The Scourging

Information Gathered by Joshua

"After a criminal's condemnation, it was the custom for a victim to be scourged with the flagellum, a whip with leather throngs." This whip usually had pieces of metal and bone attached to it, thus inflicting even more pain and damage on the body. It was the normal procedure of the Romans to flog the victim until his blood began to flow. "Roman scourging was so severe that victims often died under it. For one charged as Jesus was, with sedition, it would have been merciless."

In John 19:1 we read that Pilate took Jesus and scourged Him. Note the three words, "and scourged Him." The mind absorbs them in a second and passes to the next sentence. The Bible gives no further explanation. There is no parenthetical statement of footnote explaining what it means. Most of us have read over it for years without really contemplating the word "Scourged." It was somehow a part of the crucifixion. Maybe we heard a preacher say it was some sort of a whipping. It was much more.

According to Mt. 27:18 - Pilate knew the Jews delivered Jesus out of envy and that He had committed no real crime - certainly one not worthy of death. Pilate knew that something had to be done. The crowd had become to worked up to go home without any action, so he decided a scourging might satisfy their lust for vengeance. What exactly was involved in a scourging? Today’s humane society would not allow a dog to be treated the way Jesus was. Scourging was a legal preliminary to every Roman execution. It was a brutal flogging or whipping. It was called the "little death" and preceded the "big death" which was via crucifixion. Only women, Roman senators, and soldiers were exempt. History tells us that a criminal was flogged either by two soldiers or by one who alternated positions.

Under Hebrew law, he was limited to 39 strokes, but Romans imposed no such limitation. A scourging’s severity depended entirely on the soldiers' disposition. The only rule for one. who scourged a man about to be crucified was that he must not die at the stake.

Jesus was brutally beaten to the the point that the people of today could not even think of it.

He (the scourger) tried to bring his victim to the very verge of collapse or death, without crossing that threshold. The scourging post was two feet high. An iron ring, place close to the top, projected from two sides.The usual instrument was a short handled whip with several single or braided thongs of variable lengths, in which small iron balls or sharp pieces of sheep bones were tied at varying intervals. Sometimes it consisted of several thin, iron chains, which ended in small weights. Clothing was ripped away so the prisoner stood naked, or at the most with a loincloth. Is it any wonder that in Heb. 12:2 the Bible says, "who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame�? Before a man was scourged - a man’s wrists were firmly shackled into the iron rings. Then the victim was stretched, face down, with his feet pointed away from the post. The tension of awaiting the first blow was cruel. The body was rigid. The muscles knotted in tormenting cramps. Color drained from the cheeks. Lips were drawn tight against the teeth. Finally, the whipping began. Again, and again, more rapidly, blow after blow. The naked back, neck, sometimes face, chest, buttocks, and legs were struck. At first, it caused deep bruising. Then as the soldier continued in his well-trained methodical ritual, the thongs, sheep bones, and weights cut into the skin and muscle. The lacerations finally tore into the underlying skeletal muscles and produced quivering ribbons of bleeding flesh. The victim lost all consciousness to anything other than the blinding, burning pain as cruel whips whistled and cut, whistled and cut. It hurt so much that men were known to bite their tongues in two during the beatings. The metal balls or sheep bones would embed in the flesh. Heavily muscled Roman soldiers would then rip them away, most likely taking away hunks of flesh to the point that the bones would be exposed and what remained of the flesh would seem to just hang. Blood would spatter, covering the scourgers and most likely all the observers. After what seemed like an eternity to he victim and those who loved him, His limp body was finally cut away from the post. As was the custom, his wounds were washed but not otherwise medicated. The physical and mental abuse handed out by the Jews & Romans, as well as the lack of food, water, and sleep, contributed to a generally weakened state. The severity of this condition usually predetermined that the victim would not survive too long on the cross. In Jesus�?case, his clothes were put back on his massacred back. Imagine how the seamless garment must have soaked up that precious blood. How uncomfortable it was to have that rough material scratch against His open wounds! As the blood began to clot, His clothing became stiff and dry. The Roman soldiers, amused that this weakened man had claimed to be a king, began to mock Him. One of them fashioned a robe out of purple material; another ran out to a thorn bush and gathered some prickly limbs and formed them into a tight, pointed circle; another found a rod or stout stick of some kind to use as a scepter. Just about the time His bleeding stopped, they ripped his clothes off and placed on Him a purple robe - thus opening the wounds again. Imagine how that must have hurt - even a small area covered by a band-aid hurts terribly if it adheres itself to the band-aid. One soldier grabbed His head and forced the thorns down over His scalp. Think of the sharp thorns piercing His skin in dozens of places. Another took a reed and hit Him over the head - thus driving the thorns in more deeply.

