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 > PRINCETON, N.J. ^^ 
 
 Di'vision X>.>r^£^'' i '-----' 
 
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 Lord's Passion, cr. 8vo. c/o^>^ ^ / ^ ^ 
 
 I 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
AY 27 191B 
 
 FROM THE GARDEN ^^calso^ 
 
 TO THE CROSS 
 
 A STUDY OF OUR LORD'S PASSION 
 
 BY 
 
 A. B. CAMERON M.A. D.D. 
 
 LONDON 
 ISBISTER & COMPANY Limited 
 
 15 & 16 Tavistocic Street Covent Garden 
 1896 
 
Thou who tor me didst feel such pain, 
 Whose precious blood the cross did stain, 
 Let not those agonies be vain ! " 
 
to (gt)? Wife 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Leaving the Upper Room 9 
 
 Jesus in Gethsemane ...... 26 
 
 The divine Mystery of the Agon}^ ... 43 
 The Apprehension in the Garden ... 63 
 Jesus before His ecclesiastical Judges ... 83 
 
 Peter's Denial 110 
 
 Jesus before Pilate 132 
 
 Jesus before Herod . . . . . • ^57 
 Jesus again at Pilate's judgment bar . . .181 
 Jesus at the bar of the People . . . -199 
 Pilate washes his hands before the multitude . 221 
 Jesus scourged and crowned with thorns . . 240 
 
 The traitor's end 262 
 
 The Via Dolorosa 284 
 
 Simon of Cyrene 302 
 
 The Daughters of Jerusalem . . . .318 
 
LEAVING THE UPPER ROOM. 
 
 The hour was at hand when Jesus as our High 
 Priest and Saviour must go forth on His way of 
 death. It wanted now but this, followed by His 
 rising again, to complete His ministry on earth. 
 He had lived His perfect life, borne His faithful 
 witness to God's truth and grace, and wrought 
 His deeds of healing power and love. To crown 
 the whole there was needed only the sacrifice of 
 Himself on the cross, with all that should come 
 of it, for the world's redemption and His own 
 glory. So now He must enter upon His via 
 dolorosa^ which may be said to begin with the 
 departure from the Upper Room and to end with 
 Calvary. 
 
 The company attending Him on setting out 
 
 were the eleven. Judas had already parted from 
 B q 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 them.^ He had gone out from the Upper Room 
 by himself before they had risen from the table. 
 He was now mingling with his Master's foes, 
 and basely bargaining with them for a traitor's 
 reward. His was to be a dark and lonely pathway 
 through sin and shame down to depths of despair 
 over his crime, bringing him to the most tragical 
 end. The others were still clinging to their Master. 
 There was not, it is true, a traitor among them, 
 but there was not one who was not before long 
 to prove a deserter. Jesus was really to go for- 
 ward alone on His pathway to the cross. It was, 
 however, with a song upon His lips that He went. 
 
 But whither was the company to go ? Where 
 were they to pass the night ? It seemed as if in 
 Jerusalem Jesus had not where to lay His head. 
 On other evenings of this Passion week He had 
 gone out to Bethany, and lodged with His friends 
 Lazarus, Martha, and Mary. As some tell us, 
 however, it behoved Him on this paschal night 
 not to go beyond the bounds of the holy city.^ 
 
 ^ Keim thinks Judas did not leave till he saw Jesus set out for 
 Gethsemane (Jesus of Nazam, vol. vi. 320). Andrews, that he went 
 out on Jesus sayiug to him at the Supper table, * That thou doest 
 do quicldy' (Life of ow Lord, p. 413). The question whether Judas 
 partoolv of the Supper has often been discussed. There are weighty 
 authorities on both sides. 
 
 ~ No one could leave the city after the paschal supper till next 
 morning. 15 ut many more were at the feast than Jerusalem could 
 accommodate. Many found shelter and sleep by night in the gardens 
 around, See Andrews' Life of our Lord, p. 395. 
 
 IQ 
 
LEAVING THE UPPER ROOM 
 
 If SO, the Mount of Olives must have been 
 regarded as lying within these bounds. There He 
 had passed nights in retirement before. Judas, we 
 are told, knew the place, the favourite spot, the 
 garden there in which He was likely to be found. 
 He had doubtless satisfied himself on that point 
 before he left the Upper Room. To that favourite 
 retreat Jesus directed His way, and His disciples 
 accompanied Him with an indefinite feeling of 
 sadness and foreboding in their hearts, it is true, 
 but little knowing that the garden was to become 
 for ever memorable as the scene of the agony and 
 the arrest. 
 
 The eleven went forth with Him into the street 
 and into the night. It was drawing towards mid- 
 night ; the second watch, which began at ten 
 o'clock, was already well advanced. The moon 
 was at the full. Most probably it was just be- 
 ginning to throw its silvery light over the city, 
 and the hills around were appearing in sombre 
 majesty and impressiveness. There were crowds 
 abroad, for Jerusalem was full of pilgrims, and 
 there were the temple services to attract them.^ 
 Yet Jesus and His disciples seem to have moved 
 on unchallenged. Quietly they made their way 
 
 ^ Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, vol. II., 533. 
 II 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 through the animated streets; they passed through 
 the eastern gate, then down into the valley 
 through which the brook Kedron flowed, and so 
 onward to the enclosed garden on the slope of 
 Olivet called Gethsemane, destined to be for ever 
 sacred in Christian hearts and memories. 
 
 But before they left the supper table they 
 joined in singing a hymn.^ We have the means 
 of knowing what they sang. It was the Hallel, 
 the portion of the Psalter which was wont to be 
 sung at the close of the paschal feast — that from 
 the 115th Psalm to the end of the 11 8th. 
 
 It was the custom of the Jews for the father 
 of the house or the superior present to start the 
 singing of the Hallel, and the rest then joined in.^ 
 How intensely interesting and touching for us to 
 think of the voice of Jesus blending with the 
 voices of His disciples in the chanting of these 
 Psalms. Think of Him singing in the Upper Room 
 of Himself thus : " The sorrows of death compassed 
 me about, the pains of hell gat hold upon me. I 
 found trouble and sorrow ; " and then again, 
 '' Return unto thy rest, O my soul ; for Thou 
 hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes 
 from tears, and my feet from falling." Or again, 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 30. 
 2 IBaring Gould, Passion of Jesus, p. 63, 
 
LEAVINGJJHE IT PER ROOM 
 
 " All nations compassed me about, they compassed 
 me about, they compassed me about hke bees.'' 
 '* But the Lord is on my side, I will not fear. 
 What can man do unto me ? " " The Lord hath 
 chastened me sore. He hath thrust at me that I 
 might fall. But He hath also helped me, and 
 He hath exalted His right hand." " The stone 
 which the builders refused is become the headstone 
 of the corner." " Open to me the gates of 
 righteousness ; I will go into them, and I will 
 praise the Lord." " O, give thanks unto the Lord, 
 for He is good ; for His mercy endureth for ever." 
 Jesus could make those words His own as no 
 other who had ever used them. Li them He 
 could perceive Himself, now as the suffering and 
 again as the triumphant Redeemer. They told of 
 His coming woes, and of the glory in which they 
 were to end. The}^ gave expression to His sublime 
 faith in God. They were wonderfully suited to 
 the lips of Him who saw God directly and 
 personally connected with each one of the experiences 
 through which He had to pass, from the depths 
 of suffering to the heights of joy, from the direst 
 apparent failure and hopelessness to the most 
 glorious triumph. They come with thrilling force 
 from Jesus on His way to Gethsemane and Calvary, 
 not forgetful as He goes of the glory that is to 
 
 13 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 follow. In them are expressed for us both the 
 weeping of tlie night of the Garden and the Cross, 
 and the joy of the Resurrection morning. 
 
 When modern Jews are observing this paschal 
 meal, it is their custom that, at its close, they 
 throw open the doors of the place in which they 
 are assembled, and then remain in profound silence 
 for some minutes. They are waiting for the 
 coming of Elijah, the great Forerunner, to announce 
 the expected Messiah and the setting up of His 
 kingdom. The solemn silence is broken by the 
 whole company joining in the singing of the Hallel, 
 to which we have already referred, just as they 
 are about to leave. ^ Never could this interesting 
 Jewish custom have been observed with deeper 
 significance than on this occasion when the Messiah 
 Himself was in the midst of His followers, and 
 when He was on the way to that cross which 
 was to become the throne of His new and ever- 
 lasting kingdom. 
 
 When they had sung the hymn, chanted those 
 Psalms predictive of Jesus' sufferings and also of 
 His triumph, they went out to the Mount of 
 Olives. Doubtless there was much earnest and 
 tender discourse by the way, like that which had 
 
 ^ Mill, British Jews, p. 201. 
 14 
 
LEAVING THE UP PER ROO.V 
 
 been heard at the table of the Supper. How 
 much of what occupies the 14th, 15th, and i6th 
 chapters of John was spoken in the Upper Room, 
 and how much on the way, it would be im- 
 possible to say. It may have been the thought 
 of their going forth as men for whom Jerusalem 
 had no home that led Him for His own and their 
 comfort to say, " In my Father's house are many 
 mansions. If it were not so, I would have told 
 you. I go to prepare a place for you." ^ Perhaps 
 it was the sight of the moonlit vines growing in the 
 gardens of Olivet before them that suggested the 
 beautiful words He utters on the vine and the 
 branches.^ The calm resting on all nature, as it 
 drew on to the midnight hour, may have led Him 
 to speak of the peace He was to bequeath, which 
 the world could not give and could not take 
 away, and of the untroubled heart that rested on 
 the great love of God.'" Then the disciples walking 
 by His side— how the approaching crisis would find 
 them, what their future would be — these subjects 
 could not but be touched upon. The prospect of 
 His own woe, awful though it was, did not 
 wholly absorb Him. He had a loving concern for 
 
 1 John xiv. 2. 
 
 2 John XV. 1, 
 
 3 John xiv. 27. 
 
FROM TEE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 them. The part ihey were to play was as clearly 
 before Him as His own. He could tell them 
 beforehand of the collapse of their faith and 
 courage, which at the first onset was to take place, 
 and of their scattering like a flock of frightened 
 sheep when He their shepherd should be assailed 
 and smitten.^ He had prayed, and He would still 
 pray for their upholding in their greatest hour of 
 trial. He would warn them anew of their im- 
 minent peril, and of their urgent need to be 
 specially sustained.^ 
 
 Some are of opinion that it was on the way 
 to the Kedron Jesus turned aside and offered up 
 His great intercessory pra3'er.^ They think that 
 in some retired spot in the valley near the bridge 
 over the brook — some spot from which the hill 
 Olivet rising up on the other side and the gardens 
 on its slope might be in full view — Jesus might 
 have found the fitting temple of nature, where, 
 under the open firmament of heaven lighted up 
 by the shining moon, and with a solemnizing calm 
 resting on all around. He could pour out His soul 
 in holy intercession as He desired. Such an idea 
 is certainly not out of place, and for some minds 
 it has its attractions. 
 
 1 Matt xxvi. 31. 
 
 2 Luke xxii. 32. 
 
 '^ Lange, Gospel of John, p. 291. 
 l6 
 
LEAVING THE UPFER ROOM 
 
 But it is more likely that the Upper Room 
 itself was the place.^ It is more likely that the 
 chamber already consecrated as the scene of the 
 Supper was still further consecrated by being made 
 the Holy of holies into which Jesus entered as the 
 great High Priest, and where He pleaded with 
 the Father for His disciples and the countless 
 multitude that should beheve on Him through 
 their word. It seems most fitting that the place 
 where the Church held her first communion, with 
 her Lord visibly in her midst, should be the place 
 in which He prayed that those might be kept who 
 had been given unto Him, and that they might 
 know Him, abide in His love and fellowship, and 
 behold His glory.- 
 
 But while Jesus spoke of coming trial and 
 danger, and prayed for their safeguarding, the 
 disciples did not seem to understand Him. They 
 did not share their Master's fears and forebodings. 
 Peter, w^io spoke for them, evidently had no 
 dread of the flock scattering. Self-confidence made 
 him think that he for one was never likely to 
 leave his Lord. He thought he had the love 
 
 ^ Geikie, Life and Words of Christ, p. GG6. Also Edeisheira (vol. 
 IL, 513, 528). Westcott thinks it miiy liave been the tenii)le, but 
 that would be too crowded and noisy at this Passover time. 8ee his 
 Gospel of St. John, p. 237. 
 
 2 Jehu xvii. 
 
 17 
 
FROM TEE GARLEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 that was stronger than any. death. Measuring his 
 assurance on this point by the intensity of his 
 feeHngs at the moment he said, " Though all shall 
 be offended because of Thee, yet will I never be 
 offended."^ So strongly did the tide of feeling 
 within him run in this direction of self-assertion, 
 that nothing for the time could arrest or abate it. 
 Even the gentle but emphatic warning words 
 of his Master, " Verily, I say unto thee, that this 
 night before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me 
 thrice," ^ proved unavaiHng. 
 
 Peter knew himself, as he thought, better than 
 his Master did. He could measure himself, he 
 vainly imagined, against any danger. He was equal 
 to any possible challenge to the strength or 
 genuineness of his devotion. With his characteristic 
 ardour and energy he said, '* Though I should 
 die with Thee yet will I not deny Thee." ^ And 
 may we not discern just a trace of injured feeling 
 in his mind as he let fall that passionate utterance, 
 as if the Master were not doing justice to the 
 strength of his attachment and the strength of his 
 character, as if the Master were not quite trusting 
 him as he thought he deserved ? 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 33. 
 
 ^ Matt. xxvi. 34. 
 
 3 Matt. xxvi. 35. 
 
 l8 
 
LEAVING TEE UPEER ROOM 
 
 But Peter did not stand alone in his declarations. 
 His zeal and ardour proved contagious as they had 
 often done before. " Likewise, also, said all the 
 disciples."^ They rightly interpreted their Master's 
 words as a challenge to their devotion. They 
 were ready to meet it with the warmest pro- 
 testations on their part ; nor were they consciously 
 exaggerating when they said that they could 
 willingly die for Him. The very thought that 
 some great mysterious sorrow was impending 
 over Him, and that He seemed to be asking for 
 their fidelity in His hour of trial, doubtless made 
 their Master dearer to them than ever, and 
 intensified all their feelings towards Him. 
 
 It was not usual for Jesus to call for declarations 
 of attachment. He was content that it should reveal 
 itself in everyday words and deeds, in the thing 
 done or said that showed how much He was loved. 
 His followers were not required to be painfully 
 introspective, to be examining again and again, as 
 they walked with Him, into the state of their 
 hearts, and to be making frequent avowals of 
 their love and of their faith. We question whether 
 Jesus saw any wisdom or virtue in that — a practice 
 so like that of children taking up by the roots 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 35. 
 19 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 now and again the things they have planted, 
 that they may satisfy themselves as to how they 
 are growing, with the result that they weaken, if 
 they do not destroy, the life of the plants they are 
 so anxious about. It was enough if the disciples 
 walked with Jesus, and did so with true and honest 
 hearts. Yet times there might be which might 
 specially call for their avowals. Such a time was 
 this when Jesus had His face steadfastly set to 
 go to Gethsemane. In view of all that was to 
 take place there, we can understand Jesus in so 
 many words asking the touching question, " Will 
 ye also go away ? " 
 
 It did honour then to the disciples that they should 
 make the avowal which they did, and that they 
 should declare their readiness to die with Him. 
 But they did not know themselves as their Master 
 knew them. They were still ignorant of what the 
 cross was which was about to come upon Him. 
 They could not forecast that, as a trial or test of 
 their fidelity, it would be far beyond their strength 
 to face or to abide. They could not believe that 
 there could be any trial great or terrible enough 
 to make them deserters from their Master.^ They 
 could not understand the agony to be endured in 
 
 Mark xiv. 31. 
 20 
 
LEAVISG THE UFPER ROOM 
 
 the prospect of the cross, and which Gethsemane 
 was to witness. When it revealed itself in its 
 dread reaUty it proved too much for them. 
 Their faith, their courage first faltered, and then for 
 the time failed altogether.^ 
 
 But could there have been found men anywhere, 
 in that age or in ours, who as disciples would have 
 done any better than they did ? If the trial was 
 so great, so appalling, as to cause Jesus His bloody 
 sweat in the Garden, we ma}' well suppose that 
 the approach of it, and the possibility of sharing 
 in it, would have been enough to make cowards 
 of the bravest and the most heroic. 
 
 Once before, on a memorable occasion, Jesus had 
 sent His disciples forth on a mission fitted to 
 make special demands on their courage and faith.^ 
 That was when they were appointed to go two 
 and two, and preach the coming of the kingdom. 
 Then He had sent them ^\'ithout scrip, purse, or 
 sword. He had bidden them go even as they were 
 while they stood around Him, without provision 
 for their journey and without defence save that of 
 God, whose work they were to do. It was a trial 
 of their faith. It needed personal fortitude and great 
 loyalty to their Master thus to go at His command 
 
 ' Matt. xxvi. ijtj. 
 
 2 Luke X. 1-24, 'J"he sending forth of the Seventy. 
 
 21 
 
FROM THE GAliDHy TO TEE CROS!^ 
 
 to be the preachers of His kingdom. They were 
 for the most part humble fishermen, and they were 
 to perform the office of prophets with nothing to 
 accredit them but their commission from the Man of 
 Nazareth, and their power to work certain miracles 
 in His name. They might well have hesitated. 
 They might well have had their misgivings. They 
 could not know what reception the people would 
 give them, or what perils and sufferings might be 
 before them ; and it was trying to have to go, 
 humanly speaking, entirely unprovided for. But 
 they had been equal to that demand upon their 
 faith and their loyalty. They had gone forth, and 
 they had returned ^vith glad tidings to their Master. 
 They had '' lacked nothing." " Even the devils had 
 been subject to them in His name." ^ 
 
 It was, however, another and a greater trial that 
 lay before them now. It needed all the preparation 
 they could make for it. To use Jesus' own words, 
 which doubtless He meant in a figurative sense, 
 they needed purse and scrip and sword. ''Now," 
 said He, " he that hath a purse let him take it, 
 and likewise his scrip ; and he that hath no sword, 
 let him sell his garment and buy one."^ Better 
 without comforts than without the needed weapons 
 
 1 Luke X. 17. 
 
 2 Lulce xxii. 35-38. 
 
 23 
 
LEAVING THE UPPER ROOM 
 
 and defences for the crisis. Their honour and 
 safety could hardly be bought at too great a price. 
 That they might be sufficientty equipped and armed, 
 that they might have all their spiritual resources 
 and weapons — their trust in God, their faith in 
 their Alaster and His cause whatever might happen, 
 their steadfastness and loyalty — that they might 
 have all these at command to meet the impending 
 trial, was of paramount importance. All these would 
 be required, and would be well tried, when they 
 should see their Master in the hands of His foes 
 on the way to His cross. When the Shepherd 
 should be smitten it would be hard, nay it was 
 to be found impossible, for the flock to keep from 
 scattering. 
 
 It would seem that Peter put too carnal a meaning 
 into his Lord's words. Two swords were forthcoming 
 after those words were uttered,^ and Peter took 
 possession of one of them. What blundering use 
 he made of it we know. The stroke which cut off 
 Malchus' ear,- would, but for Jesus' intervention, 
 have proved fatal to them all. It was quite another 
 kind of armour or defence which the coming crisis 
 called for. It was that which the Master Himself 
 had, and in which He placed all His trust. It 
 
 ^ Luke xxii. 3b. 
 3 John xviii. 10. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 would have been well had the disciples gone to 
 meet the crisis as He did. It would have been 
 worth their while, " selling their garments," parting 
 with all else, to buy such a sword as He carried, 
 a sword which was to beat down Satan under His 
 feet, and to win for Him the victory of redemp- 
 tion. 
 
 It is remarkable how Jesus rests His prophetic 
 eye on this victory, even when He is about to 
 enter the scene of His passion, and how He seeks 
 to share with His disciples the comfort which the 
 hope of it gave to Himself. While He places 
 before them the dark picture of His agony and 
 cross He is careful to lighten it for them bv the 
 hope of His resurrection. In a way so true to 
 His beautiful and perfect love for them He tells 
 them that so soon as ever He should come back 
 from the grave He would make His way to them, 
 that the old fellowship, broken for a while by 
 death, might be resumed never to be broken again. 
 "After I am risen again," He says, "I will go 
 before you into Galilee."^ In the old loved haunts, 
 in the Galilee where they had walked so long 
 with their Master and seen so much of Him, 
 and which was dear to them as the country of 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 32 ; Mark xiv 28. 
 H 
 
LEAVING THE UPPER POOM 
 
 their birth, their kindred and their toils, they 
 should meet again, and their joy should be full. 
 
 With such discourse of trial and victory, of the 
 darkness of the night and the joy of the morning 
 that was to follow it all, Jesus beguiled the way 
 for His disciples till they reached the garden. 
 There they thought to pass the solemn paschal 
 night just as probably they had passed many another 
 before. It was, however, destined to be the scene 
 of momentous events for which, notwithstanding 
 all that had been or could be said, they were 
 unprepared. 
 
 25 
 
JESUS IN GETHSEMANE. 
 
 It would probably be an hour or so from 
 midnight when Jesus and His disciples reached 
 Gethsemane. It was one of those gardens on 
 Olivet to which pilgrims coming up to the feast 
 were wont to repair for meditation and repose. 
 Never did it receive greater consecration as a 
 sanctuary of devotion than it did when Jesus 
 entered it, there to agonize in prayer as the great 
 High Priest under the burden of His people's sins. 
 It was an enclosed spot, little more than half a 
 mile from the city, planted with olive trees in 
 the shade of which He could find the privacy 
 which He sought. 
 
 As to its exact locality opinions differ. The Latin 
 Christians of Jerusalem have a place which they 
 have walled round and planted with olive trees, and 
 which they believe to be the veritable scene of the 
 Passion. The monks will show you the grotto of 
 the agony, the place where the three disciples slept, 
 
JESUS IX GETHSEMANE 
 
 and the very spot where the betrayal and the 
 arrest took place. But the Greek Christians have 
 chosen another locaHty as the true Gethsemane, 
 and are quite as positive about it. Thomson 
 thinks neither locaHty is the true one, that both 
 are too near the cit}' and the public road eastwards 
 to have afforded the seclusion Jesus desired, but 
 that it may have been in some hollow of the hill a 
 few hundred 3^ards farther off.^ Within the Latin 
 enclosure there are some eight olive trees growing 
 at the present day. They are very venerable, with 
 massive trunks, partly decayed, gnarled branches 
 and scanty foliage. It is more than doubtful, 
 however, whether any of them are old enough to 
 have thrown their shadows in the moonlight over 
 the form of the Man of Sorrows in His agony. 
 Josephus says that after the siege of Jerusalem, 
 under Titus a.d. 70, not a single olive tree was 
 left standing, all having been cut down b}' the 
 soldiers of the tenth legion.^ 
 
 Gethsemane means " the garden of the oil press." 
 It is supposed by some" that in its enclosure 
 
 ^ Thomson's Land and the Book, p. 634. The whole question 
 is very full}' discussed in Robinson's Palestine, vol. I. 234, 34G. 
 Caspari {Life of Christ p 222) thinks something maybe said for the 
 traditional site as the tradition is very ancient. 
 
 2 Josephus, ^. /. V. 6. 2. 
 
 ^ Baring Gould, Passion of Jesus, p. 63. 
 27 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 there was not only an olive orchard but an olive 
 crushing mill belonging to the temple, from which 
 the seven-branched candlestick was supplied with oil. 
 It is more than likely that this is but conjecture 
 In the deepest sense, however, Gethsemane was 
 the oil press supplying from sorest pain and conflict 
 that which should make Jesus the true Light of 
 the world. 
 
 Dr. Petavel is of opinion ^ that Gethsemane was 
 the name of a country house situated on the other 
 side of the Kedron, and on the slope of the Mount 
 of Olives. The x^plov Xeyofxevov Tedarjixavei of 
 Matthew^ which is rendered "the place called Geth- 
 semane," he thinks ought to be translated, the 
 house called Gethsemane. According to him it 
 had enclosed ground occupied with olive trees 
 attached to it, and it belonged to Mary the mother 
 of John whose surname was Mark. Jesus came 
 to it as to a favourite retreat. His eight 
 disciples He left at the gate that they might 
 have its shelter during the chilly night. He 
 Himself with the chosen three went into the 
 garden. Judas at length came as if he had 
 only returned from business on which he had 
 
 1 Expositor, March, 1891. 
 
 2 Matt. xxvi. 36. 
 
 38 
 
JESUS IN GETHSEMANE 
 
 been sent by the Master. He was admitted, and 
 the band accompanying him promptly followed, 
 passed through the entrance, and hastened with 
 their torches now lit and their weapons in readiness 
 into the garden to discover Jesus and to seize 
 Him. The tumult of this movement awakened 
 Mark from his slumbers in the house, and throwing 
 a sheet hastily about him the young man rushed 
 forth to give warning to the Master and His 
 disciples. But before he could reach them the 
 apprehension had taken place, and he fled, leaving 
 the sheet that covered him in the hands of some of 
 Jesus' captors. Dr. Petavel thinks it was just because 
 a private house with private property adjoining it 
 had to be invaded that Judas' services as the 
 betrayer were of the greatest value. Had Jesus 
 and His disciples been in any other but private and 
 enclosed ground on the slopes of Olivet, the armed 
 band would have had no need of his help. Accord- 
 ing to Baring Gould, however, Mary's house was 
 that in which the Upper Room gathering took 
 place, and was therefore on the city side of the 
 brook Kedron. To it Judas with his band first 
 came ; young Mark was awakened ; and we can 
 understand the rest. 
 
 On reaching the entrance to the garden, Jesus 
 bade His disciples halt. " Sit ye here," said He 
 
 29 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 to them, "while I go and pray yonder."^ Probably 
 there was some gateway under which they might 
 thus rest as He desired. He then sought for 
 Himself the more shaded parts of the garden for 
 the sake of greater retirement. It would seem to 
 have been intended that the disciples should act 
 as sentinels to give warning of the approach of 
 foes. Thus we can understand the significance and 
 the need of the Master's injunction on leaving 
 them, "Pray that ye enter not into temptation."^ 
 But three were chosen to attend Him, and to 
 be witnesses of His passion, Peter, James and John.^ 
 They were, we may believe, the best of the band, 
 and the best Jesus could find among men as com- 
 panions for Himself in the joys and sorrows, the 
 work and the conflict of His earthly ministry. They 
 showed they had the qualities which when sanctified 
 and developed under His personal influence form 
 the noblest Christian characters, and fit men for the 
 highest Christian service. They brought the tribute 
 of their great loving souls to Him, and He gratefully 
 accepted it. They gave Him their confidence, and 
 their devotion, and He repaid them with a boundless 
 generosity. In the most solemn and sacred moments 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 36. 
 
 2 Luke xxii. 40. 
 » Mark xiv. 32. 
 
 30 
 
JESUS IX GETHSEMANE 
 
 of His life they were permitted to be with Him. 
 They were with Him on the Holy Mount when He 
 was seen in glory/ and in the death chamber where 
 He raised Jairus' daughter to life.^ Now in the 
 garden the special honour and privilege were given 
 to them of being witnesses of the most sacred scene 
 of all, and of sharing, if only they could or would, 
 the fellowship of their Master's sufferings. 
 
 Taking these three chosen ones with Him Jesus 
 went some distance into the dark recesses of the 
 garden. There His mysterious sorrow began. A 
 startling change seemed to come over Him. He 
 who appeared so calm and even cheerful at the 
 Supper table began to wear a look of greatest anguish. 
 Putthig together the accounts of it given by the 
 Synoptists — for the Fourth Gospel is silent on the 
 whole subject — we find that He began to be very 
 sorrowful and very heavy, to be sore amazed — 
 literally seized with terror — and that He exclaimed 
 "My soul is exceeding sorrowful even unto death. "^ 
 As if His sorrow were all too great to be shared, 
 He removed Himself from them "a stone's cast."* 
 After telling them of its overwhelming greatness 
 
 1 Matt. xvii. 1. 
 
 2 Luke viii. 51. 
 3_Mark xiv. 34. 
 * Luke xxii. 41. 
 
 31 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 He was constrained to withdraw Himself from them 
 for a Httle, and all alone to prostrate Himself to 
 the earth, and pour out His agonized prayer to 
 the Father. But so soon as the great wave of 
 divine agony had passed over His soul, and He had 
 uttered His supplications with strong crying and 
 tears unto the Father, He returned to His disciples, 
 hungering and asking for their sympathy and for 
 all the help they, as His deeply pledged friends, 
 could give Him by tarrying and watching with Him.^ 
 Three times Jesus thus came and went, sought 
 and quitted the companionship of the chosen three.^ 
 Three times in absolute seclusion in the garden 
 He agonized in prayer with the Father. Each 
 time He fell on His face and prayed in such words 
 as these, " O my Father, if it be possible, let this 
 cup pass from me : nevertheless, not as I will, but 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 40. 
 
 " Keim (Jesus of Nazara, vol. VI , 15) thinks the evangelists are 
 in some perplexity how to fill out their schemes of three prayers as 
 well as three denials Strauss rejects the narrative of the Passion in 
 Gethsemane altogether, because he cannot accept that Jesus knew all 
 beforehand, or tluit lie was aware His death was so near. The writer 
 of the Fourth Gospel he declares {Keiv Life of Jesus, p. 327) omitted 
 the whole story, because it did not suit his Log03 Christ who was 
 above all such trials. It may be added here, however, that Hase, 
 one of the weightiest authorities in the more modern school of German 
 criticism, goes so far as to say that in the history of the passion and 
 death of Christ all four gospels go side by side with each other, and 
 exhibit in their variations only the various sides and conceptions of 
 the same occurrence {Gcschiclite Jesu, p. 525). Hilgenfeld also admits 
 that the account of the agony is "of the highest originality, full of 
 historic truth." 
 
 32 
 
JESUS IN GETHSEMANE 
 
 as Thou wilt," ^ and each time the prayer seemed 
 to gather in intensity and subUmity. The second 
 time it took the form, "Abba, Father, all things 
 are possible unto Thee ; take away this cup from 
 me: nevertheless, not what I will, but what Thou 
 wilt." ^. The third time it ran in similar words, 
 *' O my Father, if this cup may not pass from 
 me except I drink it. Thy will be done." ^ Luke 
 specially notes that " being in an agony He prayed 
 more earnestly," and that " His sweat was as it 
 were great drops of blood falling down to the 
 ground."* 
 
 But each time on His return from His sanctuary 
 of sacred anguish and prayer Jesus found His 
 disciples asleep— the three on whom He most 
 relied, and whom He had taken apart that they 
 might specially be with Him. This fact, and all 
 that it implied, had also to enter into the cup of 
 which He must drink. At the time when He 
 needed most their fellowship those who had declared 
 they were ready to die with Him could not even 
 keep awake for His sake. Asleep they were as if 
 His agony did not concern them. Asleep though 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 39. 
 ' Mark xiv. 36. 
 •^ Matt. xxvi. 42. 
 * Luke xxii. 44. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 they had heard but a short time before that His 
 soul Avas exceeding sorrowful even unto death ! 
 Asleep in spite of His earnest loving entreaty to 
 watch and be in waiting for His return ! Could 
 anything be more touching than those gentle 
 words of expostulation which He addressed to them, 
 " What, could ye not watch with me one hour ? 
 Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation."^ 
 Are we to understand that the Saviour's solitary 
 agony and supplication lasted an hour each time, 
 and that this was the time He was absent from 
 His disciples ? If so, an incidental light is thrown 
 upon the Gethsemane agony which reveals still 
 more of its greatness. It was not a momentary 
 spasm. It was a terribly extreme tension of body 
 and soul protracted over some two or three hours. 
 The disciples watched while Jesus was with them and 
 engaged them in converse; it was while He was 
 away, and had special need for their watching unto 
 prayer, that they failed. Thrice the same drowsiness 
 overtook them, and each time it came upon them 
 as Jesus was wrestling in prayer with the Father. 
 The third time it was effectually driven away by 
 the tumult and the fear connected with their Master's 
 apprehension. 
 
 » Matt. xxvi. 40. 
 34 
 
Ji:SUS IX GETB^EMAXE 
 
 " The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is 
 weak,"^ adds the Saviour with a fine considerateness, 
 softening what might otherwise sound harsh and 
 severe. Three times that day the disciples had 
 travelled with Jesus the road between Jerusalem 
 and Bethany, and now it was far into the night. 
 They were suffering from fatigue of body, the 
 wearing out excitement of sorrow and other intense 
 feelings. They were sleeping for sorrow, sleeping 
 soundly like tired children who have cried them- 
 selves to sleep. Our Lord's rebuke was thus of the 
 gentlest ; and it bore in itself a note of tenderest 
 sympathy with those to whom it was addressed. 
 
 It might have been expected that the Master 
 would not have needed to repeat His gentle 
 chiding. But on His returning the second and 
 even the third time it had to be spoken anew. 
 And He spoke it with increasing earnestness, yet 
 without impatience — a striking example of the 
 forbearance and importunity He uses so graciously 
 towards His people. Disappointed in His three 
 chosen disciples a first and then a second time, 
 He might have given over appealing to them. 
 Coming from agonizing sorrow again and again 
 to find those His heart most clung to, parted from 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 41, 
 35 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Him in feeling by so enormous a gulf that they 
 were asleep, He might have ceased to ask for a 
 fellowship which, even when it was given, could for 
 Him be so little of a fellowship. But Jesus would 
 still hold them by the cords of love, and 
 would patiently wait till the day when the 
 feeble spark should become a flame, and the men 
 sleeping in Gethsemane men full of noblest 
 life, interest, and devotion even unto death in 
 the service of His Gospel. Thus Jesus rebukes, 
 warns, entreats still with a generous importunity, 
 and with a charity and longsuffering all His own. 
 Where any other would despair He continues His 
 gracious work. When it seems as if we were 
 asleep or dead to what stirs Himself most. He 
 comes again and again to wake us to spiritual 
 life. And who can tell the temptations and 
 dangers assailing us when we are asleep from which 
 we are delivered just because He is watching and 
 interceding for us in the sanctuary, removed more 
 than a stone's cast from us — the sanctuary above 
 that is all His own ? 
 
 The reason why the tenderest expostulations and 
 entreaties failed is not far to seek. The disciples 
 could not grasp, as they needed to do, the thought 
 that their Master's hour had come. They were in 
 Gethsemane that night just as they had been 
 
 36 
 
JESUS IN OETHSEMAXE 
 
 before. Not even the discourse in the Upper Room, 
 nor the broken bread and outpoured wine — 
 memorials of the coming cross — could bring them 
 to realise fully or clearly that that cross was 
 really at hand. We may spare our wonder or 
 our blame. It is easy to say after an event has 
 happened that it is all so clear. Nations might 
 never have committed the blunders and the crimes 
 they have done had they possessed at the time 
 the moral vision which even their history seems 
 now to give. Are there not multitudes even 
 yet who are strangers to the cross and who 
 stumble at it, though it has had the plainest 
 setting of history ? The disciples did not 
 know the cause of their beloved Master's agony, 
 and they could not sympathise with it. This 
 along wnth their false sense of security is why 
 their willing spirit was not striving as it ought 
 to have been doing against the weak flesh, and 
 why they succumbed so readily to sleep in presence 
 of the greatest crisis that ever overtook them or 
 the world. 
 
 How different it was with Jesus. His flesh was 
 also weak. So far as the flesh was concerned He 
 was not superhuman, He was even as other men. 
 The fatigue of the day, the strain of the supper 
 table, and the hours of agony and intercession 
 
 37 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 must have made Him weary indeed. For Him 
 slumber even for an hour would have been a 
 relief and a solace. But in the supreme crisis of 
 His life His spirit was not only willing but all- 
 commanding. His spirit was so intensely stirred, 
 so agonized, that sleep was impossible for Him. 
 The world, when it called for Him as the victim 
 of its sin and malice, did not come upon Him 
 unawares. It found Him keenly alive to all the 
 shame and suffering its sin had prepared for Him, 
 and to all that the Father might require of Him as 
 the divine sacrifice to take it away. And nothing 
 can keep us alive and alert in the hour of trial, 
 and clothe us with povv^er to meet the danger and 
 the conflict, like a living faith in the Cross. 
 
 When Jesus came the third time to His sleeping 
 disciples, the victory of the spirit over the weak 
 and shrinking flesh had in His case been won. 
 He was ready for His approaching foes. He had 
 taken the cup into His hands. In spirit He had 
 emptied it with all the coming woes it contained. 
 With the whole strength and intensity of His soul 
 He had said, and three times He had said it, 
 " Father, Thy will be done " ; and in the utterance 
 of these words, in view of all He knew to be 
 before Him, He had triumphed. In those hours 
 of His Gethsemane agony He had in spirit encoun- 
 
 38, 
 
JESUS IX GETHSEMAXE 
 
 tered His coming cross and all the storm of wrath 
 and woe it could mean for Him as the bearer of 
 the world's sin ; He had felt wave after wave of 
 suffering and anguish passing over His soul ; but 
 He had risen superior to all and shown Himself 
 more than conqueror in that utterance of sublimest 
 resignation. So far as His spirit was concerned He 
 had already offered His great sacrifice of Himself, 
 and He had achieved His triumph. He had con- 
 quered the world with all the evil it could do Him, 
 conquered sin and death and hell, and conquered 
 Satan with all the powder to tempt, wound and 
 bruise which might be permitted him. Hence we 
 understand His words as He rouses His disciples 
 from their slumbers the third time, " Sleep on 
 now and take your rest ; behold the hour is at 
 hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the 
 hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going ; behold 
 he is at hand that doth betray me." ^ They are 
 the expression of His perfect self-surrender, and of 
 the settled triumphant peace and resignation with 
 which He went forth to meet His cross. 
 
 At that moment, as Jesus spoke, the band was 
 seen approaching. The tramp of their feet could 
 be distinctly heard. The light of their burning 
 
 ^ Matt. XX vi. 45. 
 
 39 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 lanterns and torches flashed and flickered In the 
 darkness. They had already crossed the Kedron, 
 and were approaching the entrance to Gethsemane 
 where the eight disciples were resting. Now there 
 was no need for Jesus to say to them, or to the 
 three immediately about Him, '' Watch and pray." 
 The danger was at hand, and in presence of it 
 none of them could be neglectful of the warning. 
 
 But how much better they should now sleep and 
 take their rest, if only they could ! If only they 
 could, they would spare themselves bitter memories 
 and humiliations. Better far asleep than awake 
 only to desert their Master, or basely to deny 
 Him. "Sleep on now," He says, feeling deeply 
 for His loved ones, '* Sleep on, if you can, and 
 so be spared the sorrow of seeing your Master fall 
 into the hands that will buffet Him, scourge Him, 
 and crucify Him. Sleep on, if you can, through 
 the hours of your greatest temptations, sorrows, 
 and dangers. My prayer is that I only may be 
 seized and led away, and that you may be untouched. 
 Would that you could sleep till I come again to 
 3^ou in my resurrection glory ! " 
 
 But it could not be. Those who could not 
 keep awake while watchfulness was needed, were 
 unable to take their rest when sleep would have 
 been their greatest blessing. Jesus' loved disciples 
 
 40 
 
JESrS IX GETHSEMAXE 
 
 were still carnal. The stir and tumult of a band 
 of armed men apprehending their Master and 
 threatening themselves, could effectually rouse them 
 from slumber, while His own sore agony failed 
 entirely to do this. Fear for their own lives made 
 them wakeful and watchful enough : their Master 
 could be sorrowful even unto death, and in His 
 agony be even staining His raiment with His 
 bloody sweat, and they could not watch with Him 
 one hour. 
 
 We know how all this was changed afterwards, 
 how the return of Jesus from the grave and the 
 coming of the Holy Ghost awoke them at length 
 and for ever from their spiritual slumber. When 
 they had got their new and true vision of Jesus 
 and His cross, they counted not their lives dear 
 unto them, but rejoiced to suffer for His sake, and 
 to proclaim everywhere salvation through His blood. 
 Till we are awakened, we too are concerned for 
 ourselves rather than for our Master's cause. 
 Things outward touch us more keenly than things 
 spiritual. The world with its changes and its com- 
 motions can at any time break our repose, and even 
 fill us with a fear and alarm betokening how little 
 faith we have in God. It is otherwise when Jesus 
 quickens and stirs us into life by His sorrows and 
 His sufferings on our behalf. Then we cannot sleep, 
 
 D 41 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 as the world does, while He is agonizing. We 
 must needs watch with Him, with a sympathetic 
 interest and anxiety, keenly alive to all that touches 
 His honour and His glory. We must also be ready 
 to rise and go forth with Him, bearing His reproach, 
 and sharing in all His holy conflict. 
 
 4^ 
 
THE DIVINE MYSTERY OF THE AGONY. 
 
 There are three things that impress us with 
 reverent awe as we meditate upon the agony of 
 our Lord in Gethsemane. The first is its pecuUar 
 greatness and intensity, the second its cause, and 
 the third the spirit in which it was endured. 
 
 The evangehst Luke tells us that " being in an 
 agony our Lord prayed the more earnestly, and 
 his sweat was as it were great drops of blood 
 faUing down to the ground." This world has 
 been the scene of bitter griefs. It has had, and 
 still has, its agony and passion, its Gethsemane, in 
 countless lives. Literature and art have endeavoured 
 to explore the mystery of it, and to set forth its 
 pathos and its tragedy. History and experience tell 
 of anguish and tears, and broken hearts, and lives 
 pining away in sorrows worse to be endured than 
 death. Man's inhumanity to man, the breaking of 
 hopes and confidences, the sense of wrong or of 
 wrongdoing, the burden and agony felt from con- 
 
 43 
 
FROM THE GABDEX TO TEE CROSS 
 
 scious guilt — these and the Uke fruits of sin, from 
 which no human heart has ever been altogether 
 free, have brought men into their Gethsemane to 
 agonize and to cry unto their God. The physical 
 effects of what they have there endured have been 
 sometimes very striking and even tragical.^ But in 
 this respect, as in every other, the Gethsemane of 
 our fallen humanity, awful as it is, is surpassed by 
 that of the Son of Man. We cannot conceive 
 adequately of a sorrow so infinite as that suggested 
 by the evangelist's words. The internal conflict and 
 anguish were so severe and intense that there oozed 
 forth from the body, sharing them with the soul, 
 not sweat but blood. The whole bodily system was 
 so strained that the blood started through the pores, 
 and did this so profusely that it fell in great drops 
 to the ground.^ Those drops were an earnest of 
 the stream that was to flow when the Divine 
 Sufferer should hang upon the cross.^ 
 
 ^ Stroud [Fhysical Causes of the Death of Christ, \y. 380) cites at 
 least a dozen well authenticated cases on record in ancient and modern 
 limes of this sw^eating of blood — the feelings and passions being 
 touched to such a pitch of intensity that the blood has been forced 
 through the skin of the bodj-. Among these is that of Charles IX., 
 who might well suffer in this way, haunted as he must have been by 
 the horrors of St. Bartholomew. Another is that of a young officer 
 who was betrayed into the hands of a besieging enemy, and who, in 
 view of the tortures and death they were preparing for him, was 
 thrown into something like a bath of blood. 
 
 2 Ellioott's Life of Our Lord, p. 329. 
 
 2 In Carlo Dolce' s picture the drops as they fall are represented as 
 kindling into heavenly light. 
 
 44 
 
THE DIVIXE MYSTERY OF THE AGOXY 
 
 But if the physical effects told thus impressively 
 of the intensity of His sufferings, our Lord's own 
 words are even a more striking and more pathetic 
 testimony on the subject. " My soul," said He, 
 "is exceeding sorrowful even unto death." ^ That 
 He should have spoken of His sorrow is deeply 
 significant. Through life He was the Man of Sor- 
 rows. But where, except in Gethsemane, do we 
 ever hear of Him breathing a word, we shall not 
 say, of repining and complaint — for that was ever 
 far from Him — but of reference even to the grief 
 and the ills which He endured ? Even when on 
 the following day He was buffeted, spit upon, 
 scourged, and made to bear His heavy cross. He 
 never once let fall a word as to the bitter pain 
 and shame men were thus inflicting upon Him. 
 Meekness and patience never had such a triumph. 
 The triumph was divine.' 
 
 Why then did He speak of His sorrow now ? 
 Was this the one moment of His life when He 
 seemed to display some measure of human weak- 
 ness ? - Even were it so, we might say that the 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 38. 
 
 - Keim {Jesus of Nuzara, vol VI., 22) holds that Je:>us showed here 
 human weakess and opposing desires, and tliat this was an incipient 
 though not perfected sin. He adds, however, that in ilis second and 
 third prayer Jesus victoriously left the sinful frontier ! 
 
FROM THE GARB EX TO THE CROSS 
 
 weakness was human, and it was sinless. We can 
 add, too, that it has afforded comfort to many a 
 sufferer, assuring him that in Jesus he had a High 
 Priest touched with the feeHng of our infirmities. 
 But w^e beheve that what led Jesus to tell His three 
 loved disciples and the world through them of His 
 unutterable sorrow was that men might know that 
 His soul as well as His body shared in the sacrifice 
 He was making for their sins, and that the sacrifice 
 in either case, the price paid in the agonies of the 
 soul as well as in the pains of the body, was im- 
 measurably great. It was needful that He should 
 make Himself the revealer and the interpreter of 
 His own divine sorrow, the knowledge of which is 
 so necessary to our fellowship with Him in His 
 sufferings and to our trust in Him for our salvation. 
 Had He not thus revealed and interpreted His 
 own Passion how could we ever have known it, 
 and not knowing it, how could it ever have benefited 
 us ? In the outburst of His grief, in His deeply 
 touching words. He has therefore given us a glimpse 
 of what was in His very heart, as He was bowed 
 down and agonized under the load of our sins and 
 sorrows which was laid upon Him, that we might 
 see and know what a Saviour we have. 
 
 There is another striking circumstance to show 
 the infinite greatness of the agony. " There 
 
 40 
 
THE BiriXE MYSTERY OF THE AGONY 
 
 appeared an angel from heaven strengthening him."^ 
 Thus heaven itself was manifestly moved by the 
 scene in Gethsemane. Men failed Him in His hour 
 of trial, but the hosts above were ready to supply 
 the lack. Loved disciples could not watch with 
 Him one hour, but those whose greatest service and 
 jo}' it had been to minister to Him above were 
 looking down upon the mystery of His Passion 
 with intensest interest and adoring wonder. Alone 
 He seemed in His sanctuary of sorrow ; yet not 
 alone for there was this one of the angelic host 
 to assure Him that all heaven was with Him. This 
 angel's presence, with all that it meant of heaven's 
 interest and God's love, brought to Him more 
 comfort and strength than any sympathy human 
 hearts could offer. And we are thankful for it 
 in the record to lighten up the darkness in our 
 Lord's darkest hour, when He was about to go 
 forth to die, just as we are for the radiance and 
 the entrancing music which the multitude of the 
 heavenly host gave to the midnight sky over the 
 plains of Bethlehem when He was born. But it 
 serves to show incidentally how great the agony 
 must have been that heaven should be so stirred 
 by it, that one must needs leave its blissful seats 
 
 ^ Luke xxii. 43. 
 
 47 
 
FROM THE GARB EX TO THE CROSS 
 
 to sustain the Divine Sufferer and to bear Him 
 company. That a world where no sorrow is should 
 sympathise with our Saviour's greatest sorrow in 
 this world certainly adds to the mystery of Geth- 
 semane, but it affords one of the most comforting 
 revelations of the glorious possibilities of heaven's 
 ministering love among sorrowing and suffering 
 men. 
 
 But we pass to the all-important question, What 
 was the cause of Jesus' Gethsemane agony ? Could 
 it possibly be a timid apprehension of death ? 
 Could it be that the mere physical pain of dying 
 on the cross, now foreseen by Him, wrought Him 
 into such an intensity of mental and bodily suffering ? 
 If so, we must admit that Jesus has been sur- 
 passed by some of His own followers. Not a few 
 of the martyrs in His cause have gone bravely 
 and even joyously to the torturing rack, stake, or 
 scaffold. From a very early period the agony and 
 shrinking from apprehended suffering which Jesus 
 experienced in Gethsemane were laid hold of by 
 adversaries as a reflection upon His character. 
 Celsus and Julian the Apostate contrasted Jesus, 
 sorrowing and trembling in the garden, with Socrates, 
 the hero of the poison cup, and with other heroes of 
 antiquity, greatly, of course, to the disadvantage of 
 the former. " Why, then." said Celsus, scornfully 
 
 48 
 
THE 1)1 VINE JIYSTERY OF THE AGOXY 
 
 alluding to Jesus' conflict in the garden, "does 
 He supplicate help, and bewail Himself and pray 
 for escape from the fear of death, expressing 
 Himself in terms like these, ' O Father, if it be 
 possible, let this cup pass from me'?"^ The Emperor 
 Julian, quoted by Theodore of Mopsuestia, uses, 
 if possible, still more scornful language : '' Jesus 
 presents such petitions as a wretched mortal would 
 offer when unable to bear a calamity with serenity, 
 and although divine, He is strengthened by an 
 angel." To these heathen philosophers Jesus 
 trembling and agonized in Gethsemane seemed to 
 come far short of the great men of classic antiquity. 
 
 But the secret of the Gethsemane woe must be 
 sought in something else than the mere bodily 
 torture awaiting Him, or indeed all the outward 
 ills, sorrows, and reproaches with which an evil 
 world might afflict Him. To one with the pure, 
 keenly sensitive, divinely strung soul of Jesus, 
 what He had already suffered at the hands of His 
 foes through their hatred and unbelief, their de- 
 plorable unresponsiveness to all the truth He taught 
 and all the good He did, and their bitter scorn 
 and calumny, must have been far more than any 
 physical pain the}' could inflict upon Him. To 
 
 1 Origen, II. 24. See also Origen, YII. 53. 
 
 49 
 
FROM THE GARBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 reach the true secret of the agony we must go 
 beyond the outward and the physical. Jesus 
 Himself has taught His people to rise above the 
 sufferings which afflict the body, or which merely 
 touch the outward earthly lot. Over these He 
 had won the perfect triumph in His own soul. 
 But there was His relation to what lay at the 
 root of all these sufferings, and what was in- 
 comparably more terrible in itself than the worst 
 of them. There was His relation to the world's 
 sin, to that wdthout w^iich these sufferings would 
 not have been, and that without which there could 
 have been for Himself no sorrows, no tortures, no 
 cross.^ 
 
 If w^e leave this out of view, it is simply im- 
 possible to understand how Jesus could have been 
 so agonized in the prospect of His cross. His 
 moral excellences, which even the adversaries of the 
 Christian faith in our days are so walling to attribute 
 to Him, should have made His suffering in the 
 circumstances less instead of greater. Suffering is 
 bereft of its sharpest sting when it falls upon one 
 
 1 Ellicott {Life of our Lord, p. 329) says the Gethsemane agony 
 is ouly to be explained "by the vivid clearness of the Saviour's 
 knowledge of the awfnl affinity between death, sin and the powers of 
 darkness." Weiss {Life of Christy vol. III. 323) admits that Jesus 
 made the sin of His people His own, and that it was the fact He 
 was now to endure its awful burden which wrought for Him His 
 woe in the garden. 
 
 50 
 
THE DIVINE MYSTERY OF THE AGOXY 
 
 conscious of his own integrity ; he can meet it 
 tranquilly, and even with some feeling of triumph 
 over it, when he knows it is undeserved, or that 
 it is only the penalty of virtue and of devotion in 
 a good cause. But as a matter of fact the agony of 
 the faultless Man of Nazareth surpasses that of the 
 greatest transgressors, when in the hour of their 
 penitence they have been racked and tortured by 
 the vivid apprehension of their crimes. It becomes in- 
 telligible only when we accept His own explanation of 
 all His suffering and woe, that He had come to give 
 His life a ransom for many,^ and to shed His 
 blood for the remission of their sins.^ In other 
 words, He had come to make the sins of others 
 His own, and to suffer and die as if He had 
 committed them, and as if the guilt and the penalty 
 of them were His. 
 
 How Jesus could assume and have this personal 
 relation to sins not His own is the real nwstery 
 here. It must ever be, like much else in His 
 divine human being, largely beyond our finite thought. 
 It goes so far to explain it that He was the Son 
 of Man, and that in this unique character He 
 could be for men what no other could possibly 
 be. As the God-man He stood related to humanity, 
 
 1 Matt. XX. 28. 
 - Matt. xxvi. 28. 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 to its burden and its destiny, as no other could 
 be. He was its head and representative. As such 
 He could, while sinless Himself, make the sin, the 
 agony, and the conflict of our fallen race His own. 
 The suffering and the death which this involved He 
 as the second Adam underwent, not for His own 
 sake, but for the sake of humanity, that all might 
 issue in salvation. Thus far the Incarnation throws 
 light upon Gethsemane and Calvary. It did not 
 merely add another to the number of our race, 
 but it gave a new divine centre or head to it, 
 and one in whose personal history the agony and 
 conflict of humanity because of sin might be endured 
 and brought to the victory of redemption.^ 
 
 But considerations such as these seem at once 
 to increase and to enhance the mystery of Christ's 
 vicarious sorrow and suffering. They help to show 
 how He might come to be most closely related to 
 our sin and curse, but the relation itself remains 
 a divine mystery. The mystery, however, is 
 relieved for us, and we are led to rejoice in it, 
 when we see that it is radiant with the glory of 
 self-sacrificing love. It so meets our need crying 
 under the burden of our sins that we feel it must 
 be true. It gives us a new hope for humanity 
 
 ^ See discussion of the whole subject in Dorner, Person of Christ, 
 Pivision II., vol. III., p. 232-248. 
 
THE DiriXE MYSTERY OF THE AGOXY 
 
 that Jesus thus offers Himself for its help as the 
 Son of Man, and that He rejoices in the name. 
 It affords us, also, a new revelation pf God, showing 
 Him in the glory of His grace. We can under- 
 stand charity and self-denying beneficence meeting 
 the results of evil in this world — the poverty, 
 misery, and suffering it has caused — with their 
 bounty and all the services and forms of self- 
 sacrifice possible to them ; but here is philanthropy 
 on the Son of Man's part, going so far as to deal 
 with the evil itself and all its demerit and guiltiness, 
 its relations to the moral order of the universe, 
 and to the claims and glory of God. For divine 
 love to relate itself to human need and suffering, 
 and to multiply its offices of charity in relieving 
 them is a great thing ; but for divine love to 
 clothe itself with the shame and guilt of the 
 sufferers and make their cause its own, is another 
 and an infinitely greater thing. For God's Son 
 to come into the midst of suffering men that He 
 might share their ills and sorrows, and provide 
 them with comforts and abatements, would reveal 
 a beautiful compassion and beneficence. But for Him 
 to descend from His divine throne, step into the 
 sinner's place, and suffer Himself to be numbered with 
 the transgressors, bearing their burden and blame — 
 this is grace beyond all we can conceive of grace. 
 
 53 
 
FR03[ THE GARBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 True it is that with God alone such things are 
 possible, but who of our fallen race should not 
 be willing to believe that not only such grace, 
 but that also such power is in God ? Surety 
 of all God's creatures, fallen and stained as we are, 
 we ought to be the very last even to wish to 
 deny that such grace and power might be in our 
 Divine Maker and Lord. If the mystery be great, 
 it is glorious ; it is altogether worthy of God, it 
 is the teaching of His holy word, and it opens 
 the one way of hope for our ruined humanity. 
 
