What Jesus Saw from the Cross

by Antonin Sertillanges

Never has there been spiritual reading as powerful as What Jesus Saw from the Cross , the book that will intensify your love of Jesus by burning the events of His Passion into your memory and imagination. Written early in this century by Rev. A. G. Sertillanges, a priest who lived in Jerusalem, this acclaimed devotional classic gives you vivid and dramatic details not included in the With Jesus, you'll be jostled by crowds as you enter Jerusalem, choke on the dust of the narrow streets, experience the exotic oriental smells of the city at festival time, share the Last Supper with the disciples, stare into the face of Jesus' accusers, and be there as He dies on the Cross. Do you remember when Jesus begged His disciples to "watch one hour" with Him in the Garden of Gethsemane? With this book, you can watch not just one but many hours with Jesus. Read it slowly and prayerfully. The vivid details and the gripping narrative will soon take you'll find yourself engaged in a personal retreat, an interior pilgrimage, and a profound meditation on the love and sufferings of Jesus on the Cross. From Christ's Cross, you'

Genres: Catholic, Religion, Christianity, Christian, Theology, Faith, Spirituality

252 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1930

About the author

Fr. Antonin-Gilbert Sertillanges, O.P. was a French Catholic philosopher and spiritual writer.

Born Antonin-Dalmace, he took the name Antonin-Gilbert when he entered the Dominican order. In 1893 he founded the Revue Thomiste and later became professor of moral philosophy at the Institut Catholique de Paris. Henri Daniel-Rops wrote that it was rumored that President Raymond Poincaré asked Léon-Adolphe Cardinal Amette, Archbishop of Paris, for a reply to Pope Benedict XV's peace proposals, and that Amette passed the request along to Sertillanges; in any event, Amette gave his imprimatur to this reply on 5 December 1917, five days before it was made public. In The Heroic Life, Sertillanges had defended Benedict's attitude toward peace, but in "The French Peace", Sertillanges said, "Most Holy Father, we cannot for an instant entertain your appeals for peace."

His scholarly work was concerned with the moral theory of Thomas Aquinas. In the English-speaking world, he is best known for two non-specialist works. The Intellectual Life is a practical guide for how to structure one's life so as to make progress as a scholar. What Jesus Saw from the Cross is a spiritual work that drew upon the time Sertillanges spent living in Jerusalem. Certain of Sertillanges' works are concerned with political theory, with French identity and the structure of the traditional French family.

Reviews

[Manny · Rating 5 out of 5]

This review is patched together from my posts on my blog on this book. You can find the link to my blog on my Goodreads profile. Just search by the author or name of the book.

As I’ve noted, Sertillanges’ book is a devotional on Christ’s passion, taken from the perspective of Christ looking out hanging from the cross. Sertillanges identifies the sights and sounds, the events of Christ’s last days, Christ’s friends and His enemies, His last words, and what all this sound and fury was about. Not only are the meditations profound, but the writing is superb!

Sertillanges, a French Dominican friar, had written the work in his native tongue, but whoever translated it—it doesn’t say in my Sophia Institute Press 1996 edition—did a remarkable job. There is a note on the copyright page that says the book “was published in French as Ce Jésus voyait du haut de la croix by Ernest Flammarion of Paris in 1930. An English translation was published by Clonmore & Reynolds Ltd. in Dublin in 1948.” I assume the original French was just as finely written.

In the last chapter, as Christ raises His eyes toward heaven in His last moments of life, the vision steps away from what is below, and Sertillanges attempts to contemplate Christ’s vision beyond the earth.

Two things are important there—the intermingling of the divine with the material and the source of the first cause, God the Father. In that glance toward the Father, eternity and the temporal meet, and the mutual love of the Father and Son, which blossoms in the form of the Holy Spirit, is made manifest. What Sertillanges sees at that moment is the reconciliation of all things, the material and the spirit, the eternal and the transient, the internal and the external.

So in that moment of looking toward heaven, just before Christ dies, defeat and victory, heaven and earth, spirit and body, fuse. Sertillanges has Jesus watching the heavens open. “This is His vision of victory, symbolized on Calvary by those eyes that look out upon the infinity of space through a film of blood” (pp. 233-34).