The soldiers finally had all the fun they wanted with Him and took him back to Pilate. Pilate then presented him to the people. Picture, if you can, Pilate leading this purple-clad man, with scepter in his had, and bloody crown on his head, out for these sick people to view. In John 19:5 Pilate said simply, "Behold the man." He must have thought that would satisfy their hatred. But he under-estimated them. They wanted more - they wanted murder. Why did Jesus go through all of this? He didn’t have to; He could have gone back to heaven. Why…because He wanted to save us.

Scourging was usually done with between one and six specially training Roman officers called lictors. The person to be scourged was tied to post. The tool used for scourging was a stick or rod to which was attached several braided leather thongs. Knots were tied in the ends of each thong , and sheep bone or balls of lead were inserted into the knots at the end of each thong. The object of the bone or balls was to bruise. But with actions of the wrist lictors could cut open the bruises they were making. Lacerations from repeated blows cut into the underlying skeletal muscles and ripped the overlying skin of the back to the point that it hung in quivering ribbons of bleeding flesh. Intense bleeding occurred from the torn capillaries and veins. Sometimes the muscles were torn open and arteries were cut. In some cases even the entrails were laid bare.

The man the soldiers brought back to Pilate not only had a face bruised almost beyond recognition by repeated blows after suffering hermatidrosis, he had strips of skin dangling from his back exposing muscle tissue. After seeing him he thought surely the priest would have pity on Jesus now. So he brought Jesus out in front of the priest and said " Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no basis for a charge against him. Behold the man. But they wanted more.

The condemned were required to carry the cross beam or patibulum weighing between 75 and 125 pounds to the place of execution where several upright bars called stipes were kept planted in the ground. The stipes were sharpened to a point at the top. The patibulum had a hollowed out portion on the under side into which the sharpened point of the stipe would fit. Using ropes and latter the Romans would then lift the patibulum with the condemned attached to the top of the stipe and put the two pieces together. Unlike the Egyptians form of crucifixion the Romans did not tie the condemned to the patibulum they used tapered square spikes about five and a half inches long and about a third of an inch across the top. The spikes were driven through the wrist at the heel of the hand. They knew the exact place to drive the spike so that it pressure on the median nerve. This would cause excruciating pain to run up and down the condemned's arms while at the same time causing the thumb to be drawn inward until it press against the palm. The fingers eventually are cramped inward toward the palm. The condemned were nailed with their arms at a ninety degree angel but as they hung on the cross their body would eventually sag to about a sixty five degree angle. The weight of the body hanging in this position would cause the pectoral muscles to become paralyzed and the person would be able to breath in but not exhale. Prior to death more often than not a person would flail his body about which would aggravate the guards. So, in order to prevent this they would nail the person's feet to the stipe. In doing this they discovered that the condemned would use the spike driven through their feet as a kind of step and force his body upward so that his arms would reach in angle that would allow him to breath again and thus prolong the time before death. Sometimes it could take days for a person to die when there feet were nailed to the stipe. In nailing the feet to the stipe the knees were bent one foot was placed flat on the stipe and the other foot was placed on top of it. A spike was then driven through the second metatarsal space of the feet. Injuring the peroneal nerve and branches of the medial and lateral plantar nerves. Also causing the membrane of highly innervated connective tissue with numerous blood vessels surrounding the bones of the feet would be stripped creating very intense pain. The Romans had become such experts at crucifixion that they were able to predict within about four hours the time of a person's death by the angle they used in bending the knees.