Jesus Sentenced to Be Crucified
19 Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged. 2 The soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head. They clothed him in a purple robe 3 and went up to him again and again, saying, “Hail, king of the Jews!” And they slapped him in the face.
4 Once more Pilate came out and said to the Jews gathered there, “Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no basis for a charge against him.” 5 When Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, Pilate said to them, “Here is the man!”
6 As soon as the chief priests and their officials saw him, they shouted, “Crucify! Crucify!”
But Pilate answered, “You take him and crucify him. As for me, I find no basis for a charge against him.”
7 The Jewish leaders insisted, “We have a law, and according to that law he must die, because he claimed to be the Son of God.”
8 When Pilate heard this, he was even more afraid, 9 and he went back inside the palace. “Where do you come from?” he asked Jesus, but Jesus gave him no answer. 10 “Do you refuse to speak to me?” Pilate said. “Don’t you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?”
11 Jesus answered, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.”
12 From then on, Pilate tried to set Jesus free, but the Jewish leaders kept shouting, “If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar. Anyone who claims to be a king opposes Caesar.”
13 When Pilate heard this, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judge’s seat at a place known as the Stone Pavement (which in Aramaic is Gabbatha). 14 It was the day of Preparation of the Passover; it was about noon.
“Here is your king,” Pilate said to the Jews.
15 But they shouted, “Take him away! Take him away! Crucify him!”
“Shall I crucify your king?” Pilate asked.
“We have no king but Caesar,” the chief priests answered.
16 Finally Pilate handed him over to them to be crucified.
The Crucifixion of Jesus
So the soldiers took charge of Jesus. 17 Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha). 18 There they crucified him, and with him two others—one on each side and Jesus in the middle.
19 Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the cross. It read: jesus of nazareth, the king of the jews. 20 Many of the Jews read this sign, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and the sign was written in Aramaic, Latin and Greek. 21 The chief priests of the Jews protested to Pilate, “Do not write ‘The King of the Jews,’ but that this man claimed to be king of the Jews.”
22 Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”
23 When the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took his clothes, dividing them into four shares, one for each of them, with the undergarment remaining. This garment was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom.
24 “Let’s not tear it,” they said to one another. “Let’s decide by lot who will get it.” This happened that the scripture might be fulfilled that said, “They divided my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment.”[Psalm 22:18] So this is what the soldiers did.
25 Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 26 When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, [The Greek for Woman does not denote any disrespect.] here is your son,” 27 and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.
The Death of Jesus
28 Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” 29 A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips. 30 When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
31 Now it was the day of Preparation, and the next day was to be a special Sabbath. Because the Jewish leaders did not want the bodies left on the crosses during the Sabbath, they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken down. 32 The soldiers therefore came and broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with Jesus, and then those of the other. 33 But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. 34 Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. 35 The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe. 36 These things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled: “Not one of his bones will be broken,” [Exodus 12:46; Num. 9:12; Psalm 34:20] 37 and, as another scripture says, “They will look on the one they have pierced.” [Zech. 12:10]
The Burial of Jesus
38 Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away. 39 He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds.[Or about 34 kilograms] 40 Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs. 41 At the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb, in which no one had ever been laid. 42 Because it was the Jewish day of Preparation and since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.
19:1 Luke places the mockery of Jesus at the midpoint in the
trial when Jesus was sent to Herod. Mark and Matthew place the scourging and mockery
at the end of the trial after the sentence of death. Scourging was an integral
part of the crucifixion penalty.
19:7 Made himself the Son of God: this question was not
raised in John’s account of the Jewish interrogations of Jesus as it was in the
synoptic account. Nevertheless, see Jn 5:18; 8:53; 10:36.
19:12 Friend of Caesar: a Roman honorific title bestowed
upon high-ranking officials for merit.
19:13 Seated him: others translate “(Pilate) sat down.” In
John’s thought, Jesus is the real judge of the world, and John may here be
portraying him seated on the judgment bench. Stone Pavement: in Greek
lithostrotos; under the fortress Antonia, one of the conjectured locations of
the praetorium, a massive stone pavement has been excavated. Gabbatha (Aramaic
rather than Hebrew) probably means “ridge, elevation.”
