Tag Archives: Pilate

Pilate’s Dilemma

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PILATE’S DILEMMA 

“But Pilate answered, ‘You take Him and crucify Him. As for me, I find no basis for a charge against Him.’ The Jewish leaders insisted, ‘We have a law and, according to that law He must die, because He claimed to be the Son of God.’

“When Pilate heard this he was even more afraid, and he went back inside the palace. ‘Where do you come from?’ he asked Jesus, but Jesus gave him no answer.” John 19:6b-9 NIV.

What a horrible position to be in!

Inside Pilate’s head was a raging conscience; outside the palace was a raging mob led by a persistent, insistent religious hierarchy who were beginning to show their true colours. Although they presented Him to Pilate as a rabble-rousing, trouble-making challenge to Caesar, that was not the real issue. This was a smoke screen for a religious conflict between men who felt threatened because Jesus had exposed their wicked hearts and a man who challenged them examine the evidence, which they refused to do.

It was easier to charge Him with blasphemy and get rid of Him than to be honest enough to check out His credentials against the Scriptures to find out the truth. It was not their religion as much as it was their position and power over the people that was at stake. Jesus had made God too nice, and that did not suit them because they wanted to retain their hold over the people by their rigid insistence on obedience to their rules.

Pilate’s close encounter with Jesus had unnerved him. He was honest enough to admit that he could find no reason to charge Him with any criminal activity. Treason? Rabble-rousing? Inciting the mob to violence? Jesus didn’t even have any supporters heckling Pilate. He stood there alone and unresisting and Pilate did not know what to make of Him. Questioning Him got him nowhere. Jesus admitted to being a king, but He did not act like a typical usurper nor did He lay claim to the throne of Israel. He said, ‘My kingdom is not of this world.’ What was Pilate supposed to make of that?

Now he was faced with another even more frightening possibility. Two charges Pilate did not understand. He was a pagan Roman. What did he know about these Jews and their strange and complicated religion? King, but not of this world? Son of God? Pilate would rather have been a million miles away, even on another planet if that were possible, rather than have to deal with this man and His howling accusers. He was scared. Jesus was a hot potato but the buck stopped with him. He had to make a decision.

Back he went into the palace to face Jesus again. Desperate to get to the bottom of this matter, he questioned Him again. ‘Who are you? Where do you come from? Come on, Jesus, give me some answers. I’m trying my best to save your skin.’ But Jesus said nothing. It was almost as though He wanted to die. That was even more unnerving and Pilate was thoroughly shaken by his encounter with this unusual man.

What were Pilate’s options? Condemn an innocent man to death to appease a fanatical crowd and live with an accusing conscience, or release Him and risk a Jewish uprising and the inevitable bloodshed that would follow? These Jews were volatile. He knew what would happen if he insisted on releasing Jesus. They would probably lynch Him before He got beyond the palace grounds. He would have to face Rome no matter what his choice.

Pilate was a cruel and ruthless governor. He was guilty of having Galilean worshippers murdered while they were offering sacrifices at the temple (Luke 13:1). He was recalled to Rome after brutally quelling a Samaritan up rising. Tradition had it that he was exiled to Pontus and finally took his own life.

Pilate was caught up in circumstances that were not of his own making. Can we judge him? What would we have done?

Son Of The Father

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SON OF THE FATHER 

“With this he went out again to the Jews gathered there and said, ‘I find no basis for a charge against Him. But it is your custom for me to release to you one prisoner at the time of Passover. Do you want me to release “the king of the Jews”? They shouted back, ‘No, not Him! Give us Barabbas!’ Now Barabbas had taken part in an uprising.” John 18:38b-40 NIV.

John’s description of Pilate’s verdict is very sketchy at this point. The chief priests had not specified their charge against Jesus. Their demand was, ‘Sentence Jesus to death; He’s guilty!’ Pilate responded, ‘Guilty of what?’ They replied, ‘He’s guilty because we say so!’ What kind of reply was that?

It was up to Pilate, it seems, to determine why the religious rulers insisted that He was guilty. The only thing Rome was interested in was insurrection. Was Jesus a rabble-rouser, trying to drum up enough support to get rid of the Romans? Annas had drilled Him about His following and His teaching in the hopes that He would let slip any plan He had of an uprising. He failed to get Him to incriminate Himself, so he sent Him to Caiaphas.

