<p>27:38<em> Two robbers were crucified with him- </em>Mt. 27:38 RV has a dramatic change of tense: &ldquo;Then are there crucified with him&hellip;&quot;. Mark&rsquo;s present tenses are also arresting: &ldquo;plaiting&hellip;&nbsp; they clothe him&hellip; they smote&hellip;&quot; (:17,19 RV). Perhaps Mark is seeking consciously to make us imagine it all as going on before our eyes. Take just Mk. 15:23-26: &ldquo;They offered&hellip;&nbsp; they crucify&hellip;&nbsp; and part&hellip; casting lots&hellip; crucified&hellip; was written&quot;. These arresting changes are surely to encourage us to re-live it all. Mark speaks of &ldquo;they crucify him&quot;, going on to say that &ldquo;then are there two crucified with him&quot; (Mk. 15:38 RV), whereas Luke records the act in the past tense. Significantly, very few actual details are given by the Gospel writers of both the scourging and the crucifixion. It could be that they felt it impossible to dwell upon these things; or it could be that they and their readers knew what was involved in these practices, and we are left to dwell upon them in our own imagination. We are intended to reconstruct in our own minds what may have happened&hellip; We have a solemn duty towards Him to do this. This is perhaps why the tenses change so dramatically in the records.</p><p><em>One on his right hand and one on his left</em>- The crucified Christ is portrayed as King of criminals, King of the basest sort, enthroned between them, taking the place of their leader Barabbas, who ought to have been where the Lord was. Both Barabbas and the thieves are described with the same Greek word, translated &quot;robber&quot; (Jn. 18:40; Mk. 15:27). The Lord uses the same word when He points out that His persecutors were treating him as a &quot;robber&quot; (Mt. 26:55; Mk. 14:48; Lk. 22:52); He seems to be aware that what the experience He is going through is setting up Barabbas as a kind of inverse type of Himself, the true 'Son of the Father' (= 'Barabbas'). Those low, desperate men, the dregs of society, were types of us. Barabbas especially becomes a symbol of us all. According to Jewish tradition at the time (<em>Pesach</em> 8.6) &ldquo;They may slaughter the Passover lamb&hellip;for one whom they the authorities have promised to release from prison&quot;. The Passover amnesty freed a man justly condemned to death- on account of the death of the lamb. We can imagine the relief and joy and almost unbelief of Barabbas, as he watched or reflected upon the crucifixion of Jesus- that he who rightfully should have been there on the cross, was delivered from such a death because of the cross of Christ. The image of condemned prisoners being released due to the death of Messiah is an undoubted Old Testament figure for our redemption from slavery. Some of the legal terms used in the NT for our redemption imply that Christ redeemed us from slavery through His death. And yet one could redeem a slave by oneself becoming a slave (1 Cor. 6:20; 7:23; Gal. 3:13; 4:5). This is why the crucified Jesus is typified by the suffering servant / slave of Isaiah&rsquo;s prophesies. And Paul seems to have risen up to something similar when he speaks of giving his body to be branded, i.e. becoming a slave (1 Cor. 13:3 Gk.).</p>