John 18

CHAPTER XVIII

II

The Attestation in the Passion and the Resurrection, Chapters 18–20

Since he was an eyewitness, John selects his material in an entirely free manner in accord with his particular plan and purpose in writing this Gospel. He thus omits a record of the agony in Gethsemane and the traitorous kiss of Judas. He is not writing a complete narrative but presenting those events and those features in these events, which, while they draw a clear and full picture, do so by revealing how here, too, Jesus is attested as the Christ of God.

1. The Arrest, 18:1–11

John 18:1

1 Having said these things, Jesus went out with his disciples beyond the winter-brook Kedron, where was a garden into which he went, he and his disciples. After the discourses and the prayer Jesus left the city with his disciples. The fact that Jesus did not leave the upper room until this time appears from our interpretation of 14:31, which see. Ἐξῆλθε means that he left the city, because it is followed by the phrase “beyond the winter-brook Kedron,” which lies in the declivity between the walled city and the Mount of Olives toward the east. John alone mentions this crossing of the Kedron. He describes this correctly as a winter-brook which was dry except for a little water in the winter season when the abundant rains furnished a supply. On the form of the word see R. 275.

Zahn, Evangelium des Johannes, 615, etc., shows that we should read neither τῶνΚέδρων nor τοῦΚέδρου, but τοῦΚεδρών (used as an indeclinable word). “Kedron,” instead of the masoretic “Kidron,” is not derived from ἡκέδρος, the word for “cedar,” but signifies a black, turbid brook. Even when it flowed with water it was easily forded almost anywhere. “Beyond the Kedron” is a brief way of saying, “to a place beyond the Kedron,” to which is then added, “where was a garden.” This is Gethsemane. Instead of giving us the name, which we already know from the synoptists, John tells us that it was “a garden,” which is new information. Gethsemane means “oilpress.” This, then, was a “garden” in the sense of a grove of olive trees which had the equipment for making olive oil, was fenced with a stone wall, stone being plentiful. Here Jesus entered, and with a touch of pathos John adds, “he and his disciples.”

John 18:2

2 Now Judas, too, who was betraying him, knew the place because Jesus frequently was gathered there with his disciples. Only on the first night after Palm Sunday did Jesus return to Bethany (Matt. 21:17), the following nights he spent in Gethsemane, sleeping in the open in this retired and sheltered place (Luke 21:37; 22:39, 40). Judas had spent these nights there with Jesus and thus knew the place. His plan to capture Jesus was based on this knowledge. The second past perfect ᾔδει is always used as an imperfect; and the present participle ὁπαραδιδούς graphically describes the traitor as now being engaged in his nefarious work. It goes without saying that Jesus used this garden with the friendly permission of its owner, just as he had the use of the upper room in the city for the Passover and the use of the ass for his triumphal entry on Palm Sunday.

Purposely, it seems, Jesus had spent the past three nights in Gethsemane; he may have used its shelter also during previous visits to the city. Judas was to know where Jesus could be found when the hour had come. We also see how easily Jesus could have frustrated the plans of Judas; all he needed to do was to avoid Gethsemane and to go to some new place for the night. By again going to Gethsemane, Jesus, who knew the plans of Judas, deliberately placed himself into the hands of his enemies—the hour for this had now come.

John 18:3

3 John at once proceeds with the account of the arrest. Judas, therefore, having received the cohort and underlings from the high priests and the Pharisees, comes there with torches and lanterns and weapons. The entire action is represented as that of Judas; he received, he comes with lanterns, etc., John alone reports the composition of the force sent out with Judas. In τὴνσπεῖραν the article is significant, pointing to the cohort of Roman soldiers which garrisoned the castle Antonia near the Temple, a force of 600 men in all. We need not assume the presence of the entire cohort with Judas, since the castle would be all but abandoned. Judas had only a strong detachment under the command of their chief officer, the chiliarch himself (v. 12).

Some assume that Roman soldiers were ordered out by Pilate himself, but no intimation to this effect appears anywhere in the account. It is enough to assume that the representatives of the Sanhedrin importuned the chiliarch who then acted on his own responsibility. After the demonstration of the pilgrim crowds on Palm Sunday it was easy to persuade this officer to act, for the proposed arrest might easily result in a great demonstration by the crowds that filled the city for the Passover feast. He took with him a force sufficient for all eventualities.

In addition to the soldiers there were the ὑπηρέται of the Sanhedrin, a force of Temple police, also large in number. They would be under the command of the Temple στρατηγός or chief officer. With these were some of the δοῦλοι or servants of the chief priests (v. 10 and 26), and a crowd of voluntary followers who followed to witness the excitement. The synoptists mention only “a multitude” and “a great multitude”; it is John who tells us more. By the “high priests and the Pharisees,” here combined under one preposition, we must understand the Sanhedrin as such; its full authority went with these its “underlings.” The size of this armed force, sent out to arrest Jesus, has caused skeptical readers to question the reliability of the evangelists but certainly without just grounds. The Sanhedrin had to reckon with all eventualities.

Their own police force had failed them on a previous occasion (7:45, etc.) and might do so again even if Jesus were found. Besides, anything might happen if the effort to effect the arrest of Jesus should become known in the city. Hence the Roman legionaries were deemed necessary, a force sufficient to cope with any mob. We may, indeed, wonder that so large a force was sent out to bring in one lone man who had with him only eleven unarmed friends, but we must not forget the thousands of pilgrim visitors filling the city at this time. The Sanhedrin was reckoning with these.

John has the dramatic present tense: Judas “comes there.” This fits well with the following aorists, yet it lifts into prominence the arrival of Judas. At this moment 14:30 was fulfilled, “The ruler of this world comes, and has nothing in me.” Judas comes there “with torches and lanterns and weapons.” Of course, these are in the hands of the men with him, but John writes as though they were in the hands of Judas, as in a sense only too true they were. That is how “one of the Twelve” now comes to his heavenly Master! The “weapons” of John are “the swords and clubs” of the synoptists. When they write “swords” they intimate the presence of the soldiers without otherwise indicating their presence. Only the Temple police carried the clubs, their usual weapons.

