40. THE TRIAL OF JESUS
The death of Jesus is universally regarded among Christians as a cruel murder, perpetrated under the pretence of a legal sentence, after a trial, in which the forms of law were essentially and grossly violated. The Jews to this day maintain, that, whatever were the merits of the case, the trial was at least regular, and the sentence legally just; that he was accused of blasphemy, and convicted of that offence by legal evidence. The question between them involves two distinct points of inquiry, namely, first, whether he was guilty of blasphemy; and, secondly, whether the arraignment and trial were conducted in the ordinary forms of law. But there will still remain a third question, namely, whether, admitting that, as a mere man, he had violated the law against blasphemy, he could legally be put to death for that cause; and if not, then whether he was justly condemned upon the new and supplemental accusation of treason or of sedition, which was vehemently urged against him. The first and last of these inquiries it is proposed briefly to pursue; but it will be necessary previously to understand the light in which he was regarded by the Jewish rulers and people, the state of their criminal jurisprudence and course of proceeding, and especially the nature and extent of the law concerning blasphemy, upon which he was indicted.
In the early period of the ministry of Jesus, he does not appear to have excited among the Pharisees any emotion but wonder and astonishment, and an intense interest respecting the nature of his mission. But the people heard him with increasing avidity, and followed him in countless throngs. He taught a purer religion than the Seribes and Pharisees, whose pride and corruption he boldly denounced. He preached charity and humility, and perfect holiness of heart and life, as essential to the favor of God, whose laws he expounded in all the depth of their spirituality, in opposition to the traditions of the elders, and the false glosses of the Seribes and Pharisees. These sects he boldly charged with making void and rejecting the law of God, and enslaving men by their traditions; he accused them of hypocrisy, covetousness, oppression, and lust of power and popularity; and denounced them as hinderers of the salvation of others, as a generation of serpents and vipers, doomed to final perdition. It was natural that these terrific denunciations, from such a personage, supported by his growing power and the increasing reclamations of the people, should alarm the partisans of the ancient theocracy, and lead them to desire his destruction. This alarm evidently increased with the progress of his ministry; and was greatly heightened by the raising of Lazarus from the dead, on which occasion the death of Jesus was definitively resolved on; but no active measures against him seem to have been attempted, until the time when, under the parable of the wicked husbandmen who cast the heir out of the vineyard and slew him, he declared that the kingdom of God should be taken from them, and given to others more worthy. Perceiving that he spake this parable against them, from that hour they sought to lay hands on him, and were restrained only by fear of the popular indignation.
Having thus determined to destroy Jesus at all events, as a person whose very existence was fatal to their own power, and perhaps, in their view, to the safety of their nation, the first step was to render him odious to the people; without which the design would undoubtedly recod on the heads of its contrivers, his popularity being unbounded. Countless numbers had received the benefit of his miraculous gifts; and it was therefore deemed a vain at-
¹ See John xi. 47-54.
² Matth. xxi. 33-46. Mark xxii. 1-12. Luke xx. 9-19.
tempt to found an accusation, at that time, on any past transaction of his life. A new occasion was accordingly sought, by endeavoring to "entangle him in his talk;" a measure, planned and conducted with consummate cunning and skill. The Jews were divided into two political parties. One of these consisted of the Pharisees, who held it unlawful to acknowledge or pay tribute to the Roman emperor, because they were forbidden, by the law of Moses,¹ to set a king over them who was a stranger, and not one of their own countrymen. The other party was composed of the partisans of Herod, who understood this law to forbid only the voluntary election of a stranger, and therefore esteemed it not unlawful to submit and pay tribute to a conqueror. These two parties, though bitterly opposed to each other, united in the attempt to entrap Jesus, by the question, — "Is it lawful to give tribute to Cæsar, or not?"² If he answered in the negative, the Herodians were to accuse him to Pilate, for treason; if in the affirmative, the Pharisees would denounce him to the people, as an enemy to their liberties.³ This insidious design was signally frustrated by the wisdom of his reply, when, referring to Cæsar's image and legend, on the coins which they all received as legally current, he showed the inconsistency of withholding the honor due to one thus implicitly acknowledged by both parties to be their lawful sovereign.
Defeated in this attempt to commit him politically, their next endeavor was to render him obnoxious to one or the other of the two great religious sects, which were divided upon the doctrine of the resurrection, the Pharisees affirming, and the Sadducees denying, that the dead would rise again. The latter he easily silenced, by a striking exposition of their own law. They asked him which, of several husbands, would be entitled in the next world to the wife whom they successively had married in this; and in reply, he showed them that in heaven the relation of husband and wife was unknown.⁴
Their last trial was made by a lawyer, who sought to entrap him into an assertion that one commandment in the law was greater than another; a design rendered abortive by his reply that they were all of equal obligation.⁵
It being apparent, from these successive defeats, that any farther attempt to find new matter of accusation would result only in disgrace to themselves, the enemies of Jesus seem to have come to the determination to secure his person secretly, and afterwards to put him to death, in any manner that would not render them odious to the people. In execution of this design, they first bribed Judas to betray him by night into their hands. This object being attained, the next step was to destroy his reputation, and if possible to render him so vile in the public estimation, as that his destruction would be regarded with complacency. Now no charge could so surely produce this effect, and none could so plausibly be preferred against him, as that of blasphemy; a crime which the Jews regarded with peculiar horror. Even their veneration of Jesus, and the awe which his presence inspired, had not been sufficient to restrain their rising indignation on several occasions, when they regarded his language as the blasphemous arrogation of a divine character and power to himself; and could they now be brought to believe him a blasphemer, and see him legally convicted of this atrocious crime, his destruction might easily be brought about, without any very scrupulous regard to the form, and even with honor to those by whom it might be accomplished.
