¹² So also Jesus suffered and died outside the city gates to make his people holy by means of his own blood.

¹² With his own blood—not the blood of goats and calves—he entered the Most Holy Place once for all time and secured our redemption forever.

¹³ Under the old system, the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer could cleanse people’s bodies from ceremonial impurity. ¹⁴ Just think how much more the blood of Christ will purify our consciences from sinful deeds^[a] so that we can worship the living God. For by the power of the eternal Spirit, Christ offered himself to God as a perfect sacrifice for our sins.

¹⁷ Carrying the cross by himself, he went to the place called Place of the Skull (in Hebrew, Golgotha). ¹⁸ There they nailed him to the cross. Two others were crucified with him, one on either side, with Jesus between them.

⁵⁸ and dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. His accusers took off their coats and laid them at the feet of a young man named Saul.^[a]

²⁰ When they were finally tired of mocking him, they took off the purple robe and put his own clothes on him again. Then they led him away to be crucified.

The Crucifixion

²¹ A passerby named Simon, who was from Cyrene,^[a] was coming in from the countryside just then, and the soldiers forced him to carry Jesus’ cross. (Simon was the father of Alexander and Rufus.) ²² And they brought Jesus to a place called Golgotha (which means “Place of the Skull”). ²³ They offered him wine drugged with myrrh, but he refused it.

²⁴ Then the soldiers nailed him to the cross. They divided his clothes and threw dice^[b] to decide who would get each piece.