Isaiah 1:1 dates him by four kings of Judah — Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah. His call is pinned to “the year that king Uzziah died” (Isaiah 6:1), 740 BC. The latest event the book records is Sennacherib’s assassination in 681 BC.

On authorship: much critical scholarship divides the book — chapters 1–39 to the 8th-century prophet, 40–55 to an exilic writer (“Second Isaiah”, c. 540 BC), 56–66 later still. The traditional view, held in Latter-day Saint scholarship among others, treats the book as Isaiah’s throughout — partly because the Book of Mormon quotes chapters from the disputed range as already written before 600 BC.

The Hebrew below has no vowel points — that is authentic. Vowel marks were not invented until roughly AD 600–1000, so a scroll copied around 125 BC carries consonants only. Under each word you get a transliteration (how it sounds) and an English gloss for the lexeme behind the written form, with the KJV verse underneath for comparison.

Israel Museum — zoom the whole scroll ↗
Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library ↗

Every verse below carries a col N ↗ link that opens the Israel Museum’s zoomable scan at that exact verse — the full plate is 116,142 × 4,500 pixels (523 megapixels), so you can magnify until the individual pen strokes and the scribe’s corrections are visible. The scroll is 54 columns; the number tells you which one your verse sits in. The museum serves this over plain http (they publish no https), so your browser will mark it “not secure” — it is a photograph viewer, nothing is sent.

The word of the Lord came to him “in the thirteenth year” of King Josiah (Jeremiah 1:2) — 627/626 BC — while he was still “a child” (1:6; Hebrew na’ar, a youth). He was still prophesying in Egypt after Jerusalem fell (chapters 43–44).

His contemporaries: Zephaniah and Habakkuk in Judah; Daniel (taken 605 BC) and Ezekiel (taken 597 BC) in Babylon; and Lehi in Jerusalem, where “there came many prophets, prophesying unto the people that they must repent, or the great city Jerusalem must be destroyed” (1 Nephi 1:4). The brass plates held “many prophecies which have been spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah” (1 Nephi 5:13); “Jeremiah have they cast into prison” (1 Nephi 7:14); and “Jerusalem was destroyed according to the words of Jeremiah” (Helaman 8:20).

Why “587/586”: the Babylonian chronicle that dates the 597 surrender to the day breaks off before the final siege. The Bible counts Nebuchadnezzar’s years one ahead of Babylon’s own reckoning (2 Kings 24:12 calls 597 his eighth year; the chronicle, his seventh), so the “nineteenth year” of Jeremiah 52:12 is 587 if you apply that offset and 586 if you don’t. Many historians now prefer 587.

No copy from Jeremiah’s own hand survives — Jehoiakim burned the first scroll (Jer 36:23) and Baruch’s second is lost. The oldest copies are these, all fragments. The verse counts are verses with at least one letter still on the leather.

Together they keep letters from 283 of the book’s 1,364 verses — about a fifth — and roughly a tenth of its words. The Great Isaiah Scroll, by itself, has all 66 chapters.

Lamentations, traditionally Jeremiah’s lament over the burned city, has four Qumran copies too: 4QLam (1:1–18 and a scrap of 2:5), 5QLam^a (4:5–5:18 in pieces), 3QLam (pieces of 1:10–12 and 3:53–62) and 5QLam^b (4:17–20). They are in the reader below as well.

Dates are palaeographic estimates — from the style of the handwriting.

The Septuagint — the Greek translation made in Egypt, finished by about 130 BC — gives Jeremiah about one-seventh shorter than the Hebrew, and in a different order: the oracles against the nations (our chapters 46–51) come right after 25:13 instead of at the end, so from there on its chapter numbers don’t match ours (our chapter 29 is its 36). For a long time scholars argued over whether the translator had simply shortened the book.