It will now be necessary to consider more particularly the nature of the crime of blasphemy, in its larger signification, as it may be deduced from the law of God. That the spirit of this law requires from all men, everywhere, and at all times, the profoundest veneration of the Supreme Being, and the
¹ Deut. xvii. 15.
² Matth. xxii. 15-22. Mark xii. 13-17. Luke xx. 20-26.
³ Tappan's Jewish Ant. p. 239.
⁴ Matth. xxii. 23-33. Mark xii. 18-27. Luke xx. 27-39.
⁵ Matth. xxii. 25-40, 46. Mark xii. 28-34.
most submissive acknowledgment of Him as their rightful Sovereign, is too plain to require argument. If proof were wanted, it is abundantly furnished in the Decalogue,¹ which is admitted among Christians to be of universal obligation. At the time when the Jewish Theocracy was established, idolatry had become generally prevalent, and men had nearly lost all just notions of the nature and attributes of their Creator. It is therefore supposed that the design of Jehovah, in forming the Jewish constitution and code of laws, was to preserve the knowledge of himself as the true God, and to retain that people in the strictest possible allegiance to him alone; totally excluding every acknowledgment of any other being, either as an object of worship or a source of power. Hence the severity with which he required that sorceries, divinations, witchcrafts and false prophecies, as well as open idolatries, should be punished, they being alike acts of treason, or, as we might say, of pramunire, amounting to the open acknowledgment of a power independent of Jehovah. Hence, too, the great veneration in which he commanded that his name and attributes should be held, even in ordinary conversation. It is the breach of this last law, to which the term blasphemy, in its more restricted sense, has usually been applied;² but originally the command evidently extended to every word or act, directly in derogation of the sovereignty of Jehovah, such as speaking in the name of another god,³ or omitting, on any occasion that required it, to give to Jehovah the honor due to his own name.⁴ Thus, when Moses and Aaron, at the command of God,
¹ Exodus xx. 1-7. And God spoke all these words, saying, I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain: for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that tsketh his name in vain.
² Lev. xxiv. 11-16. And the Israelitish woman's son blasphemed the name of the Lord, and cursed; and they brought him unto Moses: (and his mother's name was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri, of the tribe of Dan.) And they put him in ward, that the mind of the Lord might be shewed them. And the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying, Bring forth him that hath cursed without the camp, and let all that heard him lay their hands upon his head, and let all the congregation stone him. And thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel, saying, Whosoever curseth his God shall bear his sin. And he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord, he shall surely be put to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him: as well the stranger, as he that is born in the land, when he blasphemeth the name of the Lord, shall be put to death. See A. Clarke on Matth. ix. 3.
³ Deut. xiii. 6. 10. If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers: Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him: neither shall thine eye pay him, neither shall thou spare, neither shall thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him: thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones that he die: because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage. Deut. xxiii. 20. But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.
⁴ It is true that in the Mishna it is written—"Blasphemis non tenetur, nisi expressit Nonem." Mishna. Pars iv. p. 242. Tractatus de Synedrus, cap. 7. § 5. But these traditions were not written until 150 years after the time of our Saviour; and the passage moreover, seems properly to refer to that form of blasphemy which consists in evil speaking of the Supreme Being, in a direct manner, rather than to the other forms in which this offence, in its larger acceptance, might be committed. See Michelis, Comm. Art. 251. Vol. 4, p. 67-79.
smote the rock in Kadesh, that from it waters might flow to refresh the famishing multitude, but neglected to honor him as the source of the miraculous energy, and arrogated it to themselves, saying, "Hear now, ye rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock!" this omission drew on them his severe displeasure. "And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron, Because ye believed me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them." Accordingly, both Moses and Aaron died before the Israelites entered into the promised land. No other deity was permitted to be invoked; no miracle must be wrought, but in the name of God alone. "I am Jehovah; that is my name; and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images." This was ever a cardinal principle of his law, neither newly announced by Isaiah, nor by Moses. Its promulgation on Mount Sinai was merely declaratory of what had been well understood at the beginning, namely, that God alone was the Lord of all power and might, and would be expressly acknowledged as such, in every exertion of superhuman energy or wisdom. Thus Joseph, when required to interpret the dream of Pharaoh, replied, "It is not in me: God shall give Pharaoh an answer of peace." And Moses, in all the miracles previously wrought by him in Egypt, expressly denounced them as the judgments of God, by whose hand alone they were inflicted. After the solemn re-enactment of this law on Mount Sinai, its signal violation by Moses and Aaron deserved to be made as signal an example of warning; and this judgment of Jehovah may be said to constitute the leading case under this article of the law; forming a rule of action and of judgment for all cases of miracles which might be wrought in all coming time. The same principle was afterwards expressly extended to prophesying. "The prophet—that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die." His character of prophet, and even his inspiration, shall not authorize him to prophesy but in the name of the Lord. He shall not exercise his office in his own name, nor in any name but that of Jehovah, from whom his power was derived.
That such was understood to be the true meaning of this law of God, is further evident from the practice of the prophets, in later times, to whom was given the power of working miracles. These they always wrought in his name, expressly acknowledged at the time. Thus, the miracle of thunder and rain in the season of the wheat-harvest, called for by Samuel, he expressly attributed to the Lord. So did Elijah, when he called fire from heaven to consume his sacrifice, in refutation of the claims of Baal. So did Elisha, when he divided the waters of Jordan, by smiting them with the mantle of Elijah; and again, when he miraculously multiplied the loaves of bread, for the people that were with him; and again, when he caused the young man's eyes to be opened, that he might behold the hosts of the Lord around him, and smote his enemies with blindness. And even the angel
1 Numb. xx. 10, 12.
2 Numb. xx. 24. Deut. i. 37, and xxxiv. 4, 5.
3 Is. xlii. 8, and xlviii. 2.
5 Exod. viii. ix. x. per tot.
6 Gen. xlii. 16. 25, 23.
8 Deut. xviii. 20.
7 "Now, therefore, stand and see this great thing, which the LORD will do before your eyes." 1 Sam. xii. 16. 15.
