scourging was always inflicted previously to crucifixion. Many exLet the following suffice. amples might be produced of this custom. Livy, speaking of the fate of those slaves who had confederated and taken up arms against the state, says, that many of them were slain, many taken prisoners, and others, after they had been whipped or Philo, relating the cruelties scourged,' were suspended on crosses. which Flaccus the Roman prefect exercised upon the Jews of Alexandria, says, that after they were mangled and torn with scourges2 in the theatres, they were fastened to crosses. Josephus also informs us that at the siege of Jerusalem great numbers of the Jews were crucified, after they had been previously whipped, and had suffered every wanton cruelty.3 "After they had inflicted this customary flagellation, the evangelist informs us that they obliged our Lord to carry to the place of execution the cross, or at least the transverse beam of it, on which he was to be suspended. Lacerated, therefore, with the stripes and bruises he had received, faint with the loss of blood, his spirits exhausted by the cruel insults and blows that were given him when they invested him with robes of mock royalty, and oppressed with the incumbent weight of his cross; in these circumstances our Saviour was urged along the road. We doubt not but in this passage to Calvary every indignity was offered him. This was usual. Our Lord, fatigued and spent with the treatment he The soldiers therefore had received, could not support his cross. who attended him compelled one Simon, a Cyrenean, who was coming from the country to Jerusalem, and happened then to be passing by them, to carry it for him. This circumstance here mentioned of our Lord bearing his cross was agreeable to the Roman custom. Slaves and malefactors, who were condemned to this death, were compelled to carry the whole or part of the fatal gibbet on which they were destined to die. This constituted a principal part of the shame and ignominy of such a death. Cross-bearer was a term of the last reproach among the Romans. The miserable wretch, covered with blood, from the scourges that had been inflicted upon him, and groaning under the weight of his cross, was, all along the road to the place of execution, loaded with every wanton cruelty. So extreme were the misery and sufferings of the hapless criminals who were condemned to this punishment, that Plutarch makes use of it as an illustration of the misery of sin, that every kind of wickedness produces its own particular torment; just as every malefactor, 1 Multi occisi, multi capti alii verberati crucibus affixi. Livii. lib. xxxiii. 36. 2 Philo in Flac. p. 529. edit. Mangey. See also pages 527, 528. ejusdem editionis. The Roman custom was to scourge before all executions. The magistrates bringing them out into the forum, after they had scourged them according to custom, they struck off their heads. Polybii Hist. lib. i. p. 10. tom. 1. edit. Gronovii. 1670. 3 Josephus de Bello Jud. lib. v. c. 2. p. 353. Havercamp. Bell Judaic. lib. i. 14.9. p. 182. Haverc. cap. 4 Vid. Justi Lipsii de cruce, lib. ii. cap. 6. p. 1180. Vesaliæ. 5 Plutarch de tardâ Dei vindictâ, p. 982. edit. Gr. 8vo. Steph. Dionysii Halicar. lib. vii. tom. i. p. 456. Oxon. 1704. when he is brought forth to execution, carries his own cross.1 He was pushed, thrown down, stimulated with goads, and impelled forwards by every act of insolence and inhumanity that could be inflicted. There is great reason to think that our blessed Redeemer in his way to Calvary experienced every abuse of this nature, especially when he proceeded slowly along, through languor, lassitude, and faintness, and the soldiers and rabble found his strength incapable of sustaining and dragging his cross any farther. On this occasion we imagine that our Lord suffered very cruel treatment from those who attended him. Might not the scourging that was inflicted, the blows he had received from the soldiers when in derision they paid him homage, and the abuse he suffered on his way to Calvary, greatly contribute to accelerate his death, and occasion that speedy dissolution at which one of the evangelists tells us Pilate marvelled? "When the malefactor had carried his cross to the place of execution, a hole was dug in the earth, in which it was to be fixed; the eriminal was stripped, a stupefying potion was given him, the cross was laid on the ground, the wretch distended upon it, and four soldiers, two on each side, at the same time were employed in driving four large nails through his hands and feet. After they had deeply fixed and riveted these nails in wood, they elevated the cross with the agonising wretch upon it; and in order to fix it the more firmly and securely in the earth, they let it violently fall into the cavity they had dug to receive it. This vehement precipitation of the cross must give the person that was nailed to it a most dreadful convulsive shock, and agitate his whole frame in a dire and most excruciating manner. These several particulars the Romans observed in the crucifixion of our Lord. Upon his arrival at Calvary he was stripped: a stupefying draught was offered him, which he refused to drink. This, St. Mark says, was a composition of myrrh and wine. The design of this potion was, by its inebriating and intoxicating quality, to blunt the edge of pain, and stun the quickness of sensibility.3 Our Lord rejected this medicated cup, offered him perhaps by the kindness of some of his friends, it being his fixed resolution to meet death in all its horrors; not to alleviate and suspend its pains by any such preparation, but to submit to the death, even this He had death of crucifixion, with all its attendant circumstances." the joy that was set before him, in procuring the salvation of men, 1 O carnificium cribrum, quod credo fore: Act. i. sec. 1. ver. 53. edit. var. 1684. 