Luke 23:48

Luke 23:48 u`pe,strefon

In order to heighten the account, several witnesses include various interpolations. After ta. sth,qh codex Bezae adds kai. ta. me,twpa (“beating their breasts and their foreheads”). The Old Syriac (syr^{c, s}) reads, “All they who happened to be there and saw that which came to pass were beating on their breasts and saying, ‘Woe to us! What has befallen us? Woe to us for our sins!’” One manuscript of the Old Latin (it^g) adds at the close of the verse, dicentes vae vobis (to be corrected to nobis) quae facta sunt hodie propter peccata nostra; adpropinquavit enim desolatio Hierusalem (“saying, ‘Woe to us on account of our sins that we have committed this day! For the desolation of Jerusalem has drawn near’”).

Similar references to grief expressed at the death of Jesus are quoted in Ephraem’s Commentary on the Diatessaron (xx,28 of the Armenian version, ed. Leloir), “Woe was it, woe was it to us; this was the Son of God”…“Behold, they have come, the judgments of the desolation of Jerusalem have arrived!” Cf. also the apocryphal Gospel of Peter, § 7 (25), h;rxanto ko,ptesqai kai. le,gein( Ouvai. tai/j a`marti,aij h`mw/n h;ggisen h` kri,sij kai. to. te,loj VIerousalh,m (“They began to lament and to say, ‘Woe unto our sins; the judgment and the end of Jerusalem has drawn near’”).