8 "And it came to pass, at the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that Elijah the prophet came near and said, Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known this day that thou art God in Israel." &c. 1 Kings xviii. 36-38.
9 "And he took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and smote the waters, and said, Where is the Lord God of Elijah?" &c. 2 Kings ii. 14.
10 "For thus saith the Lord, they shall eat and shall leave thereof," &c. 2 Kings iv. 43.
11 See 2 Kings vi. 16, 17, 18, 20. In some other places, where there is no express reference to the power of God, the omission may be attributed to the brevity of the narrative; but even in those cases, such reference is plainly implied.
Gabriel, when sent to interpret to Daniel the things which should befall his people in the latter days, explicitly announced himself as speaking in Jehovah's name.¹
The same view of the sinfulness of exercising superhuman power without an express acknowledgment of God as its author, and of any usurpation of his authority, continued to prevail, down to the time of our Saviour. Thus, when he said to the sick of the palsy, "Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee," certain of the Scribes said within themselves, "This man blasphemeeth. Who can forgive sins, but God alone?"² And again, when the Jews, on another occasion, took up stones to stone him, and Jesus, appealing to his good works done among them, asked for which of them he was to be stoned; they replied, "For a good work we stone thee not, but for blasphemy, and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God."³ Yet Jesus had on no occasion mentioned the name of Jehovah, but with profound reverence.
Thus it appears that the law of blasphemy, as it was understood among the Jews, extended not only to the offence of impiously using the name of the Supreme Being, but to every usurpation of his authority, or arrogation, by a created being, of the honor and power belonging to him alone.⁴ Like the crime of treason among men, its essence consisted in acknowledging or setting up the authority of another sovereign than one's own, or invading the powers pertaining exclusively to him; an offence, of which the case of Moses, before cited, is a prominent instance, both in its circumstances and in its punishment. Whether a false god was acknowledged or the true one denied, and whether the denial was in express terms, or by implication, in assuming to do, by underived power, and in one's own name, that which God only could perform, the offence was essentially the same. And in such horror was it held by the Israelites, that in token of it every one was obliged, by an early and universal custom, to rend his garments, whenever it was committed or related in his presence.⁵ This sentiment was deeply felt by the whole people, as a part of their religion.
Such being the general scope and spirit of the law, it would seem to have
¹ Dan. ix. 21, 23, and x. 11, 12. See further, 2 Kings xviii. 30-35, and xix. 1-3.
² Matt. ix. 2, 3 Luke v. 20, 21.
³ John x. 31 33
⁴ This view of the Jewish law may seem opposed to that of Dr. Campbell, in his Preliminary Dissertations on the Gospels; (Vol. 2, Diss. ix. Part 2,) but it is evident, on examination, that he is discussing the word blasphemy, and the propriety of its application, taken in its more restricted sense of intentional and direct malediction of Jehovah; and not whether the assumption of his attributes and authority was or was not a violation of his law. That this assumption was a heinous transgression, seems universally agreed. The question, therefore, is reduced to this - whether the offence was properly termed blasphemy. For the act, by whatever name it were called, was a capital crime. The Jewish judges of that day held it to amount to blasphemy; and in so doing, they do not appear to have given to their law a construction more expanded and comprehensive than has been given by judges in our own times, to the law of treason, or of sedition.
⁵ Thus was judicially and solemnly done by the members of the Sauberth, rising from their seats, when the crime was testified to. Only one witness was permitted to repeat the words, the others simply stating that they heard the same which he had related. The practice is thus described in the Mishna: "Exactis omnibus, interrogant vetustissimum testum, dicendo. Edicere, quodque audere, exprece. Tunc ille hoc refert. Judices autem stant erecti, vestisque discerpunt, non resarcendas. Deni secundus tertiusque aut. Ego idem, quod ille, audere." Mishna. Pars 4. Tractat de Synedrus, cap 7, § 5. Upon which, Covenus remarks: "Assurgent reverentur causa. Mos dispendarum vestum prolatur ex 2do Regum, xviii. 37. Hinc nata est regula. - Quo blasphemum audet, rel de ipsamuehare vel ex alio, tenitur restem discerperi. Ration est, ut semper ob oculos et animum versetur incorris aut indignationis inuenosynum." Coece, in loc. § 11, 12. The custom is fully explained, with particular reference to the high priest at the trial of Jesus, by Hedenus, De Sexatione Vestium, 38, 42. (In Ugolini Thesauro, Tom. xxix. fol. 1025, &c.)
been easy to prove that Jesus had repeatedly incurred its penalties. He had performed many miracles, but never in any other name than his own. In his own name, and without the recognition of any higher power, he had miraculously healed the sick, restored sight to the blind and strength to the lame, cast out devils, rebuked the winds, calmed the sea, and raised the dead. In his own name, also, and with no allusion to the Omniscient, no "Thus saith the Lord," he had prophesied of things to come. He had by his own authority forgiven sins, and promised, by his own power, not only to raise the dead, but to resume his own life, after he should, as he predicted, be put to death. Finally, he had expressly claimed for himself a divine origin and character, and the power to judge both the quick and dead. Considered as a man, he had usurped the attributes of God. That he was not arrested at an earlier period, is to be attributed to his great popularity, and the astounding effect of his miracles. His whole career had been resplendent with beneficence to the thousands who surrounded him. His eloquence surpassed all that had been uttered by man. The people were amazed, bewildered and fascinated, by the resistless power of his life. It was not until his last triumphal visit to Jerusalem, after he had openly raised Lazarus from the dead, when the chief priests and elders perceived that "the world was gone after him," that they were stricken with dismay and apprehension for their safety, and under this panic resolved upon the perilous measure of his destruction.