John alone mentions the torches and the lanterns; φανός is a torch, and λαμπάς a lantern, frequently mentioned as being fed with oil. It was the time of the full moon, and the night was chilly (v. 18), hence cloudless. Why then these torches, etc.? Evidently these captors expected Jesus to hide at their coming; also, being one of a number of men, they wanted lights to make sure of his identity.

John 18:4

4 Jesus was made known to his captors in two ways: by the kissing of Judas and by his own repeated declaration, “I am he.” Which came first? Opinions are divided. John helps us a little. He makes no reference to the kiss but he does say in v. 5 that, when Jesus made himself known by his own declaration, Judas was standing μετʼ αὑτῶν, in the company of the captors. The kiss must have come first. When Judas stepped back after giving it he was in the company of the armed crowd; and this means that he did not step forward into the company of the eleven who were ranged behind Jesus.

Thus, where he stood was highly significant. It is too difficult to assume that Jesus so positively identifies himself to his captors and that he then allowed Judas to confirm this identification by the sign he had prearranged, the traitorous kiss. Leading the crowd, Judas quickly stepped forward the moment Jesus came through the entrance of the garden and, when he had given the promised sign to his followers and had stepped back for them to close in around Jesus, there took place what John alone describes in v. 4–9. Jesus, therefore, knowing all things coming upon him, went out and says to them, Whom are you seeking? With οὗν John connects the coming forth of Jesus with the arrival of Judas and his large force. Moreover, John wants us to know that Jesus acted in full consciousness of all that now awaited him.

In 13:27 he told Judas to do quickly what he was about to do, speaking of it as though he knew all about it. So here the entire way to the cross lies plainly before the eyes of Jesus, and of his own will he enters upon this way. Knowing “all things” means just what it says. Why try to discount πάντα by inserting “except the details”? Is it more difficult for him into whose hand God had given “all things” (13:3) to know the little things that awaited him than the greater ones?

Jesus “went out,” compared with v. 1 “went into,” means that he came out through the gateway of the garden, his disciples closely behind him; and not that he came out of the house, that some imagine to have been in the garden (no evangelist says anything regarding a house), nor that he came out of the inner part of the garden, nor that he came out of the circle of the eleven. In front of the entrance Judas embraced and kissed Jesus fervently and repeatedly (this is the sense of κατεφίλησεναὑτόν, Matt. 26:49; Mark 14:45, abkuessen), and then Jesus at once faced the crowd of captors and demanded, “Whom are you seeking?” Judas was allowed to carry out his prearranged plan regarding the kiss, but immediately Jesus takes the situation out of Judas’ hands into his own. Not by a secretly arranged sign is Jesus to be identified to his captors but by an open declaration of his own. All the impressiveness and the authority of the personality of Jesus confront the armed multitude that is crowded behind Judas. With the voice that had constrained the devil himself (Matt. 4:10), the demons of the possessed, and even death to obey, Jesus demanded, “Whom are you seeking?”

John 18:5

5 They answered him, Jesus, the Nazarene. Jesus says to them, I am he. The answer came from the chiliarch who spoke for all, certainly not in a chorus from the whole force. This answer sounds like the repetition of the exact instructions he had received from the Sanhedrin. We assume that the Roman soldiers had marched in front and now stood with the underlings of the Sanhedrin behind them. Authoritatively challenged, their commander makes reply for all present.

Judas had already indicated the person of Jesus as the one to be arrested, and some ask why the answer to Jesus’ question was not, “We are seeking thee!” We cannot reply by pointing to the uncertain moonlight and to the shadow of trees. Jesus stood forth in the view of all, for he had come to deliver himself into their hands. The torches and the lanterns illumined his figure and his face clearly. His voice and his bearing plainly indicated who he was. The act of Judas was performed in view of all. The chiliarch knew that the man demanding answer was most certainly Jesus.

Yet his reply is objective, “Jesus, the Nazarene.” Two things help to explain the form: the unexpected challenge in the question of Jesus and the ringing note of authority demanding an answer. “The Nazarene” is added in order to specify, for the name “Jesus” or Joshua was borne also by other persons. These men are seeking the Jesus who hails from Nazareth of Galilee; compare Pilate’s superscription on the cross (19:19).

In the briefest and the most direct manner Jesus identifies himself, “I am he,” i.e., Jesus, the Nazarene, the man you seek. With this identification of himself Jesus brushes aside the secret and cunning identification Judas had made; it is wholly superfluous and unnecessary. Its implication that except for the cunning of Judas Jesus might yet hide and allow one of his disciples to be captured in his place, is revealed in all its baseness. By instantaneously replying, Ἐγώεἰμι, Jesus himself by his own volition and act delivers himself into the hands of his captors. The word implies, “I am the man—take me!” In v. 8 we see that it implies even more. Here is fulfilled 10:17, 18: Jesus himself lays down his life, and no man takes it from him. The glory of his sacrifice is the fact that it is absolutely voluntary.

With δέ John adds a parenthetical remark: Now Judas also, who was betraying him, was standing with them. Compare the remarks on v. 4. John says so much regarding Judas because all his readers will think of what the synoptists report about the traitor’s kiss on which John, however, does not intend to dwell. He is reporting certain important features of the arrest which the synoptists omitted. Yes, here was Judas, standing with the captors of Jesus, his traitorous kissing done. This is why John inserts the statement here.

It is difficult to assume that John intends to say that Judas now delivered the kiss; ἰστήκει, the past perfect, always used in the sense of the imperfect, means that Judas continued to stand in the company of the men he had led hither. Between v. 5 and 6 no interval can be assumed; for the moment Jesus pronounced the words, “I am he,” the crowd before him stumbled back and fell to the ground, and Judas, who was standing with them, must be included. That, too, is why John inserts this parenthetical remark at this place.

To be sure, it has a tragic tone: Judas standing with them. But this is only an incidental feature and not the chief reason for John’s remark. Unlikely is the supposition that John intimates that Judas still had a spark of good in him. No; Satan ruled him completely, Judas stood with those among whom he belonged. That he did this in a bold and brazen way needs no saying although some have thought this to be the object of John’s brief statement. Judas is even pictured as leaning against the garden wall or against a tree, one leg leisurely across the other, as much as to say, my part is done, and the rest is the part of the others.

But why overdraw the picture? The brazenness of Judas is also only incidental. John brings in the traitor here because he wants his readers to remember what the other evangelists have reported with all sufficiency regarding the traitor’s kiss, to which John desires to add nothing more.

