Gethsemane and the horrors of the atonement returned to Christ in his final hours on the cross. See Talmage, Jesus the Christ, 660–61, and Bruce R. McConkie, A New Witness for the Articles of Faith (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1985), 109.

20. “More Holiness Give Me,” in Hymns of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1985), no. 131.

W. Reid Litchfield

BYU Studies Publications