John recorded nothing of the religious trial before the Sanhedrin except the verdict, “Guilty as charged!” But not guilty of treason; guilty of blasphemy, according to the other gospels. A verdict of guilty of blasphemy would not cut it with Pilate. That was not his fight. So they kept mum about the charge and hoped that Jesus would give Pilate the evidence he needed to condemn Him to death.

Pilate must have had some clue to Jesus’ claim, or else he followed that route because it was the one thing that Roman authority would squash and quickly. In spite of his verdict, “Not guilty,” after questioning Jesus, the Jewish leaders still demanded His death. Pilate had one last loophole – the Jewish custom of releasing a prisoner on death row at Passover. Surely, if he chose the worst awaiting-execution convict, they would let Jesus go?

Pilate was in for a shock. So deep was their suspicion and hatred of Jesus that they would choose a convicted murderer and insurrectionist and allow him to roam the streets again, rather than a benevolent and upright rabbi who challenged their understanding of the Scriptures and exposed their greedy and selfish hearts.

Who was this Barabbas anyway? In a Jewish name, “bar” indicated the connection of the son with his father, just as does “son” in an English name, e.g., Johnson or Morrison, or “Mac” or “Mc” in a Scottish name, e.g., McGregor. Bartimaeus, the blind man, was the son of Timaeus; Barabbas was the son of his father. What sort of a name was that! Does his name, ironically, stand for all the sons of their fathers in whose place Jesus was crucified.

Did Barabbas’ mother give him a nondescript name like “son of his father’ because he did not have a father? Was she a single mother who tried to shield her son’s illegitimacy? Is that why he resorted to violence and murder — because he was an angry, fatherless boy? Just a thought!

According to Luke, Jesus was accused of being an insurrectionist. “Then the whole assembly rose and led Him off to Pilate. And they began to accuse Him saying, ‘We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Messiah, a king.’…Then Pilate announced to the chief priests and the crowd, ‘I find no basis for a charge against this man.’ But they insisted, ‘He stirs up the people all over Judea by His teaching. He started in Galilee and has come all the way here.'” Luke 23:2; 4-5 NIV.

Pilate was really in a dilemma; Barabbas was a convicted insurrectionist and they wanted him released. Jesus was not guilty of revolutionary activity, but they wanted Him crucified! What was he to do to satisfy justice, the Jews and his conscience?

What Is Truth?

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WHAT IS TRUTH? 

“‘You are a king, then!’ said Pilate. Jesus answered, ‘You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.’

“‘What is truth?’ retorted Pilate.” John 18: 37-38a NIV.

Two kingdoms in collision!

In His precarious position as a prisoner on the brink of being condemned to die, Jesus remained resolutely committed to His commission from the Father. He came to represent the Father to a people who had long ago rejected the truth and created a religious system which suited them better than trusting in a good God they could not see.

They had abandoned their idolatrous worship and resorted to an elaborate self-help religion that consisted of rules upon rules to protect the Law of God so that they could be sure that God would be satisfied with their efforts.

Jesus came to show them that God is not like that at all. He lived out the real meaning of God’s Torah – teaching — by loving and caring for all people, by treating their failures with mercy and their sins with forgiveness because God had provided a lamb as a sacrifice for their sin. He placed on them an easy yoke of simple trust in a loving Father and obedience to His requirement to love Him fully and to love their fellow men.

He had one prescription for carrying out His command — “Follow me.” He was the living and visible demonstration of the truth. God had entrusted the administration of this unseen kingdom to Him as His king but the nations and even His own people had rebelled against Him and set up their own ungodly systems which reflected the imagination of their own hearts.

“Why do the nations conspire and the people plot in vain?…The One enthroned in heaven laughs. He rebukes them in His anger and terrifies them in His wrath, saying, ‘I have installed my king on Zion, my holy mountain.’ I will proclaim the Lord’s decree. He said to me, ‘You are my son; today I have become your father. Ask me and I will make the nations your inheritance and the ends of the earth your possession.'” Psalm 2:1; 4-8 NIV.