The scrolls settled it. Chapter 10 is the clearest case:

4QJer^b has the Greek’s arrangement, in Hebrew — so the short edition was a Hebrew book, not a translator’s abridgement. Meanwhile 4QJer^a and 4QJer^c, from the same cave, have the long text. They even keep letters of thirteen verses the Greek lacks entirely: 7:1; 8:11–12; 10:10 (4QJer^a), 27:1; 27:13; 30:22; 33:16–20 (4QJer^c) and 48:45 (2QJer). Those verses carry a blue not in the Greek tag in the reader.

The book itself tells of a second, enlarged edition: after Jehoiakim burned the first scroll, Jeremiah dictated another, “and there were added besides unto them many like words” (36:32). No one can prove that is the same difference, but it shows the book grew.

Some passages found only in the long (Masoretic) edition — the KJV translates that edition, so all of these are in your Bible:

In both editions: the first vision (1:15), the Shiloh warning (7:12–14), the seventy years (25:11; 29:10) and 33:11’s “for the Lord is good; for his mercy endureth for ever.” The Greek is compared here through Brenton’s English translation of the Septuagint.

From Jeremiah’s own lifetime

• The Ketef Hinnom amulets — two tiny rolled-up silver scrolls found in 1979 in a tomb above the Valley of Hinnom, where Jeremiah broke the potter’s bottle (Jer 19). They are engraved with the priestly blessing (Numbers 6:24–26) and the name YHWH, and date to about 650–587 BC: the oldest surviving words of the Bible, centuries older than any Dead Sea Scroll, made in Jerusalem in his lifetime.
• “Baruch’s seal” — two clay seal impressions reading “Berechyahu son of Neriyahu the scribe,” Baruch’s full name, appeared on the antiquities market in 1975 and 1996; one even carries a fingerprint. Most scholars now consider them forgeries.
• The Lachish letters — dispatches written on pottery during the final invasion. Jeremiah says Lachish and Azekah were the last fortified towns left (34:7); Letter 4 reports “we are watching for the signals of Lachish… for we cannot see Azekah.” And seal impressions of “Jehucal son of Shelemiah” and “Gedaliah son of Pashhur” — two of the officials in Jer 38:1 who demanded his death — were excavated a few yards apart in the City of David.
• The brass plates already carried “many prophecies which have been spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah” (1 Nephi 5:13) — a written collection within a few years of the scroll Baruch wrote in 605 BC.

After the scrolls

• Greek: complete Bibles from the 300s AD — Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus.
• Hebrew, after a gap of about 850 years: the St. Petersburg Codex of the Prophets (AD 916, with the Babylonian vowel signs written above the letters); the Cairo Codex (its colophon says 895, but radiocarbon testing points to the 11th century); the Aleppo Codex (early 900s, the most authoritative — but about 40% of its pages went missing around the 1947 Aleppo riots, including Jer 29:9–31:33 and all of Lamentations); and the Leningrad Codex (AD 1008), complete, and the basis of modern Hebrew Bibles.

The long-edition scrolls agree closely with those medieval copies, a thousand years apart.

The Septuagint is the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures, made by Jews in Egypt in the centuries before Christ. Alexandria had the largest Jewish community outside the Holy Land, and most of its people spoke Greek, not Hebrew.

When it was translated. Nobody recorded the dates; these are scholars’ estimates from the Greek itself and from the earliest writers who quote it.

In 132 BC a grandson of Jesus ben Sira came to Egypt and translated his grandfather’s book, and in his preface he apologizes for the Greek: “the same things uttered in Hebrew, and translated into another tongue, have not the same force in them: and not only these things, but the law itself, and the prophets, and the rest of the books, have no small difference, when they are spoken in their own language” (Prologue to Ecclesiasticus, in the KJV Apocrypha). He dates his arrival to “the eight and thirtieth year… when Euergetes was king” — 132 BC.

The oldest copies that survive. The translators’ own scrolls are lost; these are the oldest copies of their work that have been found.

For comparison, the oldest Hebrew copies of Jeremiah are Dead Sea Scrolls from about 200 BC.

You already know some of it. The English names of the first books — Genesis (“origin”), Exodus (“the way out”), Deuteronomy (“second law”) — are the Septuagint’s Greek titles. And where the Hebrew has the divine name YHWH, the Septuagint writes κύριος, “Lord”: an early witness to the custom of saying “Lord” for the name, which the KJV marks by printing Lord in small capitals.

