The Hill Called Skull: Mark 15:16-32

The soldiers led Jesus into the palace—the Praetorium—and called together the whole company. They put a purple robe on him, twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. Then they began to mock him: "Hail, king of the Jews!"

They struck him on the head with a staff, driving thorns deeper into scalp. They spit on him. Falling on their knees, they paid mock homage. When they had finished their sport, they stripped off the purple and put his own clothes back on him.

Then they led him out to crucify him.

A man named Simon, from Cyrene—the father of Alexander and Rufus, Mark notes, as if his readers knew the family—was passing by on his way in from the country. They forced him to carry the cross. One moment he was a pilgrim coming to Jerusalem for Passover; the next he was bearing the instrument of the Messiah's death.