It is now seven in the morning. Priests, scribes, Pharisees, all come before Pilate in a howling mob, leading the Savior of mankind with a rope around His neck. They had tortured Him half the night—they have decided He shall die; they only want permission to kill Him, or have Him killed by Pilate.
As it is the holy festival time, custom does not permit the mob to enter the heathen palace of Pilate. So they stand out in the street, on a place called the "pavement," and howl.
"What is the charge against Him? What has this man done?" demands the Roman governor, with a show of justice as he steps out to the front of his palace and looks at the mob. "He says he is Christ, the King," some of the accusers answer. Pilate goes back into the great hall, with the marble floor and the gilded ceilings. He himself has no love for the Jews. They have no love for Pilate. He knows the Jerusalemites to be a seditious lot of zealots, quarreling forever among themselves, and fanatical in their adherence to the laws of Moses. The Jews know Pilate to be a hater of their creeds and customs. They regard him, too, a brutal governor; but now they would use this brutality against one of whom they were a little afraid, for in the villages this Galilean, whom they were persecuting, had many friends. Would not the people rise, moved by His wonderful miracles, and at last put an end to all their religious pretenses? It was the temple-people, the Sanhedrins, and the Pharisaic priests who stood in front of this mob, gathered at Pilate's palace on that early morning. They had already decided their victim must die, and they were inciting all the ignorant to violence.
Because of the Roman occupation, Pilate's approval was a necessity before they could quite kill a man. They reckoned, however, that he would want to please them some, and so lessen his own unpopularity.
In a little time the governor called Jesus into the judgment hall. Looking at the wronged, the suffering, the persecuted being who stood before him, the blood falling from His poor body to the floor Pilate asked Him plainly if He were the king of the Jews? "Do you ask that of yourself," said the persecuted but heroic prisoner, "or did others tell it of me?"
Pilate was in fact greatly impressed by the face, serene, even in suffering, and the mild words of one falsely accused. The Savior explained that if He was a king it was not of this world. His kingdom was of the spirit. Pilate did not quite understand that. He himself was not very spiritual. Jesus added, "I am a witness to the Truth." "Then what is Truth?" said Pilate. We can only guess the answer given him. It may have greatly moved the Roman, for he at once went out to the mob assembled on the pavement and said, "I find no fault in this man." Some one in the crowd spoke up and accused Jesus of stirring up the peasants in Galilee.
"If he is a Galilean," said Pilate to himself, "he must be tried by Antipas, the Galilean governor." Reliable tradition says that they also shouted at him that this was the very Child Jesus, whom Herod tried to kill when he massacred the children of Bethlehem. Pilate had never heard of the flight to Egypt nor of the return. He supposed the Child Christ dead. Now he is astounded, and alarmed, for where had Jesus been all these years? Had His origin, His identity been kept a secret? Does not this tradition and Pilate's alarm add strength to the supposition that years of His life had passed in the secret of the desert?
Pilate gladly sent him to Antipas, who that very day happened to be in Jerusalem at the festival. The Galilean ruler had heard of Christ a thousand times, and often had longed to see him and talk with him, but most he was curious to see a miracle performed. Again the Master is accused, but to the many questions of Antipater He makes no answer whatever. Neither does He perform some miracle for the curiosity and sport of the Galilean court. Offended at His silence, and greatly disappointed, the king mocks Him, and arraying Him in ridiculous garments sends Him back to Pilate. But he has found no fault in Him—no act against the laws of Galilee for which he dare punish Him.
Again He is before Pilate, the Roman, again full of pain, and bleeding, He answers mildly as before, or else is silent, submitting to outrageous injury. Three times Pilate goes out before the crowd and tells them that Christ has done nothing worthy of death. "Again I tell you I find no fault in Him. I sent Him over to Antipas, the king of Galilee. He also finds no fault worthy of death. Let me chastise Him and set Him free."
But the crowd yelled the louder for His blood. Once the wife of Pilate comes and whispers to him to "have nothing to do with that good man, I have been forewarned in a dream." Again Pilate earnestly strives to save Him. Again he addresses the mob, "You know it is our custom to release a prisoner at this festival. I have Barabbas, the robber, here and Jesus. Let me set Jesus free and hang the robber." "No, no," cry a hundred voices; "free Barabbas and crucify the heretic." The Roman, accomplished in killing men, practiced in cruelty as he is, shudders at the fearful injustice. He knows the Galilean has done no wrong. The bruised and bleeding body of the Master waits in silence and prayer there in the hall of the palace. The cries for His murder reach His ears—they grow louder and louder. Pilate, confused as to the law, as to his duty, and perhaps alarmed, weakened, in a contemptible moment of cowardice, yields.