The only safe method in which this could be accomplished, was under the sanction of a legal trial and sentence. Jesus, therefore, upon his apprehension, was first brought before the great tribunal of the Sanhedrim, and charged with the crime of blasphemy. What were the specifications under this general charge, or whether any were necessary, we are not informed. But that this was the offence charged, is manifest both from the evidence adduced and from the judgment of conviction. Such was the estimation in which he was held, that it was with great difficulty that witnesses could be found to testify against him; and the two who at last were procured, testified falsely, in applying his words to the temple of Solomon, which he spake of the temple of his body. When, upon the occasion of his scourging the money-changers out of the temple, the Jews demanded by what authority he did this, Jesus replied, alluding to his own person, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." But though the witnesses swore falsely in testifying that he spake of the Jewish temple, yet his words, in either sense, amounted to a claim of the power of working miracles, and so brought him within the law. The high priest, however, still desirous of new evidence, which might justify his condemnation in the eyes of the people, proceeded to interrogate Jesus concerning his character and mission. "I adjure thee, by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the Son of God. Jesus saith unto him, Thou hast said: nevertheless, I say unto you, hereafter ye shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest rent his
1 That the Jews understood Jesus to make himself equal with God, is maintained by Mr. Salvador, himself a Jew, in his Histoire des Institutions de Moire, et du peuple Hebreu, Liv. iv. ch. 3, p. 81., of which chapter a translation is given at the end of this article. Mr. Noah, also a Jew, seems to be of opinion, that Jesus was brought to trial under the law in Deut. xiii. 1. 11. See his Discourse on the Restoration of the Jews, p. 19. But whether he was charged with a blasphemous usurpation of the attributes of Deity, or with sedition, in inciting the people to serve another god, meaning himself, the difference is of no importance; the essence of the offence in both cases being the same.
2 Matth. xxvi. 60-65. This view of the nature of the offence with which Jesus was charged, is confirmed by the learned jurist, Chr. Thomasius, in his Dissertatio de injusto Pilati judicio, § 11, 12, and by the authors whom he there cites. Dissert. Thomasii. vol. 1, p. 5.
3 John ii. 13-22.
clothes, saying He hath spoken blasphemy; what further need have we of witnesses! Behold, now ye have heard his blasphemy. What think ye? They answered and said, He is guilty of death." We may suppose the multitude standing without the hall of judgment, able, through its avenues and windows, to see, but not to hear, all that was transacting within. It became important, therefore, to obtain some reason upon which the high priest might rend his clothes in their sight, thus giving to the people, by this expressive and awful sign, the highest evidence of blasphemy, uttered by Jesus in the presence of that august assembly. This act turned the tide of popular indignation against him, whose name, but a short time before, had been the theme of their loudest hosannas. There was now no need to go into the past transactions of his ministry, for matter of accusation. His friends might claim for him on that score all that the warmest gratitude and love could inspire; and all this could be safely conceded. But here, his accusers might say, was a new and shocking crime, just perpetrated in the presence of the most sacred tribunal; a crime so shocking, and so boldly committed, that the high priest rent his clothes with horror, in the very judgment seat, in the presence of all the members of the Sanhedrim, who, with one accord, upon that evidence alone, immediately convicted the offender and sentenced him to death.
If we regard Jesus simply as a Jewish citizen, and with no higher character, this conviction seems substantially right in point of law, though the trial were not legal in all its forms. For, whether the accusation were founded on the first or second commands in the decalogue, or on the law, laid down in the thirteenth chapter of Deuteronomy, or on that in the eighteenth chapter and twentieth verse, he had violated them all, by assuming to himself powers belonging alone to Jehovah. And even if he were recognized as a prophet of the Lord, he was still obnoxious to punishment, under the decision in the case of Moses and Aaron, before cited. It is not easy to perceive on what ground his conduct could have been defended before any tribunal, unless upon that of his superhuman character. No lawyer, it is conceived, would think of placing his defence upon any other basis.
The great object of exciting the people against Jesus being thus successfully accomplished, the next step was to obtain legal authority to put him to death. For though the Sanhedrim had condemned him, they had not the power to pass a capital sentence; this being a right which had passed from the Jews by the conquest of their country, and now belonged to the Romans alone. They were merely citizens of a Roman province; they were left in the enjoyment of their civil laws, the public exercise of their religion, and many other things relating to their police and municipal regulations; but they had not the power of life and death. This was a principal attribute of sovereignty, which the Romans always took care to reserve to themselves in order to be able to reach those individuals who might become impatient of the yoke, whatever else might be neglected. Apud quos (Romanos), vis imperii valet; inania transmittuntur. The jurisdiction of capital cases belonged or-
¹ Matth. xxvi. 63-66.
² Tacit. Annl. xv. 31. See M. Dupin's Trial of Jesus, p. 57-59, (Amer. Ed.) Chr. Thomasus, Dissertatio de inuisto Pilate publico, § 12, 60. The want of this power was admitted by the Jews, in their reply to Pilate, when he required them to judge Jesus according to their own law, and they replied, "It is not lawful for us to put any man to death." John xxiii. 31.