2 Nec dubium est quin impulerint, dejecerint, erexerint, per sævitiam aut per lusum. Lipsius de cruce, tom. vi. p. 1180. Vesaliæ. 3 Sese multimodis conculcat ictibus, myrrhæ contra præsumptione munitus. Apuleii Metamorph. lib. viii. Again: Obfirmatus myrrhæ presumptione nullis verberibus, ac ne ipsi quidem succubuit igni. Lib. x. Apuleii Met. Usque hodie, says St. Jerome, Judæi omnes increduli Dominica resurrectionis aceto et felle potant Josum, et dant ei vinum myrrhatum, ut dum consopiant, et mala eorum non videat. Hieronymus add Matth. xxvii. 2 in full and immediate view. He wanted not, therefore, on this great occasion, any thing to produce an unnatural stupor, and throw oblivion and stupefaction over his senses.1 He cheerfully and voluntarily drank the cup with all its bitter ingredients, which his heavenly Father had put into his hands. Our Lord was fastened to his cross, as was usual, by four soldiers, two on each side, according to the respective limbs they severally nailed. While they were employed in piercing his hands and feet, it is probable that he offered to Heaven that most compassionate and affecting prayer for his murderers, in which he pleaded the only circumstance that could possibly extenuate their guilt: Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do! It appears from the evangelists that our Lord was crucified without the city. And he bearing his cross went forth to a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha. (John xix. 17.) For the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city. (ver. 20.) And the apostle to the Hebrews has likewise mentioned this circumstance: Wherefore Jesus alsosuffered without the gate. (Heb. xiii. 12.) This is conformable to the Jewish law, and to examples mentioned in the Old Testament. (Numb. xv. 35.) And the Lord said unto Moses, The man shall surely be put to death all the congregation shall stone him with stones without the camp. (1 Kings xxi. 13.) Then they carried him [Naboth] forth out of the city, and stoned him with stones that he died. This was done at Jezreel, in the territories of the king of Israel, not far from Samaria. And if this custom was practised there, we may be certain the Jews did not choose that criminals should be executed within Jerusalem, of the sanctity of which they had so high an opinion, and which they were very zealous to preserve free from all ceremonial impurity, though they defiled it with the practice of the most horrid immoralities. It is possible indeed that they might, in their sudden and ungoverned rage, (to which they were subject in the extreme at this time,) upon any affront offered to their laws or customs, put persons who thus provoked them to death, upon the spot, in the city, or the temple, or wherever they found them; but whenever they were calm enough to admit the form of a legal process, we may be assured that they did not approve of an execution within the city. And among the Romans this custom was very common, at least in the provinces. The robbers of Ephesus, whom Petronius Arbiter mentions, were crucified by order of the 3 qui quatuor numerat milites cruciQuod clarum etiam est ex tunice Cornelii Curtii de Clavis Domi 1 See Dr. Benson's Life of Christ, p. 508. 2 Monet nos quoque non parum evangelista, figentes, scilicet juxta quatuor membra figenda. partitione, quæ quatuor militibus facienda erat. nicis, p. 35. edit. Antwerpiæ 1670. The four soldiers who parted his garments, and cast lots for his vesture, were the four who raised him to the cross, each of them fixing a limb, and who, it seems, for this service had a right to the crucified person's clothes. Dr. Macknight, p. 604. second edition, 4to. 3 Credo ego istoc exemplo tibi esse eundum actutum extra portam, dispessis manibus patibulum quem habebis. Plautus in Mil. Glor. act. 2. scen. iv. Quum interim imperator provinciæ latrones jussit crucibus adfigi, secundum illam candem casulam, in qua recens cadaver matrona deflebat. Satyr. c. 71. governor of the province without the city. likewise in Sicily, as appears from Cicero.1 This was the custom, It was customary for the Romans, on any extraordinary execution to put over the head of the malefactor an inscription denoting the crime for which he suffered. Several examples of this occur in the Roman history. It was also usual at this time at Jerusalem, to post up advertisements which were designed to be read by all classes of persons, and in several languages. Titus, in a message which he sent to the Jews when the city was on the point of falling into his hands, and by which he endeavoured to persuade them to surrender, says: Did you not erect pillars, with inscriptions on them in the GREEK and in our (the LATIN) language, "Let no one pass beyond these bounds ?"3 In conformity to this usage, an inscription by Pilate's order was fixed above the head of Jesus, written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, specifying what it was that had brought him to this end. This writing was by the Romans called titulus, a title, and it is the very expression made use of by the Evangelist John, Pilate wrote a TITLE (sygae TITAON), and put it on the cross. (John xix. 19.) After the cross was erected, a party of soldiers was appointed to keep guard, and to attend at the place of execution till the criminal breathed his last; thus also we read that a body of Roman soldiers, with a centurion, were deputed to guard our Lord and the two malefactors that were crucified with him. (Matt. xxvii. 