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Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Cæsar.

Then delivered he Him therefore to be crucified. And when they had mocked Him, they took off the purple robe from Him, and put His own clothes on Him, and led Him out to crucify Him.

Christ bearing the Cross.

S. Matt. xxvii. 32; S. Mark. xv. 21; S. Luke xxiii. 26–32;
S. John xix. 17.

And as they came out, they found a man of Cyrene, against the degradation even of a Jewish pretender to the royalty which all desired should be restored, or perhaps some who remembered Christ's deeds of mercy, he puts the question once more, in different form. But, if the people for one moment relent, the chief priests prevent any expression of pity; and thus Pilate's last appeal only elicits the most thorough rejection of Christ in the character of the king. They speak words as prophetic as those of Caiaphas, concerning the expediency of giving one man over to death for the nation; for they never again were nationally offered by God, the King, the Messiah whom they rejected. They had "no king but Cæsar" whilst they remained a nation, and in rebellion against his sovereignty they were destroyed as a Church and nation. The saying of Christ is often verified in the experience of human life: "By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned " (Matt. xii. 37). Men often thus unwittingly pronounce the sentence in their own case, which God refuses to pronounce, but which the Judge will verify at the last. (See App. XVI.)

41. delivered.-Pilate no longer struggles against their determinate will. This is his final order, to carry the sentence of crucifixion into execution.

42. the robe. The scarlet robe of mockery. (See note 22.) It is not said also that they took off the crown of thorns; and some of the early writers assert that this remained upon His brow as He hung upon the cross, as artists, in all ages, have depicted. The Jewish priests and mob now took their turn in mocking Christ, and then they led Him away to execution.

43. came out.-Execution took place without the city (Num. xv. 35; Acts vii. 58; Heb. xiii. 12). As Christ suffered not within the limits of the Jewish city, so we see that the efficacy of His saving death is world-wide, without limitation or restriction of locality—a point pressed in the latter passage.

44. a man of Cyrene.-They met Simon entering the city, as they

Simon by name, the father of Alexander and Rufus, coming out of the country, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus. And there followed Him a great company of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented Him.

came forth from the gates. Cyrene was a part of Lybia, or Africa, which was attached to the Roman government of Crete, to which island it was somewhat adjacent. It was extensively colonized by Jews, who had a synagogue at Jerusalem (Acts vi. 9), to which they resorted when business or worship called them there. We find some of them present, and beholding the effusion of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. Some appear to have become Christians, and, after Stephen's death, to have preached the Gospel to the Greeks, who were probably Gentiles, not merely Hellenists or foreign Jews (Acts xi. 19, 20, xiii. 1). The names mentioned here are found in the Acts, and that of Rufus (Rom. xvi. 13) is identified with the son of this Simon. Both he and his mother were Christians, and therefore there is probability that Simon also, now or eventually, was a follower of Christ. It is his special

distinction to have thus shared the burden of the cross of Christ. Basilides propounded the monstrous heresy that Simon was crucified instead of Christ. The word used for "compelled" is a Persian word, signifying the pressing of horses or men to the king's service.

45. after Jesus.-Bearing the cross was a degradation which formed part of the sufferings of the crucified. Christ was now too much exhausted by long vigils, and by His agony, to bear the weight alone. It appears, therefore, that whilst He bore the upper portion, the foot of it was laid upon Simon, who so bore it "after Jesus;" or he may have borne it at intervals instead of Christ. "Take up thy cross and follow Me," is Christ's monition to those to whom He will give afterwards a share in His glory. We must bear the cross with Him therefore; and it is a thought of comfort that our crosses may be crosses of Christ, and that, if we are bearing them patiently for His sake, He is bearing them with us.

46. company. Not of disciples, but of ordinary spectators. There is always a curious throng attendant on the execution of a sentence of death; and the circumstances of Christ's life and ministry must have attracted very many "to that sight." Many of the women in this company, as they beheld Christ, and the two malefactors who were condemned to die with Him, going to their terrible death, bewailed His melancholy condition and prostration of strength. Many of them remembered His deeds of love and mercy; perhaps by His touch, and at His word, they had "received their dead raised to life again" from the living death of incurable disease; and they did not hesitate now to show their sympathy with Him, though they did not confess or espouse His cause.

But Jesus turning unto them said, Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children. For, behold, the days are coming, in the which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck. Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us. For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?

47. Jesus turning.-The gesture is noticed. Christ always arrested the movements and attention of those who guarded Him; when He had words to speak, they must stay and listen. (See xxix. 16.) He now bids these women not to mourn for His sufferings, but for their own future misery, should they be involved in the destruction of their city. The exhortation is that gospel cry to repentance and obedience, which He had uttered from the first; and it contained the offer of mercy, that the fate He foretold should not fall upon them if believers.

48. the days.-Those foretold in His great prophecy, delivered on the Mount of Olives.

49. they shall say.-It has been noticed that Christ does not say, " Ye shall say. Some of those who heard Him might not live to see those days; some might happily embrace His faith, and so escape the doom of those who refused to believe. But those shut up within the city, during those days of terror, would bless the lot of those who were spared the agony of parents beholding the misery from which they could not save their children, and which would come within the lifetime, and upon the children, of those who heard Him.

