The Passion Plays were held in the last month of the inundation ( the annual Nile flood, coinciding with Spring, and held at Abydos / Abedjou which was the traditional place where the body of Osiris / Wesir drifted ashore after having been drowned in the Nile.

* The first decennial performance of the Oberammergau Passion Plays is held.

* Pilate appears in the Mystery Plays and Passion Plays, the most notable being in the Cornish cycle in which he is summoned to Rome by Tiberius and sentenced to death for killing Jesus because this crime cannot be contained by earth, sea or water and so immediately proceeds ( body and soul, rather than just soul ) to hell.

In the Chester Mystery Plays ' portrayal of Christ's Passion, specifically his humiliation before his sentence to crucifixion, the accounts of the Gospels concerning the physical violence visited on Jesus during his trial before the Sanhedrin, and the humiliating crowning of thorns visited upon him in Pilate's palace ( or by Herod's soldiers, according to Luke ), is further confused by showing both actions as being carried out by jeering Jews.

Later on, Passion Plays made their appearance, first in Latin, then in vernacular languages ; contents and forms were adapted more and more to audience expectations, until, in the fifteenth century, the popular religious plays had developed.

Yet even this oldest of the Passion Plays already shows a tendency to break away from the ritual and to adopt a more dramatic form.

The oldest Frankfort Passion play, that of Canon Baldemar von Peterwell ( 1350 – 1381 ), the production of which required two days, was more profusely elaborated than the other Passion Plays of this period.

Connected with this group are the Eger, the Donaueschingen, Augsburg, Freising and Lucerne Passion Plays, in which the whole world drama, beginning with the creation of man and brought down to the coming of the Holy Ghost, is exhibited, and which was produced with great splendour as late as 1583.

Nearly all these Passion Plays have some relation to those coming from the Tyrol, some contributing to, others taking from, that source.

In Tyrol the Passion Plays received elaborate cultivation ; at Bozen they were presented with great splendour and lasted seven days.

The magnificent productions of the Passion Plays during the fifteenth century are closely connected with the growth and increasing self-confidence of the cities, which found its expression in noble buildings, ecclesiastical and municipal, and in gorgeous public festivals.

Master Grobianus with his coarse and obscene jests was even introduced into some of the Passion Plays.

Thus, the Bishop of Havelberg commanded his clergy, in 1471, to suppress the Passion Plays and legend plays in their parish districts because of the disgraceful and irrelevant farces interspersed through the productions.

The Passion Plays came to be presented more rarely, particularly as the Reformation was inimical to them.

When, in the 17th century, the splendidly equipped Jesuit drama arose, the Passion Plays ( still largely secularized ) were relegated to out-of-the-way villages and to the monasteries, particularly in Bavaria and Austria.

* One of the most widely viewed Passion Plays in the United States is The Promise, performed near Glen Rose, Texas.

The origin of theatre in Christian societies in Europe is often traced to Passion Plays and other religious pageants, similar in some ways to the Purim plays.

As stated in the Boston College Guide to Passion Plays, " Over the course of time, Christians began to accept ... that the Jewish people as a whole were responsible for killing Jesus.

While the historicity of the gospel accounts is questioned to some extent by some critical scholars and non-Christians, the traditional view states the following chronology for his ministry: Temptation, Sermon on the Mount, Appointment of the Twelve, Miracles, Temple Money Changers, Last Supper, Arrest, Trial, Passion, Crucifixion on Good Friday (,), Nisan 14th (,, Gospel of Peter ) or Nisan 15th ( Synoptic Gospels ), ( 7Apr30, 3Apr33, 30Mar36, possible Fri-14-Nisan dates ,-Meier ), entombment by Pharisees Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus of the Sanhedrin, Resurrection by God on Easter Sunday, appearances to Paul of Tarsus (), Simon Peter (), Mary Magdalene (,), and others, Great Commission, Ascension, Second Coming Prophecy to fulfill the rest of Messianic prophecy such as the Resurrection of the dead, the Last Judgment, and establishment of the Kingdom of God and the Messianic Age.

* Great and Holy Friday Orthros — Twelve Passion Gospels are interspersed throughout the service ; Antiphons are used between the Gospels ( these originated in a different office ); While the troparion at the 15th antiphon Today is hung upon the cross ... ( Simeron krematai ) is chanted, the priest brings a large crucifix into the center of the church, and all venerate the cross.

The motif found increasing currency as the Passion became a central theme in Western piety in the 15th and 16th centuries.

* Great and Holy Friday Orthros — Twelve Passion Gospels are interspersed throughout the service ; Antiphons are used between the Gospels ( these originated in a different office ); While the troparion at the 15th antiphon Today is hung upon the cross ... ( Simeron krematai ) is chanted, the priest brings a large crucifix into the center of the church, and all venerate the cross.

* La Pasión Según Antígona Pérez ( ( The ) Passion according to Antigone Pérez ), adaptation of Sophocles by Puerto Rican writer Luis Rafael Sánchez ( b. 1936 ), updated to 20th century Latin America

These 14 stations depict the Passion from the sentencing by Pilate to the sealing of the tomb, and since the 16th century representations of them in various media have decorated the naves of most Catholic churches.

They mostly date from the late 16th to the 17th century ; most depict the Passion, others different subjects as well.

The reading of the Passion section of one of the Gospels during Holy Week dates back to the 4th century.

The Passion continued to be very popular in Protestant Germany in the 18th century, with Bach's second son Carl Philipp Emanuel composing over twenty settings.

In the 19th century, with the exception of John Stainer's The Crucifixion ( 1887 ), Passion settings were less popular, but in the 20th century, they have again come into fashion.

Thus, the Benedictbeurn Passion Play ( thirteenth century ) is still largely composed of Latin ritual sentences in prose and of church hymns, and, being designed to be sung, resembles an oratorio.

From these humble beginnings the Passion Play developed very rapidly, since in the fourteenth century it was at a stage of development which could not have been reached except by repeated practice.

These, again, are founded upon the Tyrolese Passion play which originated during the transition period of the fourteenth to the fifteenth century.

Public interest in the Passion Play developed in the last decades of the 19th century, and the statistician Karl Pearson wrote a book about them.

* St. Mary of the Angels Church ( 16th century ) with the fresco of the Christ's Passion from Bernardino Luini

The accounts of 4th century pilgrims to Jerusalem allude to the Crown of Thorns and the instruments of the Passion of Christ.

Many psalters, particularly from the 12th century onwards, included a richly decorated " prefatory cycle "-a series of full-page illuminations preceding the Psalms, usually illustrating the Passion story, though some also featuring Old Testament narratives.

*" The Passion " ( Milton ), a 17th century poem by John Milton

Somewhat more recent, but not later than the beginning of the 14th century, is a Passion of Christ ( not yet printed ) and a mystery of the Marriage of the Virgin, which is partly adapted from a French poem of the 13th century, ( see Romania xvi.

From the thirteenth century their use began to decline, as a new conception of Christ in Majesty, showing the wounds of the Passion, began to be used.

Angel Holding the Holy Nails, formerly one of a series of " Angels of the Passion ", oak, formerly painted, Northern French, late 13th century ( Metropolitan Museum of Art )

The historian Charles Grosset also notes that the Passion of St Helier, written in the 10th or 11th century, draws upon two very much earlier lives of St Marculf ( A and B ), and amends them to suit his narrative.

Many composers wrote musical settings of the Passion in the late 17th century.