Verse 35. - Notwithstanding the supernatural darkness, there were those who lingered about the cross. Indeed, the darkness would add greatly to the awfulness of the place. It was out of that darkness that the voice of Jesus was heard; and inasmuch as Elias, or Elijah, was believed to hold some relation to the Messiah, it was natural for some of those who stood by to understand the words to mean that our Lord was actually calling for Elias.
15:33-41 There was a thick darkness over the land, from noon until three in the afternoon. The Jews were doing their utmost to extinguish the Sun of Righteousness. The darkness signified the cloud which the human soul of Christ was under, when he was making it an offering for sin. He did not complain that his disciples forsook him, but that his Father forsook him. In this especially he was made sin for us. When Paul was to be offered as a sacrifice for the service saints, he could joy and rejoice, Php 2:17; but it is another thing to be offered as a sacrifice for the sin of sinners. At the same instant that Jesus died, the veil of the temple was rent from the top to the bottom. This spake terror to the unbelieving Jews, and was a sign of the destruction of their church and nation. It speaks comfort to all believing Christians, for it signified the laying open a new and living way into the holiest by the blood of Jesus. The confidence with which Christ had openly addressed God as his Father, and committed his soul into his hands, seems greatly to have affected the centurion. Right views of Christ crucified will reconcile the believer to the thought of death; he longs to behold, love, and praise, as he ought, that Saviour who was wounded and pierced to save him from the wrath to come.
when they heard it; the loud voice of Jesus, and the words he uttered:
said, behold he calleth Elias; whom they ignorantly, or wilfully took for Eloi; See Gill on Matthew 27:47.