John 18:6

6 When, therefore, he said to them, I am he, they went backward and fell to the ground. The fact that the remark about Judas is only parenthetical is shown by the way in which John connects the reply of Jesus with its astonishing effect. He even repeats the reply, “I am he.” This it was that caused the multitude to go backward and then to fall to the ground. Both verbs have their subjects only in their endings: ἀπῆλθον and ἔπεσον, “they went back, and they fell down,” two aorists to denote the two facts. The preposition in the first verb (ἀπό) indicates that they shrank and retreated from Jesus who was facing them. This cannot mean that only some of the men stumbled backward and fell.

We might imagine it so, but John, who with his own eyes saw what happened, does not say this. He could easily have inserted “some” or another limiting subject; but he writes no subject at all, the verb endings are sufficient. He, indeed, might have added “all,” either with or without emphasis; but by leaving out an expressed subject, the verbs carry the emphasis: “they went backward, and they fell to the ground.”

All the ancients regard this as a miraculous effect, and to this day many follow them. But others seek to explain what happened as a natural and a psychological effect. They call to mind the miracles of Jesus, the belief of so many Jews in the divinity of Jesus, his grand entry into Jerusalem, and his second cleansing of the Temple. They adduce a few similar instances from ancient history. Then they imagine that only a few men in the front ranks actually fell down. But when all is said that can be said about the unexpectedness of Jesus’ demand and answer and about the sudden panic this inspired, it fails to convince, granting even that only some fell prostrate.

Men might pause and hesitate in such a situation; a few might take a step or two backward, but that would be all. If in stepping backward any should stumble they would be held up by coming against those standing behind them. Here, however, several hundred men fell down as though struck by the word, “I am he.” They were given no time to think—they went backward, they went down completely. Moreover, we are bound to place the Roman cohort, which marched and which stood in military rank and file, at the head of the entire force, directly facing Jesus; for in v. 3 the cohort is named first, and it is hard to imagine the chiliarch with his military detachment in full armor bringing up the rear behind the non-military underlings (ὑπηρέται) who were equipped only with clubs. Army men would today demand the front place. Something more happened than a psychological and a natural effect.

Trained soldiers of the Roman type, standing in formation, do not go down so easily, including even their chief commander. Luther is right: “John did not want this to be left unsaid in order that by means of the actual act he might indicate with certainty who this person is: so that no one is to think that this is only a common man but a person who with seven letters: Ἐγώεἰμι, hurls them all back upon the ground, both the cohort and the servants of the high priest, including also Judas, the traitor. This was a peculiar and divine power which Jesus intended to display, not only in order to frighten the Jews, but also to strengthen the disciples. For from this they could conclude, if the Lord did not voluntarily intend to give himself into death, he would have been well able to protect himself and to hinder his enemies, not needing other people’s help though the disciples dared to offer it. Very properly they should have thought: lo, if this man can do this with a single word, which is not even a curse but a friendly answer, it surely must signify something especial that he so willingly yields himself and allows himself to be captured. He could defend himself, yet he does not do so but he suffers.

Therefore, the divine power which he so often and now in the garden displays in one word, this power will not be able to allow itself much longer still to be restrained, his foes must go down, but he will rule. This the disciples especially were to conclude from this miraculous act.”

John 18:7

7 Jesus pauses and allows the men to rise to their feet. Once more, therefore, he requested of them, Whom are you seeking? And they said, Jesus, the Nazarene. This time John uses the dignified verb ἐπερωτάω. His captors had lost their dignity by tumbling over each other, not so Jesus. With the same authority he repeats his question.

Nothing is left for them but also to repeat their answer. Luther is one of the very few who pause at this answer: “Here we may learn what an abominable thing an obdurate heart is, in order that we may learn to abide in the fear of God. They feel themselves falling to the ground but they do not recede in their hearts from the intention and evil purpose, thinking that their falling backward must be due to some witchcraft. These are hearts of utter steel and adamant. And the rogue Judas, the evangelist tells us, also stood with them, is so obdurate and hard and falls to the ground with the rest; yet he is not moved that he should think: Man, quit defying him who hurls us all back with one word. Even if heaven and earth were created anew before the eyes of such people, and the greatest miracles were wrought that could possibly be wrought, it would avail nothing.”

John 18:8

8 Jesus answered, I said to you that I am he; if, therefore, you are seeking me, let these be going their way; in order that the word might be fulfilled which he spoke, Those whom thou hast given me, not one of them did I lose. Twice Jesus made his captors repeat the instructions that they were to take him. The repetition brings out the point that they had no instructions to take any man besides him. With the same impressive authority Jesus now orders that they abide by their instructions and keep their hands off his disciples. The scene is remarkable indeed! Jesus faces these armed men, a host of them, with their proud commanders, and he issues his orders to them, “Let these be going their way!” And Jesus is obeyed.

We have no reason to assume that any move had as yet been made to take either Jesus or any of his disciples. Luther writes: “Christ can strike down his enemies and defend his disciples with one word and did this when he was weak and willed to suffer; what may and can he do now that he is exalted to the right hand of God? And what will he do at the last day?” We may say that the Sanhedrin had entirely disregarded the disciples. With Jesus out of the way, what could the disciples do? Moreover, it might prove inconvenient to have also the disciples brought in. It was easier to make away with only one man.

Yet the zealous agents of the Sanhedrin might easily have gone beyond their instructions and, while they were at it and had the opportunity, might have arrested also the disciples. Nor would the authorities have chided their agents for showing such zeal. It is Jesus who settles the matter that they must capture him alone. Even when sacrificing himself the Good Shepherd spreads his protection over the sheep. The disciples are left alone.

John 18:9

9 Jesus uttered this command to his captors in order that the word which he spoke in his high-priestly prayer, 17:12, might be fulfilled, namely, that in this extremely critical moment he so guarded his disciples that he lost none of them. We cannot agree that John intends to say only that he (John) noted this fulfillment, at least noted it later on and so placed it into the record. While v. 9 is a statement added by John to draw our attention to the fulfillment, this ἵνα clause expresses the intention which Jesus had when he gave this order to his captors. It was Jesus who saw the danger of his disciples, it was he who had in mind the word he had spoken in his prayer, it was he who now acted so that this word should be fulfilled, it was he who protected his disciples accordingly. To deny this intent on the part of Jesus would compel us to assume that his word spoken in 17:12 was inadvertently fulfilled merely in an accidental way. For us this alternative is impossible.

