John 19:3

19:3 They ¹  came up to him again and again ²  and said, “Hail, king of the Jews!” ³  And they struck him repeatedly ⁴  in the face.

John 19:5

19:5 So Jesus came outside, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. ⁵  Pilate ⁶  said to them, “Look, here is the man!” ⁷ 

John 19:19-22

19:19 Pilate also had a notice ⁸  written and fastened to the cross, ⁹  which read: ¹⁰  “Jesus the Nazarene, the king of the Jews.” 19:20 Thus many of the Jewish residents of Jerusalem ¹¹  read this notice, ¹²  because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and the notice was written in Aramaic, ¹³  Latin, and Greek. 19:21 Then the chief priests of the Jews ¹⁴  said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The king of the Jews,’ but rather, ‘This man said, I am king of the Jews.’” 19:22 Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”

[19:3]  ¹ tn Grk “And they.” The conjunction καί (kai, “and”) has not been translated here in keeping with the tendency of contemporary English style to use shorter sentences.

[19:3]  ² tn The words “again and again” are implied by the (iterative) imperfect verb ἤρχοντο (hrconto).

[19:3]  ³ tn Or “Long live the King of the Jews!”

[19:3]  ⁴ tn The word “repeatedly” is implied by the (iterative) imperfect verb ἐδιδοσαν (edidosan).

[19:5]  ⁵ sn See the note on the purple robe in 19:2.

[19:5]  ⁶ tn Grk “He”; the referent (Pilate) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[19:5]  ⁷ sn Look, here is the man! Pilate may have meant no more than something like “Here is the accused!” or in a contemptuous way, “Here is your king!” Others have taken Pilate’s statement as intended to evoke pity from Jesus’ accusers: “Look at this poor fellow!” (Jesus would certainly not have looked very impressive after the scourging). For the author, however, Pilate’s words constituted an unconscious allusion to Zech 6:12, “Look, here is the man whose name is the Branch.” In this case Pilate (unknowingly and ironically) presented Jesus to the nation under a messianic title.

[19:19]  ⁸ tn Or “an inscription.”

[19:19]  ⁹ tn Grk “Pilate also wrote a notice and placed it on the cross.” The two verbs should be read as causatives, since it is highly unlikely that the Roman governor would perform either of these actions himself. He ordered them to be done.

[19:19]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “Now it was written.”

[19:20]  ¹¹ tn Grk “the Jews.” Here the phrase refers to the residents of Jerusalem in general. See also the note on the phrase Jewish religious leaders” in v. 7.

[19:20]  ¹² tn Or “this inscription.”

[19:20]  ¹³ tn Grk “in Hebrew.”

[19:21]  ¹⁴ tn Or “the Jewish chief priests.” Nowhere else in the Fourth Gospel are the two expressions οἱ ἀρχιερεῖς τῶν ᾿Ιουδαίων (Joi arcierei" twn Ioudaiwn) combined. Earlier in 19:15 the chief priests were simply referred to as οἱ ἀρχιερεῖς. It seems likely that this is another example of Johannine irony, to be seen in contrast to the inscription on the cross which read ὁ βασιλεὺς τῶν ᾿Ιουδαίων (Jo basileu" twn Ioudaiwn). For this reason the phrase has been translated “the chief priests of the Jews” (which preserves in the translation the connection with “King of the Jews”) rather than “the Jewish chief priests.”