This point has been held in different ways by learned men. Some are of opinion that the Sanhedrim had power to inflict death for offences touching religion, though not for political offences; and that it was with reference to the charge of treason that they said to Pilate what has just been cited from St. John. They say that, though the Sanhedrim had convicted Jesus of blasphemy, yet they dared not execute that sentence, for fear of a sedition of the people — that they therefore craftily determined to throw on Pilate the odium of his destruction, by accusing him of treason; and hence, after condinarily to the governor general or Præses of a province, the Procurator having for his principal duty only the charge of the revenue and the cognizance of revenue causes. But the right of taking cognizance of capital crimes was, in some cases, given to certain Procurators, who were sent into small provinces, to fill the places of governors, (Vice Præsides,) as clearly appears from the Roman laws. The government of all Syria was at this time under a governor general, or Præses; of which Judea was one of the lesser dependencies, under the charge of Pilate as Vice Præses, with capital jurisdiction.¹
It could not be expected that Pilate would trouble himself with the cognizance of any matter, not pertaining to the Roman law; much less with an alleged offence against the God of the Jews, who was neither acknowledged nor even respected by their conquerors. Of this the chief priests and elders were fully aware; and therefore they prepared a second accusation against Jesus, founded on the Roman law; as likely to succeed with Pilate, as the former had done with the people. They charged him with attempting to restore the kingdom of Israel, under his own dominion as king of the Jews. "We found this fellow, said they, perverting the nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Cesar, saying, That he himself is Christ, a king."²
It was a charge of high treason against the Roman state and emperor; a charge which was clearly within Pilate's cognizance, and which, as they well knew, no officer of Tiberius would venture lightly to regard. Pilate accordingly forthwith arraigned Jesus, and called upon him to answer this accusation. It is worthy of note, that from the moment when he was accused of treason before Pilate, no further allusion was made to the previous charge of blasphemy; the Roman governor being engaged solely with the charge newly preferred before himself. The answer of Jesus to this charge satisfied Pilate that it was groundless, the kingdom which he set up appearing plainly to be not a kingdom of this world, but his spiritual reign in righteousness and holiness and peace, in the hearts of men. Pilate therefore acquitted him of the offence. "He went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, I find in him no fault at all."³ Here was a sentence of acquittal, judicially pronounced, and irreversible, except by a higher power, upon appeal; and it was the duty of Pilate thereupon to have discharged him. But the multitude, headed now by the priests and elders, grew clamorous for his execution; adding, "He stirreth up the people, teaching throughout all Jewry, demning him, they consulted further, as stated in Matth. xxvii. 1, 2. Mark xv. 1, how to effect this design:—that when Pilate found no fault in him, and directed them to take and crucify him, some replied, "we have a law, and by our law he ought to die." (John xix. 7.) to intimate to Pilate that Jesus was guilty of death by the Jewish law also, as well as the Roman, and that therefore he would not lose any popularity by condemning him. See Zorrus. Hist. Fisci Judnici, ch. 2, § 2, (in Ugolin Thesaur, Tom. 26, col. 1001-1003.) The same view is taken by Deylingius, De Judicorum Jure Gladii, § 10, 11, 12, (in Ugolin Thesaur, Tom. 29, col. 1189-1192.) But he concludes that in all capital cases, there was an appeal from the Sanhedrim to the Prietor; and that without the approval of the latter, the sentence of the Sanhedrim could not be executed. Ibid. § 15, col. 1196. Molineus understood the Jewish law in the same manner. See his Harmony of the Gospels, note on John 18, 31. C. Molinei Opera, Tom. 5, pp. 603, 604. But this opinion is refuted by what is said by M. Dupin, Trial, &c. § 8, and by Thomasius, above cited.
¹ See M. Dupin's Trial of Jesus, pp. 55-62. His authorities are Loiseau, Godefroy, and Cujas, the two latter of whom he cites as follows;—"Procurator Cæsaris fungens vice præsidis potest cognoscere de causis criminalibus. Godefroy, in his note (letter S) upon the 3d law of the Code, Ubi causa fiscalis, &c. And he cites several others, which I have verified, and which are most precise to the same effect. See particularly the 4th law of the Code, Ad leg. fab. de plug., and the 2d law of the Code, De pœnis.—Procuratoribus Cæsaris data est jurisdictio in causis fiscalibus pecuniaris, non in criminalibus, nisi quum fungebantur vice præsidum; ut Pontius Pilatus fuit procurator Cæsaris vice præsidis in Syria. Cujas. Observ. xix. 13."
² Luke xxiii. 2.
³ John xviii. 38.
beginning from Galilee to this place."¹ Hearing this reference to Galilee, Pilate seized the opportunity, thus offered, of escaping from the responsibility of a judgment, either of acquittal or of condemnation, by treating the case as out of his jurisdiction, and within that of Herod tetrarch of Galilee, who was then in Jerusalem on a visit. He therefore sent Jesus and his accusers to Herod; before whom the charge was vehemently renewed and urged. But Herod, too, perceived that it was utterly groundless, and accordingly treated it with derision, arraying Jesus in mock habiliments of royalty, and remanding him to Pilate.² The cause was then solemnly reexamined by the Roman governor, and a second judgment of acquittal pronounced. For "Pilate, when he had called together the chief priests and the rulers, and the people, said unto them, Ye have brought this man unto me, as one that perverteth the people; and behold, I having examined him before you, have found no fault in this man, touching those things whereof ye accuse him: No, nor yet Herod: for I sent you to him; and lo, nothing worthy of death is done unto him. I will therefore chastise him and release him."³
It may seem strange to us that after a judgment of acquittal thus solemnly pronounced, any judge, in a civilized country, should venture to reverse it, upon the same evidence, and without the pretence of mistake or error in the proceedings. Probably, in the settled jurisprudence of the city of Rome, it could not have been done. But this was in a remote province of the empire, under the administration not of a jurist, but a soldier; and he, too, irresolute and vascellating; fearful for his office, and even for his life, for he served the "dark and unreleasing Tiberius." As soon as he proposed to release Jesus, "the Jews cried out, saying, If thou let this man go, thou art not Cæsar's friend. Whosoever maketh himself a king, speaketh against Cæsar."⁴ Whereupon "Pilate gave sentence that it should be as they required."⁵ That Jesus was executed under the pretence of treason, and that alone, is manifest from the tenor of the writing placed over his head, stating that he was king of the Jews; such being the invariable custom among the Romans, in order that the public might know for what crime the party had been condemned.⁶ The remaining act in this tragedy is sufficiently known.
