Then did they spit in his face, and buffeted him; and others smote him with the palms of their hands,
Ver. 67. Then did they spit in his face] Condemned prisoners are sacred things; and by the law of nations, should not be misused and trampled on, but rather pitied and prepared for death. But these barbarous miscreants (not without the good liking of their lords the priests and elders) spare for no kind of cruelty toward Christ, who was content to be spit upon, to cleanse our faces from the filth of sin, to be buffeted with fists, and beaten with staves, a to free us from that mighty hand of God, 1 Peter 5:6, and from those scourges and scorpions of infernal fiends.
a ερραπισαν, bacillis ceciderunt. Beza.