examination of the heart 546 For as soon as the Governor passed the sentence of Christ’s flagellation, [and] it was proclaimed that Christ was to be lashed with rods, the torturers hastilywent toprepare their tools, undoubtedly being additionally spurred by some monetary gift from the Jews. And so they tie the rods together and put iron hooks on their ends. They place on the outside the iron whips hanging like chains, completed with sharpened stars. To these they add various other kinds of whips, which their cruelty was able to devise at this time, and which your pious mind can piously imagine.278 3. Turn your thoughts fully to Christ the Lord and ponder Him with admiration as He, inflamed with the greatest desire to suffer for you, removes from Himself His garments; as He offers to the furious lictors279 His hands to be tied to the pole and, by His meekness, rouses their fury for flogging. Now, close your eyes, curb your pious imagination, lest perhaps you may be frightened and struck by incredulity and abhorrence at the first apprehension of the unheard of, unseen and unspeakable cruelty of the tormentors in carrying out the flogging. Succeeding one after another, the executioners approached the less injured parts of the body and flogged this purest body with their utmost strength till there was no room for new scourges, lashes, and wounds. And this is what a certain seer declared in a prophetical inspiration: “From the sole of the foot unto the top of the head, there is no soundness therein” (Is 1:6) [DRB]. The legs, knees, chest, sides, loins, arms, shoulders, hands have been most cruelly torn 278 Cf. Stanislaus Papczyński, The Suffering Christ: In Seven Meditations, adapted to the penance of Lent, [and] given to the faithful for fervent reflection by Father Stanislaus of Jesus and Mary Papczyński, a Polish priest, in: Selected Works of St. Stanislaus Papczyński, Marian Heritage — PROMIC, Stockbridge — Warsaw 2021, p. 777 (Disc. III: “The Scourging of the Sinner,” n. 2), where we find the description of the tools used for the scourging of Jesus Christ. [Hereafter The Suffering Christ will be abbreviated as SC.] 279 The word “lictor” refers to a public attendant of the principal Roman magistrates, who executed the sentences which they pronounced. In this instance, St. Stanislaus is referring to the Roman magistrate Pontius Pilate’s attendants who executed his sentence that Jesus Christ was to be scourged. Cf. CLD, p. 318 (s.v. lictor).
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