 To quote from the masterly review of theories 
 of the atonement in Professor Orr's recent work, 
 •' The Christian View of God and the World,'' no 
 theory can possibly be adequate or satisfactory 
 which does not recognise as elements in the case 
 "that Christ did enter, as far as a sinless being 
 could, into the penal evils of our state, and finally 
 submitted to death — the doom which sin has brought 
 on our humanity ; that He did this with a perfect 
 consciousness and realisation of the relation of these 
 evils to sin ; that He experienced the full bitterness 
 of these evils, and, especially in His last hours, was 
 permitted to endure them without even the allevia- 
 tions and spiritual comforts which many of His own 
 people enjoy ; that there were mysterious elements 
 in His sufferings, which outward causes do not 
 
 54 
 
• THE DiriXE MYSTEUT OF THE AGOXY 
 
 seem adequate lo explain (e.g. the agony in Geth- 
 semane, the awful darkness of His soul on Calvar}') 
 which appear related to His position as our Sin- 
 bearer ; finally that in all this mortal sorrow He 
 still retained unbroken His relation to the Father, 
 and so transacted with God for men that His death 
 may fitly be regarded as the Redemption of the 
 world." 1 
 
 To consider sin in its effect not on man's 
 character merely, but on man's relation to God, 
 and how Christ relates Himself to this and meets 
 this is, as Denney says, " the ulterior question which 
 reall_v goes to the root of the matter, and on 
 which the whole of Biblical teaching emerges.''^ 
 Christ related Himself to man's sin as it touched 
 his relations to God by taking it upon Himself. 
 He made the burden of God's condemnation of it 
 His own. He took over the responsibilities of our 
 sin as arising out of our relations to God upon 
 Himself, and He discharged them by suffering and 
 dying in our stead. It is this which yields the 
 only satisfactory explanation of the agony or the 
 crucifixion. To quote further the same author 
 (p. 123), " It is hard to believe, hard even to 
 
 ^ Oit's Christian View of Goi and the World, pp. 382, 383. 
 - Denney' s Studies in Theology, p. 102. 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO TEE CROSS 
 
 impossibility, that it was simply the anticipation 
 of pain which so overcame Him, It was the con- 
 demnation in the cross which made Him cry, ' O 
 my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass 
 from me.' It was the anticipation of that experience, 
 in which all sinless as He was, the Father would 
 put into His hand the cup our sins had mingled. 
 
 . . The cross is the place at which the sinless 
 One dies the death of the sinful, the place at 
 which God's condemnation is borne by the Innocent, 
 that for those who commit themselves to Him 
 'there may be condemnation no more.'" We have 
 the fullest sympathy with Dr. Denney when he 
 here adds, " I cannot read the New Testament in 
 any other sense." 
 
 Bearing in mind then Jesus' voluntarily assumed 
 relation to the world's sin, we can understand 
 somewhat, as we cannot otherwise do, the sorrow 
 that weighed upon Him all through life, and which 
 rose to the height of a divine agony on the eve 
 of His crucifixion. What humiliation and pain it 
 must have been to the sinless Jesus to come into 
 contact and close neighbourhood with the sin of our 
 race ! Is it any wonder that when the accursed 
 thing was laid upon Him, it wrought Him into 
 the greatest possible anguish of soul ? This was the 
 cup which in Gethsemane He held in His hands, 
 
 ^6 
 
THE LIVIXE MYSTERY OF THE AGOXY 
 
 Is it any wonder that He shrank from drinking it, 
 and that He prayed it might pass from Him ? 
 
 It is to be noted that the evangchsts offer no 
 explanation of the expression " the cup," used in 
 our Lord's Gethsemane prayer. To them it did 
 not seem to need any for those for whom they 
 were writing. Matthew and Mark, however, by 
 speaking of it as " the hour " as well as "the cup," 
 put the matter beyond all reasonable doubt. ^ Our 
 Lord had so often spoken and meditated in regard 
 to His final sufferings and death, that the time 
 of their occurrence did not need to be otherwise 
 indicated than as " the hour," and clearly these 
 made up the cup which it was the Father's will 
 He should drain to the bitter dregs. He knew 
 He had come to be a sacrifice for sin. The great 
 altar was being prepared on which the sacrifice 
 was to be offered up. The fires, however, which 
 were to burn on that altar, and by which He was 
 to be consumed, were to be so awful that He 
 was stirred in His agony to pray that if it 
 were possible He might be spared them. 
 
 What sufferings, what woes indeed must have 
 been in His cup ! Who can tell what the cross 
 was which His soul endured, of which that of 
 
 ' Matt. xxvi. 45 ; Mark xiv. 41. 
 
 E 57 
 
FROM THE GARB EX TO THE CROSS 
 
 Calvary was only the outward symbol and ex- 
 pression ? We are fallen creatures, but we know 
 what a cross a burning sense of wrongdoing is 
 to bear, and to what depths of anguish through 
 shame and remorse men may be brought. But to a 
 perfectly pure soul such as that of Jesus, what agony 
 the bearing of the world's sin must have meant ! 
 If a sense of guilt makes men hang down their heads 
 among their fellowmen in a world where all have 
 sinned, what shame Jesus bearing our sins must 
 have felt in the sight of God and of heaven ! 
 If men with their dulled and limited susceptibilities 
 suffer the most poignant distress as the}' realise 
 their own share of the world's sin, what anguish 
 Jesus must have suffered when the great Gethsemane 
 agony of the world became His own, and became 
 His in a more awful form than ever the world 
 had known it, when " the Lord laid upon Him the 
 iniquity of us all ! " ^ And if, even in the view of 
 men, there is guilt such that no punishment at 
 the hands of men is adequate to it, what shall 
 we say of that cross more awful than the mere 
 material one men saw on Calvary which Jesus 
 must have endured, while in God's hands He was 
 being "wounded for our transgressions and bruised 
 for our iniquities ! " 
 
 ^ Isaiah liii. 6. 
 
 ;8 
 
TKE mVIXE MYSTERY OF THE AGOXY 
 
 One thing more demands our reverent thought 
 before the m^-stery of Gethsemane, and that is the 
 spirit in which the agony was endured. Here 
 also we see something which Hfts Jesus above all 
 other men, and gives Him a matchless preeminence. 
 The more we meditate on what His coming cross 
 involved, and what the anguish of His soul was 
 in prospect of it, we are the more profoundly 
 touched by the sublime willinghood and resignation 
 which He breathes. "Nevertheless not my will, but 
 thine be done." It was His meat and drink, as He 
 Himself has told us, to do His Father's will and 
 to finish His work.^ We can understand Him 
 doing the will of His Father with gladness when, 
 in accordance with it. He had miracles to perform, 
 divine blessings to spread abroad, and His own 
 perfectl}' pure and good life to live. We can 
 also understand Him bravely doing it when, with 
 His soul which loathed evil and every kind of 
 wrong, He bore up unflinchingly against the 
 wrongs and the evils with which He was Himself 
 assailed. But Jesus' subjection went far beyond 
 this when He took the cross from His Father's 
 hand, and meekly said as He did so in Geth- 
 semane, " Not what I will but what Thou wilt." ^ 
 
 1 John iv. 34. 
 
 2 ;Mark xiv. 36. 
 
 59 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 This was bidding welcome to suffering from 
 which nature shrank. It was taking up the load 
 of others' sins, with all their shame and guilt, at 
 which His own spotless soul could not but be filled 
 with horror. It was also submitting to the wrath 
 and the accursed death due to Him who should 
 be the bearer of the world's sin, and enduring all 
 at the hands of a God whose love and fellowship 
 had been life and bliss to Him through eternal ages. 
 Self-subjection reached its divine climax when Jesus 
 accepted the lot of shame and woe which were 
 appointed Him, and went forth in the spirit not 
 only of resignation but of thanksgiving to meet 
 all that justice could decree, or wicked men and 
 the powers of darkness could inflict. 
 
 Here we have an example that appeals to us 
 with the most pathetic force. It strikes at the 
 root of our selfishness. It touches us where perhaps 
 we are weakest — that is, in respect of our wills. 
 It tells us of that being done under the most 
 trying circumstances which, under the most favour- 
 able, men can with difficulty be induced to do — 
 that is, to give up their will or way even when 
 it can plainly be shown to be evil and ruinous. 
 It tells us also of an infinite love, ready to suffer 
 and die that even wrongdoers against itself might 
 be blessed and saved. And it tells us of an 
 
 60 
 
THE DIVINE MYSTERY OF THE AGOXY 
 
 absolutely limitless confidence in God, ready to go 
 forth to meet any storm of evil and suffering at 
 His call, relying on His faithfulness and power, 
 and impelled by an immeasurable love for Him 
 and desire for His glory. 
 
 What a mighty uplifting and transforming power 
 lies in this sublime Gethsemane utterance, " Thy 
 will be done " ! Even as He uttered the words 
 ere ever the cross was laid upon His shoulders, 
 Jesus had already overcome the sin and woe 
 from which He came to deliver us. All the 
 shame, torture, agony which followed became but 
 the glorious scars of the conflict and the adorn- 
 ments of His triumph as our Redeemer. The 
 cruel blows and insults showered upon Him, the 
 mock purple robes, the crown of thorns, the cross 
 itself became radiant with an eternal glor^^ That 
 He met them all as they came as the Father's 
 will for Him, and met them with an unmurmuring 
 acquiescence, made Him the most glorious of God's 
 servants, and turned them all into everlasting 
 honours for Himself and everlasting blessings for 
 His people. And so soon as we are brought to say 
 in any trials which have come from God's hand, 
 " Father, Thy will be done," as our Lord did in 
 the garden, we too become in these more than 
 conquerors. Those trials, which otherwise might 
 
 6i 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 crush us beneath their weight, become transformed 
 into angels of God, whom we entertain unawares, 
 and who are sent to raise us to honour and 
 blessing with Jesus. What the world wants to 
 make it a new and a redeemed world is just the 
 Gethsemane spirit of Jesus — His sublime resignation, 
 His Avilling obedience, His perfect trust. 
 
 " Gethsemane ! Joy hath not flowers so sweet 
 As those which cluster on thine olive slope : 
 Beneath the crimson sheen of Jesus' feet 
 Springs up the blossom of a deathless hope. 
 
 Oh, not as I, but as thou wilt, my Lord ! 
 
 I will not put aside Thj- cup of pain ; 
 Sorrow is turned to gladness at Thy word, 
 
 And life's Gethsemane becomes a gain." ^ 
 
 ^ Erodrick's Gethsemane in Baynes' Sacred Poems. 
 62 
 
THE APPREHENSION IN THE GARDEN. 
 
 It might have been supposed that the priests 
 on that Passover night were engrossed in its 
 rehgious services, and that nothing would be farther 
 from their minds than to stain the memory of so 
 sacred a season by the holding of courts or the 
 shedding of blood. But Annas and Caiaphas were 
 intent upon the plot which was to end the career 
 of the Man of Nazareth. This had come to possess 
 an intense personal interest for them far beyond 
 the formal or official interest they might have in 
 any religious observance. Thev had said as to their 
 laying hands on Jesus, " Not on the feast day, 
 lest there be an uproar among the people." ^ But 
 it was to be on the feast day. Their own ordi- 
 nances had prescribed that the court of the Sanhedrim 
 should not be held on the day preceding a holy 
 festival or a Sabbath.^ But it was in the earliest 
 
 ' Mark xiv. 2. 
 
 - Talmud, Sanhedrin iv. 7 
 
 t>3 
 
FEOJI THE GAUBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 hours of such a day that that court was to meet, 
 and with frantic haste to send forth the Christ of 
 God with the brand of a malefactor. 
 
 Events in God's providence had so brought it 
 about. To the chief priests the traitor came that 
 night fresh from the fellowship of the Upper Room. 
 It was an unexpected joy. They had given a 
 command that if any of the people knew where 
 Jesus was they should show it, that they might 
 take Him.^ It was creditable to the people that 
 they gave so little heed to the command, and that 
 the betrayer was not to be found among them. 
 It was what no one, friend or foe, could have 
 looked for, that the traitor should come from 
 the ranks of the disciples. The chief priests lost 
 no time in concluding the bargain with him for 
 his services. " They covenanted with him for thirty 
 pieces of silver." ^ 
 
 To get a band which might be sufficient for 
 the arrest, and which Judas might lead, was their 
 next care. The temple police were always at their 
 service, those whose duty it was to maintain order 
 in the sacred courts, and it was not long before 
 a considerable body of them was brought together. 
 But it seemed to be doubted whether a band, 
 
 1 John xi. 57. 
 - Matt. XX vi. 15. 
 
 64 
 
THE APPREHEXSION IX THE GARDEX 
 
 armed as they were onl\^ with clubs or staves, 
 would be sufficient.^ Jesus was feared. They did 
 not know what force He might put forth in His 
 own defence. He had done so many extraordinary 
 deeds. Besides, there were eleven resolute and 
 deeply-attached disciples with Him. Judas himself 
 had heard them declare that they were ready to 
 die with Him. So the Roman governor was 
 approached, and he was induced to send a strong 
 detachment, armed not with clubs, but with swords, 
 from the Roman garrison at Antonia to help in 
 the capture.- 
 
 Thus a great multitude was, in the early hours 
 of the morning, gathered together. Along with 
 those temple guards and Roman soldiers there 
 were chief priests and elders whose hot zeal against 
 Jesus made them so far forget themselves, servants 
 
 ' Baring Gould (raastofi of Jesus, p. 85) thinks it possible but not 
 probable that the captain of the temple guard asked the assistance of 
 Homan soldiers. But how are ^\'e to account for the swords with 
 which some of the band were armed ? The temple guards carried 
 only clubs or staves, and to secure a more formidable force recourse 
 was had necessarily to the Roman governor (Geikie, life and IVords 
 of JesHs, p. 675). Westcott thinks that the priests would not have 
 taken the step of apprehending Jesus without some understanding with 
 Pilate, that Romans were associated with Jews in that act, and that 
 it is likely a whole cohort (600) was engaged (Westcott, Gospel of 
 St. John, p. 252). 
 
 - According to Keim, there would be about 500 soldiers from 
 Antonia, besides servants of the high priest and of the Pharisees 
 [Jesus of Naznra, vol. YL, 25). Weiss thinks that a regiment was 
 kept in readiness in case of need, but that only a detachment of it 
 was sent {Life of Christ, vol. III., 328). 
 
 65 
 
FR03I THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 of the high priest, eager to see their masters' 
 scheme succeed, stragglers abroad in the streets 
 attracted as the band passed along, and many others 
 drawn by curiosity or interest. Anticipating a stout 
 resistance and the possibilities of escape, they were 
 provided not only wuth swords and staves but 
 with lanterns and torches.^ Probably by the same 
 route as Jesus and the eleven had taken, some 
 three hours before, through the eastern gate over 
 the Kedron, and then up the slopes of Olivet 
 they went till they reached the garden to which, 
 as Judas knew, Jesus often resorted. Quickly and 
 quietly they hastened on, hoping to come upon 
 Jesus unawares, and to render escape or conceal- 
 ment impossible. They very likely counted on 
 Jesus and His disciples being at this early hour 
 asleep under the shadow of the ohve trees. But 
 when His hour was cOme He was to be found 
 ready. 
 
 Agreeably to the plan which had been arranged 
 Judas, when they were approaching the entrance 
 to Gethsemane, put himself at their head. He 
 went some Httle distance in advance to seek for 
 his Master amid the recesses of the garden. He 
 
 ^ Hackett {Illustrations of Scripture, p. HO) says "They would 
 need lanterns aid torches, even on a clear night and under a brilliant 
 moon, because the western side of Olivet abounds in deserted tombs 
 aud caves." 
 
 60 
 
THE APPREHENSIOX IX THE GARLEX 
 
 was to single Him out and salute Him ; then the 
 guards were to rush forward and seize Him. Thus 
 separating himself from the band, he might make 
 it appear as if he were not really one of them. 
 It might seem to the disciples that he had only 
 returned from doing what he had been understood 
 by them to leave the Upper Room to do, and 
 that the coming of the multitude was a matter 
 for which he was not at all responsible. 
 
 But Judas was speedily to be undeceived. His 
 Master who knew what was in man, and had 
 read the traitor's heart to himself, if he could 
 only have profited in time by the lesson, was not 
 to be imposed upon. He was in readiness for him 
 and the formidable band he led. He was not 
 taken unawares. Nor did He act at all as the 
 traitor had expected. He showed no trace of 
 agitation or fear. He manifested no desire or 
 design to put forth His miraculous power on His 
 own behalf. He did not attempt to flee. On the 
 contrary, to his utter dismay and remorse, Judas 
 saw Him put Himself into His captors' hands and 
 allow Himself to be led away as a lamb to the 
 slaughter. It was a charge Celsus made that Jesus 
 was taken while trying to hide Himself and to 
 escape in the most disgraceful way.^ It would 
 ^ Origen, II. 9 
 
 67 
 
FROM THE GAEDEy TO THE CROSS 
 
 seem as if the charge were met by anticipation, 
 when the evangehst John writes that '' Judas also, 
 which betrayed Him, knew the place ; for Jesus 
 ofttimes resorted thither with His disciples." ^ 
 
 Judas' conceptions of his Master must have been 
 low indeed if he thought He w^ould seek safety in 
 flight, appalled by the force come to apprehend 
 Him. He could have learned little from what he 
 had seen of his Master's ministry. Possibly he 
 thought that when it should come to the worst 
 his Master might, by some exercise of His 
 supernatural power, extricate Himself from the 
 toils of His enemies. But Jesus had never been 
 known to work miracles for Himself, though He 
 had wrought many for others. 
 
 Judas is indeed an inscrutable mystery. Un- 
 questionably he filled his cup of iniquity to the 
 brim that night when he violated the sanctities 
 of affection and confidence, and with the kiss of 
 love and discipleship acted the traitor's part. 
 " Whomsoever I shall kiss " said he, " that same 
 is He : hold Him fast."^ Going forward in advance, 
 he found Jesus where he had expected. " Friend," 
 said Jesus to him, "wherefore art thou come?''^ 
 
 ^ John xviii. 2 
 
 - Matt. xxvi. 48. Mark xiv. 44. 
 3 Matt. xxvi. 50. 
 68 
 
THE APrREHEXSIOX IX THE GARDEX 
 
 Unabashed with the touching and searching question, 
 he saluted Him with his "Hail Master," and he dared 
 to throw himself upon His neck and to kiss Him. 
 
 Never was there a greater outrage upon love, 
 never a more wicked profanation of its most tender 
 and sacred forms of expression. " Betrayest thou 
 the Son of Man with a kiss ?"^ said Jesus, dealing 
 still more closely with the traitor's soul, every word 
 so expressive and so fitted to touch the conscience 
 of Judas if anything could have done it. The 
 act received its fitting name, and was put in all 
 its blackness before the doer. What aggravated 
 it immeasurably was that it was being done against 
 the Son of Man, and done by the sacred symbol 
 of friendship and trust. It would have been one 
 of the foulest crimes to use any man in that way, 
 but so to use the Son of Man and the Master 
 he had known so long, could one possibly 
 exaggerate such guiltiness ? 
 
 There is reason to believe that Jesus felt this 
 treason more than almost anything else He suffered 
 at the hands of men. The injustice and wrong done 
 Him at the bar of Caiaphas or Pilate were by 
 men known to be either hostile or indifferent. The 
 buffeting and scourging and indignities He endured 
 
 1 lAike xxii. 4S. 
 69 
 
FROM THE GARBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 later on came from hirelings, Jewish and Roman, 
 of whom little else was to be expected. But 
 this came from a professed disciple. Even the 
 humiliating weight of the cross He had to carry, 
 or the physical pain of it He had to bear, could 
 hardly of themselves touch Him so keenly as this 
 wounding in the house of His friends. The 
 Psalmist's words He could make His own, " It 
 was not an enemy that reproached me, then I 
 
 could have borne it but it was thou, a 
 
 man mine equal, m}' guide, and mine acquaintance."^ 
 Shaking Himself free from the embrace of the 
 traitor Jesus went calmly to meet the band who 
 were now rushing forward to seize Him. The 
 action so unexpected, and so unlike all that officers 
 of the law were accustomed to, at once disconcerted 
 them. They had expected to surprise Him in His 
 hiding place. They were themselves surprised. 
 "Whom seek 3^e?" This simple question, followed 
 up by the avowal that He was the Jesus of 
 Nazareth they were seeking for, startled them. Nay 
 it seemed as if the words were the stroke of some 
 mysterious divine power, for instantly they reeled 
 and fell backward to the ground. There may have 
 been something in Christ's aspect and in the tone of 
 
 1 Psalm Iv. 12. 
 70 
 
THE APritEHEXSIOX IX THE GAUDEX 
 
 voice in which He spake. There were times when 
 even bad men were awed by His presence. The 
 unhallowed traffickers in the temple courts fled in 
 terror before Him as He moved about with His 
 whip of small cords. While they were in the 
 very act of making Him a prisoner there was a 
 mysterious something to remind the armed band 
 how infinitely little against Him all their arms 
 and their numbers availed, how they were much 
 more in His hands than He could be in theirs, 
 and how entirely voluntary His surrender of Himself 
 was.^ When they rose from the ground and again 
 advanced to Him, it was the same question as 
 before that He put to them, "Whom seek ye.?"- 
 adding as fie looked round on His loved disciples, 
 " If therefore ye seek me, let these go their way." " 
 His disciples' safet}" concerned Him. He would 
 spare them every trial He could. In this hour of 
 danger He would shield them. Like the Good 
 Shepherd He was. He would interpose His own 
 person between His flock and the peril that 
 
 ^ Ellic'utt {Life of our Lord^ p. 327) holds that there was a 
 miraculous power attendino^ the "I iini he." Keim's r.aturalistic 
 piinciples fail him here. lie admits the falling down of the band 
 to be entirely involuntary and purely physical, but he cannot account 
 for it otherwise than as connected with the mysterious personal 
 influence of Jesus {Jesus of Xazara, vol. VI., 34.). 
 
 2 John xviii. 7. 
 
 3 John xviii. 8. 
 
 71 
 
FROM THE GAEDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 threatened them. Upon Himself He would con- 
 centrate the hostile attentions of the band, and 
 draw them off as much as He could from those 
 He so deeply loved. 
 
 All the more He sought their safety that He 
 knew how ill prepared they were for the crisis. 
 Thc}^ had not the strength which comes from 
 watching and prayer. They could not watch with 
 Him in His agony, nor understand His coming 
 cross. So they were to be spared while He went 
 to suffer and die. The cruel and violent hands 
 that should be laid upon Him should not be laid 
 upon them. Alone indeed He should go forth to 
 take up and bear His cross. Not a single disciple 
 He had should share in its shame and suffering. 
 
 What an honour to humanity it would have been 
 had Peter and John been seized at the same time 
 with their Master, and had Jesus died on Calvar}^ 
 between two disciples instead of dying between 
 two thieves ! But humanity was not to have that 
 honour. It is humbling to think that it did not 
 possess virtue enough, as appears from the history, 
 to deserve it. Not even a disciple could be found 
 to travel the way to Calvary with Jesus. He had 
 to "tread the wine press alone.'' And such was His 
 boundless consideration, generosity and love, that 
 He willed that it should be so, and that the shield 
 
 72 
 
THE ArPJREHEXSIOX IN THE GARDEX 
 
 should be thrown over all others so that none 
 but Himself should suffer while He wrought out 
 the world's salvation. 
 
 The Master's words, and His calm and dignified 
 demeanour before His captors, appear to have had the 
 effect of rallying the disciples for a little. Dismayed 
 and filled with fear on the first appearance of the 
 great multitude in the garden, they seemed now 
 to gather some courage by the way in which He 
 was meeting them. Their impulse now was to 
 use what weapons they had, and fight in their 
 own and their Master's defence. " Lord, shall 
 we smite with the sword ?"^ said Peter, ever 
 foremost to speak or to act. Without waiting 
 for a reply, he drew his sword, and with it 
 smote off the ear of one in the band. His 
 name was Malchus. Most probably he had been 
 showing himself particularly forward and offensive 
 in his conduct on the occasion. He was a servant 
 of the high priest ; and we may well believe that 
 he shared his master's hatred of the Nazarene, and 
 that among those engaged in the arrest he was 
 well to the front. ^ 
 
 That sword-stroke was a blundering one. Peter 
 
 ^ Luke xxii. 49. 
 
 2 Ewald makes Malchus leader of the Jewish section of the band 
 {Life of Christ, p. 310). 
 
 ^ 73 
 
FROM THE GAEL EX TO THE CROSS 
 
 was not accustomed to arms, and he was too excited. 
 The stroke might have had disastrous consequences. 
 Malchus all ' but lost his life, and Peter had 
 endangered his own and the lives of his fellow 
 disciples. They had come forth prepared, and 
 probably expecting to capture the whole band of 
 them as well as their Master. Could they possibly 
 stop short of that now when one of them had 
 drawn the sword with such a result ? The first 
 blood between them had been spilt, and a disciple 
 had shed it. Was it not to be avenged } If it 
 should be, was not more and more blood hkely to 
 flow ? 
 
 But the Master was equal to the emergency. 
 Promptly He threw His shield over His followers, 
 and with infinite tact, tenderness and power He 
 healed the wound of strife that had been opened. 
 " Suffer ye thus far," ^ said He to the smitten 
 Malchus as He touched his bleeding ear and healed 
 him.^ 
 
 It was His last miracle, and it was done to an 
 
 ^ Luke xsii, 51. 
 
 ~ In Duccio's picture of the arrest, Jesus is seen in the centre, 
 Judas is beside Him in the act of kissing, the armed men are behind 
 Him. Peter has just struck off the ear of Malchus ; his fellow 
 disciples to the right of their Master are in the act of flight, while 
 He Himself is looking in the direction of Malchus, and has His hand 
 raised in benediction and healing (Jameson's History of our Lord in 
 Works of Art, vol. II. p. 39). 
 
 74 
 
TEE APPREHENSION IX THE GARDEN 
 
 enemy. It brought healing to one who came to 
 bring to Himself death. It came of the love that was 
 going to die for sinners, and that even amidst the 
 agonies of Calvary moved Him to pray for His 
 murderers. And it revealed, in the very hour when 
 He was giving Himself up as a prisoner into their 
 hands, that He was possessed of a power nothing 
 less than divine. The power that could heal a foe 
 could also destroy him. There was not a man of 
 them indeed who did not owe his life to the 
 infinite forbearance of Him whom they were about 
 to bind with shameful cords. 
 
 Jesus, after doing this wonderful healing act, 
 had a word, first for His rash and impulsive 
 disciple, and then for the multitude. '' Put up thy 
 sword," said He to Peter, " into his place : for all 
 they that take the sword shall perish with the 
 sword. Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to 
 my Father, and He shall presently give me more 
 than twelve legions of angels ? But how then 
 shall the Scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it must 
 be ?" ^ "The cup which my Father hath given me, 
 to drink shall I not drink it ? " ^ Jesus at once and 
 for ever disclaims the use of all such weapons in 
 
 ^ Matt. xxvi. 52, <33. 
 '^ John xviii. 11. 
 
 75 
 
FROM THE GAMDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 His cause. ^ Ecclesia non sitit sang-tmiein (the 
 Church does not thirst for blood). But how often 
 has the secular arm been invoked to promote a 
 perverted Christianity ? The sword in the service 
 of the Church has had a most melancholy and 
 tragic history. Christ's true people have suffered 
 more from the persecutions of those who have 
 called themselves Christians than they have done 
 from His open foes. Popes and Romanists have 
 added far more to the martyr's roll of His church 
 than pagan Roman emperors such as Nero or 
 Diocletian. Christ trusts for the spread and triumph 
 of His cause and kingdom only to the power 
 inherent in His truth, and to the Spirit of God, 
 commanding freely with His truth the hearts and 
 lives of men. 
 
 '' for a two-edged sword, my God, 
 That I may swiftly slay 
 Each foe of Thine — that I may speed 
 Thy universal sMay ! " 
 '* Put up thy sword within its sheath : 
 My gift is life ; would' st thou deal death ? " 
 
 *' Oh for the fire from heaver, my God, 
 
 That it may fiercely hurn 
 All those who following not with me 
 
 To other masters turn." 
 With scorching flame would' st Thou reprove, 
 But I must win hy fire of love. 
 
 ^ Renan believes that Jesus thought at first to repel force by force, 
 but that He abandoned the plan when He saw the visible fear of His 
 disciples {Life of Jesm, p. 4U3). 
 
 76 
 
THE APrBEHEXSION IK THE GARDEN 
 
 " M-y son, art thou above thy Lord, 
 
 A greater one than He ? 
 "When called I for fire or sword r 
 
 Thou hast not learnt of me. 
 Make truth thy sword, and love thy flame, 
 Then battle in thy Master's name." ^ 
 
 Peter did not share the vision which his Master 
 had. He did not see the legions that were at His 
 command. He saw only His defenceless state, and 
 as he recalled what He had been, and what He 
 had done in the world, Peter would have drawn 
 a hundred swords for Him if he had had them. 
 The cross should be far from his Lord. That was 
 still his mood. He did not yet understand the 
 Scriptures that it behoved Christ to suffer, and then 
 to enter into His glory. But the Master saw all 
 clearly — the divine plan He had come to fulfil, the 
 cross on which He was to be crowned as Redeemer, 
 the future of suffering and struggle for His cause, 
 and the legions also that would be given for His 
 support, and for protection and victory to His 
 cause in the end. And He gave Himself up in 
 the fullest consciousness of His divine freedom and 
 power. 
 
 Observing some of the chief priests and elders 
 among the multitude, Jesus addressed some words 
 to them well-fitted to stir their consciences. " Are 
 
 ' W. Chatterton Dix : The Master and the Disciple. 
 
 11 
 
FR03I TEE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 ye come out as against a thief, with swords and 
 staves, for to take me ? I was daily with you in 
 the temple teaching, and ye took me not. But 
 the Scriptures must be fulfilled." ^ It was not the 
 manner of thieves and evildoers to move about 
 openly in the .world as Jesus had done. He had 
 lived and wrought in the broad daylight. He had 
 taught and healed in public. He had been a 
 familiar figure in the temple courts. Trusting solely 
 to the armour of truth and righteousness which He 
 constantly wore, He had faced the multitude day 
 after day. i^nd these men knew well how He had 
 spoken, so as again and again to rebuke them, 
 and put them to shame. But they had laid no 
 hands upon Him. Their thoughts and purposed 
 deeds being evil, they had not dared to carry them 
 out openly and in the day. What need had they for 
 clubs and swords as if it were some notorious bandit 
 they had come to seize ? Why should they select 
 the midnight hour when they had Him within 
 reach times without number in the full light 
 of day ? And why should they invade His private 
 retreat to come upon Him unarmed, and, if possible, 
 asleep, when they had the opportunity of seizing 
 Him at any time as He was teaching the people ? 
 
 Mark xiv. 48 ; Matt. xxvi. 55 ; Luke xxii. 52, 53. 
 
 7S 
 
THE ArrRFAIEXSIOX IX TILE GARDEX 
 
 But it was their hour and the power of dark 
 ness — the deed, the time, and the manner of it all 
 corresponded. It was their hour — the time appointed 
 for their doing what God had determined beforehand 
 they should do. And it was His hour to put 
 Himself without a murmur into their hands. How 
 ridiculous all their preparations, their swords and 
 staves, their blazing torches and lanterns, their 
 great numbers ! Pie freely gave Himself up, offering 
 His hands to be bound, and entering willingly 
 upon the way to Calvary. 
 
 They bound Him with the cords they had brought 
 for the purpose.^ It was a needless precaution for 
 His captors in the circumstances. It was a humilia- 
 tion which He might have been spared. But He 
 was dealt with, notwithstanding all that He had 
 said and done, as if He had been the leader of 
 some robber band, caught after a desperate struggle. 
 The fact is, they were afraid. Never man had 
 acted in the circumstances like this Man, and 
 yet they could not believe that He would not 
 resist. Judas even, who had known Him so long 
 yet had so fatally failed to understand Him, evidently 
 expected that they would have the greatest diffi- 
 culty in securing Him. " Take Him," said he in 
 
 ' John xviii. 12. 
 
 79 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 his abject terror — the dread and remorse now 
 beginning to agitate him which issued so tragically — 
 " take Him and lead Him away safely." ^ Safely 
 (d(rcf)a\(os — well secured), for, as Judas would whisper 
 in their ears, they had no ordinary prisoner to deal 
 with. There was no telhng what He might do. 
 So the cords were at once brought, and fastened 
 with cruel care upon His hands ; and the whole 
 band gathered around Him, every man making 
 sure that he had his club or his sword in readiness — 
 all of them very resolute and greatly excited. 
 
 Behold Him now in their midst bound, and yet 
 the freest among them ; having power to lay down 
 His life and power to take it up again ; shamefully 
 treated, and yet revealing His divine patience and 
 glory through all His speech and demeanour; calm 
 and resigned, and ready to go onward to complete 
 His work as a Saviour, while all around are excited, 
 and His disciples are panic-stricken. 
 
 The sight of their Master in the hands of His 
 foes, fettered, apparently helpless, appears to have 
 been too much for the disciples. It took all the 
 courage out of them, and made them fear for 
 themselves. It seemed as if in that awful moment 
 all their bright hopes had been blotted out, and 
 
 ' Mark xiv. 44, 
 80 
 
THE APPREEEKSION IX THE GARDEX 
 
 all their past enthusiasm had perished. " They all 
 forsook Him and fled." ^ Even Peter who, a little 
 before was so valiant with his sword, caught the 
 contagion of panic, and sought safety in flight. 
 
 But they might have done worse. Their conduct 
 was unheroic enough. It was sadly out of keeping 
 with their brave professions a few hours before 
 when, around the supper table, and on the way 
 to the garden they had declared that though they 
 should die wiih Him they would not deny or 
 forsake Him. But it might have been more shameful 
 than it was. It was base of them to desert their 
 Master in His hour of trial ; but they did not 
 make themselves baser still like Judas by betraying 
 Him and selling Him to His foes. It was to their 
 shame that not one of them offered to stand by 
 Him, or to speak for Him when He should appear 
 before His judges; but not one of them was willing 
 to be found among His foes, or to be associated 
 with them in inflicting the slightest wrong or pain 
 upon his Master. Even Peter's denial, heinous as 
 it was, came far short of the guilt of deliberately 
 assisting to bring upon Him His sufferings and 
 death. It was inexcusable enough that he should 
 declare that he did not know Jesus, and that he 
 
 ^ Matt. xxvi. b%. Mark xiv. 50. 
 8l 
 
FRO 21 THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 was not one of His disciples ; but he would have 
 descended to a lower depth of infamy had he used 
 his lips to defame and fling taunts at his Master, 
 or had he joined with those who made cruel sport 
 of Him. Doubtless it was the pitying look of 
 Jesus, bringing immediate repentance, that saved 
 him from that depth. 
 
 Two at least of the eleven did recover so far from 
 their alarm and fit of cowardice as to follow the 
 company of Jesus' captors at some distance. Peter 
 was one of them, the other was John.^ For the 
 moment, like the rest, he and John rushed away 
 for hiding into the dark recesses of the garden. 
 But they gathered courage after a little to come 
 forth, and to venture into the city in the rear of 
 the multitude to see what should become of their 
 beloved Master. They could not keep away from 
 Him ; and their heartfelt attachment was to survive 
 the crisis, and to save them in the end. John 
 knew some people in the high priest's palace,^ and 
 so he obtained admission into the place, and he 
 used his influence to get the gate opened for 
 Peter as well. The situation was a perilous one 
 for them both. How Peter comported himself in 
 it, and fell before the trial which awaited him, we 
 shall afterwards see. 
 
 ^ Luke xxii. 54. ^ John xviii. 15. 
 
 ^2 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAT. 
 JUDGES. 
 
 Jesus was now a captive in the hands of His 
 foes. Bound with cords as if He had been a 
 prisoner secured only after a stout resistance, they 
 led Him away. The arrest had not occupied them 
 long. Though they knew it not, when His hour 
 was come He was ready to meet it, and He who 
 could have summoned more than twelve legions of 
 angels for His protection suffered Himself to be 
 led away by probably less than the twelfth of a 
 legion of men. Soon the garden was left to its 
 wonted quiet and solitude, and the motley, excited, 
 clamorous band were on their way back to the 
 city. 
 
 In the midst of this band Jesus walked, with 
 not a friend or follower bearing Him company. 
 His disciples had sought safety in flight. Two of 
 them, as we have seen, Peter and John, appar- 
 ently more daring than the rest, kept following 
 
 S3 
 
FROM THE GARB EX TO THE CROSS 
 
 the multitude at some safe distance. They became 
 part, afterwards, of the company round the fire in 
 the court of the high priest's house. We read, 
 also, of a certain young man following, supposed 
 to be Mark. The incident is recorded only in 
 Mark's Gospel, and the probability is that the 
 unnamed youth was no other than the evangelist 
 himself.^ But, whoever he was, his courage soon 
 gave out. When they attempted to lay hands upon 
 him he fled, leaving the linen garment with which 
 he had hastily clothed himself in their hands. 
 *' I looked and there was none to help, and I 
 wondered that there was none to uphold.''- 
 
 To the house of Annas they conducted their 
 prisoner. Annas was an old man of seventy, but 
 the most powerful still in ecclesiastical circles in 
 Jerusalem. Twenty years before he had been 
 compelled to lay down the priesthood, but though 
 not nominally, yet really the office seemed still 
 to be in his hands. Five of his sons had occupied 
 it, and Caiaphas, who at this time held it, was 
 his son-in-law. Then he was wealthy, and all 
 
 1 So Weiss (Life of Christ, vol. III., p. 332) who is also of 
 opinion that he had just come from his father's house, and that the 
 Supper had taken place there. Others suppose him to be Lazarus, 
 others John. 
 
 - Isaiah Ixiii. o. 
 
 84 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JULtGES 
 
 the Sadducean party looked upon him as their 
 leader.^ 
 
 It is remarkable that that party is seen taking 
 the lead in bringing about the condemnation and 
 death of Jesus. iVrchbishop Whately thought that 
 if only atheism had the power it would be quite as 
 intolerant and persecuting as Romanism.^ It is, 
 indeed, hard to say whether Christ and His 
 cause have more to fear from the Sadducee or 
 from the Pharisee. There is not much to choose 
 between the Sadducean philosopher of the French 
 Revolution type, who could be terribly passionate 
 and could shed blood freely for the triumph of his 
 faction and his theories, and the bigoted inquisitor 
 who looked upon the tortures and deaths he 
 inflicted as so much pious service to God and the 
 faith. It would be difficult to say which is more 
 to be dreaded." 
 
 It was to the Sadducean Annas, at any rate, that 
 the band of conspirators against Jesus at this time 
 looked as their inspiring head. His was the evil 
 genius that formed the plot, and saw to the means 
 for its execution. He probably was the chief party 
 
 1 Josephus, Antiq., XYIIL, III., 6. 
 
 2 Whately's Errors of Romanism, ch. v. 9. 
 
 ^Josephus [Antiq XX. IX. I.) says that "the Sadducees were 
 very rigid in judging offeaders above all the rest of the Jews." 
 
 8c 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 to the bargain with the traitor. The band that 
 made the arrest in Gethsemane had been gathered 
 together by his direction. Doubtless he was eagerly 
 awaiting their return. Sleep had not concerned him 
 that night. It was the Passover night. He was 
 fresh from its holy celebration. But the feast had 
 been a mere formality with him. It had far less 
 interest for him than the success of the infamous 
 plot in which he was engaged. To his malicious 
 joy, in the early hours of the morning, the Naza- 
 rene was at last delivered into his hands. It is 
 said that Annas and the chief priests had a 
 personal grudge against Jesus. That unholy traffic 
 in the temple, to which Jesus with His whip of 
 small cords had summarily put an end, had been, 
 it appears, a special source of revenue to them. 
 Whatever their wrath otherwise against Him, this 
 increased it, and they resolved to terminate His 
 career.^ 
 
 The examination of Jesus before Annas seems 
 to have been of a general and informal character. 
 It was probably not otherwise meant than to take 
 up the time during those early hours of the 
 morning until the Sanhedrim could be brought 
 together. While it was going on, messengers would 
 
 1 Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, vol. II. 547. 
 86 
 
JESTTS BEFORE HTS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 be swiftly traversing the streets of the city to arouse 
 the members from their slumbers, and to summon 
 them at once to a meeting. The purpose of Annas and 
 his party was evidently that Jesus should that morn- 
 ing go forth from their hands, and appear before 
 the multitude with the brand of the condemned 
 criminal upon Him, as one unanimously found 
 guilty by the highest Jewish tribunal. The effect 
 of this, it was expected, would be to withdraw 
 from Jesus any lingering popular feeling there 
 might be in His favour, and to secure the necessary 
 amount of popular prejudice and hostility for 
 accomplishing His final condemnation and death. 
 They were successful beyond their highest hopes. 
 This examination before Annas being over, the 
 procession w^as re-formed, and Jesus was led away 
 still bound, to the palace of Caiaphas.^ There the 
 Sanhedrim was to meet.^ Entering through a 
 gateway, the crowd soon filled the court within. 
 Through the court the guards conducted their 
 Prisoner up some marble stairs to a large hall 
 above. This hall occupied one side of the court. 
 
 ^ John wiii. 24. 
 
 - The usual place of meeting for the Sanhedrim was the Gazith, a 
 hall on the south side of the temple (Friedlieb's Archdolorjie, p. 10). 
 Josephus, however, tells us it was not uncommon in the days 
 of Annas and his party for courts to be held in the high priest's own 
 bouse. 
 
 87 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 from which it was separated by a row of pillars. 
 There Jesus had to wait in the custody of His 
 rude guards till the members of the Sanhedrim 
 had had time to assemble. It was while He 
 waited, and also while the trial was going on, 
 that those scenes occurred around the fire in the 
 court and at the gate, when Peter thrice denied 
 his Lord. Lighted up in the interior as it must 
 have been, what took place in that hall above could 
 easily be seen by those outside. Peter could not 
 help casting many an anxious and deeply inter- 
 ested glance at the Prisoner there, so that the 
 bystanders were soon led to question him whether 
 he was not one of this Man's disciples. 
 
 At length the council hall became filled with the 
 Jewish fathers. ^ According to the Talmud, a full 
 Sanhedrim of seventy-one was required for so 
 important a trial as that of a false prophet or a 
 high priest.* This makes the illegality and injustice 
 of the packed court in the case of Jesus only the 
 more glaring. The sevent}', as they are called, 
 would not all be present. It is not likely that 
 members such as Nicodemus, who were in favour 
 
 ^ A couple of hours are supposed to have elapsed between the two 
 trials — that is, between the first hurried meeting in the morning, and 
 the more formal one after dawn. (Gould's Trials of Jesus, p. 17.) 
 2 Sanh. I. 5. 
 
 88 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 of Jesus, would be disturbed in their slumbers that 
 mornincr and summoned to the meetinor by servants 
 of the high priest. The fact is, it was not a regular 
 or legal meeting, but an extemporised one, such as 
 many a revolutionary tribunal has been, when the 
 head of it has had only those around him acting as 
 judges who were of the same faction with himself.^ 
 It was an instance of what, according to Josephus, 
 was common enough in the later days of Jerusalem, 
 when, to quote his own words, "fictitious tribunals 
 and judicatures were set up, and men called 
 together to act as judges, though they had no 
 real authority, when it was desired to secure the 
 death of an opponent."^ 
 
 We are not left without some knowledge of the 
 men composing this extemporised council who took 
 it upon them to try and condemn Jesus, the Son 
 of God. Annas has already been noticed, a man 
 old in priestly craft and intrigue, and Caiaphas, 
 his son-in-law, of whom as a heartless and unprincipled 
 opportunist we have a sufKicient indication in those 
 cold-blooded words of his which the evangelists have 
 
 ^ About a third— that is. twenty-three members —formed a quorum 
 of the Sanhedrim (Talmud, Scuiliedri),, I., 6). Jost says it was only 
 the Caiaphas faction of the Sanhedrim M'hich formed the court which 
 condemned Jesus {Geschichte des Jiulenthums, p. 408). 
 
 2 Josephus, B.I, IV., v., 4. 
 
 Q 8q 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS! 
 
 preserved for us, ''It is expedient for us that one 
 man should die for the people."^ There were those 
 five sons of Annas also referred to, so like their 
 father and so Sadducean that some have thought 
 that they were hinted at in the parable of Dives and 
 his five brothers.^ There was one Alexander, and 
 one John, who stood next in dignity to Caiaphas 
 and Annas, of the latter of whom we read in the 
 Acts of the Apostles.^ There were the two brothers. 
 Joazer and Eleazar, whose sister Mariamne, the 
 greatest beauty of her time, so fascinated King 
 Herod that he married her. There was also Simon 
 the Quarrelsome, as he was called, who put to death 
 James, the brother of John ; and Ishmael Ben Phabi, 
 the handsomest and best dressed man of his time; 
 and Issachar of Kefar Barkai, who must have his 
 silk gloves on when he. was offering up sacrifices ; 
 and Johanan Ben Nebedai, who did what he could 
 to make a martyr of the Apostle Paul.'* Such are 
 the men known to have been the leading spirits 
 of the Sadducean party of that time. Their record, 
 as appears from Jewish history, is disreputable 
 
 ^ John xi. 50. 
 
 2 Geikie, Life and Words, p. 671 
 
 ^ Acts iv. 6. 
 
 ^ Acts xxiii. 2. 
 
 90 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 enough. The rest of the council were doubtless 
 Hke unto them.^ 
 
 In their procedure as a court, as in their religious 
 observances, those chief priests and elders were 
 zealous for forms, while otherwise they were most 
 unscrupulous.^ Looking in upon that gathering of 
 judges in Caiaphas' palace, one might have seen 
 at the outset that it had at least all the appearance, 
 while it claimed the character, of a meeting of the 
 Sanhedrim. Here at one end of the hall would 
 be the members of the council, sitting on cushions, 
 cross-legged and unsandalled, in a semi-circle. 
 Caiaphas, the presiding judge, would be in the 
 centre of this half circle, with Annas and other 
 
 1 Geikie, p. 672. 
 
 Dante, as might be expected, has a special place foi- Caiaphas and 
 his friends in his Inferno. Caiaphas is the " one crucified with three 
 stakes on the gronnd," and thus he is described : — 
 
 The transfixed one whom thou seest, 
 Counselled the Pharisees that it was meet 
 To put one man to torture for the people. 
 Crosswise and naked is he on the path, 
 
 As thou perceivest ; and he needs must feel 
 Whoever passes, first how much he weighs ; 
 And in like mode his father-in-law is punished 
 "Within this moat, and the others of the council, 
 A\Tiich for tbe Jews was a malignant seed. 
 
 —Inferno, Canto XXIII. 
 
 - The Sanhedrim had an upper and a lower house. The former 
 consisted of the high priests, or those who had filled that office, and 
 the heads of the twenty-four priestly colleges, while the elders and 
 rabbis of note formed the latter. In this instance the two houses 
 were united. Hence the expression which occurs so often, " the 
 chief priests and elders." (Gould's Passion of Jes/is, p. 13.) 
 
 91 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 notables to the right and left of him, according 
 to office or age. In front of His judges, facing the 
 president, would be the Prisoner, with the guards 
 on one side of Him, and a place for the witnesses 
 that were to be heard on the other. On either 
 side of the semi-circle of grave fathers would be 
 a scribe taking a record of the trial. ^ 
 
 But if the old and traditional formalities of this 
 Jewish court were religiously observed, law and 
 justice were otherwise flagrantly violated. To begin 
 with, the Prisoner stood guarded and fettered as 
 if He were a dangerous and already a convicted 
 criminal.^ The law required that persons accused 
 should be treated with the utmost humanity.^ It 
 was with barbarity Jesus was treated. The judges 
 were enjoined to favour acquittal, and only to give 
 their voices for condemnation when the evidence 
 compelled them.* Jesus' judges came together with 
 
 1 The arrangements of the court are described in the Talmud, 
 Sanhedrin, ch. iv. 9. The principal authorities to consult as to the 
 Talmud are — ITgolinus, who devotes to it fully a third of his thirty 
 huge volumes, in which the Hebrew text (unpointed) and a Latin 
 translation are placed in parallel columns ; Schwab, who has trans- 
 lated into French both the Jerusalem and the Babylonian portions of 
 it ; and "Wiinsche, who has given a German translation of the 
 Babylonian only. It is singular that we should have as yet no 
 corresponding translation of the Talmud into English. We have 
 only brief extracts or selections. The information about the Sanhed- 
 rim is in TJgolinus, vol. XXV.; in Schwab, vol. X.; and in Wiinsche, 
 vol. III. 
 
 '^ Geikie, Life and Words of Christ, p. 680. John xviii. 24. 
 
 ' Lightfoot, Horrc TJch. in Ev. Johannis, p. 217. 
 
 * Sanhedrin, V. 5. 
 
 92 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 a foregone conclusion that He was worthy of death, 
 and used the basest means and the most indecent 
 haste to reach it. Any who were known enemies 
 to an accused person were thereby disquaHfied 
 from acting as judges, or even as witnesses in his 
 case.^ There does not appear to have been even 
 one in that court who, under that rule, should not 
 have been obliged to vacate his seat. A case 
 involving capital punishment could not be judged 
 on the eve of the Sabbath or on the eve of a 
 feast day.^ Jesus was tried and found worthy 
 of death on the great feast day itself — the 
 feast of the Passover. A midnight meeting of the 
 Sanhedrim was unlawful.^ Its members on this 
 occasion knew this. Hence their second meet- 
 ing after daybreak at which they but confirmed, 
 and very hastily, what had already been done. 
 It was an express rule that the accused should, 
 be allowed to employ one to plead his cause, and 
 that his judges should not also be witnesses or 
 accusers.'* Jesus was permitted no advocate, and 
 none was forthcoming ; and as for the accusations, 
 they were manufactured and hurled at Him by 
 His judges, Caiaphas, the president, being the chief 
 
 1 Sanhedrin, III. 8. 
 - Sanhedrin, IV. 7. 
 '^ Sanhedrin, IV. 1. 
 * Sanhedrin, III. 6. 
 
 93 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 offender, while the witnesses were all on one side, 
 no room or opportunity being given for witnesses 
 for the defence. And still further to crown the 
 iniquities and illegalities of this trial, another wise 
 and humane arrangement was flagrantly set aside — 
 it was this, that in any serious case involving the 
 punishment of death the sentence should not be 
 pronounced on the same day as the trial, and that 
 the execution of it should not take place till at 
 the earliest a day after the sentence.^ But the 
 sun was not more than three hours in the sky 
 that same morning when Jesus was seen hanging 
 on the cross of Calvary.^ So keenly, we are told, 
 is the judicial murder, as it may truly be called, 
 of Jesus Christ by the Jewish nation felt by its 
 representatives in modern times that they have 
 invented the view that there was some law existing, 
 according to which, if any one set up as a false 
 Messiah, he might be tried and condemned forth- 
 with on the same day, or even in the night. 
 But Moses had given them no such laws for dealing 
 with a pretender to Messiahship, and the Old 
 Testament prophets had not anticipated such a case. 
 They had foretold, however, pretty plainly that the 
 
 1 Sanhedrin, IV. 6. 
 
 2 The trial and its illegalities are fully treated by Keim, Jesus of 
 Nazara, vol. VI., pp. 41-45 also (33, 64. 
 
 94 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 true Messiah would have just such sufferings as 
 they were about to mete out to Jesus. 
 
 Jost, a Jewish and non-Christian writer of our 
 day, admits that the rabbis of later times have 
 been able to allege nothing against Jesus but that 
 He sought to turn away the people from the 
 religion of their fathers. He goes so far as to 
 say that Jesus' death was a private murder on the 
 part of Caiaphas and his Sadducean party, and that 
 Gamaliel and others of the most important members 
 of the Sanhedrim were not at the council which 
 condemned Him. He declares with warmth that 
 it was not the Jewish people who crucified Jesus, 
 but only a number of arrogant and determined 
 foes, and that the people and the rabbis gave little 
 heed to the event till its consequences came to be 
 of the gravest character for Israel.-^ 
 
 Speaking of the condemnation of Socrates, and 
 what he describes "as the event which took place 
 on Calvary rather more than eighteen hundred 
 years ago," the late John Stuart Mill expresses the 
 opinion that the feehngs with which mankind now 
 regard these lamentable transactions, especially the 
 latter of the two, render them extremely unjust 
 in their judgment of the unhappy actors. "These," 
 
 1 Jost, Geschichte des Judenihums, p. 408. 
 95 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 he adds," were to all appearance not bad men, not 
 worse than men commonly are, but rather the 
 contrary, men who possessed in a full, or somewhat 
 more than a full measure the religious, moral and 
 patriotic feelings of their time and people : the 
 very kind of men who in all times, our own 
 included, have every chance of passing through life 
 blameless and respected." ^ It is enough to say that 
 the judgment of the Christian world which has 
 uniformly and in all ages been different is only 
 too well sustained, and that it has its ample 
 justification in the simple unvarnished account of 
 the trial which the evangelists have given us. 
 
 At the very outset it could be seen that justice 
 was not to be hoped for, and that the Prisoner's 
 condemnation had already been determined upon. It 
 was attempted to entrap Him into self-accusation. 
 Usually, a prisoner is told what he is charged with, 
 and he is allowed to prepare some defence and 
 engage some one to plead his cause. But Jesus 
 was invited to accuse and bear witness against 
 Himself. The high priest asked Him about His 
 disciples and His doctrine. Jesus answered him : 
 "I spake openly to the world; I ever taught in 
 the synagogue, and in the temple whither the Jews 
 
 1 Mill On Liberty, ch. II., p. 14. 
 
 96 
 
J£SUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 always resort, and in secret have I said nothing. 
 Why askest thou me ? Ask them which heard me, 
 what I said unto them ; behold, they know what I 
 said." If charges were to be brought against Him for 
 anything He had said or done — all had been in 
 public as they well knew — it was only reasonable 
 and dutiful on their part that they should produce 
 their witnesses from the multitude who had heard 
 and seen Him. We are reminded of the noble 
 words, so like those of Jesus here, used by Socrates 
 when he stood also before his accusers and judges : 
 "I have always spoken openly. Let them say if I 
 have taught anything evil instead of good. I know 
 that futurity will bear witness that I did wrong 
 to no man, made no man the worse, but ever 
 laboured to make my friends better." ^ 
 
 But we read that when Jesus had thus spoken, 
 one of the officers who stood by struck Him with 
 the palm of his hand saying, " Answerest thou the 
 high priest so ? " ^ It was the first of many blows 
 which were to fall upon Jesus. It showed the 
 spirit of the court. It passed unrebuked, most 
 probably causing only a gleam of wicked satisfaction 
 to the assembled fathers, and preparing the guards 
 
 ^ Xenophon, Memor. IV., 8, 10. 
 - John xviii. 22 
 
 97 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 for the brutal sport in which they so freely 
 indulged so soon as the trial was over. 
 
 For such shameful acts of indignity as the chief 
 priests and elders permitted without rebuke to be 
 done in their presence to Jesus their own law, 
 which they were there to administer, required the 
 heaviest fines to be exacted.^ But the prophet's 
 words were verified, '' He was despised, and we 
 esteemed Him not." ^ 
 
 The reply of Jesus to that disgraceful blow was 
 fitted, if anything could have done it, to recall 
 the court to a sense of its duty before God and 
 man, and of the wrong and outrage to which it 
 was making itself a party. It was altogether worthy 
 of His meekness and wisdom. " If I have spoken 
 evil, bear witness of the evil; but if well, why 
 smitest thou me ? " ^ Until they had established 
 their charges, and by evidence that might reasonably 
 be received, it was only decent that they should 
 withhold their blows and their penalties. But 
 neither the offending officer nor the court ventured 
 upon a reply. Witnesses were now, however, called 
 for. They were forthcoming even at that early 
 hour of the morning. Jerusalem had been searched 
 
 ^ Gould's Trials of Jesus, p. 22. 
 - Isaitih liii. 3. 
 ^ John xviii. 23. 
 
