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Palm Sunday 4/28/2013
The entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem after he raised the four days buried Lazarus is a moment of the most multifold and joyous recognition of the Lord and the Saviour in Him by His contemporaries. Jesus enters the capital city seating on a donkey colt, by the Old Testament prophecy. This is yet another among the myriad of signs by which He could be recognised, and still not even His disciples understood this token. A great many of people found out that He would come, and so they welcomed Him with palm branches in their hands. So, they took off their garments spreading them in the way and inspired they cried out in exaltation: „Hosanna! Blessed is He Who comes in the name of the Lord, the King of Israel!“ Even some of the Greek pilgrims having arrived for the Pascha drew near and entreated to see Him. Only the priests and the Pharisees became malicious preparing to murder Him quickly, and likewise planning to have Lazarus killed, for he was a witness of His power and Deity. And once more the Lord is trying to reveal His identity to the assembled people and to prepare them for the nearest future and for the meaning of this mission and its temptations. In fact, when He addresses them with the word about the Cross, they then lose the knowledge of Him as a King and Christ, their mind then closes to the word and the Scriptures. Palm Sunday is celebrated on the Sunday before Resurrection. It is for certain the most dramatic feast among the Twelve major feasts of the Church. It marks the beginning of the hardest week in the history of mankind, which the ascetical watchful knowledge of human nature calls ‘Passion Week’, which means ‘week of (Christ's) suffering’.
