Then he released: in the Greek text Pilate is not mentioned by name, but Good News Translation, followed by Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch and Bible en français courant, does so in order to help the readers.

For them may be translated “for the crowd and their leaders” or “for the Jewish crowd and their leaders.”

Scourged Jesus is not something Pilate would have done himself, and the verb obviously carries a causative force: “He ordered Jesus to be first scourged” (Jerusalem Bible). It was common practice for the Romans to whip prisoners condemned to be crucified. Scourged can be translated very much as “flog” was at 10.17. The basic meaning is seen in Good News Translation‘s “whipped.”

Delivered is the verb commonly used of Jesus’ betrayal, though in its initial occurrence in the Gospel it is used of John the Baptist (“had been arrested” of 4.12). Here it may be helpful to identify to whom Pilate delivered Jesus, and who would do the crucifying, as in “handed him over to the soldiers so they could crucify him.” A shift to direct discourse may be preferable: “Then Pilate told his soldiers, ‘Whip this man Jesus and then crucify him.’ ”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .