"Who hath
believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? For he shall
grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he
hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that
we should desire him. He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and
acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was
despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried
our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But
he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the
chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.”
Isa53:1-5
This is going to be a special Easter teaching. While we are
commemorating the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ there is
great value in us reflecting and meditating on the Cross of Christ and on what
Jesus has accomplished for us.
I want to begin with a vivid description of the crucifixion of Jesus
and thereafter we shall proceed with a look at the behind the scenes happenings
while Jesus was on the Cross. In explaining the crucifixion of Jesus to the
Galatians, Paul presented it in such a graphic, clear and detailed manner that
it was as if the Galatians had seen Jesus crucified before their very eyes.
“O foolish
Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before
whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?”
Gal3:1
His revelation of the Cross was that profound. The Holy Spirit was able
to reveal this to his heart in such a way that it was so clear to Him. I pray
that He does the same for us.
The Crown of
thorns
“And the soldiers
led him away into the hall, called Praetorium; and they call together the whole
band. And they clothed him with purple, and platted a crown of thorns, and put
it about his head, And began to salute him, Hail, King of the Jews! And they
smote him on the head with a reed, and did spit upon him, and bowing their
knees worshipped him.” Mk15:16-19
Because of the crime that He was accused of before Pilate i.e. claiming
to be a king, the soldiers in mockery made a crown of thorns which they forced
Jesus to wear. Now this wasn’t worn the way you wear a cap. Crowns weren’t worn
like that. A crown was worn in such a way that it would cover the entire head
up to the ears. The thorns pierced through His head all round so that it would
fit properly.
There would have been no point in making Him wear a crown of
thorns that didn’t hurt! He was bleeding
from the head by the time they were done putting the crown on Him. This was a
precursor of things to come.
The Scourging;
“And Pilate, when
he had called together the chief priests and the rulers and the people, Said
unto them, Ye have brought this man unto me, as one that perverteth the people:
and, behold, I, having examined him before you, have found no fault in this man
touching those things whereof ye accuse him: No, nor yet Herod: for I sent you
to him; and, lo, nothing worthy of death is done unto him. I will therefore
chastise him, and release him. (For of
necessity he must release one unto them at the feast.) And they cried out all
at once, saying, Away with this man, and release unto us Barabbas: (Who for a
certain sedition made in the city, and for murder, was cast into prison.)
Pilate therefore, willing to release Jesus, spake again to them. But they
cried, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. And he said unto them the third time,
Why, what evil hath he done? I have found no cause of death in him: I will
therefore chastise him, and let him go. And they were instant with loud voices,
requiring that he might be crucified. And the voices of them and of the chief
priests prevailed. And Pilate gave sentence that it should be as they
required.” Lk23:13-24
After Jesus was arrested by the High Priest and arraigned before their
court, they found Him guilty of blasphemy and worthy of death. However they
could not kill Him because they had no authority to condemn a criminal to
death. They had to take Him to Pilate. When they brought Him to Pilate, he was
not willing to deliver the punishment they wanted. As far as He was concerned,
Jesus was innocent and had done nothing worthy of death. Pilate’s solution to
this problem was to scourge Jesus. He thought that if He scourged Jesus, they
would be satisfied and not kill Him. This is how Jesus ended up being scourged
first.
Scourging was such a terrible punishment that it was dreaded in all the
Roman colonies. It was reserved for the worst of criminals and the majority of
those that were scourged usually died during the scourging. In fact one of the
nicknames for this punishment was ‘half-death’. This was because most of those
who were scourged usually passed out during the scourging because of the
intensity of the pain. This was a terrible punishment that Jesus went through.
The tools used
for a scourging
For a proper scourging there were only 3 tools required. A big log
called a ‘whipping log’, a scourge and 2 men. The log was where they tied the
victim so that he couldn’t move, the scourge was what they used to scourge the
victim and this scourging was done by two men standing opposite each other on
either side of the victim.
The scourge (phragellóō) also known as a flagellum was a Roman whip
used for severe bodily punishment. It consisted of a wooden handle, to which
several leather thongs or strands were fixed. These thongs were attached with
sharp toothed uneven pieces of bone or metal, to make the whip more painful and
effective. Below is a picture of the scourge;
The scourge that the Romans used
The Process of
scourging
The very first thing that happened before a scourging was that the
victim was stripped naked. This was a great form of humiliation in the Jewish
culture for one to be stripped naked in public. Imagine Jesus, Lord of all was
also stripped naked in front of all these people including His mother and
disciples!
