Matthew 27:19

Matthew 27:19. While he was sitting. Probably while the people were considering the matter.

The judgment seat. A lofty seat of authority, usually on a stone pavement; comp. John 19:13. On this occasion he ascended the seat of judgment to receive the decision of the people, in the other case (in John) to mock the Jews and pronounce the final sentence against Jesus.

His wife sent to him. From the time of Augustus the Roman governors were in the habit of taking their wives with them into their provinces. Tradition gives the name of Pilate's wife, as Claudia Procula or Procla, and the Apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus says she was a proselyte of the gate, but little weight is to be attached to this.

That righteous man. She may have known something of Jesus and was satisfied of His innocence. Her request hints that Pilate might incur Divine vengeance by injuring Jesus. She alone pleads the cause of our Saviour. Compare Plato's description of the perfectly just man, who ‘without doing any wrong, may assume the appearance of the grossest injustice;' yea who ‘shall be scourged, tortured, fettered, deprived of his eyes, and after having endured all possible sufferings, fastened to a post, must restore again the beginning and prototype of righteousness.'

Suffered many things, or ‘much.' Some fearful apparition must be meant

In a dream. The dream may have been entirely natural. The governor's wife knew something of the mission of Jesus; and the night before, the Sanhedrin had in all probability alarmed the procurator's household, coming to demand a guard. Pilate's desire to release Jesus was doubtless increased, but he was already committed to the choice of the people.