In 17:12, however, Jesus speaks of his success in keeping the souls of his disciples so that none was lost by falling into unbelief and thus perishing forever as Judas did. Here the success of Jesus consists in keeping his disciples out of the clutches of the men who were arresting Jesus. This seems like a discrepancy to some who, therefore, are inclined to regard v. 9 as an interpolation. Luther has long ago cleared up this verse: “The evangelist here indicates that in this word Christ spoke of becoming lost in a temporal sense, while in 17:12 the text is clear that the Lord speaks of becoming lost in an eternal sense. This, however, is really not a contradiction; for if the disciples had been arrested on this occasion, they would also have been lost in body and soul eternally.” What Luther means is that by their arrest the disciples would have been plunged into a spiritual test that was at this time altogether beyond their strength. We see this in the case of Peter who disregarded the warnings of Jesus (13:36–38) and ignored the protection Jesus spread over his disciples here at the time of his arrest.

How quickly he succumbed, how miserably he denied Jesus! But in the end Jesus saved even him.

John 18:10

10 How Peter nearly brought on the very calamity Jesus was warding off is now added to the record; but the main point of this addition is the word addressed to Peter which, like the entire paragraph, attests that Jesus entered his passion voluntarily to carry out his Father’s will. Simon Peter, therefore, having a short sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant and cut off his right ear. Now the servant’s name was Malchus. Luke 22:38 tells us that there were two swords in the hands of the disciples; μάχαιρα, a Roman short sword. Those who know Peter will not be surprised to find that he carried one of them. The Lord’s word to the captors declared his readiness to submit to arrest but forbade the arrest of the disciples.

At this point a move must have been made to act on the word of Jesus, namely to lay hands on Jesus in order to bind him. From Matthew’s and from Mark’s accounts we need not conclude that the arrest had already been effected before Peter acted. Luke 22:49 tells us that the disciples, seeing what was coming, asked Jesus whether to smite with the sword. But Peter asks no question, awaits no answer. He draws his sword and delivers a blow which severs the ear of the high priest’s servant. All was done in an instant.

It is easy to imagine what a calamity this blow might have precipitated. Instantly Jesus interferes and wards off the effect of Peter’s rashness.

We must reckon with the excitement of the moment. Then the tumbling over of the entire armed force at the one word of Jesus may have made the disciples and Peter feel that, though armed with only two swords, they might rout this entire opposing force. Another such word of Jesus and the disciples would be victors. And had not Peter protested that he was ready to lay down his life for Jesus? and had not the others, stimulated by Peter, done the same? So Peter now redeems his word. Jesus is to see that he meant it.

Some refer to the love of the disciples for Jesus, and who would leave this out? But what a poor show of love was this readiness for violence? Had the last discourses of Jesus been spoken in vain? Had none heard Jesus say that he intended to lay down his life and by death go to his Father? And right here at the garden had they not heard Jesus offer himself to his captors, commanding them to let his disciples go their way? Was this not a command also to the disciples, namely that they should go their way while Jesus submitted to arrest?

Peter acts as though Jesus really meant none of the things he had said. His love does not listen and obey; it assumes to dictate its own course.

It is John who names Simon Peter as the disciple who cut off the servant’s ear; the other evangelists withhold the name. The conjecture may be correct that the earlier evangelists, who wrote while Peter was yet alive and the Sanhedrin was still in power, did not deem it safe to mention his name, and that when John wrote a long time after Peter’s death and Jerusalem’s destruction, such considerations were no longer necessary. As far as a derogatory effect in the first church is concerned, this can offer no explanation, for Peter’s rash blow with the sword is completely outdone by his threefold denial of Jesus. If anything hindered Peter in his work, it would have had to be the latter. Why has τὸνδοῦλον the article? This man was not one of the “underlings” called ὑπηρέται in v. 3; for in v. 18 the two classes of men are distinguished, and in 22 one of the underlings speaks, while in v. 26 it is one of the servants.

This δοῦλος belongs to the high priest, while the ὑπηρέται are the police force sent out by the Sanhedrin, v. 3. “The servant” is taken to mean the one especially delegated by the high priest to accompany this expedition. He must have been one especially trusted and prominent in the household of the high priest. That may also explain his position in front of the soldiers and thus close to Jesus, so that Peter found him as his first target. In a parenthetical remark with δέ John tells us his name, and John alone does this. The name itself cannot be so important. Its insertion substantiates what John writes in v. 15, 16 about his acquaintance with the high priest and with his servants, enabling him to get Peter past the doorkeeper of the courtyard.

In v. 26 this intimate knowledge again comes out, for John knows that the servant there mentioned is a relative of Malchus’. These and many other touches vouch for the authorship of this entire Gospel; it bears John’s signature in a large number of places.

The diminutive ὠτάριον does not mean a part of the ear but the entire ear. The Greeks loved to use diminutive terms to designate the parts of the body. Malchus seems to have dodged Peter’s blow, who certainly aimed to strike the head and to kill the man. It was providence that let the blow do no more damage. John does not report the miraculous healing of the ear. Some are inclined to think that it was not sheared off entirely but hung by a portion of the kin. The verb, however, allows us no such option.

John 18:11

11 Jesus at once interposes. First, the order to put up the sword, only in its wording a little different from Matt. 26:52, and certainly a peremptory command: Sheathe thy sword! literally, “Throw the sword into the scabbard!” The word is a strong rebuke to Peter. Jesus disowns the rash deed of his follower. Luke reports how Jesus at once repaired the damage (22:51), thus protecting Peter from the dire consequences of his deed. To wound the special representative of the high priest was no small matter for one who was already in disfavor as a follower of Jesus.

Jesus said more in rebuke of Peter, for his act militated against the gracious plan of God and the will of Jesus. To this rebuke, as recorded by Matt. 26:52–54, John adds a new and significant statement left unrecorded elsewhere: The cup which the Father has given me, shall I not drink it? Does Peter intend that Jesus shall turn away from that cup, or does he intend to prevent Jesus from drinking it? With great emphasis the nominative absolute places the object in front and then picks it up as the object with the redundant pronoun αὑτό (R. 683). John omits mention of the agony in the garden, but this word about the cup given to Jesus by the Father plainly refers to the prayers uttered by Jesus in his agony. The explanation that the figure of drinking the Father’s cup is quite ordinary and hence has no reference to prayers of Jesus is surely insufficient.

