View John 19 in the note window.
1: (Mt 27:26,Mr 15:15).
7: By our law he ought to die, because he made himself the
Son of God - Which they understood in the highest sense, and
therefore accounted blasphemy.
8: He was the more afraid - He seems to have been afraid before
of shedding innocent blood.
9: Whence art thou? - That is, whose son art thou?
11: Thou couldst have no power over me - For I have done nothing
to expose me to the power of any magistrate. Therefore he that
delivered me to thee, namely, Caiaphas, knowing this, is more
blamable than thou.
13: Pilate sat down on the judgment seat - Which was then without the
palace, in a place called, in Greek, the pavement, on account of a
beautiful piece of Mosaic work, with which the floor was adorned:
but in Hebrew, Gabbatha - Or the high place, because it stood on an
eminence, so that the judge sitting on his throne might be seen and
heard by a considerable number of people.
14: It was the preparation of the passover - For this reason both the
Jews and Pilate were desirous to bring the matter to a conclusion.
Every Friday was called the preparation, (namely, for the Sabbath.)
And as often as the passover fell on a Friday, that day was called
the preparation of the passover.
17: Bearing his cross - Not the whole cross, (for that was too
large and heavy,) but the transverse beam of it, to which his
hands were afterward fastened. This they used to make the
person to be executed carry.(Mt 27:31,Mr 15:20,Lu 23:26).
19: Jesus of Nazareth, the king of the Jews - Undoubtedly these
were the very words, although the other evangelists do not
express them at large.
20: It was written in Latin - For the majesty of the Roman empire;
in Hebrew - Because it was the language of the nation; and in Greek
- For the information of the Hellenists, who spoke that language,
and came in great numbers to the feast.
22: What I have written, I have written - That shall stand.
23: The vesture - The upper garment.
24: They parted my garments among them - No circumstance of David's
life bore any resemblance to this, or to several other passages
in the 22d Psalm. So that in this scripture, as in some others,
the prophet seems to have been thrown into a preternatural ecstacy,
wherein, personating the Messiah, he spoke barely what the Spirit
dictated, without any regard to himself.(Ps 22:18).
25: His mother's sister - But we do not read she had any brother.
She was her father's heir, and as such transmitted the right of
the kingdom of David to Jesus: Mary, the wife of Cleopas - Called
likewise Alpheus, the father, as Mary was the mother of James,
and Joses, and Simon, and Judas.
27: Behold thy mother - To whom thou art now to perform the part
of a son in my place, a peculiar honour which Christ conferred
on him. From that hour - From the time of our Lord's death.
29: A stalk of hyssop - Which in those countries grows exceeding
large and strong.(Ps 69:21).
30: It is finished - My suffering: the purchase of man's redemption.
He delivered up his spirit - To God,(Mt 27:50).
31: Lest the bodies should remain on the cross on the Sabbath
- Which they would have accounted a profanation of any Sabbath,
but of that in particular. For that Sabbath was a great day - Being
not only a Sabbath, but the second day of the feast of unleavened
bread (from whence they reckoned the weeks to pentecost:) and
also the day for presenting and offering the sheaf of new corn:
so that it was a treble solemnity.
34: Forthwith there came out blood and water - It was strange,
seeing he was dead, that blood should come out; more strange,
that water also; and most strange of all, that both should come
out immediately, at one time, and yet distinctly. It was pure
and true water, as well as pure and true blood. The asseveration
of the beholder and testifier of it, shows both the truth and
greatness of the miracle and mystery.
35: His testimony is true - Valid, unexceptionable. And he
knoweth - And his conscience beareth him witness, that he
testifieth this for no other end, than that ye may believe.
36: A bone of it shall not be broken - This was originally spoken
of the paschal lamb, an eminent type of Christ.(Ex 12:46).
37: They shall look on him whom they have pierced - He was pierced
by the soldier's spear. They who have occasioned his sufferings
by their sins (and who has not?) shall either look upon him in
this world with penitential sorrow: or with terror, when he
cometh in the clouds of heaven, (Re 1:7).(Zec 12:10).
38: Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate - And Nicodemus also came
- Acknowledging Christ, when even his chosen disciples forsook
him. In that extremity Joseph was no longer afraid, Nicodemus
no longer ashamed.
41: In the place where he was crucified - There was a garden in
the same tract of land: but the cross did not stand in the garden.
42: Because of the preparation - That is, they chose the rather to
lay him in that sepulchre which was nigh, because it was the day
before the Sabbath, which also was drawing to an end, so that
they had no time to carry him far.