 98 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 for those whose evidence might be helpful to secure 
 the ends of the priests. One by one they were 
 brought in, but no two of them could be got to 
 agree. It seemed as if the case were to break 
 down. In the crowd in the palace-yard below, 
 could not some be found ready to give the 
 testimony needful ? Some of the fathers went out 
 to find them.^ 
 
 At length two were brought in who declared 
 they had heard Him say, " I am able to destroy 
 this temple of God, and to build it in three 
 days." ^ These were not quite the words He had 
 spoken, and a meaning was put upon them which 
 they were never intended to bear. He had said, 
 " Destroy this temple," meaning the temple of His 
 body, ^' and in three days I will raise it up.'' ^ 
 This saying, which was meant as a prophecy of 
 His death and resurrection, was twisted into a 
 sacrilegious attack upon the temple. We can under- 
 stand how it would be regarded by men to whom 
 the temple and its outward formalities were nearly 
 all the religion they had or knew. It was one 
 of the popular expectations with regard to the 
 Messiah that when He came He should erect a 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 59, 60. 
 
 2 Matt. xxvi. 64. 
 ^ John ii. 19. 
 
 99 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 more glorious temple than that of Herod or of 
 Solomon, and there was an ancient Rabbinical 
 tradition to the same effect.^ 
 
 While these witnesses played their part in this 
 solemn mockery, Jesus remained silent. The accu 
 sations answered each other. It needed no word 
 of His to bring out how hollow and false they 
 were. "As a sheep before her shearers is dumb, 
 so He opened not His mouth." ^ His silence is 
 an example and fruitful lesson for ourselves. It 
 rebuked error and wrong more than speech could 
 have done. Caiaphas and the assembled fathers 
 found it more than they could bear. The high 
 priest rose from his seat in a passion and exclaimed, 
 " Answerest Thou nothing ? What is it which 
 these witness against Thee ? " ^ He pretended to 
 be terribly impressed with the evidence that had 
 been led. The fact, however, was, thai he saw 
 the necessity of interposing with what simulated 
 gravity and indignation he could command, to 
 prevent the case from utterly breaking down. 
 
 lesus held His peace. The kind of witnessing 
 to which the high priest had been listening was 
 
 ^ Sanhedrin, I. 5 ; Mishna, VIII. 2, 
 
 2 Isaiah liii. 7. 
 
 3 Matt. xxvi. 62 ; Mark xiv. 60. The scene here is well described 
 in Keim {Jesus of Nazara, vol. VI., 328). 
 
 100 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 a sufficient answer to his question. He did not 
 need to be told what evidence they had been 
 giving against Jesus. But he despaired of founding 
 upon anything that had fallen from their lips a 
 charge of guilt. So, as a last resource, he sprang 
 to his feet again in feigned indignation. "I adjure 
 Thee by the living God," said he, '' that Thou 
 tell us whether Thou be the Christ, the Son of 
 God."i 
 
 Then He who stood silent, while false and hireling 
 witnesses were refuting and contradicting one 
 another, spoke out calmly and fearlessly when the 
 claims of truth demanded it. Had He been a 
 mere man He could not have resisted the temp- 
 tation to speak and to exult over the utter failure 
 of the witnesses against Him. Had He been merely 
 a pretender to divine honours He would have been 
 silent when the avowal of His claims to them 
 could not but be at the peril of His life.^ At 
 this supreme moment all eyes were on Him, all 
 ears were intent for His answer. And the answer 
 came without the slightest ring of dubiety or 
 
 1 Matt. Nxvi. 03. 
 
 - Renan {Life of Jesus, p. 273) attaches so much importance to this 
 that he cannot believe but that Jesus was silent to Caiaphas' ques- 
 tion here. Strauss however refrains from attacking the truth of the 
 account given by the evangelists here, and is willing to admit it. 
 (Strauss, JVew Life of Jesus, p. 391.) 
 
 101 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 hesitancy about it — an answer meant not for the 
 Sanhedrim merely, but for the great audience 
 chamber of the universe and the ages, " Thou 
 hast said, I am the Christ, the Son of God. 
 Hereafter shall ye see the Son of Man sitting on 
 the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds 
 of heaven." ^ 
 
 Thus Jesus dared to tell that court that He was 
 the Messiah of whom the law and the prophets 
 had spoken, and that the day should come when 
 He should be His judges' Judge. Caiaphas and 
 those around Him were not slow in apprehending 
 His meaning. It gave them a malicious joy that 
 Jesus should so deliver Himself into their hands. 
 They had otherwise failed to find anything worthy 
 of death in Him. Their witnesses had disagreed, 
 and their charges had not been sustained. But 
 the Prisoner to their amazement and delight had 
 opened His lips against Himself. " He hath spoken 
 blasphemy,'' exclaimed the high priest. The 
 whole court caught up the words, and one repeated 
 them to another with ever increasing vehemence. 
 
 As He spoke the words, Caiaphas seizing His fine 
 linen robes with both hands, rent them in twain^ 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 64; Mark xiv. 62 ; Luke xxii. 67-71. 
 
 2 The high priest tore his garments from bottom to top— the 
 ordinary priests from top to bottom. To mark the sin as unpardonable 
 the rent garments must never be sewn again. Maimonides, I. 1. 
 See also Sanhedrin, VII- 10. 
 
 102 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 — a theatrical way of expressing his feigned horror 
 of the supposed blasphemy, and thereby of rousing 
 abhorrence and creating prejudice against the Accused. 
 " What further need have we of witnesses ? Behold 
 now ye have heard His blasphemy. What think 
 ye ? " The response was as he expected. They 
 answered and said, '' He is guilty of death."^ An 
 incidental proof we have here, not to be overlooked, 
 of the accuracy of the evangelists. In trials for 
 minor offences the president or the oldest of the 
 judges was called upon, according to the law, to 
 give his opinion first : in capital cases, however, 
 the ordinary members of the court were first asked 
 what their judgment was, and when all others 
 had spoken the presiding judge summed up and 
 pronounced the final decision of the court .^ 
 
 Thus Jesus on His claim to be divine was 
 ultimately condemned. Undoubtedly He made the 
 claim, and He made it in circumstances which put 
 the sincerity of His conviction in the matter beyond 
 all doubt. It could not be refuted by clamour 
 and torture and the cross. These have served rather 
 to establish it. We can ask no better proof of it 
 than His conduct before His judges, and the manner 
 in which He endured His cross. And those who 
 
 ^ Matt. xxvi. 65, 66. Mark xiv. 64. 
 2 Schwab's Talmud, vol. x. 262. 
 103 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 realise that they owe to His sufferings their salvation, 
 must ever feel that there is no place short of the 
 highest that will do for Him, and that no love, 
 no devotion, no honours are too great to be lavished 
 upon Him. He is God, and He cannot have a 
 rival or a superior. 
 
 This midnight council now broke up. True, its 
 proceedings were all irregular and illegal, but it 
 was a successful rehearsal of the play which was to 
 be finished when the council should meet again 
 after daybreak. The end had been gained. The 
 condemnation of Jesus had been secured. From 
 the fathers' point of view, Caiaphas had done 
 splendidly, and that last stroke of his had been a 
 magnificent one. It had entrapped the Prisoner, 
 as they thought, into using words which rendered 
 all further accusing and witnessing against Him 
 needless. They could now retire to rest, and snatch 
 an hour or two's sleep before their next formal 
 meeting. 
 
 They left Jesus w^th His guards. It is not 
 difficult to understand the scene that followed. 
 Jesus, amid a shower of blows and insulting out- 
 cries, was brought down from the council hall to 
 the palace-yard below. There, and on the way 
 thither, the sport was renewed. The officer who 
 had struck one blow would doubtless feel that his 
 
 104 
 
JUSUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 Opportunity had come for many more. But the 
 smiting was not all. One grieves for our poor 
 humanity as it shows itself in its most passionate 
 and brutalised moods. Jesus had to endure shame 
 and spitting — the greatest indignity that any man, 
 but especially an Oriental, could be subjected to. 
 They made sport of Him, covering His face and 
 then smiting Him, and asking tauntingly, "Prophesy 
 unto us, thou Christ, who is he that smote Thee " 
 It was thus the Christ was treated. Thus His 
 holiest offices were turned to ridicule. He who 
 could claim to be divine was used in a way in 
 which it would be an inhumanity to use even the 
 vilest of our fellow-creatures. This scene, which 
 was repeated by the Roman soldiers in Pilate's 
 judgment hall, throws a lurid light upon the terrible 
 possibilities of evil in man. Contact with Christ 
 is seen to be a wonderful revealer of character. 
 The best in His friends and the worst in His foes 
 are the more fully laid bare the nearer they are 
 brought to Him. 
 
 After daybreak the fathers again assembled. It 
 was now their lawful meeting, lawful so far that 
 the night was now past, and that the recognised 
 time for the holding of courts harj come — but 
 unlawful still as being a packed and irregularly 
 summoned assembly and strangely incongruous as 
 
 H 105 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 occurring in the most sacred week of all the year. 
 Jesus was again placed at their bar, bearing 
 now the marks of the cruel and disgraceful 
 treatment He had in the interval received, His 
 face and raiment already stained with blood and 
 spitting. The proceedings were purely formal. 
 There was no desire to hear witnesses over again. 
 The high priest rehearsed what had previously 
 taken place, and called for a formal vote of those 
 who were present. With a feeling of malicious 
 satisfaction and triumph the sentence of condemnation 
 was renewed. There was no note of dissent, no 
 Nicodemus to urge even a modest plea in bar of 
 judgment. With a unanimity such as had seldom 
 been witnessed in the Sanhedrim " they all con- 
 demned Him to be guilty of death. "^ 
 
 But it was '' not lawful for them to put any 
 man to death."^ Caesar had taken from them the 
 power of life and death. Only minor penalties 
 they were at liberty to inflict.^ What remained, 
 therefore, for the Jewish fathers to do was to 
 approach the Roman governor, and to induce him 
 to carry out the death sentence they had pronounced.** 
 
 ^ Mark xiv. 64. 
 - John xviii. 31. 
 ■'■ Joseplius, Antiq. XVIII. I. 1. 
 
 < The Sanhedrim could mit meet on the feast, hut it appears that 
 the execution of criminals was often deferred to the feast day that 
 
 J06 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTICAL JUDGES 
 
 Three things strike us particularly in Jesus' trial 
 before His ecclesiastical judges. The first is His 
 silence when lying tongues were busy bearing 
 witness against Him. It is only Divine Innocence 
 that could have maintained it. It is like the 
 silence He has often kept since when error, unbelief, 
 and calumny have been clamorous, and He has 
 vouchsafed no answer but that of His own pure 
 life, and His self-sacrificing work and death, and 
 the divine witness men may discover for them- 
 selves as to His whole saving work. 
 
 The second thing is Jesus' vision of His coming 
 glory even in the hour of His humiliation. That 
 council hall in Caiaphas' house seemed the strangest 
 place for such a vision. There the fettered Prisoner 
 dared to predict the time when He as the Son of 
 Man should be on the right hand of power ; and 
 in the very hour when His humiliation seemed the 
 greatest and His doom was at hand, He could 
 speak of His return as Judge of all, attended by 
 every circumstances of heavenly majesty and glory. 
 
 the people might be deterred from wrongdoing by the sight of its 
 punishment {Mishna, 4, 7). We may add here that the only direct 
 reference we can find in the Talmud to Jesus is in Sanhedrin, folio 
 43, where it is stated He was crucified on the preparation day of the 
 Passover, and that a herald went before Him for forty days calling, 
 and calling in vain, for witnesses in His favour, and declaring that 
 He should be stoned because He had used sorcery to draw away the 
 people from the religion of their fathers. 
 
 107 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 We observe also as deeply significant that His 
 rejection is accompanied by an outflow of the 
 worst passions, of the inhumanity as well as 
 iniquity of man. Something like this seems to 
 mark His rejection always. Those who deny 
 Him as their Lord and Saviour cannot let 
 Him alone. They must needs in their own 
 way and measure renew the story of His shame 
 and suffering. They cannot put an end to Him 
 within themselves but the awful deed must be 
 accompanied with insult and wrong. The Jewish 
 fathers grew the more passionate against the Prisoner 
 the greater the difficulty became of finding any 
 fault in Him. So the very excellence of the 
 religion of Jesus, its heavenly purity and truth, 
 are its condemnation in the eyes of worldly Saddu- 
 cean men. Their dislike and opposition to it grow 
 while they feel that they cannot answer it, and that 
 it is constantly proclaiming their own condemnation. 
 And the blow struck and unrepented of calls for 
 other and more violent blows. The man who puts 
 Christ to shame in any way, or does Him a wrong 
 or an injustice, feels impelled either to seek Him 
 in contrite confession, or to go onward in his fatal 
 pathway, adding iniquity to iniquity and wrong to 
 wrong. When one does a wrong to another he 
 must either speedily become very contrite, or he 
 
 1 08 
 
JESUS BEFORE HIS ECCLESIASTIC J I JUDGES 
 
 will have his antipathy and desire to strike and 
 injure greatly increased. Unrepentant men are 
 impelled to hate more and more those they have 
 wronged. Unrepentant Sadducees and Pharisees 
 could not stop short of crucifying Jesus. They 
 were not likely to leave any means untried of 
 accomplishing that end. 
 
 109 
 
PETER'S DENIAL. 
 
 Two at least of the disciples of Jesus — Peter 
 and John — were witnesses of His trial before 
 Caiaphas. Probably Judas also was present, his soul 
 distracted and tortured with his guilty thoughts, and 
 watching with a sinking, despairing feeling the issue 
 of his traitorous deed. But of him we learn nothing 
 at this stage. John was known unto the high 
 priest,^ and he went with Jesus and the band that 
 had seized Him into the high priest's palace. It 
 is not unlikely that he was even present in the 
 council hall, and watched the proceedings there. 
 The fact that we find him afterwards standing by 
 the cross shows us that throughout all the events 
 ot this momentous day the disciple whom Jesus 
 loved was never far from his Master. 
 
 Only one glimpse we get of Peter between the 
 arrest and the morning of the third day, when 
 
 _ ' John xviii. 16. Ewald {Hist, of Israel, VI. 186) hazards the 
 view that John was of priestly descent. Edersheim also inclines to 
 think that he was a priest. Vol, U., p. 487. 
 
 110 
 
PETER'S DENIAL 
 
 he comes early to the empty grave of his Master, 
 startled by the news that He is risen. It is not 
 a favourable one, but it is full of needed instruction 
 and warning. It is one the world could not 
 have expected to be placed on record by the 
 friends of the apostles, or by the apostles them- 
 selves. But there it is in their immortal pages, 
 set forth without apology and without extenuation, 
 showing what manner of absolutely true and 
 unworldly men those were whom Christ made and 
 gathered to Himself. Peter is presented as one of 
 the throng around the fire in the court of the 
 high priest's palace. Naturally when he is observed 
 he is challenged as to his connection with the 
 Accused. He fears in such company to avow himself. 
 He seeks a miserable refuge for himself in denial, 
 and in an attempt, happily for him proving a 
 failure in the end, to make it appear that he is 
 not a disciple of the Nazarene, but only one of 
 the casual crowd that has gathered to witness 
 His trial. In the end he hastens from the scene 
 of his sin and shame a humbled and penitent 
 man. Such in brief is the story the evangelists 
 tells us of his fall. 
 
 To understand the situation, we must bear in 
 mind the arrangements of an Oriental house such 
 as that of the high priest would be. It consists 
 
 111 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 usueilly of a group of buildings varying in their 
 size and architecture, forming a great square in 
 the centre. Often it has a wall shutting it in 
 from the street. In that case there is a forecourt 
 between the front gate at the wall and the main 
 doorway of the house. Then there is the larger 
 court within, around which the different apartments, 
 offices, halls are gathered, and by which they freely 
 communicate with one another. Viewed from the 
 street, the great palatial building presents nothing 
 usually but dead walls; it is only from within that 
 its architectural grandeur is seen. Around the 
 inner court are the porticos and galleries, where 
 the cool shade is enjoyed, and there are the 
 chambers for guests and entertainments. Sometimes 
 the court is paved, and sometimes it is planted 
 with trees and covered with grass, and there is a 
 fountain of cool sparkling water playing in the 
 centre.^ 
 
 The inner court of Caiaphas' palace was a scene 
 of great stir and tumult on the night of the arrest.^ 
 
 1 For an interesting description of an Oriental house such as that 
 of Caiaphas would be, see Eobinson's Harmony of the Gospels, 
 p. 225. 
 
 ^ John xviii. IS. 'J'he question has been raised whether it was in 
 the court of Annas' house or that of Caiaphas that the denial of Peter 
 took place. J ohn seems definitely to indicate the former, Matthew 
 definitely and Mark indefinitely the latter. Weiss {Life, III. 335) 
 thinks that it was in the former, as strangers would not likely be 
 admitted to the palace of the high priest. He admits, however, that 
 
 I 12 
 
PETER'S LEXIAL 
 
 As soon as they had got their Prisoner within the 
 gate they closed it, and saw to its being well 
 guarded.^ They seemed to think they had need 
 still for every precaution. They had still their 
 fears that a rescue might be attempted. John 
 had entered with the multitude ; Peter was with- 
 out, whether because he had not reached the 
 gate in time, or because he had not the courage 
 to venture in as one of the band, we cannot say. 
 John used what influence he had, and the maid 
 who kept the door was induced to open it for 
 his friend. 
 
 In the centre of the court within which Peter 
 now found himself, a fire was blazing, for it was a 
 chilly April night.'^ Around this fire gathered a 
 strangely mixed company — Roman soldiers still on 
 duty along with the Jews who had been engaged in 
 
 the oldest tradition, which he believes we have in Mark, represents the 
 court of Caiaphas' house as the place of the denial. Pressense's view 
 is that the first denial may have taken place in Annas' house and the 
 last in Caiaphas'. Caspari {Life, p. 223) offers a solution of the 
 difficulty hy supposing- that Annas, as father-in-law of the high priest, 
 occupied a wing of the high priest's palace so that his dwelling and 
 that of Caiaphas looked into the same court. EUicott agrees with 
 Caspari in supposing that Annas and Caiaphas occupied a common 
 official residence ; and further, he inclines to think that the thi-ee denials 
 took place M'hile the examination in Annas' house was going on, and 
 that it was when Jesus was being led across the court tc; the council 
 hall in Caiaphas' house that He gave Peter that look Avhich brought 
 to him repentance (Ellicott's Life, p. 334). The same views are held 
 by Lange, Steinmeyer, Keim, and others. 
 
 ^ John xviii. IG. 
 
 ^ John xviii. 18. 
 
 113 
 
FR02I THE GARBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 the arrest; servants, male and female about the high 
 priest's house; priests and elders with crafty and cold 
 Sadducean looks eagerly watching their prey. Peter 
 perhaps was for a while content with the shaded 
 side of the archway, where he could see and not 
 be seen, and where he could above all observe 
 what might be going on in the council hall yonder. 
 But by and by the cheery blazing fire attracted 
 him, and he found himself among the bitterest 
 foes of his Master. 
 
 Peter was sitting by the fire,^ or as another 
 evangelist puts it, was standing and warming him- 
 self.^ He was listening to the conversation of those 
 around, which doubtless all turned upon the events 
 of that morning, and upon the Prisoner they had 
 taken. We may be sure that the feelings, the 
 bad passions of the grave fathers and priests in 
 the council hall above would be reproduced in the 
 coarsest form by their underlings and followers in 
 the court below. Peter's ears would be assailed 
 by the most abusive language regarding his Master. 
 
 Only two courses were open to Peter. He could 
 not be indifferent or neutral in such circumstances 
 where his Master's honour and life were so deeply 
 concerned. Of the two, however, that of confessing 
 
 ' Luke xxii. 55. 
 
 - John xviii. 18. 
 
 114 
 
PETER'S DENIAL 
 
 Christ was fraught with great danger ; the other, 
 that of conceahng his discipleship for the time 
 seemed to him to give the only promise of safety. 
 And what did it matter though he should impose 
 on the rough company round about him ? What 
 would his poor avowal avail against the apparently 
 resistless mass of opposition ; or his one small 
 voice for his Master against the multitude of voices 
 on the other side, and all the storm of abuse, 
 malicious taunts and revilings which they were 
 raising? Was it not wiser for him to appear as 
 if he had no more to do with the Prisoner than 
 any other there ? Why should he offer his 
 testimony to truth when it would only be scorned, 
 and when he himself would be endangered ? Why ? 
 the world still asks, and it counts every martyr 
 a fool, a man who gives his testimony where it 
 is not wanted, and gives it so as to excite those 
 who are opposed to him to get rid of him 
 altogether. The world should be very tender 
 towards Peter, for he only yielded, under the 
 strongest temptation, to its spirit, forgetful of the 
 grand example of his Master only a few yards 
 from where he was, who could not be withheld 
 from bearing witness to the truth of His divine 
 claims and His divine mission by all the exasperation 
 of His judges, and by all their threatenings. 
 
 »15 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 But in vain did the disciple try to be like those 
 around him. In vain he disguised himself for the 
 time. He found even the disguise of an unconcerned 
 onlooker uncomfortable. He could not wear it well, 
 and those around him were not to be deceived by 
 it. His uneasy manner, his look of anxiety, his 
 evident deep concern for the Prisoner under trial, 
 his changing countenance as the trial went on, 
 as words of biting insult or ridicule were uttered 
 about his beloved Master, and rewarded by the 
 horrid laughter of the company — all these things 
 betrayed the disciple, and drew down upon him 
 the very attention which he feared and sought to 
 avert. 
 
 The world is quicker than is sometimes thought 
 in discerning the differences between itself and 
 Christ's people. It has a special satisfaction in 
 seeing professing Christians imitating its own 
 manners and habits, but it has a cruel way of 
 rewarding them for their attempts. It delights to 
 point out their inconsistency, to taunt them about 
 their Christianity, and to bring to the light their 
 shame and humiliation. 
 
 Peter's case is a marked instance of this kind. 
 
 The maid who kept the door and had let him 
 
 in at John's request seems to have fixed her eyes 
 
 on him and watched his movements. After some 
 
 Ii6 
 
TETEKS DENIAL 
 
 time she dared to leave her post at the gate for 
 a little, and came over to the centre of the court 
 where Peter was standing and warming himself 
 with man}' others. Looking closely into his face, 
 lighted up as it was by the glare of the fire, she 
 put the question directly to him, " Art not thou 
 also one of this man's disciples ? " ^ 
 
 " Thou also I " There was that other on whose 
 entreaty she had opened the gate to Peter. She 
 knew he was a disciple. He appears to have been 
 at no pains either to conceal the fact, or to let 
 it be known. But no one, so far as we learn, 
 assailed him. He could even stand by the cross 
 afterwards, and no hand was laid upon him. A 
 mysterious shield was over him. It was the shield 
 of the Master's prayers which had ensured the 
 safety of the eleven in the garden, and which 
 was to ensure their safety all through. If Peter 
 had only known and trusted it as he ought, he 
 would have found that divine shield sufficient for 
 the protection of himself, as well as John, within 
 the walls of Caiaphas' palace, and even in the 
 midst of the reviling multitude on Calvary. How 
 much better and nobler it would have been for 
 Peter if he had had the courage and honesty at 
 once to say, " It is true, I also am one of this 
 
 * John xviii. 17. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 man's disciples ! " Is not the avowed disciple as 
 a rule safer among Christ's foes than the concealed 
 or wavering one? 
 
 Peter under the fatal impulse of the moment 
 chose a different course. He was confused and 
 put out by the abrupt question of the girl. At 
 first he sought to evade the questioner and her 
 question by seeming to take no notice of either. 
 But the maid was not to be put off or ignored. 
 She promptly renewed the attack on him. " Thou 
 also wast with Jesus of Galilee," ^ and then turning 
 to those about him she said, " Certainly this man 
 also was with Him." ^ Then Peter, filled with 
 a mortal dread that he was discovered, answered 
 with an angry outburst, " Woman, I do not know 
 Him, I neither know nor understand what thou 
 say est." ^ 
 
 Peter chose the most open manner of denying 
 the charge made against him. He denied 
 before them all,'^ we are told. It was a lie 
 which like most bold ones of its kind over 
 stepped the occasion and furnished its own refutation. 
 Every one there knew quite well what the maid 
 
 ^ Mark xiv. 67. 
 
 2 Luke xxii. 56. 
 
 3 Luke xxii. 57 ; Mark xiv. 68. 
 * Matt. xxvi. 70. 
 
 Il8 
 
PETER'S DENIAL 
 
 meant by her accusation. Every one there knew 
 Jesus of Gahlee. There was perhaps no part of 
 the country to which His name and fame had 
 not spread. It was a pitiable thing to feign 
 indifference or ignorance in regard to Him, but 
 on the part of a disciple it was inexcusable. And 
 to speak of Him contemptuousl}^, as if He were 
 only some common criminal who had fallen into 
 the hands of the Sanhedrim, and who was too 
 insignificant for the notice and interest of such a 
 man as Peter, was indeed a shameful transgression. 
 It had come to this that Peter so regarded, or 
 pretended to regard his Master whom he professed 
 only a few hours before to be dearer to him than 
 life. He pretended not to know that it was Jesus 
 of Galilee about whom all the stir was being made 
 at that early hour of the morning. Jesus of 
 Galilee who is He? what about Him? I know Him 
 not,^ I know not what you are speaking about !^ 
 Who could have believed that Peter would have 
 come to this ? How his words must have pierced 
 the Master's heart ! His disciples had forsaken 
 Him. But this was worse than being forsaken, 
 that the foremost of them should affect to treat 
 Him with the contempt of indifference. Yet to 
 
 ' Luke xxii. 57. 
 2 Mark xiv. CS. 
 
 JI9 
 
FMOM THE GARDEK TO TEE CROSS 
 
 this depth Peter is brought at the first onset of a 
 woman's tongue. By the words of a female 
 slave, bent probably on mischievous amusement, 
 this disciple, who was to have been a pillar that 
 should have stood erect though the world had 
 fallen, was in a moment overthrown. 
 
 As the wrangle between the maid and the 
 disciple was coming to a close a shrill sound broke 
 upon the chilly morning air, and could be heard 
 distinctly above the din of human voices. It was 
 the crowing of a cock.^ What a significance it 
 had for Peter, if he could only at that moment 
 have perceived it ! It was the monitor the Master 
 had appointed to warn him when he should be 
 approaching the abyss. If only he had remembered 
 the words of the Lord the night before, then at this 
 first cockcrowing he might have recovered himself 
 at once, and he might have been spared the 
 deeper shame and guilt into which he was to fall. 
 
 Thus a first denial was made, and a second and 
 a third followed. The company around the fire 
 became uncomfortable for Peter. To the porch, or 
 the space under the archway at the gate, he retired 
 to be free from his tormentors, and to get his 
 agitated feelings after the first terrible disavowal 
 calmed down. But no place is easy or safe for 
 
 1 Mark xiv. 68. 
 120 
 
PETER'S DENIAL 
 
 one with an uneasy conscience, and the court of 
 the high priest's palace that morning was the 
 most dangerous of all places for a disciple. In 
 the porch Peter found troublesome questioners as 
 he had done around the fire. There another 
 maid saw him. She, with the one at the gate 
 who had admitted Peter and had gone over to 
 the nre to challenge him, had doubtless been 
 talking about him, and she said in the hearing 
 of others around her, " This fellow was also 
 with Jesus of Nazareth " ^ He evaded her words 
 and her presence as much as he could. But, like 
 the other maid, she was not to be shaken off. 
 She repeated her assertion to the bystanders, 
 "This is one of them ; " ^ and one of the men 
 among them making common cause with her, turned 
 directly upon Peter and said, " Thou art also of 
 them." ^ With a passionate emphasis he replied 
 to him, " Man, I am not," * while the maid's 
 persistent taunts as to his being a disciple drew 
 forth from him the fierce denial, backed by an 
 oath, "I do not know the Man " ^ 
 
 It is significant that Peter again overstepped 
 
 ' Matt. xxvi. 71. 
 2 Mark xiv. 69. 
 •^ Luke xxii. 58. 
 * Luke xxii. 58. 
 '"> Matt. xxii. 72. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 the bounds of the necessities of the case. There 
 was no need for the oath. He might have been 
 content with the simple statement. But it is to be 
 remarked, that while truth can walk abroad in the 
 simplest raiment, falsehood must put on the gaudiest, 
 and must use the strongest colours. The simplest 
 terms will do, and are indeed the best for the 
 purposes of the former, but the latter presses the 
 strongest and the most sacred into its service, and 
 lays its defiling hand equally upon the things of 
 heaven and the things of earth. To the man 
 who is carried away by passion or self-interest so 
 as to maintain a lie, nothing is sacred, and nothing 
 is unclean. The moral sense discriminating between 
 things sacred and things common or even degrading 
 seems for the time to be paralysed within him, 
 and God and heaven have to lend themselves to 
 the basest uses. 
 
 If Peter imagined he could purchase peace and 
 safety in that company with denials and with 
 oaths, he was soon to find that he was greatly 
 mistaken. It was not to allay their suspicions 
 and to ward off their attacks and accusations that 
 he should adopt for the time their style and 
 language. It could in that company be for 
 a very short time that the makeshift of the 
 oath would avail. They were only too well 
 122 
 
PETEWS DENIAL 
 
 accustomed to that device, and were read}' rather 
 to laugh at those who trusted to it, and to 
 disbeheve them all the more. Peter drew to 
 himself a greater amount of prying suspicious 
 attention than ever. He was more closely and 
 critically watched. He seems to have moved 
 restlessly about. Now he might be standing under 
 the archway at the door, again, crossing the court 
 and stealthily taking his place once more among 
 those around the fire ; at one time he might be 
 on this side of the court, at another he might be 
 seeking a place of quiet on the other. 
 
 A brief respite, however, seems now to have 
 been given him. It w^as an hour, we are told, 
 before the attacks on him were renewed.^ Probably 
 he owed that hour's respite, less to his oath 
 with which he had meant to secure it, than 
 to the attention of the company being drawn away 
 to his Master in the council hall. Probably between 
 the second and the third denial there was the 
 stir connected with the assembling of the Jewish 
 fathers ; there was the momentous trial going on ; 
 there were the charges so passionately made by 
 the accusers, and the Accused's silence and dignity 
 so exasperating to His judges ; there was the intense 
 excitement as a point seemed to be made or lost, 
 
 ^ Luke xxii. 59. 
 123 
 
FROM TEE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 and the fortunes of the trial were followed, and 
 as one father and another came down those marble 
 stairs from the judgment hall to find this one or 
 that one from among the throng in the court, 
 who could remember anything he had ever heard 
 or seen that miorht be told against the Prisoner. 
 The disciple would be lost sight of in the immensely 
 greater interest gathering round the Master. 
 
 But the disciple could not long be overlooked. 
 The interest he had in that trial must sooner or 
 later have betrayed him. For the third time he was 
 attacked. He was again beside the fire of coals.^ 
 Probably it was a trifling circumstance that brought 
 back the attention to him. He was assailed on 
 all sides. One confidently affirmed, saying, " Of a 
 truth this fellow also was with Him, for he is a 
 Galilean."^ Then another, who was a kinsman of 
 that Malchus whose ear Peter cut off, annoyed 
 and indignant evidently at the denial given, said 
 sharply to him, " Did not I see thee in the garden 
 with Him?"^ It was a cruel reminder calling 
 up action on Peter's part which, at that moment 
 and in that company, he must have wished to be 
 utterly unknown. Then a number gathered round 
 
 ^ John xviii. 25. 
 
 2 Luke xxii. 59. 
 
 ^ John xviii. 26. 
 
 124 
 
PETER'S LEXIAL 
 
 and declared with one voice that they were sure 
 there must be truth in the charges the two were 
 bringing against him, for he spoke just as might 
 be expected of one of the GaUlean followers of 
 Jesus. *' Surely thou art one of them, for thy 
 speech bewrayeth thee."^ "Thou art a Galilean, 
 and thy speech agreeth thereto.''^ Among the Jews 
 the Galilean could be singled out by his dialect, 
 just as the unlettered Cockney or Aberdonian 
 might be among ourselves. The Galileans, accord- 
 ing to the Talmud, had great difficulty with their 
 aspirates and vowels. Some instances of their 
 peculiar use of these are given by that authority.^ 
 And what Galilean was likely to be interesting 
 himself in the trial of the Nazarene, and to be 
 found in the high priest's palace at such an hour 
 of the morning, unless he were a disciple ? 
 
 The singular thing is that Malchus' kinsman 
 should content himself with asserting that he saw 
 Peter at the time of the arrest, and should say 
 nothing about the armed champion of the Man 
 of Nazareth and the blundering stroke of his sword. 
 Was Malchus not among the servants of the high 
 priest in that court ? Why was he silent ? Or 
 
 ^ Matt. XX vi. 73. 
 - Mark xiv. 70. 
 
 ^ Wiiosche, Babylonische Talmud, Encbin, fol. 03, p. 189. 
 12^ 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 was he employed in waiting upon the Prisoner 
 before the council ? He could not readily be 
 mistaken in identifying the man who had dealt him 
 his wound. One would imagine that the glimpse 
 he had of Peter and also of his divine Healer could 
 never have faded from his memory. But that act 
 of healing was evidently to save Peter as well. 
 Malchus does not even appear upon the scene 
 seeking the revenge so easily within his power. 
 How easy for him, or even for his kinsman it 
 would have been, to have brought it about, that 
 Peter should stand side by side with his Master 
 to share in the same condemnation and in the 
 same death I But this surpassing honour was not 
 to be his. 
 
 Peter's case was becoming a desperate one. He 
 was surrounded with vexatious questioners. It was 
 difficult for him to gainsay those who had been 
 face to face with him in the garden. And 
 whatever else he might change or conceal, he 
 could not rid himself of his accent. Attacked and 
 tortured on all sides, like a wild beast in the 
 arena, he was goaded to madness, and began to 
 lose all control of himself. " Then began he to 
 curse and to swear saying, I know not the man."^ 
 
 1 Matt. xxvi. 74. 
 126 
 
rETER'S DEXIAL 
 
 To such a depth of moral debasement this specially 
 favoured disciple was brought ! 
 
 Peter could hardly have taken to any course 
 more effectually to prove that he was none of 
 Christ's than by polluting his lips with oaths and 
 curses, and exhibiting some of the worst passions 
 and vices of the ungodly. There is a sense of 
 fitness and propriety possessed in a fair measure by 
 men generally. Peter was making violent and 
 passionate appeal to it, when he thus tried to 
 demonstrate to them how he could not be one 
 of this man's disciples, because he could be as 
 coarse and profane as any of the rough throng 
 about him. The world still knows that the man 
 who is touched with the spirit of Christ cannot 
 indulge in its profanity or its vice, and that the 
 man who does so is not to be taken for a disciple 
 of His. And had not Peter been so touched ? 
 Could he have been so long with Jesus, and yet not 
 have felt the power of His spirit ? And if he 
 had felt it, how are we to account for this dreadful 
 outpouring of oaths and curses ? What came to 
 the lips, one would be inclined to say, must have 
 been in the heart. It may have been the revival 
 of old bad habits which had for long been laid 
 aside, but might break out under sufficiently strong 
 provocation, and still awaited the destroying touch 
 127 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 of Christ's cross. It betokened at any rate a well 
 of evil and profanity from which there was now 
 a fearful overflow. 
 
 When Peter had exhausted himself in this out- 
 burst, amidst the comparative quiet that for a brief 
 space prevailed, the crowing of a cock was again 
 distinctly heard. ^ At that very time probably there 
 was some movement in the council hall. Probably 
 the first trial was over, and the Prisoner was being 
 brought down to the courtyard, where he was for 
 a couple of hours or so to be subjected to the 
 roughest and most insulting treatment. Jesus may 
 have been coming down the stairs, or passing 
 through the court. At any rate the eyes of the 
 Master and the disciple met ; '' the Lord looked on 
 Peter."^ It was a look of pitying love, a look 
 that touched and broke Peter's heart, and filled 
 him with a deeper penitence than ever he had 
 known. In a moment the reaction of feeling came 
 
 1 Mark xiv. 72. 
 
 It _ is singular that there should he controversy as to the cock 
 crowing, M^hether it actually took place or whether it was only the 
 mode of expression they used for indicating the time of the morning. 
 It is even alleged that there was a Rabbinical law forbidding fowls 
 to be kept in Jerusalem. Edersheim {Life, vol. II, 537) doubts this, 
 and certainly no absurd law of this kind would affect the Roman 
 gamson not so far off. It may be true, as is alleged by the author 
 of '* Rabbi Jeshua," that there was a temple official caUed the cock 
 because he cried the hours ; but it is more likely that our Lord was 
 referring to the ordinary cock crowing, as marking the hours of the 
 morning, than to the services of any such official. 
 
 128 
 
PETER'S DENIAL 
 
 in resistless flood. Peter could not speak. Never 
 did His Master seem so divinely beautiful, or 
 himself so utterly vile. He was utterly crushed 
 under a sense of shame and contrition. The past 
 came up so vividly, and the warning words that 
 had fallen on his ear so heedlessly. The place, 
 the company became now intolerable to him. " He 
 remembered the words of the Lord, and he went 
 out and wept bitterly."^ There is a tradition that 
 the remembrance of what he had been and done 
 that night so clung to him ever afterwards that, 
 morning by morning, he was wont to awake at 
 the hour when the cock crew and the Lord turned 
 upon him His look so pitiful and so heart - 
 searching, and to ask anew for pardon.^ 
 
 Who is not tempted in this rough and evil 
 world at times to deny the Lord that bought him, 
 and who may not fall ? Our strength is only in 
 Himself. The secret of fidelity is in not " following 
 afar off," but keeping ever near, and letting our 
 life and our actions, whatever be the company in 
 which we must mingle, tell unmistakably whose 
 we are. And the hope of recovery when we have 
 fallen is all, as in Peter's case, in the grace of 
 our Lord, and in His divine look of pitying and 
 
 ^ Luke xxii. C'J. 
 
 - Geikie, Life and JFords, p. 665. 
 129 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 forgiving love meeting our look of penitence and 
 shame. The well known prayer of Augustine may 
 well be ours every day. " Gracious Jesus, look on 
 me with those eyes of mercy with which Thou 
 didst look on Peter in the hall ; on the sinful 
 woman at the feast ; on the thief upon the cross; 
 and grant me to weep with Peter, to love Thee 
 with the woman that was a sinner, and with the 
 penitent thief to see Thee in paradise." 
 
 The narratives of the three denials of Peter as given by the four 
 evangelists have always, in view of the differences they present, 
 offered to candid and sceptical critics of the Bible too tempting a field 
 of criticism to be overlooked by them. These differences have been 
 again and again pointed out, especially as to their bearing on the 
 claims of inspiration and the inerrancy of Scripture. But the more 
 closely they are h)oked at they are found to strengthen rather than to 
 weaken those claims. They are strong incidental proofs of the 
 independence and trustworthiness of the narratives ; nor can we doubt 
 that as Alford^ says, " If we could be put in complete possession of 
 all the details as they happened, each account would find its 
 justification, and the reasons of the variations w^ould appear." If 
 Paulus sneeringiy remarks that there were eight denials and not three, 
 is it not a fair and reasonable reply to say that there may have been 
 quite a number of denials on each of the three distinct occasions on 
 which Peter was challenged as being a disciple, and that it is 
 intelligible that each of the evangelists chose those three for his 
 narrative which seemed to him the most striking and significant ?- 
 A close examination of the alleged variations and discrepancies strongly 
 suggests that they are but supplementary details belonging to the 
 same incidents. Thus as to the first denial we are told that Peter 
 was sitting in the hall without (Matthew), that he was warming 
 himself in the hall below (Mark), that he was sitting by the fire 
 (Luke), that he was accosted by the maid that kept the door (John). 
 Why should not all these statements be true, and do they not afford 
 just the kind of independent testimony bearing upon the same incident 
 
 ^ Alford's Greek Testament, vol. I, p. 283. 
 
 - See on this and other points Da Costa's Four Witnesaes, p. 383 ; 
 also Andrew's Life of our Lord, p. 491 ; and Westcott's Gospel of St. 
 John, pp. 263-266. 
 
 130 
 
PETER'S LEXIAL 
 
 which, for the very reason that it is not mere reiteration, is felt to be 
 peculiarly strong h In the second denial, I'eter has gone out into the 
 porch (]\Iatthe\v), he is standing and warming liimself (John), and it 
 is another maid who assails him (Matthew), it is a male servant 
 (Tjuke), it is the bystanders (John). At this second onset may not 
 Peter have moved from the porch tc the fire, and have been attacked 
 first by otic, then by another, then by several ? Then if in the third 
 denial bystanders rally Peter on his accent (Matthew, Mark, and 
 Luke), while one of them, the kinsman of Malchus, amazed at his 
 audacity in denial, asks him whether he had not with his own eyes 
 seen him in the garden Avitli Jesus, does not this conjoint evidence 
 only give us a more vivid presentation of the scene, and a more vivid 
 sense of its reality ? The cock crowing and the repentance of Peter 
 are reported with the same refreshing variety. 
 
 131 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE. 
 
 It was still very early, but much had to be 
 
 done that day. It was indeed destined to be a 
 
 day more crowded with the most momentous 
 
 events than any that had ever dawned upon the 
 
 world. The Jewish Sabbath followed it, and it 
 
 was the Sabbath of the Passover week, to which 
 
 a special sacredness attached. If Jesus was not 
 
 brought before Pilate that day ere the sun set, 
 
 it would be a week before the opportunity could 
 
 recur. What might not happen in a week ? The 
 
 chief priests and elders had their intended victim 
 
 in their hands now. They had unanimously 
 
 voted Him worthy of death. If they had had 
 
 the power they would have carried out their 
 
 own sentence forthwith, but under Roman rule 
 
 '' it was not lawful for them to put any man to 
 
 death." ^ To Caesar or his representative therefore 
 
 ^ .Tosephus, Aniiq., XVIII., I. 1. The Romans claimed the 
 power also of preventing meetings of Sanhedrim being held without 
 their consent (Tacitus, Annals, XII. 54 ; Joseph., Ant.^ XX., IX. 1.) 
 132 
 
JEHUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 they must go to secure the execution of their 
 sentence ; but if haste, rancorous zeal, pertinacity 
 and importunity could bring it about, these were 
 not to be wanting on their part. 
 
 The Jewish rulers after pronouncing their sentence 
 hastened forth with their prisoner from the council 
 hall to the palace of Pilate. The first streaks 
 of morning -were just falling upon the city. 
 We should think it unusually early for a judge 
 to be expected to take his place upon the 
 bench, and to enter upon an important trial. But 
 we must remember that life and business begin 
 early in the East, while the Oriental must needs 
 rest during the hours when we are busiest. They 
 did not doubt that Pilate would be in readiness 
 to receive them. 
 
 The procession, as it moved on, doubtless gathered 
 to itself an increasing crowd. It must have been 
 a very unusual sight to see the leaders of the 
 Jewish people hurrying off, in this public way, to 
 the hated Roman governor with one of their own 
 race, that they might give him up to punishment. 
 They knew well that any death a Jew might die 
 in Roman hands would be an accursed one. They 
 knew before they set out, that the death they 
 went to ask for their prisoner at Pilate's hands 
 could be none other than crucifixion — the most 
 
 133 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 painful and shameful of all, especially for any one 
 of Abraham's race. And yet those abroad in the 
 streets at this early hour could see the grave 
 fathers and priests of their nation personally attending 
 one as a prisoner, bound and safeguarded in the 
 hands of their servants, whom many of them must 
 have known well as the Man of Nazareth, and 
 moving with quick steps and agitated looks towards 
 the Praetorium — the headquarters of the Roman 
 governor — to deliver Him up there to the Gentiles ! 
 How the news must have spread through the 
 city, and drawn multitudes from every quarter in 
 the greatest excitement ! Who could have believed 
 that such a sight should ever have been witnessed 
 in Jerusalem ? It would have been an extra- 
 ordinary thing had it been even a Barabbas whom 
 the Jewish priests and elders were taking the 
 trouble of putting in this way into the hands of 
 their Roman rulers. But it was their own Messiah 
 they were thus giving up to ignominy and death ; 
 and it was not a Jewish mob in an hour of 
 madness that was doing it, but the responsible 
 rulers and representatives of the Jewish people. 
 It was Israel through them playing the part of 
 Judas Iscariot, betraying her divine Master into the 
 hands of the uncircumcised. Thus indeed the 
 apostles ever afterwards regarded the act, Every- 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 where they went they sought to bring home to 
 the hearts of their fellow-countrymen, that they 
 had been the betrayers as well as murderers of the 
 Just One, and that it had been the basest deed 
 in all their nation's history that they had delivered 
 up the Christ to the Gentiles.^ 
 
 The Praetorium, to which this extraordinary 
 procession made its way, merits some attention in 
 passing. Here Pilate resided when he was in 
 Jerusalem ; but this was only at the time of the 
 feasts, as he hated the place and the people, 
 and preferred to live at the Romanized city of 
 Csesarea. It was a vast palatial building on 
 Mount Zion, erected by Herod the Great.- It 
 consisted of two great wings with a central building 
 connecting them. It contained magnificent apart- 
 ments for the governor and his household, and 
 accommodation for the various government offices, 
 and also for a large garrison. Within its spacious 
 enclosure almost an army, it is said, could be 
 
 1 Acts iii. 13, U. Acts vii. 52. 
 
 2 Caspari thinks there are grounds for believing the Praetorium 
 was the fortified garrison of Antonia on the north-west side of the 
 Temple ^Mountain. The Gabbatha or Pavement referred to is 
 supposed to be the paved surface of the Temple Mountain whicli 
 Josephus mentions as being all paved with variegated mosaic work 
 (Casi)ari's Life, p. 225). Edersheim believes it far more likely that 
 I'ilate occupied "the truly royal abode of Herod, and not the 
 fortified barracks of Antonia " (Edersheim, vol. II., o^G). This is 
 also the opinion of Ewald {Hisionj of Israel, vol. YI., 39), and of 
 qiost others on the subject. 
 
 135 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 gathered together. It thus served the double 
 purpose of a government house and a strong 
 fortification. In the central part was the hall of 
 judgment, where so much occurred in connection 
 with the trial of Jesus. In front of it, and 
 connected by a doorway, was a raised platform 
 called in the Hebrew Gabbatha or the Pavement. 
 There, as on the present occasion, the curule chair 
 was sometimes placed for the governor, and he 
 dispensed justice in the open air.^ Its tesselated 
 floor was of costly marble, and adorned with stones 
 of various colours. It was spacious enough to 
 accommodate the accusers and accused, and those 
 who attended on the governor's person, or assisted 
 him in judgment. 
 
 The Praetorium and the Temple were the 
 chief glories of Jerusalem. Referring to the former 
 Josephus says, " The kinds of stone used in 
 its construction were countless. Whatever was 
 rare abounded in it. The roofs astonished every 
 one by the length of their beams, and the beauty 
 of their adornment. Vessels mostly of gold and 
 silver, rich in chasing, shone on every side. The 
 
 ^ Josephus, B. I. II. IX. 3. Eoman governors, it is said, attached 
 so much importance to the tesselated pavement, on which their bema 
 might be placed, that they had a portable one which they could use 
 whenever they might be dispensing justice. So says Suetonius of 
 Julius Caesar in his life of him. 
 
 136 
 
JEfiUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 great dining hall had been constructed to supply- 
 table couches for three hundred guests. Others 
 opened in all directions, each with a different 
 st5^1e of pillar. The open space before the 
 palace was laid out in broad walks, planted with 
 long avenues of different trees, and bordered by 
 broad deep canals and great ponds, flowing with 
 cool clear water, and set off along the banks with 
 innumerable works of art."^ 
 
 To this great building, then, the impressive 
 monument and headquarters of the alien government 
 under which they lived, the Jewish fathers brought 
 Jesus. It was the first and last time He was 
 to enter a king's palace, and it was as a prisoner. 
 With Him those fathers, after traversing some 
 steep and winding streets, and then the open 
 space to which Josephus refers, ascended the steps 
 leading to the Pavement. They would not accom- 
 pany Him further lest they should be defiled. The 
 Talmud says, " Let the court of the stranger be to 
 you as the stable of oxen."^ Roman buildings, even 
 the most useful of them, were, according to the same 
 authority, objects of antipathy to the Jews.^ They 
 sent word to the procurator, very likely by some 
 
 ^ Josephus, Antiq. V., IV. 4. 
 
 2 Bab. Talmud, Eruhin, fol. 62. 
 
 3 Bab. Talmud, Shabbath, 33 b. 
 
FROM THE GAEBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 of the guards or officers whom they found about 
 the Praetorium, that they desired to see him, 
 and that they had a prisoner with them whom 
 they adjudged worthy to be handed over to him. 
 So scrupulous about ceremonial defilement even 
 while they were in the way of committing the 
 greatest crimes ! So careful to keep the outside 
 of the cup and the platter clean, while they 
 were allowing the cup within to be filled with 
 the pollution of iniquity and malice ! ^ 
 
 ^ If the priests were careful lest they should he defiled hecause they 
 had the Passover to eat, then it would appear the paschal lamb had 
 not yet been eaten when Jesus was on His trial. Here differences 
 of view emerge. Edersheim {Life and Times, vol. II., 487) holds 
 that the paschal lamb was eaten on the previous evening, the night 
 of the Lord's Supper ; he even speaks of Peter and John (the latter 
 according to his view being a priest) bringing the lamb, after it had 
 been slain and dressed as the law required, to the house of Mark, 
 where he considers it likely that the supper took place. Caspari 
 {Life, p. 204) on the other hand is of opinion that it was not 
 the paschal lamb, but only the paschal meal which was partaken 
 of by our Lord and His disciples on the night before the Crucifixion, 
 when the supper was instituted. The paschal meal, he says, was 
 kept on the day of the preparation — the 14th Nisan-and Judas 
 was understood when he left the Upper Eoom to be going forth 
 to buy the things — that is the lamb, &c. — necessary for the feast, 
 the real Passover observance on the next day, the 15th. Ewald 
 {Life, p. 299) shares this view, and goes so far as to say that if 
 it had been the paschal lamb, and not this paschal meal which had 
 been eaten on the night of the supper, it would have been flesh and 
 not bread Jesus would have used as the symbol of His body. But 
 proof appears to be lacking of the existence of this paschal me;il in the 
 time of our Lord. After the destruction of Jerusalem a sort of 
 memorial Passover without the paschal lamb (there being no temple 
 in which it could be slain) "was observed, but in our Lord's case there 
 was no necessity for that. 
 
 There seems to be no escape in this way from the old Passover 
 controversy. The Syno^jtists say that Jesus and His disciples 
 ate the Passover on the night before His death. John appears 
 
 138 
 
JESTTS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 Pilate knew them too well to contend or 
 parley with them on a point of religious etiquette. 
 Wearing his white robe with its broad purple border, 
 the mark of his rank and authority as a Roman 
 procurator, he came forth at their request, and 
 the trial began. A singular scene, indeed, that 
 open-air court must have presented — the Roman 
 governor as judge in his ivory chair of state, his 
 Roman attendants and assessors about him, the 
 
 to indicate that the Passover remained to be eaten on the day 
 He died. It is extremely unlikely that Jesns observed it a day before 
 the Jews in general, or that latitude was allowed of observing it on 
 one or other of two days. The only feasible way out of the 
 difficulty appears to be that John applies the term Passover to the 
 whole feast, while the Synoptists use it in the more restricted sense 
 of the paschal lamb. The feast lasted seven days. On each of those 
 days, there was the Passover to be observed or eaten. John uses the 
 expression "to eat the Passover" in the wide sense that it applies to 
 each of the celebrations of the paschal week. On the second day there 
 was the chagigah, the offerings of the flock and herd, first to be 
 presented, and then to be partaken of at a festive meal. The 
 chac/igah also in John's vieAV was the Passover, and the priests would 
 be in the act of slaying the animals at the time Jesus died on the cross. 
 Edersheim says (Life and Times, vol. II., p. 568) that no competent 
 Jewish archoDologist would care to deny that the term Passover might 
 not apply to the chagignh, no less than to the paschal lamb. 
 This second day happened to be the preparation {Tapaffxivri), the day 
 before the Sabbath. So also with John it was the preparation of the 
 Passover, that is, the preparation which happened to occur during the 
 paschal week, and therefore unusually important. Jesus ate the 
 Passover on the Thursday evening as the law directed, and as all others 
 did. But there was the Passover to be eaten or observed in other 
 forms and seiwices on the day following, and there is no discrepancy 
 after all between John and the other three evangelists on this point. 
 The whole subject is very ably, concisely, and fully discussed in 
 Andrews' (Life, pp. 3G7-397). It may be added 'that upon the 
 remark of John, why the members of the Sanhedrim would not enter 
 the Praetorium, Delitzsch has hinged an interesting argument for the 
 Gospels being wiitten in the first, rather than in the second century 
 (Zeitschriftfdr Lnth, ThcoL, 1874). 
 
 139 
 
FR(m THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Jewish fathers standing at a safe ceremonial 
 
 distance in front of him, Jesus in the midst, and 
 
 the Roman soldiers stationed all around the 
 
 elevated platform on which they were assembled, 
 
 and with their long spears guarding the place 
 
 from a multitude growing every moment in numbers 
 
 and in excitement. Jesus standing between the 
 
 cultured heathen and the bigoted Jew, the Truth 
 
 on its trial when He is being tried, and the world 
 
 looking on and finally uniting in His condemnation ! 
 
 The scene is worthy to be the masterpiece of the 
 
 greatest artist.^ 
 
 In this trial the character of Pilate, as well as 
 
 that of others connected with it, is, as it were, 
 
 held up before the sun. As might be expected 
 
 from what we learn of him— not from Christian 
 
 writers who might be supposed to be prejudiced 
 
 against him, because under him their divine 
 
 Saviour suffered, but from Roman writers and 
 
 historians— the trial has only added to his evil 
 
 reputation, and given him an unenviable immortality. 
 
 His procuratorship he owed to Sejanus, the infamous 
 
 favourite of the Emperor Tiberius, and the cUent 
 
 was like his patron. He was unprincipled, sensual, 
 
 '^ It is to be observed that Pilate conducts the examination and trial 
 liiDiself . Had he been a consul or proconsul he would have had his 
 quaestor to conduct it, but being a procurator he had no quaestor. 
 Another incidental proof of the accuracy of the evangelists (Tacitus, 
 Annals, XII. 60). & v ; 
 
 140 
 
JESUS HEFORE EILATE 
 
 venal, covetous, and pitiless in shedding blood 
 when he could do it with safety and gain to 
 himself, but he was wanting in decision of character 
 and was known to yield under pressure. He 
 could be firm enough when courage cost nothing, 
 but he would vacillate and temporise when the 
 opposition was sufficiently formidable and threatening. 
 He was equal to any injustice and to any deed of 
 blood, and could carry it through without compunc- 
 tion, provided only it should be to his advantage. 
 Morality with him was only a matter of policy 
 and utility, and he could not understand anyone 
 sacrificing himself for either truth or virtue. 
 
