loudandclear

Mark 15:1-20
(notes by Niko Gruber)

 1 Very early in the morning the leading priests, the elders, and the teachers of religious law—the entire high council—met to discuss their next step. They bound Jesus, led him away, and took him to Pilate, the Roman governor.
 2 Pilate asked Jesus, “Are you the king of the Jews?”

   Jesus replied, “You have said it.”

 3 Then the leading priests kept accusing him of many crimes, 4 and Pilate asked him, “Aren’t you going to answer them? What about all these charges they are bringing against you?” 5 But Jesus said nothing, much to Pilate’s surprise.

 6 Now it was the governor’s custom each year during the Passover celebration to release one prisoner—anyone the people requested. 7 One of the prisoners at that time was Barabbas, a revolutionary who had committed murder in an uprising. 8The crowd went to Pilate and asked him to release a prisoner as usual.

 9 “Would you like me to release to you this ‘King of the Jews’?” Pilate asked. 10(For he realized by now that the leading priests had arrested Jesus out of envy.) 11But at this point the leading priests stirred up the crowd to demand the release of Barabbas instead of Jesus. 12 Pilate asked them, “Then what should I do with this man you call the king of the Jews?”

 13 They shouted back, “Crucify him!”

 14 “Why?” Pilate demanded. “What crime has he committed?”

   But the mob roared even louder, “Crucify him!”

 15 So to pacify the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas to them. He ordered Jesus flogged with a lead-tipped whip, then turned him over to the Roman soldiers to be crucified.

 16 The soldiers took Jesus into the courtyard of the governor’s headquarters (called the Praetorium) and called out the entire regiment. 17 They dressed him in a purple robe, and they wove thorn branches into a crown and put it on his head. 18 Then they saluted him and taunted, “Hail! King of the Jews!” 19 And they struck him on the head with a reed stick, spit on him, and dropped to their knees in mock worship. 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.

(((This chapter begins with Jewish priests, elders, and teachers meeting together. This group was known as the Sanhedrin. They were the court system for the Jews. Because they were still under Roman rule, they couldn’t give anyone a death sentence so they gave Jesus to Pilate hoping he would rule in their favor.)))

(((Mark’s Gospel shows Pilate as being hesitant to punish Jesus as he hasn’t seen Him as guilty of anything.  The Sanhedrin found Jesus as being guilty of saying that He was God.  Pilate didn’t care about this as it didn’t go against the Roman government.  Pilate even tries to just let Jesus go, but instead the crowd votes to let a murderer go free.)))

(((Often when we think of Jesus’ death we think of the extreme pain He was in after being whipped 39 times with a “lead-tipped whip” and the deep cuts in His forehead from the crown of thorns.  He was in tremendous amounts of pain, but He was also being humiliated. The crown was supposed to be His because of Jesus being the King of the Jews and the constant mocking He was getting from the soldiers and the crowds around Him. Even in His own death Jesus was exemplifying humility.)))