54.) 5 While they were thus attending them, it is said, our Saviour complained of thirst. This is a natural circumstance. The exquisitely sensible and tender extremities of the body being thus perforated, the person languishing and faint with loss of blood, and lingering under such acute and excruciating torture,-these causes must necessarily produce a vehement and excessive thirst. One of the guards, hearing this request, hasted and took a spunge, and filled it from a vessel that stood by, that was full of vinegar. The usual drink of the Roman soldiers was vinegar and water. The knowledge of this custom illustrates this passage of sacred history, as it has sometimes been inquired, for what purpose was this vessel of vinegar? Considering, however, the derision and cruel treatment which Jesus Christ had already received from the soldiers, it is by no means improbable that one of them gave him the vinegar with 1 Quid enim attinuit, cum Mamertini more atque instituto suo crucem fixissent post urbem in via Pompeia; te jubere in ea parte figero, quæ ad fretum spectaret? In Verr. lib. v. c. 66. n. 169. 2 Dion Cassius, lib. liv. p. 732. edit. Reimar, 1750. See also Sueton. in Caligu la, c. 32. Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. lib. v. p. 206. Cantab. 1720. 3 Josephus, de Bell. Jud. lib. vi. c. 2. § 4. 4 See instances in Suetonius, in Caligula, c. 34.; and in Domitian. c. 10. 5 Miles cruces asservabat, ne quis corpora ad sepulturam detraheret. Petronius Arbiter, cap. 111. p. 513. edit. Burman. Traject. ad Rhen. 1709. Vid. not. ad loc. 6 The Roman soldiers, says Dr. Huxham, drank posca (viz. water and vinegar) for their common drink, and found it very healthy and useful. Dr. Huxham's Method for preserving the Health of Seamen, in his Essay on Fevers, p. 263. 3d. edition. See also Lamy's Apparatus Biblicus, vol. ii. 278. See also Macknight in loc. the design of augmenting his unparalleled sufferings. After receiving this, Jesus "cried with a loud voice, and uttered with all the vehemence he could exert, that comprehensive word on which a volume might be written, It is finished! the important work of human redemption is finished; after which he reclined his head upon his bosom, and dismissed his spirit." (Matt. xxvii. 50.) The last circumstance to be mentioned relative to the crucifixion of our Saviour, is the petition of the Jews to Pilate, that the death of the sufferers might be accelerated, with a view to the interment of Jesus. All the four evangelists have particularly mentioned this eircumstance. Joseph of Arimathea went to Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus; then Pilate commanded the body to be delivered. And when Joseph had taken the body, he laid it in his own new tomb. (Matt. xxvii. 58-60. Mark xv. 45, 46. Luke xxiii. 50–53. John xix. 38-40.) And it may be fairly concluded, the rulers of the Jews did not disapprove of it: since they were solicitous that the bodies might be taken down, and not hang on the cross the next day. (John xix. 31.) The Jews, therefore, says St. John, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain on the cross on the sabbath day (for that sabbath day was an high day ;) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. Burial was not always allowed by the Romans in these cases. For we find that sometimes a soldier was appointed to guard the bodies of malefactors, that they might not be taken away and buried.1 However it seems that it was not often refused, unless the criminals were very mean and infamous. Cicero reckons it one of the horrid crimes of Verres's administration in Sicily, that he would take money of parents for the burial of their children whom he had put to death.2 Both Suetonius3 and Tacitus represent it as one of the uncommon cruelties of Tiberius, in the latter part of his reign, that he generally denied burial to those who were put to death by his orders at Rome. Ulpian, in his treatise of the duty of a proconsul, says: "The bodies of those who are condemned to death are not to be denied to their relations:" and Augustus writes, in the tenth book of his own life, "that he had been wont to observe this custom;' 995 that is, to grant the bodies to relations. Paulus says: "that the bodies of those who have been punished, [with death], are to be given to any that desire them in order to burial." 1 See the passage cited from Petronius Arbiter, in note 5. p. 157. 2 Rapiunt eum ad supplicium dii patrii: quod iste inventus est, qui e complexu parentum abreptos filios ad necem duceret, et parentes pretium pro sepultura posceret. In Ver. lib. i. cap. 3. 3 Nemo punitorum non et in Gemonias abjectus uncoque tractus. Vit. Tiber. c. 61. 4 Et quia damnati, publicatis bonis, sepulturà prohibebantur. Ann. lib. vi. c. 29. 5 Corpora eorum qui capite damnantur cognatis ipsorum neganda non sunt. et id se observasse etiam D. Aug. lib. x. de vità suà, scribit. Hodie autem eorum, in quos animadvertitur, corpora non aliter sepeliuntur, quam si fuerit petitum et permissum; et nonnunquam non permittitur, maxime majestatis causâ damnatorum. 1. i. ff. de cadaver. Punit. 6 Corpora animadversorum quibuslibet petentibus ad sepulturam danda sunt. 1. iii. eod. |