Mark 15:15

Here, I. Pilate, to gratify the Jews' malice, delivers Christ to be crucified, Mar 15:15. Willing to content the people, to do enough for them (so the word is), and make them easy, that he might keep them quiet, he released Barabbas unto them, who was the scandal and plague of their nation, and delivered Jesus to be crucified, who was the glory and blessing of their nation. Though he had scourged him before, hoping that would content them, and then not designing to crucify him, yet he went on to that; for no wonder that he who could persuade himself to chastise one that was innocent (Luk 23:16), could by degrees persuade himself to crucify him. Christ was crucified, for that was, 1. A bloody death, and without blood no remission, Heb 9:22. The blood is the life (Gen 9:4); it is the vehicle of the animal spirits, which connect the soul and body, so that the exhausting of the blood is the exhausting of the life. Christ was to lay down his life for us, and therefore shed his blood. Blood made atonement for the soul (Lev 17:11), and therefore in every sacrifice of propitiation special order was given for the pouring out of the blood, and the sprinkling of that before the Lord. Now, that Christ might answer all these types, he shed his blood. 2. It was a painful death; the pains were exquisite and acute, for death made its assaults upon the vitals by the exterior parts, which are quickest of sense. Christ died, so as that he might feel himself die, because he was to be both the priest and the sacrifice; so that he might be active in dying; because he was to make his soul an offering for sin. Tully calls crucifixion, Teterrimum supplicium - A most tremendous punishment: Christ would meet death in its greatest terror, and so conquer it. 3. It was a shameful death, the death of…

15:15 to pacify the crowd: To protect his job, Pilate ordered a completely innocent man to be crucified. • He ordered Jesus flogged: Flogging was preliminary to crucifixion. It was done with leather thongs tipped with metal, stone, or bone. This laceration of the flesh could itself bring death. Jesus’ prediction in 10:34 was now being fulfilled.