When they led him away, they grabbed one Simon of Cyrene, coming from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it after Jesus.
World English Bible
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When they led him away, they grabbed one Simon of Cyrene, coming from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it after Jesus.
World English Bible
Questions where the Bible appears to say two different things, with the passages on each side set together.
Matt 27:32 — “they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name, and they compelled him … that he might carry his cross” / John 19:17 — “He went out, bearing his cross”
Who carried Jesus' cross?John 19:17 has Jesus carry his own cross to Golgotha — explicitly, *bastazōn heautō ton stauron*. Matthew 27:32, Mark 15:21, and Luke 23:26 have Simon the Cyrenian compelled to carry the cross for him.
Critical scholarship: Leans toward a genuine contradiction.
The tension: Strauss reads John as having Jesus carry his own cross where the synoptics have Simon the Cyrenian bear it in his stead.
Harmonization: Gill reads Jesus as carrying the cross first, until Simon the Cyrenian was compelled to bear it after him, the two accounts describing different stages.
Each section sets the viewpoints side by side; you weigh the evidence. Here, "critical scholarship" means academic study, not a value judgment. How this is built →
Within each section, grouped by shared field or question type — not a cross-section comparison.
This citation refers to this GEBible page — the verse and the analysis gathered here. To cite the underlying scholarship, cite those sources directly.
"Luke 23:26 — Scripture Analysis" GEBible, https://gebible.app/analysis/verse/luke/23/26?version=WEB (retrieved 26 August 2026).