Woland's Story of Pontius Pilate

Woland begins narrating the story of Pontius Pilate, the procurator of Judea, on the morning of the fourteenth of Nisan. Pilate suffers from a severe headache and is forced to interrogate Yeshua Ha-Nozri, a wandering philosopher accused of inciting the destruction of the temple. Yeshua impresses Pilate with his ability to heal his headache and his radical philosophy that all people are good and that all authority is violence. Pilate is torn between his personal sympathy for Yeshua and his political duty to uphold Roman law.