This is something that Pilate would have not understood. He represented the most powerful human system of his day, and the men who perpetuated that system by their arrogant, ruthless and despotic rule. People were there to serve them. They were at the pinnacle of authority — God’s delegated authority, mind you (…”The authorities that exist have been established by God…” Romans 13:1b NIV) and they wielded it with the foolish notion that it was their authority and they could do what they liked with it. They even claimed to be the source of their authority, demanding that their subjects worship them as God! It was treasonable to refuse to honour Caesar as Lord.

Into this scenario came Jesus to tell the world the truth. What is the truth? He, not Caesar, is Lord. Pilate asked the question, ‘What is truth?’ not with a humble desire to know but with a cynical sneer. The Jews whom he governed with an iron fist, had certainly not shown him the truth and neither had his own idolatrous religion with its debauched and depraved gods created by man in the image of man.

What a relief it is to know that Jesus is Lord! What if Caesar or some modern equivalent were Lord? Hitler! Osama ben Laden! Stalin! Gaddafi! Saddam Hussein! Or even one of our present presidents or kings! Unthinkable!

No! They mocked Him, dressed Him in a second-hand royal robe, crowned Him with thorns, spat on Him, ripped out His beard and enthroned Him to a cross but He was still the king of the Jews. He beat them all and still reigns today.

“Then the end will come when He hands over the kingdom to God His Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” 1 Corinthians 15:24-26 NIV.

King Of The Jews

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KING OF THE JEWS

“Pilate then went back inside the palace, summoned Jesus and asked Him, ‘Are you the king of the Jews?’ ‘Is that your own idea,’ Jesus asked, ‘or did others talk to you about me?’

“‘Am I a Jew? ‘Pilate replied. ‘Your own people and chief priests handed you over to me. What is it you have done?’

“Jesus said, ‘My kingdom is not of the world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.'” John 18:33-36 NIV.

One has to feel some pity for Pilate. At the crack of dawn, when the poor man had hardly wiped the sleep from his eyes, an irate mob of Jews, led by their religious leaders, turned up on his doorstep but refused to go inside because of some religious scruple of their own making. They were demanding the execution of a prisoner he knew nothing about.

When he asked about the prisoner’s crime, His accusers retort with the lame excuse that they would not have brought Him had He not been guilty! How was Pilate to interpret that? Were they trying to make him look like a fool so that they could dodge the question?

It was left to Pilate and Jesus to determine His crime. Pilate must have had some notion that Jesus claimed to be the king of the Jews. Now it was no longer blasphemy but treason and that was serious enough a charge to deserve the death penalty if it were proven true.

Pilate asked Jesus outright, ‘Are you the king of the Jews?’ He certainly didn’t look very regal at that moment. There was blood congealed on His face from the thorny crown that had bitten into His flesh. His seamless robe was dirty and dishevelled. There were bald and bloodied patches on His cheeks where the soldiers had pulled out His beard. He was pale and gaunt from lack of food and sleep.

He didn’t act like a king either. Where was His retinue of attendants? Where were His loyal subjects? He was neither loudly protesting His innocence not demanding justice for a man in His position. He had no secret army waiting in ambush to attack the Romans and defend Him. He stood before Pilate in respectful silence, waiting for him to decide what to do with Him.

Pilate and Jesus engaged in an unusually polite exchange for a Roman governor and a prisoner. Pilate must have been intrigued by this accused man who did not behave like all the others. There was a calm dignity about Jesus, in spite of His precarious position, that caused Pilate to treat Him far more gently than he would the run-of-the-mill prisoner.

Since Jesus would not state the charge which was supposed to have been brought by His accusers, Pilate tried to find out from Him what He had done to deserve this treatment. Jesus’ response was mystifying. ‘My kingdom is not of this world.’  Was this man crazy? What was He talking about? He looked perfectly sane. Was He hallucinating from pain and shock?

No, Jesus was not crazy or hallucinating. As always, He viewed His life from the perspective of His purpose for coming to earth. Whether Pilate understood or not was irrelevant. He was making no claim to Caesar’s rule over Israel. He was establishing His right to rule over the hearts of the men and women He had created for Himself.

It was not what He had done that was the issue but who He was, and it was not Pilate’s responsibility to decide but to acknowledge that He was who He was and to submit to Him as King of the Jews.