 Yet Pilate was not worse, in some respects 
 he was better, than some other Roman governors 
 in those degenerate days of the empire, who worked 
 their way to office attracted by the spoils and the 
 wealth which it brought, and who gambled and 
 speculated in a variety of ways for those spoils, 
 bribing, flattering, finessing, and financing, till by 
 some lucky turn in the great imperial lottery, the 
 coveted prize of this or that province should become 
 theirs.^ Unfortunately for himself, Pilate obtained 
 the government of a people wdio were the most 
 
 ^ As Ellicott {Life, p. 350) says, Pilate was a thorough and complete 
 type of the later Roman man of the world. We have it on the 
 aiitliority of Eiisebius {Hist. Ecclcs. II. 7) that he was recalled, and 
 sent into banishment for his iniquities as a governor, and that he 
 died bv his own hand. 
 
 141 , 
 
FRO 21 THE GARLEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 intractable and troublesome of all the races that 
 Rome attempted to rule, and the most difficult 
 for a pagan Roman to understand. He had 
 already made himself odious to them ; and every 
 movement, especially on the part of their eccle- 
 siastical rulers, he had come to regard with 
 suspicion and distrust. He made no attempt to 
 conceal that repugnance and contempt which he 
 shared with the Romans generally in regard to 
 them, and they repaid him with their sullen 
 submission and their untiring watchfulness for his 
 halting. He carried his pride of Roman authority 
 and power loftily against their pride of race and 
 religion, but in obstinacy and dogged pertinacity he 
 was no match for them. Of this we could hardly 
 have a more striking example than the part we find 
 him playing in the condemnation and death of Jesus. 
 Reverting now to the Pavement where the court 
 is set up, let us endeavour with the help of the 
 evangelists' brief notes to follow the course of 
 the trial. We may suppose that Caiaphas, like the 
 orator TertuUus when Paul was being tried before 
 another Roman governor,^ indulged in his opening 
 address in much complimentary language in regard to 
 the procurator, and in much bitter invective against 
 the Prisoner. Concluding, he said, and he said it 
 
 ^ Acts xxiv. 1, 8. 
 142 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 as if nothing more needed to be said, " If He 
 were not a malefactor we would not have delivered 
 Him up to thee." ^ And Pilate replied forthwith, 
 "A malefactor you say He is. Take Him, therefore, 
 and judge (or punish) Him according to your law." 
 But it was " not lawful for them to put any man 
 to death," and death was the punishment they 
 thought due to this man's offences. The Talmud 
 says that forty years before the destruction of 
 Jerusalem, that is shortly before Jesus was on 
 His trial, the power of pronouncing capital sentences 
 was, by the Romans, taken from the Sanhedrim. 
 We find Rabbi Simon expressing his devout thank- 
 fulness at being relieved of the responsiblity.^ 
 What the priests and elders now desired was 
 that Pilate should affirm their sentence, and com- 
 mand its execution. Would Pilate not abide by 
 their judgment without further inquiry ? Would 
 he not be satisfied that they had tried their 
 prisoner and condemned Him ? They had found 
 Him guilty of crimes which it was beyond their 
 power to punish. Should not the very fact that 
 they were there with Him that morning be 
 enough to satisfy the governor that His crimes 
 were great ? 
 
 1 John xviii. 30. 
 
 - Schwab's Talmud, vol. x., p. 228. 
 
 143 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 But the governor, to his credit be it said, was 
 not to be persuaded so easily. He had a special 
 pleasure in giving the Jewish rulers to feel the 
 weight of his authority and their own dependent 
 and subject state. No mere protestations of the 
 kind which they made could be enough to secure 
 his acquiescence offhand in their sentence, and to 
 gratify their wishes for the Prisoner's death. He 
 would have them justify their sentence before 
 him. What were their charges against the Accused? 
 Were they merely ecclesiastical ? He could not 
 allow death to be inflicted for mere differences of 
 religious opinion or practice. It would be a degra- 
 dation of Rome that her power should be at the 
 disposal of factious Jewish priests, to persecute and 
 punish those they might consider heretics or 
 blasphemers as they pleased. Was it not the 
 case that in their eyes every Roman in the land 
 was worse than a heretic ? 
 
 This difficulty was foreseen by Jesus' accusers. 
 They had indeed condemned Him for blasphemy, 
 because He had made Himself the Son of God. 
 But before the Roman governor they produced 
 entirely different charges.^ " We found this fellow," 
 
 1 We may remark here that Strauss (New Life, pj). 3o6, 358) 
 avows his readiness to believe the passage in Tacitus (^Annals, XV. 
 44) as to the fact of Christ's death, and also that the Je'ws trumped 
 up political charges against Him to secure His condemnation ; but 
 
 144 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 said they, " perverting the nation, and forbidding 
 
 to give tribute to Caesar, saying that He Himself 
 
 is Christ a king." ^ With what feehngs of suspicion 
 
 and distrust Pilate must have listened to these 
 
 accusations ! The Jewish rulers finding fault with 
 
 anyone who taught that tribute should not be paid 
 
 to Caesar ! The Jewish rulers now become so 
 
 loyal and so ardent in Caesar's interest that 
 
 they give themselves the trouble of laying hands 
 
 upon a new pretender to a Jewish throne ! It 
 
 was a new role for them to play that they should 
 
 appear such friends and watchful defenders of 
 
 Roman rule. The governor must have at once 
 
 surmised that there was a great deal behind all 
 
 this which was being concealed from him, and that 
 
 their profuse loyalty and disinterestedness were 
 
 only on the surface. 
 
 Those Jewish fathers had heard Jesus calmly 
 
 and bravely bearing witness at their own bar, 
 
 knowing well the peril He incurred, that He was 
 
 the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God. They 
 
 had condemned Him on this very ground. And 
 
 that around these simple facts the evangelists gathered a mass of 
 legendary and traditional lore to suit their purpose, and used it, he 
 allows, in a Avouderfully dramatic way. The scene hetwcen I'ilate 
 and Jesus, he thinks, is admirably theatrical. But as Wacc {Chief 
 Facts in lite Life of our Lord, p. 116) remarks, the Gospel narrative 
 is so marked by the absence of a single false note, that even 
 unbelievers are compelled to acknowledge its truth and reality. 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 2. 
 
 H5 
 
FROM THE GAEL EN TO THE CROSS 
 
 now attaching their own carnal and worldly notions 
 to the Messiahship, and setting Him forth to 
 Pilate as if He aimed at fulfilling them by exciting 
 false hopes among the people, stirring them up 
 against Caesar, and aspiring to be their king, they 
 demanded His condemnation and death. This they 
 did though His whole life and ministry were a 
 refutation of these charges, and though, as they 
 well knew. He had again and again repudiated 
 their carnal ideas of the Christ. Had He consented 
 to be the Messiah they accused Him of being 
 before Pilate, they would never have condemned 
 Him. It was because He would not fulfil their 
 worldly ambitions, and be the Christ after their 
 own hearts, that they rejected Him ; and yet while 
 fixing upon Him the character of their own Christ, 
 they asked Pilate on this very ground to put Him 
 to death. Singular perversity and hypocrisy, which 
 it would be difficult to find surpassed ! 
 
 Pilate doubtless knew something of Jesus' public 
 career. He knew it had been a peaceful one, that 
 Jesus never appealed to force, and that His followers 
 were by no means an armed or warlike band. 
 He had never heard that the multitudes that 
 gathered round the Man of Nazareth had done 
 any violence, or attempted any uprising, or given 
 the smallest trouble to the government. But the 
 
 146 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 accusers had set Him forth as a mover of sedition, 
 a teacher of disloyalty, a claimant of royal honours. 
 They had mentioned Caesar's name, and he dreaded 
 what handle they might make of it against him 
 if he did not show himself zealous for the imperial 
 interest and honour. His interest, if not his 
 perplexity, was aroused. He wished a private 
 examination of the Prisoner. He rose from the 
 judgment seat on the Pavement, retired into the 
 judgment hall that was behind, and gave instructions 
 that the Prisoner should follow him.^ 
 
 There the most remarkable colloquy occurs 
 between them.^ We see Pilate, with his rough 
 Roman and pagan instincts, making a poor and 
 half sincere attempt to understand Jesus. Not 
 much was there outwardly to prepossess him in 
 His favour. Not much to put him in dread as of 
 a rival potentate, or a disturber of great Caesar's 
 
 1 John xviii. 33. 
 
 Keim (vol. VI. 85) is amused at Pilate's peripatetic method of 
 conducting his examination and trial of Jesus, his going to and f lo 
 between Jesus in the palace and the Jews standing without. But 
 while lloman comis were open, it was natural that the governor who 
 was to be the judge in what he saw from the first was to be a case 
 of peculiar difficulty should wish to see and confer with the Prisoner 
 apart. 
 
 - The language used between Pilate and Jesus, and indeed through- 
 out the whole of the trial would most probably be Grreek. It was the 
 language which lloman governors, who had Eastern provinces to rule, 
 were expected to speak. It was known througliout Judea and Galilee, 
 just as English is throughout Wales or the Highlands of Scotland. 
 Jesus and Pilate therefore needed no interpreter. (Tacitus, Rint. V. b). 
 
 147 
 
FROM TEE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 empire. A meek and lowly Man, weary and worn 
 with His agony and the trials and buffetings He 
 had already endured — His garments stained plentifully 
 with blood and spitting, His face pale and wan, 
 and yet with something of heaven resting upon 
 it ! A King indeed with a greater and more awful 
 sovereignty than that of any Caesar ! 
 
 "Art thou the King of the Jews?"^ Pilate asked 
 in beginning his examination. Jesus replied to him, 
 " Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or did others 
 tell it thee of me ? " ^ It was answering one 
 question by putting another. Pilate was taken 
 aback. He had probably looked for a complete 
 disavowal of all such pretensions to kingship, 
 especially now that they were removed from those 
 terrible Jewish fathers, and in the judgment hall 
 by themselves. The least disavowal of the kind 
 would most likely have satisfied the Roman 
 governor, now that he was more than suspecting 
 in his own mind that those fathers were but 
 compassing some malicious end of their own, under 
 cover of doing a service for Caesar. But instead of 
 receiving the disavowal he expected he was startled 
 to be asked where he had got his idea of Jesus' 
 kingship, and whether he understood it strictly 
 
 ^ Jolin xviii. 33. 
 
 - John xviii. 34. 
 
 148 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 in his own sense as a Roman, or whether he had 
 learned to attach to it some other meaning. It 
 was a reasonable question, and necessary to be 
 answered if the ground was to be cleared between 
 them. Was "King" to be understood in the Roman, 
 or in the Messianic sense ? It was needful at the 
 outset that each should know the language which 
 the other was employing. But it speedily became 
 apparent that Jesus was using a language which 
 to Pilate, as to any other mere man of the world, 
 was utterly foreign and transcendental. Pilate knew 
 of no kingship but that which was after the 
 manner of Caesar's — the idea of any other he 
 left to the dreamers and the philosophers. 
 
 The governor appeared to be somewhat nettled 
 at the question addressed to him. "Am I a Jew.?''^ 
 said he. " Your own nation and the chief priests 
 have delivered you unto me. What care I about 
 the dreams of your people about a Messiah ? As to 
 this Messiahship they must be the judges and not 
 I. Whatever your claims to it, you are evidently 
 no Messiah in their eyes, for they have given 
 you up into my hands. Tell me what have you 
 done ? Your deeds, and not your idle dreams I 
 must be the judge of." 
 
 ^ John xviii. 35. 
 149 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Jesus answered with calmness and dignity, " I 
 am a king, but my kingdom is not of this world. 
 If I were a king in your sense, I should have 
 followers and subjects who should bear arms in 
 my cause. They would have fought for me when 
 I was being arrested, and prevented me from being 
 delivered to the Jews. But I forbade them 
 using the sword. I gave myself up of my own 
 will into the hands of my foes, and my followers 
 have made no attempt to rescue me. It should 
 be evident to you that my kingdom is like no 
 earthly one." ^ 
 
 "But are you really a king?"^ asked Pilate again. 
 " If you are not, why do you not deny the 
 accusation they make against you ? If you are, 
 what is the kingdom you claim to rule over ? " 
 
 The answer was at once forthcoming and how 
 sublime it is ! " Thou sayest that I am a king. 
 To this end was I born, and for this cause came 
 I into the world that I should bear witness unto 
 the truth. Everyone that is of the truth heareth 
 my voice."^ A new kingdom indeed to which 
 Pilate with all his knowledge of courts was an 
 utter stranger — the grandest of all however — one 
 
 ^ John xviii. 3G. 
 2 John xviii. 37. 
 •^ John xviii. 37. 
 
JESTTS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 whose glorious sovereignty could never be in any 
 but divine hands — a kingdom inward, spiritual, 
 eternal, in which all souls that love the truth 
 find their country and their inheritance for ever. 
 The Prisoner before him dared to claim its 
 divine throne ; and nothing, not even the threatened 
 agony and death of the cross, could induce Him 
 to renounce His title to it. He dared also to 
 affirm that the children of the truth everywhere 
 and in all ages were His loyal and devoted subjects, 
 owning His kingship, and hearing His voice. ^ 
 
 "What is truth ?"^ contemptuously asked Pilate, 
 when the Prisoner had done trying to make plain 
 to him the kingship which He claimed. Truth, 
 thought he, is a very good thing and a noble 
 study for the schools and the philosophers, but 
 what have Roman courts of law and Roman 
 procurators to do with it ? He turned away 
 without waiting for an answer to his own 
 question. We almost feel as if we owed him a 
 grudge that, in so doing, he has withheld from us 
 a reply which would have been of priceless value 
 to the world. Yet Jesus is Himself the answer 
 
 ^ Yet llenan ventures to remark here that " the great ambiguity 
 of speech which had been the source of Jesus' strcngtli, and whicli 
 after His death was to establish His kingship, injured Him on this 
 occasion ! " Life of Jrsns, p. 27S. 
 
 2 John xviii. 38. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 to Pilate's question. He is the Truth ; and so 
 every one who is of the truth turns to Him as by 
 the force of an instinct, and responds to Him as 
 He reveals Himself with a holy confidence and joy. 
 Thus the private interview between Pilate and 
 Jesus ended. The s^overnor returned to the 
 Pavement where the Jewish rulers were still 
 waiting. He had found nothing in Jesus which 
 he could condemn, nothing which "Roman law 
 could punish. '' I find no fault in this man," ^ 
 said he to them as he again took his seat as 
 judge in the open-air court. He was disposed at 
 once to set the Prisoner free. Gallio would have 
 come to a like judgment f so would any other 
 Roman procurator. Like Gallio, he did not see that, 
 in an}^ of the things of which Jesus was really 
 accused, there was anything a Roman governor 
 should care for, or could justly punish. He only 
 saw in Jesus a religious enthusiast, a man who 
 talked the merest, but the most harmless trans- 
 cendentalism about His kingdom and His kingship. 
 What did it all matter to him ? What if Pilate 
 had only been possessed of the needful courage 
 and decision, and had played the part of Gallio 
 still farther, driving chief priests and elders, 
 
 ^ John xviii. 38. 
 2 Actsxviii. 12-17. 
 
 152 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 accusers and Accused, and the people thronging 
 around, all of them from his judgment seat ? It 
 would have been the barest justice to the Accused. 
 
 The Jewish rulers, however, were not to be got 
 rid of so easily. They were there that morning 
 with a fell purpose, and they would not rest till 
 they had seen it executed. They had laid their 
 hand on Pilate, and they were not the men to 
 relax their hold till he had done as they desired. 
 Pilate's words about the Prisoner's innocence only 
 incensed them the more against Him. Were they 
 to be told that this man was innocent whom they 
 had declared worthy of the last and greatest 
 punishment, and for whom they, in person and 
 very expressly, had come to ask a cross ? " They 
 accused Him of many things." ^ In their vehemence 
 and fury one and another, and sometimes several 
 at the same time, could be heard hurling charge 
 after charge against Him.^ 
 
 But in the midst of this pitiless storm, this 
 remorseless outpouring of reproach and calumny, 
 Jesus stood calm and silent. In the majesty of 
 His innocence and sinlessness He left the accusa- 
 tions to answer each other, just as He had done 
 in the council hall before Caiaphas. " When He 
 
 ^ Mark xv. 13. 
 2 Matt, xxvii. 13. 
 
 153 
 
FROM TEE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 was reviled He reviled not again, when He 
 suffered He threatened not, but committed Himself 
 to Him that judgeth righteously." ^ The governor, 
 we are told, marvelled greatly.^ He had seen 
 outbreaks of Jewish fanaticism and passion before, 
 but the Jewish fathers seemed on this occasion 
 to surpass themselves. He could not understand 
 the scene. Those Jews, with their Messiah dreams 
 and their religious feuds, were to him the strangest 
 people in the world. 
 
 What could the governor do in the circumstances ? 
 The silence of Jesus was adding fuel to the flame 
 in the hearts of the accusers, and increasing the 
 clamour of their tongues. It was becoming irksome 
 and perplexing to himself. " Hearest Thou not," 
 said he, "what these witness against Thee?^ Hast 
 Thou no defence to offer ? " But Pilate, who would 
 not stay to hear Jesus, when He would willingly 
 have spoken to him had he been a serious seeker 
 after truth, was not to have any answer from Him 
 now. Jesus left him to answer his own question. 
 He could himself hear what was being charged 
 against the Accused, and he could judge for himself 
 
 1 1 Peter II. 23. 
 ~ Matt, xxvii. 14. 
 3 Matt, xxvii. 13. 
 
 154 
 
JESUS BEFORE PILATE 
 
 whether the charges were such as to call for a 
 reply. 
 
 At length a way of escape suggested itself to 
 the governor's mind. Amidst the torrent of 
 accusation and reviling Pilate's ear caught up the 
 word Galilee. Some one had shouted out, " He 
 stirreth up the people, teaching throughout all 
 Jewry, beginning from Galilee unto this place." ^ 
 Jesus then was a Galilean. He belonged therefore 
 to Herod's jurisdiction, and fortunately Herod was 
 in Jerusalem at this very feast. To hand Him 
 over to the lord of Galilee would be an act of 
 diplomatic courtesy which might have many ad- 
 vantages, and it would cost Pilate nothing. It 
 might improve the relations between them which 
 were at that time rather strained and unfriendly. 
 At any rate it promised to rid Pilate of a most 
 unwelcome responsibility, and to deliver him from a 
 position which was every moment becoming more 
 difficult and even dangerous. If Herod should con- 
 demn and execute Jesus, as the Jewish rulers desired, 
 it would not trouble Pilate. He would be able 
 to congratulate himself on being done with what 
 was threatening to be a most unpleasant business, 
 and on escaping the toils which the chief priests 
 and elders seemed to be preparing for him. 
 ' Luke xxiii. 5, 
 
 DO 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Accordingly Pilate sent Jesus, attended by a 
 strong guard of Roman soldiers, to the tetrarch of 
 Galilee. He himself re-entered the Praetorium, and 
 the court on the Pavement broke up. The place 
 became deserted for the time. The chief priests 
 and grave members of the Sanhedrim now mingled 
 with the rabble, and the whole multitude followed 
 the Prisoner and His guards on their way to 
 the old palace of the Asmoneans, no great distance 
 off, in which Herod Antipas was then living, all 
 eager to witness the next scene in the eventful 
 drama of that da}^ 
 
 156 
 
JESUS BEFORE HEROD. 
 
 The palace to which Jesus was now led was a 
 place of some historic interest and importance. 
 It had been built by one of the Maccabees, 
 and had been the headquarters of the Jewish 
 government in Jerusalem in the days when Judea 
 could boast of some measure of independence. In 
 the struggle with Rome it was the last Jewish 
 stronghold to surrender, and when it was taken by 
 Herod the Great — the father of the Herod Antipas 
 who now inhabited it — the old Maccabean rule 
 came to an end, and the Jews became the 
 subjects of Caesar. When the tetrarch of Galilee 
 came to the capital to observe the feast of the 
 Passover, it was this old palace which he occupied.^ 
 
 It must have been with somewhat mingled 
 feelings that the chief priests and elders accompanied 
 Jesus on His way from Pilate's judgment bar to 
 
 > Josephus, Antiq.j XX., VIII. 11. 
 
 I'T 
 
FR02I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 that of Herod. ^ It could not be pleasing to them 
 to be driven from court to court, and to be 
 compelled to mingle again with the rabble in the 
 streets. But they had this satisfaction at least, that 
 they were going to a judge who claimed to be 
 of their own race and faith, and who as a 
 thoroughgoing Sadducee — though he was not with- 
 out a dread, strangely enough, of John the Baptist's 
 rising again from the dead^ — might be expected 
 to meet their utmost wishes. At the same time 
 they would doubtless have preferred that Pilate 
 had sentenced Jesus as they desired, and that their 
 malicious end had been attained at the Praetorium. 
 When the chief priests and elders spoke of 
 Galilee, it was with no intention of relieving the 
 Roman governor, and of getting the Prisoner 
 remitted to Herod's jurisdiction. It was rather 
 with the view of furnishing Pilate with another 
 reason for condemning Jesus. Galilee had a bad 
 name as a hotbed of disaffection and rebellion, 
 
 1 Kenan {Life of Jesus, p. 280) regards the narrative of Jesus' 
 appearance before Herod as imhistoric. He thinks it must have 
 been a tradition which had reached Luke, and which he had gathered 
 from a more recent document than the other evangelists had had 
 access to. Strauss allows that it may have happened, but is some- 
 what distrustful of the account. He thinks that it was put in for a 
 purpose to show that two judges — one a heathen, the other a Jew — 
 pronounced in favour of Jesus' innocence ! Otherwise he admits the 
 account contains nothing that might not have really happened as it 
 is told {New Life, vol. II. 3G2). 
 
 2 Matt. .xiv. 2. 
 
Ji:SUS BEFORE HEROD 
 
 and it was insinuated that Jesus was only another 
 dangerous demagogue kindhng the flame of discontent 
 there with Rome.^ The tragic action of Pilate in 
 slaughtering a number of Galileans while offering 
 their sacrifices was still fresh in men's minds.^ 
 Probably in these circumstances the Jewish fathers 
 thought it was enough to say that Jesus was a 
 Galilean stirring up the people to induce the 
 governor to join with them in condemning 
 Him. But somehow the case did not so appeal 
 to his mind. He distrusted those fathers. He 
 decided to send them with their Prisoner to 
 Herod. But if by doing so he gained time and 
 temporary relief, it was only to have them all 
 returning to him, as we shall see, with their feelings 
 of vindictiveness and their relentless persistency in 
 the prosecution of Jesus unto His death increased 
 and intensified by the delay. 
 
 Pilate was under no necessity to hand Jesus 
 over to the jurisdiction of Herod. Even though 
 he belonged to another province, the native of 
 a subject state as Jesus was, not being a Roman 
 citizen, might be tried and condemned by the 
 
 ' "lie stirrcth up the people . . . beginning from Galilee" 
 (Luke xxiii. 5). Professor G. A. Smith compares the relations of 
 Jiulca and Galilee at tliis time to those existing between Enghmd 
 and vScotland soon after the Union {Historical Geographi/ of the Holy 
 Land, p. 423). 
 
 - Luke xiii. I. 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 Roman governor within whose province he had 
 been seized, without any claim to extradition 
 other than one ex gratia of the governor himself. 
 Yet it appears that the principle of forum delicti 
 commissi — that is the rule of remitting prisoners 
 to the governor within whose jurisdiction their 
 alleged crimes were committed came to be more 
 and more observed.^ 
 
 It is to be noted that the Jewish fathers entered 
 with the Prisoner and His Roman guard into the 
 court of justice in Herod's palace. They could not 
 enter the Praetorium lest they should be defiled. 
 But this was the dwelling of one who could boast 
 of Jewish descent, and who observed the Passover.^ 
 They believed therefore they could be in Herod's 
 hall of judgment just as they might be in their 
 own council. Yet when we compare Herod with 
 Pilate we find that whatever difference there is, is 
 in favour of the latter rather than the former. If 
 Herod's professions were Jewish, his practices were 
 heathen. He did more to Romanize the Jews, and 
 make them utterly pagan at heart than any Roman 
 procurator could have done. His capital, Tiberias, 
 which was on the western shore of the sea 
 
 ^ Rein, Criminalrecht der R'dmer, p. 177. 
 
 - Josephus {Aniiq., XVIII. V. 3) tells us Herod was in the habit 
 of coming up to the feasts. 
 
 1 60 
 
JESUS BEFORE UEIWD 
 
 of Galilee, he aimed at making a Rome in 
 miniature. There he erected theatres and baths, 
 and a palace for himself, for, like his father, he 
 was great in architecture if in nothing else ; and 
 there he gathered around him crowds of actors, 
 singers, and jugglers. No Roman could have taken 
 life less seriously, or have given himself more freely 
 to sensuous indulgence and entertainment. Yet 
 those Jewish priests and rabbis feared no con- 
 tamination by being under the same roof with 
 him, because like themselves he was ceremonially 
 clean, and entitled to eat the Passover ! And he 
 was to be the judge of their Messiah ! 
 
 Into the presence then of this petty king, with so 
 discreditable a record, they brought Jesus to be tried. 
 They struggled to make their way with the throng 
 into his court of justice. The place was not large, 
 and it was soon filled. Herod came and took his 
 seat on the throne of judgment. The courteous 
 message of Pilate was delivered to him handing 
 over the Man of Nazareth to his jurisdiction. Then 
 the Prisoner was set before him. He stood with 
 the marks of the suffering and humiliation He had 
 already borne, wearing the chains they had anew 
 bound upon Him after Pilate had dismissed Him; 
 and Herod, like the chief priests, had no thought 
 of sparing Him the indignity of continuing to 
 endure them. i6i 
 
FROM TEE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Tt was the first time He and Herod had met. 
 Yet it might have been otherwise. Herod was 
 tetrarch of GaHlee. In the very country over 
 which He ruled Jesus had been brought up. 
 There He had fulfilled the greater part of His 
 ministry. There He had gathered round Him 
 multitudes of people belonging to all classes, 
 the rich and the poor, the nobleman and the 
 peasant, the learned rabbi and the fisherman, the 
 blameless Pharisee, and the woman that was a 
 sinner. To these multitudes He had addressed His 
 words of truth and life, and on their sick and 
 suffering He had wrought those miracles which 
 had spread His fame far and wide. Of Him 
 Herod could not but have heard, and of His 
 divine ministry and His mighty works he might 
 have been a personal eye and ear witness if he 
 had so chosen. 
 
 But he had not so chosen. Religion was not 
 popular in his palace. Neither thc»se who taught 
 it, nor those who lived it were after his liking. 
 A man more void of conscience, of all moral 
 scruple, it would have been difficult to find. He 
 was one of that worst class of men in those 
 degenerate days who, while professing to follow 
 Moses, laid themselves open to all the inroads of 
 Gentile vice and superstition. For just as a merely 
 
 162 
 
JESUS BEFORE HEROD 
 
 nominal Christian, who sins against the Hght which 
 the Gospel has brought him, can surpass even the 
 heathen in his immoralities, and sink to a lower 
 depth, so this nominal worshipper of Jehovah, who 
 was a pagan at heart, outdid many of the heathen 
 in vice and moral callousness. John the Baptist 
 fell somehow into his hands. That prophet of 
 the wilderness and preacher of repentance had 
 the courage, as might be expected, to denounce 
 him to his face for his sin in taking Herodias, 
 his brother Philip's wife. He was requited for his 
 fidelity by being put into prison, where at length 
 his execution was ordered to reward the dancing 
 of the daughter of that shameless and heartless 
 woman. ^ 
 
 We are not surprised therefore that such a ruler 
 had never before seen his most illustrious subject. 
 Nor need we wonder at the reception he gave 
 Him. He was glad to see Him, just as he might 
 have been to see any clever conjuror or popular 
 impostor. He had no sense whatever of moral 
 proportions. Moral considerations did not enter for 
 a moment into his conception of the person or 
 character of Jesus. He would have liked to see some 
 miracle done by Him.^ He desired the Prisoner 
 
 ' Matt. xiv. 3-12. 
 - Luke xxiii. 8. 
 163 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 to perform one in his presence, just as if Jesus 
 had been some strolling magician, who would only 
 be too glad to give some exhibition of His 
 conjuring skill before a king, especially when it 
 was likely to purchase a king's favour, and escape 
 from a dreadful death. The miracle would have 
 been to Herod an entertainment, something to 
 wile away a weary hour, and something to talk 
 about to wondering lordly guests on banqueting 
 days to come. But its moral significance would 
 have had not the smallest interest or consequence 
 for him. Like the thorough man of the world 
 he was, he had lost the moral significance of his 
 own life, and his spiritual vision was so blinded 
 that Jesus even could stand before him, and he 
 could see nothing of His exalted character or of 
 His moral excellence. 
 
 Pitiful it is indeed, but at the same time 
 deepty instructive to see Herod with Jesus as 
 a prisoner standing before him for examination 
 and judgment. Jesus hears his request for a 
 miracle, and all the response He makes is to 
 fix upon him that steady penetrating look, more 
 telling than any speech. He had been prompt to 
 answer every appeal made by the suffering, even 
 the poorest among them, and to put forth His 
 almighty power in healing and restoring them 
 
 164 
 
JESrs BEFORE HER(tT) 
 
 according to their faith. But for the man, so lost 
 to all reverence for divine things that he could 
 ask the exercise of divine power merely for his 
 entertainment, and without the smallest sense of 
 personal need, and that he could treat Him who 
 was possessed of it as if He were no better than 
 a master of the black art, Jesus could have 
 nothing but a look of infinite pity. 
 
 Then we learn that Herod questioned with Him 
 in many words but that He answered him nothing.^ 
 Herod was not an ignorant man. He could talk 
 about religion, though it had no real or vital 
 place in his heart. With the questions of the 
 day regarding it he was familiar. Very likely 
 he had often discussed them with Sadducee and 
 Pharisee, with priest and with rabbi. He was 
 glad to have the opportunity of showing off, 
 before the learned fathers in his presence, how 
 much he knew of the law and the prophets and 
 of the Christ who was expected. He did what he 
 could to draw Jesus into a discusssion. He 
 propounded question after question, and, being a 
 voluble man, he talked at great length on the 
 points he raised. 
 
 We have not a few like him iti our own day. A 
 debate about religion is a diversion they enjoy, but 
 ' I.iilco xxiii. 9. 
 
 165 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 religion is by no means a serious business with them. 
 They Hke to discuss doctrines. They overwhelm 
 you with questions. They start no end of difficulties 
 and objections. But they are not greatly concerned 
 whether they are on the one side or the other. 
 The questions discussed have only a speculative 
 interest for them ; they do not touch their con- 
 sciences or affect their conduct, and any floating 
 impressions they have about them are not such 
 as to induce them to be martyrs for their faith. 
 You would make the greatest mistake possible, 
 were you to imagine that they would be won for 
 the faith by any victory you might obtain over 
 them in argument. You can but leave them to 
 talk on and exhaust themselves, as Jesus did with 
 Herod, now that He stood before him. 
 
 Herod is the only one of all His judges before 
 whom Jesus is altogether silent. But what answer 
 could He have for such an utter worldling ? What 
 can His gospel signify to one who sets its most 
 glorious mysteries of divine truth and grace at 
 nought, and counts them of far less importance 
 than the last good dinner he ate, or the question 
 of how that absolute trifle of a personal affair is 
 to end next week ? Jesus, so ready to open His 
 lips in warning and entreaty where these were 
 needed, and were likely to meet with some fitting 
 
 i66 
 
JESUS BEFOliE IIEROJD 
 
 response, is silent in presence of the man who, 
 stained with the blood of the last of God's 
 prophets, is hastening on in his career of woe. 
 If the Baptist himself had been there would he 
 have been silent ? And was he not in some sense 
 there ?^ Was he not there in that very hour 
 pleading with Herod, through the recollection of 
 his martyred form, to beware of filling his cup 
 of woe to overflowing by imbruing his hands in 
 the blood of Jesus whose forerunner he was ? 
 
 Jesus would doubtless have spoken had there 
 been the slightest evidence of moral seriousness or 
 of repentance on Herod's part, had there been any 
 readiness to listen and be saved. How hopeless the 
 case of the man to whom Jesus w411 say nothing ! 
 How awful is his case in whom no self-reflection, 
 no enquiry, no remorse can be stirred ! Yet such 
 a depth of moral hopelessness appears possible even 
 in this world. It seems to have been reached by 
 Herod, who, however, at one time gave promise 
 of better thmgs. No ice, they say, is so close and 
 hard as that which forms upon the surface after a 
 thaw has been. His heart had once been touched. 
 He had listened gladly at one time to the Baptist, 
 and had done many things because of him.^ But 
 
 1 Matt. xiv. 2. 
 
 ■^ Mark vi. 20. 
 
 167 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 heart-hardening had set in after that. Now Jesus 
 can but keep silence before the mystery of evil 
 he has become. 
 
 What a sight that is which presents itself in 
 that judgment hall, one fitted to stir the most 
 solemn reflection and the deepest pathos — Herod 
 with all his moral sensibilities weakened or destroyed 
 by long sinning against his better knowledge and 
 better self, sitting on his royal beina and babbling 
 about religion —while Jesus standing in his presence 
 is mutely listening to him, and with those tender 
 piercing eyes of His searching His judge through 
 and through, if haply there might be even one 
 moral chord within, which might be responsive to 
 His divine touch, and searching all in vain ! What 
 an impressive warning that sight is to listen to 
 the voice of Jesus while we may ! That will 
 be the most woeful of da3^s for a man when 
 he hears only the babble of the world, and the 
 attractions and the threatenings of the Gospel 
 alike fail to touch him, and when Jesus can onl}' 
 look upon him in his frivolity and sin with an 
 awful and ominous silence. 
 
 But the silence of Jesus unloosed the tongues 
 of His accusers. " The chief priests stood and 
 vehemently accused Him." ^ They had had their 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii, 10. 
 l68 
 
JESUS BEFORE HEROD 
 
 own experience already of Jesus' silence. It had 
 been more than they could endure. But they had 
 succeeded in breaking it in their own council, 
 and in moving Jesus to let fall words which they 
 could use for His condemnation.^ Probably they 
 hoped for a similar result now that they were in 
 Herod's judgment hall. If so, they were to be dis- 
 appointed. One and another of them uttered their 
 fierce accusations. The hall rang with their vehement 
 outcries. But the Prisoner stood silent in their 
 midst. It was the sublimest self-possession and 
 self-control He thus revealed. It was not after the 
 manner of men thus to be silent when groundless 
 reproaches and calumnies were being hurled against 
 Him, and thus to be patient and unmurmuring 
 amid the storm of abuse and falsehood assailing 
 Him. It was conduct worthy of the divine Man 
 whom He claimed to be. 
 
 Herod could not understand the vehemence of 
 the chief priests. He could not see why they 
 should be so furious against this Galilean subject 
 of his. Did they speak of Moses despised, the law 
 violated, blasphemy uttered ? What were these 
 things to him ? As to these offences alleged, were 
 they not all his own ? But he had no keen feeling 
 
 ■^ Matt. xxvi. 63, 64. 
 L 169 
 
FROM THE GAEDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 or real concern about them. The frivolous, con- 
 science-hardened tetrarch had a delight rather in 
 provoking the vehemence of the priests by his air 
 of proud indifference as to the whole affair. He 
 v^ould not treat Jesus seriously, notwithstanding 
 all their fierce protestations ; nor would he give 
 heed to the charges they were bringing against 
 Him. He would not put himself to the trouble 
 even of pronouncing a judgment with regard to 
 Jesus. He had no desire to be burdened with the 
 responsibility of the case. Jesus was Pilate's 
 prisoner, and His accusers were not Galileans but 
 the leading rabbis and priests of Jerusalem. His 
 case therefore seemed one for Jerusalem rather 
 than for Tiberias. Then, like Pilate, he could find 
 no fault in Him ; and there was a mysteriousness, 
 an otherworldliness about the Prisoner which was 
 altogether distasteful and incomprehensible to his 
 poor secularized or rather paganized mind. 
 
 Herod regarded Jesus even less seriously than 
 the Roman governor had done. If he began in 
 a spirit of irreverence by asking for a miracle 
 as a sort of diversion to himself and his little 
 court, he ended in a spirit equally frivolous 
 and callous. He, with his men of war, as 
 they are called — those who were attending upon 
 him, and were meant to give the court some show 
 170 
 
j:esus before hebol 
 
 of dignity and authority — set Jesus at nought.^ 
 There was even a touch of malice mingled with 
 the mockery. Very Hkely he resented the 
 silence of Jesus, and that He would not so much 
 as make answer to his request for an exhibition 
 of His wonder-working power. At an}^ rate Herod 
 went further than Pilate had as yet done. Though 
 he could find in Him nothing worthy of death, 
 he dared to put Him to shame. It was he who 
 first taught Pilate how to turn the kingly claims 
 of Jesus to ridicule. As he sat upon his chair 
 of judgment he looked with undisguised satisfaction 
 upon his soldiers making sport of Jesus, arraying 
 Him in a gorgeous robe — a white robe, we are 
 told, the emblem of Jewish royalty in mockery of 
 His claims to be the heir of David's throne ^ — and 
 indulging in very rude play as pretended subjects 
 before Him. 
 
 The attendants and men of war did what they 
 could to amuse their frivolous master. They bowed 
 the knee, and offered their feigned homage 
 to Jesus as a puppet king. They excited the 
 merriment of the crowd by their exaggerated 
 imitations of the ways of courtiers before Him, 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. U 
 
 2 Geikie, Xi/<? and TFords of Christ, p. G96 ; Josephus, XIX., 
 
 yiii. 2, 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 mingling with these no doubt a good deal of 
 rough handling and insulting rudeness. They thus 
 set an example which was copied and carried to 
 a still greater degree by Pilate's soldiers afterwards, 
 when they arrayed Him in a purple robe — the 
 emblem of imperial majesty — and put a crown of 
 thorns on His head, and a reed for a sceptre in 
 His hand. Then when they had grown somewhat 
 weary of their play, Herod bade them attend the 
 Prisoner back to Pilate. Feeling that he could do 
 nothing more with Him, and that there might be 
 some diplomatic gain in returning the Prisoner as 
 courteously as He had been sent, he gave in- 
 structions as he quitted the be77ta that this should 
 be done. So with the mock raiment of royalty 
 still on Him,^ and amid shouts of laughter Jesus 
 was led from the court, and conducted, probably 
 by the way He had come, back to the Praetorium. 
 Thus Herod did what so many have done with 
 Jesus since. He mocked Him, made light of every- 
 thing connected with Him, and then dismissed 
 Him from his presence and from any serious 
 thought on his part. Many have followed and are 
 still following his example. In their hearts Jesus 
 
 ^ It is not said that it was taken off, or that His own rainment was 
 put on again. That is distinctly stated as Jesus goes forth bearing 
 His cross. Mat. xxvii. 31. Mark xv. 20. 
 
 172 
 
JESUS BEFORE HERO I) 
 
 is condemned, and there He is continually put 
 to shame. Yet they utter no formal sentence 
 against Him. They are willing that others should 
 provide the cross, and be responsible for the 
 violence, cruelty, and agony under which He dies. 
 Sometimes, to hear them speak, one might think 
 they wished religion well, and that they were as 
 far as possible from desiring to persecute it. But 
 they set it at nought, as if worthy only of their 
 contempt and derision. It is not a matter with which 
 they are seriously concerned. If others assail it, it 
 is no business of theirs to defend it. If it fares 
 badly in the world, is despised and neglected, 
 what is that to them ? Like Herod they can even 
 look on and enjoy the spectacle of Jesus being 
 put to shame. They can find entertainment when 
 religion is being turned into ridicule, and the 
 sublimest things into comedy. Yet like Herod 
 also they would rather not have the responsibility 
 of Jesus' death. They would prefer to roll over 
 upon others, if possible, the odium of such a deed. 
 But they consent to His being crucified. They 
 would willingly be rid of Him and His religion 
 altogether. Christianity might perish from the 
 earth, but, so long as their own secular interests 
 and pleasures should be untouched, its loss and 
 destruction would not excite their regret. 
 173 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 The narrative of Jesus' appearance before Herod 
 doses with the significant statement, "And the 
 same day Pilate and Herod were made friends 
 together, for before they were at enmity between 
 themselves." ^ The evangelist says nothing as to 
 how this enmity arose. We are left to infer from 
 history otherwise what was its probable cause. 
 One circumstance that seems to throw some light 
 upon it may be mentioned. Herod Agrippa I. and 
 Herod Agrippa II. had both been treasurers of 
 the Temple ; it is probable therefore that Herod 
 Antipas held the same office. In that case we 
 can understand somewhat Herod's estrangement 
 from Pilate after the latter had seized the temple 
 revenues to pay for bringing water into the city.^ 
 
 But two such men could hardly be otherwise 
 than at enmity. They ruled over people of the 
 same race, who would have been better united 
 under one government. There was plenty of scope 
 for jealousy and suspicion between them ; nor could 
 long time elapse without something occurring, such 
 as the circumstance referred to, or the slaughter 
 
 1 Luke xxiii. 12. 
 
 - Josephus, B. I., II., IX., 4. There is a letter by the emperor 
 Claudius extant appointing Agrippa II. to be keeper of the pontifical 
 or high priestly vestments. This office carried with it that of manager 
 of the temple and its revenues. When Fadus, the Roman governor, 
 appropriated these offices, the Jews made an uprising in Avhich they 
 were successful (Josephus, XX., I 2). 
 
 174 
 
JESUS BEFORE HEROD 
 
 of the Galileans/ to give rise to a rupture. 
 Two such unprincipled, ambitious, self-seeking, and 
 intriguing rulers, within such near neighbourhood 
 of each other as Caesarea and Tiberias, and 
 meeting from time to time in Jerusalem, could 
 hardly be expected to be long without some 
 quarrel. Renan compares the situation not altogether 
 inaptly to that of an arrogant and self-seeking 
 English governor in India in his relations with a 
 native prince in his neighbourhood, who has a 
 kind of independence under the British protectorate, 
 and who might naturally be supposed to be 
 jealously watchful of the few rights and honours 
 which are still left to him. It was strange indeed 
 that between the Roman governor and the petty 
 sovereign, or tetracch rather, of Galilee, Jesus 
 at this time should have proved the peacemaker.^ 
 The temporary agreement and friendship which 
 Jesus brought about between them is deeply 
 significant. It is first of all a striking tribute to 
 the faultlessness of Jesus. Had Jesus been the 
 
 * Luke xiii. 1 . 
 
 2 Weiss (Life of Christ, III., 351) thinks the reason why Herod 
 would not seriously sit in judgment and pronounce sentence upon 
 Jesus was that he would not allow himself to he surpassed in polite- 
 ness hy Pilate. His right to try his Galilean suhject had been 
 admitted, and he was satisfied. He would not exercise the right, 
 but he Mould show his courtesy and his confidence in Pilate by 
 renouncing what had been so graciously accorded to him. 
 
 175 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 malefactor He was falsely accused of being, had He 
 been a Barabbas, for example, there would have 
 been no diplomatic courtesies between the two 
 rulers over His case. He would not have been 
 sent from the bar of the one ruler to that 
 of his hated rival. Pilate would have shown 
 himself zealous enough for the vindication of law 
 and order within the bounds of his own govern- 
 ment. His pride, his affected zeal for his office 
 as the representative of Caesar, would not have 
 allowed him in such a case to surrender his 
 functions as a judge to another. It was the 
 innocence of Jesus, the impossibility of convicting 
 Him of transgressing any law which perplexed 
 Pilate. It was this that made him desirous of 
 passing the responsibility of dealing with His case 
 to another. It was the same with Herod. He 
 could allow his men of war to mock Jesus and 
 make cruel sport of Him ; but regardless of morals 
 though he was, he felt he could not condemn 
 Him. 
 
 It is a fact, not without significance, that most 
 of the adversaries of the Christian faith are agreed 
 in paying their tribute of honour to the character 
 of Jesus Christ. They are ready to admit that 
 by no standard of justice or morality can He be 
 condemned, and even that He does not come 
 
 176 
 
JESUS BEFORE EEIWIJ 
 
 short of the highest requirements of goodness. 
 Neither His own conduct nor His reHgion con- 
 travenes any law worthy of the name. From 
 the pages of scepticism some of the finest 
 tributes to His matchless excellence might be 
 gathered. He can still look round upon His 
 adversaries and confidently ask, " Which of you 
 convicteth me of sin ? " ^ They are constrained 
 to be silent ; and it would seem as if the only 
 thing they could do was to pass Him from their 
 own bar of judgment to another, and try to veil 
 their hostility under a cloak of sceptical or cynical 
 indifference. 
 
 Further, the friendship of Pilate and Herod 
 indicates another point in which worldly unbelieving 
 men are agreed, and that is in rejecting Jesus. 
 It seems strange that they should be agreed in 
 recognising His guiltlessness, and at the same time 
 in wishing to have nothing to do with Him. His 
 faultlessness should have won them over to His 
 side. It should have impelled them to throw 
 over Him the shield of their authority, and unite 
 in resisting the violence and outrageous demands 
 of the mob, with all the resources of power which 
 as rulers they possessed. But they had no zeal 
 for morals, no eye for true goodness and spiritual 
 
 ^ John viii. 46. 
 
FROM THE GARLEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 excellence, and no love for such a character or 
 cause as that of Jesus. It could hardly have 
 been expected that they should. 
 
 Would we discover the point of harmony among 
 the enemies of the religion of Jesus, we shall find 
 it here. They are divided among themselves. In 
 nothing are they absolutely at one but in their 
 opposition to Jesus and to His demands upon their 
 consciences and their lives. Like the witnesses 
 against Him when He stood at the bar first of 
 Caiaphas and then of Pilate, those who assail His 
 truth are generally found to answer one another, 
 and to destroy each other's arguments and testi- 
 monies. Ask the indifferent and those living 
 without God what fault they have to find with 
 Jesus. Prosecute your inquiries, and you will 
 discover that with them, it is His very faultless- 
 ness that is His greatest fault. Through every line 
 and feature of His character they read the con- 
 demnation of their own. They see in Jesus one 
 who lives only for righteousness and for God, and 
 as they live for neither, the real voice of their 
 hearts is, '' Away with Him." To receive Jesus 
 and to bear His yoke, would, with their unchanged 
 hearts, be an intolerable burden. They are not 
 sighing for any moral deliverance, for any real 
 salvation from sin. What they are desirous of is 
 
 178 
 
JESUS BEFORE HEROD 
 
 rather that they should go on following the drift 
 of their worldly desires and ambitions, only with 
 less loss, disappointment and suffering to them 
 selves than the working of sin usually brings. 
 They have no wish to talk with you either about 
 the evils of sin, or about the beauties of holiness. 
 The truth is the crowning difficulty in the way 
 of the acceptance of Christianity is the moral one 
 — the aversion felt to such a character as that of 
 Jesus is, and the want of any real desire, by any 
 saving work whatever, to be brought into conformity 
 with it. How men like Herod can become 
 followers of Jesus is a problem very specially for 
 the conquering grace of God. 
 
 What became ultimately of the patched up 
 friendship between Pilate and Herod we are not 
 informed.^ We know only that it had the effect 
 at the time of strengthening and encouraging each 
 other in their unworthy and alien attitude to 
 Jesus. Pilate's soldiers, as we shall see, surpassed 
 
 1 Within less than ten years from this time Herod Antipas came to 
 his downfall. Josephus [AiUiq., XYIL, YII., 2) tells that after the 
 death of Tiherius in ad 38 he went to Rome to obtain for himself 
 the title of king, but that instead he was sent into peii^etual banish- 
 ment at Lyons. Eventually he went to Spain whither he was 
 followed by Herodias— one of the few good things recorded of her— 
 and there he died (Josephus, R.I., II., IX., G). We may add here 
 the testimony of the same JeM'ish historian {Aniiq., XVIH., V., o) 
 that within a liundred years almost all the family of Herod the Great, 
 notwithstanding tlieir numerous marriages, were utterly destroyed. 
 
 1/9 
 
FR03I TEE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 those of Herod in their cruel and insulting treat- 
 ment of their Prisoner ; and doubtless Herod's 
 treatment of Jesus prepared Pilate for breaking 
 through every scruple, and giving up Jesus to 
 the shameful scourge and the still more cruel and 
 shameful cross. Their friendship meant enmity to 
 Jesus ; and the humiliation and woe endured upon 
 Calvary reveal how terrible that enmity could 
 be. But the words of the Psalmist, prophetic of 
 their unholy alliance and of its ignominious and 
 woeful result, are applicable to all combinations 
 against Him. " The kings of the earth set 
 themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, 
 against the Lord and against His anointed, saying, 
 ' Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away 
 their cords from us.' He that sitteth in the 
 heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall have them 
 in derision. Then shall He speak to them in 
 His wrath, and vex them in His sore displeasure."^ 
 
 ^ Psulm ii. 2-5. 
 1 80 
 
JESUS AGAIN AT PILATE'S JUDGMENT 
 BAR. 
 
 From the court of Herod Antipas Jesus was 
 now led back to the Praetorium. The tetrarch of 
 GaHlee had not been able to condemn Him ; but 
 with his men of war he had set Him at nought 
 and covered Him with ridicule. Jesus, in his 
 view, was not to be taken seriously. He was but 
 a harmless visionary, against whom nothing criminal 
 could be proved, and whose claims to be a king or 
 to be divine were worthy only of being laughed 
 at. He was to be treated as a fool. 
 
 This was the shame now put upon Jesus, that 
 through the streets of the city He was compelled 
 to walk wearing the mock raiment of a king 
 in the midst of a jeering crowd. ^ A lamentable 
 spectacle indeed was that hilarious mob, and the 
 Son of God so apparelled, moving on meekly and 
 silently, the object of taunt and insult on every 
 
 * Luke xxiii. 11. 
 
 i8i 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE GROSS 
 
 side — a sight to make angels weep. Even had 
 Jesus been a criminal, it was a disgrace to justice 
 and to humanity that He should be so treated 
 for the entertainment of the multitude. It could 
 not but have the effect of preventing the people 
 from considering the claims of Jesus seriously. By 
 this pitiful exhibition before their eyes they were 
 being prepared for their final rejection of Him. 
 Their hilarity now was soon to be changed into 
 bitter reviling. Their jeers and laughter were 
 to lead before long to their frenzied outcries in 
 answer to the appeals of Pilate, " Away with Him, 
 crucify Him." Those who can go so far as to 
 ridicule religion must have a deep and even 
 passionate hatred of it within their hearts. They 
 are on the way to "crucify the Son of God afresh, 
 and to put Him to an open shame" (Heb. vi. 6). 
 
 Pilate was doubtless waiting, with some interest 
 and anxiety, the issue of the proceedings in Herod's 
 court of justice. He was in readiness for the 
 company when they returned. He came forth 
 from his palace and took his seat as before on 
 the Gabbatha or Pavement. The scene of the 
 former trial repeated itself. The Prisoner again 
 stood before him. But the raiment which was 
 put on in mockery was taken off, so also were 
 the chains with which He was bound. Fetters 
 
JESTTS AGAIN AT PILATE'S JUDGMEXT BAR 
 
 and mockery for an accused person were not in 
 harmony with the customs of Roman courts. The 
 accused, however he might be guarded, was 
 unbound till he was condemned. Jesus appeared 
 as before in the garb He was wont to wear as 
 the Man of Nazareth. The chief priests and elders 
 drew near, prepared to renew their accusations ; 
 and the crowd gathered again round the open-air 
 tribunal, kept back at a respectful distance by the 
 guard of soldiers in attendance. 
 
 Thus the second trial at the Praetorium began. 
 The accusers were not asked to state anew their 
 former charges, though they had the opportunity of 
 bringing fresh accusations, if they were so minded. 
 They were not even called upon to produce 
 witnesses and substantiate their charges.^ It may 
 seem strange that Pilate did not require this from 
 the very first. But the charges, even if they could 
 have been proved by overwhelming testimony, 
 would not have amounted to guilt in the eye of 
 Roman law. Witnesses, therefore, in support of 
 such charges were unnecessary. Pilate felt this 
 all through the trial. There was nothing which 
 fell from the lips of the fiercest accuser among 
 those fathers which could render Jesus worthy of 
 death, or indeed of any punishment whatever at 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 13-16. 
 
 183 
 
FBOM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 the hands of a Roman judge. The return of Jesus 
 from Herod's bar, uncondemned, confirmed him in 
 this view. 
 
 So Pilate summoned courage to address those 
 Jewish fathers with the view of deHvering to them 
 the judgment regarding Jesus to which he had 
 come. With an air of great judicial authority and 
 decision he said to them, ^' Ye have brought this 
 Man unto me as one that perverteth the people, 
 and behold, I, having examined Him before you, 
 have found no fault in this Man touching those 
 things whereof ye accuse Him. No, nor yet Herod, 
 for I sent you to him, and lo, nothing worthy of 
 death is done unto Him."^ 
 
 So far, bravely and justly spoken ; Pilate had 
 stated the facts of the case in true and worthy 
 terms. In declaring that he found no fault in 
 Him, he had done simply what any just Roman 
 judge would have felt compelled to do. What 
 then might have been expected to be his conclusion 
 from premises he had himself laid down so well ? 
 It was a halting one. '' I will therefore chastise 
 Him, and let Him go." - Pilate hoped, as Jeremy 
 Taylor expresses it, that ''a lesser draught of blood 
 
 ' Luke xxiii. 14-15. 
 
 '^ Lnlco xxiii. 16. 
 
 184 
 
JESUS AGAIN AT TIL ATE' S JUBGMENT BAR 
 
 might stop the furies and rabidness of their passion."^ 
 But he was to find himself disappointed in the 
 end, and that the "leeches would not so let go." 
 There was to be the scourging first, and then 
 liberty for the Prisoner. He was to be chastised, 
 the painful and humiliating scourge was to be 
 laid upon Him ; and He uncondemned and guiltless ! 
 What a cruel mockery of justice ! It was only con- 
 victed criminals who were scourged ; and Jesus was 
 to be treated as if He were one. But as nothing 
 worthy of death had been proved against Him, 
 He was to be let go. After being thus shamefully 
 handled, visited with the most degrading punish- 
 ment, He was to have His liberty ! 
 
 Pilate's proposal was a miserable compromise, 
 a gross paltering with justice and with duty. The 
 chastising was the satisfaction he was willing to 
 give the rabbis and priests who were the accusers. 
 It was the compliment intended for these fathers, 
 the politic acknowledgement that they had not 
 been altogether without grounds for their complaints 
 and accusations. On the other hand, as the offences 
 they alleged were not such as Roman law could 
 punish, the Prisoner should be released. 
 
 Pilate was thus compromising matters with the 
 
 ^: Jeremy Taylor's Zi/e ^;?f/ Death of Jesm Christ, yol. III., ch. 
 XV. 27. ' 
 
 M 18:: 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Jewish rulers. He had no objection to order the 
 flogging. That was going but a step further than 
 Herod had gone, when he sent the Prisoner back 
 to him covered with ridicule. But he could not 
 yet consent to sentence the Prisoner to death. 
 He was wavering between what was his duty as 
 a judge, and what was his interest or advantage 
 in dealing with his troublesome Jewish subjects. 
 The note of vacillation was distinctly in his 
 deliverance. Its weakness and hollowness were 
 promptly perceived. It was caught up at once, 
 and the utmost advantage was taken of it. It 
 was answered by a perfect storm of dissent. 
 " They cried out all at once."^ The decision 
 incensed them to the highest pitch. They tightened 
 the grip which they felt they had upon the weak 
 and yielding governor. They increased their efforts 
 to compel him to do as they wished. 
 
