He was scourged The instrument used to scourge the prisoner was called a flagrum.
The flagrum was a stick with leather strips upon the end of which were pieces
of bone and metal. Jewish law limited the strokes to 40 (and would only
administer 39 to make sure they didn’t miscount), but the Romans had no such
limit. Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea in the third century writes that in a Roman scourging preparatory to execution, the victim’s “veins were laid bare, and … the very muscles, sinews, and bowels of the victim were open to exposure.” (in Epistle of the Church in Smyrna, quoted by John Mattingly in Crucifixion: Its Origin and Application to Christ, unpublished ThM thesis, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1961) Mark 15: 15-20: And wishing to satisfy the multitude, Pilate released Barabbas for them, and
after having Jesus scourged, he delivered him over to be crucified. And the
soldiers took Him away into the palace (that is, the Praetorium), and they
called together the whole Roman cohort. And they dressed him up in purple, and
after weaving a crown of thorns, they put it on him; and they began to acclaim
him, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they
kept beating his head with a reed, and spitting at him, and kneeling and bowing
before him. And after they had mocked him, they took the purple off him, and
put his garments on him. And they led him out to crucify him. (NIV) |