This is a remarkable book, one of the best devotionals—if not the best—I have ever read.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well, I learned from this book and that is how I measure success. I was able to get past the manifesto aspects of the text and get down to what the author was really trying to say. The author's perspective on the women around Jesus was especially interesting... he gave them a lot of credit whereas most historians tend to shove them aside. The author did have a terrible job; how does one describe the horrors of Jesus' crucifixion? One of the parts that struck me as something I needed to take and apply to my own life was Jesus' love of nature and and how He saw heaven in everything here on Earth. The other thing I took from this book was a "rediscovery" of sorts... allow me to tell you a story.

A long time ago, in a Catholic school not too far away, I was a fourth grade girl with braces on her teeth, several flabby rolls of skin on her person and a truly unfortunate haircut on her head. In religion class, we were all assigned a small paper to write on our favorite Apostle. The Magdalene was not an option, so I chose Peter. Little did I know that by choosing Peter, I had basically become his defense council in what would become a classroom tribunal. I was the only person to pick Peter and my teacher (not the nicest, kindest person in the world, for sure) had me read my paper out loud and then take questions. Peter and I got slammed from all sides. "Peter denied Jesus!" "Peter left Jesus!" The only response my nine-year-old self could come up with was simple and basic... "Jesus loved Peter. And Jesus trusted Peter." Needless to say, that did not sate the crowd. After that day, I began to do what I always did when unfairly bested; I armed myself with knowledge. Something in my childhood self found something to identify with in poor Peter. I could not name it at 9, but I think I can now.

Peter was loud, impetuous, temperamental and judgmental. He left Jesus when He needed Peter most. But even through all of that, Jesus still loved Peter. Believed in Peter. Entrusted His new Church to Peter. If Jesus could still love, trust, forgive and believe in Peter… than He will always love, trust, forgive and believe in me.

I had forgotten how I loved Peter as a child… and how I identify with him now, as an adult. So for that lesson, I am eternally grateful.

[Daniel Avery · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book! It really helps you to visualize the passion. With the sights and sounds, you can almost feel Jesus making his way along the Via Dolorosa. Even for someone who's been to Jerusalem, I'll be praying the sorrowful mysteries in a whole new light.

[TurtleneckGirl · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful meditation on the Passion, originally published in French as Ce que Jésus
Voyait du Haut de la Croix in 1930. This 1996 edition was based on the English translation, first by Clonmore & Reynolds Ltd., Dublin, in 1948.

[Melissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

No wonder Mother Teresa recommended this book! I will be reading this devotional each year for Lent. The author, a priest who lived in Jerusalem, takes you into the streets to see, to vividly experience the Passion of Christ. So beautifully done!!!

[Jeannette · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sertillanges explores Jesus's last days through the people and places surrounding him during his Passion. Each chapter focuses on one idea and meditates on the significance of it in Jesus's life and God's plan. There were a couple of things that stood out to me, specifically Sertillanges's focus on women and the way he spoke about the Apostles. Most of it wasn't exactly a new perspective though, which is what I'd hoped for, and I didn't love the style. Still, it was a really interesting series of reflections and would probably be really well suited to a Lenten series of reading.

[April · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mostly I found this book boring. He said a few things which almost bordered on heretical. The one part I did like was the chapter called His Enemies. This one chapter would make a really good Lenten reflection. It's about His experience on the Cross....it's the only part I felt he described vividly. Otherwise I felt like this book was a letdown.

[booklady]

Another gift from Lloyd...

[Kendra DiMichele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very powerful book, lots of vivid descriptions of the Passion of Jesus

[Wendy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is written more poetically than prosaically and because of that, I had to take my time with it. Still, the imagery and the beauty with which Fr. Sertillanges describes the sights, sounds, and historical and sensorial context of the Passion provide a profound meditation perfect for Lent. Will likely re-read from time to time, as I am sure there is much I mentally "missed" while contemplating what stood out upon first read.

[CN · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Those who continue to dream of trifles when Jesus is passing are His murderers at heart.”

[Jill Vaughn · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little more intense book than I usually read, but so rich with details on how Jesus saw the final days of his life and the resurrection. I really feel for the first time I have a clearer picture of what the Passion felt and looked like.

[Dana]

A little tough to read, but good for times when I need to remember what's important and what's not.

[Tom Willis · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this during my Triduum retreat 2017. Excellent book. Probably best read over the course of Holy Week, and not three days. Highly recommended, both by me and, apparently, Mother Teresa.

