Counts, and protects every hair of your head.”
Pilate Washeth His Hands
Pilate therefore went forth again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in him. Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the man! When the chief priests therefore and officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Take ye him, and crucify him: for I find no fault in him.—And the governor said, Why, what evil hath he done? But they cried out the more, 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 this just person: see ye to it. Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our children. Then released he Barabbas unto them: and when he had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified.—St. John xix: 4-6; St. Matt. xxvii: 23-26.
NOTE BY THE ARTIST
Once more the scene is “Gabbatha”—the place where Pilate sat; and Jesus, his lacerated shoulders covered with a cast-off soldier’s cloak of scarlet, and wearing a crown of thorns, is exposed to the gaze of the rabble of Jerusalem, who now surged and thronged in the courtyard of the palace. Pilate vainly hoped that the sight of the sufferings the prisoner had already endured might satisfy the fury of his enemies; but the relentless hatred of the priests was voiced through the insensate yells of the ignorant and bloodthirsty mob, and their final argument was cunningly directed to the point of least resistance. Pilate’s sense of justice yielded to that of self-interest. “He released unto them one who (Barabbas), for sedition and murder, was cast into prison, whom they had desired; but he delivered Jesus to their will.”
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The second lesson that we may learn from the history of Christ’s trial is a lesson about—the wicked priests.
If our Saviour had been persecuted and put to death by infidels or by men who did not profess to be religious, it would not have been surprising. But, when we find that it was the priests—men occupying the highest places in the church, and whose business it was to study the Scriptures, and teach them to the people—when these were the men most forward in having Jesus put to death—it seems very strange. And yet, it was just so. When Jesus began his ministry, the priests were the first to oppose him. As he went on with the work of his ministry, they were always the most ready to persecute him, and give him trouble. And at the last, it was the priests who resolved he should be put to death and who took the lead in bringing about that awful result. It was the priests who hired Judas to betray him. It was the priests who brought false charges against him. And, when Pilate was willing to let him go, it was the priests who stirred up the people to insist on his being put to death. Jesus had come at the time and in the way that the prophets had said he should come; and yet the priests would not receive him. He had been loving, and gentle, and kind; and yet they hated him. He had spent his life in going about doing good; and yet the priests made up their minds that he must be put to death.
And the question that comes up here is—how was it possible that these men—these priests—should be so wicked? This is a very serious and important question. And the answer to it is this: that being ministers, or priests, or being engaged in the outward duties of religion will do us no good and make us no better than other people, unless we are careful to have our hearts made right in the sight of God; unless we are willing to believe what he tells us, and to think, and feel, and speak, and act, as he wishes us to do. The best things, when spoiled, always become the worst things. Women have many things that help to make them better than men. But a bad woman is always worse than a bad man. Satan was once an archangel. But he sinned. He fell. He is now an angel ruined, and this makes him the worst, the wickedest person to be found in all the universe.