Hebrews 8:8–12 quotes Jeremiah’s promise of a new covenant (Jeremiah 31:31–34) — the longest Old Testament passage quoted in the New Testament. The KJV translators worked from the Hebrew for Jeremiah, but from the Greek for Hebrews, and Hebrews quotes the Septuagint. So the same verse reads two ways in the same Bible:

The Greek line is the Septuagint’s Jeremiah (its 38:32), word for word. See it in the reader below.

The Greek Jeremiah is about one-seventh shorter than the Hebrew the KJV follows: 68 of the KJV’s 1,364 verses have no counterpart in it at all, and many others are shorter (it often says just “the Lord” where the Hebrew has “the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel”). And it arranges the book differently: the oracles against the nations (KJV chapters 46–51) come in the middle, right after 25:13, in a different order — Elam, Egypt, Babylon, the Philistines, Edom, Ammon, Kedar, Damascus, Moab — so from there on its chapter numbers differ from the KJV’s.

Hebrew fragments from Qumran (4QJer^b and 4QJer^d) follow the same short edition, so the difference goes back to two Hebrew editions of the book, not to the translators. The Jeremiah Scrolls tab shows that evidence.

Asked of Americans who read the Bible: “What translation of the Bible do you most often read? Is it the King James Version, New International Version, New American Bible, New Revised Standard Version, Living Bible, or some other version?”

More than half still read the King James Version. The survey offered only those five names, so the English Standard Version (then only eleven years old), the New Living Translation and the New King James Version are all inside “other.” Source: The Bible in American Life ↗ (Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture, Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis, March 2014), from questions it placed on the 2012 General Social Survey; the report’s own chart gives these six shares.

The Evangelical Christian Publishers Association’s bestseller list for March 2026, the most recent it has posted, ranks Bibles by sales reported to Circana BookScan (Bible portions excluded):

1. New International Version
2. King James Version
3. English Standard Version
4. New Living Translation
5. New King James Version
6. Christian Standard Bible
7. Reina–Valera (Spanish)
8. New American Standard Bible
9. New Revised Standard Version
10. Nueva Versión Internacional (Spanish)

The top three trade places: in February 2025 the ESV was first; from December 2025 to February 2026 the NIV led with the ESV second. Sales count new copies bought, not what people read. Source: ECPA Bible Translations Bestsellers, March 2026 ↗ (February 2025 ↗).

Dates and makers: List of English Bible translations ↗ and each version’s article there; the KJV’s history from the Church’s History of the Scriptures ↗; the NIV’s 1986 overtaking of the KJV from The Bible in American Life, p. 12.

— The First Presidency (Ezra Taft Benson, Gordon B. Hinckley, Thomas S. Monson), “First Presidency Statement on the King James Version of the Bible,” Ensign, Aug. 1992, 80 ↗

The Church published its own edition of the King James Version in 1979, after work led by Elders Thomas S. Monson, Boyd K. Packer and Bruce R. McConkie: the same text, with footnotes, chapter headings, study aids and cross-references to the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants and the Pearl of Great Price. The standard works were typeset again in 2013. Source: History of the Scriptures ↗.

Even at its largest, on the eve of the Roman siege in AD 70, Jerusalem probably held somewhere between 20,000 and 100,000 people, depending on whose estimate you follow — fewer than Provo today (115,162 in the 2020 census). In Jeremiah’s day the walled city held perhaps 8,000–25,000; in Nehemiah’s, a few hundred to a few thousand. The only “millions” come from the first-century historian Josephus, and modern historians don’t accept them. For comparison, Jerusalem today has about 951,000 people.

Every figure on this page is an estimate. Careful scholars working from the same ruins disagree by a factor of two to five, so the charts show each published figure rather than a single “answer.”

Each dot is one scholar’s published estimate; the line spans the range. Hover or tap a dot for who made it.

