Matt. xxvii. 2-30; cf. Mark xv.1-19=Luke xxiii. 1–25= John xviii. 28-xix. 16.

BEFORE PONTIUS PILATE.

2 And when they had bound him, they led him away, and delivered him to Pontius Pilate the governor. 3 Then Judas, which had betrayed him, when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the 4 chief priests and elders, saying, I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What is that to us? see thou to that. 5 And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, 6 and departed, and went and hanged himself. And

the chief priests took the silver pieces, and said, It is not lawful for to put them into the treasury, because 7 it is the price of blood. And they took counsel, and

bought with them the potter's field, to bury strangers 8 in. Wherefore that field was called, The field of 9 blood, unto this day. 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 10 value; and gave them for the potter's field, as the II Lord appointed me. And Jesus stood before the

governor and the governor asked him, saying, Art thou the King of the Jews? And Jesus said unto 12 him, Thou sayest. And when he was accused of the 13 chief priests and elders, he answered nothing. Then

said Pilate unto him, Hearest thou not how many things 14 they witness against thee? And he answered him to

never a word; insomuch that the governor marvelled 15 greatly. Now at that feast the governor was wont to release unto the people a prisoner, whom they would. 16 And they had then a notable prisoner, called

17 Barabbas. Therefore when they were gathered together, Pilate said unto them, Whom will ye that

I release unto you? Barabbas, or Jesus which is called 18 Christ? For he knew that for envy they had 19 delivered him. When he was set down on the judgment seat, his wife sent unto him, saying, Have thou nothing to do with that just man: for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of 20 him. But the chief priests and elders persuaded the multitude that they should ask Barabbas, and 21 destroy Jesus. The governor answered and said

unto them, Whether of the twain will ye that I 22 release unto you? They said, Barabbas. Pilate saith unto them, What shall I do then with Jesus which is called Christ? They all say unto him, Let 23 him be crucified. And the governor said, Why, what evil hath he done? But they cried out the more, 24 saying, Let him be crucified. When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but that rather a tumult was made, he took water, and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood of 25 this just person: see ye to it. Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our 26 children. Then released he Barabbas unto them :

and when he had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to 27 be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took

Jesus into the common hall, and gathered unto him 28 the whole band of soldiers. And they stripped him, 29 and put on him a scarlet robe. And when they

had platted a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked him, saying, Hail, 30 King of the Jews! And they spit upon him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head.

The Sanhedrin had found Jesus guilty of blasphemy, and had Israel been free, He would

forthwith have been stoned to death. But she was subject to Rome, and the Sanhedrin's sentence had to come under the review of the Roman procurator (cf. John xviii. 31). Thus Jesus had to stand a second trial. The procurator at that time was Pontius Pilate, a typical Roman, with all the Roman reverence for justice and all the Roman contempt for superstition, especially the superstition of the Jews. He was singularly ill adapted for governing that sensitive and turbulent race. He had trampled on their prejudices, and treated them with undisguised scorn and occasionally with tyrannical brutality (cf. Luke xiii. 1). The indignant people had addressed a complaint to the Emperor Tiberius, and he had administered a rebuke to the procurator. Pilate was thus in a difficult situation. He hated his subjects, but he must keep the peace with them on pain of deposition and disgrace. They knew how matters stood: they had only to clamour and threaten insurrection, and he would yield to them. He would fain have done justice to Jesus, and made repeated attempts, whereof Matthew records only one, to escape the odious necessity of condemning an innocent man; but the Jews had him at their mercy, and he surrendered to their clamour. would have been an awkward report to reach the ears of the suspicious Emperor that his procurator in turbulent Judæa had acquitted a prisoner charged with seditious aspiration to the throne of Israel. It was a choice between sacrificing himself and sacrificing Jesus, and he chose the latter

course.

It

2. "They bound His hands with ropes, but understand thou that it was within that He was

bound-bound by the meshes of mighty love, as immeasurably stronger than those ropes as chains of iron are beyond threads of flax" (Juan de Avila).

3-4. His crime accomplished, he realised the enormity of it, and was stricken with remorse. It happened with him as with the matricide Nero : "When the crime was at length accomplished, its greatness was understood" (Tac. Ann. xiv. 10). He had hoped that Jesus might be acquitted by the Sanhedrin, and when he saw Him condemned, the desperate idea of cancelling his bargain occurred to him, and he confronted the Sanhedrists as they retired from the Hall of Hewn Stone with the thirty shekels in his hands.

5. into the Sanctuary (see n. on xxiii. 16). Whither the High Priests had betaken themselves to be rid of the wretch. Ere they could close the entrance he hurled the ringing coins in after them. The traitor repented terribly. Would that he had sought mercy at the feet of Jesus! Origen's charity suggested to him a quaint fancy: "He thought to anticipate in death his dying Master, and to meet Him with naked soul, that, confessing and entreating, he might win mercy."

6. Cf. Deut. xxiii. 18. They shuddered at the blood-stained shekels, oblivious of the worse stain on their souls.

7. A worked-out clay-bed, outside the city, useless and unsightly, a blot on the landscape. Because of the smoke potteries must be remote from dwellings in out-of-the-way places. Cf. 1 Chron. iv. 23. strangers. I.e., Gentiles who died in the Holy City. An unintentional proclamation of the Saviour's world-wide grace. "By this symbol

the hope of salvation was given to the Gentiles, because they were included in the price of Christ's death" (Calv.).

8. the Field of Blood. In Aramaic, "Akeldama" (Acts i. 19). Jerome says it was pointed out in his day on the southern slope of Mount Sion.

9-10. Zech. xi. 12-13, where the prophet tells how the people requited his service with a slave's price and he "cast it to the potter"-a phrase denoting contemptuous rejection, a potter's handiwork being frail and slight in value (cf. Lam. iv. 2; Eccl. xii. 6). The prophecy does not speak of a "field." The Evangelist has adapted it. He has also attributed it to Jeremiah. "How the name of Jeremiah has crept in," says Calvin, "I confess I know not; nor does it greatly trouble me. That the name of Jeremiah has certainly been put by an error for 'Zechariah' the fact shows, since nothing of the sort is read in Jeremiah, nor anything approaching it." Perhaps, however, there is no error. "I read lately," says Jerome, "in a Hebrew book, which a Hebrew of the Nazarene sect presented to me, an apocryphal writing of Jeremiah in which I found this passage written word for word." And it is generally recognised that Zech. ix.-xv. is a collection of prophecies of various dates, and since there is reason for regarding ix.-xi. as pre-exilic, it may be that our passage was really spoken through Jeremiah the prophet.

11. This is the charge which the Sanhedrin had reported to Pilate: that Jesus claimed to be the Messiah, King of the Jews, and therefore a rival of the Emperor (cf. Luke xxiii. 2). A double baseness;