nation, and the principal officer of its great council, his duty surely was to investigate the confession and claim of one who professed to embody the hopes of the nation, and to scrutinize the true nature of that claim, the real meaning of it, the grounds on which it rested, the reasons of it, and the evidence for it. On the contrary, he grasped with avidity at the prospect of a condemnation. His sense of justice was no higher than his sense of religion; on anything that might tend to explain, or extenuate, or exculpate, he shut his eyes and closed his ears. But what is still wore disgusting in the conduct of this ecclesiastic was his abominable hypocrisy. He feigned abhorrence at the crime which he was so anxious to establish. Glad as he was to have this constructive crime of blasphemy to allege, he pretended the most extreme horror by tearing his garments from the neck to the waist. Here, indeed, was “ spiritual wickedness in high places.” 5. The third stage of the Jewish trial. This was the more formal trial; it was held at dawn of day, and in the presence of the whole Sanhedrim (SAoy rd ovvédpov). The previous trial, being held at night, was invalid; besides, it had been conducted only bya representation—an influential representation or committee of the Sanhedrim, consisting, it is probable, mainly of the priests. At the present stage the whole council was present, with its three constituent parts—elders, chief priests, and scribes. This is the meeting of council mentioned in the first verse of the present chapter, and in the parallel verses of St. Matthew and St. Luke, viz. xxvii. 1 of the former, and xxii. 66 of the latter. The object was to ratify a predetermined decree. They also found it necessary for their purpose to change the charge, and consequently also the venue. It was more, perhaps, with the object of consummating than of ratifying their sentence that this meeting was hastily summoned. ‘The judicial murder which they had decided on was not in their power to carry out. Had it been so, stoning would have been the death-penalty. A deputation of an influential and imposing kind waited upon Pilate, to whom the Prisoner is now transferred, either hoping, through the facile condescension of the procurator, to get the case remitted to themselves for execution, or to devolve it on the Roman governor.
IL Tue Roman TRIAL, OB TRIAL BEFORE Prnare. 1. Inctdents leading to cruct-
i Crucifixion was a mode of death unknown to Jewish law, and unpractised by the Jewish people. It was fearfully familiar as a mode of execution among the Romans—this we learn from their writings; as, “Thou shalt not feed the crows on the cross,” of Horace; “ It makes no difference to Theodore whether he rots on the ground or aloft, .e. on the cross,” of Cicero; also from such expressions as the following :— “ Go, soldier, get ready the cross; ” “Thou shalt go to the cross.” It was not, how- ever, till the Roman period that it was introduced into Judwa, It was only after Jew and Roman had come into collision, and had taken respectively the position of con- queror and conquered, of sovereign and subject, that this cruel mode of death found its way into the Holy Land. And yet, strange to say, long years before the Romans had risen to pre-eminence and power, and centuries before Judea had been catalogued as a province of their vast empire, it had been foretold that Messiah’s death would be by crucifixion. We refer to the well-known prediction in the twenty-second psalm, where we read, “They pierced my hands and my feet” (“ piercing my hands and my feet,” according to Perowne; “ geknebelt [‘ fastened,’ as the extremities were in cruci- fixion] meine Hande und Fiisse,” according to Ewald). Before that prophecy was fulfilled a long series of events had to be evolved; dynasties had to rise and fall; a kingdom had to pass through the hands of many successive rulers and become extinct ; an empire, the greatest of ancient times, had to rise to unprecedented power; that kingdom had to be absorbed, and become a province of that empire. In a word, Judea had to become tributary and Rome triumphaut before the event could take place. The facts referred to changed the complexion of our Lord’s trial. Of the many charges they might have manufactured, such as violation of the sabbath law, contempt of oral tradition, purification of the temple, heretical teaching, or esoteric doctrines of a dangerous kind, they elected that of blasphemy, grounded on his own confession of divinity, or of being “the Son of God;” while he strengthens the admission by fore- telling that, besides (wAhy) the verbal avowal, they would have ocular proof when they should see him—the Son of man as well as Son vf God—* sitting at the right hand of power, and coming on the clouds of heaven.” ‘This admission was, as we have seen, extorted after the suborned witnesses had entirely broken down, and the two best of
884 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MARK. [cn. xv. 1—47
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