Jerusalem kept its enlarged walls from Hezekiah’s time until the Babylonians destroyed it in 587/586 BC, so Jeremiah’s city was likely about the size the late-8th-century estimates describe.

This is where the “millions” come from. On the same scale, the modern estimates are barely visible.

Josephus reached his 2.7 million by counting the Passover lambs Cestius had the priests tally — 256,500 — and allowing “no more than ten that feast together” for each one. He also says most of the 1.1 million who died in the siege were pilgrims “not belonging to the city itself” (Jewish War 6.9.3). Tacitus gives 600,000 besieged (Histories 5.13). Modern estimates rest instead on how much ground the city covered and how densely it could have been settled.

Estimates for the whole population, not just the capital. Read each row’s label: the area covered changes from period to period.

The Bible’s figures for Jerusalem are in the thousands, the same order as the archaeology, though sometimes higher: Nehemiah’s 3,044 men, with their families, would make a town of about 12,000–15,000 (Joel Weinberg’s reckoning), while today’s archaeological estimates for Nehemiah’s day run from 400 to 3,000.

The national census totals are another matter. 1.3 million men under arms would mean several million people — many times what surveys find even at the Iron Age peak, about 400,000 for the whole land in the 8th century BC. The Exodus count, 603,550 men, is traditionally reckoned with their families at two million or more. Explanations offered include:

• the Hebrew ’elef, “thousand,” can also mean a clan or a military unit, which would shrink the totals to tens of thousands (George Mendenhall, 1958; Colin Humphreys, 1998);
• large round numbers may have honored a people rather than counted them;
• the surveys may miss people — tent-dwellers and herders leave few remains.

The text itself shows the totals were not passed down identically: 2 Samuel 24:9 and 1 Chronicles 21:5 report the same census with different numbers. The Assyrian figures are royal boasts, not census reports.

Archaeologists measure how much ground was actually built up in a given period — from excavations and surface surveys — and multiply by a density. For Persian-period settlements, Charles Carter and Oded Lipschits used 250 people per built-up hectare; Israel Finkelstein argues 200 is the most a sparse highland village could hold. Densely built walled cities are reckoned higher.

The answers move when the evidence does. Estimates for Nehemiah’s Jerusalem have fallen for a century as digs showed how little of the city was occupied after the exile: 10,000–15,000 “in and around the capital” (William F. Albright, 1949) → about 4,800 (Magen Broshi, 1977) → 1,000–1,500 (Hillel Geva; Carter; Lipschits) → about 400 (Finkelstein, 2008).

22 letters × 8 verses = 176 verses

Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible, and it is built on the Hebrew alphabet. It has 22 stanzas — one for each Hebrew letter — and every one of the eight verses in a stanza begins with that letter. Not the same word eight times: eight different words that all start with the same letter.

The acrostic letter is highlighted inside the Hebrew word, and the English that translates it is highlighted in the KJV verse — often mid-sentence, because Hebrew puts its verbs first.

Click any Hebrew word to break it into its pieces — prefixes, root, and endings — with a transliteration and what each piece means. Hebrew has no separate word for “of”, “my”, or “in”: those are built into the word itself, which is why one Hebrew word often needs four English ones.

Click any Hebrew letter to hear its name, and inside a word’s breakdown use Hear the word for the whole word, or the Google Translate link for their pronunciation and a second opinion on the meaning.

Expand all breakdowns

A craft note: eleven of the twenty-two stanzas repeat an opening word, and the strain shows exactly where the alphabet runs thin. Teth opens five of its eight verses with טוב (tov, “good”); Daleth leans on דרך (derech, “way”) four times.

Hebrew text and morphology: Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (Westminster Leningrad Codex). Glosses: Strong’s Hebrew lexicon. English: King James Version. Cantillation marks removed for legibility.

Lazarus, the brother of Mary and Martha, had been dead four days when Jesus arrived. Jesus wept at the tomb, then commanded:

This miracle was the tipping point. Many Jews believed on Jesus, but others reported it to the Pharisees. The chief priests and Pharisees convened a council and from that day "took counsel together for to put him to death" (John 11:53).