 Pilate, we are inclined to think, meant the 
 scourging to take the place of crucifixion.^ Not 
 so the mob. It should only be preliminary. 
 Release should never be. That day should see 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 18. How they could make a clamour Josephus tells 
 us (Aitiiq., XYIII., ITI , 2) where he speaks of the Jews boldly casting 
 reproaches upon Pilate till he was so incensed that he caused forthwith 
 a fearful massacre of them, 
 
 2 According to Weiss {Life of Christ, III., 355), Pilate meant the 
 scourging as the usual preliminary to crucifixion, but hoped when 
 they saw the result that the people might be moved to rest satisfied 
 with the suffering thus inflicted. 
 
 I86 
 
JESUS AGAIN AT PILATE'S JUDGMENT BATi 
 
 Jesus die. And their fell purpose triumphed. They 
 had the wicked satisfaction of seeing Jesus first 
 scourged, and then crucified. They beheld Him 
 treated worse ultimately than the malefactors who 
 were crucified with Him. He had to endure both 
 the lash and the cross, and these accompanied 
 with barbarities which the others were spared. 
 Pilate after scourging Jesus laboured hard, but in 
 vain, for His release. 
 
 But the procurator's attitude of compromise was 
 altogether like him. It was the attitude which was 
 assumed in regard to most things by Roman poli- 
 ticians and governors. They seldom found a straight 
 course to their end. There was always so much to 
 be yielded to those opposed to them, and so much 
 more, if possible, to be secured for themselves. 
 The lines of right and wrong, justice and injustice, 
 morality and vice faded away before the more 
 distinct ones between what seemed practicable and 
 pleasing, and what was not. What was politic 
 and expedient took the place of what was just 
 and dutiful. So here it was not a question with 
 Pilate what was due to his Prisoner, but what 
 could be done in the circumstances with the least 
 trouble and the greatest advantage to himself. It 
 occurred to him as a stroke of statesmanship, and 
 as an admirable solution of the difficulty that there 
 
 187 
 
FROM THE GARB EN TO THE CROSS 
 
 should be scourging inflicted to please the Jewish 
 rulers, and the release afterwards to meet the 
 demands of Roman law and authority. 
 
 It was some considerable time, as we find, before 
 the governor was brought to giv^e up the hope of 
 such a solution. He was surprised when it was not 
 accepted at once. He tried the chief priests, and 
 from them he turned to appeal to the people/ 
 but all in vain. His miserable compromise was 
 rejected with scorn and indignation by both rulers 
 and people. He was taught ultimately that, whatever 
 else he might do with the Prisoner — make sport of 
 Him, buffet Him, scourge Him, as he pleased — 
 nothing would satisfy them but His death upon 
 the cross. His compromise was destined to end as 
 all compromises of the kind always tend to do. 
 
 Pilate's feet were in fact slipping down a steep 
 incline ; and there were the forces behind, which 
 he could not resist, bent on pushing him downward 
 till he should touch the bottom, by giving up a 
 Prisoner whom he declared innocent to a death 
 than which a more awful could not be inflicted 
 even upon the guiltiest, and thereby covering 
 himself with infamy. Or, changing the figure, we 
 might say that, allowing himself to drift from the 
 safe guidance of principle and of duty, he was at 
 
 1 Matt, xxvii. 20. 
 i88 
 
JESVS AGAIX AT PILATE'S JULGMENT BAR 
 
 once on the way to complete moral shipwreck ; and 
 he was all the more swiftly and disastrously borne 
 along that his poor frail bark had such a tempest 
 of popular passion to endure. 
 
 The lesson is plain enough, and hardly any is 
 more frequently set before us. The lives of too 
 many are but a series of wretched compromises 
 with righteousness and duty. Both are generally 
 sacrificed in the end. Many are ready to admit that 
 nothing can be said against Jesus or His religion ; 
 but they will not confess Him, or honestly act 
 up to their own avowals. It is always in these 
 cases irreligion that wins. Let a man dethrone 
 conscience, and refuse to listen seriously to her 
 voice ; let him slight duty, and deny to it its 
 divine character and obligation once and again and 
 again ; other powers than justice, truth, and 
 goodness will then get the mastery over him, take 
 all moral strength out of him, and work out 
 his ruin. Away from the rock of principle there 
 is really no firm footing. Any compromise with 
 justice is always a triumph for injustice, any half- 
 hearted dealing with religion is a victory for the 
 world, any trifling with convictions is a defeat for 
 all that is serious and sacred. 
 
 There is one striking incident at this stage c-f 
 the trial, which deserves our special attention, and 
 189 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 which shows that Pilate was not without warning 
 before announcing his fatal resolution. As he 
 was about to take his place on the judgment seat, 
 and to open for the second time the proceedings of 
 the court, a messenger hurriedly entered and delivered 
 a message to him. The message was from his 
 own wife.^ She had evidently heard of the case 
 going on. In some providential way, of which we 
 have no record, she had come to be deeply 
 interested. It is intelligible that she had learned 
 more even than the governor about Jesus and 
 His wonderful ministry in Galilee and Judea. It 
 is possible that, like some other truly noble 
 Roman ladies, she had become acquainted with 
 the Jewish Scriptures, and that she was even a 
 Jewish proselyte.^ If the wife of one high 
 in Herod's service and household could be reached 
 and touched by the ministry of Jesus,^ it would 
 not be wonderful if the wife even of the Roman 
 procurator had heard enough of the Prophet of 
 Nazareth to have her sympathies moved towards 
 
 ^ The law prohibiting governors from taking their Avives with 
 them when they went to their provinces was not observed from the 
 time of Tiberius. Another incidental proof is thus given of the 
 accuracy of the Gospel records. In Tacitus {Annals, III, 33, 34) 
 we have an interesting report of a discussion in the Senate at Kome 
 on a motion, which was lost, to rene\v the prohibition. 
 
 - The Gospel of Nicodemus represents Pilate's wife as a proselyte. 
 
 •^ Joanna, the wife of Chusa, Herod's SteM^ard. Luke viii. 3. 
 190 
 
JESUS AGAIX AT PILATE'S JUBGMENT BAR 
 
 Him. And if, on inquiring, her servants told her 
 of His appearance before the governor, of His 
 remarkable air of mingled meekness and divine 
 majesty, of His wonderful silence and self-restraint 
 while so many throats were sending forth the 
 most passionate invectives against Him, of His 
 being remitted to Herod, and then of His return 
 to the Praetorium for His final sentence — if she 
 were informed of these things, it is not difficult 
 to understand why she should be very particularily 
 moved about this case, and should hasten to 
 interpose some warning word before any decisive 
 step should be taken. That night, she had 
 had a dream. It had troubled her greatly.^ Jesus 
 had been the central figure of it. He had 
 appeared with an awful holiness of character about 
 Him, so that the guilt of doing to Him an 
 injustice could not but be the greatest possible. 
 Her message to her husband ran in these remarkable 
 words : " Have thou nothing to do with that Just 
 One, for I have suffered many things in a dream 
 because of Him ? " '^ 
 
 Every Christian thanks Claudia Procula (for such, 
 according to tradition, is the name of Pilate's wife) 
 for that message, and admires her for the noble 
 
 1 Matt, xxvii. 19. 
 
 - Matt, xxvii. 19. 
 
 191 
 
FROM THE GAIUJEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 testimony she thus gave to Jesus. She has won a 
 place in the heart of a grateful Christendom that 
 she should thus pay her tribute to the purity, the 
 perfect guiltlessness of Jesus. He is the Just One 
 in her eyes,'^ and the guilt of condemning Him 
 appals her, and makes her tremble, lest it should 
 fall upon her husband. We do not wonder that 
 the Greek Church should have canonized her. 
 
 It is remarkable that, with a solitary exception, 
 her tribute to Jesus ere He was condemned, and 
 the Roman centurion's who said " Truly this was 
 the Son of God," ^ as he saw Him die, should 
 be, so far as we learn from the evangelists, the 
 only tributes paid Him throughout all this eventful 
 day. Jesus was passed from bar to bar, and at 
 length led bound to Calvary, and there was only 
 another voice in addition to those two Gentile 
 voices heard speaking on His behalf. It was 
 that of the penitent thief who, amidst the storm 
 of reviling round Calvary, said, as he turned 
 to his divine fellow-sufferer, " Lord, remember me 
 when Thou comest into Thy kingdom."^ His 
 indeed was a fuller and more striking tribute 
 
 ^ Her words are Mjj^b ao) ku) tu Iix-olIu \ku\m. Whether 
 she recognised in Him anything- supernatural or divine it might he 
 hazardous to say. 
 
 2 Matt, xxvii. 54. 
 
 '^ Luke xxii. 42. 
 
 192 
 
JESUS AGAiy AT VILATE'S JUDGMEyi BAR 
 
 than theirs. It came from him with touching 
 appropriateness as the representative of that large 
 class of the consciously guilt-laden and outcast 
 whose friend and saviour Jesus was, and for whom 
 He had come to die. Two Romans and a 
 robber receiving "the due reward of his deeds" — 
 these the only persons testifying on Jesus' behalf 
 on the day of His trial and woe! 
 
 What the dream of Procula was, we are not 
 told. Poets and painters have laid hold of it as 
 a subject, and wrought it up according to their 
 fancies. Gustave Dore's representation of it is well 
 known. Pilate's wife is seen, with eyes still dazed 
 with sleep, descending the steps of a broad staircase. 
 An angel hovers beside her, seeming to rest upon 
 the marble rail of the staircase, and whispering in 
 her ear the story of the vision she has in her 
 dream. Before her, as the central figure of the 
 wonderful scene on which she looks out, is our 
 Saviour on whom a flood of light is falling. 
 Around Him are the rude soldiery who kneel 
 at His feet, and the evil-eyed priests and rulers 
 cowering and muttering their dismay. In the 
 background are long lines of figures, group 
 behind group, representing the various epochs of 
 the Church's history — the apostles, the early Church 
 Fathers, the Crusaders, the martyrs, crowds of 
 193 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 worshippers of all lands and languages, witnesses 
 to the development and extension of Christianity 
 down to the latest ages. Encompassing or 
 hovering over all is a radiant host of angels, 
 filling the sky ; and above them shines out a 
 starry cross shedding rays of silvery light over the 
 whole scene. 
 
 Thus the painter has represented the dreamer as 
 seeing in vision the future triumphs and glories 
 of the Cross. He has supposed that Procula's 
 dream concerned the future of Jesus, the Just 
 One, who had come to inspire her with a holy 
 awe ; and he has dared to interpret that dream 
 in the light of the history of Christianity. He 
 has painted what, for us at any rate, is not a dream 
 but a most impressive reality. And whatever 
 there was in Procula's dream fitted to warn Pilate 
 to do nothing against the Just One, the history of 
 the religion of Jesus through these past nineteen 
 centuries ought to make on our minds, and on the 
 minds of the most indifferent or most adverse 
 to the Gospel, a still greater and more lasting 
 impression, not only in the way of warning us 
 to do nothing against Jesus, but in the way of 
 encouraging us to faith and devotion, and to doing 
 all we can for His cause and for His glory. 
 
 The subject has fascinated the modern poet 
 194 
 
JESUS AGAIN AT PILATE'S JUDGMENT BAR 
 
 as well as the modern painter. Sir Edwin Arnold 
 nitroduces it in an interesting way in his " Light 
 of the World." He represents Pilate as spending 
 a night in Nazareth, on his way back to Rome 
 where he was to answer for his faults as governor. 
 The place reminds him of the wonderful Prophet 
 who had so long dwelt there, and who only 
 three years before had suffered death at his hands. 
 As they stand on the balcony of the house where 
 they were lodged, talking together and recalling 
 the events of the crucifixion day, Pilate's wife 
 repeats to her husband the story of her dream. 
 She tells how in her dream she saw *' a presence 
 most sweet and most majestical." He wore a 
 crown of thorns, and His hands and feet were 
 pierced. But He looked kingly and even divine ; 
 and she stretched out " eager, quick hands of 
 worship unto Him," and fell upon her knees 
 in reverence and wonder. Jesus spoke to her 
 of His coming cross, and of the curse and 
 shame it would bring to Pilate should he yield 
 to the multitude. As she awoke she heard " the 
 angry roars, as if of hungered beasts," from those 
 clamouring that Jesus should be crucified and 
 Barabbas released. Drawing near her latticed 
 window and looking out she saw the divine 
 Man of her vision, and was so impressed with 
 195 
 
FR02I THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 His bearing before her husband's tribunal that she 
 feh impelled to write him forthwith the message 
 she had sent, warning him not to involve himself 
 in the guilt of this Man's deathJ 
 
 Pilate, no doubt, was troubled by the message 
 that came from his wife. Even the most en- 
 lightened Romans believed somewhat in dreams 
 and in omens,^ and Procula's was no ordinary 
 dream. There was so much in it that accorded 
 with his own vague feelings and impressions 
 in regard to the Prisoner. And why should 
 he not set Jesus at liberty at once to please 
 his wife ? If Herod could abandon himself to 
 the injustice and wickedness of executing John 
 the Baptist to please a base woman whom he had 
 brought to take the place of his wife, would it 
 not have been the most gracious and honourable 
 act Pilate ever did had he, at the earnest request 
 of his wife, given life and liberty to Jesus ? Alas, 
 as the event shows, Pilate did not dare to be his 
 own master in these matters, otherwise he might 
 have done this at once. 
 
 ^ Arnold's Light of the World, pp. Gl — 65. 
 
 •^ Cicero, Nat. iJeorum, 11., LXV., 163. *'Multa cernunt liaru- 
 spices, multa augures provident, multa oraculis declai-antur, multu 
 vaticinationibus, multa somniis, multa portentis, quibus cognitis 
 multae saepe res ex hominum sententia atque utilitate partae, multa 
 etiam pericula depulsa sunt." 
 
JESUS AGAIN AT PILATE'S JUDGMENT BAR 
 
 But his wife's message had at least this effect, 
 that it made him the more anxious to secure 
 Jesus' release. When he found the Jewish rulers 
 would not hear of it, he bethought himself 
 of a custom by which Roman governors had 
 been wont to pay a certain tribute of honour to 
 the most sacred of Jewish observances. It was 
 the custom of releasing a prisoner on the Passover 
 day for whom the people might desire this boon.^ 
 He would take advantage of this custom. Probably 
 he did not think seriously of the imputation of 
 guilt it involv^ed for Jesus. In seeking such a 
 favour for Jesus he should be seeking what was 
 meant only for a notorious criminal. But Pilate 
 was anxious to have done with Jesus' case, and 
 at the same time to be, if possible, guiltless 
 of His blood. He was sanguine the people could be 
 induced to ask for Jesus' release. He turned 
 therefore from the priests and elders before him — 
 "for he knew that for envy they had delivered 
 Him " 2 — to the multitude gathered together in 
 front of the Pavement. Virtually he thereby 
 remitted Jesus from his own bar to that of the 
 Jewish people. At that bar of the populace he 
 
 ^ Matt, xxvii. lo. 
 '^ Matt, xxvii. IS. 
 
 1^7 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 who was the judge abnegated his office and 
 became advocate. He was to find to his humiHa- 
 tion in the end the case decided against him. 
 How he pleaded, and pleaded all in vain, for 
 Him in whom he could find no fault, we shall see 
 plainly enough from the sequel. 
 
JESUS AT THE BAR OF THE PEOPLE. 
 
 It had been the desire and the strategy of the 
 Jewish rulers that Jesus should be tried and con- 
 demned that morning, before the multitude had 
 had time in any considerable numbers to gather. 
 Hence their own hurried procedure, the eager 
 haste with which they went to Pilate, and the 
 clamorous urgency they used to induce him to 
 acquiesce in their sentence. In fact they were 
 afraid of the multitude. They remembered the 
 hosannas with which, a few days before, the 
 temple courts had rung. They could not trust 
 those who had raised them. Nor could they tell 
 how widely feelings in favour of Jesus might be 
 spread. They would rather have avoided an appeal 
 to the popular judgment, being uncertain as to 
 how it might issue.-' Their hope was that, before 
 the multitude had had time to act, the condemnation 
 of Jesus might be secured at the hands both of 
 
 ^ Matt. XX vi. 5. Luke xxii. 2. 
 
 199 
 
FROM THE GAUDEX TO TEE GROSS 
 
 Pilate and of the Sanhedrim, and that His going 
 forth with this double brand of being a malefactor 
 might turn any tide of popular feeling which there 
 might be in His favour. But it was the multitude 
 after all who had the final decision to give in the 
 case of Jesus. They, in the end, were the judges 
 at whose bar Jesus stood, and from which He was 
 dismissed with the sentence passionately shouted 
 out by thousands, " Let Him be crucified." 
 
 Before this popular tribunal, then, took place 
 the final trial of our Lord. The priests had delivered 
 Him to the governor, and the governor remitted 
 Him to the judgment of the populace. Priests 
 and people, rulers and ruled, were all to be involved 
 in the guilt of His death. It was not to be said 
 that His death was merely a judicial blunder, a 
 gross miscarriage of justice. It was to be the 
 crime of the Jewish nation ; nay more, it was to 
 be the crime of the world. Christianity is not an 
 affair merely for official recognition and judgment, 
 whether ecclesiastical or civil. It makes its appeal 
 to every man. Not only so, but the question, 
 " What think ye of Christ ? " is one that must be 
 settled ultimately, not in courts and councils, nor 
 by count of heads and the voices of the mob, but 
 in the judgment hall of every man's heart. 
 
 Recall, then, the scene and circumstances of this 
 200 
 
JUSUS AT THE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 trial. Pilate is sitting in his chair of state on 
 the Pavement in front of the Praetorium. Jesus 
 is before him, clothed in the homely garb of a 
 Galilean peasant. His accusers, the members of 
 the Sanhedrim who had that morning already 
 condemned Him, are around Him. The governor 
 can find no fault in Him, and this he has publicly 
 declared. He is anxious to release, but he is 
 morally weak and irresolute. He is willing to do 
 justice, but only if it should cost him nothing. 
 His wife's dream troubles him, and he is all the 
 more desirous to be rid of his Prisoner on the 
 easiest terms. But those priests and elders before 
 him are not to be easily put off. Nothing but 
 the death of Jesus on the cross will content them. 
 Pilate offers to scourge Him. It is not enough 
 for them. So in his perplexity he turns to the 
 people. 
 
 Round the Pavement the people are crowding. 
 They have been increasing in numbers and in 
 excitement as the news of the trial has spread. 
 They are looking on with intensest interest. They 
 are with difficulty kept back by the Roman spears. 
 As Pilate is soon to learn, they share the mood 
 of their priests and rabbis. As the latter grow 
 more fierce in their accusations, their followers in 
 the crowd become more excited and unrestrained 
 
 N 201 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 in their outcries. The outburst of passionate 
 dissent with which the Jewish fathers receive 
 Pilate's sentence, '' I will chastise Him and let Him 
 go," is caught up, and repeated in greater volume 
 by the multitude. 
 
 For the moment Pilate misinterprets their 
 shouting. He imagines it may have come from 
 friends of the Prisoner, and that it is in His 
 favour. He will take advantage of it, and make 
 his appeal to the multitude. He recollects also 
 that this is the Passover morning, and that his 
 Jewish subjects are expecting to be gratified as 
 usual by the release of a prisoner. "Ye have a 
 custom," he says as he rises from his chair of 
 judgment, and addresses himself to the throng surg- 
 ing in front of him and on either side, " that I 
 should release unto you one at the Passover. Will 
 ye therefore that I release unto you the king of 
 the Jews ? "^ Thus begins the trial of Jesus by 
 the people, in which, before the mob as determining 
 judge, Pilate plays the part, as we shall see, of 
 the half sincere, half-hearted advocate for the 
 Accused, while the Jewish rulers are the insidious, 
 unfaltering, and weighty counsel on the other side. 
 
 The custom to which Pilate refers it is some- 
 what difficult to trace. " General acts of pardon 
 
 1 John xviii. 39. 
 202 
 
JESUS AT THE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 and release," says Rein, "were not seldom granted 
 by the emperors on their accession, ecclesiastical 
 festivals (as for example, the Passover), birthdays, 
 and other joyous occasions."^ But the authority 
 he quotes for this statement is the Theodosian 
 Code which belongs to the first half of the fifth 
 century. It had, however, been the custom for 
 the Romans on Caesar's birthday, or on some 
 other festive occasion, to grant to people of 
 subject provinces such as Judea a gratification 
 of the kind referred to. The Passover was a 
 commemoration of deliverance from bondage. 
 Roman governors had deemed it fitting and politic, 
 it would appear, by the release of a prisoner 
 whom the people might choose, to pay their 
 tribute to the great Jewish festival. It is a custom 
 which has been often observed in more modern 
 times, as when a new ruler like the Czar of 
 Russia ascends the throne, and he chooses to give 
 a proof of his benignity by opening the prison 
 doors to a certain number who have been confined 
 within them. In an enlightened and well ordered 
 country where the law is, as it ought to be, placed 
 beyond the arbitrary handling of the sovereign 
 such a custom is hardly to be expected. The 
 ruler has no more title to open the prison doors 
 
 ^ Rein, Crhninalrecht der Romer, p. 272. 
 203 
 
FROM THE GABDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 to anyone, unless in exceptional circumstances 
 where the prerogative of mercy may be called for, 
 than the humblest subject of his realm. He is 
 on the throne to execute the law, not to annul 
 it at his pleasure. Moses certainly had never 
 contemplated such a custom, least of all that a 
 man guilty of sedition and murder should get the 
 benefit of it.-^ 
 
 At the same time one can understand how in a 
 conquered country like Judea, suffering under the 
 oppression of a foreign tyranny, such a custom 
 might sometimes be a real boon. Seldom would 
 the prisons of Jerusalem be without Jews whose 
 greatest fault was that they dared to denounce 
 and to resist the tyranny of Rome. It was some 
 satisfaction that the people had it in their power, 
 even once a year, to demand the liberty of one 
 such political offender. The custom would have 
 been honoured, as it never had been, had the 
 people on this occasion demanded the release of 
 Jesus.^ 
 
 ^ Baring Gould {Trials of Jesus, p. 71) says that at the Passover 
 the Jews M^ere wont, during the Maccabean period, to bring criminals 
 out of prison, some to be executed, others released. But his authority 
 [Pesachim, XOI., 1) has a doubtful reading, and we have failed to 
 find anything in the Talmud to justify the statement. 
 
 - Winer [Realwortcrbuch, vol. II. 202) says that the practice 
 originated with the early procurators of Judea adopting a pagan 
 custom, and applying it to the festivities of the Jewish Passover. 
 There is, however, some difficulty in tracing this custom. It was 
 not Mosaic in its origin. Livy (V. 14) refers to a time of great 
 204 
 
JESUS AT TEE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 Yet, whether Pilate knew it or not, he was 
 insulting Jesus by proposing that He should have 
 the benefit of such a custom. It was for condemned 
 criminals. It was no favour for the governor to 
 release innocent men — it was an act of justice. 
 To propose that Jesus should be released in 
 accordance with the custom of the feast was really 
 to imply that He was guilty. It was to put on 
 Him the brand of the transgressor, and then to 
 let Him go free. Then Pilate proposed to do this 
 to one in whom he declared he could find 
 no fault. It was an outrage upon justice and 
 consistency. And to ask the mob that he might 
 be allowed to release Him, as if He were some 
 deeply- dyed, blood-stained criminal whose fate, 
 notwithstanding His crimes, might call forth their 
 compassion, was for the governor to exhibit his 
 own weakness, to degrade his office, and to put 
 his prisoner to open shame. 
 
 But the proposal was of a piece with that other 
 which Pilate had before made to the Jewish rulers, 
 " I will chastise Him and let Him go." ^ It was 
 
 distress when, among other things done to appease the anger of 
 the gods, prisoners were freed from their chains. Josephus cites one 
 instance {Antiq., XX., IX. 5) when Alhinus, a Eoman governor of 
 Judea, a successor of Pihite, opened the prison doors to a numher of 
 minor offenders, in order to please the Jews. But the fact of the 
 custom as stated by the evangelists there is really no reason for 
 calling in question. 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 22. 
 
 20q 
 
FR02I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 a discreditable compromise, destined like that other 
 to end in failure, and to add rather to the 
 shame and suffering of the Prisoner. Pilate could 
 not treat Jesus as a convicted criminal, plead for 
 His release on that ground before the multitude, 
 and then expect that he could save Him from 
 the cross. Ask the world's indulgence for Jesus, 
 while you allow its aspersions and accusations 
 against Him to pass without answer or rebuke ; 
 it will laugh you to scorn, and crucify Him all 
 the same. And if you suffer Jesus to be so 
 treated in your own mind ; if you are not con- 
 cerned about the upholding of His honour, and 
 of His claims on heart and conscience ; if you 
 attempt to compromise matters regarding Him, 
 and treat Him as if it were a charity to let Him 
 alone and not to bring positive injury and disgrace 
 upon His cause — if that is your mood and attitude 
 you will find that you have to reckon with forces 
 of evil in yourself which, like the passions of the 
 Jerusalem mob, will carry you farther and farther 
 till there is a Calvary for Jesus within your own 
 soul. 
 
 It must be admitted, however, that Pilate 
 
 meant well by his appeal to the multitude before 
 
 him. He believed the people would favour Jesus. 
 
 He knew that for envy the chief priests had 
 
 206 
 
Ji:SUS AT TEE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 delivered Him into his hands.^ He thought he 
 understood human nature. It seemed to him that the 
 reason why the priests and rabbis were so bitter 
 against Jesus was simply that Jesus had a growing- 
 influence among the people of which they were 
 jealous. It seemed to him that they were afraid 
 that, as the popularity of the Prophet of Nazareth 
 increased and spread, their own influence would 
 decline. Nor was Pilate doing them any injustice 
 in attributing to them such feelings and fears. 
 Only a few days before they had been saying one 
 to another, " Perceive ye how ye prevail nothing ; 
 behold, the world is gone after him." ^ He had 
 the hope, therefore, that in Jesus' case he might 
 be able to foil the priests by using the people 
 against them. If the people could only be induced 
 to ask for the release of Jesus, he would be able 
 to rid himself of his unpleasant responsibility on 
 easy terms, and have the peculiarly agreeable 
 satisfaction of a triumph over those Jewish rulers 
 with whom indeed he had a standing feud. 
 
 This attempt to win the people against the 
 priests was made, as we see, with wonderful 
 adroitness. First the governor speaks the people 
 fair. He begins by offering, before they have 
 
 1 Mark XV. 10. 
 
 - John xii. 19. 
 
 207 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 asked, the usual Passover favour. He reminds 
 them of their custom. He assures them of his 
 vviUingness to comply with it. They shall have a 
 prisoner released to them whom they may desire. 
 But he will guide them in their choice. Shall it 
 not be Jesus, the King of the Jews ? ^ His words 
 are astutely chosen. He calls Jesus by the 
 name best fitted to touch their patriotic feeUngs. 
 He is a Roman, and may be presumed to be 
 jealously watchful of Caesar's honour and interests. 
 But he will play the magnanimous part. He will not 
 call in question the kingly claims of Jesus. He 
 will show his regard for their national feelings and 
 hopes. He is willing to do them the pleasure, 
 that he will set this Jesus at liberty ; he will let 
 them have their king that they may do with 
 Him as they please. 
 
 When was Roman governor so condescending and 
 so gracious towards a Jewish multitude ? He be- 
 lieves himself to be doing an act which was a special 
 tribute to Jewish feeling, to Jewish nationality ; 
 and even had Jesus been a false Christ it could justly 
 be so construed. Could he imagine that it would 
 not be reciprocated, or that his offer would be 
 rejected with scorn ? It would not have been 
 wonderful if he had cherished just a little fear 
 
 * John xviii. 39. 
 208 
 
JESUS AT THE BAR OF THE FEOPLE 
 
 that it would be only too promptly accepted. 
 He might have anticipated that with this Jesus 
 restored to the people, and the people gathering 
 round about Him as, in some sense still mysterious 
 to Pilate, their king, there might be new and 
 unforeseen troubles to the Roman government in 
 the land. 
 
 But the shouting that came back in response 
 surprised him.^ It revealed at once that Jesus 
 and His kingly claims were not in the favour 
 he had supposed. It revealed at once that some 
 skill and tact would be needed to persuade that 
 multitude, if Jesus was to be released. The 
 governor was not wanting in these qualities, and 
 he made all the use of them he could in the 
 circumstances. 
 
 Foiled in the direct appeal he made at the 
 outset in favour of Jesus, Pilate forthwith tried 
 another. He suggested an alternative of two 
 names to the people,^ putting before them that 
 of the most notorious criminal he could at the 
 moment recall along with that of Jesus. The 
 alternative was so cleverly framed that one would 
 have thought there could be no doubt of the 
 choice that would be made. He selected from 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 18. 
 
 2 Matt, xxvii. 17. 
 
 209 
 
FR02I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 those who were then lying in the dungeons of 
 Jerusalem the criminal with the worst record, a 
 man named Barabbas, "who for a certain sedition 
 made in the city, and for murder "^ had been 
 cast into prison. He gave the people to understand 
 that their choice must lie between this worst 
 of men in Jerusalem and Jesus. Then, with the 
 view of making a deeper impression upon the 
 people, Pilate ordered the man to be brought 
 forth from his cell, and placed side by side with 
 Jesus on the Gabbatha.^ 
 
 There was some delay before the wretched man 
 appeared. The time was diligently employed by 
 the chief priests and elders. They and their 
 following were busy among the people, " persuading 
 them that they should ask Barabbas and destroy 
 Jesus."^ Their instructive propaganda succeeded 
 only too well. But had not many in that crowd 
 been indulging only a little before in insulting 
 and making sport of Jesus in the streets, as they 
 came back with Him from Herod? And through 
 all the trial, of which they were keenly in- 
 terested spectators, the multitude had never given 
 a single expression of feeling in favour of the 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 19. 
 
 -Matt, xxvii. 21. "The twain," so that in all probability the 
 two were side by side. 
 3 Matt, xxvii. 20. 
 
 210 
 
JBSUS AT TEE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 Prisoner. Now that they had to choose between 
 following Pilate and following their priests it was 
 only too easy to induce them to do the latter. 
 So by the time Barabbas appeared the people 
 were prepared to give Pilate such an answer as 
 might well have appalled him.^ 
 
 What a sight those two, Barabbas and Jesus 
 standing side by side in presence of the multitude ! ^ 
 Barabbas is fresh from the dungeon. He still 
 wears his chains. The rags with which he is 
 covered, his lean and haggard looks tell of the 
 misery and neglect in which he has long lain. 
 He bears the marks of crime, and has the air of 
 one who is still defiant under the ban of society. 
 He knows the priests would gather up their 
 garments in proud disdain if he should come 
 near them, and as for the people he cannot 
 imagine that they should ask for his life. He 
 stands in bewilderment before them. Can it be 
 
 I There Avas a Barabbas who was leader of the insurrection which 
 Pilate caused in Samaria by his attempt to plant the Roman eagles 
 on Mount Gerizim. "Whether he is the same with the Barabbas of 
 Gospel histoiy it is impossible to say. To asli for the release of such 
 a fanatical upholder of Judaism, however agreeable it may have been 
 to the Jewish populace, must have been a peculiarly bold action on 
 their part. Had he been the person whose release was desired we 
 would most probably have heard more of the governor's unwillingness 
 to comply, and it is unlikely that the governor would have brought 
 forward his name (Josephus, Antiq., XVIII., IV.) 
 
 - Ewald {Hist. Israel, VI., 436) says that Barabbas' name was also 
 Jesus, and that he was the son of a rabbi, but Tischendoii rejects 
 this view. 
 
 211 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 that he has been brought forth only to be cruelly 
 tantalised with the hope of freedom, and then 
 ordered back amidst the jeers and curses of the 
 mob to his dungeon and his deserved doom ? And 
 who is this Prisoner to whom it is just possible 
 he may be preferred — one so calm and silent 
 while all around are excited, so dignified and 
 wearing an aspect so unworldly, so divine ? 
 
 Was there ever such a striking contrast presented ? 
 Pilate himself is impressed by it, and believes that 
 it cannot be without effect upon the multitude. 
 For the moment, as he looks upon the spectacle, 
 he congratulates himself upon the happy thought 
 that suggested to his mind the placing of it before 
 them. He cannot imagine any hesitancy in choosing 
 between the two, the deeply-stained, repulsive- 
 looking malefactor and the Prisoner in whom he 
 can find no fault.^ He rises from his chair, and 
 pointing to the two as they stand side by side 
 before him he asks, "Whom will ye that I release 
 unto you ? Barabbas, or Jesus which is called 
 Christ ?" ^ But there is no hesitancy, and there is no 
 divided opinion among the multitude. There is a 
 unanimous outcry rending the air, staggering to 
 
 ^ According to Weizacker, Pilate proposed the liberation of 
 Jesus that he might not be compelled to free Barabbas. Quoted in 
 Weiss, Life of Christ, III., 354. 
 
 2 Matt, xxvii. 17. 
 
 212 
 
JESUS AT THE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 Pilate, instructive to all ages, '' Away with this 
 man, and release unto us Barabbas." ^ 
 
 Pilate can hardly beUeve his ears. He tries to 
 reason with the multitude. He is but pouring 
 oil upon the blazing fire. " What will ye, then, 
 that I shall do unto Him whom ye call the King 
 of the Jews ?"^ And the answer comes unhesitatingly 
 from the assembled thousands, " Crucify Him. " ^ 
 Yet again he reasons and expostulates with them, 
 " Why, what evil hath He done ? " '* If the Roman 
 oppressor could not find guilt in Him, what possible 
 charges could His own countrymen have against 
 Him? But the mob is not there to listen to reason. 
 It is content to make shouting do duty for argument. 
 " Crucify Him " is the reply, and it is delivered 
 with such passionate force that the bewilderment 
 of the governor is greater than ever. And when 
 he asks a second and even a third ^ time, " Will 
 ye that I release unto you the King of the 
 Jews ? " and pleads with them to be content with 
 His being chastised — joining in so fierce an out 
 burst as to make any further reasoning vain, they 
 all cry again, "Not this man but Barabbas."® 
 
 1 Luke xxiii. 18. 
 
 2 Mark xv. 12. 
 •^ Mark. xv. 13. 
 4 Murk XV. 14. 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 22. 
 6 Johnxviii. 39, 40. 
 
 213 
 
FROM THE GABDEK TO THE CROSS 
 
 As Luther forcibly expresses it, '' They would 
 sooner have asked for the release of the devil 
 than that God's Son should escape." 
 
 Thus far Pilate's appeal to the multitude only 
 ends in bringing fresh humiliation upon Jesus. It 
 was humbling that appeals on His behalf, even 
 from such a man as Pilate, should be treated so 
 scornfully. It was humbling that a Barabbas should 
 be preferred to Him, that the people would sooner 
 release the worst criminal in the land than they 
 would release Him, that He should be so unblushingly 
 numbered with transgressors, that scourging even 
 should not be thought enough for Him, and that 
 He should be held so vile as to be given over by 
 the unanimous voice of the multitude to be 
 crucified. 
 
 It was as painful as it was humbling. It 
 must have given Him sharper agony than the 
 nails that pierced His hands and His feet on the 
 cross. It had in it that sharpest sting of all, the 
 sting of deep ingratitude. Had not Jesus made 
 Himself one of the people, stooping to their 
 condition and their lot of toil ? What a life of 
 singular excellence He had lived ! What a glory 
 He had brought on the land, on Bethlehem 
 and Nazareth, on despised Galilee and Judea, on 
 Cana and Jericho, on Nain and Bethany, on 
 214 
 
JESUS AT THE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 Capernaum and Jerusalem ! What miracles He had 
 wrought ! Could there be a crowd gathered in 
 Jerusalem in which there were not some He had 
 healed ? Where were the lepers He had cleansed ? 
 Where was the blind man who had received his 
 sight after washing in the pool of Siloam ? Was 
 not Malchus there whose ear He had restored, 
 even in the hour when He was seized in the 
 garden ? Was not Bartimaeus, who had followed 
 Him from Jericho, and who could make his voice 
 heard above the din of a multitude ? 
 
 Then, was it true that the common people heard 
 Him gladly when He preached ? Where now 
 were the grateful hearers ? How true it was 
 that whenever the spiritual was uppermost and 
 not the temporal, the masses were no longer 
 with Jesus. It was the Gospel of loaves the}- 
 wanted. Never had there been such a prophet, 
 never such a ministry in Israel ; and this was 
 the people's response to it all — " Not this man, 
 but Barabbas ! " Ingratitude has written many 
 a shameful page in human history, but never a 
 darker or more disgraceful than this. They tell 
 us, sometimes, that it is a grand principle to trust 
 the people, and that the vox popiili is the vox 
 Dei. But what people, we would ask ? A people 
 priest-ridden, and in their hours of unreasoning 
 215 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 passion and infatuation, like the multitude that 
 chose Barabbas and designed a cross for Jesus ? 
 No, we must trust or follow unquestioningly neither 
 the masses nor the classes, neither democracy as 
 represented in that mob, nor aristocracy and 
 learning as represented in those priests and rabbis ; 
 but we must think for ourselves, engage in our 
 own search for truth and principle, and trust 
 only and at all times in God. 
 
 Side by side, Uke Jesus and Barabbas before 
 Pilate and the multitude, are placed for us in 
 this world truth and falsehood, faith and unbelief, 
 innocence and purity, the kingdom of evil and 
 the kingdom of God. What is the choice the 
 multitude are making ? Why should it be so 
 much easier to persuade them to unbelief than to 
 the grateful acceptance of the faith ? Why so 
 much easier to delude them with errors and 
 falsehoods than to convince them of the truth ? 
 Why should men be so ready to believe anything 
 faulty about Jesus Christ and Christianity, and be 
 so credulous about the Barabbas that would rob 
 them of their only hope and Saviour? It is 
 human nature, we admit, but it is fallen and 
 unregenerate human nature. The enmity to Jesus 
 is native to the human heart, and abides till it 
 is slain by His cross. There is small hope of 
 216 
 
JESXrS AT THE BAR OF TEE PEOPLE 
 
 anyone making the right choice, who does not 
 carry the matter away from the distracting cries 
 and misleading influences of the multitude into 
 the presence of God, and the quiet sanctuary of 
 his own mind and heart, and seek very earnestly 
 with divine help to have it determined there. 
 
 But let the world choose its Barabbas if it will, 
 it may be assured of this, that though he may 
 have the voices still of the great mass of mankind 
 in his favour he will never be its Saviour. Mone3% 
 force, sedition, murder, anarchism, not any of 
 these means or disguises which Barabbas may use — 
 neither the compulsion of the law, violent revo- 
 lution, nor daredevilism of any kind, will ever avail 
 to bring about the world's redemption. Jesus' 
 programme of spiritual reform and salvation by 
 His atoning and regenerating work is the only 
 one that is at once reasonable and ever likely to 
 succeed. Change men's hearts, and set them in 
 new and harmonious relations with God ; thus 
 onty can you hope for a redeemed world. 
 
 What the feelings of Barabbas were when he 
 was released we do not know. It must have been 
 the greatest and the most agreeable surprise to 
 him. Probably he thought there was not a prisoner 
 in any of the dungeons of Jerusalem who had a 
 smaller chance of life and liberty. Murderers are 
 
 Q 217 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 not popular usually ; and Barabbas was one whose 
 hands were terribly stained with blood. Probably 
 the one redeeming feature in his character in the 
 eyes of the Jewish people was that he had been 
 involved in some uprising against the Roman 
 government. But what recommended him most 
 to the mob at this time was that he was the 
 worst and most abandoned criminal they could 
 think of, and that to prefer him to Jesus was 
 to give the greatest sting to the insults they 
 were in the mood to pour forth upon Jesus. 
 
 However it may have been, Barabbas owed his 
 life to Jesus. That is a touching fact, not without 
 deep significance. The worst man in Jerusalem 
 owed his life to the best. Jesus received the 
 scourging and the sufferings of the cross which 
 should have fallen upon Barabbas. But for Jesus, 
 Barabbas would have been dragged forth from his 
 prison to the most cruel and ignominious death 
 a criminal could endure ; and the people might 
 have rejoiced rather, and have breathed more 
 freely that they were rid of one who was a blot 
 and a terror to society. Instead, however, of 
 coming forth from his prison amid the execrations, 
 he comes forth amid the cheers and the enthusiasm 
 of the mob. He is made to feel, in the wonderful 
 upturn of things, as if he had become in some 
 2i8 
 
JESUS AT THE BAR OF THE PEOPLE 
 
 inexplicable way the hero of the day, instead of 
 being a candidate for the gallows, a victim 
 destined for the cross. 
 
 Is there not an acted parable here ? Have we 
 not here a striking illustration of our own case 
 as guilty sinners in the sight of God ? Jesus has 
 borne the stripes which should have fallen on 
 ourselves. He has endured for us the cross, 
 despising its shame. This makes it possible for 
 the ■ prison door to be opened to us, laden with 
 guilt though we are, worse before the pure eye 
 of God than any Barabbas could be in the 
 eye of the world. The freedom, the favour, the 
 honour and blessedness that belong to innocence 
 are imparted to the guilty trusting in Jesus. And 
 in one important respect their case is better than 
 that of Barabbas, for, through their Lord who died 
 for them, they are delivered, not merely from the 
 punishment their sins deserve, but by His cleansing 
 blood from the power and defilement of the sins 
 themselves. 
 
 What Barabbas' future was, we cannot tell. We 
 have nothing further on record regarding him. 
 We should like if we could think of him as having 
 bestowed more than a passing thought on Jesus, 
 whose appearance at Pilate's bar so signally brought 
 about his deliverance. It would be pleasing to know 
 219 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 that the death of Jesus had been to him new 
 spiritual Ufe as well as bodily deliverance. We can, 
 so far, sympathise with the modern novelist ^ who 
 makes of him a hero, an interested and sympathetic 
 witness of the sufferings of the divine Man who 
 died for him, one of the first to come to the 
 grave with Mary Magdalene and others on the 
 morning of the third day, an earnest enquirer into 
 the truth as it is in Jesus, and by-and-by a 
 confirmed and ardent believer, going back after a 
 while to his dungeon in Jerusalem because he had 
 been wrongfully delivered, and finding there a way 
 by death into the paradise of his Lord. We are 
 willing enough that these things should be true 
 of the historic Barabbas after his release ; but whether 
 they are or not we have no means of knowing. 
 It is for us, however, to see to it that His bearing 
 the cross is a true release and a true salvation 
 to ourselves, and, as those who feel that the 
 greatest deliverance has been brought to them, 
 that we avow our faith, and show our gratitude 
 and devotion to Him by whom it has been so 
 dearly won. 
 
 ^ Marie Corelli in her popular work of fiction entitled Barabbas, 
 220 
 
PILATE WASHES HIS HANDS BEFORE 
 THE MULTITUDE. 
 
 The governor was in evil case. He had referred 
 his Prisoner to the judgment of the multitude. 
 He had virtually laid down his office as judge 
 and made himself advocate. He had, however, 
 utterly failed in his pleading. Judgment had gone 
 contrary to his wishes and his hopes. And every 
 attempt he made to dispute the judgment, every 
 plea he put forth, every word for Jesus he spoke 
 was received with a fresh burst of contempt and 
 fury on the part of the mob. The priests had 
 indeed persuaded the people. If Pilate talked of 
 release, then anyone might be released, Barabbas or 
 any other vile criminal, but not Jesus. If he 
 appealed to them on behalf of his Prisoner 
 whether on the ground of patriotism or justice or 
 humanity, he was answered only by shouting 
 which grew the more fierce the longer he delayed 
 to do as they required. 
 
 221 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing.^ The 
 scene before him probably recalled to him another 
 he had witnessed once in Caesarea soon after he had 
 entered upon his procuratorship. He had dared 
 to allow some Roman legions to enter Jerusalem 
 carrying their heathen military standards with them. 
 It is well known what regard, what ardent devotion 
 soldiers have to their colours. Wherever the 
 regiment marches they are carried. They are in 
 the forefront of every battle. They are the last 
 things a regiment would think of parting with. 
 Many a heroic tale can be told of soldiers 
 preferring to give up their lives rather than their 
 standards. It was the same with Roman soldiers 
 as with our own. And it seemed hard to them 
 that they could not take their colours with 
 them into Jerusalem as well as into the capital 
 of any other province that their own arms had 
 conquered. But the Roman standards consisted 
 of what to a Jew were idolatrous images. It 
 was regarded as a defilement of the holy city to 
 have those Roman eagles and those busts of the 
 emperor, of which the standards consisted, within 
 its sacred walls.^ 
 
 ^ Matt, xxvii. 24. 
 
 2 Even in their coins the Jews showed their antipathy to images. 
 Those issued by Herod the Great and Archelaus had none upon them, 
 neither of gods nor men. The Roman procurators succeeding them 
 
 222 
 
PILATE IVASILBS HIS HAXBS 
 
 The excitement over the matter was intense. A 
 multitude of the citizens went down to Caesarea. 
 For five days and five nights they besieged him in 
 his palace, assailing his ears continually with the 
 same cries that the standards might be removed. 
 On tlie sixth day he had them all gathered together 
 in the circus. There they made their outcries more 
 loudly and defiantly than ever. The soldiers 
 whom he had in readiness he ordered to enter, 
 with their drawn swords, the arena where the 
 Jews were crowded. Still they continued their 
 shouting. Their law was dearer to them than 
 their lives. They laid bare their throats, and 
 knelt down to receive the strokes of the sword 
 with which they were threatened. Pilate had to 
 make his choice between a wholesale massacre 
 and a humiliating surrender. Dreading what 
 might be the effect of the former, should it come 
 to the ears of Caesar, he preferred the latter. 
 The Roman legions, had thereafter to do without 
 their standards when on duty in the holy city.^ 
 
 Now such a scene as that at Caesarea threatened 
 to repeat itself before the Praetorium on this 
 
 put upon their Judean coins such harmless figures as palms and lilies, 
 •and onl)- the name of tlie reigning Caesar, The ordinary lloman 
 coins had, of course, Caesar's image as well as superscription (Mad- 
 den's Jewish Coinage, pp. 135-153). 
 1 Josephus, B L, II., IX., 2. 
 
 223 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE GROSS 
 
 occasion. Here again Jewish fanaticism was at 
 the boiHng point, and behind it the pertinacity 
 which could go to any extreme to gain its ends. 
 What could Pilate do? He had divested himself 
 of his judgeship. He had given over his Prisoner 
 virtually to the disposal of the mob. He had 
 even lent himself so far to the side condemning 
 Jesus as to say that he would chastise Him. 
 The mob were ready to take every advantage 
 and concession he would give them. They were 
 most willing to take his power and office out 
 of his hands, and to use both against his 
 own feeble and half-hearted protests and his 
 infirm purposes. The popular torrent swiftly rose 
 to flood, and threatened to sweep away the 
 irresolute governor. While he was protesting, 
 "Why crucify him .^ what evil hath He done.^ I 
 have examined Him and I find no fault in Him," 
 the governor was to be seen pitiably yielding to 
 the mad current of the hour. While they were 
 instant with loud voices requiring that He should 
 be crucified, his own voice became lost in the 
 uproar.^ It became in vain to speak, and still 
 more so to reason. 
 
 Pilate was not the man to brave the flood. 
 With him justice was a very good thing if it 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 23. 
 224 
 
rilATK WAiiHElS HIS EAyUS 
 
 could be had for nothing. But here to do right 
 was to face and fight out all that fanatical 
 opposition. Who could tell how many lives that 
 might cost, and what results it might have for 
 the governor himself? Were a hundred lives to 
 be sacrificed for this one ? And what was this 
 one life ? That of a poor Jew about whom, as 
 it seemed to him, the most diverse opinions were 
 held, and who might be forgotten and dismissed 
 from men's thoughts in a few days after His death. 
 Pilate hated tumults. He had had enough of 
 them already in his procuratorship of Judea.^ So 
 then, "wilHng to content the people,^ he gave 
 sentence that it should be as they required, and 
 he released unto them him that for sedition and 
 murder was cast into prison whom they , had 
 desired ; but he delivered Jesus to their will." ® 
 
 But while he did so, Pilate made yet another 
 appeal to the people. Not in words was it made 
 but in acted form. Words in the tumult prevailing 
 would have been thrown away. A symbolic act, 
 
 ^ Josephus {£.!., II., IX. 1, 2, 3) inentious three of these 
 tumults out of which Pilate had on each occasion come badly. 
 Writing of Pilate's conduct in the tumult about the shields, Philo 
 {Leyatio ad C'auim, p. 38) says, " He \vus afraid that if they should 
 send an embassj^ they might discuss the many maladministrations of 
 his government, his extortions, his unjust decrees, his inhuman 
 punishments. This reduced him to the utmost perplexity." 
 
 ^ Mark xv. ]o. 
 
 ^ Luke xxiii. 24 25. 
 
 22; 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 however, could speak to the eyes of all ; and it 
 was such an act — one which was intelligible alike 
 to Jew and Roman, and one which could not but 
 rivet the attention of all beholders— that Pilate 
 chose now to perform. The act, it is said, is 
 more Jewish than heathen in origin, but there are 
 traces of the custom among the Gentiles as well. 
 If a crime was done, a murder committed, blood- 
 guiltiness incurred, which there was difficulty in 
 discovering, it was a custom among the ancients 
 for those who wished publicly to protest their 
 innocence to take water and wash their hands.^ 
 
 Moses had ordained a similar custom. When a 
 man was found dead in a field, and it was not 
 known who had slain him, then the elders of the 
 nearest city were to meet with the priests and 
 the people ; and over the beheaded body of a 
 heifer they were to wash their hands, and to say, 
 "Our hands have not shed this man's blood, 
 neither have our eyes seen it.'' ^ 
 
 Thus the act Pilate chose now to perform 
 appealed alike to Gentile and to Jew. While the 
 storm and tumult that made speech vain were 
 prevailing, the governor, seated on his chair 
 of state, beckoned to one of the officers in 
 
 ^ Sophocles, AJax G54 ; Virgil, ^neid II, 719. 
 2 Deut. xsi. 7. 
 
 226 
 
PILATE IF ASHES HIS HANDS 
 
 attendance upon him. The attendant caught up 
 at once the whispered instructions of his master, 
 and left to fulfil them. He returned bearing a 
 vessel, doubtless richly gilt, filled with pure and 
 clear water. The governor, rising from his bema^ 
 and flinging back his magnificent flowing robes of 
 office, advanced in face of the populace, and put 
 his richly jewelled hands into the basin which the 
 attendant held out to him. The act and movement 
 of the governor struck all beholders. The clamour 
 for the time ceased. Every eye was turned to 
 Pilate. They watched him dipping and washing 
 his hands in the vessel, and then raising them 
 and shaking off" the glittering drops of water. 
 Amidst the silence which the action for the time 
 commanded they could hear him saying, by way 
 of interpreting what he had done, "I am innocent 
 of the blood of this just person ; see ye to it.'' ^ 
 At once the expression, "blood of this man," 
 was caught up. The people seemed to have far 
 less hesitancy and far less fear as to the guilt of 
 shedding Jesus' blood than Pilate himself. They 
 were in fact in a state of frenzy. They were 
 at this time bent upon victory in their cause as 
 against Pilate at whatever cost. Moral scruples did 
 
 1 Matt, xxvii 24. 
 227 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 not stand in their way. The passion of the hour 
 was proof against all appeals. Under its influence 
 they were absolutely scornful of all threatenings 
 and of all fears. It was a frightful climax which 
 they reached when they followed up their infatuated 
 outcry, " Let Him be crucified," by daring to 
 challenge heaven to send any issue it pleased for 
 their putting to death this Jesus, this Just One. 
 " We will see to it, Pilate. We will have this 
 man's blood. We will take the consequences for 
 ourselves and for our children coming after us." 
 Then answered all the people and said, " His 
 blood be on us and on our children."^ 
 
 Little did they know what those consequences 
 were to be. They knew not that while they 
 were that day calling for a cross for this Jesus, 
 they were actually decreeing crosses for hundreds 
 of thousands of their children even in the next 
 generation, and preparing the saddest future for 
 their race and nation in their being scattered and 
 despised for ages.^ His blood is still on them, and 
 
 ^ Matt, xxvii. 25. 
 
 - Thus Josephus {B.I., V., XI., 1) writing of tlie multitude of 
 captives taken at the siege of Jerusalem and of the cruel fate prepared 
 for them says, " They were lirst whipped and tormented with all sorts 
 of torture, and then crucified before the walls of the city, 'ilie soldiers, 
 out of the wrath and hatred they bore the Jews, nailed those they 
 caught one after one way, another after another, to crosses, by way 
 of jest, when their multitude was so great that room was wanting for 
 the crosses, and crosses wanting for the bodies. This miserable pro- 
 cedure made Titus greatly pitv them." 
 228 
 
PILATE W ASHES HTS HANDS 
 
 will be on them for condemnation and suffering 
 till they see in Him the Christ of their hope, 
 and turn in penitence to find their salvation in 
 the cross they gave Him. 
 
 But if Pilate's handwashing before the multitude 
 was a fruitless appeal, it was also an empty and 
 hypocritical formality. Pilate might wash his 
 hands before the multitude, but he could not 
 thus free himself from the responsibility of 
 Jesus' death. ^ The people of Jerusalem and all 
 the world would have known there was reality, 
 and not merely idle form, in Pilate's symbolic 
 act, had he manfulty tal^en up the cause of his 
 Prisoner, and stood between Him and the mob 
 thirsting for His blood ; had he ordered his soldiers 
 to be a guard of honour and defence around 
 Jesus ; had he given the people to understand 
 that all the power and authority of Rome which 
 might be at his service would be used to prevent 
 them carrying out any sentence against Him. 
 But when Pilate did nothing after washing his 
 hands beyond speaking weak words ; when he 
 made his base surrender to the mob ; when he 
 
 ^ The words of Ovid (Fasti, II., 46), a poet of his own race, and 
 about his own time, Pilate might have found peculiarly appropriate 
 to himself : — 
 
 Ah ! nimium faciles, qui tristia crimina caedis 
 
 Fluminea tolli posse putetis aqua. 
 
 22Q 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 gave up the just person, the man Christ Jesus, 
 
 in whom he could find no fault, to be scourged 
 
 and then crucified ; when he even allowed and 
 
 commanded his soldiers to do the scourging, 
 
 accompanied as it was with other tortures and 
 
 insults, and to prepare the cross and to see Him 
 
 die thereon — when he did these things his washing 
 
 of his hands became the greatest act of mockery, 
 
 and the guilt of Jesus' death he made his own 
 
 so that no waters on earth could ever cleanse the 
 
 stain of it from his soul. Had there been in Pilate 
 
 a soul that could have been stirred by a keen 
 
 sense of sin, he might, on looking upon his hands, 
 
 have made his own the words put into the mouth 
 
 of Macbeth after his murderous deed ; — 
 
 What hands are here ? Ha ! they pluck out mine eyes. 
 Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood 
 Clean from my hand ? No, this my hand will rather 
 The multitudinous seas incarnadine, 
 Making the green one red.^ 
 
 The poet represents Pilate saying to his wife 
 
 some years after as he recalled the events of this 
 
 momentous day : — 
 
 I could not wash 
 My conscience clean. The water, to my eyes, 
 Ran foul and grimy to the golden bowl 
 From each palm, vninly laved. So did He pass 
 To lofty death, and I to life defamed. ^ 
 
 1 Macbeth, Act II., Scene II. 
 
 2 Sir Edwin Arnold's Eif//tt of the World, p. 69. 
 
 230 
 
PILATE WASHES HIS HANDS 
 
 Here, indeed, is reason for our deepest self- 
 abasement and contrition. The blood of Jesus is 
 on us. The guilt of its being shed is ours. 
 Our sin-laden and condemned state gave Him His 
 burden and condemnation. Our sins brought Him 
 to the tree, and wrought for Him there all His 
 shame and agony. We dare not, and it avails 
 for us nothing to do as Pilate did — wash our 
 hands and declare our innocency. Yet in that 
 very blood that is on us is all our hope. Here 
 is cleansing such as the laver in which Pilate 
 washed his hands could not give. This blood, 
 which would otherwise stain and condemn for ever, 
 faith turns into the thing that cleanses and 
 everlastingly saves every truly penitent soul. 
 
