The meaning of Ecce Homo in the Bible
(From International Standard Bible Encyclopedia)
ek'-se ho'-mo (idou ho anthropos, "Behold, the man!" John 19:5): Pilate's statement regarding Jesus during His trial. While the significance of this statement is somewhat debatable, yet there is little doubt, as judged from his attitude and statement immediately following, that Pilate was endeavoring to appeal to the accusers' sympathies and to point out to them the manly qualities of Jesus. The ordinary punctuation which places an exclamation point after "Behold" and a period after "the man" is evidently incorrect if the grammatical structure in the Greek is to be observed, which gives to the second and third words the nominative form, and which therefore admits of a mild exclamation, and therefore of the emphasis upon "the man." Some, however, hold the contrary view and maintain that the utterance was made in a spirit of contempt and ridicule, as much as to say, "Behold here a mere man." See especially on this view Marcus Dods in Expositor's Greek Testament. It would seem, however, that the former of the two views would be sustained by the chief facts in the case.
Walter G. Clippinger
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