Jesus withdrew to Ephraim, a city near the wilderness, and stayed there with His disciples (John 11:54).

As Jesus departed from Jericho, blind Bartimaeus sat by the highway begging (Mark 10:46). He cried out, "Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me!" (Mark 10:47). The crowd rebuked him, but he cried louder (Mark 10:48). Jesus stopped and said:

Matthew records two blind men; Mark and Luke focus on Bartimaeus by name.

As Jesus entered and passed through Jericho (Luke 19:1), there was a man named Zacchaeus, "the chief among the publicans, and he was rich" (Luke 19:2). Being "little of stature," he climbed a sycamore tree to see Jesus passing through (Luke 19:3–4). Jesus looked up and called him by name:

The people murmured that Jesus had gone to be a guest of a "sinner." But Zacchaeus stood and pledged to give half his goods to the poor and restore fourfold anything taken by false accusation. Jesus declared:

A nobleman went to a far country to receive a kingdom. He gave ten servants each a pound and said, "Occupy till I come." On return, the faithful servants were rewarded with authority over cities. The one who hid his pound had it taken away.

A supper was made for Jesus (John 12:2). Lazarus sat at the table with Him; Martha served. Mary took a pound of very costly ointment of spikenard and anointed Jesus's feet, wiping them with her hair (John 12:3). The house was filled with the fragrance.

Judas Iscariot objected: "Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor?" (John 12:5). John notes: "This he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag" (John 12:6).

Meanwhile, the chief priests conspired to also put Lazarus to death, "because that by reason of him many of the Jews went away, and believed on Jesus" (John 12:10–11).

Jesus sent two disciples to fetch a colt (a young donkey) that had never been ridden (Mark 11:2), with its mother (Matthew 21:2). He sat upon the colt and rode toward Jerusalem. The multitude spread their garments and palm branches on the road (John 12:13), crying:

This fulfilled Zechariah 9:9 — "thy King cometh unto thee, meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass."

The Pharisees told Jesus to rebuke His disciples. He answered:

As Jesus drew near and saw the city, He wept:

A prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem by Rome in A.D. 70.

Mark records that Jesus entered the temple and "looked round about upon all things" — surveying the scene — but because "now the eventide was come," He went out to Bethany with the twelve (Mark 11:11).

In the morning, returning to the city, Jesus was hungry. He saw a fig tree with leaves but no fruit and said:

Mark notes the disciples saw it withered the next morning (Tuesday). The fig tree is widely understood as a symbol of Israel — outward show of religion (leaves) but no spiritual fruit.

Jesus entered the temple and drove out the moneychangers and those selling doves, overturning their tables (Matthew 21:12):

Mark adds: "My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer" (Mark 11:17) — emphasizing that the Court of the Gentiles, the one place where non-Jews could worship, had been turned into a marketplace.

The blind and the lame came to Him in the temple and He healed them. Children cried "Hosanna to the Son of David" and the chief priests were "sore displeased" (Matthew 21:14–15).

The disciples saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. Jesus taught them about faith:

The chief priests and elders challenged Jesus's authority (Matthew 21:23). He answered with a question about whether John's baptism was from heaven or of men (Matthew 21:25). They could not answer, so He said, "Neither tell I you by what authority I do these things" (Matthew 21:27).

The Pharisees and chief priests "perceived that he spake of them" and sought to lay hands on Him, but feared the people (Luke 20:19).

Jesus asked the Pharisees: If Christ is the son of David, how does David in spirit call Him Lord?

"And no man was able to answer him a word, neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions" (Matthew 22:46).

Jesus delivered eight pronouncements of woe against the scribes and Pharisees (Matthew 23:13–36) — the most searing public rebuke of His ministry. Among them:

He concluded with a lament:

Jesus sat near the treasury and watched the people cast in their money (Mark 12:41). Many rich people cast in much. Then a poor widow cast in two mites, "which make a farthing" (Mark 12:42).

Certain Greeks among those who came to worship at the feast asked Philip to introduce them to Jesus. Jesus responded with a teaching about His coming death:

A voice came from heaven: "I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again." Some said it thundered; others said an angel spoke (John 12:28–29).