Even if the figure were common—which it certainly is not—the connection is too evident. “This cup” means the contents and thus is only a grammatical figure, naming the vessel instead of what it contains, Krauth, Conservative Reformation, 778, etc., quoted in the author’s Eisenach Gospel Selections, 532. This ordinary grammatical form of speech is here used together with the corresponding verb with regard to drinking as a metaphor. The experience of the bitter passion awaiting Jesus is compared with the drinking of a bitter potion. This is an uncommon metaphor, although its use by Jesus has made it familiar to us. The emphasis is on ὁπατήρ. He places this cup to Jesus’ lips; his will is that Jesus drink this cup.

Shall Jesus, who has come for the very purpose of doing his Father’s will, now evade that will and refuse the cup? This cup and its drinking on the part of Jesus are not mere incidental parts of the Father’s will but the supreme part of that will (“obedient unto death, yea, the death of the cross,” Phil. 2:8). Shall Jesus fail the Father in the essential part of his will? The entire context reveals that the cup is filled with bitterness, requiring utter self-abnegation to drink it—“not my will, but thine be done.” The implied bitterness (figure) pictures the coming suffering and death of Jesus (reality). The aorist subjunctive πίω has the strong negative οὑμή (R. 929, etc.; 1174, etc.).

2. The Inquiry before Annas and the Denial of Peter, 18:12–27

John 18:12

12 So the cohort and the chiliarch and the underlings of the Jews arrested Jesus and bound him and led him to Annas for the first; for he was father-in-law of Caiaphas who was high priest of that year. The first three aorists simply report the facts in a summary way. These three acts are ascribed to the entire force that had come out to take Jesus prisoner. Yet the chiliarch or military tribune (R. V. margin) is mentioned personally in second place, after the cohort which he commanded. We shall not be wrong when we assume that the chiliarch issued the order to several of the Roman soldiers to place Jesus under arrest and to tie his hands or his arms.

The rest of the cohort was commanded to surround Jesus. The underlings of the Jews likewise surrounded Jesus. By “Jews” John refers to the Jewish authorities, the Sanhedrin. Nothing is said about the eleven who fled at this point, Matt. 26:56, nobody paying any attention to them. The three synoptists report that Jesus protested against his arrest, including the manner in which it was made, and revealed what lay back of it in the counsel of God and in the power of darkness.

The procession formed and marched back to the city. Here John amplifies the account of the synoptists. Matthew and Mark omit the judicial inquiry before Annas and thus report that Jesus was brought to Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin, following this with an account of the trial proper. Luke 22:54 reports that Jesus was led to the high priest’s house; he omits the trial at night, reporting only the abuse and the mockery that marked its close. From John we learn that the trial during the night was preceded by a judicial examination under Annas. The captors had orders to bring Jesus to Annas who, most likely, lived in the house of his son-in-law Caiaphas.

John reports the full details of the abortive preliminary examination before Annas; then, however, he at once takes us to the praetorium of Pilate (v. 28). Yet by saying, “they led him to Annas for the first,” πρῶτον, John intimates that presently Jesus was brought before the Sanhedrin itself; this is the sense of the direct statement in v. 24. See B.-D., 55, and R. 254, etc., on the Greek declension of Annas and of Caiaphas.

John 18:13

13 John again gives evidence of his acquaintance with the high priest’s family by informing us that Annas was the father-in-law of Caiaphas; and he assigns this relationship as the reason why Jesus was ordered to be brought before Annas for the first. We may read a bit between the lines. Annas had been the high priest from the year six to the year fifteen; a son of Annas was the immediate predecessor of Caiaphas, and another his successor. During the years to 66 three additional sons and one grandson of Annas held that office. We may speak of “the dynasty of the house of Annas” in the high-priestly office. It seems that Annas bore the title of high priest after he was no longer high priest, and the same may be true regarding his son.

He was most certainly a man of tremendous influence among the Sadducees and in the Sanhedrin. He was of one mind with his son-in-law concerning Jesus, and thus was designated as the man into whose hands Jesus was to be delivered if he were captured on this night raid. Naturally also it took a little time to assemble the Sanhedrin with its membership of 71 men in the middle of the night. The moment news of the capture arrived messengers flew through the dark streets to gather at least a quorum of the High Court. The leaders felt that they dared not wait until morning but must secure action at once. The legal restrictions forbidding trials at night were summarily set aside, and the Sanhedrin was summoned.

Modern Jews assail the evidence of the evangelists on this vital point and declare that this trial by night never took place; but the evidence of the Gospels cannot be overthrown by modern Jewish assertion that this evidence is false. The leaders who deliberately plotted the murder of Jesus were not the men who balked at a technicality of legal procedure when they had their victim in their grasp.

The reason why Jesus was brought for the first to Annas is the one assigned by John. This reason is personal not official. It was not Annas who issued the order to arrest Jesus. Annas was not the real high priest with Caiaphas being only his second; nor did the two in some way divide the office, either by official or by private arrangement; nor did the office alternate between them annually. Annas was not the vicar (sagan) of Caiaphas, nor the president (nasi) of the Sanhedrin. No vicar would be mentioned ahead of his chief as is done in Luke 3:2 and Acts 4:6; and none but the president of the Sanhedrin would dare to speak as Caiaphas speaks in 11:49, etc.

The effort to combine into one the examination by Annas and the trial proper under Caiaphas is fruitless; the two differ in every point. Transpositions of the text, especially placing v. 24 before v. 19, are unwarranted.

Once more (see 11:49 and 51) John remarks that Caiaphas was high priest “of that year,” i.e., of that notable year in which Jesus was done to death. Being high priest during the years 18–36, his term included this tragic year.

