Then the soldiers took Jesus into the Pretorium, and stripped him, and scourged him, and plaited a crown of thorns, and gave him a scarlet robe, and put a reed in his hand. Smiting him again and again on the head, they offered him mock reverence.
Guido, Plate 142, portrays Jesus at this time (Matt. 27:27-30). Afterwards Pilate brings Jesus forth to the crowd and says, "Behold the Man." (John 19:5.)
Ciseri, Plate 143, takes us upon the colonnade with Pilate and Jesus, and gives us a sense of the mad crowd below—immense, implacable—shouting "Crucify him! Crucify him!" (John 19:6.)
Hofmann, Plate 144, shows "the man" to us, and says, Behold him! Hofmann too, suggests the angry crowd, and in the distance introduces the three Marys. Both these artists include Pilate's wife in the picture because of Matt. 27:19.
Doré, Plate 145, with his love of the extraordinary, has objectified such a dream as he supposes might have caused a Roman matron to 'suffer many things.' She sees the living and the dead, all heaven and hell attendant upon the Christ, and because of this fears for the welfare of her husband if he does not protect so august a person as this mysterious King, whose Kingdom is not of this world.