As they departed the temple, the disciples pointed out the temple buildings. Jesus said, "There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down" (Matthew 24:2). Sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples asked privately: When? And what shall be the sign?

The Gospels record no public teaching by Jesus on this day. But Judas Iscariot went to the chief priests:

Luke adds that "Satan entered into Judas" (Luke 22:3). Thirty pieces of silver was the Old Testament price of a slave (Exodus 21:32), fulfilling Zechariah 11:12.

Jesus sent Peter and John to prepare the Passover meal (Luke 22:8). He told them to follow a man carrying a pitcher of water (Luke 22:10) — unusual, as women normally carried water — to a "large upper room furnished and prepared" (Mark 14:15).

Before supper, Jesus laid aside His garments, took a towel, and washed the disciples' feet. Peter objected; Jesus said:

As they ate, Jesus said, "Verily I say unto you, that one of you shall betray me." The disciples were sorrowful, each asking "Lord, is it I?" (Matthew 26:21–22).

Jesus took bread, blessed it, broke it, and gave it to the disciples (Matthew 26:26):

He took the cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them:

Judas departed. "He then having received the sop went immediately out: and it was night" (John 13:30).

After Judas left (John 13:30), Jesus delivered His longest recorded teaching — comfort, commandment, and promise to the eleven:

Jesus prayed to the Father — not only for Himself (John 17:1–5) and the eleven (John 17:6–19), but for all who would believe (John 17:20–26):

Jesus took Peter, James, and John further into the garden (Matthew 26:37). He told them, "My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me" (Matthew 26:38).

He went a little farther, fell on His face, and prayed:

He prayed three times. Each time He returned to find the disciples sleeping. Luke alone records:

Luke also notes: "And there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him" (Luke 22:43).

Judas arrived with a great multitude armed with swords and staves, from the chief priests and elders (Matthew 26:47). The signal was a kiss (Matthew 26:48):

Peter drew his sword and cut off the ear of Malchus, the high priest's servant. Jesus healed the ear (Luke 22:51) and said:

John records that when Jesus said "I am he," the soldiers "went backward, and fell to the ground" (John 18:6). Then "all the disciples forsook him, and fled" (Matthew 26:56). Mark notes a young man (likely Mark himself) who fled naked, leaving his linen cloth behind (Mark 14:51–52).

Jesus was taken first to Annas, the former high priest who still wielded power. Annas questioned Him about His disciples and doctrine. Jesus answered:

An officer struck Jesus for this answer. Annas sent Him bound to Caiaphas.

The chief priests sought false witness against Jesus but found none that agreed. Finally the high priest asked directly:

The high priest tore his clothes: "He hath spoken blasphemy!" They condemned Him, spat in His face, blindfolded Him, and struck Him, saying, "Prophesy unto us, thou Christ, Who is he that smote thee?" (Matthew 26:67–68).

While Jesus was tried inside, Peter sat outside in the courtyard, warming himself by the fire. Three times he was identified as one of Jesus's followers. Three times he denied it, the third time with cursing and swearing:

Luke alone records: "And the Lord turned, and looked upon Peter" (Luke 22:61).

When Judas saw that Jesus was condemned, he repented and brought the thirty pieces of silver back to the chief priests:

The priests used the money to buy the potter's field as a burial place for strangers, fulfilling Zechariah 11:12–13 and Jeremiah 32:6–9.

Early in the morning, the Sanhedrin delivered Jesus to Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor (Matthew 27:1–2). The Jews would not enter the Praetorium "lest they should be defiled" before Passover (John 18:28) — an irony, since they were about to murder the Lamb of God.

Pilate asked, "Art thou the King of the Jews?" Jesus answered:

Pilate found no fault in Him and sent Him to Herod.

Herod was "exceeding glad" to see Jesus, hoping to witness a miracle (Luke 23:8). He questioned Jesus at length, but Jesus "answered him nothing" (Luke 23:9). Herod and his soldiers mocked Him, "arrayed him in a gorgeous robe," and sent Him back to Pilate (Luke 23:11).