John 18:14

14 A parenthetical remark is added in order to indicate how the relationship to Caiaphas made Annas the man to whom Jesus was sent at first. Now Caiaphas was he who gave counsel to the Jews that it was expedient that one man die instead of the people. Annas was the father-in-law of the man who not only voiced this thought (11:51) but was now in the act of carrying out that thought. The two men were of one mind. Thus John furthermore indicates what treatment Jesus might expect of Annas during the wait for the convocation of the Sanhedrin. R. 1058 regards the accusative with the infinitive as the subject of the impersonal συμφέρει which the Greek retains in the present tense of the direct discourse. The exposition of this word of Caiaphas is given in 11:50.

John 18:15

15 For the moment John leaves Jesus and turns to Peter. And there followed Jesus Simon Peter and another disciple. Now that disciple was known to the high priest and went in with Jesus into the court of the high priest. Luther remarks on how elaborately all four evangelists describe Peter’s denial, whereas many important events pertaining to Jesus are omitted by one or the other or are briefly treated. Why is so much space devoted to Peter? Luther answers that it is due to the fact that Peter’s case illustrates the great fruit of the passion, the forgiveness of sin, which, though it pertains so directly to you and to me, is yet the hardest article to believe.

John’s account amplifies that of the synoptists quite materially. First we learn that two disciples and not merely one followed Jesus. All fled in Gethsemane when the soldiers closed in on Jesus at the tribune’s command. But presently two began to follow at a safe distance (so the synoptists). Love drew them to follow, fear kept them at a distance. We have already seen that John never names himself nor any of the members of his family.

While some have thought of this or that person, the consensus of opinion is that this unnamed disciple is John himself. John here relates his part in the story of Peter, not merely in order to add what the other evangelists omit but to make a confession of sin for his own part in it, to tell how he aided and abetted Peter in entering the high priest’s court where Peter fell, and how, but for his aid, Peter could not have entered.

John feels compelled to tell how he was able to aid Peter in gaining entrance. John was a person known to the high priest, known to such an extent that even the doorkeepers were quite familiar with him. This is astonishing, but we shall have to stop with the astonishment; for no clue is offered us by which we could safely hazard a guess as to how John could be so well known to the high priest and to his household. Various opinions have been expressed, the best of which is that, perhaps, John was related to the high priest. Yet, γνωστός does not mean a relative. “The high priest,” who is twice mentioned in this verse, must be Annas who still retained this title although he now no longer held this office; note the plural in Luke 3:2, and in John 18:35. Caiphas is mentioned only in the parenthetical remark in v. 13.

It may be possible that John knew both men, also that both lived in the same palace; for very likely this was a large rectangular structure surrounding an open court with many rooms on the four sides. When the crowd of captors brought Jesus in, John and Peter followed along in the rear, and John passed in with the rest, but Peter held back.

John 18:16

16 But Peter was standing at the door without. Accordingly the other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out and spoke to the doormaid and brought Peter in. Perhaps John saw Peter through the gate; he stepped outside, spoke a few words to the doormaid, secured her permission, and thus enabled Peter to enter—doing his friend an ill-service. The reason why John recounts all these details is because he is taking full blame. Instead of reminding Peter of the warning of Jesus and taking Peter away, John, even John himself, helps to make Peter disregard that warning. Here was direct disobedience.

Here was another case of rashness. Here was a useless act. Peter wanted to see the τέλος or outcome, Matt. 26:58, and had not Jesus foretold exactly what that would be? That was not enough for Peter. His disobedient curiosity leads him into a situation so full of danger that he cannot hope to escape unscathed. After bringing Peter in, John, privileged as he was, went into the palace, to the hall where Jesus was before Annas.

John 18:17

17 Mark and Luke first tell about the fire, and then about the denial. John does the opposite. We are at once told what happened, and then the circumstances are added. Says, therefore, the maid, the doorkeeper, to Peter, Certainly thou, too, art one of the disciples of this man? He says, I am not. From John we learn that the very maid who let Peter in exposed his identity.

But from the synoptists we gather that she left her post at the door, came over to Peter, fixed her eyes upon him, and then put her sudden, startling question. What made her do that? Was she afraid that she had let the wrong man in, and did she take this means of making the man known? If so, then what about John whom she knew much better? The καί in her question, “thou, too,” indicates that she knew John as a disciple of Jesus. She makes no issue of John.

Was she merely teasing Peter, trying to make him uncomfortable when she saw him hiding his identity? Her words do not sound like light banter. The most probable guess is that she wished to make herself important by letting the men know that she knew something they did not know. Here they were talking about Jesus and what had just taken place and yet did not know that right in their own midst there was one of Jesus’ own disciples. No doubt, they all cocked their ears at the question. Its form with μή expects a positive answer.

Jesus is designated as “this man,” a derogatory appellation.

Peter is compelled to reply, and he denies his discipleship. John reports this first denial in the simplest way, “I am not!” with which the synoptists agree although they add other words. Thus Peter fell. It took only a menial woman to bring the chief of the Twelve to his fall. Gone were all his high and heroic protestations to Jesus; gone all the courage from his heart and from the hand that a short time ago had snatched out the sword. Here stands the arrant coward, unable to confess his Lord, cringing in lying denial.

We cannot agree with those who think that Peter misjudged the situation, that in reality he was in no danger and might freely have confessed his discipleship. They paint the situation accordingly. Strange to say, they make no reference to John about whom the doormaid hints that he was also a disciple of Jesus. It seems likely that she concluded from Peter’s connection with John, when the latter spoke to her to allow Peter to enter, that Peter, too, must be a disciple of Jesus. Yet this would not prove the absence of danger for Peter even if no danger existed for John because he was known in the high priest’s house. Peter would most likely have been arrested, brought before Annas, and held for a time.

We can hardly think that his life was in danger. What swept Peter off his feet was the suddenness of his exposure, its publicity before the crowd about the fire, and the guilty feeling that he had of his own will and against warning walked into this trap. He was thrown into a panic. Frightened, he saw no way out except to lie. The devil still loves to pounce upon the foolhardy and to sweep off their feet those who boast of their strength.

John 18:18

18 Now John gives us a glimpse of the situation, adding these details to the main point of the narrative. Now there were standing the servants and the underlings, having made a charcoal fire, for it was cold, and they were warming themselves; and Peter also was standing with them and warming himself. Introduced by δέ, this description is like a parenthesis, which also explains the imperfect tenses. Verse 18 must, therefore, be regarded as describing the situation at the moment when the maid confronted Peter, not as narrating what occurred after Peter’s denial. The latter would require aorists. Of course, after the denial Peter lingered awhile. “The servants” or δοῦλοι are those who belong to the palace, while “the underlings” or ὑπηρέται belong to the Temple guard and are under orders of the Sanhedrin.

