The Apostles’ Creed: God The SonSample

Jesus’ Body: Hebrews 2:14-17

Here we have in mind the Apostles’ Creed’s claim that:

[Jesus] suffered under Pontius Pilate,
Was crucified, died, and was buried.

In these words, the creed attributes certain experiences to Jesus that would only have been possible if he was truly a physical human being. 

According to accounts of Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion in Matthew 27, Mark 15, Luke 23, and John 18–19, Jesus suffered under Pontius Pilate in a variety of ways. He was flogged, forced to wear a crown of thorns, spit on, mocked, repeatedly struck in the head with a staff, and forced to carry his own cross part of the way to the place of execution.

Jesus’ sufferings, crucifixion, death and burial demonstrated that he was a real man with a physical human body — one that could be beaten, one that could bleed, one that could be abused by soldiers, one that could collapse under exhaustion, one that could be killed, and one that could be buried in a tomb when his soul had left it.

And having a real human body was critical because the justice of God required that a genuine human being suffer physical divine judgment to atone for the sins of humanity. We find this emphasis in places like Romans 7:4, Colossians 1:21-22, and Hebrews 10:10.

As just one example, consider these words from Hebrews 2:14-17:

Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might ... make atonement for the sins of the people (Hebrews 2:14-17).

As this passage makes clear, Jesus had to be flesh and blood, a physical human being, in order to make atonement for us.