[Mike Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sertillanges always comes at things from an intriguing combination of intellectual, spiritual, and obviously deeply religious perspectives. He poses intriguing and challenging questions while exploring an eternal question [one that is rarely asked]. The timeliness of his work, given our history of the last 100 years, removes him from much of our modern dogma and allows him to explore Christ in a personal manner, free from most of our prejudices of our present age. He does come at it with his own biases, but if you come into it knowing that, you can cypher through that, perhaps gaining a little more knowledge, and looking more closely at the nature of the crucifixion, its eternal and truly incomprehensible nature, and the deeper nature of our response and relation to it. Early in the work he poses the challenge for us not to place ourselves at the foot of the cross, but to put ourselves ON the cross. Given his visit the location, his spiritual, intellectual, and sincerely personal experience, this book provides an opportunity to explore your own beliefs through his lens.

[Ioana Barcan · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a very poetic book, loved that. However, I would have liked a little more actual "facts", more information - not that it was lacking, on the contrary, but by times i felt the need for more.

[Christine · Rating 5 out of 5]

For my Holy Week reading, I added another book to the one I was already studying (a new translation of St. Mark’s Gospel), and I’m very glad I did. A. G. Sertillanges’s “What Jesus Saw from the Cross” was a wonderful exploration for Holy Saturday and Easter Sunday. Although I took four days to go through it, I would recommend taking longer. The book may be only about 240 pages long, but it is so very dense with theological commentary and visionary understandings of Jesus’ life that it is best read slowly to allow one to take in all the riches that the book offers.
Father Antonin Gilbert Sertillanges was a Dominican priest who taught and wrote in the first half of the 20th century. He spent a year studying in Jerusalem, and “What Jesus Saw from the Cross” is the sweetest of the fruits of his time in the Holy Land. He is a Thomist, following in the tradition of the great 13th century Dominican theologian, philosopher, and mystic St. Thomas Aquinas. In this volume, Sertillanges brings Jesus’ whole life to bear on every aspect of the view from the cross. Not only does he develop its theological significance, but he often steps into somewhat mystical explanations of what Christ might have been thinking. Of course, he doesn’t claim to know this is exactly what the Savior was contemplating, but his reasoning is convincing and his theology sharp.
The view from the cross encompasses many sites (and sights), and Father Sertillanges explores not just the geography, but the history, philosophy, and theology connected to them. We examine Zion, a small strip of land above the Kidron Valley—a strip which was the original City of David, the Great King of Israel from whom Jesus is descended. What Israel means to the world and to its people thus comes into play, as does the idea of kingship. From there, we look at Jesus’ Father’s House, the beautiful Temple, the center of the life of Israel, of which much had been prophesied and which Jesus had cleansed of the merchants and money-changers that had defiled it just before His arrest. We also look to the near future to see the Temple’s destruction and meditate on the new temple that is Jesus’ body, which will be destroyed only to rise again on the third day in the new kingdom He will have brought into being. Sertillanges takes us to the Upper Room (the Cenacle), where the Last Supper took place, the Mount of Olives (for the Agony in the Garden—one of the most moving meditations of the book), and Jesus’ Tomb, which, just a few hundred yards away, awaits the body suffering torture now on the cross.
In addition to the geographical places, we also look at the faces and attitudes of the passersby, Jesus’ loved ones, and His enemies. Sertillanges imagines the various attitudes of the huge crowds that are there for the Passover, the temperament of the people that become a mob eager for blood as they cry, “Crucify him” (and why they do that), and the motives of those guilty of Jesus’ unjust punishment and execution, from the Roman soldiers, through Herod and Pilate and the Sanhedrin, to Judas Iscariot. The most beautiful, moving, and bordering-on-the-mystical moments, in addition to the Agony in the Garden, though, are his descriptions of Jesus’ seeing Mary Magdalene and Mary, His Mother, the Co-Redemptress. These are passages that focus on love in suffering and action; they merit slow reading and contemplation, as does the penultimate chapter, “Heaven.”
At the end of the Crucifixion, Jesus’ sight is upward, not toward the sky but toward His Heavenly Father, and Father Sertillanges’s meditation becomes more mystical as he brings to bear on this topic the meaning of the hypostatic union of God and man in Jesus. How that union affects Jesus’ knowledge of the Resurrection and His hope (or despair) at the last moments of His life becomes another thoughtful and beautiful passage in which the priest combines his theological training with deep emotion to make the scene come alive with meaning for the reader.
The book is clearly written with tender love and dedication to the Lord and provides many opportunities to pause and think or pray, as one wishes. For those of us who like visual aids, there is a map of Jerusalem on which are marked the important sites, as well as the routes Jesus took from Palm Sunday on. It’s a splendid meditation handbook for anyone wishing a deeper understanding and appreciation of the events and meaning of Holy Week.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent meditation on the Passion... Illuminating perspective from someone who has obviously been to the site and spent much time putting himself in the place of Christ. Especially beautiful and poignant ending.