In the preceding remarks, the case has been considered only upon its general merits, and with no reference to the manner in which the proceedings were conducted. But M. Dupin, in his tract on the Trial of Jesus before the Sanhedrim, in reply to Mr. Salvador's account of it, has satisfactorily shown that throughout the whole course of that trial the rules of the Jewish law of procedure were grossly violated, and that the accused was deprived of rights, belonging even to the meanest citizen. He was arrested in the night, bound as a malefactor, beaten before his arraignment, and struck in open court during the trial; he was tried on a feast day, and before sunrise; he was compelled to criminate himself, and this, under an oath or solemn judicial adjuration; and he was sentenced on the same day of the conviction. In all these particulars the law was wholly disregarded.⁷
¹ Luke xxiii. 5.
² Luke xxiii. 10, 11.
³ Luke xxiii. 13, 14, 15. I regard this judgment as conclusive evidence of the innocence of the accused. Pilate's strenuous endeavors to release him instead of Barabbas, and his solemn washing his own hands of the guilt of his blood, though they show the strength of his own convictions, yet add no legal force to the judgment itself.
⁴ John xix. 12.
⁵ Luke xxiii. 24.
⁶ See M. Dupin's Trial of Jesus, pp. 82-84.
⁷ See M. Dupin's Trial of Jesus, pp. 7-15. John's Bibl. Ant. § 246.
NO. V.
Mr. Joseph Salvador, a physician and a learned Jew, a few years ago published at Paris, a work, entitled, "Histoire des Institutions de Moïse et du Peuple Hebreu," in which, among other things, he gives an account of their course of criminal procedure, in a chapter on "The Administration of Justice;" which he illustrates, in a succeeding chapter, by an account of the trial of Jesus. As this is the recent work of a man of learning, himself a Jew, it may be regarded as an authentic statement of what is understood and held by the most intelligent and best informed Jews, respecting the claims of our Lord, the tenor of his doctrines, the nature of the charge laid against him before the Sanhedrim, and the grounds on which they condemned him. The following translation of the last-mentioned chapter will therefore not be unacceptable to the reader. It will be found in Book IV. chapter iii., entitled, "The Trial and Condemnation of Jesus." The reader will bear in his mind, that it is the language of an enemy of our Saviour, and in justification of his murderers.
"According to this exposition of judicial proceedings," says the Jew, "I shall follow out the application of them in the most memorable trial in history, that of Jesus Christ. I have already explained the motives which have directed me, and the point of view in which I have considered the subject; I have already shown, that among the Jews no title was a shelter against a prosecution and sentence. Whether the law or its forms were good or bad, is not the object of my present investigation; neither is it to ascertain whether we ought to pity the blindness of the Hebrews in not discovering a Deity in Jesus, or to be astonished that a God personified could not make himself comprehended when he desired it. But since they regarded him only as a citizen, did they not try him according to their law and its existing forms? This is my question, which can admit of no equivocation. I shall draw all my facts from the Evangelists themselves, without inquiring whether all this history was developed after the event, to serve as a form to a new doctrine, or to an old one which had received a fresh impulse.
Jesus was born of a family of small fortune; Joseph, his supposed father, perceived that his wife was big before they had come together. If he had brought her to trial, in the ordinary course of things, Mary, according to the 23d verse of the 22d chapter of Deuteronomy, would have been condemned, and Jesus, having been declared illegitimate, could never, according to the 2d verse of the 23d chapter, have been admitted to a seat in the Sanhedrim.¹ But Joseph who, to save his wife from disgrace, had taken the resolution of sending her away privately, soon had a dream which consoled him.²
After having been circumcised, Jesus grew like other men, attended the solemn feasts, and early displayed surprising wisdom and sagacity. In the assembly on the Sabbath, the Jews, eager for the disputes to which the interpretation of the law gave rise, loved to hear him. But he soon devoted himself to more important labors; he pronounced censures against whole towns, Capernaum, Chorazin and Bethsaida.³ Recalling the times of Isaiah and Jeremiah, he thundered against the chiefs of the people with a vehemence which would in our day be terrific.⁴ The people then regarded him as a prophet;⁵ they heard him preach in towns and country without opposition; they saw him surrounded with disciples according to the custom of the learned men of the age; whatever may have been the resentment of the chief men, they were silent as long as he confined himself to the law.
¹ Deut. xxii. 22, and xxiii. 2. Selden, De Synedriis, lib. 3, cap. 4, 5.
² Matth. i. 19, 20.
⁴ Matth. xxiii. per tot.
⁵ Matth. xi. 20-24. Luke iv. &c.
⁶ Matth. xxi. 11, 46. John vii. 40.