“Then the
soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the common hall, and gathered unto him
the whole band of soldiers. And they stripped him, and put on him a scarlet
robe. And when they had platted a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head,
and a reed in his right hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked
him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews! And they spit upon him, and took the reed,
and smote him on the head.” Mat27:27-30
“But when the
soldiers had Paul stretch out [to tie him to the whipping post] with the
straps, Paul asked the sergeant who was standing there, “Is it legal for you to
whip a Roman citizen who hasn’t had a trial?” Acts22:25 GW
After tying the victim securely and stretching them out properly, the
scourging would then begin. The two men on either side of the victim would
deliver their blows simultaneously to the back, legs and loins and sometimes
even to the face and the stomach. As
each man delivered their blow, the sharp bones and pieces of metal on the
leather throngs would dig deeply and firmly into the skin of the victim. The
soldier would then firmly pull the scourge out so that it tore off the skin and
flesh where it had attached itself. They would then proceed to do the same over
and over again. Whipping and pulling continuously.
In many cases due to the tense stretched position of the body the
scourge would take away entire chunks of flesh from the victim’s body so that
even the sinews and bones could be seen. This would go on until the victim’s
internal organs like the bowels could actually be seen. The pain was unbearable
and the victims would scream in pain pleading for mercy much to the delight of
the executioners. The victims would cry out until they had no more strength to
cry. Most would die.
But the effect of the scourging was not only the ripping of flesh away
from the body, it was also the over bleeding and loss of body fluid. As the
soldiers pulled the scourge embedded in the flesh of the victim, all manner of
blood vessels were ripped and torn and the effect was tremendous bleeding all
over the body from the head to the legs. This would first of all lead to an
incredible thirst and weakness in the victim. A thirst that none of us have
ever experienced. The entire body would be lacking in fluid and the pain would
be indescribable. The Psalmist is able to see the scourging of Jesus
prophetically and he describes it in Psalm22;
“Many bulls have
surrounded me. Strong bulls from Bashan have encircled me. They have opened
their mouths to attack me like ferocious, roaring lions. I am poured out like
water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax. It has melted
within me. My strength is dried up like pieces of broken pottery. My tongue
sticks to the roof of my mouth. You lay me down in the dust of death. Dogs have
surrounded me. A mob has encircled me. They have pierced my hands and feet. I
can count all my bones. People stare. They gloat over me.” Psa22:12-17 GW
And again;
“They have plowed
my back [like farmers plow fields]. They made long slashes [like furrows].” The
LORD is righteous. He has cut me loose from the ropes that wicked people tied
around me.” Psa129:3-4 GW
In Jn19:28 Jesus said while on the Cross that He was thirsty.
“After this,
Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might
be fulfilled, saith, I thirst.”
For the Romans there was no fixed number of blows to the victim. This
depended entirely on the mood of the commanding officer. God had commanded that
no man should be given more than 40 lashes in Deuteronomy 25:3 “Forty lashes
may be given, but no more. If an Israelite were given more than that, he would
be publicly humiliated.”
However the Romans not being under the Law of Moses many times went far
beyond this limit even in punishing Jews.
Paul says that he received ‘stripes above measure’ many times in his
sufferings for the gospel and yet Paul never suffered as much or more than what
Christ suffered in His crucifixion. Paul suffered only a fraction of what Jesus
suffered. Look at his description of his sufferings;
“Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a
fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons
more frequent, in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes
save one. Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered
shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; In journeyings often, in
perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in
perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in
perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; In weariness and
painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in
cold and nakedness.” 2Cor11:23-27.
Many times during the scourging a victim would faint before his
punishment was over. When this happened the soldiers would take cold water and
pour it on the victim to wake them up so that the scourging could continue.
When the victim was near death, the scourging would then cease. After this
scourging Jesus was then led away to be crucified.
Terrible as this may appear (and it is terrible indeed), this was just
the beginning. The actual intense punishment was to come later when Jesus was
placed on that Cross.
On the Cross God Himself would take over. That is where God would start
to release the fullness of His wrath and anger for all the sins of all the
people in the world for all time past, present and future in the body, soul and
spirit of Jesus.
Not a single sin would survive the judgment and wrath that God would
release upon Jesus on that Cross. Here men were punishing Him by scourging but
there God would punish Him with the curse. At the Cross Jesus would drink of
this cup of suffering that He had dreaded to the point of death and asked God
to take away if possible in the garden of Gethsemane.
“Then saith he
unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and
watch with me. And he went a little farther, and fell on his face, and prayed,
saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless
not as I will, but as thou wilt.” Mat26:38-39
Jesus didn’t fear the scourging by the Romans; He dreaded the wrath of
God, the curse of the law which He would bear on the Cross. He had long told
His disciples not to be afraid of those who would destroy their physical bodies
but to fear God who could do much worse;
“And fear not
them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear
him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” Mat10:28
He knew that this was what was waiting for Him on the Cross, God had
prophesied this cup of wrath in Isaiah 51:17
“Awake, awake,
stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the LORD the cup of his
fury; thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling, and wrung them out.”
God called it the cup of trembling. How many of you know God doesn’t exaggerate? Jesus knew this very well. Later we shall look at this cup of trembling, the cup of God’s wrath.
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