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[172]
On the next day Pilate sat upon his tribunal, in the open market-place,
and called to him the multitude, as desirous to give them an answer; and
then gave a signal to the soldiers, that they should all by agreement at
once encompass the Jews with their weapons; so the band of soldiers stood
round about the Jews in three ranks. The Jews were under the utmost consternation
at that unexpected sight. Pilate also said to them that they should be
cut in pieces, unless they would admit of Caesar's images, and gave intimation
to the soldiers to draw their naked swords. Hereupon the Jews, as it were
at one signal, fell down in vast numbers together, and exposed their necks
bare, and cried out that they were sooner ready to be slain, than that
their law should be transgressed. Hereupon Pilate was greatly surprised
at their prodigious superstition, and gave order that the ensigns should
be presently carried out of Jerusalem.
Flavius Josephus. The Works of Flavius Josephus. Translated by. William Whiston, A.M. Auburn and Buffalo. John E. Beardsley. 1895.
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