Old/New Testament
Here’s the man!
19 So Pilate then took Jesus and had him flogged. 2 The soldiers wove a crown of thorns, put it on his head, and dressed him up in a purple robe. 3 Then they came up to him and said, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they slapped him.
4 Pilate went out again.
“Look,” he said to them, “I’m bringing him out to you, so that you’ll know I find no guilt in him.”
5 So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple cloak.
“Look!” said Pilate. “Here’s the man!”
6 So when the chief priests and their attendants saw him, they gave a great shout.
“Crucify him!” they yelled. “Crucify him!”
“Take him yourselves and crucify him!” said Pilate. “I find him not guilty!”
7 “We’ve got a law,” replied the Judaeans, “and according to that law he deserves to die! He made himself the son of God!”
No king but Caesar
8 When Pilate heard that, he was all the more afraid. 9 He went back into the Praetorium and spoke to Jesus.
“Where do you come from?” he asked.
But Jesus gave him no answer.
10 So Pilate addressed him again.
“Aren’t you going to speak to me?” he said. “Don’t you know that I have the authority to let you go, and the authority to crucify you?”
11 “You couldn’t have any authority at all over me,” replied Jesus, “unless it was given to you from above. That’s why the person who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.”
12 From that moment on, Pilate tried to let him go.
But the Judaeans shouted at him.
“If you let this fellow go,” they said, “you are no friend of Caesar! Everyone who sets himself up as a king is speaking against Caesar!”
13 So when Pilate heard them saying that, he brought Jesus out and sat down at the official judgment seat, called The Pavement (in Hebrew, “Gabbatha”). 14 It was about midday on the day of Preparation for the Passover.
“Look,” said Pilate, “here is your king!”
15 “Take him away!” they shouted. “Take him away! Crucify him!”
“Do you want me to crucify your king?” asked Pilate.
“We have no king,” the chief priests replied, “except Caesar!”
16 Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.
The King of the Jews
So they took Jesus away. 17 He carried his own cross, and went to the spot called Skull Place (in Hebrew, “Golgotha”). 18 That was where they crucified him. They also crucified two others, one on either side of him, with Jesus in the middle.
19 Pilate wrote a notice and had it placed on the cross:
JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS
20 Lots of the Judaeans read this notice, because the place where Jesus was crucified was close to the city. It was written in Hebrew, Latin and Greek.
21 So the chief priests said to Pilate, “Don’t write ‘The King of the Jews’! Write that he said, ‘I am the King of the Jews’!”
22 “What I’ve written,” replied Pilate, “I’ve written.”
Scripture quotations from The New Testament for Everyone are copyright © Nicholas Thomas Wright 2011, 2018, 2019.