50. fall on us.-(See Hos. x. 8.) There is a repetition of this in Rev. vi. 16, where the scope of the prophecy is enlarged to include all who have refused Christ as their Saviour; and they are represented as desiring to escape from "the wrath of the Lamb," of Him who was now being "led as a lamb to the slaughter." This, therefore, is the sad cry of the lost, who discern that ruin is upon them, and that it is too late for salvation. There was a literal fulfilment of our Lord's words; for, in the siege of Jerusalem, numbers took refuge, and were destroyed, in the excavations under the city.

51. green tree. This is a proverbial expression. (See Ps. lii. 8.) Christ is the green tree, the tree of life; the unbelievers are the dry and withered branches (see xxv. c. 9); and, more immediately, the dry tree is the dead Jewish Church. If God permits such sufferings to come upon the righteous, who are engaged in His direct service, giving proof of the vitality of their union with Him by their works of faith, "where shall the ungodly and sinner appear"-where shall the wicked, and all who reject and who forget their Saviour, stand, when He

And there were also two other, malefactors, led with Him to be put to death.

XXXI. THE CRUCIFIXION.

S. Matt. xxvii. 33-44; S. Mark xv. 22-32; S. Luke xxiii. 33-43;
S. John xix. 17-27.

And when they were come to the place, which is called Calvary, that is to say, being interpreted, the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha, they appeareth? Elseley and Bishop Goodwin give another interpretation, perhaps of more immediate application to those to whom our Lord spoke: "If the Romans crucify Me in this way, during peace and prosperity, what will they do to the nation when they come upon them as bitter foes?" that is, whom rebellion has rendered suitable for destruction.

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52. two other, malefactors.-The punctuation here is important. There is a separation between the "two other," which were malefactors," and Christ; the plural "others" would have made the sentence more clear to modern readers. These two malefactors were, no doubt, men of the band of Barabbas, whom we read of as a prisoner in company "with them that had made insurrection with him (Mark xv. 7). We might suppose, from the difference in their disposition, that one had followed him as a leader of desperadoes, for the chances of plunder which he offered; the other, perhaps, from purer and more heroic motives, followed him as a false Christ. (See notes 6, 7, 9.) Pilate may have ordered their crucifixion with Christ, if followers of Jesus Barabbas, to anger the Jews for their preference of their leader to the true Christ.

1. a skull.-Calvary is the Latinized form; Golgotha, the Hebrew equivalent. Why the place should thus be named, it is difficult to say. There is an old tradition that Adam was buried here by Shem, which has been dwelt on by early writers, as being a significant fact that the first Adam and the second Adam should meet in death, upon the same place. There is also a tradition that, in the Garden of Gethsemane, where our Lord's Passion commenced, Adam eat the apple of temptation, by which disobedience man fell. Another explanation is, that this was the place of public execution, and that the name was derived from the skulls of the criminals put to death or exposed here; but it is not the place of skulls," and, if even the usual place of execution, it was contrary to Jewish custom to leave human bones exposed. A third (apparently the most reasonable, certainly the best supported) is,

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gave Him to drink wine mingled with myrrh: and when He had tasted thereof, He would not drink. And there they crucified Him, and the malefactors, one on the right

that this was a low rounded hill, the form of which bore some resemblance to a human skull, and formed a slight eminence. The reason for the name, however, remains a matter of debate. There has been great question as to the identity of the site pointed out in modern times with that of the true Calvary. One of the objections seems to be that it now lies within the city. But the importance of the place itself would soon bring the modern city round it. Without entering into arguments beyond the compass of a note, it is exceedingly probable that the site has been correctly maintained by constant tradition. (See App. XV.) The period most possible for error would be that prior to the time of Constantine. It may reasonably be hoped that the progress of modern research may place this interesting question on a satisfactory and permanent footing.

2. wine... myrrh.-S. Matthew gives "vinegar and gall;" the vinegar being the sour wine of the country, and the gall either added to the myrrh, or as being typical of extreme bitterness. S. Matthew speaks in the words of Ps. lxix. 21. It is probable that the draught was drugged with other herbs, as the effect of myrrh alone would not be particularly stupefying; for it is generally agreed that this was the usual draught given to those condemned to die on the cross, in order to deaden their sensibility to pain. This might, indeed, in the end prolong the period of suffering, as, if really an anodyne, it would lessen the first shock to the nervous system. But it seems to have been given to Christ from some kindly motive. Farrar says that charitable women in Jerusalem prepared these opiates for criminals, and that the custom was founded on a rabbinical interpretation of Prov. xxxi. 6.

3. tasted.—He first tasted; and whilst thus accepting any intended kindness, He deliberately declined what He perceived was intended to prevent His experiencing the full bitterness of pain, by the stupefaction of His natural senses; nay, by tasting, He accepted the bitterness, of which, by refusing to drink, He denied Himself any mitigation.

4. crucified. This punishment is generally considered to have been that in which the extremes of agony and degradation were combined. That death, therefore, which by common consent includes these extremes, comprehends, and is representative of, all other deaths that man can die; thus, as well as in the stead of all, Christ "tasted death for every man," and conquered death in whatsoever form it can assail man. The cross was of several forms. That on which our Lord was crucified consisted of one upright, with a transverse bar; the upright being continued above the transverse, as it bore the superscription or title" over His head," which was written by Pilate (Matt. xxvii. 37; Mark xv. 26; Luke xxiii. 38; John xix. 19). The sufferer was some

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