The chapter
Simply Pilate has Jesus flogged, and the soldiers dress him up as a king to mock him. Pilate keeps trying to release him and keeps being pushed back, until he hands him over. Jesus is crucified between two others, with a notice over him in three languages. He speaks to his mother, says he is thirsty, and says it is finished. A soldier pierces his side. Two men who had kept quiet until now bury him.
Context The hour given here does not match Mark's. Verse 14 has Jesus still in front of Pilate at about the sixth hour, and Mark 15:25 says it was the third hour when they crucified him. Both are in this app and a reader can open them side by side. This file reports the difference and does not resolve it, the same way it reports the difference about the Passover at 18:28. The chapter is also the one where the book's habit of quoting scripture becomes densest: three quotations in eleven verses, at 24, 36 and 37.
Verses 1-16
Simply Pilate has him whipped. The soldiers plait a crown of thorns, put a purple robe on him and hit him. Pilate brings him out and says, look at the man. The chief priests shout for crucifixion. Pilate says to take him themselves, then hears the charge that he made himself Son of God and becomes more afraid. He tries again to release him, and is told that anyone who does is no friend of Caesar. Then he hands him over.
Context Pilate is the most reluctant executioner in the four Gospels here, and the text tracks the pressure precisely: he tries to release him at 18:39, at 19:12, and says three separate times that he finds no case. What moves him is not an argument but verse 12, which turns the trial into a question about his own standing. Verse 8 is unusual in that it reports his fear increasing, and it is the theological charge at verse 7, not the political one, that does it.
Verses 17-27
Simply He carries his own cross to a place called the Skull, and is crucified between two others. Pilate writes a notice, Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews, in three languages, and refuses to change it. The soldiers split his clothes four ways but will not tear the seamless tunic, and cast lots for it instead. His mother is standing there with the disciple he loved, and he tells each to take the other.
Context All four Gospels record a notice over the cross and no two of them word it the same way, which is worth seeing rather than being told: Matthew 27:37, Mark 15:26, Luke 23:38 and this verse can all be opened here. The three languages are in John 19:20 in every one of the thirteen editions this app offers. They are also in Luke 23:38 in eight of the thirteen and missing from five, so whether a reader meets this detail twice or once depends on the edition they are holding. The lots cast at verse 24 are a quotation of Psalm 22, which can be opened. Verses 26 and 27 are the only words in this Gospel spoken from the cross to a named person, and neither person is given a name.
Verses 28-42
Simply He says he is thirsty, is given sour wine on a sponge, says it is finished, and dies. Because of the Sabbath the legs of the crucified are broken to hasten death, but his are not, because he is already dead; a soldier pierces his side instead, and blood and water come out. Joseph of Arimathea, a secret disciple, asks for the body, and Nicodemus comes with a great weight of spices. They bury him in a new tomb in a garden nearby.
Context The two quotations at verses 36 and 37 are given for two things that did and did not happen to the body: no bone broken, which is the rule for the Passover lamb at Exodus 12:46, and a piercing, which is Zechariah 12. Both can be opened here. Nicodemus at verse 39 is the same man who came at night in chapter 3 and spoke up carefully in chapter 7; this is the third and last time he appears, and it is the only time he does anything in daylight. Joseph is described as a disciple in secret for fear, and the text says so without comment, in the same sentence that has him ask Pilate for the body.