Matthew 27:24 When Pilate saw that he was accomplishing ...
(24) He took water, and washed his hands.--The act belonged to an obvious and almost universal symbolism. So in Deuteronomy 21:6 the elders of a city in which an undiscovered murder had been committed were to wash their hands over the sin-offering, and to say, "Our hands have not shed this blood, neither have our eyes seen it." (Comp. also Psalm 26:6.)