19:14 Noon: Mk 15:25 has Jesus crucified “at the third
hour,” which means either 9 a.m. or the period from 9 a.m. to 12 noon, the time
when, according to John, Jesus was sentenced to death, was the hour at which
the priests began to slaughter Passover lambs in the temple; see Jn 1:29.
19:16 He handed him over to them to be crucified: in context
this would seem to mean “handed him over to the chief priests.” Lk 23:25 has a
similar ambiguity. There is a polemic tendency in the gospels to place the
guilt of the crucifixion on the Jewish authorities and to exonerate the Romans
from blame. But John later mentions the Roman soldiers (Jn 19:23), and it was
to these soldiers that Pilate handed Jesus over.
19:17 Carrying the cross himself: a different picture from
that of the synoptics, especially Lk 23:26, where Simon of Cyrene is made to
carry the cross, walking behind Jesus. In John’s theology, Jesus remained in
complete control and master of his destiny (cf. Jn 10:18). Place of the Skull:
the Latin word for skull is Calvaria; hence “Calvary.” Golgotha is actually an
Aramaic rather than a Hebrew word.
19:19 The inscription differs with slightly different words
in each of the four gospels. John’s form is fullest and gives the equivalent of
the Latin INRI = Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum. Only John mentions its polyglot
character (Jn 19:20) and Pilate’s role in keeping the title unchanged (Jn
19:21–22).
19:23–25a While all four gospels describe the soldiers casting
lots to divide Jesus’ garments (see note on Mt 27:35), only John quotes the
underlying passage from Ps 22:19, and only John sees each line of the poetic
parallelism literally carried out in two separate actions (Jn 19:23–24).
19:25 It is not clear whether four women are meant, or three
(i.e., Mary the wife of Cl[e]opas [cf. Lk 24:18] is in apposition with his
mother’s sister) or two (his mother and his mother’s sister, i.e., Mary of
Cl[e]opas and Mary of Magdala). Only John mentions the mother of Jesus here.
The synoptics have a group of women looking on from a distance at the cross (Mk
15:40).
19:26–27 This scene has been interpreted literally, of
Jesus’ concern for his mother; and symbolically, e.g., in the light of the Cana
story in Jn 2 (the presence of the mother of Jesus, the address woman, and the
mention of the hour) and of the upper room in Jn 13 (the presence of the
beloved disciple; the hour). Now that the hour has come (Jn 19:28), Mary (a
symbol of the church?) is given a role as the mother of Christians (personified
by the beloved disciple); or, as a representative of those seeking salvation,
she is supported by the disciple who interprets Jesus’ revelation; or Jewish
and Gentile Christianity (or Israel and the Christian community) are reconciled.
19:28 The scripture…fulfilled: either in the scene of Jn
19:25–27, or in the I thirst of Jn 19:28. If the latter, Ps 22:16; 69:22
deserve consideration.
19:29 Wine: John does not mention the drugged wine, a
narcotic that Jesus refused as the crucifixion began (Mk 15:23), but only this
final gesture of kindness at the end (Mk 15:36). Hyssop, a small plant, is
scarcely suitable for carrying a sponge (Mark mentions a reed) and may be a
symbolic reference to the hyssop used to daub the blood of the paschal lamb on
the doorpost of the Hebrews (Ex 12:22).
19:30 Handed over the spirit: there is a double nuance of
dying (giving up the last breath or spirit) and that of passing on the holy
Spirit; see Jn 7:39, which connects the giving of the Spirit with Jesus’ glorious
return to the Father, and Jn 20:22, where the author portrays the conferral of
the Spirit.
19:34–35 John probably emphasizes these verses to show the
reality of Jesus’ death, against the docetic heretics. In the blood and water
there may also be a symbolic reference to the Eucharist and baptism.
19:35 He knows: it is not certain from the Greek that this
he is the eyewitness of the first part of the sentence. May [come to] believe:
see note on Jn 20:31.
19:38–42 In the first three gospels there is no anointing on
Friday. In Matthew and Luke the women come to the tomb on Sunday morning
precisely to anoint Jesus.
The Gospel of John
Online Bible Study in English
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