[Johnathon Massey]

This is a great book and it beautifully depicts the life of Jesus through the eyes of Jesus. It is one of the greatest interpretations of Jesus and his life. I think Antonin Sertillanges does Jesus and religion a great justice to get the story of Jesus's life out and describes his life very well.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I vacillated between three and four stars, finally rounding up to four because I greatly appreciate the spiritual insights Sertillanges brought to the effort. His meditations are quite suitable for Lent and gave me something to ponder.

I struggled with several aspects of the book. Most seriously, Sertillanges identifies Mary Magdalene as the same Mary as Martha’s and Lazarus’s sister. He also identifies her as the woman who anointed Jesus’s feet with perfume at Simeon’s house. Based on the gospels and other things I’ve read and listened to, that seems extremely unlikely. For one thing, nowhere in the Bible is there any intimation that the Lazarus’s sister was anything but an upstanding, observant Jewish woman who was also a good friend and disciple of Jesus. No scandal is attached to her. For another, it is generally thought that “Magdalene” refers to Mary’s place of origin. Lazarus and family are never identified as coming from Magdala.

Another issue I had was the scarcity of maps and artists’ renderings of Jerusalem. The physical book that I read was a facsimile of the original, which was published in 1948. Later editions might have more illustrative information. I don’t know, but I doubt it because, according to the biographical information, the author died in 1948. Although it would detract from the authenticity of the book as originally published, adding illustrations would greatly enhance the reading experience.

Finally — and this didn’t bother me, but it might other modern readers— the language is formal and prone to excessive description. This is probably a combination of the time and the language in which the book was written (French). The translator seems to have done an excellent job of preserving Sertillanges’s voice.

[Celia · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is very deep and spiritual. I read this during my holy hours of Adoration. It is an amazing way to be with Christ from leaving the praetorium at just about noon, through his last breath on the cross. It is a look back at everything that transpired in those last three days, and it is a lot to contemplate. It was originally published in French back in 1930. The author, Antonin-Gilbert Sertillanges, O.P. was a French Catholic philosopher and spiritual writer. This is not light and fluffy, but quite the opposite. I read it in small increments, and I am glad I did.

[Paige Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful and devastating and humbling view. This is very similar to The Stations of the Cross ( the Way of the Cross) that Catholics remember during Lent. Also in every church there are depictions of the events leading to The Crucifixion, The Resurrection and The Acension. 14 steps. This telling is about the history and backstory of what led to The Cross. I am not worthy... but only say the Word and my Soul shall be healed.

[Cherlynn Womack · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the most powerful books I have ever read in Christianity. I recommend this book to everyone! This describes what Jesus saw from the cross, his crucifixion, & His love for us from the beginning to infinity. The descriptions are beautiful & the words are powerful & will leave a lasting impression on the reader.

[Jacqueline · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m sure this book should get five stars, but I’m not very bright and some of it was really hard for me to follow. I loved the chapter on His loved ones! How the author explained our Lord’s thoughts regarding His apostles, especially Peter was really deep. And the honor he gave the Holy Women, just made me weep. Good book to read for Holy Week.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. The author did a good job of looking at what Jesus saw from numerous angles, not only the area in Jerusalem but the people he saw. There were parts that were too heady for me - especially the last chapter on heaven. But overall a good meditative book

[Fr. Carlos · Rating 4 out of 5]

The back cover has a recommendation from St. Teresa of Calcutta that is worth noting: "I am happy to recommend What Jesus Saw from the Cross. In it, we enter into the Heart of Jesus during His Passion and discover how precious we are to Him."

[Angelica · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is such a good read and a profound meditation on the passion. I especially liked the reflection on Mary Magdalene at the cross--hands down one of the best reflections of her role at the passion.

[Don Palmer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful and evocative reflections on Christ’s Passion. Also highly recommend his *The Intellectual Life* which I read many years ago.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slow in spots

[Janey Barclay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Disappointing

Not very well-written. I expected more information, even speculation perhaps, about what Jesus saw through his eyes as he hung there dying on the cross.