 But further, while Pilate's symbolic act might 
 be a fruitless appeal and an empty formahty it 
 afforded a very striking testimony to the inno- 
 cence of Jesus. He was a just person. His death 
 would, in the governor's view, involve blood- 
 guiltiness from which he for his part wished to 
 be free. Yet why should he be so concerned on 
 this point } Every day, probably, cases of persons 
 tried and condemned by the courts of the land 
 were coming before him for review and confirmation. 
 How often such cases were passed with small 
 consideration of whether the accused were guilty 
 231 
 
FROM THE GABDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 or not. And the Prisoner in this case was the 
 lowly Nazarene. There was none to plead His 
 cause. There He was before him and the multitude, 
 in mute dignity seeming to refuse to plead for 
 Himself. If He had friends or followers they were 
 not there to speak for Him. Not a voice seemed 
 lifted up on His behalf. It seemed that Pilate 
 might condemn Him if he chose, and that he 
 ran no risk of offending any party or faction. 
 
 But the unique character of his Prisoner impressed 
 Pilate. His whole bearing throughout the trial 
 had an influence over him which he could not 
 have explained, but which he could not throw off. 
 And his soul was constrained to speak out and 
 give such tribute to Jesus as it could. So the 
 heathen judge proclaimed the innocence of Jesus. 
 He deigned for the moment to be the pleader of 
 His cause, and he adopted the most impressive and 
 emphatic form he could think of for publicly 
 testifying on His behalf when he took water and 
 washed his hands before the multitude.^ 
 
 Was there ever more striking testimony given 
 to the character of a prisoner at any human bar ? 
 We have the judge giving it, a judge whose 
 interest and prejudice might have been supposed 
 to be all against the Prisoner. We have the judge 
 
 ^ Matt, xxvii. 24. 
 
 232 
 
PILATE WASHES HIS HANDS 
 
 givinor it in the face of a multitude who were 
 witnesses, and very many of them unfriendly wit- 
 nesses, of the words and acts of Jesus. The judge's 
 bar was open at that time to any of them. If 
 they could have brought any accusation against 
 Him it would have been welcomed. If they had 
 ever known Him do a wrong act, or teach what 
 any law on earth could have justly condemned ; 
 if He had ever done or said anything in the 
 slightest degree calling for censure or condemnation 
 they had their opportunity, and it would have 
 been a positive relief to the troubled conscience of 
 the judge to hear it. But nothing of the kind 
 could they adduce ; they could but answer the 
 testimony of a heathen judge and governor like 
 Pilate by unreasoning and passionate outcries. 
 
 The great Jewish historian pays Jesus this 
 remarkable tribute: — "He was a wise Man, if at 
 least a Man He may be called. He was a great 
 worker of miracles, and a teacher of those that 
 were curious and desirous to learn the truth, and 
 He had a great many followers, both Jews and 
 Gentiles. This was the Christ that was accused 
 by the princes and great men of our nation. 
 Pilate delivered Him up to the cross, and, all 
 this notAvithstanding, those that loved Him at first 
 did not forsake Him. He was seen alive again 
 
 P 233 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 the third day after His crucifixion, as had been 
 
 foretold by several prophets, with other wonders 
 
 that He wrought ; and there are a sort of people 
 
 that to this day bear the name of Christians, as 
 
 owning Him for their head."^ 
 
 Thus Jesus compels homage even from His foes. 
 
 And in another spirit than that of Pilate those 
 
 who know Him declare His infinite purity and 
 
 excellence. They not only find no fault in Him, 
 
 but they find in Him every perfection. Tried 
 
 as He has been in every way, by friends and by 
 
 foes, put to the proof of experience by those who 
 
 are His friends, and found to be better than the 
 
 best they have ever been able to think of Him, 
 
 they know Him to be worthy of their perfect 
 
 confidence and also of their reverence and adoration. 
 
 And if His adversaries will go as far as Pilate 
 
 even, if they will go so far as to allow that He 
 
 is the Just One whom to injure or even to 
 
 asperse were a crime, why, we would ask, do 
 
 they not believe in Him ? Not to believe in 
 
 Him while admitting the surpassing excellence of 
 
 His character is to be silent while He is being 
 
 condemned : it is to cover Him with empty 
 
 compliments and honours, and at the same time 
 
 to let Him go on His way to the cross. 
 
 ^ Josephus, Antiq., XVIII. IV. 3. Ew^ald, however, sees in th 
 passage the \york of a christian hand in the second century 
 234 
 
PILATE WASHES HIS HAXDS 
 
 But if that washing of his hands was the most 
 pubhc testimony Pilate could give to the innocence 
 of Jesus, its being followed up, as it was, by his 
 base surrender to the will and clamour of the 
 multitude made it the severest sentence of con- 
 demnation he could have passed upon himself. 
 What did it mean ? It meant that Pilate, governor 
 though he was, was less concerned for justice than 
 for his own ease and advantage. It meant that 
 he was a thoroughly time-serving man, one of 
 the last men who might be expected to make 
 sacrifices for righteousness' sake, morally one of 
 the weakest and most unprincipled of mortals. He 
 declared, as plainly as words could have done it, 
 that he was ready to sacrifice a just person rather 
 than risk losing the favour of the people. He 
 had not the courage of his own convictions. 
 Avowing Jesus to be innocent, he gave Him up 
 to be treated as if He had been the greatest of 
 malefactors. What a splendid hero he might 
 have been if he had found himself at the head 
 of a people bent upon doing magnanimous and 
 heroic things ! He might have shone as their 
 leader. He might have made grand and impressive 
 orations appealing to virtue and justice and honour. 
 He might have figured as a valiant champion of 
 the good cause, while the people were there to 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 give the applause, and there was no opposition, 
 no foe to fear. 
 
 There are so man}^ still who are like him. 
 They praise virtue and righteousness, but drop the 
 practice of them whenever it becomes difficult and 
 costly or involves self-denial. They make fine 
 figures in religious society, and shine there as 
 long as there are only speaking and handwashing 
 and praying to be done. They are the men too 
 to lead popular movements ; and while they hav^e 
 the multitude shouting with them their words are 
 bold, their enthusiasm is great, and they seem to 
 be the men to write noble chapters of history. 
 But let the tide turn, and they are turned with 
 it. Let the people wish something else, and they 
 wish something else. Let their surroundings change 
 from being very religious to being very secular, 
 and they are changed with them. Or let the 
 way of uprightness and godliness become rough, 
 and they are off, notwithstanding all their brave 
 professions, to try the smooth and alluring slopes 
 of Bye-path Meadow. 
 
 Pilate could hardly have revealed himself in a worse 
 light than when with one breath he declared Jesus 
 to be a just person and entitled to release, and 
 with the next, in deference to the clamour of the 
 mob, he gave orders to his soldiers to carry out 
 
 236 
 
PILATE WASHES HIS HANDS 
 
 their will, and see to Jesus being scourged and 
 then crucified. That act showed him to be one 
 of the weakest and basest of men — a man who 
 preferred himself to truth, justice, everything — a 
 man who was the slave of his selfish fear and 
 ambition — the kind of man who, to-day as in the 
 past, is so particularly dangerous to himself, to 
 society, and to every good cause. 
 
 It is the most important and momentous discovery 
 a man can make when he finds that there is 
 something or some one to be preferred to himself; 
 some one whose will should ever command his 
 own, whose interests are ever greater than his 
 own ; one for whom he rejoices to live, and for 
 whose sake he would even be ready to lay down 
 his life. That is a place which only Jesus the 
 Prisoner at Pilate's bar can fill. Preferring Him 
 to all else men have taken joyfully the spoiling 
 of their goods, and as martyrs have died. Preferring 
 Him to all else, and regarding His work and His 
 will ever as supreme, they learn to fear neither 
 the commandment of a king, nor the clamour 
 of a mob. They do not merely practise the 
 virtues — are honest, truthful, chaste, and just, 
 when it is convenient and when it pays ; but 
 they strive after these virtues continually as men 
 
 2; 
 
 ^1 
 
FRO 21 THE GAEL EX TO THE CROSS 
 
 living in the presence of the Holy One, and 
 charged with the honour of His name. 
 
 But those who prefer themselves to Him and 
 to all else are ever vacillating and time-serving 
 as Pilate. And they have dark paths to traverse 
 where truth and virtue and God become more and 
 more difficult to be found, and where at last the 
 self, for which all else may have been sacrificed, 
 is overwhelmed with shame and woe.^ 
 
 Pilate, doubtless, had many defenders in his own 
 day. He has found at least one apologist in our 
 own times in Sir J. Fitzjames Stephen. The defence 
 he offers is, if not in form, in substance such, we 
 think, as Marcus Aurelius might have made. 
 Briefly, it is this : Pilate's position was very much 
 like that of one of our lieutenant-governors in 
 India. Before all things he had to maintain the 
 peace and order of the Roman empire, and to do 
 this in the province which was perhaps the most 
 troublesome of all to govern. Jesus did not, and 
 could not be expected to concern him any more 
 
 ^ In W. Canton's graphic version of the legend of Pilate's suicide 
 on Mount Pilatus [A Lost Epic, pp. 211-215), he is seen standing by 
 a torrent and despairing of all its waters to wash his ** red hands." 
 Descending to give himself up to the Roman soldiers marching 
 through the valley below, and disappointed that they will not take 
 him and end his wretched existence, he casts his life away that he 
 might never more behold 
 
 " Those awful eyes— that thorn-crowned head which fills 
 The nights with terror." 
 
 238 
 
TIL ATE WASHES HIS HANLS 
 
 than a new Guru arising among the Hinckis, or 
 the expected Imam appearing among the Moham- 
 medans, might interest an Anglo-Indian administrator. 
 It became plain to the Roman governor that to 
 listen to this new Prophet of Galilee and to do 
 Him justice would be to cause the most serious 
 breach of public order, and to incur the suspicion 
 at Rome of acting disloyally and of imperilling 
 imperial interests. In all these circumstances Pilate 
 only did what might have been expected of him, 
 and what the ordinary rules of political expediency 
 would have guided him to do.^ 
 
 It seems to us that such an argument or apology, 
 so saturated with opportunism, needs only to be 
 stated. Then to say that Jesus might be to Pilate 
 what a Hindu or a Mahommedan religious pretender 
 might be to a British governor in India, passes 
 quite too severe a judgment on Pilate's moral 
 discernment, poor as we know it was ; and it is 
 not borne out by the facts which the evangelists 
 have given. Time has revealed nothing to abate 
 the judgment Pilate has received at the bar of 
 the Christian world. The poet has hardly over- 
 stated it when he says : — 
 
 Ilis action brought him 
 
 The burden of a shame, sinking his soul, 
 
 The burden of a name, intolerable, 
 
 Accurst throug h all the ages, hated, scorned.'-^ 
 
 ^ Stephen, Liberty, Equalil;/, Fraternity, pp. 89-96. 
 2 Arnold's Light of the World, p. 64. 
 
JESUS SCOURGED AND CROWNED WITH 
 THORNS. 
 
 Pilate's act of washing his hands before the 
 multitude was an idle and delusive ceremony. It 
 made but a passing impression. While it was 
 being performed the crowd ceased their tumult 
 and their dreadful outcries, and looked on in 
 wonder. When it flashed upon them what it all 
 meant they became the more urgent that the 
 governor should do as they required. Pilate 
 making such a show of his integrity as a judge, 
 so scrupulous about his hands being unstained — 
 the symbolic act, especially when they remembered 
 what the governor had been, only excited their 
 derision and contempt. They probably interpreted 
 it, and interpreted it rightly, as only the prelude 
 to a complete surrender. It was indeed, as the 
 issue showed, a great historic instance of what is 
 seen not unfrequently in the world, when the 
 loud and ostentatious protestings of men are 
 
 240 
 
JESUS SCOURGEL AXL CROirXED WITH TIIORXS 
 
 followed by their doing the very things they have 
 lifted up their hands against in holy abhorrence. 
 It seems as if for their consciences they thus 
 sought a theatrical, for want of the real solace 
 and satisfaction which come only from honest and 
 just action. 
 
 Pilate at any rate followed up his ceremonious 
 hand-washing by doing the very thing he had 
 thereby declared to be a crime. He yielded to 
 the torrent which he had not the courage or the 
 moral force to resist. He now released Barabbas 
 to the multitude, and he gave up Jesus to be 
 scourged.^ 
 
 This was a punishment only for slaves and 
 for foreigners, the conquered enemies of Rome. 
 Cicero's well-known words in regard to it may 
 be recalled : " It is a crime to bind a Roman 
 citizen ; to scourge him is a wickedness ; to 
 put him to death is almost parricide. What 
 shall I say of crucifying him ? '' ^ It appears, 
 however, that corporal punishment in the form 
 of cudgelling or flogging (fiistigatio vel flagellatio)^ 
 had a place in the military penal code. Pro- 
 bably it was applied chiefly, if not entirely, to 
 
 ' John xix. 1. 
 
 2 Cicero, In Verrem, V. CO. It was one of the greatest crimes 
 Cicero could allege against Verres that he had scourged Roman 
 citizens. The scourge was the " horribile flagellum " of Horace. 
 
 241 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 the troops raised in the provinces. But as a 
 civil punishment scourging, being regarded as the 
 most ignominious, was awarded only to slaves.^ 
 For want of the lictors who usually performed it, 
 the scourging in a province like Judea was done 
 by the soldiers.^ To them this duty was, as a 
 rule, agreeable. It gave them an opportunity 
 of paying off old scores against the troublesome 
 people they had to keep in order. It afforded 
 them peculiar pleasure to lay the lash upon Jewish 
 offenders who were given over to them for this 
 end.^ 
 
 Nor need we wonder that to those rude Roman 
 soldiers Jesus was nothing more than such an 
 offender. When their superiors judged Him, 
 as it must have seemed to them, worthy of 
 scourging and of death, we could hardly expect 
 that they should have eyes for the excellence 
 and grandeur of His character. Then it is true 
 that it was not usual for Roman soldiers to be 
 in sympathy with a Jewish mob. In ordinary 
 circumstances they would have been specially 
 careful to see that a prisoner against whom 
 
 ^ Eein, Crim'malrecht der Romer, pp. 699, 913. 
 
 2 Throughout Josephus' history it is always the soldiers who are 
 seen employed as lictors (Jos., B.I.y V., XI. 1). 
 
 ^ Several instances of this are to be found in Josephus (Antiq., 
 XIX., 9, 1 ; B.L, II., 12, 1 ; and B.I., V., 11, 1). 
 
 242 
 
JESUS SCOURGED AXD CliOJFXEI) IVITH TIWRXS 
 
 Jewish wrath might be raging received no unfair 
 treatment ; but in this case it was only too easy 
 for them to be carried away by the evil spirit 
 of the hour. For once, at anyrate, they were 
 at one with the mob of Jerusalem. The bitterest 
 enemy Jesus had in the city could not have 
 wished for Him greater indignity and torture than 
 He received at their rough hands. 
 
 Now upon the merely physical sufferings of 
 Jesus, whether under the scourge or on the 
 cross, we have no desire to dwell unduly. But, 
 while it is possible to give to them an undue 
 prominence, it is possible also not to dwell 
 sufficiently upon them, and to lose thereby much 
 of their impressiveness and significance. The days 
 have been when every detail was set forth and even 
 exaggerated, and when it was thought to be an 
 act of religion to realise all the dreadful externals 
 of our Lord's passion as fully and vividly as 
 one could. 
 
 The modern mood of the Christian world is 
 different. The tendency now is to make too 
 little of the physical sufferings. As a consequence 
 we are apt to lose much of what they reveal 
 of the infinite greatness and love of Him who 
 for us endured them. We believe that to have 
 seen the suffering Saviour as those did, who were 
 243 
 
FROM THE GARBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 eyewitnesses of Him as He went on His via 
 dolorosa, could not but have called forth towards Him 
 our deeper reverence and devotion. The Saviour 
 as He was could not possibly be surpassed by 
 the Saviour idealised however beautifully in our 
 minds. The lowly life, the homely garb, the mock 
 royal raiment foully bespattered, the bleeding brow 
 under the crown of thorns, the body bruised and 
 broken by the scourge and then by the cross, 
 and the visage more marred than any man — these 
 things, far from hiding the true glory of Jesus, 
 are the very things that help us the more to 
 realise it while we think of the surpassing 
 meekness, dignity, and grace which He showed 
 through them all. 
 
 We would see Him then standing mutely before 
 Pilate's judgment seat. The governor gives the 
 order, " Go, bind His hands and let Him be 
 beaten." ^ He is seized by the soldiers. He is 
 stripped to the waist, and to some post or over 
 some block near at hand He is bound in a 
 stooping posture with His hands tied behind His 
 back.^ Then upon His bared back is laid the 
 cruel lash, formed of some rough knotted rope or 
 
 ^ The usual fomiula (Livy. I. 26). 
 
 ^ Painters generally represent Him as bound to the post, some 
 with His back, others with His face to it (Jameson, Histori/ of our 
 Lord in Works of Art. Vol. II. 71-83). 
 
 244 
 
JESUS SCOURGET) ANT) CROWNET) WITH THORNS 
 
 of plaited leather thongs, with small sharp- 
 pointed bits of bone or bits of lead at the ends. 
 The cruel strokes cut open the flesh, and the 
 blood starts and freely flows. As it is only one 
 destined for the cross with whom, as they suppose, 
 they have to do, the soldiers who relieve one 
 another in the awful work are indifl'erent where the 
 strokes fall. Scourging being the usual preliminary 
 to crucifixion, they know that the heavier the 
 blows they deal the sooner they will be done 
 with the task of crucifixion. " Under the fury of 
 their countless stripes," says Geikie ^ " The victims 
 sometimes sank amidst screams, convulsive leaps, 
 and distortions into a senseless heap ; sometimes 
 died on the spot ; sometimes were taken away 
 an unrecognisable mass of bleeding flesh to find 
 deliverance in death from the inflammation and 
 fev'er, sickness and shame." 
 
 In presence of the mob that condemned Him, 
 Jesus was thus scourged and put to open shame. 
 We are unwilling to believe that Pilate stooped 
 so low as to play the part of the judge in cases 
 of this kind, who was wont to stand by while 
 the scourging was being done by the lictors, and 
 to incite them to their duty towards the condemned 
 saying, " Give it him, give it him." But even if 
 
 1 Geikie, Life and Words of Christ, p. 699. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 he did no more than look on, as he sat in his 
 
 official seat, the people were there to reward with 
 
 their applause every merciless blow. 
 
 When they had grown weary of their dreadful 
 
 work, the governor, yet with a lingering hope 
 
 and desire that his Prisoner might in some way 
 
 eventually be spared, delivered Jesus to the 
 
 centurion that should have charge of His crucifixion. 
 
 Then, from the open grounds in front of the 
 
 Praetorium in which the scourging was done, the 
 
 soldiers took Him and led Him away to their 
 
 own quarters. It was their odious privilege to 
 
 have Him in their power for a while to do 
 
 with Him what they pleased, short of denying 
 
 the multitude the satisfaction of seeing Him die 
 
 upon the cross. Like a hunted creature flung to 
 
 the dogs before the finishing stroke is given, so 
 
 was Jesus now among the soldiers. Into the 
 
 common halP the whole band trooped to share 
 
 in the brutal entertainment they were to make for 
 
 ^ Sir Charles AVilson (Art. Jerusalem in Smith's Diet.) thinks 
 that "the common hall" into which were " gathered the whole band 
 of soldiers " to make sport of Jesus would be at the tower of Antonia. 
 According to him, Jesus was taken first to Herod's palace — the 
 Praetorium in which Pilate resided ; after lie was condemned the 
 soldiers brought Him to Antonia, Avhich was at once their head- 
 quarters and the state prison ; and from Antonia He was led forth to 
 be crucified. Sir Charles AVarren, who has shared with Sir C. 
 Wilson the work of the Palestine exploration expedition, has 
 recently discovered in a subterranean chamber, on what is believed 
 to be the site of Antonia, a truncated pillar such as that to which 
 Jesus might have been tied in order to be scourged. 
 246 
 
JESUS SCOURGED AXL CROWXEI) WITH THORNS 
 
 themselves. They crowded into the place just as 
 they might have done, had they been in Rome, 
 into the amphitheatre to look on the degrading 
 spectacle of a gladiatorial fight or of a ribald 
 play. From what we learn of their doings we 
 can appreciate the remark of Luther, that '' men 
 in those days were treated as brutes are treated 
 now." We might go further and say, that they 
 were treated as even brutes are not treated now. 
 Yet Armenian and other horrors and outrages of 
 OUT time remind us that inhumanity seems to 
 lose nothing of its repulsiveness and savagery by 
 lapse of ages. 
 
 We must remember that Jesus was fresh 
 from the wounds and sores the scourge had left Him. 
 From the whipping post or block, even as He 
 was, the soldiers led Him into their quarters, bent 
 upon adding mockery to torture. In the course 
 of His trial they had heard it said that He 
 claimed to be a king. The higher the dignity 
 claimed, the more easily it lent itself to purposes 
 of ridicule. It occurred to them to make Him a 
 mimic representation of mock royalty in their 
 midst. Over His half-naked body, covered with 
 cruel wounds, they threw an old cast-off military 
 cloak to serve for an imperial robe. They next 
 thrust a reed or cane pole into His hand— common 
 247 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 enough in Jewish houses, and put to a variety 
 of uses— as the emblem of His kingly power. 
 For a crown an ingeniously cruel hand snatched 
 some twigs from a thorny bush, growing in the 
 grounds around the Praetorium, and twisted the 
 prickly leaves round His brows, pressing them 
 down till ihe blood started and trickled down the 
 Sufferer's face.^ Then the soldiers, following the 
 the example of Herod's men, and even going 
 beyond it, began their courtly play, and turned 
 it into the rudest buffoonery and burlesque. 
 They approached Him with mock obeisance. They 
 offered Him mock homage. Some of them, bolder 
 and more insolent than the rest, took the reed, 
 which they had dashed in their violence from His 
 hand, and smote Him with it on the head. And 
 we blush for our poor humanity that we nmst 
 add that they covered Him with spitting — the 
 greatest mark of abhorrence or disgrace man can 
 put upon man. Truly there is no cruelty like 
 that of underlings. And one can hardly exaggerate 
 the evil of which men are capable under the 
 dominion of their basest passions.^ 
 
 ^ EUicott thinks the soldiers took what iirst came to hand, whether 
 likely to inflict pain or not {Life, p. 348) ; Geikie, that they were 
 the tough twigs of the thorny Nubk which they twisted into a cruel 
 crown {Life and JFoids, p. 700). 
 
 2 As to the mockery and buffeting in the common hall, Renan 
 {Life (f Jesus, p. 270) says, " It is ditiicult to understand how Roman 
 
 24S 
 
JUSUS SCOURGED AND CROJTNED WITH THORNS 
 
 Yet Jesus endured all without a murmuring 
 word. The pain of the wounds from the scourge 
 must have been great, the pain from those insults 
 and buffooneries to a nature so sensitive as His, 
 must have been still greater. But there is 
 no word of complaint. To go through all, 
 and to keep silence, to be the same meek, 
 dignified Sufferer, never chargeable with an 
 unworthy look, a vindictive word or act — this 
 proclaims, more eloquently than almost anything 
 else could. His sovereignty over suffering, His 
 absolute divinity. See Him in Gethsemane ap- 
 parently crushed under His coming load, and 
 praying that it might be spared Him. See Him 
 here in the common hall among the rude mocking 
 soldiery, a King in verity, triumphant over shame 
 and pain, revealing a conquering power and 
 grace truly divine in the silence and composure 
 with which He bears Himself through all. 
 His silence, what is it but His calm and sublime 
 resignation to His Father's will? The victim 
 
 dignity could stoop to acts so shameful." He thinks they were 
 not really Eoman but auxiliary troops, composed of Syrians, 
 &c., and that Romans would not have so degraded themselves. 
 Fan-ar {Life of Christ, p. 677) favours this view, and supposes they 
 were just " the mercenary scum and dregs of the provinces." Philo 
 {In Flacc, 980) relates how on one occasion Herod Agrippa I. was 
 publicly insulted at Alexandria in the person of an idiot who, arrayed 
 in pretended royal robes, was treated to moi;k homage and ridicule as 
 he was led through the streets. Also in Graetz, II., 183. 
 
 Q 249 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 destined for the cross is already its victor. He 
 who can endure pain and shame, as Jesus did, 
 has truly all things under His feet. 
 
 Pilate was an interested spectator of what took 
 place in the common hall. The crowd were not 
 there ; they did not witness what would have 
 been so gratifying to their malice and contempt 
 for the Nazarene. But the governor saw the rude 
 jesting, the cruel mockery to which they subjected 
 their Prisoner. He looked on their discreditable 
 conduct, and did nothing to abate it. On the 
 contrary it is more than likely that his presence 
 and presumed patronage encouraged the soldiers 
 to use the wildest licence. 
 
 Yet Pilate had mingled feelings. He became 
 more than ever perplexed about his Prisoner. He 
 did not know what to make of Him, so unlike 
 was he to any other that had ever stood before 
 him. His demeanour in the midst of this scene of 
 revelry and insult was to him passing strange. 
 The thought of His innocence grew upon him, 
 and the desire to release Him came back with 
 redoubled force. ^ A certain dread possessed him 
 that it was not safe to have a hand in the death 
 of such a Man. Was there no escape from such 
 an unwelcome responsibility ? It occurred to him 
 
 ^ John xix. 4. 
 2^0 
 
JESUS SCOURGED AXT) CROWNED WITH THORNS 
 
 that what was so strangely moving himself might 
 also move the people. As he beheld the pitiable 
 spectacle of Jesus mocked, buffeted, roughly handled, 
 tortured in the midst of his soldiers, he felt some- 
 how that in this there was that which might touch 
 the hearts of the Jewish mob, there before him in 
 front of the Praetorium, clamouring for Jesus' death. 
 A Jew so insulted by Gentiles, so cruelly used by 
 Roman soldiers whom the Jewish people cordially 
 hated at all times ! Would not the sight have 
 some effect in stirring up their compassion and 
 causing them to relent ? A son of Abraham so 
 shamefully treated by the uncircumcised, however 
 dark His crimes — surely that was enough to rouse 
 resentment against the Roman authorities and pity 
 n favour of the Accused 
 
 Pilate therefore brought Him forth in full view 
 of the Jerusalem crowd, wearing the crown of 
 thorns and the purple robe, and with all the 
 marks of the shame and pain He had endured, 
 and exclaimed " Behold the Man." ^ The effect 
 of the sight upon the Jewish multitude was not 
 what he expected. It only roused them to 
 greater fury, to a very frenzy of hatred against 
 Jesus, and the insensate cry " Crucify Him, crucify 
 
 ' John xix. y. 
 2!;i 
 
FR031: THE GABDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 Him"^ rent the air. We may well be astonished 
 no less than Pilate seemed to be— astonished that 
 even Jewish patriotism should so forget itself, and 
 should unite with all else to deliver up the 
 Christ to ignominy and death, as if the whole 
 nation had come to execrate Him and to cast 
 Him ofr.2 
 
 But what is the effect which the sight of the 
 suffering thorn-crowned Jesus has still upon the 
 world ? The very sufferings of Jesus are a 
 stumbling block. His cross is an offence. The 
 world is blind to the glory they reveal. It refuses 
 to identify, with omnipotence, such weakness as 
 men can make sport of, and such endurance or 
 shame and pain even unto death with kingly and 
 divine claims. It refuses also to take or to believe 
 in salvation from the hands of the Crucified. 
 
 But on those awaking from the dreams of 
 the world, recovering from the blinding and 
 hardening power of sin the sight of Jesus with 
 His crown of thorns has a totally different effect. 
 It is the most powerful appeal to all that is best, 
 
 ^ John xix. 6. 
 
 - When Plato in his Republic (p. 3G0— Jowctt's Translation) 
 writes, "The just man will he scourged, lackecl, hound, have his 
 eyes put out, and will at last he cmcilied," he seems to utter the 
 most remarkahle prophecy of how the world was to treat the sinless 
 Jesus. It is amazing that this forecast or dream of the heathen 
 philosopher should have hecome history. 
 
 252 
 
JESUS SCOURGED AXlJ CliOJUXEJ) WITH TIWRXS 
 
 tenderest, and most sacred in their hearts. It is 
 love's divine appeal. When it meets with an 
 answering love and faith the divine King in His 
 beauty stands revealed, and His kingdom and 
 salvation have come to our souls. We give our 
 homage to Him as we would not give it to 
 another. The thorns that wreathe His brows 
 become a veritable crown for us — love's grandest 
 crown ; and all the wounds He suffered, and the 
 blood He shed are unspeakably dear as love's 
 greatest sacrifice, the price of our pardon, the 
 hope of our salvation. In the beautiful words 
 of St. Ambrose, " the thorns are the sinners of 
 this world, thus woven into a trophy, and worn 
 triumphant upon the bleeding brows of the 
 Redeemer." 
 
 Pilate, by thus bringing Jesus forth a spectacle 
 of woe and pity, after all He had suffered from 
 the scourge and at the hands of the soldiers, made 
 then another and most striking appeal to the 
 multitude. The appeal, pathetic though it was, 
 utterly failed. The sense of pity, of humanity, was 
 met and overborne in the priests and people by that 
 religious hatred which is the fiercest of all passions. 
 The sight that might have melted the stoniest 
 heart only called forth anew, and in fiercer 
 accents than before, " Crucify Him ; " and it was 
 253 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 the chief priests and the officers who led in the 
 cry. 
 
 Angry and impatient at this fresh repulse 
 the governor thereupon replied, " Take ye Him 
 and crucify Him ; for I find no fault in Him."^ 
 " Go, find the cross for Him, and let yours be 
 the responsibility of His death. He is one of 
 yourselves. If you will persist thus in your fury 
 against Him, take Him and do with Him what 
 you will. I will be no party to your crime." 
 
 But Pilate was not to get off even on these 
 iniquitous terms. He was to find himself com- 
 pelled in the end to pronounce the sentence of 
 condemnation with his own official lips, and to 
 provide the cross for Jesus and the soldiers also 
 who should see to His dying there. 
 
 "We have a law," the Jews answered him, "and 
 by our law He ought to die, because He made 
 Himself the Son of God." ^ In so saying the 
 Jews reminded him of his oath and duty as 
 Roman governor to respect their law. Their 
 customs and laws as a people the Romans had 
 promised to regard and protect.^ Jesus might 
 
 ^ John xix. 6, 
 
 ^ John xix. 7. 
 
 ^ They could plead that Tiberius had expressly promised that 
 their laws and institutions should be respected (Philo, Lcyatio ad 
 Caium). 
 
 254 
 
JESUS SCOURGED AND CROWXED JFITH THORNS 
 
 be faultless so far as Roman law was concerned, 
 but according to Jewish law He, as claiming 
 divine honours, was the greatest of transgressors. 
 Their courts had tried Him on the charge. Was 
 it not for Pilate to uphold their authority, and 
 to confirm their decision ? 
 
 This opened up a wide and delicate question. 
 It was not one that could be safely discussed 
 between the governor, seated on his official chair 
 on the Gabbatha, and a heated and frenzied mob 
 in the open air. And the expression " Son of 
 God " they had used had, as applied to this 
 Jesus, something ominous about it for Pilate's 
 ears. He rose therefore from his seat of judgment, 
 and bade Jesus for the second time follow him 
 into the hall of the Praetorium behind. When 
 they were there alone he asked Jesus with a 
 troubled air, " Whence art Thou ? " ^ Jesus gave 
 him no answer. Why it seems difficult to under- 
 stand, unless it be that silence was itself the best 
 answer ; and that if he had not already found 
 an answer to his question in all that he had seen 
 of Jesus and heard from Him since He came 
 into his hands, nothing that Jesus could say now 
 was likely to enlighten him. With no true sense 
 of the divine in him, God incarnate could stand 
 
 1 John xix. 9. 
 
 255 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 before Pilate and be unrecognised. In vain we 
 argue for the supernatural and the heavenly with 
 men who do not see and feel the supernatural 
 and the heavenly in the Christ of Gospel history. 
 
 The governor was annoyed at the silence. If 
 his question came from the fear that he was after 
 all in the presence of some superior being,^ the 
 silence only increased it. But with the fear there 
 was his pride of office, and the umbrage he felt 
 that he could not get those lips of Jesus to open 
 just when he would. " Speakest thou not unto 
 me ? Knowest thou not that I have power to 
 crucify thee, and have power to release thee ? " ^ 
 
 Then on these words being uttered, the lips 
 so long sealed amid a storm of accusation and 
 abuse were opened. " Thou couldst have no power 
 at all against me except it were given thee from 
 above ; therefore he that delivered me unto thee 
 hath the greater sin." ^ Thus the proud governor 
 was rebuked, while at the same time Jesus, 
 holding in His hands the balance of judgment 
 between Pilate and the priests, extended His 
 charity so far to the former by saying that his 
 sin was the less. Jesus reminded him also and 
 
 ^ John xix. 8. 
 2 John xix. 10. 
 •^ John xix. 11. 
 
 256 
 
JESUS SCOURGE!) AXI) CliOirXEI) WITH THORNS 
 
 the world that there was One above in whose 
 almighty hands Pilate and all who had to do 
 with His death were but instruments, willing or 
 unwilling ; that they were but carrying out His 
 sovereign will to provide in this wonderful way 
 the one great sacrifice for the world's sin. 
 
 It did not lessen Pilate's fears that he was thus 
 spoken to, and reminded of his comparative 
 impotence by the Prisoner who seemed so entirely 
 in his power. On the contrary, he was the more 
 afraid. He left his Prisoner in the hall, and 
 returned to his chair of judgment on the Pave- 
 ment. Again he sought to release Jesus. But to 
 all his pleading the multitude answered in words 
 which had a new terror for him. They contained 
 the threat which had once and again in days 
 past been found effectual with Pilate. If he failed 
 to listen to it he knew there were ample forces 
 of a tumultuary kind in that mob, and diplomatic 
 skill and fanatic zeal enough in those Jewish 
 rulers to make it good. " If thou let this man go, 
 thou art not Caesar's friend ; whosoever maketh 
 himself a king speaketh against Caesar.'* ^ Again 
 we see the same fatal confusion of Messianic king- 
 ship and earthly kingship. But Pilate could not 
 discriminate. What he perceived clearly was that 
 
 ^ John xix. 12. 
 257 
 
FR03I THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 if he did not let the Jews have their own way 
 they would report him to his imperial master in 
 Rome. As his record was not good,^ he could 
 hardly afford to give them occasion for doing 
 that. He could therefore give the multitude no 
 answer. 
 
 He returned to the hall of judgment where he 
 had left Jesus, and brought Him a second time 
 before the people. The morning was well ad- 
 vanced. Three hours had gone by since He was 
 placed before him as a prisoner, and it was now 
 the third hour — nine o'clock in the morning.^ 
 
 1 Josephus, Antiq., XVIII., III., 1-2, and i?./., II., IX., 2-4 ; 
 also Philo, Legatio ad Caium, 36. 
 
 2 Mark states it was the third hour when they crucified Jesus 
 (Mark xv. 25). Matthew and Luke do not say when the crucifixion 
 began, but all three mention the darkness as coming on about the 
 sixth hour. The Synoptists also agree that it was the ninth hour 
 when Jesus died, while the fourth Gospel is silent on that point. 
 John, however, marks the hour definitely as the sixth hour (John 
 xix. 14) when Pilate said, " Behold your king," and thereafter 
 delivered Jesus to be crucified. Thus there is an apparent discrepancy 
 between the statements of Mark and John as to when the crucifixion 
 began. To get rid of it some suppose that John reckoned from 
 midnight and Mark from sunrise. Eut neither Jews nor Romans 
 reckoned from midnight. The latter divided the day into twelve 
 hours from sunrise to sunset, so that in summer the hours were long 
 and in winter short. The Jews in oiu- Lord's day seemed to have 
 followed their example. And to suppose John reckons from midnight 
 only increases the difficulty otherwise. Another offered solution is 
 that John is not referring to the commencement of Jesus' sufferings 
 on Calvary, but to something else — the fact perhaps that the special 
 preparation [-^apocffKivvi) began at noon, the sixth hour according to 
 the usual reckoning, and that Mark's statement has therefore really 
 no statement opposed to it at all. Many authorities think that the 
 true solution of the difficulty is that there has been an error in 
 transcribing the number in the original text, only they are divided. 
 
JESUS SCOURGED AND GROIFNED WITH THORNS 
 
 Pilate was utterly weary of the case and careless 
 how it should end, if only it did not touch 
 himself or his relations with Tiberius. With a 
 gesture of impatience and a tone of contempt he 
 said to the multitude as he placed Jesus again 
 before them, "Behold your king."^ "Away with 
 him, crucify him," ^ was the cry again raised in 
 response. "Shall I crucify your king?"® said he 
 again, and the tone of irony and contempt was 
 more marked than before. " What patriots you 
 are ! And this is your Messiah King ! Is it your 
 will that He should be treated as the vilest 
 malefactor .?" He was their Messiah, their King, 
 and it was so they willed He should be treated."* 
 In their infatuation denying all their Messianic 
 
 some being of opinion that Tplrn in Mark should be read 'Iktyi, others 
 that VxT») in John should be read t/)/t>j. dx^])i\,xi {Life of Christ, ]}. 
 228) adopts the former view, and thinks it would be midday before 
 Jesus was lifted upon the cross, and that the three hours' darkness 
 came on very soon after, and lasted till He died about three in the 
 afternoon. But six hours seem too long for the trial and three too 
 short for the crucilixion. Alford's view {Comment, in loc), which 
 was the view of the early fathers, Eusebius and Theophylact, and 
 that adopted by Farrar {Life of Christ, 683), Ellicott, Keim {Jesus of 
 Nazara, vol. VI 122), &c., is that the erratum is likely to be in 
 John, and that Tplryi should be read for extjj so as to harmonise all 
 satisfactorily. The tradition had been very generally, if not 
 universally, accepted that Jesus hung upon the cross six hours, from 
 nine till three in the afternoon, from the third to the ninth hour. 
 
 ^ John xix. 14. 
 
 - John xix. 15. 
 
 •^ John xix. 15. 
 
 * As Eenan says " If ever crime was the crime of a nation it M-as 
 the death of Jesus " {Life, p. 282). 
 
 259 
 
FROM THE GARDE X TO THE CROSS 
 
 hopes, and basely kissing the foreign chains which 
 bound them, they cried out " We have no king 
 but Caesar."^ The cry carried with it the hint 
 that Caesar should know of it if Pilate by releasing 
 Jesus should show himself unfaithful to his interests.^ 
 Pilate yielded. He was baffled and beaten by 
 his own worldly weapons in the end. He was no 
 match for the crafty Jewish priests and elders, or 
 for a Jewish mob inspired and led by them. 
 '' Then delivered he Jesus unto them to be 
 crucified." He rose from his judgment seat. He 
 gave orders now finally to his soldiers to see 
 to the crucifixion. Then without daring to 
 
 ^ John xix. 15. 
 
 - Philo, writing of Pilate threatened in this way on another occa- 
 sion, says — ** This last sentence exasperated him more, as he feared 
 they might in realitj^ send an embassy to the emperor, and impeach 
 his whole government in respect of his corruption, his acts of insolence, 
 his rapine, his habit of insulting people, his cruelty, his continual 
 murders of people imcondemned, and his never-ending and most 
 grevious inhumanity " {Lcgatio ad Caiuni, XXXVIII). Trials for 
 treason were conducted in Augustus' time by the Senate, and they 
 were very few as he was a trusted and popular ruler. In his later 
 days Tiberius took those cases involving supposed crimes against him- 
 self into his own hands, and so liberally rewarded informers {ddalores) 
 that they became a numerous class. Tacitus {Annals, \ . and VI.; 
 gives many examples of the cruel and unjust way in which those 
 accused of crimen mnicstatis were dealt with, and informs us that 
 very few of them ever escaped. Not a few of them took away their 
 own lives on the first intimation of their being accused {Annals, VI., 
 38, 39, 40). A sti iking instance we have in the case of Nerva, a 
 favourite of Tiberius, who lived in such dread of delation that he 
 resolved, notwithstanding that emperor's personal entreaties, to starve 
 himself to death before the informer should have even singled him 
 out. 
 
 260 
 
JUSUS SCOURGED ANT) CROWNEI) JFITII THORNS 
 
 look again into the face of that truly divine King, 
 clothed in mock raiment and crowned with thorns, 
 standing so near to him, he withdrew from the 
 Pavement for the last time, and retired to his 
 palace leaving the multitude to have their will.^ 
 The dread of Caesar, the fear of losing the 
 favour of the world and involving himself in 
 trouble had prevailed with Pilate. The innocence 
 of Jesus, the claims of justice, the better voices 
 of the heart — these availed nothing against the 
 interests and inclinations of self and the allure- 
 ments of the w^orld. But how often this moral 
 tragedy is repeated ! Men that might have put 
 wreaths of glory around Jesus have by their lives 
 plaited for Him the crown of thorns, subjected 
 Him to the scourge of their sins, and abandoned 
 Him and their better selves as well. 
 
 * We have reason to believe that I'ilate did send some report after- 
 ■svards to the emperor Tiberius as to what he had done with his 
 remarkable Piisoner. Justin Martyr and Tertullian in their Apologies 
 appeal to official records of the trial and death of Jesus in such a way 
 that they must have been in existence. Eusebius states (Jlist., II., 
 2) on the authority of Tertullian that Tiberius having heard from the 
 " Acts of Pilate" of the miracles and resun-ection of Jesus proposed to 
 his senate that he should be placed among the gods. But wo have 
 no quotation from these " Acts " either in Christian or pagan writers, 
 and no writer referring to them claims to have seen them. Yet 
 it is not unlikely that Pilate transmitted some official report of our 
 Lord's case to liome. 
 
 261 
 
THE TRAITOR'S END. 
 
 The fate of Judas is recorded by two of the 
 evangelists — Matthew and Luke. Luke's reference 
 to his end is incidental, being contained in the 
 report he gives (Acts i. 16-19) of Peter's words 
 to the assembled brethren in the Upper Room, 
 after our Lord had ascended into heaven, in regard 
 to the election of a successor to the traitor as 
 one of the twelve. Matthew ^ gives details which 
 Peter omits, but the two narratives fit into and 
 supplement each other. The latter was speaking, 
 as may readily be understood, to an audience well 
 acquainted with the manner of Judas' death ; and 
 he had to refer to the facts only so far as they 
 were needed to serve the purpose of his address. 
 
 Strauss, it may be remarked, regards the whole 
 story, as he does much besides in the gospels, as 
 mythical. The Christian records, according to him, 
 were not to be complete without some calamity or 
 
 1 Matt, xxvii. 3, 10. 
 262 
 
THE TRAITOR'S END 
 
 tragedy befalling the actors concerned in the 
 crucifixion of Jesus. Hence one such tragedy had 
 to be invented. The Christians of those days 
 were the shadiest of people, with a wonderful 
 propensity for inventing useful falsehoods and 
 imposing upon the credulity of the world. They 
 laid hold of Zechariah's prophecy about the thirty 
 pieces of silver and the buying of the Potter's 
 Field ; and it was easy for them with the help 
 of the 69th Psalm to fill up the outline, and to 
 put a disciple as traitor and then suicide in the 
 forefront of it all.^ 
 
 It is a striking and instructive fact, however, 
 that Judas is the only one concerned in Jesus' 
 death, the circumstances of whose end are related 
 in the New Testament. We must turn to 
 Josephus, or Tacitus, or to the apocryphal legends 
 for the woful end of Annas and his five sons, of 
 Caiaphas, and of Pilate and Herod — the leading 
 actors in that event.^ The evangelists simply 
 
 ^ Strauss, New Life of Jesus, vol. II. 350, 355. 
 
 2 Annas and his five sons were, one after the other, deprived of 
 their high priesthood, and so also was Caiaphas (Josephus, Antiq., 
 XVIII., VI. 3). Ananias, the son of Nebedai, was sent hound to 
 Rome {Antiq., XX., VI. 3) : his palace was burned to the ground 
 ( B.I., II., XVII. 6) : he himself was found at last in a sewer and 
 brought forth along with his brother Ezekiasand executed {B.I., II., 
 XVII. 9). Ishmael ben Phabi was beheaded in Cyrene {B.I., VI., 
 II. 2) : and Jonathan, the son of Ananus, was murdered by the Sicarii 
 (B.L, II., XIII. 3). Herod Antipas seems to have been banished, 
 first to Lyons in Gaul {Antiq., XVIII., Vll. 2), and then to Spain 
 
 263 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 record the part they played in the condemnation 
 and death of Jesus. They refrain from expressing 
 any judgment upon them. The}^ leave their words 
 and deeds to speak for themselves. And they 
 say nothing in regard to their future. It would 
 have been very different had they been the 
 unscrupulous dealers in fiction Strauss seems to 
 think them to be. It was for the sake of the 
 Church of Christ, for its instruction and warning 
 in after times, for our learning and spiritual 
 profiting, they have preserved for us the memory 
 of their fellow disciple's woful end, and we cannot 
 doubt that their record is true. 
 
 The evangelist Matthew tells us it was when 
 Judas saw that Jesus was condemned he went on 
 his way of despair. He had been a spectator 
 deeply interested and deeply involved in all the 
 proceedings. We remember his treacherous kiss in 
 the Garden.^ He is one of the great band who 
 bring his Master after His capture, first to Annas, 
 and then to Caiaphas. He follows the trials by 
 the priests and the Sanhedrim with an agitated 
 
 where he died {B.I., II., IX. 6). Pilate was ordered by Vitellius to 
 Rome to answer before Caesar the accusations that were exhibited 
 against him and he died in banishment (Josephus, Antiq., XVIII., 
 V. 2). The legend of his suicide on Mount Pilatus, near Lucerne, 
 is well known. 
 
 ^ Lightfoot says it was not unusual for a master to kiss his disciple, 
 but it was very exceptional that a disciple kissed his master (Light- 
 foot, Horae Eeh. in Ev. Matt., p. 303). 
 264 
 
THE TRAITOR'S END 
 
 heart, his hopes or his fears rising at each stage 
 of the procedure. His eye and interest are fixed 
 on Him above all others whom he had been wont 
 to call Master. His whole bearing, the answers 
 He gives he eagerly observes. Very likely he is 
 disappointed, even from the outset, with the turn 
 things are taking. To his carnal worldly mind 
 Jesus seems to offer a poor defence of Himself. 
 He makes no use of His miraculous power to 
 confound His judges and foes. He seems even to 
 deliver Himself over to His enemies by putting 
 forth claims on His behalf which to the court 
 appear blasphemies. And when He is condemned 
 He accepts His sentence meekly, and then submits 
 without a murmur or protest to all the indignities 
 and blows that follow. 
 
 Judas' heart sinks as he witnesses all this. It 
 sinks still more as he follows the crowd of priests 
 and elders going to deliver Jesus into Pilate's 
 hands, and as he watches the singular course of 
 events at the Praetorium and in Herod's judgment 
 hall. When at length a Barabbas is openly 
 preferred to his Master, and Jesus is handed over 
 to the Roman soldiers to be scourged and then 
 crucified, his feeling of despair grows to an 
 intensit}^ which becomes unbearable. Probably the 
 last sight he sees before rushing upon his tragic 
 
 R 265 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 end is his Master standing before the mob with 
 the robes put on in mockery, the crown of thorns 
 on His head and the sad traces of the blows He 
 has received.^ 
 
 He cannot bear to witness more.^ The money 
 he has got for his traitor's service is now an 
 intolerable burden to him. He rushes from the 
 place where he has been a spectator of all 
 he has had so large a hand in bringing 
 upon his Master. He crosses over with hurried 
 steps to a part of the Temple^ where only 
 consecrated feet may tread, and where some 
 priests are to be seen. For aught we know to 
 the contrary Caiaphas himself is among them. 
 The door is open. Without daring to pass the 
 threshold of a place thus sacred to the priests 
 Judas flings through the open door the thirty 
 pieces of silver they had given him for betraying 
 
 1 Matt, xxvii. 3. "When he saw that He was condemned, 
 repented himself, &c. 
 
 2 In a remarkahle picture by Thomas, a Belgian painter, Judas 
 is represented as coming suddenly in the course of the night or early 
 morning upon two men fashioning the cross, intended for his Master, 
 by the light of a fire, and as being transfixed with horror by the 
 sight. 
 
 3 See Sepp {Leben Christi, VI., 78), Geikie {Life and Words of 
 Christ, p. 705) and others, Judas forced his way into the inner 
 portion of the Tem])le where the priests were preparing for the feast 
 and where also penitents were wont to be in waiting for them, and 
 there he flung down the price of blood. 
 
 266 
 
THE TRAITOR'S END 
 
 his Master/ and scatters them about their feet 
 over the sacred floor. '' I have sinned," he cries 
 in his agony of remorse and despair, '' in that 
 I have betrayed the innocent blood." ^ 
 
 Those sacred courts had been associated with 
 the greatest joys and the greatest sorrows of men. 
 Many a touching bit of spiritual history had been 
 enacted within them. They had been the scene of 
 many a penitent's confession, but never had been 
 heard there a more remarkable or pathetic than 
 this. Men had come to them to confess great crimes, 
 but never a crime such as Judas now confessed. 
 He acknowledged himself a sinner of the deepest 
 dye — a traitor responsible for bringing to a 
 shameful death the greatest of benefactors and 
 the most perfectly free from all fault or sin. 
 
 iMultitudes had found relief in those temple 
 courts as they poured forth their hearts in 
 penitential sorrow. So might Judas have done. 
 But it was to the priests there he turned with 
 his remorseful confession, and not to God. Had 
 he only taken it to Jesus Himself, how different 
 the result might have been I To have gone with 
 
 ^ It is interesting to recall that thirty minae was the price which 
 the disciples of Socrates offered to redeem him — the heathen sage thus 
 being reckoned at more than thirty times the value of the divine 
 Teacher of Nazareth (Plato, Apologia, par. 38). 
 
 ^ Matt, xxvii. 4. 
 
 267 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 it to Him whom he had so deeply wronged would 
 have been manly and honourable. To have made 
 his touching tribute to the spotlessness of Jesus 
 heard above all the mad cries for His death — to 
 have dared to stand by the side of the condemned 
 Man of Nazareth, and declare that the greatest 
 sin of his life had been to betray Him, and that 
 it was truly God's holy One they were hurrying 
 to His cross — this might have given Judas the 
 place of the greatest of heroes among fallen men, 
 while it might have secured for him that day 
 the glory of sharing martyrdom with his Lord. 
 Had Judas taken his confession to the quarter 
 where it was most of all due, he, no less than 
 the penitent thief, would have been with Jesus 
 that day in paradise ; and, instead of a terrible 
 darkness investing his eternal future which we do 
 not seek to penetrate, he would have stood forth 
 to all coming ages the brightest example of the 
 pardoning grace and saving power of his Master. 
 But Judas went to the priests and not to Jesus. 
 To them he went as a disappointed, despairing 
 man, hoping doubtless by fixing a share of his 
 guilt upon them to relieve his own distressed soul. 
 Well did they perceive, and perceive at once, 
 the drift of his action. Immediately he was to 
 learn that of sympathy or comfort he should have 
 
 268 
 
THE TMAITOli'S ENT> 
 
 none from them. If his conscience troubled him over 
 
 what he had done, they were ready to tell him that 
 
 was his affair, not theirs. "What is that to us?" 
 
 they said ; " see thou to that." ^ He must bear his 
 
 own burden. They would not trouble themselves to 
 
 sit in judgment upon his actions. It was no 
 
 concern of theirs either to praise or to blame him. 
 
 He had served their purpose, and they did not 
 
 care now what became of him. So if he had hoped 
 
 for great things from going over to the service 
 
 of the priests he was now completely disenchanted. 
 
 His money even they were unwilling with their 
 
 consecrated hands to touch. Hurrying from them 
 
 in his despair he left it lying on their sacred 
 
 floor. ^ He found it so easy to rid himself of the 
 
 reward of his iniquity, but so difficult to be rid 
 
 of the crime itself. The consciousness of it was 
 
 as a hot burning in his soul. The burden of it 
 
 became for him heavier than ever. Those priests 
 
 he had served too well would not, and could not 
 
 lighten it for him. They were exulting over the 
 
 success of their wicked plot, but their success 
 
 was now his awful failure and distress. In vain 
 
 he sought pity for himself from his partners in 
 
 guilt. Abandoned of men, with a crushing sense 
 
 ^ Matt, xxvii. 4. 
 
 2 The thirty pieces of silver — between £3 and £4 oi" our money — 
 the price, according to Exodus xxi. 32, of a slave. 
 269 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 of divine retribution, with the horror and anguisli 
 of an awakened conscience, and apparently despairing 
 of mercy, he went and hanged himself.-^ And it 
 appeared as if the very tree on which he sought 
 death threw liim off. The cord with which 
 he bound himself broke, and falling headlong — 
 over a precipice perhaps — " he burst asunder in the 
 midst, and all his bowels gushed out.^ " 
 
 It was a terrible death to die, especially for 
 one brought up in the religion of Jehovah. 
 There is only another case of the kind in Scripture. 
 It is remarkable it is also that of a traitor — that 
 of Ahithophel, the betrayer of the cause of king 
 David, the Judas of the Old Testament history.^ 
 Suicide was only too common in pagan Greece and 
 Rome. There it was thought the proper and even 
 manly thing to put an end to one's life when it 
 
 ^ Matt, xxvii. 5. Oecumeuius {Enarrationes in Acta Apostohrum, 
 cli. II.) refers back to Papias, a disciple of John, the tradition that 
 Judas " moved about in this world, a terrible example of impiety, 
 being swollen in body in such a degree that where a chariot Avould 
 easily pass he was not able to find a passage. His eyelids were so 
 swelled out that he could not see the light. . . After suffering 
 many torments and judgments he died in his own field." Lange 
 curiously supposes that Judas " attempted first to retire to a hermit 
 life as anchoret," and then having found this life unendurable he 
 went on his way of self-destruction {Life of Christ, vol. IV. 122). 
 
 ^ Acts i. 18. Hackett [Illustrations of Scripture, p. 266) says that 
 he found " a precipice on the face of the hiU from twenty-five to 
 forty feet in height, with olive trees growing near the edge, and a 
 rocky pavement at the bottom, so that a person falling from above 
 would probably be crushed and mangled as well as killed." 
 
 3 2 Sam xvii. 23. 
 
