Jesus cried out the opening words of Psalm 22:1 in the darkest hour of the cross. Barnes lists what probably lay behind the cry: His great bodily sufferings, the hour when His enemies were permitted "to do their utmost," and the possible withholding of comfort from Him. But Barnes adds, "we have reason to think that there was still something more than all this": Jesus was bearing sin, and "he died in our place, on our account, that he might bring us near to God." Gill explains that Jesus was not cut off from God in His being, for "the fulness of the Godhead still dwelt bodily in him," but He was "without a sense of the gracious presence of God." Even so, the question keeps hold of God: He still says "My God." Gill notes that He "strongly claims and asserts his interest in God, and repeats it."

Matthew records no spoken reply from heaven. Some who stood there said, "This man calleth for Elias" (Matthew 27:47). One ran and gave Him vinegar on a reed, while the rest said, "let us see whether Elias will come to save him" (Matthew 27:48-49). Jesus "cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost" (Matthew 27:50). Then "the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom," the earth quaked, and the centurion and those with him said, "Truly this was the Son of God" (Matthew 27:51, 54).

Matthew gives Jesus' words as He spoke them and then translates them. Eli is Hebrew for "my God," lama means "why," and sabachthani is Aramaic for "thou hast forsaken me." Barnes says the language is "not pure Hebrew nor Syriac, but a mixture of both," and Gill says the words are "partly Hebrew, and partly Chaldee," an older name for Aramaic. Mark gives the form "Eloi" (Mark 15:34). The bystanders apparently heard "Eli" as a call for Elias, that is, Elijah (Matthew 27:47).

The Greek verb for "forsaken," enkataleipo, means to abandon or desert, and Thayer adds "to leave in straits, leave helpless." The same verb appears in the promise of Hebrews 13:5, "I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee."

Jesus prayed Scripture in His agony. Psalm 22 opens with this cry, but it does not end there: "when he cried unto him, he heard" (Psalm 22:24), and "all the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD" (Psalm 22:27). Matthew has already shown the psalm unfolding at the cross: the soldiers parted His garments and cast lots (Matthew 27:35; Psalm 22:18), and the chief priests mocked, "He trusted in God; let him deliver him" (Matthew 27:43), words close to Psalm 22:8.

Why was the Son forsaken? Barnes points to Isaiah 53:4-5, Galatians 3:13, and 2 Corinthians 5:21: Christ was "made a curse for us," and it was "suffering endured by Him that was due to us." Matthew Henry describes Him as "suffering his Father's displeasure against the sin of man." Matthew Henry says the believer learns from this cry "something of the Saviour's love to sinners," and he writes that the torn veil right after His death "signified that Christ, by his death, opened a way to God."