to it.” The Jews cried out: “His Blood be upon us[1], and upon our children.” Then Pilate released Barabbas, and delivered Jesus [2] to be crucified (Fig. 88).
COMMENTARY.
"He suffered under Pontius Pilate." The words of the Apostles’ creed do not merely mean that our Blessed Lord suffered during the time that Pontius Pilate was governor of Judaea, but are meant to show that Pontius Pilate was guilty of our Lord’s Passion and Death by his cowardly compliance with the Pharisees’ demands.
The Innocence of Jesus was supernaturally revealed a short time before His Death; for the dream of Pilate’s wife was a supernatural dream. In it God revealed to her that Jesus was a just Man, and that Pilate would incur a heavy punishment if he condemned Him to be crucified.
The Abasement of Jesus. It was a great humiliation to our Lord Jesus not only to be named in the same breath as Barabbas, but to have this ill-famed malefactor preferred before Him. Judas had valued his Lord at the price of a slave, and now the blinded people bartered away the life of their Messias for the liberty of an utter scoundrel who had robbed the peaceful inhabitants of Jerusalem of safety, possessions and life! Could a greater insult be offered to the Most Holy? Why did Almighty God suffer His Son to be so grievously insulted? The answer is this: It was our Blessed Lord’s will to be “reputed with the wicked”, and to be treated as if He were the worst of men, because
- ↑ Upon us. You shall answer for nothing! We take all responsibility on ourselves. We and our children will bear the guilt and the punishment, if innocent blood (which cries to heaven for vengeance) is shed.
- ↑ Delivered Jesus. Pronouncing the sentence of death on Him. It was now "about the sixth hour", or near the end of the second quarter of the day. The Jews divided their day of twelve hours into four quarters, each quarter being known by the name of the hour which began it (or, rather, of the last hour which preceded it). Thus the "first hour” was the quarter from 6 to 9 o’clock a. m. of our time; the third hour was from 9 to 12 o’clock; the sixth hour from 12 to 3 p. m.; the ninth hour from 3 to 6 o’clock. Pilate’s first examination of Jesus, which was followed by his sending Him to Herod, began about six o’clock in the morning. When Herod sent our Lord back, and the second examination began, it must have been about nine o’clock. He was scourged, crowned with thorns, and presented to the people between nine and half-past ten, and the sentence of death must have been pronounced a short time before eleven o’clock. During the whole night, and up to that hour, Jesus was being ill-treated, dragged about from one judgmentseat to another, loaded with ignominy, scorned, mocked, and tortured with scourges and thorns! Not for one moment had He been allowed to rest; no one had given Him even a drop of water to revive Him. If all this took place before He was condemned to death, we can imagine what sort of treatment He was likely to receive after Pilate had pronounced sentence.