 270 
 
THE TRAITOR'S EXD 
 
 seemed to have nothing more to offer, when its bur- 
 dens or its trials became too great to bear. And with 
 paganism reviving and spreading amid our nineteenth 
 century civiUsation, suicide is increasing and is not 
 looked upon with the horror it ought ever to 
 inspire. The question is even seriously discussed 
 whether there be not circumstances in which it is 
 justifiable, as if such a sin could by any circumstances 
 whatever be whitewashed and turned into a virtue. 
 ' Believing that there is a God we justly look upon 
 it as crowning Judas' guilt, as crowning any man's 
 guilt, however great otherwise it may be, that he 
 should thus abandon the sacred trust of life, and 
 rush presumptuously and unbidden into the divine 
 presence. In such a case the verdict usually 
 required by charity is that the doer of the act was 
 not in his sound mind when he did it. But 
 taking the sceptic or the atheist even on his 
 own ground, and allowing that there is no God 
 and no judgment day to reckon with, we 
 are bound to say that suicide is the basest and 
 most cowardly of acts. It is a man running away 
 from the battle of life because he has been 
 worsted, and refusing to live because the selfish 
 terms on which he demands to have existence 
 are not met. 
 
 But what was to be done with the money Judas 
 271 
 
FIW3I THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 had thrown on the sanctuary floor? It is significant 
 how the priests discuss the question. They do it 
 as men to whom the externals of law and creed 
 are everything. Gathering up the silver pieces 
 they said, " It is not lawful for us to put 
 them into the treasury, for it is the price of 
 blood." ^ It was according to them lawful to use 
 those silver pieces to buy the services of a traitor, 
 but not to put them to the sacred uses of the 
 Temple. It did not matter how they soiled their 
 consciences, .but the Temple treasury must not 
 be defiled. With the money they might buy 
 a field in which to bury strangers — that is, pious 
 pilgrims from heathen lands who happened 
 to die in Jerusalem — but it must not be 
 allowed to desecrate God's house. Men's con- 
 sciences were of less account and less sacredness 
 than the outward and material building in which 
 God was w^orshipped ; and apparently there was 
 the least possible sanctity, if any at all, attaching 
 to a graveyard for foreign Jews or Gentile 
 proselytes.^ They could plot against the Son of 
 
 1 Matt, xxvii. 6, 7. 
 
 2 Meyer {Matthciv, vol. II., p. 249) thinks that it was in- 
 tended as a burial place for foreign Jews, not Gentile proselytes, 
 otherwise they would have been more specifically indicated. The 
 prophecy he believes to be taken from Zechariah, XI., 12, 13, and 
 that it was by some slip of the memory Jeremiah was inserted. 
 Lange {Com. on Matthcir, p. 505) holds the opposite view. 
 
 272 
 
THE TRAITOR'S EM) 
 
 God, and hire the man that should betray 
 Him without a sense of guilt at all, while they 
 would have regarded it as a sin to fail in the 
 smallest point of outward or ceremonial observance. 
 It is singular how human nature inclines still to 
 such artificial standards of conduct and moral 
 judgment. Morality and religion are externalised; 
 and men who would count it sacrilege to rob a 
 church, or to be guilty of any outward irreverence, 
 have no qualms of conscience while they may 
 be robbing God and profaning His name every 
 day by their lives and their conduct. And so 
 absorbed do they become in the outward, the 
 formal, and the conventional that it is difficult 
 to bring them to any real sense of sin. 
 
 It was no doubt kind and thoughtful of these 
 priests to lay out the money that had thus 
 
 Edersheim [Life and Times, vol. II. 575) believes that the 
 '* Potter's Field which was afterwards bought with the blood money- 
 was also the place where Judas had tragically ended his life. It 
 was, he conjectures, near to where the Xedron and Hinnom valleys 
 merge, and where jagged rocks rise perpendicularly, and there may 
 have been some gnarled and stunted tree on which the wof ul deed 
 might be done." According to Weiss {Life, III., 345) it was the 
 ' ' held of blood ' ' because it was the place stained by J udas' blood 
 \\hen he committed suicide, and the place in which the hrst grave 
 opened was that of the traitor himself. Robinson {Biblical 
 Researches in I'alestitu-, vol. I., 353) agreeing with Edersheim, 
 describes the "Potter's Field" or Aceldama as at the eastern end 
 of the ridge of the hill to the south of the valley of Hinnom 
 opposite Mount Zion near to where that vallej- meets with the valley 
 of Jehoshaphat. He says that the hill is steep and in many part's 
 rises in rocky precipices, and that the rocks and the whole hill side 
 are full of excavated tombs. 
 
 273 
 
FROM TEE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 come into their hands in purchasing a burying 
 place for strangers.^ The proposal had this at 
 least to recommend it, that it was a cheap way of 
 carrying out a charitable object. It cost them 
 nothing. The Potter's Field was a comparatively 
 waste and worthless piece of land. It was the 
 exchange they were pleased to have for the price 
 at which they themselves had valued Jesus' blood. 
 They would probably feel relieved when the money 
 that might have come to burn their fingers, as 
 well as those of Judas, was got rid of in such a 
 satisfactory way. The strangers would esteem them 
 the more highly that they had been so thoughtful 
 for their dead. When the priests heard of Judas' 
 tragic death they would be happy in the thought 
 that they could use his own money to provide 
 him with a grave. Probably Judas himself was 
 the first to be buried in this new place of graves, 
 this Aceldama or "field of blood," which tradition 
 still points out as a monument to the truth of 
 this part of the Gospel story.^ 
 
 The evangelist Matthew, true to his characteristic 
 
 ^ In Acts i. 18 Judas is said to have pui^chased the field himself. 
 Here in Matthew it is the priests who do it with Judas' money. But 
 it is only the hypercritical who can see a discrepancy here. 
 
 2 Tradition places the Potter's Field or Aceldama on the steep face 
 of the southern hill opposite Mount Zion, which bounds the valley of 
 Hinnom. For centuries it appears to have been used as a burying 
 place for strangers or pilgrims. 
 
 274 
 
THE ri{AlTOlVS ENL 
 
 manner, lis careful to point out how prophecy 
 was fulfilled in this singular transaction^ ''Then 
 was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy 
 the prophet, saying. And they took the thirty 
 pieces of silver, the price of Him that was valued, 
 whom they of the children of Israel did value. 
 And gave them for the Potter's Field, as the Lord 
 appointed me." ^ Here is one of those minute 
 difficulties or discrepancies in Scripture which have 
 not yet been satisfactorily explained, but which 
 should disturb no one unless he is concerned to 
 maintain a very mechanical conception of the 
 inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture. It is in 
 Zechariah Cxi. 12 13) and not in Jeremiah that 
 the Old Testament quotation is to be found. And 
 the quotation is a free one from a chapter in 
 which, as it seems to us, the prophetic vision 
 of the coming Christ, the Branch, as Zechariah 
 loves to call Him, is not so clear as in some 
 other passages from that prophet. But if the 
 evangelist saw this prophetic meaning in the 
 words, we may well yield to him. He stood 
 nearer the times of those old prophets, and 
 he had learned in the best of all schools — that of 
 Christ Himself, how to interpret their predictions.^ 
 
 1 Matt, xxvii. 9, 10. 
 
 - Lightfoot is of opinion that here we have a mere mistake of 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 The character, career and end of Judas present 
 one of the most difficult moral problems. For 
 centuries he has been looked upon as the worst 
 of men. In our own day there has been a 
 certain reaction in his favour. Dante, who may 
 be regarded as representing the general feeling of 
 Christendom in his time, and for generations 
 before and since, places him in the lowest circle 
 of all in his Inferno. The emperor of the king- 
 dom dolorous and he occupy the circle together, 
 as if he were next to him in enormity of 
 transgression, and pre-eminent above all sinners 
 of mankind. He dwells in the mouth of Satan, 
 who crunches him between his teeth. His face 
 is hidden in the awful cavity, while his feet 
 are plying wildly without. The Judecca, the 
 name given to his abode, is a place where fire 
 and ice maintain eternal feud ; and his is the 
 soul which beyond all others in the Inferno has the 
 greatest pain.^ 
 
 The judgment all this implies in regard to 
 Judas some writers in our modern times have 
 been disposed to call in question, and to modify, 
 
 memory, Jeremiali being put in the prophecy regarding the Potter's 
 Field instead of Zechariah {Horae Heb. in Ev. Matt., p. 307). Others 
 suggest error in transcription, and others that Jeremiah was the name 
 given to that division of the Old Testament from which the quotation 
 was taken. 
 
 ^ Dante, Inferno, Canto XXXIV. 
 276 
 
TEE TRAITOR'S ENL 
 
 if not reverse. Reversed altogether it cannot be 
 so long as men have respect to what our Lord, 
 who knew what was in man, so plainly said of him, 
 " Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you 
 is a devil."^ 
 
 De Ouincey's theory is well-known.^ It has 
 seemed plausible to many. Judas had followed 
 Jesus believing in His promised kingdom. He 
 saw His power manifested in His miracles. He 
 marked how He could move the people so that 
 they were read}^ to take Him b}^ force and make 
 Him a king.^ But one year, two years, three 
 years passed, and still there was no sign of the 
 kingdom. Judas desired to hasten matters. He 
 determined at last to precipitate a crisis. That Pass- 
 over should see the revelation of his Master's expected 
 power and glory. When his Master entered 
 Jerusalem amid the hosannas of the multitude his 
 hopes were raised to the highest point. Day 
 after day however passed, and his Master seemed 
 to do nothing to fulfil those hopes. At the 
 supper in the Upper Room he resolved on the step 
 that was to end the uncertaint3\ He was to put 
 his Master into the hands of the Jewish rulers ; 
 
 ^ John vi. 70. 
 
 2 De Quincey's Works {Massoii's Edition^ Vol. VITT.. IHl, 
 
 3 John vi. 15. 
 
 277 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 and judging his Master by himself he expected 
 that He would confound His most bitter and 
 most formidable foes, extricate Himself from their 
 hands, and make such a display of Himself and 
 His supernatural power as would lead to the 
 establishment of His kingdom. Events did not 
 proceed as Judas anticipated. When he saw his 
 Master a spectacle of pity given over to shame 
 and torture and death, he was overwhelmed with 
 disappointment and despair. Innocence and Divinity 
 so meekly and patiently enduring, He that saved 
 others not saving Himself — this Judas could not 
 understand. The career of Jesus was ending so 
 differently from what he had expected. All his 
 hopes regarding it were blighted and destroyed. 
 His suicide was that of one with a broken heart. 
 But however much of truth and plausibility 
 there may be in this theory, it is not the one 
 the evangelists support. They tell us Judas was 
 an unworthy disciple, and that it was Satan's 
 entering him that made him a traitor.^ They state 
 that the Master had seen the traitor in him 
 long before he came to play that tragic part, and 
 that He had sought to warn him from his evil 
 course again and again.^ They suggest to us that 
 
 ^ Luke xxii. 3. 
 "^ John vi. 64, and xiii. 26. 
 278 
 
THE TRAITOR'S END 
 
 he was a selfish, covetous, ambitious, worldly- 
 minded man.^ They do not hesitate to say that 
 he was a thief,^ helping himself out of the bag 
 which he carried as treasurer of the little company, 
 doing sometimes what many thieves would scorn 
 to do, stealing what Jesus would have given to 
 the poor. They make plain that his avarice was 
 uppermost when he bargained with the priests 
 about the betrayal and unblushingly asked — "What 
 are you willing to give me, and I will deliver 
 Him unto you ? " ^ 
 
 It is a problem how such a man came to be 
 a disciple. Undoubtedly Jesus chose him as 
 He did the others. He must have had the 
 qualities which, outwardly at least, made him 
 eligible. We cannot suppose that he was a 
 deceiver from the first, or that he had come 
 among the twelve as a spy or an enemy in 
 disguise, of set purpose to play a traitor's part in 
 the end. We think rather that Judas was a 
 self-deceived man. He meant to be religious. 
 There was very much in Christ that had a real 
 attraction for him. But self continued uppermost. 
 It did not yield to the influence, or to the direct 
 
 ^ John xii. 4-6 
 
 2 John xii. 6. 
 
 3 Matt. xxvi. 15. 
 
 279 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 appeals of the Master. He was willing to follow 
 the good so long as it lay in the direction of 
 his self-interest, but when the two parted it was 
 to the self-interest he clung. The treasurership of 
 the band exactly suited him. There was no 
 competition for that office ; and in it he was 
 continued with a large measure of unsuspecting 
 confidence of which he was unworthy. 
 
 As self would not yield, and covetousness and 
 worldly ambition grew by what they had to feed 
 upon, the inward rupture between Judas and his 
 Master became more and more distinctly felt. 
 The gulf widened. Jesus knew His false disciple 
 through and through, and the false disciple came 
 to feel more and more distinctly that he was found 
 out. He could not but be aware that the Master 
 did not like him, and did not trust him, and 
 that so long as Judas was Judas, an unchanged 
 man, the estrangement must continue. When 
 there was strife among the Twelve as to which 
 of them should be the greatest, we may be sure 
 he would be in the heart of it. Any dis- 
 sension there might be such a spirit as his 
 would be sure to embitter ; and one knows 
 not how many old sores a jealous self-asserting 
 nature like his may have given him to carry 
 within. And his management of the bag may 
 280 
 
THE TUAlTOirs EXT) 
 
 also have roused some measure of distrust and 
 ill-feeling.^ Renan thinks that spite had a good 
 deal to do with Judas' conduct, and also that 
 " the treasurer overcame the apostle." ^ 
 
 Three years was a long time for such a man 
 to abide in the fellowship of Jesus. What a trial 
 of patience it must have been for our Lord ! It 
 was tolerating in His innermost circle the man 
 who should at length secure the cross for Him. 
 It is not wonderful that by and by that association 
 was more than Judas could endure. The open 
 rupture was only a question of time and of mood. 
 And the mood and the time came with the night 
 of the Supper. Judas felt that he could no longer 
 bear such holy company, and that there was nothing 
 more for him to hope for from such a Master. 
 He was also shrewd enough to know that a 
 catastrophe was at hand, and he meant to be on 
 the winning side. His fellow disciples seemed to 
 him blinded, but he thought he knew where his 
 advantage lay. He would make himself useful 
 to those who, as he believed, were about to 
 triumph. He would sell his services for what 
 they might bring ; and when the triumph of 
 
 ^ These and other causes accounting for Judas' remaikal)le 
 charactei- and development are admirably treated in the chapter on 
 Jmhis in Professor IJruce's " Traimng of the Tirelre.'" 
 
 2 Renan, Life <f Jesns, p. 264. 
 
 S 281 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 the priests came he expected he would not be 
 forgotten. His Master's loss should be his gain.^ 
 And so from the table in the Upper Room he 
 went out — "and it was night." 
 
 Are Judas-like men so rare after all ? How 
 many under the influence of self are every day 
 proving traitors to duty and to their most 
 solemn professions ? Judas' act of betrayal 
 touched directly the person of Christ, and this 
 has given it the pre-eminence in guiltiness that it 
 has. But the spirit is the same which, for personal 
 gain or pleasure or self in any form, sacrifices a 
 friend or a cause or a principle to which one has 
 distinctly pledged himself. 
 
 We believe there have been worse men than 
 Judas. There have been men who have committed 
 the greatest crimes, and have not been troubled 
 with remorse or with pity for their victims. To 
 escape those stings of conscience and the horrors 
 of despair which were his tragic experience in 
 the end Judas, it has been well remarked, should 
 have been either a better or a worse man. If he 
 had been a better man he would not have done 
 
 ^ Jeremy Taylor remarks that Judas sold his Master fo • the sura 
 at which he valued the ointment that he saw poured on Jesus' head 
 — reckoning the piece of silver to be equal t) ten denarii, three 
 hundred pence ! {D^e and Death of Jesus Chris', Part III. ad Sect. 
 15, 11.) 
 
 282 
 
THE TRAITQIVS EX]) 
 
 his wicked deed. If he had heen a worse the 
 doing of it would not have tortured him as it did. 
 To such a man the words of Jesus have a 
 specially significant application, " Woe unto him ! 
 it had been good for that man if he had not 
 been born.'' ^ 
 
 ^ Matt. xxvi. 24. 
 
 283 
 
THE VIA DOLOROSA 
 
 The trial was now over. Pilate had given 
 sentence that it should be as the multitude 
 required. Preparations for carrying out the 
 crucifixion decreed were forthwith entered upon. 
 Usually with us several days, weeks indeed, are 
 allowed to elapse between the capital sentence 
 upon a criminal and its execution. Jeremy Taylor 
 states on the authority of Suetonius that there 
 was a Tiberian law, made some twelve years before, 
 requiring that ten days should elapse between a 
 capital sentence and its execution.^ But the 
 conquered subjects of Rome were not treated as 
 her citizens. They were often, like slaves, dealt 
 with in a very summary way. According to 
 Jewish law and custom, no one could be executed 
 on the same day on which his sentence was 
 pronounced. No time was lost in executing the 
 sentence passed on Jesus. He was forthwith 
 
 ^ Taylor's Life and Death of Jesus Christ, III,, xv., 28, 
 284 
 
THE VIA DOLOROSA 
 
 hurried on His way to Calvary. He was not 
 a Roman citizen. Even if He had been, it is 
 questionable whether, as one condemned for being 
 a mover of sedition. He would have been allowed 
 a right of appeal. Notorious robbers, or leaders 
 of factions, or movers of sedition, might be 
 punished immediately after their trial. ^ The 
 Catiline conspirators were declared as public enemies 
 to have forfeited their citizenship, and therefore 
 to have no right of appeal, and they were strangled 
 in prison on the afternoon of the day on which 
 they were tried.^ Yet it must be added that 
 this act formed one of the charges on which 
 Cicero afterwards was banished.^ Usually the time 
 for appealing, or the time elapsing between a 
 sentence of capital punishment and its being 
 carried out, was two or three days,"* and it 
 appears in the later Justinian code to have been 
 lengthened to ten days.^ But there was much 
 arbitrariness in this part of Roman criminal 
 procedure ; and a governor like Pilate would see 
 nothing improper or unjust, least of all in the 
 case of one who could claim no Roman rights, 
 
 1 Modestine, Ligest, 49, 1, 16. 
 ^ Fronde, Julius Caesar, p. 164. 
 •' Froude, Julius Caesar, p. 214. 
 ^ Marcian, Digest, 49, 4. 
 ' Justinian, Nowlla, 23, 1. 
 28:: 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 in his being led at once from the bar to the 
 place of punishment. 
 
 It appears also that this promptitude in executing 
 a capital sentence was in accordance with Jewish 
 as well as Roman usage, and even with Jewish 
 sentiment. Usually, according to the Talmud, a 
 day was required to elapse between the sentence 
 and its execution ; but if the accused were con- 
 demned on a Friday (the Jewish week being 
 understood), seeing it was not lawful for him to_ 
 be executed on a Saturday or a Sabbath, he 
 might be executed immediately after the trial, 
 as they thought it not right to keep him waiting 
 too long} Rabbi Abahou said, "It would aggravate 
 the punishment not to execute the condemned at 
 once." 
 
 The multitude, in this instance at any rate, 
 were impatient to see their victim on the 
 cross. And what cared the Roman governor ? 
 Compelled to yield to their clamour, he was 
 rather desirous to be done with the trouble- 
 some business as soon as possible. As for the 
 Jewish priests and rulers, they had already 
 shown their disregard of law, humanity, everything 
 sacred or just, while they sought to compass 
 Jesus' death. It was the Passover time. One 
 
 ^ Schwab's Talmud, vol. X. pp. 6S, 268. 
 286 
 
THE VIA DOLOliOSA 
 
 might have expected that they would have been 
 unwiUing to have their most sacred festival asso- 
 ciated with a thing so abhorrent and so defiling 
 as a public crucifixion. But they were as eager 
 for their prey as the mob could be, and it was 
 so ordered that the day on which the Passover 
 should be slain should witness the shedding of 
 the blood of the great Paschal Lamb. Probably 
 in less than an hour after receiving His final 
 sentence at the Praetorium, Jesus was to be seen 
 in the agony of His cross on Calvary. 
 
 Pilate's last act as he left his chair of judgment 
 on the Pavement was to order two thieves to 
 join Jesus on his via dolorosa. It seemed a 
 needless and wanton humiliation that He should 
 have to travel to Calvary and to die there 
 in such compan}^ Probably they were Barabbas' 
 companions in crime.^ They were doubtless 
 men who had been lying in prison under 
 sentence of death. And Pilate seemed in the 
 mood to give the mob the entertainment of more 
 executions than they had asked for. He would 
 forthwith on this day empty the dungeons of 
 Jerusalem of its greatest criminals, cover Calvary 
 
 ^ So Andrews {Life^ p. 460), who adds that an early tradition 
 gives them the names of Titns and Dumachus, and says that Jesus 
 met them in Eg^qit, and predicted to them that tliey should both be 
 cruciliod with llim. 
 
 287 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 with crosses, and provide such a carnival of blood 
 and horror as should satisfy the most bloodthirsty.^ 
 
 We are tempted here to anticipate what Jesus 
 afterwards made of His degrading company. What 
 was intended as an insult and humiliation was 
 turned into an honour. Jesus gained in one of 
 those two thieves the first glorious triumph of His 
 cross. The Friend of sinners found in one who 
 seemed among the chief of sinners the companion 
 He loved to have for Himself on His way that 
 day to Paradise. 
 
 The cross they brought Jesus was, we may be 
 sure, of the roughest description. Very likely it 
 consisted simply of a strong upright post, not 
 much over the height of a man, with two cross 
 pieces nailed to it so as to form the shape of 
 the letter V, and with a rough wooden pin 
 about the middle of the beam offering a cruel seat 
 for the body of the sufferer. The condemned 
 man was expected to carry the cross on 
 which he was to die, this being one of the 
 refinements of cruelty and insult to which he 
 w^as subjected. It was laid upon his shoulders, 
 
 1 Weiss {Life, III. 362) thinks that Pilate, by joining the two thieves 
 to His company, meant to insult not Jesus, hut the Jews. Their king- 
 should die between two malefactors. 
 
 288 
 
THE VIA DOLOROSA 
 
 and to its outstretched arms it often happened 
 that his own were bound. ^ 
 
 Thus we can imagine to ourselves Jesus going 
 forth bearing His cross.- We can see Him moving 
 on, wearing His own simple Galilean dress (for 
 they had taken off the purple robe, and put 
 His own raiment on again^), the crown of thorns 
 still on His brows (there is no word of that 
 being removed), and His arms bound to the arms 
 of the cross He is carrying. He is stooping 
 heavily under His burden. It seems as if He 
 would faint and die under it before He reaches 
 the place of execution. His two wretched 
 partners in suffering and in this open shame are 
 bearing Him company. Each carries a cross like 
 His own, and with a whitened board hung from his 
 neck, telling in large black letters what his name 
 and his crimes are."* Each is attended by his 
 executioners — four Roman soldiers to each acting 
 as a o'uard ; while before and behind are the rest 
 
 1 Edersheim, Zi/<? 0/ Christ, II., 583. Geikie, Life and Words 
 of Christ, 706. 
 
 - Not merely the patibtclufn or cross beam, as has been supposed, 
 but the whole of the great and heavy instrument of death. Zoeckler's 
 Cross of Christ, p. 93. 
 
 ■^ Matt, xxvii. 31. Mark xv. 20. 
 
 ^ This whitened board with the name and crime of the 
 condemned man written in large letters on it was sometimes borne 
 before him on his way to execution by an inferior officer. Suetonius, 
 Caliyula 32. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 of the detachment under the command of the 
 centurion whose duty it is to see the crucifixion 
 carried out.^ The great multitude who liave been 
 clamouring for this feast of slaughter, and whose 
 numbers are increased as street after street is 
 traversed, follow in the rear, or hasten on in 
 front to secure for themselves the best places from 
 which to view the dreadful spectacle.^ 
 
 What the actual route was which was taken by 
 the mournful procession can only be conjectured. 
 Jerusalem has been so often destroyed and built 
 upon again that it is very difficult to identif}^ 
 localities. Over its site city has been piled upon 
 city in the course of the centuries. They tell us 
 that London, as the Romans knew it, is some 
 sixteen or seventeen feet below the surface of the 
 London of to-day. To reach the Jerusalem and 
 the way of sorrows which Jesus trod, or even the 
 skull-like eminence on which He died, much deeper 
 excavations have to be made. This explains 
 why most of the holy places there, Calvary not 
 excepted, are matters of uncertainty and controversy. 
 What is certain in the present case is that the 
 distance from the Praetorium to the place of 
 
 ^ Tacitus, Annals, III. 14. 
 
 2 Edersheim remarks that processions usually took the longest road 
 to the place of execution {Life of Christ, II., oSo). 
 
 iqo 
 
THE VIA DOLOROSA 
 
 crucitixion must have been about a mile, that 
 the procession had to traverse a considerable part 
 of the city, and that the place called Calvary or 
 Golgotha where the cross was erected was without 
 the gate. Along that way the thorn-crowned 
 Monarch of all lands and ages moved on to His 
 death and to Pi is triumph in meekness and in 
 majesty, if also in pain and sorrow^, marking the 
 way as He w^ent with His blood. 
 
 Over this via dolorosa of our Lord the 
 Christian imagination has often been fondly at 
 work. Incident after incident has been invented 
 to fill in the lines of the infinitely pathetic picture. 
 Thus we have the legend of Veronica,^ the 
 maiden who weeps as she sees the Man of Sorrows 
 on His way, carrying His heavy load. His 
 raiment so stained, Himself so weary and worn, 
 and who, in the kindness of her heart, approaches 
 and wipes the bloody sweat from His brow, 
 receiving upon the napkin she uses the impression 
 which it ever afterwards retains of the blessed 
 Saviour's face. 
 
 Then, as if to supply and illustrate a lesson of 
 a totally different kind, we have the remarkable 
 legend which appears in so many forms of the 
 
 ^ In the apocryphal writings, the Mors Filati and the Vindkla 
 Salvaloris. 
 
 291 
 
FRO 21 THE GAEBEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 Wandering Jew.^ Ahasuerus — for such is his name, 
 according to perhaps the best known form of the 
 story — is a shoemaker who, as Jesus is passing by, 
 comes forth from his dwelHng. Jesus asks to be 
 allowed to rest for a little on his doorstep. 
 The shoemaker scornfully refuses, strikes Him, 
 causes Him to totter under His cross, and 
 bids Him hasten with quicker steps upon His 
 way. Jesus replies, " Because thou grudgest me 
 a moment of rest, I shall enter into my rest, 
 but thou shalt wander restless till I come again." 
 From that moment Ahasuerus must needs follow 
 the Christ and see Him die. Thereafter he must 
 wander over the world, visiting many lands, passing 
 through many a fearful experience and peril, and 
 unable to find rest or death anywhere. A parable 
 we have here, specially suited, no doubt, to 
 mediaeval minds, but not without instruction for 
 our own as to the restlessness and misery of 
 those who turn away the suffering Saviour from 
 their doors, or who have no place for Him in 
 their hearts and their lives. 
 
 These two legends, so contrasted, illustrate well 
 the varied impression Jesus bearing His cross still 
 
 ^ In Baring Gould's Curious Myths of the Middle Ages, different 
 forms of this legend as existing in different countries are given, pp. 
 1-31. 
 
 292 
 
THE VIA T) 010 ROSA 
 
 makes upon men. As Jeremy Taylor when writing 
 on this very event in the history of the Passion 
 says, " Sin laughed to see the King of heaven 
 and the great Lover of souls, instead of the sceptre 
 of His kingdom, to bear a tree of cursing and of 
 shame. But piety wept tears, and knew they 
 would melt into joy when she should behold that 
 cross, which loaded the shoulders of her Lord, 
 afterwards sit upon the sceptres, and be engraved 
 and signed upon the foreheads of kings." ^ 
 
 But art has done even more than legend here. 
 One of Dore's most striking pictures is that of 
 Christ leaving the Praetorium. It is one of 
 the largest that ever left a painter's hands. 
 In It there are several hundreds of figures, some 
 of them lifesize. Christ is seen descending for 
 the last time the steps of the Praetorium. He is 
 wearing His seamless white robe, and the crown 
 of thorns is still upon His head. He stands alone, 
 sublimely apart, while a vast assemblage is looking 
 on. He appears like the Man of Sorrows He is, 
 sorrowful unto death, yet divinely majestic ; 
 meek and lowly, yet a dignity not of this 
 world in His whole aspect and bearing. A halo 
 is round His head ; and it is so treated by the 
 artist that it throws an unearthly radiance about 
 
 ^ Jeremy Taylor's Life of Christ, III. 15, 
 293 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 the crown of thorns, imparting to it a kind of 
 transfiguration. Near Jesus are the chief priests 
 who have had so large and guilty a hand in this 
 divine tragedy. In the foreground are the excited 
 mob, many of them pressing eagerly forward to 
 feast their eyes upon their victim, while others 
 seem as if now they would ^\'illingly be away 
 from the scene. The Roman guard is seen sternly 
 urging the crowd back with their glittering spears, 
 and clearing a way for their Prisoner. In the 
 distant background, amidst an ominous darkness 
 that appears to be gathering about them, Pilate 
 and Herod are to be observed making friends 
 with each other — the governor in his toga of 
 dusk}' red, with an air about him as if he were 
 still uneasy, and not without a tinge of remorse, 
 but the more eager on that account to disclaim 
 all responsibility. Nor must we omit to mention 
 that close by the great central figure are the 
 mother of our Lord, in tranquil grief and in an 
 attitude of resignation, some sympathetic friends and 
 disciples, and Mary Magdalene, with her tearful 
 face turned aside, and apparently sinking to 
 the ground, in danger of being trodden upon by 
 the rude soldiery. Through a crowd, that seems 
 as if the cry '' Crucify him " were upon their 
 lips, the divine Sufferer is seen passing on with 
 
 294 
 
THE VIA nOLOlWSA 
 
 the majesty of God, and at the same time with 
 the sensitiveness of man. And over the whole vast 
 picture a m3'Sterious darkening air is thrown, as if 
 of gathering clouds presaging the tempest of 
 divine wrath which was to break forth upon the 
 infatuated people who rejected and crucified the 
 Son of God. 
 
 That picture sets forth the pathetic scene with 
 wonderful fidelity, though there are some things 
 that must be set down purely to the artist's 
 imagination. Certainly Pharisees were there with 
 the look of malignant satisfaction on their faces, 
 now that the object of their relentless hatred had 
 been brought so low. Sadducees were there who 
 used to listen with cynical disdain to His loft}- 
 spiritual teaching, bestowing upon Him now 
 their contemptuous pity. Roman soldiers were 
 there, fraternising with the Jewish people, and 
 delighted that for this time at least they were 
 playing a popular part and pleasing the multitude 
 by the insults and tortures they had been and still 
 were inflicting upon thair Prisoner. And we are 
 willing to believe that the licence is justified 
 which the painter has used bv throwing upon 
 the canvas figures of an opposite character — the 
 sympathising Nicodemus, the disciple whom Jesus 
 loved, the Magdalene who could die for Him, and 
 
 295 
 
FROM THE GARBEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 the mother whose heart was pierced by His 
 sufferings as by a sword. 
 
 Of these sympathising friends, however, the 
 sacred record says nothing. We cannot doubt 
 that some of them were present ; but, perplexed and 
 paralysed by the turn things had taken, they 
 had not the courage to declare themselves. Alone, 
 trusting only in the Father, and upheld by His 
 own great love which the greatest suffering and 
 self-sacrifice could not exhaust, Jesus entered upon 
 His way of sorrow, took up the cross men gave 
 Him, and went to die upon it on Calvary. No 
 human friend appeared to defend Him or His 
 cause. No angel visibly came to His aid. No 
 fire descended from heaven to consume those 
 w^ho had mocked and scourged Him, and who 
 were now to put Him to the cruellest death. There 
 was not even that ominous cloud-threatening sky 
 which the artist has given to his work. The sun 
 shone as usual. The hour had not yet arrived 
 when nature should throw her thick veil of 
 darkness over the last agonies of her Lord. She 
 gave no sign, even when to her divine Maker 
 the rude and cruel cross was brought, and when 
 the crowd broke out into a j^ell of fiendish 
 satisfaction as they saw it laid upon Him. 
 
 Yet to complete the picture we should like 
 296 
 
THE VIA DOLOBOSA 
 
 to have of the whole pathetic scene, we would 
 wiUingly put into it the great sympathetic grateful 
 throng, who in their own grief and sorest need 
 have turned to the divine Man of Sorrows 
 bearing the cross of sin and shame for them, and 
 have blessed Him for the help and the hope He 
 has thus brought. We like the conception so 
 far of that other French artist, Beraud, who in 
 his picture of the scene has represented the 
 Saviour travelling on and bending under His 
 heavy load, with His foes and executioners behind 
 Him, but with a great band of devout sympa- 
 thisers and worshippers in front. In that represen- 
 tative band there are the old man whose face is 
 made radiant as he directs his dying look upon 
 his suffering Saviour, the orphan children praising 
 His name and thanking Him for the loving care 
 and the home His bearing the cross has provided 
 for them, the wounded soldier who finds healing 
 and soothing as he looks upon the Sufferer, the 
 young bride entreating His benediction upon 
 her new life, and the slave too holding up his 
 chains and gazing wistfully and gratefully upon 
 Him who suffered Himself to be bound that all 
 might be free.^ A countless throng indeed have 
 
 ^ The painter, as a good Roman Catholic, has not scrupled to be 
 guilty of the anachronism of putting a priest and a couple of 
 
 T 2Q7 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 gazed, and are still gazing upon this thorn-crowned 
 Jesus bearing His cross ; they are blessing Him 
 through their tears for their comfort and salvation, 
 while Jesus is moving onward through their 
 midst, in triumph and in joy, leaving His foes 
 behind or fallen. 
 
 With Jesus thus going forth the shame of His 
 cross has begun. The cross was indeed the 
 accursed tree. To touch it was pollution, to 
 carry it was deepest disgrace. Reputable men 
 shrank back from it, as indicating contact with 
 the greatest criminality. Religious men remembered 
 it had been said, " Cursed is every one that 
 hangeth on a tree."^ Self-righteous Pharisees saw 
 in it the foulest contamination. And Gentiles 
 shared in these feelings of abhorrence. Cicero 
 wrote that death by the cross was a punishment 
 the very name of which should never come near 
 the thoughts, the eyes or ears of a Roman 
 citizen, far less his person.^ It was a punishment 
 for slaves, for alien and rebellious subjects whom 
 Rome despised, for the vilest malefactors ; and it 
 was that given to Jesus. 
 
 But what was all that men, with their poor 
 
 nuns in the forefront of tliis devout band. But we can overlook 
 that for the vahxe of his conception otherwise. 
 
 1 Gal iii. 13. 
 
 * Cicero, Fro Rabirio, V. 
 
 2Q8 
 
THE VIA DOLOROSA 
 
 perverted notions of honour or purity, saw in the 
 cross, as a thing of horror and a thing telHng 
 of the curse, compared to what Jesus must 
 have seen ? To Him it spoke of sin, of its 
 awful penalty and curse. It symbolised the 
 atoning death He was to die. As He took 
 it up He in very deed made Himself of no 
 reputation. He beggared Himself of His wealth of 
 righteousness, He consented to be numbered with 
 the transgressors, He humbled Himself to the guiltiest 
 sinner's place. The shame and punishment of our 
 sins He made His own. This was what was 
 worst of all to endure. To pass with His 
 humiliating burden through a scowling and hostile 
 crowd, to be exposed to every one's gibe and 
 sneer, to insult and injury at every step — this 
 was trying, especially for one with a keenly 
 sensitive moral nature. But to take up and carry 
 in the face of the universe the burden of a 
 world's guilt, and that which should be its 
 expiation, and to do this, knowing and feeling all 
 as only the God Man could — this was humiliation 
 and suffering altogether beyond our powers to 
 conceive and realise. To take up the cross 
 as Jesus did, purely under the compulsion of 
 His own love, and in the fullest consciousness 
 that those who laid it upon His shoulders had 
 299 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 no power at all against Him except what was 
 given them from above, affords us another glimpse 
 of His sublime resignation to His Father's will, 
 and His boundless devotion to His redeeming 
 work. The martyrs in His cause, who have 
 resignedly carried the wood for their own burning, 
 have but followed Him at an infinite distance. 
 
 We do not forget, however, that the cross Jesus 
 took up at the Praetorium had its two sides for 
 Him. While there was the shame and the suffering 
 manifest enough at that moment, there was also 
 the glory that was to follow ; and for the joy 
 that was set before Him He went forth to endure 
 the cross, despising its shame. ^ Unfriendly faces 
 all around, voices that reviled Him, passionate 
 insulting outcries such as only a frenzied mob 
 could utter, eyes gleaming with malignant delight 
 at the sight of Him bending and tottering under 
 His humiliating load, what were they all to Him 
 with His soul fixed on God and the eternities? 
 Pilate, Caiaphas, Pharisee, Sadducee, what were 
 they with their seeming triumph for an hour in 
 comparison with the things that must stand for 
 ever ? What were men, who would soon all be 
 off the stage of time and reduced to so many 
 handfuls of dust, compared with the everlasting 
 
 1 Heb. xii. 2. 
 
 300 
 
THE VIA DOLOROSA 
 
 God He had been sent to glorify, and the souls 
 He yearned to save ? 
 
 Would that we had more of the virtue that 
 still goes out of Jesus to enable us worthily to 
 follow Him. What is wanted is the strength 
 to stand alone while all the world may be against 
 us, together with the self-denial and the courage 
 to make light of loss, pain, and shame for His 
 sake. These come only to those who have the 
 vision, as He had, of the eternal and divine, the 
 unseen and heavenly. With that vision given to 
 them, with their souls' look and bent fixed 
 towards God and the things that abide, they are 
 the less moved or appalled by the sights and 
 sounds of this world. They can look above man 
 and beyond time. The cloud o witnesses belonging 
 to the higher world inspires them and concerns 
 them more than the crowd of their struggling 
 and sinning fellow-mortals around them on earth. 
 They dare to do the right, and they follow the 
 great Cross-bearer, rejoicing in the assurance that, 
 beyond all crosses for His sake, there is the crown 
 of life that fadeth not away. 
 
 301 
 
SIMON OF CYRENE. 
 
 Art and legend have done not a little, as we 
 have seen, to fill up the pathetic picture for us 
 of our Lord's carrying His cross to Calvary. But 
 the evangelists have not been altogether silent on 
 the subject. Doubtless much occurred on the 
 way, which the Christian world would gladly have 
 known, and which they could so well have told 
 us. Two of them at least, Matthew and John, 
 were in all probability eye and ear witnesses ; and 
 Mark and Luke must have often heard apostles 
 and others, for whom the day of Jesus' death 
 would have an imperishable memory, telling of 
 all they had that day seen and heard. 
 
 Yet how sparing of incidents they have been 
 except when their Master was specially concerned. 
 John, at any rate, who was a witness of the 
 trial in Caiaphas' house, was not likely to have 
 been absent from the crowd that saw his Master 
 going with His burden of shame to the place 
 302 
 
SIMON OF CYRENE 
 
 where He was to die. He must have been a 
 keen and deeply interested observer of all that 
 took place on the way. He must have had 
 incidents and impressions of the scene, stored up 
 in His mind and memory, which He would retain 
 to His dying day, and which the Church would 
 willingly have possessed. But from him we 
 have not even one. He has nothing to add to 
 what the other three evangelists have given. 
 Each of those three has preserved for us the story 
 of Simon of Cyrene, and of his touching service 
 to Jesus ; the third, the evangelist Luke, has 
 added that of the weeping of the women. These 
 two incidents are all that are recorded of a 
 scene on which the Christian imagination has 
 ever fondly dwelt. 
 
 Now had the men from whom we have the 
 Gospel history been the writers they are sometimes 
 represented to be — men who wrote for selfish and 
 party ends, and who did not hesitate to invent, 
 and to put forth myths when such were likely 
 to be helpful — they could not have resisted the 
 temptation to pile up the miraculous and the 
 legendary at this tragical stage of their story. 
 But they have written as if they did not even 
 know of temptation of that kind at all. They 
 have told their story as honest simple-minded men 
 303 
 
FROM THE GARLEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 o whom the truth was dearer than their Hves. 
 From their ample stores of knowledge and 
 experience they have selected just what was 
 needed to fulfil their great purpose in writing, 
 which was to lift up Christ crucified worthily, 
 and as Fie really was, to the view of the world 
 through all ages. 
 
 To the first of these two incidents, then, we 
 now turn our attention. A brief verse from each 
 of the Synoptists is all we have regarding it. 
 Yet each is not just the echo of the others. 
 Each puts the incident in his own way ; and so 
 we find, as might be expected, a touch supplied 
 b}^ one which is not given by the others. Thus 
 we are helped to a complete picture in our own 
 minds. 
 
 We see the melancholy procession on its way 
 from the Praetorium to Calvary. Jesus is in its 
 midst bearing His heavy cross. Accompanying 
 Him are the two thieves bearing each a similar 
 burden, and bound for the same tragic end. The 
 soldiers are there in strong force, with their 
 centurion at their head, charged with the safe 
 guarding of the prisoners and the carrying out 
 of the sentence of crucifixion. And the mixed 
 multitude are there, priests, rulers, people of all 
 classes and conditions, enlivening the way with 
 304 
 
SIMOX OF CYREKE 
 
 their brutal pleasantries. Onward the procession 
 moves through street after street, bringing people 
 forth from their houses to enquire what it all 
 means, and to add to Jesus' reviling foes or to 
 His few silent friends, according as the sight 
 happens to touch them. At length it reaches 
 the gate of the city, and makes for the hill 
 in the open country beyond the walls, where 
 ceremonial defilement from malefactors dying was 
 supposed no longer to be feared.^ 
 
 At this stage in the journey Simon of Cyrene 
 appears upon the scene. He has been in no way 
 connected with the previous proceedings. He has 
 seen nothing of the trial. He knows nothing of 
 what the priests and the people, Pilate and Herod 
 have been doing. Very likely he has never seen 
 the divine Sufferer before, though he may have 
 heard of Him in the distant country in North 
 Africa from which he has been travelling. 
 It is just possible, though of this we have 
 no hint, that through men of Cyrene coming 
 up in previous years to the Paschal Feast^ 
 he has learned something of the wondrous career 
 of the Man of Nazareth. Such men we know 
 
 ' Crucifixions among the Romans as well as among the Jews were 
 wont to tiike place outside the city. Cicero, In Verrem, Y. 66. 
 
 ' Ptolemy Lagus planted a colony of 100,000 Jews in Cyrene. 
 There was a synagogue of them in Jerusalem. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 had an honourable place among those on whom 
 the blessing of Pentecost came, and such a place 
 as naturally leads us to suppose they had some 
 sympathetic acquaintance previously with Jesus. 
 Simon is coming out of the country as the 
 evangelists tell us.^ He is on his way into the 
 city, rejoicing as he comes near the gate at the 
 prospect of ending a very long journey, and of 
 being in time to join in the Passover celebrations. 
 He is on pilgrimage to the holy city, and a 
 crowd of high and sacred feelings are filling him. 
 He is coming up to observe the most sacred of 
 Jewish feasts, probably for the first time in his 
 life. And here is the divine Paschal Lamb coming 
 forth to meet him, on His way to be slain on 
 Calvary. Could he ever have hoped to see such 
 a sight ? Could it be supposed that one looking 
 as he was for the consolation of Israel would see 
 at once in that most melancholy sight the 
 fulfilment of his grandest hopes ? Jesus bending 
 and ready to fall under His heavy cross, and 
 going to die upon it — could this be the 
 consolation and the glory of Israel ? Could He 
 be the long looked- for Messiah ? Or was it true 
 
 ^ Lightfoot supposes him to have been working in the fields and 
 bearing wood home ; Meyer that he was a slave ; Andrews, Geikie, 
 and many others that he may have been a pilgrim who was coming 
 up to the Paschal Feast. 
 
 306 
 
SIMON OF CTRENE 
 
 that the Paschal Lamb, associated with the 
 great deUverance from Egypt's bondage, slain, 
 roasted, eaten, was after all but the type of the true 
 Messiah, and that Simon coming to observe the 
 type was to find in that cross-bearing Jesus on 
 His way to Calvary the veritable antitype ? It 
 was even so, as Simon, we have reason to 
 believe, soon came to know. 
 
 One is struck with the instance here afforded 
 of the unforeseen ways in which men may be 
 brought into contact with Christ. Simon probably 
 had no thought of meeting Him when he set 
 out on pilgrimage. He came up to worship, but, 
 like another from Ethiopia,^ he was destined to 
 return with the treasure of the Gospel ; and 
 his country of Cyrene was to be one of the 
 first lands beyond Judea to receive the blessing 
 of the knowledge of Christ.^ He came to eat the 
 Passover. A special providence it was for him 
 that, as we have already remarked, he should 
 meet at the very gate of the city as he was 
 about to enter it, the true Paschal Lamb going 
 forth to be offered up on the appointed altar 
 on Calvary.^ That apparently chance meeting 
 
 ' Acts viii. 27. 
 
 - Acts xi. 20. 
 
 ^ Joseplius (Z^./., VI., IX. o) informs us that the Passover was 
 slain from the ninth to the eleventh hour. So Jesus must have died 
 as the tirst of these Paschal sacrilices were being oli'ered. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 turned the current of Simon's life for eternity.^ 
 An unexpected turn of events brings you in some 
 way or other face to face with Christ ; you meet 
 Him bearing His cross, or reveaHng His saving 
 power and life can never be again just what it 
 has been. Either you take the cross, so to speak, 
 from Christ's shoulders and make it your own, or 
 you join the multitude who add to its weight 
 and shame. 
 
 Simon met Jesus unexpectedly ; and there are 
 indications, we shall see, that his sympathies were 
 with Jesus and not with His foes. Barabbas also 
 came unexpectedly into contact with Him, but, 
 we fear, with a different result. To Jesus he 
 owed his release in a way he never could have 
 anticipated. The multitude chose him in preference 
 to the sinless Son of God. But he left his prison 
 that morning, it is to be feared, notwithstanding 
 the halo of beautiful romance modern writers of 
 fiction have sought to throw around him, to join the 
 ranks of the mob, and to show how worthy he was 
 of their insulting and wicked choice. For a brief 
 space of time he stood side by side with Jesus 
 on the Gabbatha, but they met only to part 
 again : he to receive the world's applause, Jesus 
 
 * Pressense {Life of Jams, p. 621) makes Simon a believer from 
 the day of his carrying the cross. 
 
 308 
 
SnWX OF CYREXE 
 
 to bear the world's sins, and to endure the cross 
 at its hands. 
 
 Simon's is a different experience. Jesus evidently 
 attracts his attention. To him He is no ordinary 
 Prisoner on His way to death. He soon shows 
 himself more than interested. As he sees Him 
 under His cross, weary and worn with the marks 
 of the cruel sport and scourging to which He 
 has been subjected, his heart is touched. There 
 is something in His look and bearing too that 
 impresses him. His sympathy is stirred, and with 
 it a certain undefined feeling of dislike and 
 resentment towards the reviling mob. He has no 
 wish to join them. The rude merriment they 
 are indulging in, and the brutal spectacle to which 
 they are looking forward have no attractions for 
 him. He seeks to pass by,^ and to hasten away 
 from the dreadful scene. 
 
 But the soldiers and the mob are quick to 
 perceive this. Immediately they find a new 
 object for their hatred and contempt ; and as Jesus 
 is at that moment bending and ready to faint 
 and fall under His cross they quickly take measures 
 to pass the load from Him to the shoulders of 
 this stranger. At once Simon is seized hold of. 
 
 ' Mark xv. 21. 
 
 309 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 He is requisitioned by the military for service. 
 The cross is taken from Jesus and laid upon 
 him. He is compelled to bear it. The mob 
 greets the act with their loud merriment and 
 applause. They are just in the humour to enjoy 
 seeing the cross, which Jesus is failing to carry 
 with as quick steps as they could wish, put upon 
 the broad shoulders of this foreign-looking, tawny- 
 skinned man from North Africa. It gives them 
 a cruel satisfaction to see this mark of ignominy 
 put upon the stranger, who will not turn with 
 them to add his raillery and insult to their own. 
 It is wonderful how an act of little or no 
 importance in itself may reveal character and have 
 momentous issues. Simon's passing by revealed 
 a possible, if not an actual disciple. It annoyed 
 the multitude. It drew tiieir attention to him 
 as one upon whom they were disposed to take a 
 mean revenge by arresting his steps, and putting 
 on him the humiliation of carrying the condemned 
 Galilean's cross. Had he but mingled with them 
 and united in their shouting and jeering he might 
 have escaped, and his name would never have 
 emerged from its obscurity. But his passing by 
 singled him out, threw him into the fellowship 
 of the divine Sufferer, and brought him the 
 immortal honour which the greatest kings or 
 310 
 
SIMON OF CYREXE 
 
 heroes might covet, that of carrying the cross of 
 Jesus. 
 
 Thus there are times and circumstances when a 
 word or an act, otherwise of no particular 
 consequence — the holding up of a hand, the 
 writing of a name in a paper, the wearing of a 
 badge, or the use of a watchword — the doing or 
 not doing of any of these things, which in other 
 circumstances might be of no importance, determines 
 the place and the whole future of a man. It 
 may be the very thing to put him among the 
 friends or the foes of Christ, to bring him the 
 cross of honour and suffering in His cause, or 
 to number him with its persecutors and those 
 who put Himself to open shame. Had Simon's 
 passing by taken place an hour sooner or an 
 hour later it might have had no special signifi- 
 cance whatever. Happening when and where it 
 did, however, it meant sympathy, then it led to 
 association with Jesus, and it issued in salvation 
 for Simon himself and for his family as well. 
 
 Are we claiming too much for Simon when we 
 thus represent him and the significance and results 
 of his passing by ? We think not. Mark tells 
 us he was the father of Alexander and Rufus^ — 
 two brothers, as we may conclude from the way 
 
 1 ^Ifirk XV 21. 
 
FROM TEE GARDEX TO THE CROSS 
 
 in which they are referred to, who were well 
 known and highly esteemed members of the early 
 Church. Paul in his closing words in the epistle 
 to the Romans sends his salutations to " Rufus, 
 chosen in the Lord, and his mother and mine." ^ 
 This is one of the highest tributes which could 
 be paid to Simon's wife that she had been as a 
 mother to the great apostle of the Gentiles. It 
 reveals the kind of woman she must have been 
 that the great, tender, ChristHke heart of the 
 apostle found in her a kindred spirit — one to 
 whom he could look up as sweeter, saintHer, 
 more Christlike than himself. It would be strange 
 indeed if the husband of such a woman and the 
 father of two such sons, as had but to be named 
 in order to be known wherever the Gospels were 
 read, had not himself been a convert. The 
 probability is that the burden he had that day 
 to bear for Jesus was the thing that decided him 
 in His service, and brought him into everlasting 
 union with Him. 
 
 But Simon had to be compelled to take up 
 this burden for Jesus. We might have wished 
 this had not been necessary. We should have left 
 it to be at least one bright human touch in the 
 otherwise dark picture of our Saviour's passion 
 
 ^ Romans \vi 13. 
 
SIMON OF CTREKE 
 
 had Simon been so moved with pity as 
 he passed by, at the sight of Him strugghng 
 along under His heavy cross, that he had freely 
 offered to bear it for Him. When we think of 
 the Man of Sorrows on His dolorous way, of the 
 brutal soldiery, with the ruthless mob hurrying 
 Him to His awful death, and then of what He had 
 been, and of all the good He had done — how He 
 had borne the sins and sorrows of others, and 
 lightened every man's burden but His own, it 
 seems incredible that there should have been no 
 one to befriend Him in His day of sorest need, 
 no one to spare Him a single indignity, no one 
 to bear His cross for Him, even for a little, but 
 this Simon who had to be compelled. 
 
 True, neither he nor any other could lighten 
 Jesus of the heavier load which weighed upon His 
 soul, and of which the cross was but the outward 
 symbol. Yet it was something to relieve for 
 a while the wearied aching bodily frame, and to 
 enable Him to reach Calvary without further 
 torture by the way. But Simon required to have 
 this honour thrust upon him, the honour of 
 doing a service for which every Christian heart 
 has felt tenderly grateful ever since. Nor need 
 we much wonder at this. It was a humiliation, 
 a ceremonial defilement to have to touch the 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 cross. To have to take up the cross of a 
 supposed malefactor, just as he was about to 
 enter the city to take part in the most sacred 
 observance, was for Simon to be covered with 
 contempt and shame, and subjected to the 
 greatest indignity. It was hardly to be expected 
 that the passing stranger and pilgrim should 
 at once be found ready for this. Even the 
 disciple whom Jesus loved could follow in the 
 procession — we find him afterwards standing by 
 the cross — but he had neither the courage nor 
 the devotion to step forward and offer to relieve 
 for a little his Master of His load. 
 
 Simon was richly rewarded for his service. 
 His carrying the cross became his greatest privilege, 
 his shame was turned to his immortal honour. 
 Amidst the jeers of the mob he had the cross 
 of Jesus laid upon him. Soon the procession, 
 arrested for a little, moved forward again. But 
 Simon with his humihating burden had Jesus by 
 his side. The two walked onward together. Can 
 we doubt that a kindly relationship was established 
 between them— a kinship so that Simon's soul 
 was drawn out in growing sympathy and love 
 towards Him whose cross he was bearing — and that 
 Jesus found in him a trophy of the conquering 
 power of His cross even while He was on the 
 
 3H 
 
SIMON OF GYRENE 
 
 way to endure it?^ If the penitent thief was so 
 moved b}' what he saw of Jesus on the cross 
 that the divine Sufferer became transfigured in 
 his view from appearing a malefactor hke himself 
 into being a divine King with a paradise for His 
 friends, what may we not suppose was the effect 
 on Simon walking side by side with Him to 
 Calvary amidst the reviling multitude, and carrying 
 the cross on which He was to die ? 
 
 Simon became, we may well believe, more and 
 more interested in, and touched by the incomparable 
 Sufferer. He felt the spiritual influence, the divine 
 magnetism that went forth from Him. His emotions 
 were such as he could not explain. There was a 
 secret happiness and joy which welled up from a 
 fountain within never unsealed before. The humi- 
 liating load became lighter, the rough road smooth 
 as the softest grass for his feet. The jeering of 
 the mob he heeded not, while he was absorbed 
 and entranced by the presence and fellowship of 
 Him whom he was relieving of His accursed load. 
 The journe}', that might have seemed to another 
 as if it would never end, seemed all too short to 
 him ; and when he laid down his burden at Calvary 
 we can imagine him laying doAn that reluctantly 
 
 ^ Stalker [Trial and Death of Jesus, p. 134) thinks he may be the 
 same Simon of Acts xiii. I . 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 which he took up only under compulsion. For 
 all he had had to endure he felt immeasurably 
 recompensed by the very presence and gracious 
 regard of the Sufferer by his side ; and it gave 
 him a secret joy that he was relieving Him of 
 His burden for the time, and making the way of 
 sorrow and death easier for Him. And what a 
 privilege was that of Simon, as he reached Calvary, 
 to see with his own eyes how for sinners Jesus 
 died, and to know more fully and poignantly than 
 ■any other in the world could, by the personal 
 experience he had had of it, what the cross, with 
 its cruel weight and shame and woe must have 
 been to Him who endured it for our sakes ! 
 
