Pilate
Who is this man they send me
Why is his fate brought to me
Who is this man?
They say he is called Jesus
They say he's a Galilean
But who is he?
He says nothing to my questioning
But what he doesn't say says more
This man who Caiaphas calls a criminal
But who is this man?
If Caesar knew what I would do
To release this proclaimed King of Jews
I would suffer the fate
That I sentence him to
So out he walks
To bear a cross
On which he shall die
Because I fear, my life
I hear
My wife's cries
For this man.
Yet I know he is no mere man.
Judas
What have I done!
What have I done!
Oh, my sweet Lord, what have I done!
Why did I betray him, oh why!
My holy God I traded away!
These coins, what do they matter!
The priests will surely kill him!
Why did I do this!
Why do I regret!
I followed him for three years of my life
I'd seen the miracles he performed
Yet I went seeking out, to give out his locale
Just take it back, it's blood money
I have no use for it
And I sat there, and played innocent
As we ate our Seder meal
And that night I came to him
With a kiss I sealed my deal
I cannot endure this
They bought me this field
I cannot go on
Remembering what he said to me
I'll get a rope
I'll rap it tight
And on this say we both shall die.
The Soldiers
"Long Live the King of the Jews"
Is what the soldiers shout
"Long Live the King of the Jews"
Before he is to be nailed to a cross!
"Take your crown, your scepter too, don't forget your robe!"
Jeers and taunts to this man about to die!
His crown pricks into his skull and covers his robe with blood
His own clothes lays on the ground
As they gamble for it
And the King's scepter is used to beat him with
This man who just came back from being whipped!
The sadistic laughs of these Roman Guards
Who've killed so many before
Such pleasure that they get
From wielding this sick power
What do they care if another prophet dies
If a man covered in blood bleeds more
Just kill the man is their command
The rest is just for fun.
Simon the Cyrenian
I am a simple country man
Cyrene is my home
I traveled with my two sons
To go to Jerusalem
I came to celebrate the Exodus
Of my people from Egypt
But as I entered the city gates
I met much confusion
Before me was a ghastly sight
A man covered in blood
Thorns stuck out from around his head
He wore a royal robe
Yet on his back he was carrying
Two boards of wood
Each one easily looked
Heavier than him
The man fell before my feet
A Roman soldier grabbed at me
He wanted me to walk with him
To carry this cross for him
This must have been some criminal
I do not know
I wondered how all these people
Came on this Holy Day to see such sorrow
I tried to cover my face in shame
Being humiliated this way
Forced to take up somebody else's cross
To help some thief or murderer
As we passed the people
They hurled such insults
People came to spit on him
I got covered with their spit
It seemed they hated me too
For walking with this man
The guards said head for the hill
The one called "Skull"
I wondered what he could have done
To merit all of this
How could these people hate him still
While he was suffering like this
I tried to help him but I knew
All I really could do
Was send him straight to death
What did he do to deserve this!
I knew he must have been
The worst kind of man
But as I looked into his eyes
I didn't understand.
Why did they hate this man?
The Officer
I've been stuck in this post for years
The armpit of the Empire
a noble Roman soldier
Stuck keeping these Hebrews in line.
As always they wanted me
To watch out over the new bunch
Of criminals, who were condemned to crucifixion
But, they heeded me, it wasn't the same today
It was always bad for us during Passover
But more so today
One man sentenced was Jesus
Some peasant carpenter
I'd heard his story being told
Another so-called "Savior"
So many people flocked to seeking
As this man died
I waited there patiently
Hoping the crowds would subside
The man died at three o'clock
It had all gone to plan
We'd worried his followers would revolt
But what happened was much worst
For the second he called out to his God and died
The earth itself trembled
The sky turned dark
And rain and thunder came from nowhere
The guards ran to get the bodies down
But I just knelt to the ground
As buildings in the city tumbled
This all started when he died
This is how I came to realized
That nothing this man had said was lies
This man was God
The one true God
And that is how on the same day I helped to kill Christ
I became a Christian
Joseph of Arimathea
I watched as he hanged there
Suffocating slowly
I wished then that I had been open with my faith
I followed Jesus, he was my way
But I was so afraid of my fellow council members
That I had not voted to release him
But to send him to the governor.
But now, as he lay lifeless, I refused
To deny him any longer
I went to Pilate and asked
To keep the body
I lay Jesus in my tomb
I gave him my burial cloth
Whoever saw me do it, I no longer cared
The money that I had spent
It did not matter
This was my king, he deserved the best
That his mother could not give
With Nicodemus I rolled in the stone
Christ was dead.
