Flogging is a process by which the Roman soldiers would strip the accused, stretch and beat him with thongs of leather, on which pieces of metal were fastened. At times the beating was so vicious, the condemned man would die even before being led to his crucifixion.

Jesus was taken to the Praetorium, stripped, dressed in a scarlet robe, crowned with a crown of thorns, spit upon, mocked, struck on the head repeatedly, and led to Golgotha ("The Place of the Skull"), also called Calvary.

According to the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), along the road leading to Golgotha, the crossbeam a battered and bloodied Jesus was required to heave up to the mountain where He would be crucified was forced upon a man named Simon of Cyrene. 

Cyrene (modern-day Tripoli) was an important city in upper Libya, North Africa.  Founded in 630 BC, Ptolemy (son of Lagus) later brought in one hundred thousand Jews to live there. By the time of Jesus, that number would have greatly increased.

No one knows for sure why Simon (which means "that hears and obeys") was in Jerusalem at the time, but the possibility of being there to celebrate the Passover is fairly probable. We don't know the attitude of Simon toward Jesus at the time, but we have some other insights to this man who was so honored to have done what he did.

According to Mark, Simon was the father of Alexander and Rufus (Mark 15:23).  Theologians believe this Rufus may have been the same one mentioned in Romans 16:13, which reads:  Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord. We know, also, that after the resurrection of Jesus and the infilling of the Holy Spirit during Pentecost, "men from Cyprus and Cyrene went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks also, telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus. (Acts 11:20)