When ¹  Pilate saw that he could do nothing, but that instead a riot was starting, he took some water, washed his hands before the crowd and said, “I am innocent of this man’s blood. You take care of it yourselves!” ² 

Joseph of Arimathea, a highly regarded member of the council, ¹  who was himself looking forward to ²  the kingdom of God, ³  went boldly to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. ⁴ 

Pilate told them, ¹  “Take him yourselves and pass judgment on him ²  according to your own law!” ³  The Jewish leaders ⁴  replied, ⁵  “We cannot legally put anyone to death.” ⁶ 

Pilate asked, ¹  “What is truth?” ²  When he had said this he went back outside to the Jewish leaders ³  and announced, ⁴  “I find no basis for an accusation ⁵  against him.

When the chief priests and their officers saw him, they shouted out, “Crucify ¹  him! Crucify him!” ²  Pilate said, ³  “You take him and crucify him! ⁴  Certainly ⁵  I find no reason for an accusation ⁶  against him!”

From this point on, Pilate tried ¹  to release him. But the Jewish leaders ²  shouted out, ³  “If you release this man, ⁴  you are no friend of Caesar! ⁵  Everyone who claims to be a king ⁶  opposes Caesar!”

Then they ¹  shouted out, “Away with him! Away with him! ²  Crucify ³  him!” Pilate asked, ⁴  “Shall I crucify your king?” The high priests replied, “We have no king except Caesar!”

Then the chief priests of the Jews ¹  said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The king of the Jews,’ but rather, ‘This man said, I am king of the Jews.’”

The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, ¹  the God of our forefathers, ²  has glorified ³  his servant ⁴  Jesus, whom you handed over and rejected ⁵  in the presence of Pilate after he had decided ⁶  to release him.

“For indeed both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, assembled together in this city against ¹  your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, ² 

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, ¹  when Pontius Pilate ²  was governor of Judea, and Herod ³  was tetrarch ⁴  of Galilee, and his brother Philip ⁵  was tetrarch of the region of Iturea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ⁶  was tetrarch of Abilene,

Then Pilate said, ¹  “So you are a king!” Jesus replied, “You say that I am a king. For this reason I was born, and for this reason I came into the world – to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to ²  my voice.”

Then, because it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies should not stay on the crosses on the Sabbath ¹  (for that Sabbath was an especially important one), ²  the Jewish leaders ³  asked Pilate to have the victims’ legs ⁴  broken ⁵  and the bodies taken down. ⁶