And when they came to the place called Golgotha, which means “Place of a Skull,”
Golgotha (Heb. Golgotha, Gk. Kranion — “place of a skull”) was the hill near the gates of Jerusalem where executions were carried out. It received its name either because the hill had the shape of a skull, or because the skulls of those who had been executed were left there. This place, outwardly being a symbol of death, as we will see next, becomes a source of life: there, where the blood of the condemned had once been spilled, now the blood of the Lamb of God was to be poured out for the salvation of humanity. Golgotha embodies the meeting of darkness and light—a place of death where eternal life was born. That place of execution became the sanctuary of the New Covenant, where death was defeated through love.