The latter had helped to bring in Jesus. We hear nothing further about the Roman cohort and its commander. These returned to their barracks in Antonia. We cannot imagine that the cohort entered the palace hall where Jesus was examined; the number of men was altogether too great for that. Only a few underlings led Jesus before Annas. An ἀνθρακιά is a heap of charcoal, and “to make” such a heap means to pile it up and to make it burn.

John 18:19

19 At this point John shifts the scene to the examination of Jesus within the palace. The high priest, accordingly, inquired of Jesus concerning his disciples and concerning his teaching. The resumptive οῦ̓ν connects with v. 12: Jesus, having been brought for the first to Annas, is now examined by Annas and after this is sent to Caiaphas by Annas (v. 24). “The high priest” who interrogates Jesus is thus Annas. But this is denied by some. We are told that Jesus was brought to the house of Annas although John writes, “to Annas.” It is said that the owner of the house need not be the person to make the examination—though no one makes such a claim—but the trial judge alone is qualified for that—but Caiaphas was not “the trial judge” in the true sense of this term. The case of Jesus did not come before Caiaphas as the trial judge but before the entire court of 71 judges serving as one bench.

Any one of this bench might have been delegated to undertake the preliminary judicial examination. The fact that Annas was chosen has been explained in v. 13 by the γάρ. Jesus was not brought to him only “to honor the old gentleman.” Nor did Caiaphas conduct this examination “chiefly for the information of Annas.” The reverse is true: Annas conducted this examination in order to extract some information for the use of Caiaphas. The assertion that whenever ἀρχιερεύς is mentioned in this chapter without further addition (as in v. 15, 19 and 22) it refers to Caiaphas overlooks the point that up to this time Caiaphas has been introduced to us, not as “high priest,” but as “he who was high priest of that year” (11:49–51; 18:13). This enables John to designate Annas as “the high priest” without causing a misunderstanding. See also the comment on v. 24.

Preliminary hearings or preliminary judicial investigations have always been a part of recognized legal procedure with prisoners after arrest and before regular trial. We see that in the present case Jesus gives answer to the probing question put to him by Annas in the capacity of examining judge. By answering, Jesus recognizes the authority of Annas. If he had refused to answer he would have denied that authority. John states only the substance of the question which Annas put to Jesus. It covered two closely related points: “concerning his disciples and concerning his teaching” or doctrine.

Note that John employs two prepositions. Jesus has been gathering adherents or disciples, meaning not merely the Twelve but all those who accepted what he taught. What is this peculiar doctrine that Jesus is promulgating? Luther pictures the proud ecclesiastic in all his haughty arrogance, acting as though he did not know what Jesus taught, as though he had not deemed it worth while hitherto to acquaint himself with the teaching of this inferior man. Of course, Annas takes for granted that the doctrine of Jesus for which he gathered adherents is heretical and contrary to the teaching of the Old Testament, the accepted standard of Judaism. The question is thus full of hostile intent.

Its one purpose is to find something in whatever Jesus may say about his doctrine that may be used for condemning him to death.

John 18:20

20 Jesus answered him, I on my part have spoken publicly to the world. I on my part did always teach in synagogue and in the Temple, where all the Jews come together, and in secret did I speak nothing? Why dost thou question me? Question those who have heard what I said to them. Behold, these know what I on my part said. There is no reason to bring in the spiritual condition of Annas in explaining why Jesus gave answer to his question or why he answered as he did.

The reason for both the fact and the form of Jesus’ answer is that Jesus recognized the judicial authority of Annas. Though Annas may abuse his authority and prostrate it to unrighteous ends, Jesus submits to the proper legal authority and gives an answer. But the course which Annas pursues is wrong. Therefore Jesus points this out and indicates what the right course should be. Jesus answers only in regard to his doctrine. This, however, does not mean that he ignores the question regarding his disciples.

For only if the doctrine of Jesus is false would it be wrong for him to win disciples, whether many or few. Thus in answering the main point the minor point is also covered.

With three emphatic ἐγώ Jesus states what he on his part has done. Others may spread their doctrine secretly, Jesus has promulgated his only in the most public way. Annas and all those present know this beyond question. The perfect “I have spoken” covers the entire period from the day on which Jesus began to speak until the day when he ceased teaching. All this speaking was παρρησίᾳ, “in a public way,” a dative of manner. It was so public that it was addressed “to the world.” Jesus does not say merely παντὶτῷλαῷ, “to all the people,” i.e., to all the multitude who heard him or to all the chosen nation; but τῷκόσμω, “to the world.” Nebe well says that Jesus used Palestine as his pulpit from which to preach to the whole world. What if only a limited number had heard him hitherto, the teaching of Jesus is addressed to a vastly greater audience which shall yet hear what he has spoken. “To the world” is prophetic fact.

This first statement is broad, the second is specific, hence the two constative aorists ἐδίδαξα and ἐλάλησα. Whatever others may do, “I on my part,” Jesus says, taught publicly “in synagogue” (no article), using synagogues as my forum with their public audiences, “and in the Temple, where all the Jews come together” at the time of the great Jewish festivals. There are many synagogues, hence no Greek article, but only one Temple, hence the article. These two emphatic positives are re-enforced by an equally emphatic negative, “and in secret did I speak nothing,” never opened my mouth even to speak, to say nothing of teaching. Jesus had no esoteric doctrine. He did not present one kind of doctrine in public for the crowd and another doctrine behind locked doors for the initiate.

Reference has been made to Matt. 10:27 and Mark 10:10, but what Jesus there says he himself declares shall be shouted from the housetops. Jesus simply states the facts regarding the utter publicity of his teaching. Did Annas not know that? Is it not ridiculous for him to ask about something that has been published so openly before the entire nation for over three years? Others may conspire in secret like the Sanhedrin, not so Jesus; others may have secret teachings which they communicate behind locked and guarded doors under seal of oaths, not so Jesus.