 In Simon of Cyrene we see what all the 
 followers of Jesus in some measure are. They walk 
 with Him as He now unseen carries His cross 
 through the world and the ages. Of them it may 
 be said, as of Simon, that while passing by they 
 have been arrested and turned aside, and made to 
 bear the cross and shame of Jesus. But it is 
 the burden and the conflict they take up for Jesus 
 that establishes their deathless union and fellowship 
 with Him. They share His cross, and they are 
 destined to sit with Him upon His throne. And 
 in one respect at least they are more favoured 
 than he. Simon carried the cross with his face 
 316 
 
SIMON OF CYREKE 
 
 towards Calvary. He was unable to foresee 
 all that might come of it, all the glory that 
 was to follow it, all the streams of grace, 
 pardoning mercy and salvation that should yet 
 flow from it. But now, as they bear the cross 
 after their Lord and Saviour, they can look back 
 upon Calvary and all the blessings and triumphs 
 there won. As they struggle on with their 
 burden of present reproach, labour, and conflict in 
 His service, they may know that they are walking 
 with Him, not as He is wearily travelling from 
 the judgment bar of His foes to His cross, but 
 as He is moving on with the step of a divine 
 conqueror from Calvary to glory.^ 
 
 ^ De Costa {Four Witnesses, p. 415) offers an interesting explanation 
 of Simon's service. He says that the cross, being ordinarily fastened 
 to the shoulders of the condemned, was not likely to have been un- 
 loosed by the soldiers on the way. He is of opinion that Simon 
 was only compelled by them to lift up the cross, which was i)roving 
 too much for Jesus' physical strength, and to walk behind or beside 
 Him bearing it up. This view also lends itself to spiritual uses and 
 lessons such as we have indi fated. 
 
 3' 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 It would have been strange indeed if, in that 
 mixed multitude attending Jesus on His way to 
 Calvary, there had been absolutely no evidence of 
 sympathy with Him. Even the thought of that 
 thorn-crowned Man of Sorrows bearing His cross 
 has stirred pity and called forth tears in the 
 case of a countless throng that have never seen 
 Him. We can hardly imagine that the reality 
 should have failed entirely to make a tender 
 impression upon any of those who were eye-witnesses. 
 So we are thankful for the touching incident which 
 the evangelist Luke has preserved for us, and 
 which he alone records as to the wailing of the 
 women of Jerusalem. It supplies at least one 
 pleasing human touch to the otherwise dark 
 and forbidding picture of how the Son of Man 
 fared at the hands of men when He was on His 
 way to die for them. Alas for our poor fallen 
 humanity, their treatment of Him seems, for the 
 3'8 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 most part, more like that of fiends than Hke that 
 of men. It reveals such depths of malice and 
 such possibilities of evil that, when contemplating 
 it, we seem to be beholding the wild play of 
 malignity and sin among the abandoned and 
 lost in the place of woe, rather than the conduct 
 of men in a religious city observing its most 
 sacred festival. It is a welcome relief to us 
 therefore to learn that there were human hearts 
 which were touched with compassion, that there 
 were those who with their tears and lamentations 
 followed the suffering Jesus to the place where He 
 was to die. 
 
 There were women in the crowd, and they 
 were not destitute of womanly feelings. They saw 
 Jesus with His visage more marred than any man, 
 and His form more than the sons of men. They 
 marked the thorn-crowned brows, the blood-stained 
 face and raiment, and the look of unutterable 
 sorrow which He wore. They beheld Him moving 
 wearily on, and ready to fall at times under His 
 heavy and shameful burden. They were touched 
 by the ruthless treatment He was receiving, the 
 blows and insults with which He was hurried on 
 His way, the awful death that was awaiting Him. 
 Simon's service but increased their pity. 
 
 Those women were daughters of Jerusalem. It 
 319 
 
FROM THE GARBEh TO THE CROSS 
 
 was their husbands, fathers, or brothers that had 
 raised the cry " Crucify him." They belonged to 
 a city that, cursed by Rabbinism and Phariseeism, 
 had been the least responsive to the public 
 ministry of Jesus. It was not so much Jerusalem 
 men and women who a few days before had 
 greeted Him with hosannas, as the people who 
 followed Him from Galilee.^ When He entered in 
 His triumphal way amid their acclamations, all 
 the city was moved. Not with sympathetic gladness 
 was it moved but with suspicion and alarm. ^ 
 Jerusalem was the headquarters of all that 
 was hostile to Jesus. Her priests and rabbis, 
 self-interested and obdurate in their cold and 
 unspiritual traditionalism, had shown themselves 
 His bitterest adversaries. It was asked in scorn 
 whether any of her rulers had believed in Him. 
 Her religious sects though divided among them- 
 selves were united against Him. Her population, 
 in general cold and self-complacent, full of religious 
 pride and bigotry, were just the kind of people 
 that could, without compunction, stand around and 
 see such a one as Jesus die amid the horrors 
 of crucifixion. 
 
 But in spite of all else nature asserted itself in 
 her daughters. At the sight of the suffering Man 
 
 ^ Stalker's Trial and Death of Jesus ^ p. 140. "^ Matt. xxi. 10. 
 320 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 of Nazareth on His way to Calvary they broke 
 forth into wailing. In their tears and lamentations 
 nature paid Him this tribute that, whatever might 
 be the charges against Him, whether the)' were 
 true or false, His sufferings were such as to entitle 
 Him to the deepest compassion. In the view of 
 these women, Pilate, the Jewish rulers, the 
 multitude might have been right in treating Him as 
 they had done. Very likely they themselves had been 
 lifting up their voices with those that clamoured 
 for His death. There might have been also a 
 Jewish law, as is alleged, forbidding sympathy 
 with a condemned man. But notwithstanding all 
 this, their tender womanly feelings proved too 
 strong and overpowering to be restrained. There 
 was that in the sufferings of Jesus and the divine 
 way in which He was bearing them, which 
 unsealed the fountain of pity and caused it to 
 flow forth in spite of every obstruction. One, 
 and then another and another took up the wailing, 
 as if they were attending not an execution but a 
 funeral.^ 
 
 ^ Renan { Life of Jesus y^. 286) regards this whole passage ahout the 
 wailing of the daughters of Jerusalem as unhistoric, and is sure that 
 the words Jesus addressed to them could only have been written after 
 the siege of Jerusalem. Keim [J cms of JS'azara, vol. VI., 131) 
 also doubts Jesus having spoken to the women, though he admits His 
 words are in keeping with the character and spirit of Jesus. But 
 Luke's nan-ative here bears the clearest impress of naturalness and 
 historic reality. 
 
 321 
 
FROM THE GARDEX TO THE GROSS 
 
 To women then, it is to be observed, the honour 
 of paying this tribute of humanity is due. But the 
 attitude of women to Jesus throughout His earthly 
 career is altogether remarkable. We do not read 
 of one of them ever doing Him an unkind act, or 
 speaking an unfriendly or insulting word. It was not 
 women who betrayed Him, or who forsook Him and 
 fled when He was delivered up to His foes. It was 
 not women who had any part in the brutalities 
 of Pilate's judgment hall, in the mocking and 
 scourging of Jesus ; but it was they who were 
 found offering the one refreshing draught of human 
 sympathy which He received on His way to 
 Calvary. On the other hand, it was women who 
 solaced the Saviour with their fellowship, who 
 ministered to Him of their substance, who anointed, 
 one His feet with tears, another His head with 
 the costliest ointment, who sorrowed over His 
 sorrows while He went bearing His cross, and 
 who were the first to seek Him and to be 
 greeted by Him on the day of His resurrection. 
 
 But whatever debt Jesus thus owes woman He 
 has infinitely repaid. He has brought her forth 
 from her seclusion, and raised her from her state 
 of subjection. He has made her the equal and 
 the companion, instead of the slave of man. He 
 has created for her the Christian home, and given 
 322 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 her there love's throne. He has also thrown open 
 to her His church upon earth and His kingdom 
 above, as places where there is neither male nor 
 female, but all are one in Himself. Wherever the 
 Gospel of Jesus exerts its power, woman has most 
 reason to call Him blessed. 
 
 Those tears and wailings of the daughters of 
 Jerusalem did honour to their womanly hearts. 
 But they did more. They afforded the most 
 touching evidence of the greatness of the sufferings 
 which called them forth. It would probably be 
 doing those daughters of Jerusalem no injustice 
 to say that their tears came from a mere 
 emotional pity, without any genuine feeling of 
 attachment. They wept for the suffering Jesus 
 probably as children are wont to do at the sight 
 of pain and anguish in others, apart from all 
 consideration of who they are, and of what may 
 be the cause of their suffering. Thus tears have 
 been shed over the worst as well as over the 
 best of men. They have flowed at the execution 
 of the greatest criminals as well as at the burning 
 of the most eminent saints and martyrs. They 
 are but nature's sympathetic tribute to suffering 
 humanity. They might not have been denied to 
 Barabbas, had he been led forth to be crucified, 
 any more than to Jesus. 
 
 323 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE GROSS 
 
 These considerations, however, make the testimony 
 of the women's waiHng to the unique greatness 
 of the sufifreings of Jesus all the more striking 
 and impressive. Those women had been consenting 
 unto His death. They were the wives, sisters, or 
 daughters of those who had been instant with 
 loud voices requiring that he should be crucified. 
 But they were moved, so to speak, in spite of 
 themselves, in spite of all their prejudice and 
 hatred. They could not be silent, but must break 
 forth into piteous lamentations, even in the hour 
 when the Sufferer was being assailed with the 
 outpouring of the worst human passions. In short, 
 His sufferings were so great and so pathetic, that 
 they drew tears from the daughters of the sinful 
 Jerusalem that was inflicting them. It is no 
 wonder then that they have had such a power 
 ever since to touch the hearts even of the greatest 
 enemies of the cross. The world of humanity 
 indeed is constrained to pay its tribute of 
 sympathetic emotion to Him who meekly endured 
 them, as to no other in the great army of 
 sufferers. 
 
 It would have been well had the daughters of 
 Jerusalem followed up their tears by action worthy 
 of them. But, as we find, that was singularly 
 awanting. They wept over the sufferings of Jesus, 
 
 324 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 but they did nothing to alleviate them, or to bring 
 them to an end. The tears shed did not avail 
 to change hatred into love, or to turn the tide 
 of evil. Too soon they were dried away, and 
 the sinless Sufferer, who for the time called them 
 forth, was allowed to go on to His awful death. ^ 
 
 What a great amount of such emotion there is 
 still — emotion which is never translated into any 
 worthy practical form ! Tears too many there are 
 that tell but of a passing fit of tenderness. Pity 
 in plenty there is that can speak in touching 
 accents, but the helping hand it should inspire 
 is too often paralysed, or beyond its power to 
 move. Tender sacred emotions fill the hearts of 
 many under impressive religious influences to 
 whom it hardly seems to occur that religion is 
 seriously meant for their every day life. Many 
 shed tears over the sufferings of Jesus, in the 
 same way as they would over those of some 
 fictitious hero or heroine in the last novel they 
 have been reading, or the last sensational play 
 they may have seen upon the stage. 
 
 Emotion which begins and ends with itself is 
 a most dangerous thing. It is fascinating, and it 
 is deceiving. It weakens the sense of duty, 
 
 ^ Sepp [Life of Jesm, vol. vi., 321) brings these wailing women 
 into connection with those who offered Jesus drink to assuage His 
 sufferings on the cross. 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 enfeebles the will power, and acts as a hurtful 
 intoxicant upon the inner man. Hence the peril 
 there is for very many from fiction and the 
 drama. They go on imbibing large libations of 
 mere sentiment and sensationalism. As a con- 
 sequence they live in a state of intellectual and 
 moral intoxication. They become dazed and 
 insensible often to the ordinary duties and 
 demands of life in this world, not to speak 
 of the claims of religion and of the world that 
 is to come. They can revel in scenes and 
 situations the most thrilling and pathetic without 
 their consciences being touched, or their being 
 moved to do a single unselfish act, or to break 
 off a single evil habit or sin that besets them, 
 They can fatally and miserably content themselves 
 with having in their own minds the emotional 
 luxury of dreams of great, virtuous and heroic 
 deeds without the trouble of doing them. They 
 can also delude themselves with the idea that 
 this aesthetic, artificially wrought up satisfaction 
 will take the place of the happiness and rest 
 within, which can come only from personal devotion 
 to duty and to God. One can understand how 
 many who thus live and dream and dissipate 
 themselves in their artificial sensational world 
 gradually waste away their moral strength and 
 
 326 
 
TEE DATTGITTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 sensibilities, grow apathetic to every thing serious 
 and sacred, and become practically wrecks so far 
 as either this world or the next is concerned. 
 
 It is of vital importance that emotion should 
 lay hold of our manhood, and that our manhood 
 should be stirred to rise to its sacred appeals and 
 demands. Emotion should be linked with reason 
 and conscience and will. It should be as a force 
 from above, ever inspiring and impelling to dut}^ 
 and to worthy Christian living. It is well that 
 tender and sacred feelings should fill the heart, 
 and that tears should flow at the sight of 
 suffering, especially of suffering innocence. The 
 daughters of Jerusalem did honour to their 
 womanly affections, weeping while they saw Jesus 
 bearing His cross. But they should have given 
 Him more than the tribute of their tears. They 
 would have brought everlasting honour to them- 
 selves had they with their pity given Him their 
 heartfelt devotion, and had they done something 
 to show how genuine it was. Where Jesus is 
 concerned, it is true most of all, that tears and 
 prayers and professions avail nothing unless our 
 wills are won for Him, and unless the sacred 
 feelings which find expression upon our lips 
 are justified by the better conduct of our lives.^ 
 
 ' Some excellent remarks in the same direction here are to be found 
 in Hannah's Last Lays of our Lord^s Passion^ pp. 156-159, 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 We are not told what effect the women's 
 wailing had upon the multitude, but we learn 
 that it drew forth the most touching response 
 from Jesus. Luke informs us expressly that 
 Jesus turned to them, and addressed them.^ 
 For the moment doubtless this act arrested the 
 procession. There was a brief pause in the onward 
 march. Silence fell upon the multitude, and an 
 awe probably for the moment like that which 
 had fallen upon the band in the Garden. Every 
 one was intent to hear what might fall from 
 those lips, which all the outcries of the mob, 
 and all the indignities and tortures they had 
 seen inflicted had failed to open. The words 
 heard in the temporary lull were the last words 
 of Jesus to unrepentant Israel, full of pathetic 
 expostulation and warning : ^ — " Daughters of 
 Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for your- 
 selves, and for your children. For, behold, the 
 days are coming, in the which they shall say, 
 Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never 
 bare, and the paps which never gave suck. Then 
 
 1 Luke xxiii. 28—31. 
 
 ~ An interesting parallel to this scene we find in Josephus. He 
 tells us of one Niger of Perea who had fought bravely against the 
 Romans, and deserved well of his country, but fell a victim to party 
 rancour. On his way to the place of execution this Niger addressed 
 the people, and warned them of coming calamity because of their 
 sins (Josephus, li.I ^ IV., VI. 1). 
 
 328 
 
THE DAUGHTEBS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 shall they begin to say to the mountains, fall on 
 us ; and to the hills, cover us. For if they do 
 these things in a green tree, what shall be done 
 in the dry ? " 
 
 The speech of Jesus, especially during the time of 
 His trial and sufferings, is as remarkable as His 
 silence. He is silent before the council when the}' 
 are bringing one after another of their false 
 witnesses against Him ; before Herod when that 
 frivolous creature questions Him in many words, 
 and when chief priests and scribes vehemently 
 accuse Him ; and before Pilate when the like 
 occurs, answering him to never a word, so 
 that the governor marvels greatly. But He 
 speaks when His testimony to the truth is called 
 for, or when some response is given to the 
 appeal His sufferings make, as in the present case, 
 by the wailing of these women who follow Him. 
 He speaks when Pilate asks Him about His 
 kingdom,^ explaining to him its spiritual and 
 unworldly character. In silence He moves on amid 
 the noise and ribaldry of the mob attending Him 
 on His way of death. He meekly endures their 
 rude jests, their insulting outcries, without a word 
 or look of repining or complaint. But the weeping 
 of those tender-hearted women touches Him, and He 
 
 1 John^xviii. 30-37. 
 
 V 329 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 stops, pausing for a little on His dolorous way 
 that He may respond to the tribute of their 
 pity. 
 
 It is the same, we find, when He is dying on 
 the cross. In silence He suffers, having no 
 response but His own meek endurance to all the 
 storm of human malice and abuse raging around 
 Him. No sooner however has the penitent thief 
 dying by His side turned from his railing, in 
 which his companion in crime has been joining 
 him, to speak words of thoughtful and even 
 tender and reverential regard, than instantly he 
 has the ear and the heart of Jesus. His humble 
 request for remembrance when Jesus should come 
 into His kingdom is far exceeded by the promise 
 of fellowship that day with Himself in the joys 
 of paradise.^ 
 
 But it is the same still. When men are 
 wrangling about Christ and His doctrines in the 
 spirit of the rabbis who persecuted Him, or are 
 treating Him hke Pilate, who unjustly condemned 
 Him, their voices prevail, His own is unheard. 
 When they are bent, not on finding out the 
 truth, but rather on making good their denials, 
 He may be found answering to never a word. 
 When they suffer themselves to be carried away 
 
 ' Luke xxiii. 43. 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 by the prevailing tide of the hour, allow reason 
 and conscience to be silenced and overpowered, 
 and are ready to shout with the multitude, not 
 knowing what they do, He preserves an ominous 
 silence. But let there be the smallest movement 
 of serious feeling and thought towards Himself, be 
 it the tribute of sincere homage paid to Him for 
 His worth and work, or only a tear genuinely 
 shed over His sorrows, Jesus will respond to it, 
 and the honest heart must be drawn more and 
 more closely to His own. We may well believe 
 that He, who was willing, so to speak, to step 
 aside from the tumult of those who hurried Him 
 to Calvary that He might address Himself to 
 the wailing women of Jerusalem, is ready now to 
 stoop from His divine throne to recognise and 
 make response to the most unworthy penitent. 
 
 Turning now to the words which Jesus addressed 
 to the wailing women, we are struck first of all 
 with what they reveal of the patriotic spirit of 
 Jesus, and of the place Jerusalem had in His 
 heart. The pity the daughters of Jerusalem ex- 
 pressed for Him called forth a truer, tenderer pity 
 in His heart for them and their children, in view 
 of the awful calamities that were soon to overtake 
 them. His own cross was heavy ; but He was 
 bearing it in His sinlessness, and He was sustained 
 331 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 by the joy that was set before Him. Their coming 
 cross, however, was to be so awful, and so un- 
 reUeved, as one coming upon a guilt-laden people 
 ripe for their day of doom. The wrath and 
 destruction about to descend upon them were to 
 be for their nation like the fire consuming a dry 
 and sapless tree. 
 
 Jesus' heart was moved at the woful prospect 
 for the race and nation to which he belonged, 
 and which He loved so well. It was His last 
 opportunity before He should be stretched upon 
 the accursed tree to utter a warning word, or to 
 leave His public testimony behind Him, if haply 
 the threatened calamity might be averted. What 
 a heart of pity and love His melting words 
 disclose! What a testimony they are, given by 
 Him as He is about to be driven off the stage 
 of this world, alike to His righteousness and His 
 mercy ! Jesus willed not that any should perish, 
 but He willed rather to stand when He could, 
 and as long as He could, between men and their 
 doom. 
 
 Our wonder and praise, as we think of this truly 
 divine pity of Jesus, increase when we recall how 
 He had been treated by the city and people with 
 which those daughters of Jerusalem were con- 
 nected. Jerusalem had given Him little reason 
 332 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 for affectionate remembrance. As a matter of 
 fact, no city had been so cold, so unresponsive. 
 Its rabbis had no welcome for the greatest 
 of teachers. Its priests did not recognise His 
 priesthood. Its rulers did not believe in Him. 
 Its inhabitants, on one occasion at least, threatened 
 to stone Him.^ And now they seemed all with 
 one accord clamouring for His death, and hurrying 
 Him to Calvary. 
 
 But for all that Jesus loved the city. It was 
 dear to Him as the place God had chosen for 
 His habitation. In its Temple He recognised His 
 Father's house.^ Its history, so chequered, was 
 after all that which He had come to crown with 
 His own reign and work as the true King and 
 Redeemer of Israel. Its name seemed engraven 
 upon His heart. It is really remarkable how its 
 future concerned Him, and how frequently it en- 
 gaged His thoughts, and called forth His tenderest 
 solicitude. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, He exclaimed^ 
 as with a breaking heart, while He recalled what 
 God had done for it, sending prophets and mes- 
 sengers, and at length His own Son, and while 
 He thought of how its people had killed the 
 prophets, and stoned them that had been sent unto 
 
 ^ John viii. 59, 
 2 Luke xix. 46. 
 V 2 333 
 
FROM TEE GARDEN TO TEE CROSS 
 
 them, and were about to consummate their guilt 
 in crucifying Himself.^ 
 
 Four times within the week before His death 
 He referred to the city, and each time in a 
 tone of infinite pathos. As He came to it 
 for the last time from Galilee, and sat in 
 view of it on the Mount of Olives, He wept 
 over it and said, " If thou hadst known in 
 this thy day the things which belong to th}^ 
 peace, but now they are hid from thine eyes." ^ 
 On the afternoon of the day of His arrival, when 
 they were pointing out to Him the goodly stones 
 with which the Temple was adorned, He said, "See 
 ye not all these things? Verily I say unto you there 
 shall not be left one stone upon another which 
 shall not be thrown down."^ Later on when the 
 disciples touched by His words asked for an 
 explanation, He uttered His long prophecy about 
 the siege and destruction of the city and the 
 scattering of the Jewish nation.* Then here on 
 the eve of His crucifixion when He was in 
 the very act of bearing His cross, and when as 
 the city's greatest Outcast He was going forth 
 without its gates to die, it was Jerusalem with its 
 
 ^ Matt, xxiii. 37. 
 2 Luke xix. 42. 
 '^ Matt xxiv. 2. 
 
 * Matt . xxiv. 3-51. ^Mark xiii, 5-37. 
 334 
 
THE DAUGHTERS OF JERUSALEM 
 
 future that occupied His thoughts and stirred His 
 tenderest feehngs. The Hps that had kept close 
 amidst the storm of reproach and suffering opened 
 to give the most touching evidence, in the words 
 addressed to the women who bewailed Him, of how 
 the sins and the coming woes of Jerusalem lay- 
 heavy upon His heart. 
 
 Those momentous words were a prevision of 
 the appalling carnage and horrors which, a 
 generation later, were to overtake the city He 
 loved. They should be called blessed who had 
 no sons or daughters to come after them, fated 
 to perish miserably during those woful days. 
 Retribution the most terrible should be stalking 
 abroad, and the people should be seeking escape 
 and refuge from it in the dens and caves of the 
 earth, in the underground passages and sewers 
 of the city.^ 'hey should prefer to be buried 
 beneath the mountains than to be exposed to the 
 sword of their infuriated and revengeful foes." 
 
 1 Josephus, B.I., VI., IX., 4. 
 
 - Description of the horrors of th« siege, with famine, plague, 
 hitter party feud, massacre, incendiarism, devastation, scourging the 
 doomed city and its guilty inhabitants will he found in Josephus, 
 B.I., Books V. and VI. The dire retribution on the vaiious guilty 
 actors involved is vividly portrayed in Farrar, Life of Christ, pp. 685, 
 G86. Professor Graetz, a non-Christian Jewish M'riter in his recent 
 history of the Jews (1891), says that more than h million Jews 
 perished in the siege, and that many thousands were sold afterwards 
 into slavery at an incredibly low figure. His graphic account of the 
 siege is given in vol. II., ch. XI. 
 
 335 
 
FROM THE GARB EX TO THE CROSS 
 
 Were the women of Jerusalem so touched 
 by the sufferings of Jesus that they could 
 not be restrained from waihng and from tears? 
 What then would they be were they to live to 
 see the sufferings of their nation in its day of 
 wrath ? If the fire caught, scorched and burned 
 the green tree so terribly, what would it do 
 with the wood of the dry ? If the sufferings 
 falling upon an innocent person as He was were 
 so great as to call for their lamentations, what 
 cause for weeping there would be over the woes 
 befalling a city whose sins and crimes were the 
 wonder of the universe, and which was ready 
 for destruction as dry wood for the flames ! ^ 
 
 But are we not too apt to forget that guilty 
 Jerusalem and the Israel that rejected and 
 crucified Christ are only representatives of, or other 
 names for ourselves as guilty sinners ? His love 
 
 ^ Graetz admits that the Jews did not understand at the time the 
 importance of Jesus' death, but protests that it was not they but 
 Pontius Pilate and his Roman soldiers who maltreated and murdered 
 Him, while he writes of Him and of the momentous consequences of 
 His crucifixion for the Jewish race in these remarkable words: — 
 ** Such was the end of the man who had devoted himself to the 
 improvement of the most neglected, miserable, and abandoned 
 members of his people, and who, perhaps, fell a victim to a 
 misunderstanding. How great was the woe caused by that one 
 execution ! How many deaths and sufferings of every description 
 has it not caused among the children of Israel ! Millions of broken 
 hearts and tragic fates have not yet atoned for his death. He is the 
 only mortal of whom one can say without exaggeration that his death 
 was more effective than his life." History of the Jews, vol. II., 165, 
 166. 
 
THE LAUGHTERS OF JERUSALE3I 
 
 and pathetic solicitude for Jerusalem, and His 
 patriotic feeling for Israel were only, as it seems 
 to us, the colours in which at the time Jesus 
 chose to clothe His love and solicitude for the 
 sinning world for which He was on His way to die. 
 Jerusalem with Him but stood for the world that 
 should reject Him. The love He had for it, with 
 all its blackslidings and sins, is but the form in 
 which He expresses the yearning of His heart 
 for human souls. His sorrow over its doom is 
 His sorrow over ours, if we should go on our 
 way as impenitent sinners. Even those warning 
 and imploring words He utters in regard to it 
 while bearing the cross which it gave Him, are 
 in a measure the Gospel appeal to us all. They 
 are impressive words meant for ourselves, bidding 
 us repent and believe, that we may be saved 
 from the wrath and judgment which otherwise 
 must fall on us. The pity they breathe towards 
 those whose sins were giving Him all His woes, 
 like the prayer He lifted up for His murderers 
 while He was hanging on the cross, is the divine 
 compassion He has for all sinners of mankind. 
 There is no better or more salutary exercise for 
 us than to take all the terrible things that ever 
 were or could be said against guilty Jerusalem, 
 and to charge them home against ourselves. On 
 337 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 the other hand, as penitent sinners, we cannot 
 desire or hope for greater blessings, or a greater 
 salvation than what Jesus yearned to bestow 
 upon those who crucified Him. 
 
 " Weep for yourselves," said Jesus to the 
 daughters of Jerusalem ; " weep not for me." ^ 
 What cause they had for the sorrow that wrought 
 repentance. What wailing could be too great for 
 a people crucifying their promised Christ, and 
 thereby morally crucifying themselves ! If only 
 the}^ had seen their sins as God did, and if 
 they had had so much as a glimpse of the 
 immeasurable calamities they were bringing upon 
 themselves, theirs would have been the weeping 
 of true broken-hearted penitents, and their sorrow 
 would have been their salvation. Had those 
 women wept and lamented for themselves as Jesus 
 so pathetically desired them, they would have 
 wept none the less but all the more for Him, and 
 they would have given Him their hearts and their 
 devotion for ever. They would have come to 
 sympathise with Him and to trust in Him as 
 they never otherwise could do, and their sorrow 
 should have been turned into joy. 
 
 The cross of Jesus can be understood only 
 when its great mystery of redeeming love is read 
 
 * Luke xxiii. 28. 
 
 338 
 
THE BAUGETERS OF JERUSALEM! 
 
 with eyes filled with penitential tears. Whatever 
 its woes are to others in the way of exciting 
 compassion and calling forth sorrow, they are 
 still more in this direction to those who look 
 upon them as caused by their sins, and as the 
 price paid for their forgiveness and salvation. 
 We weep for the suffering Jesus all the more when 
 we weep for ourselves. Our pity is intensified 
 when we see that our sins gave to Him a crown 
 of sharper thorns than that which was bound 
 upon His brows, and that they inflicted upon 
 His soul more humbling and painful stripes than 
 those which fell upon His bod3^ Our sorrow 
 is sincere when we realise that our sins clothed 
 Him with a more awful shame than that which 
 the purple robe put upon Him, and all the 
 mockery and insult He had to endure. Ours is 
 the repentance not to be repented of when we 
 mourn for our sins as having made for Jesus a 
 heavier and more awful cross than that which 
 men saw Him carry and die upon. Never indeed 
 can we know the true pathos of the cross until 
 we have seen it in this light, and have wept for 
 ourselves as well as for Jesus in presence of its 
 infinite mystery. 
 
 Tracing the history of our Lord's passion, as 
 we have endeavoured to do, recalling the incidents 
 339 
 
FROM THE GARDEN TO THE CROSS 
 
 of His arrest and trials, with all the shame and 
 suffering with which they were accompanied, we 
 have been led necessarily to review the conduct 
 of those immediately concerned. But while sitting 
 in judgment upon the guilty actors, it is for us 
 to bear in mind that we are also sitting in 
 judgment upon ourselves. The priests and rulers, 
 Pilate, Herod, the Roman soldiers, and the Jewish 
 mviltitude were after all but instruments ; the sins 
 w^hich moved them were the real authors of Jesus' 
 death. Their sins are represented in each one of 
 our hearts, and they make us all partners in their 
 guilt. But they become — to use the beautiful 
 expression of Augustine — heatae culpae, when we 
 sincerely repent of them, and are brought humbly 
 and gratefully to accept of salvation through the 
 death which they caused. 
 
 340 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Accent, Galilean, 125 
 
 Accounts of Peter's denials — 
 
 discrepancies, 130 
 Accuracy of the evangelists, 
 
 14.0, 190, 263, 274, 303 
 Aceldama, 273, 274 
 Action and emotion, 325-327 
 ''Acts of Pilate," 261 
 Address to the wailing women, 
 
 328 
 Agony in the Garden, 26-62 ; its 
 
 greatness, 44 ; its mystery, 
 
 43-62 ; its cause. 49 ; the spirit 
 
 in which it was endured, 59 
 Albinus, 205 
 
 Alexander and Eufus, 311 
 Alford, 130, 259 
 Ambrose, 253 
 
 Andrews, 10, 130, 139, 287, 306 
 Angel strengthening Jesus, 47 
 Annas, 63, 84 
 Annas faction, 89, 90 
 Ananias, " the %vhited wall, " 263 
 Antonia, 246 
 Apocryphal writings referred to, 
 
 190, 261, 291 
 Apology for the Jewish people, 
 
 Jost's, 95, Graetz', 336 ; for 
 
 Pilate, Stephen's, 238; for the 
 
 Sanhedrim, Mill's, 95 
 Appeal, Right of, discussed, 284 
 
 -286 
 Arnold (Edwin), 231, 239 
 Arrest in the Garden, 63-82 
 Art, Gethsemane in, 44, 74 
 Art, Via Dolorosa in, 293, 297 
 Arbitrariness of Roman criminal 
 
 procedure, 285 
 
 Atheism and persecution, 85 
 Atonement and the Incarnation, 
 
 Attitude of women to Jesus, 322 
 Augustine, 130, 340 
 Augustus, The emperor, 260 
 Avarice of Judas, 279 
 
 Band led by Judas, 66 ; falling 
 to the ground, 70 
 
 Baptist, John the, 163, 167 
 
 Barbarities in the common hall, 
 248 
 
 Barabbas, 209 ; with Jesus on 
 the Gabbatha, 210 ; never the 
 world's saviour, 217 ; his re- 
 lease an acted parable, 219; 
 place in modern fiction, 220 
 
 Bearing the cross after Jesus, 3 1 7 
 
 ''Behold the Man," 251 
 
 Bema, or judgment seat of Pilate, 
 136 
 
 Beraud's Christ bearing the Cross, 
 297 
 
 Betrayers of the Christ, The 
 Jews, 135 
 
 Blood-sweating, Cases of, 44 
 
 Brodiick, 62 
 
 Bruce (Professor), 281 
 
 Buffeting of Jesus, 105, 240 
 
 Burden and curse of sin on 
 Jesus, 59 
 
 Caesar, Delivering Jesus to, 106 
 Caesarea, Scene at, 223 
 Caiaphas and the Council, 63, 
 
 89, 91 
 Canton (W.), 238 
 Captain of Temple guard, 65 
 
 34' 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Captors, Jesus' words to His, 
 
 78 
 
 Carlo Dolce, 44. 
 
 Caspari, 27, 113, 135, 138, 259 
 
 Casuistry of the priests, 272 
 
 Celsus and Julian the Apostate, 
 48, 67 
 
 Chagigah, Offering of the 
 firstlings, 138, 139 
 
 Charges against Jesus — eccle- 
 siastical, not civil, 144 
 
 Chastising and liberty, 1 84 
 
 Christianity and the sword, 76 
 
 Cicero, 196, 241, 298, 305 
 
 Claudia Procula, 1 9 1 
 
 Clubs and swords, 65 
 
 Cock -crowing, 128 
 
 Coins, Jewish, 223 
 
 Common hall at Antonia, 248 
 
 Companions in death — thieves, 
 not disciples, 72 
 
 Company round the fire in 
 Caiaphas' house, 113 
 
 Compelled to bear the cross, 312 
 
 Compromise, Pilate's, 184, 187 
 
 Conscience and sentiment, 327 
 
 Country house called Gethse- 
 mane, 28 
 
 Court hours early, 133 
 
 Corelli, Marie, 220 
 
 Court of Sanhedrim, 91 
 
 Crimen maiestatis, 260 
 
 Cross, described, 288 ; its shame 
 and suffering triumphed over 
 in the Garden, 61 
 
 Crcwn of thorns, 248 
 
 Crucifixion, Hour of, 258 ; 
 its shame, 241, 298, 313; out- 
 side the city, 305 
 
 Cup and the hour, 57 
 
 Cyrene, Jews in, 305 ; Simon of, 
 302 
 
 Da Costa, 130, 317 
 Danger from fiction and the 
 drama, 326 
 
 Dante, 91, 276 
 
 Daughters of Jerusalem, 318-340 
 
 Delitzsch, 139 
 
 Denials of Peter, 130 
 
 Denney, 55 
 
 De Quincey, 277 
 
 Destroying and raising the 
 Temple again, 99 
 
 Difficulty in identifying holy 
 places in Jerusalem, 290 
 
 Disciples, sentinels at the gate, 
 30 ; sleeping in the Garden, 
 33 ; not understanding the 
 cross, 37 ; Jesus' concern for 
 them, 71 ; forsaking and 
 fleeing, 80 ; witnesses of the 
 trial and death, 1 10, 302 
 
 Discourse on the way to Geth- 
 semane, 15 
 
 Discrepancies as to Peter's 
 denials, 1 30 ; passover obser- 
 vance, 138 ; hour of cruci- 
 fixion, 258 ; Jeremiah's pro- 
 phecy, 275 
 
 Dore's Dream of Pilate's ivife, 
 193 ; and Christ leaving the 
 Praetorinm, 293 
 
 Dorner, 52 
 
 Dream of Pilate's M'ife, 191 
 
 Dreams, Eoman belief in, 196 
 
 Duccio's Arrest in Gethsemane, 
 74 
 
 Earthly and Messianic king- 
 ship, 149 
 
 Edersheim, 11, 86, 128, 135, 
 138, i39» 273' 289 
 
 Elijah, Waiting for, 14 
 
 Ellicott, 44, 50, 71, 113, 141, 
 211, 248, .289 
 
 Employment of Eoman soldiers 
 in the arrest, 65 
 
 Emotion and duty, 327 
 
 Eusebius, 141, 259, 261 
 
 Evangelists sparing of incidents, 
 302; record end of none of guilty 
 
 342 
 
INDEX. 
 
 actors but Judas, 263 ; inde- 
 pendent and accui-ate, III, 262 
 Ewald, 73, no, 135, 138, 211 
 Execution on feast days, 106 
 Extradition, Practice in regard to, 
 160 
 
 Farrar, 249, 259, 33^ 
 
 Fathers roused from their 
 shimbers for the trial, 87 
 
 Fear of the people, The priests', 
 199 ; Pilate's, 260 
 
 Fines for humiliating treatment 
 of accused persons, 98 
 
 Five sons of Annas, 84, 263 
 
 Forewarning of divine retribu- 
 tion, 335 
 
 Four references to Jerusalem by- 
 Jesus during Passion week, 334 
 
 Fourth Gospel's silence about 
 Gethsemane, 31 ; Judas' end, 
 262 ; incidents on the way to 
 Calvary, 303 
 
 Fourth Gospel, Incidents special 
 to : band in the Garden falling 
 backward, 70 ; trial before 
 Annas, 87 ; sent bound to 
 Caiaphas, 87 ; officer smiting 
 Jesus in Caiaphas' court, 97 ; 
 private interviews vnih. Pilate, 
 147,255; "Behold the Man," 
 251; "Behold your King," 259 
 
 Friedlieb, 87 
 
 Fronde, 285 
 
 Gabbatha or the Pavement, 136, 
 
 182, 210 
 Galilee and Judea, 159 
 Galilee, hotbed of disaffection, 
 
 Gallic and Pilate, 152 
 Gardens on Olivet, 10 
 Gazith, the usual meeting place 
 
 for Sanhedrim, 87 
 Geikie, 17, 65, 90, 92, 129, 171, 
 
 245, 248, 266 
 Gerizim uprising, 2 1 1 
 
 Gethsemane, locality, 26; country 
 house so called, 28; three hoxurs 
 agony in, 31-33 ; world's 
 Gethsemane of suffering, 43 ; 
 mystery of, 57 ; its trans- 
 forming spirit, 61 ; in art, 44, 
 
 74 
 Gould (Baring), 12, 65, 88, 91, 
 
 98, 204 
 Graetz (Professor), 249, 335, 336 
 Greek used in the trials, 147 
 Green tree and the dry, 336 
 Grievance of Annas and the 
 
 Sadducees against Jesus, 86 
 Guilty Jerusalem the type of the 
 
 sinful world, 337, 340 
 
 Hackett, 56, 270 
 
 Hallel at Paschal feast, 12, 14 
 Jesus leading in the singing, 12 
 
 Handwashing of Pilate, 231-239 
 
 Hannah, 327 
 
 Hase, 32 
 
 Hasty procedure of the Jewish 
 rulers, 199 
 
 Heathen edifices and ceremonial 
 defilement, 137 
 
 Heathen custom of washing 
 hands, 226 
 
 Heaven's interest in the Passion, 
 47 ; its s)Tupathy with sorrow 
 upon earth, 48 
 
 Herod Agrippa I. and II., 
 treasurers of the Temple, 1 74 ; 
 Agi'ippa 1. insulted at Alex- 
 andria, 249 
 
 Herod Antipas, his palace in 
 Jerusalem, 157; coming to 
 the feasts, 160; judgment 
 hall, 161 : had never seen 
 Jesus before, 162 ; his treat- 
 ment of John the Baptist, 163; 
 more pagan than Jewish, 163 ; 
 asking for a miracle, 164 ; 
 babbling about religion, i68 ; 
 at enmity with Pilate, 174 ; 
 
 343 
 
INDEX 
 
 made friends, 174; his down- 
 fall and end, 179, 263 
 
 High priest's palace described, 
 88, III 
 
 High priest rending his gar- 
 ments, 102 
 
 Hilgenfeld, 32 
 
 '* His blcod be on us," 231 
 
 Honour thrust on Simon of 
 Cyrene, 313 
 
 Hour of the crucifixion — Mark 
 and John, 258 
 
 Hour's respite for Peter between 
 second and third denial, 123 
 
 Hours, Eoman and Jewish 
 reckoning of, 258 
 
 Illegalities and irregularities of 
 the Sanhedrim trial, 92-95 
 
 Incarnation in relation to the 
 Agony, 52 
 
 Informal trial before Annas, 86 
 
 Informers and the dread of being 
 reported to Caesar, 260 
 
 Innocence of Jesus, Testimonies 
 to, no fault in Him, 152 ; 
 Pilate's effoitsto obtain release, 
 184, 197, 207, 213, 220, 250, 
 259 ; Pilate's washing his 
 hands, 221 
 
 Intercessory Prayer, 16 
 
 James, one of the three in the 
 
 Garden, 30 
 Jameson (Mrs.), 44, 74, 244 
 Jeremy the prophet — difficulty, 
 
 275 
 
 Jerusalem unresponsive to Jesus' 
 ministry, 320, 333 ; difficulty 
 of tracing its holy places, 290 ; 
 Jesus' love for it, 333 ; His 
 lamentations over it, 334; the 
 horrors of its siege and destruc- 
 tion, 228, 335 
 
 Jesus singing on His way to 
 Gethsemane, 12 ; agonizing in 
 the Garden, 26 ; interpreting 
 
 His OMTi sorrow, 46 ; His 
 relation to the world's sin, 50 ; 
 His sublime resignation, 59 ; 
 His last miracle done to an 
 enemy, 74 ; words to the 
 band arresting, 78 ; bound 
 with cords, 79 ; alone on 
 His way of trial and death, 
 83 ; condemned on His own 
 coufession of divinity, 102 ; 
 treatment by His guards in 
 Caiaphas' house, 104, 105 ; 
 His vision of glory there, 107; 
 explaining His kingdom to 
 Pilate, 147; remitted to Herod, 
 155; sent back to Pilate, 181; 
 His silence before the San- 
 hedrim, 95 ; before Pilate, 153; 
 before Herod, 165, 169 ; in 
 the common hall, 249 ; set at 
 nought by Herod's men of war, 
 171 ; His innocence. 177, 232 ; 
 His being scourged and 
 crowned with thorns, 240 ; 
 side by side with Barabbas, 
 212 ; His private interviews 
 with Pilate, 147, 255 ; con- 
 demned, 241 ; His via dolorosa 
 284 ; Simon His companion, 
 310 ; daughters of Jerusalem 
 bewailing Him, 321 ; hushing 
 the tumult while He speaks to 
 them, 328 ; predicting Jeru- 
 salem's doom, 334 
 
 Jesus and Socrates, 48, 97, 267 
 
 Jewish abhorrence of images, 
 223 
 
 Jewish law as to appeal, 284 
 
 Jewish non- Christian writers 
 on the trial and death of 
 Jesus, 95, 336 
 
 JeMdsh police and Boman 
 soldiers, 65 
 
 Jewish tumults during Pilate's 
 governorship, 222-225 
 
 Joanna, wife of Chuza, 190 
 
 344 
 
INDEX. 
 
 John and Peter following at a 
 distance, 82 ; witnesses of 
 trial in Caiaphas' house, 100 ; 
 and of the crucifixion, 303 
 
 John's priestly descent, 1 1 1 
 
 Josephus, 27, 85, 87, 89, 106, 
 132, 136, 137, 157. 160, 171, 
 172, 179, 186, 205, 225, 228, 
 234, 242, 258, 263, 264, 307, 
 328, 335 
 
 Jost, 89, 95 
 
 Judas leaving Upper E(joni by 
 himself, 10 ; his bargain with 
 the priests, 11, 279; his 
 surprise and discomfiture that 
 Jesus did not resist, 67 ; his 
 terror in the Garden, 80 ; his 
 despair on seeing Jesus con- 
 demned, 266 ; his confession 
 to the priests, 268 ; his suicide, 
 270 
 
 Just man, Plato's prophecy of 
 his fate, 252 
 
 Justinian, 285 
 
 Justin Martyr, 261 
 
 Kedron. Brook, 12 
 
 Keeper of the high priestly 
 
 robes, 174 
 Keim, 10, 32, 45, 65, 71, 89, 100, 
 
 147, 259, 321 
 King of the Jews abandoned to 
 
 be ci-ucified, 259 
 Kingship worldly and spiritual, 
 
 148 
 Kiss, The traitor's, 69, 264 
 Knowledge of the cross through 
 
 penitence, 33S 
 
 Lange, 16, 272 
 
 Lanterns and torches, 66 
 
 Latin and Greek Christians and 
 
 site of Gethsemane, 91 
 Leading members of Sanhedrim, 
 
 89, 90 
 Legend of Pilate's suicide, 238 ; 
 
 of Veronica, 291 ; of Wander- 
 ing Jew, 292 
 
 I-ightfoot, 264, 276, 306 
 
 Livy, 204, 244 
 
 Lower and upper house in 
 Sanhedrim, 91 
 
 Luke's Gospel, Incidents special 
 to : bloody sweat, 43 ; angel 
 strengthening, 47 ; hour be- 
 tween second and third denial, 
 123 ; the Lord's looking upon 
 Peter, 128 ; trial before Herod, 
 158 ; daughters of Jerusalem, 
 
 303 
 Luther, 214, 247 
 
 Malchus, 23 ; his kinsman, 124 
 
 Mark, the young man who fol- 
 lowed and fled. 29, 84 
 
 Mark's Gospel, Incidents special 
 to: the two cock cro wings, 120, 
 128 ; multitude asking for the 
 act of release, 202 ; Barabbas 
 lying bound in prison, 210 
 
 Matthew's Gospel, Incidents spe- 
 cial to : Jesus standing before 
 the governor, 140 ; Pilate's 
 wife's dream, 191 ; Pilate 
 washing his hands, 227 ; mul- 
 titude crying '* His blood be on 
 us," 228 ; traitor's suicide, 262 
 
 Meeting pi ace of Sanhedrim, 88 
 
 Mercenaries and not iloman 
 soldiers scourging and mocking 
 Jesus, 249 
 
 Message from Pilate's wife, 190 
 
 Messianic claims, 102, 107, 148 
 
 Meyer, 272, 306 
 
 M idnight Temple services, 1 1 
 
 Mill, 14 
 
 Mill (John S.), 96 
 
 ^Mockery of Jesus in Caiaphas' 
 house, 104; by Ileiod's men 
 of war, 171 ; by Pilate's 
 soldiers in the common hall, 
 248 
 
 345 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Modern mood as to physical 
 aspects of the Passion, 243 
 
 Modestine and Marcian, 285 
 
 Moral difficulty to acceptance of 
 Christianity, 179 
 
 Motives for hasty procedure of 
 the priests, 87 
 
 National crime, Jesus' death a, 
 
 95' 259» 336 
 
 Nature's tribute to Jesus 
 sufferings 
 
 Naturalistic explanations and 
 their failure, 71 
 
 Nerva, 260 
 
 Niger of Perea, 328 
 
 Numbered with the trans- 
 gressors, 214 
 
 Numbers employed in the arrest, 
 65 
 
 Obedience of Jesus to His 
 
 Father's will, 59 
 Oecumenius, 270 
 Officer striking Jesus during 
 
 trial in Caiaphas' house, 97 
 Olive trees cut down, 27 
 Opportunism, Eoman. 187 
 Oracles, Eoman belief in, 196 
 Origen, 49, 67 
 Orr, Professor, 55 
 Ovid, 226 
 
 Palace of Herod, 157 
 
 Papias, 270 
 
 Paschal Lamb, type and antitype, 
 
 306 
 Paschal meal and the Supper, 
 
 138 
 Passover according to the 
 
 Synoptists and John, 138, 139 
 Passover customs referred to, 14, 
 
 i39» 197 
 Passover sacrifices offered at the 
 
 hour Jesus died, 307 
 Patriotism of Jesus, 331 
 
 Paul's tribute to Eufus and his 
 
 mother, 312 
 Penitence and knowing the 
 
 mystery of the cross, 338 
 Persecuting spirit of Sadduceeism 
 
 85 
 
 Pertinacity of Jewish rulers, 153, 
 169, 188, 201, 260 
 
 Petavel, 28 
 
 Peter's avowals of devotion, 18 
 blundering sword stroke, 74 
 following at a distance, 82 
 denials, no;- witness of the 
 trial, 84 
 
 Philo, 225, 249, 254, 260 
 
 Physical, Jesus' sufferings more 
 than merely, 49 
 
 Pilate's aid sought for the arrest, 
 65, his residence, 135 ; the 
 Praetorium, 136 ; his character 
 140 ; his opportunism and 
 spirit of compromise, 1 84 — 1 8 7 ; 
 examines the Prisoner himself, 
 140 ; his sending Jesus to 
 Herod, 155 ; his repeated 
 efforts and pleadings to release 
 Jesvis, 204 ; his meetings with 
 Jesus privately in the judg- 
 ment hall, 147, 255 ; his 
 tributes to Jesus' innocence, 
 152, 184, 227,250; his failure 
 to understand Him, 147, 255 ; 
 his washing his hands, 221 — 
 239 ; his pity for Jesus 
 scourged and mocked, 251 ; 
 his dread of being reported to 
 Caesar, 260 ; his surrender to 
 the multitude, 241 ; his report 
 of our Lord's case, 261 ; his 
 end, 238, 264 
 
 Plato, 252, 267 
 
 Possibilities of evil in man 
 revealed, 105, 167, 248, 319 
 
 Praetorium, 135 
 
 Preparation, Tbe, 139, 258 
 
 Price of blood, 272 
 
 346 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Pressense, 113, 308 
 Priests leading in the outcries, 
 89; fearing defilement, 137 ; 
 afraid of the people, 199 ; pro- 
 paganda among them, 214 
 Problem of Judas, 276 
 Procession to Calvary, 290 
 Prophecy fulfilled, 275 
 Protesting and yielding, 240 
 
 Quaestors, Pilate Avithout, 140 
 Quorum of Sanhedrim, 89 
 
 Rein, i6o, 203, 242 
 
 Eelation of Jesus to the world's 
 sin, 50 
 
 Release, 202 ; custom at Pass- 
 over time, 203 ; origin of cus- 
 tom, 204 
 
 Eenan, 76, loi, 151, 158, 248, 
 259, 281, 321 
 
 Repeated attempts to release 
 Jesus, 152, 184, 197, 207, 225, 
 
 253. 259 
 
 Resistance anticipated to the 
 arrest, 66 
 
 Responsiveness of Jesus, 329-331 
 
 Revolutionary tribunals, 89 
 
 Robinson, 27, 112, 273 
 
 Roman governors in Judea, 141 
 
 Roman governors and their 
 Avives, 190 
 
 Roman mode of reckoning the 
 hours, 258 
 
 Roman respect for Jewish laws 
 and institutions, 254 
 
 Roman shields and standards, 
 222, 225 
 
 Roman soldiers and Jewish 
 offenders, 242 
 
 Roman restraints upon the San- 
 hedrim 132 
 
 Sadducees severe and perse- 
 cuting, 85 
 
 Sanhedrim, quoi-um, 89 ; presi- 
 dent, 89 ; not lawful before 
 dawn, or on a feast day, 63 ; 
 
 held in Caiaphas' house, 87 ; 
 usually in Gazith, 87 ; leading 
 members, 91 ; two meetings, 
 105 ; irregularities and ille- 
 galities in its procedure, 92 — 
 94 ; condemning Jesus for 
 claiming divinity, 105 ; una- 
 nimity, 106 ; no power to 
 punish with death, 132 ; ap- 
 peal to Caesar, 132 
 
 Schwab, 92, 143, 286 
 
 Scourge, The, 240 ; its severity, 
 245 
 
 Scourging, The place of, 246 ; a 
 militar}^ as well as civil 
 punishment, 241 
 
 Sejanus and Pilate, 140 
 
 Self dominant in Judas, 280 
 
 Sending forth of the Seventy, 21 
 
 Sepp, 266, 325 
 
 Simon of Cyrene, 302 : a Jewish 
 pilgrim, 306 ; meeting Jesus 
 at the gate, 306 ; endeavouring 
 to pass by, 309 ; compelled to 
 bear the cross, 312 ; his 
 fellowship with Jesus in 
 suffering, 314 ; a convert and 
 type of Jesus' followers, 3 1 6 
 
 ** Sleep on now and take your 
 rest," 40 
 
 Smith (Professor G. A.), 159 
 
 Soldiers, not lictoi's, scourging 
 Jesus, 242 
 
 Sophocles, 226 
 
 Spirit willing and flesh weak, 35 
 
 Spirit in which the agony was 
 endured, 59 
 
 Stalker, 315, 320 
 
 Steinmeyer, 113 
 
 Stephen (Sir J. F.). 239 
 
 Strauss, 32, loi, 144, 263 
 
 Stroud, 44 
 
 Substitution and redemption, 58 
 
 Suetonius, 136, 289 
 
 Suicide and secularism, 271 
 
 Sympathizers with Jesus, 297 
 
 347 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Synagogue of Cyrenians, 305 
 
 Synoptists and John as to Pass- 
 over, 138 ; Gethsemane, 31 ; 
 Peter's denials, 112 ; incidents 
 on the way to Calvary, 303 
 
 Tacitus, 132, 140, 144, 147, 190, 
 260, 290 
 
 Talmud, Jewish (canonical litera- 
 ture of Judaism, witness to 
 Jewish laws, customs and 
 institutions), 63, 88, 92, 93, 
 94, 100, 102, 103, 106, 125, 
 i37» 143' 204, 286 
 
 Taylor ( Jeremy 1, 185, 282, 284, 
 
 293 
 
 Tears, the tribute to suffering, 323 
 
 Temple, its police, 64 ; its sanc- 
 tuary floor, 272 ; its treasurer, 
 174 ; its destruction, 334 
 
 Tertullian, 261 
 
 Thieves joined with Jesus, 287 ; 
 one of the two a triumph of 
 His grace, 288 
 
 Thirty pieces of silver, 64, 269 
 
 Thomas' picture of Judas, 266 
 
 Thomson, 27 
 
 Three appeals to the people, 213 
 
 Three, The chosen, 30 
 
 Three tributes to Jesus — of 
 Pilate's wife, the Eoman 
 centurion, and the penitent 
 thief, 192 
 
 Tiberias Romanized by Herod. 1 60 
 
 Tiberius, The emperor, 179, 190, 
 254, 260 
 
 Titus, The emperor, 27, 335 
 
 Titus and Dumachus, 287 
 
 Traditions^as to Gethsemane, 
 27; Pilate's wife, 190; the 
 Potter's field, 273 ; Judas' 
 suicide, 270 ; the two thieves, 
 287; Pilate's tragic end, 238 
 
 Traitor found among the disciples, 
 
 Traitor's kiss, how Jesus felt 
 it, 69 
 
 Trials of Jesus -before Annas, 
 84 ; before Caiaphas and the 
 Council, 87 ; before Pilate, 
 132; in Herod's judgment 
 hall, 157 ; before Pilate again, 
 181 ; at bar of the Jewish 
 people, 199 
 
 Trials for treason, 260 
 
 Ugolinus, 92 
 
 Upper Room, scene of the 
 
 Supper, 9 ; supposed to be 
 
 Mary's house, 9 
 
 Via Dolorosa, 290 
 
 Violence and inhumanity of the 
 
 age, 247 
 Virgil, 226 
 Vox populi vox Dei, 2 1 5 
 
 Wace, 145 
 
 Walking with Jesus from Calvary 
 to glory, 317 
 
 Warien and Wilson, 246 
 
 Washing hands— Jewish and 
 Heathen, 226 
 
 '* Weep not for me," 338 
 
 Weiss, 50, 84, 112, 175, 212, 228 
 
 Westcott, 17, 65, 130 
 
 " What is Truth ? " 151 
 
 What woman owes to Jesus, 322 
 
 Whately, 85 
 
 " Whence art thou ? " 255 
 
 Winer, 204 
 
 Women's treatment of Jesus, 322; 
 their tribute to the greatness of 
 His sufPerings, 323 ; offering 
 drink to Him on the Cross to 
 assuage His pain, 325 
 
 Witnesses, False, at the San- 
 hedrim trial, 99 ; none pro- 
 duced before Pilate, 183 ; or 
 before Herod, 168 
 
 Wlinsche, 92, 125 
 
 Zechariah's prophecy about the 
 
 Potter's field, 272, 275 
 Zockler, 289 
 
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