Why would the highest authority or chief priest stop the whipper during a beating?
The highest authority or chief priest would stop the whipper because most men could not endure such a beating and would die as they were being whipped. Since very few victims could take that many lashes, the beating often had to be halted at around 25 or 30 before it became fatal.
Les explains that very few victims could take that many lashes. Usually the highest authority, the chief priest or somebody, had to stop the whipper before they reached that point, because most men could not take it and would die while being whipped. So the beating would often have to stop at maybe 25 or 30. He adds that people in the modern age can have no concept of what a human being looked like after being beaten 39 times. Stoning was even worse; when Jews stoned someone, the corpse was obscene, because they used rocks so big it took two hands to smash them down. The apostle went through that. Les reminds us that in western culture most have never had to suffer for their faith, yet for us to have the New Testament as we know it, this is what the man had to go through.
Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one.
More Questions
Why did the chief priest have to stop the whipper before 39 lashes were finished?
Very few victims could endure 39 lashes; the highest authority, such as the chief priest, usually had to stop the whipper before that point because most men could not take it and would die while being whipped, so the beating often stopped at about 25 or 30.