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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comAdam Clarke Commentary - Matthew 27:26 - 27:26
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Scourged Jesus - This is allowed to have been a very severe punishment of itself among the Romans, the flesh being generally cut by the whips used for this purpose: so the poet: -
- Horribili Sectere flagello.
“To be cut by the horrible whip.”
Hor. Sat. I. 3. 119.
And sometimes it seems, they were whipped to death.
See the same poet, Sat. I. 2. 41.
- Ille Flagellis Ad Mortem caesus
See also Horat. Epod. od. iv. v. 11.
It has been thought that Pilate might have spared this additional cruelty of whipping; but it appears that it was a common custom to scourge those criminals which were to be crucified, (see Josephus De Bello, lib. ii. c. 25), and lenity in Christ’s case is not to be allowed; he must take all the misery in full tale.
Delivered him to be crucified - Tacitus, the Roman historian, mentions the death of Christ in very remarkable terms: -
Nero - quaesitissimis poenis is affecit, quos - vulgus Christianos appellabat. Auctor nominis ejus Christus, qui Tiberio imperitante, per Procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio affectus erat. -
“Nero put those who commonly went by the name of Christians to the most exquisite tortures. The author of this name was Christ, who was capitally punished in the reign of Tiberius, by Pontius Pilate the Procurator.”