"Farmers plowed my back, they dug their long grooves." Psalm 129. 3

In ancient Rome, flogging with a sort of short-handled flail called flagrum was used as a preliminary punishment for killing (usually crucifixion). It was applied to non-citizens, Roman citizens being generally exempt from this infamous punishment. The flagrum carried two or three straps at some distance from their extremity, with balls of lead or sheep bone. The thongs cut the skin and the bullets or ossicles printed deep wounds. The only part of the body that can withstand the blows of such an instrument of torture is the back, with the muscles that cover it.

This torment, our Savior had to endure ! He had just been brutalized by the members of the Jewish tribunal, presented to the screaming crowd, and for more than twenty-four hours he had not slept.

Do we see him thus, stripped of his clothes, tied to a post, under the blows of the Roman soldiers ? Yes, the blows trace long furrows on his back, which is no more than a mass of bloody flesh.

The blows do not stop there, for the soldiers put a crown of thorns on his head and strike it with the reed which, in their mockery, they had given him as a scepter. The scalp is a very firm tissue that does not close around blood vessels broken by thorns. So the blood flows abundantly on the figure of Christ. At the end of this ordeal, the Lord lost so much blood that any other man would certainly be in shock. And this is only the beginning of the ritual of crucifixion.

The Lord was fully aware of the physical pain he endured because of us. Yet he had delivered from their sufferings so many sick and so many cripples ! And he could have escaped all these pains at any moment. He accepted everything out of love for God and love for us. Let's keep these tragic images before our eyes when we remember the sacrifice of the Lord. He won a total and definitive victory ... but at what price !

Source (To please the Lord)