The Shadow of Nazareth Jesus. Both Barrabas and Jesus are sentenced to die by crucifixion, but Jewish custom allows the release of a prisoner on the day of the Passover feast. Pontius Pilate, the Prefect of the Roman province of Judaea, has the authority to decide whether to free Barabbas or Jesus in honor of the Passover. However, Pilate is unwilling to make the decision himself, so he lets a crowd that has gathered before him choose who is to live. The crowd chooses Barabbas, who is set free, and Jesus, who is innocent of any wrongdoing, dies on the cross. Following the crucifixion,
Pontius Pilate's wife wrote between 1929 and 1934, in which Pilate's wife has the name "Veronica". "The Bride of Pilate" is a 1959 novel by Esther Kellner. On television, Pilate's wife was played by Joan Leslie in the 1951 "Family Theater" episode "Hill Number One" (also starring James Dean as John the Apostle), and by Geraldine Fitzgerald in the 1952 "Studio One" episode "Pontius Pilate" (where Procula is depicted as half-Jewish, and is brought before Pilate as a Christian rebel herself, fifteen years after Jesus' death). Pilate's wife is mentioned briefly in Pilate's hand-washing scene in "The Robe" (1953) ("Even my wife had