But Jesus, in presenting new theories, and in giving new forms to those already promulgated, speaks of himself as God; his disciples repeat it; and the subsequent events prove in the most satisfactory manner, that they thus understood him.¹ This was shocking blasphemy in the eyes of the citizens: the law commands them to follow Jehovah alone, the only true God; not to believe in gods of flesh and bone, resembling men or women; neither to spare nor listen to a prophet who, even doing miracles, should proclaim a new god, a god whom neither they nor their fathers had known.²
Jesus having said to them one day: "I have come down from heaven to do these things," the Jews, who till then had listened to him, murmured and cried: "Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph and of Mary? we know his father, his mother, and his brethren; why then does he say that he has come down from heaven?"³ On another day, the Jews, irritated from the same cause, took stones and threatened him. Jesus said unto them, "I have done good works in your eyes by the power of my Father, for which of these works would you stone me? It is for no good work," replied the Jews, who stated the whole process in few words, "but because of thy blasphemy; for being a man,⁴ thou makest thyself God."⁵
His language was not always clear. Often his disciples themselves did not comprehend him. Among his maxims, some of which showed the greatest mildness, there were some which the Hebrews, who were touched only through their natural sense, thought criminal. "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth; I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me."⁶ Finally, if he wrought miracles before certain of the people, his replies to the questions of the doctors were generally evasive.⁷
In regard to political relations, he caused dissensions.⁸ A great number of disorderly persons whom he had the design of reclaiming, but who inspired dread in the national council, attached themselves to him;⁹ his discourse flattered them inasmuch as he pronounced anathemas against riches. "Know," said he, "that it is easier for a camel to go through the eve of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven."¹⁰ In this state of affairs, the council deliberates; some are of opinion that he should be regarded as a madman,¹¹ others say that he seeks to seduce the people.¹² Caiaphas, the high priest, whose dignity compels him to defend the letter of the law, observes that these dissensions would furnish an excuse to the Romans for overwhelming Judea, and that the interests of the whole nation must
¹ The expression son of God was in common use among the Jews, to designate a man of remarkable wisdom and piety. It was not in this sense that Jesus Christ used it; for in that case it would have occasioned no great sensation. Besides, if we should assume, in order to make it a subject of accusation against these Jews, that Jesus did not expressly declare himself to be God, we should be exposed to this rejoinder: why then do you believe in him?
² See Deut. iv. 15, and xiii. per tot.
³ John vi. 39-42. Matth. xiii. 55.
⁴ This fact is as clearly established as possible; and we must observe that till then there had been neither opposition nor enmity in the minds of this people, since they had listened to him with the greatest attention, and did not hesitate to acknowledge in him all that the public law permitted them to do, viz. a prophet, a highly inspired man.
⁵ John x. 30-33.
⁶ Matth. x. 34. Mark x. 29.
⁷ Matth. xvi. 1-4. John viii. 13-19.
⁸ John vii. 43. Luke xxiii. 6.
⁹ Matth. ix. 10. Mark ii. 15. Luke xv. 1.
¹⁰ Matth. xix. 24. ¹¹ John x. 20.
¹² John vii 12.
outweigh those of a single individual; he constitutes himself the accuser of Jesus.¹
The order is given to seize him. But let us pause here upon a fact of the highest importance. The senate did not begin by actually seizing Jesus, as is now the practice; they begin by giving, after some debate, an order that he should be seized.² This decree is made public; it is known to all, especially to Jesus. No opposition is offered to his passing the frontier: his liberty depends entirely upon himself. This is not all; the order for his arrest was preceded by a decree of admonition. One day, Jesus having entered the temple, took upon himself authority contrary to the common law; then he preached to the people, and said: "That those who should believe in him should be able to do all things, so that if they should say to a mountain, remove thyself and cast thyself into the sea, it would obey." Then the chief priest and senators went to find him, and said to him, "By what authority doest thou these things¹ who gave thee this power?"³
Meanwhile a traitor discloses the place whither the accused had retired; the guards, authorized by the high priest and by the elders,⁴ hasten to seize him. One of his disciples, breaking into open rebellion, with a stroke of his sword cuts off the ear of one of them, and brings upon himself the reproof of his master.⁵ As soon as Jesus is arrested, the zeal of the apostles is extinguished; all forsake him.⁶ He is brought before the grand council, where the priests sustain the accusation. The witnesses testify, and they are numerous; for the deeds of which he is accused were done in the presence of all the people. The two witnesses whom St. Matthew and St. Mark accuse of perjury, relate a discourse which St. John declares to be true, with regard to the power which Jesus arrogates to himself.⁷ Finally, the high priest addresses the accused, and says: "Is it true that thou art Christ, that thou art the Son of God?" "I am he," replies Jesus; "you shall see me hereafter at the right hand of the majesty of God, who shall come upon the clouds of heaven." At these words, Caiaphas rent his garments in token of horror.⁸ "You have heard him." They deliberate. The question already raised among the people was this: has Jesus become God? But the senate having adjudged that Jesus, son of Joseph, born at Bethlehem, had profaned the name of God by usurping it to himself, a mere citizen, applied to him the law of blasphemy, and the law in the 13th chapter of Deuteronomy, and the 20th verse in chapter 18, according to which every prophet, even he who works miracles, must be punished, when he speaks of a god unknown to the Jews and their fathers:⁹ the capital sentence was pronounced. As to
¹ John xi. 47-50.
² Matth. xxvi. 1. John xi. 53, 54.
³ Matth. xxi. 23.
⁴ It will be recollected, that the senate held its sessions in one of the porticos of the temple. At this time the high priest presided over the senate, so that the guards of the high priest, of the elders and the temple, were no other than the legal militia.
⁵ John xviii. 10, 11. ⁶ Mark xiv. 50. Matth. xxvi. 56.
⁷ Matth. xxvi. 60, 61. And the last came two false witnesses, and said, this fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days. Mark xiv. 57, 58. And there arose certain and bare false witness against him, saying, We heard him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands. John ii. 19, 21, 22. Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. But he spake of the temple of his body. When, therefore, he was risen from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this unto them; and they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.