"And the same day Pilate and Herod were made friends together: for before they were at enmity between themselves" (Luke 23:12).

Pilate offered to release Jesus according to the Passover custom. The crowd, stirred up by the chief priests, demanded Barabbas (a murderer and insurrectionist) instead.

Pilate's wife sent word: "Have thou nothing to do with that just man: for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of him" (Matthew 27:19).

Pilate washed his hands before the multitude: "I am innocent of the blood of this just person: see ye to it." The people answered: "His blood be on us, and on our children" (Matthew 27:24–25).

Jesus was scourged, crowned with thorns, robed in purple, and mocked: "Hail, King of the Jews!" Pilate brought Him out and said:

Jesus bore His own cross (John 19:17), but they compelled Simon of Cyrene to carry it for Him (Matthew 27:32). A great company of women followed, "which also bewailed and lamented him" (Luke 23:27). Jesus turned to them:

They crucified Jesus at the third hour (9 a.m., Mark 15:25) between two thieves (Matthew 27:38). Pilate wrote the title: "JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS" in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin (John 19:19–20).

The soldiers cast lots for His garments (John 19:23–24), fulfilling Psalm 22:18. Passersby mocked: "If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross" (Matthew 27:40).

From the sixth hour (noon) to the ninth hour (3 p.m.), there was darkness over the whole land. At His death:

The centurion at the cross declared:

The soldiers broke the legs of the two thieves but not of Jesus (He was already dead), fulfilling "a bone of him shall not be broken" (John 19:36; Psalm 34:20). A soldier pierced His side, "and forthwith came there out blood and water" (John 19:34).

Joseph of Arimathaea, "a rich man" and secret disciple (Matthew 27:57; John 19:38), went to Pilate and begged the body of Jesus (Matthew 27:58). Nicodemus, who had come to Jesus by night (John 3:1–2), brought "a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound weight" (John 19:39). They wrapped the body in linen and laid it in a new sepulchre hewn in rock (Matthew 27:59–60).

The next day (Saturday), the Pharisees asked Pilate to set a guard and seal the stone, "lest his disciples come by night, and steal him away" (Matthew 27:64).

The Gospels record almost nothing of this day. The disciples were scattered. The women rested "according to the commandment" (Luke 23:56). The body of Jesus lay in the tomb.

The chief priests and Pharisees secured the tomb with Pilate's permission: "So they went, and made the sepulchre sure, sealing the stone, and setting a watch" (Matthew 27:66).

Very early in the morning, the women came to the sepulchre bringing spices (Mark 16:1; Luke 24:1). There was a great earthquake; an angel rolled back the stone (Matthew 28:2). The guards became "as dead men" (Matthew 28:4).

The women ran to tell the disciples (Matthew 28:8). Peter and John ran to the tomb (John 20:3–4). John outran Peter and looked in first but did not enter (John 20:5). Peter went in and saw the linen clothes and the napkin that had been about His head, "wrapped together in a place by itself" (John 20:7).

Mary Magdalene remained at the tomb weeping (John 20:11). She saw two angels (John 20:12), then turned and saw Jesus — but did not recognize Him at first (John 20:14). He spoke one word:

Two disciples walked to Emmaus, "which was from Jerusalem about threescore furlongs" (Luke 24:13). Jesus drew near and walked with them, "but their eyes were holden that they should not know him" (Luke 24:16).

He expounded the scriptures to them, beginning at Moses and all the prophets, explaining "the things concerning himself" (Luke 24:27). When they arrived and sat to eat:

That evening, the disciples were gathered behind locked doors "for fear of the Jews" (John 20:19). Jesus appeared in their midst:

He showed them His hands and His side (John 20:20). He breathed on them and said, "Receive ye the Holy Ghost" (John 20:22). He opened their understanding of the scriptures: "Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day" (Luke 24:46).

Thomas was not present and later said:

Eight days later, the disciples were again gathered, and this time Thomas was with them (John 20:26). Jesus appeared again and said to Thomas: