Although crucifixion was a violent and inhumane method of torture and execution, crosses are typically not meant to symbolize violence or pain. Rather, the cross is ultimately meant to symbolize the hope and salvation believed to result from Jesus' death.
Crucifixion was invented by the Persians between 300-400 B.C. It is quite possibly the most painful death ever invented by humankind. The English language derives the word “excruciating” from crucifixion, acknowledging it as a form of slow, painful suffering.
Suffocation, loss of body fluids and multiple organ failure. It wasn't pleasant, but for those with a strong constitution take a deep breath and read on. "The weight of the body pulling down on the arms makes breathing extremely difficult," says Jeremy Ward, a physiologist at King's College London.
Probably among the most painful deaths you can experience if done right. You would have large nails(about 5–7 inches I've heard) hammered into your heel bone and wrists.
The Humiliation of Christ is a Protestant Christian doctrine that consists of the rejection and suffering that Jesus received and accepted, according to Christian belief. Within it are included his incarnation, suffering, death, burial, and sometimes descent into hell.
Christ descended into hell, experienced all its horrors. He tasted every dimension of its pain. And He did that on the cross.
On the cross, just as Jesus takes on the guilt of all who trust in him – their unrighteousness before God – so, on the cross Jesus also takes on our shame – he receives the rejection from God and from others that we deserve, so that we can be set free from it. Jesus receives and absorbs our shame on the cross.
Death by crucifixion now begins. As Jesus slowly sags down with the weight of His body on the nails through His wrists, excruciating, fiery pain shoots along the most sensitive nerve endings in the body – called the median nerves – and travels along the fingers and up the arms to explode in the brain.
Crucifixion lasted from 6 hours to 4 days. It was preceded by a brutal scourging. A Roman soldier would strike the victim 39 times with a whip whose leather straps were laced with slivers of sharp bones and small metal balls that severely cut into the body, exposing bones and internal organs.
For many scholars, Revelation 1:14-15 offers a clue that Jesus's skin was a darker hue and that his hair was woolly in texture. The hairs of his head, it says, "were white as white wool, white as snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined as in a furnace.”
Given that, according to the Quran, Jesus had not died before going up to God, nor will he die before the day of resurrection, the interpretation by most Muslims is that Jesus entered heaven alive.
Death, usually after 6 hours--4 days, was due to multifactorial pathology: after-effects of compulsory scourging and maiming, haemorrhage and dehydration causing hypovolaemic shock and pain, but the most important factor was progressive asphyxia caused by impairment of respiratory movement.
Apparently there is only one extant account (in Josephus) of one person surviving crucifixion out of the hundreds reported in ancient literature. (And that case was only when excellent medical care was immediately provided by the Romans, and even so, only one out of three who were so rescued actually survived!)
Jesus also forgave people who didn't know they were doing something wrong. He asked Heavenly Father to forgive the men who crucified Him. They didn't know they were hurting the Son of God. Jesus forgives people because He loves them.
He notes that our earliest accounts of the crucifixion, such as the Gospel of Mark written circa 60-70 C.E., make clear that it was Pilate who had Christ crucified. Gospels written much later, such as those of Matthew and Luke, reflect different interests and viewpoints, and each places more and more blame on the Jews.
More recently, however, researchers have come around to the view that the nailed feet provided enough support for the body, and that the hands could have been merely tied. "Quest for Truth" uses the Visible Human Project to show that putting nails through the palms would have resulted in maximum nerve damage and pain.
Greco-Roman texts show that in certain cases the bodies of the crucified were left to decompose in place. In other cases, the crucified bodies were buried.
Pulmonary embolism has been proposed as the mechanism of Jesus' death due to the high prevalence of hereditary thrombophilia (e.g., Factor V Leiden). However, the more widely accepted medical hypotheses for Jesus' death are cardiac rupture, asphyxiation, and shock.
Description. Mary is supported as she cries when Christ is condemned to death.
Frequently, the legs of the person executed were broken or shattered with an iron club, an act called crurifragium, which was also frequently applied without crucifixion to slaves. This act hastened the death of the person but was also meant to deter those who observed the crucifixion from committing offenses.
“The nailing to the cross was not through the hands but between the two bones below the wrist so the wrist bones could bear the entire weight of the body on the cross,” Dery explains. “Having a nail driven through there would feel like lightning going through your middle and ring fingers.
According to pious legend, St. Bernard asked Jesus which was His greatest unrecorded suffering and the wound that inflicted the most pain on Him in Calvary and Jesus answered: "I had on My Shoulder, while I bore My Cross on the Way of Sorrows, a grievous Wound which was more painful than the others and which is not ...
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9, NIV). Jesus did not pay for our sins only in part: he paid for all our sins. “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed" (John 8:36, NIV).
Now, it sure looks like Jesus is forgiving people at the cross. After all, we do find the words “forgive them” coming out of Jesus' mouth. But in both of our examples from Luke, Jesus says, “Your sins [plural] are forgiven.” In other words, “All of your sins are forgiven.”
In Luke, he forgives his killers, reassures the penitent thief, and commends his spirit to the Father. In John, he speaks to his mother, says he thirsts, and declares the end of his earthly life.