⁸ I repeat that the expression son of God, includes here the idea of God himself; the fact is already established, and all the subsequent events confirm it. Observe, also, that I quote the narrative of only one of the parties to this great proceeding.
⁹ Deut. xxviii. 20. But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.
the ill-treatment which followed the sentence, it was contrary to the spirit of the Jewish law; and it is not in the course of nature, that a senate composed of the most respectable men of a nation, who, however they might have been deceived, yet intended to act legally, should have permitted such outrages against him whose life was at their disposal. The writers who have transmitted to us these details, not having taken a part in the prosecution, have been disposed to exaggerate the picture, either on account of their prejudices, or to throw greater obloquy on the judges.
One thing is certain, that the council met again on the morning of the next day or of the day following that, as the law requires, to confirm or to annul the sentence: it was confirmed. Jesus was brought before Pilate, the procurator that the Romans had placed over the Jews. They had retained the power of trying according to their own laws, but the executive power was in the hands of the procurator alone: no criminal could be executed without his consent: this was in order that the Senate should not have the means of reaching men who were sold to foreigners. Pilate, the Roman, signed the decree. His soldiers, an impure mixture of diverse nations, were charged with the punishment. These are they who brought Jesus to the judgment hall, who stripped him before the whole cohort, who placed upon his head a crown of thorns, and a reed in his hand, who showed all the barbarity to which the populace in all ages is disposed; who finally caused him to undergo a punishment common at Rome, and which was not in use among the Jews. But before the execution, the governor had granted to the condemned an appeal to the people, who, respecting the judgment of their own council, would not permit this favor, couching their refusal in these terms: "We have a law; and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God." Then Pilate left them the choice of saving Jesus, or a man accused of murder in a sedition; the people declared for the latter; saying that the other would scatter the seeds of discord in the bosom of the nation, at a time when union was most necessary.
Jesus was put to death. The priests and elders went to the place of punishment; and as the sentence was founded upon this fact, that he had unlawfully arrogated to himself the title of Son of God, God himself, they appealed to him thus: "Thou wouldst save others; thyself thou caust not save. If thou art indeed the king of Israel, come down into the midst of us, and we will believe in thee; since thou hast said, I am the Son of God, let that God who loves thee come now to thine aid." According to the Evangelist, these words were a mockery; but the character of the persons who pronounced them, their dignity, their age, the order which they had observed in the trial, prove their good faith. Would not a miracle at this time have been decisive?
¹ Matt. xxvi. 1. Mark xv. 1.
² The duties of Pilate were to inform himself whether the sentences given did or did not affect the interests of Rome; there his part ended. Thus it is not astonishing that this procurator doubtless little acquainted with the Jewish laws, signed the decree for the arrest of Jesus, although he did not find him guilty. We shall see hereafter that there were then many parties among the Jews among whom were the Herodians or serviles, partisans of the house of Herod, and devoted to the foreign interests. These are they who speak continually of Caesar, of rendering to Caesar the tribute due to Caesar; they also insist that Jesus called himself King of the Jews; but this charge was reckoned as nothing before the senate, and was not of a nature alone to merit capital punishment.
³ See Matth. xxvii. 27. Mark xv. 16. John xix. 2. ⁴ John xix. 7.
⁵ The sending back of Jesus to Herod, which, according to the Gospel of St. Luke, Pilate would have done, is not stated by the other Evangelists, and does not at all change the judicial question. Herod Antiques, tetrarch of Galilee, and of Perea, had no authority in Jerusalem. Upon his visit to this city, Pilate, according to St. Luke, would, out of respect, have caused Jesus to appear before this ally of the Romans, because Jesus was surnamed the Galilean, though originally from Judea. But to whatever tribe he belonged, the nature of the accusation would still have required, according to the Hebrew law, that he should be judged by the senate of Jerusalem.
⁶ Matth. xvii. 42, 43.
NO. VI. See § 159 to § 171.
The accounts of the Resurrection and of the subsequent appearances of our Lord, have been harmonized in various methods; of which the latest, and probably the best, is that of Professor Robinson, in an Article published in the Bibliotheca Sacra for February, 1845, vol. ii. pp. 162-189. As the best service the present writer could do to the English reader, he has therefore here abridged that Article, by omitting the introduction, and such parts as relate to the Greek text, and a few other passages, which it seemed might be spared without injury to the narrative itself.
§ 1. The Time of the Resurrection.
Matt. 26: 1, 2. Mark 16: 1, 2, 9. Luke 24: 1. John 20: 1.
That the resurrection of our Lord took place before full daylight, on the first day of the week, follows from the unanimous testimony of the Evangelists respecting the visit of the women to the sepulchre. But the exact time at which he rose is nowhere specified. According to the Jewish mode of reckoning, the Sabbath ended and the next day began at sunset; so that had the resurrection occurred even before midnight, it would still have been upon the first day of the week, and the third day after our Lord's burial. The earthquake had taken place and the stone had been rolled away before the arrival of the women; and so far as the immediate narrative is concerned, there is nothing to show that all this might not have happened some hours earlier. Yet the words of Mark in another place render it certain, that there could have been no great interval between these events and the arrival of the women; since he affirms in v. 9, that Jesus "had risen early, the first day of the week;" while in v. 2, he states that the women went out "very early." A like inference may be drawn from the fact, that the affrighted guards first went to inform the chief priests of these events, when the women returned to the city (Matt. 28: 11); for it is hardly to be supposed, that after having been thus terrified by the earthquake and the appearance of an angel, they would have waited any very long time before sending information to their employers. — The body of Jesus had therefore probably lain in the tomb not less than about thirty-six hours.