Son of God…King of the Jews…from the human point of view He was guilty of both charges but, from the divine perspective, He not only claimed but proved Himself to be who He said He was. The problem was that His accusers refused to examine the evidence. He was a threat to their cushy lives and that was more important than the truth. Unlike Jesus, they refused to view the whole of life including the part that extended beyond the grave. Jesus was offering them mercy for the past and grace for the present and future but they turned it down flat!

What about you?

Our Buddy, Pilate

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OUR BUDDY, PILATE

“Then the Jewish leaders took Jesus from Caiaphas to the palace of the Roman governor. By now it was early morning and, to avoid ceremonial uncleanness, they did not enter the palace, because they wanted to be able to eat the Passover. So Pilate came out to them and asked, ‘What charges are you bringing against this man?

“‘If He were not a criminal,’ they replied, ‘we would not have handed Him over to you.’ Pilate said, ‘Take Him yourselves and judge Him by your own law.’ ‘But we have no right to execute anyone,’ they objected. This took place to fulfil what Jesus had said about the kind of death He was going to die.” John 18:28-32 NIV.

John said nothing about Jesus’ trial before Caiaphas. According to the other three gospels, it was this trial that revealed the Sanhedrin’s true colours. Caiaphas allowed false witnesses to testify without suffering the penalty for lying. The men of the Sanhedrin behaved in a disgraceful way, using verbal and physical abuse against the prisoner and allowing the soldiers to mock Jesus by ramming a crown on His head woven out of twigs covered in vicious thorns.

Having satisfied themselves of Jesus’ guilt, the Jewish leaders marched Jesus to Pilate to have their verdict ratified. They had decided that He was guilty of blasphemy because they refused to accept His claim to be the Son of God. They did not bother the test His claim by listening to the testimony of reliable witnesses. As far as they were concerned He was guilty and that was that.

Although it was illegal to condemn a man on his own testimony, Caiaphas put the question to Jesus, ‘Are you the Christ?’ to which Jesus replied, ‘You have said it.’ Triumphantly proclaiming Him ‘Guilty!’ they bundled Him off to Pilate to ratify their verdict and sentence, only Pilate would not buy the charge of blasphemy. That was an internal, religious matter. Pilate didn’t give a hoot about their religious squabbles. It was His job to protect Rome’s interests and nothing else.

They thought that they had Jesus in the bag. Charge Him with treason because He claimed to be the king of the Jews and Pilate would be a pushover. After all, they were buddies, and he would go along with them as long as they did their job to keep the peace. Since they insisted that Jesus was a rabble-rouser, Pilate would surely rubber-stamp their verdict and condemn Him to death.

They did not bargain on Pilate’s resistance to their straightforward scheme. Pilate had to be sure that this man’s so called “treason” was in fact a threat to Rome. He couldn’t just go crucifying people left, right and centre just because the Jewish high court insisted they were guilty. It may have been true that Jesus claimed kingship over the Jews but what evidence was there that He was planning to overthrow Roman rule and drive them out of Israel? What sort of king was He?

Friend though he might have been, Pilate was not ignorant of the nature of these Jewish leaders. They could be conniving and unscrupulous to get their own way. Most of them were drawn from the wealthy political party of the Sadducees who did not have much interest in religion. They did not believe in the supernatural and rejected the Pharisees’ belief in the resurrection.

In spite of the coalition in the Sanhedrin, there was a deep divide between the two groups. Many years later, Paul would exploit this divide to turn the heat of their hatred off him.

Pilate had a responsibility to exercise Roman justice, even towards Jewish prisoners. Therefore he questioned Jesus’ accusers. ‘What’s the charge against Him?’ he demanded. The Jewish leaders shrewdly turned his question back on him. They dodged the question by trying to make Pilate look foolish. ‘Don’t be silly, Pilate! Do you think we would have brought Him to you if we hadn’t already found him guilty?’

‘Guilty of what?’ No answer! Pilate was also shrewd. ‘You take Him and try Him,’ he replied. He knew that they had no power to execute anyone. Only he could do that. This would turn into a running battle between Jewish and Roman authorities with Jesus as the prize. Who would come out tops?