They have parted my garments (Notes)

Saint John - Chapter 19

Upon my vesture they have cast lots. J-J Tissot

[23] Milites ergo cum crucifixissent eum, acceperunt vestimenta ejus ( et fecerunt quatuor partes, unicuique militi partem) et tunicam. Erat autem tunica inconsutilis, desuper contexta per totum.
The soldiers therefore, when they had crucified him, took his garments, (and they made four parts, to every soldier a part,) and also his coat. Now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.

[24] Dixerunt ergo ad invicem : Non scindamus eam, sed sortiamur de illa cujus sit. Ut Scriptura impleretur, dicens : Partiti sunt vestimenta mea sibi : et in vestem meam miserunt sortem. Et milites quidem haec fecerunt.
They said then one to another: Let us not cut it, but let us cast lots for it, whose it shall be; that the scripture might be fulfilled, saying: They have parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture they have cast lots. And the soldiers indeed did these things.

But His coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. Euthymius says it was said to have been woven by the Blessed Virgin.
Allegorically. This was a type of Christ’s Church, which it is not lawful to rend, and thus cause a schism.


Tropologically. S. Bernard regards it as the Divine Image, so implanted and impressed on nature that it cannot be torn asunder.

From The Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ, by J-J Tissot (1897)

Now that the crowd has dispersed, the four hardened executioners are able to give their minds to their own affairs.  The law De bonis damnatorium  gave them the garments of those put to death; they had not the slightest intention of renouncing their claim, and as they were careful Fellows, they also resolved not to injure their booty.  They therefore refrained from cutting the seamless vesture, which would have made it have no use to anyone, but decided to begin by dividing the clothes into four equal parts. This is my idea on the subject.  To make the four portions pretty equal, the mantle was first divided into two parts, an easy operation, as it was made up of several parts.  Then the whole was parcelled out into four portions.  The drawer of the first prize got the seamless vesture, the second the white robe already described, the third got the sash, which was of finer material than the other raiment, probably with part of the mantle, whilst the forth lot was made up of the sandals with the rest of the mantle.  Strictly speaking, perhaps the account given by Saint John should be interpreted somewhat differently.  He says: "then the soldiers took his garments and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat", which would seem to imply that this "coat" was drawn lots for separately, whilst the rest of the raiment was divided into four portions without it, though to which of the fourt claimants each of these four portions should fall was also decided by what the Evangelists call the casting of lots.  The "coat" or "tunic" referred to by Saint John was "without seam" (inconsutilis), that is to say, it was open ''woven from the top throughout" in the same way as, according to Josephus, where garments of the Priests.

Totus tuus ego sum 

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:
Ad Jesum per Mariam