“Jesus was acquitted by the same lips as condemned Him: ‘I find no basis for a charge against this man,’ (Luke 23:4).
Here, human justice condemns itself. The criminal is on the bench, not in the dock, just as in the person of Caiaphas the blasphemer is the one at the altar, not the One on the cross.
The judge acquits the prisoner, and then sentences Him to be flogged and crucified.”
–Donald Macleod, Christ Crucified: Understanding the Atonement (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2014), 32.