John 18:21

21 Hence the pertinent question, “Why dost thou question me?” The emphasis is not on the pronoun “me” but on the reason and the intent of Annas. Jesus lays his finger on the evil motive of Annas. He touches the old sinner’s callous conscience. Annas is not seeking to know what Jesus actually taught, he is seeking to lay hold of something that Jesus may now say in order to misuse this against him. Jesus lets Annas feel that he sees through the farce he is putting on in this pretended judicial examination. The evil questioner is himself questioned, and he has no answer except one which would incriminate himself.

And this question is followed by a direction. Does this judge not know the right course? “Question those who have heard what I said to them. Behold, these know what I on my part said.” These thousands of hearers are the ones who should be called in to testify, provided Annas in truth desires to know what Jesus taught. These are the witnesses by whom to prove that Jesus taught something false and wrong if, indeed, such a charge is to be made. Does Annas fear to lose the case against Jesus by calling in such true witnesses? Does he probe Jesus alone because the verdict of his condemnation is already signed and sealed?

Despite all his shrewdness and cunning Annas has messed up the proceedings. His proposed judicial investigation is mired beyond hope. Annas is at the end of his resources. The tables are turned. He sits there nonplused, unable to proceed.

John 18:22

22 One of his henchmen comes to the rescue. And when he had said these things, one of the underlings standing by gave Jesus a blow, saying, Thus dost thou answer the high priest? The nature of the case decides whether the action of an aorist participle precedes that of an aorist main verb or occurs at the same time. Here αὑτοῦεἰπόντος precedes while εἰπών accompanies. One of the ὑπηρέται, not a δοῦλος, strikes Jesus, evidently one of the police force of the Sanhedrin sent out to capture Jesus and now standing as a guard beside the bound prisoner. He was quick to see the discomfiture of Annas, caught the opportunity to curry favor with a superior by giving the situation a quick new turn, and hit Jesus a violent blow in the face.

Some have thought that ῥάπισμα means a blow with a rod, because of its derivation, but the word was used for “a blow on the cheek with the open hand,” M.-M., 563, thus distinguished from κολαφίζειν, to strike with the fist. The blow with the hand was considered especially shameful. Compare Isa. 50:6, 7; Micah 5:1. It was an outrage to strike a prisoner in the presence of the judge while the former was making his defense. This underling dared to strike Jesus only because he knew with certainty that his action would please Annas, especially at the moment when Annas was cornered and knew no way out. He receives no rebuke of any kind.

By his silence Annas seconds the blow.

The man tries to justify his blow by exclaiming with a show of indignation, “Thus dost thou answer the high priest?” but he carefully refrains from intimating what is wrong in either the substance or the form of Jesus’ answer. Both the blow and the word accompanying it are basely hypocritical. The hands of Jesus are bound so that he cannot raise them to ward off the blow. He receives its full impact—an advance indication of the treatment to follow. Here one man vents his viciousness upon Jesus; what will happen when many not only unite but vie with each other?

John 18:23

23 Jesus answered him, If I spoke in an evil way, testify concerning the evil; but if in a good way, why dost thou bruise me? Jesus answers the ruffian’s attack with perfect calm and exposes its baseness just as he had exposed the farce of Annas’ judicial examination. Both κακῶς and κακόν are opposites. If Jesus had spoken evil in any manner, the one thing for the man to do was to testify and to specify the evil so that the judge might hear and decide. The condition of reality assumes for the moment that something wrong was contained in Jesus’ reply. On the other hand, if Jesus had spoken properly, and this he most assuredly had, why had the man struck Jesus?

Here again Jesus lays bare the ugly motive prompting the man’s vicious blow. Jesus uses the strong verb δέρειν, “to flay,” indicating the violence of the blow he had received. It produced a contusion of the skin. This reply of Jesus helps to interpret Matt. 5:39, the word of Jesus concerning our turning the other cheek. Luther writes: “You are to understand that a great difference exists between these two: holding out the other cheek and rebuking with words the one who strikes us. Christ is to suffer, and yet the word is placed into his mouth that he is to speak and to reprove what is wrong.

Therefore I am to distinguish between the mouth and the hand. The mouth I am not to yield to condone the wrong; but the hand I am to hold still and not to avenge myself. We are not only to allow ourselves to be struck on the cheek, but are to allow ourselves to be burned for the sake of the truth. But that I should say to the judge, ‘Dear judge, you are certainly doing right to burn me,’ this would be to betray and to deny Christ as well as that for which I die.… For why should I bid knaves and ruffians do injustice? Why should I say to the thief, ‘Sir, come and steal my coat’? Christ does not ask this, but Christ says, ‘Whoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.’ This means to say, ‘if one wills to smite thee, do not resist, do not take revenge, do not repay evil with evil.’”

John 18:24

24 This ended the proceedings before Annas. Annas, therefore, sent him still bound to Caiaphas, the high priest. No reason exists for reading this statement in any other way than as reporting the final action of Annas in disposing of the prisoner sent to him for preliminary examination. The examination had been abortive; it yielded nothing that could be used at the impending trial. Annas had left Jesus bound as he was—this is the sense of the perfect participle; and now he orders the guard of underlings to lead Jesus to Caiaphas. This means to Caiaphas, who as the real high priest presided over the Sanhedrin.

Jesus is thus led away to his first trial before this supreme court of the Jews. But we are not ready to let πρὸςΚαϊάφαν mean, “to the house of Caiaphas,” just as πρὸςἌνναν in v. 12 does not mean, “to the house of Annas.” The fact that the preliminary examination took place in the palace of Annas we see, not from this phrase “to Annas,” but from other remarks in the narrative (“the court of the high priest,” etc.). Jesus was not brought to Caiaphas as he had been brought to Annas. With Caiaphas was the Sanhedrin (Matt. 26:57). This high court had its own hall of assembly and its court facilities. It is gratuitous to assume that this court of seventy-one judges (even though there were some absentees) met in the house of Caiaphas.

Jesus was conducted into the hall of the Sanhedrin itself.

Those who take “high priest” in v. 15, 19, and 22 to refer to Caiaphas are forced into an impossible situation. Then Caiaphas conducted the preliminary examination; then it was his own palace in which he conducted it (v. 15); then Annas was only present at this hearing—yet Jesus was led “to Annas for the first,” and, strange to say, Annas with Caiaphas present, sends Jesus to Caiaphas! The two high priests follow, and the place to which they go is only the palace of Caiaphas. Some make this only another part of the palace of Annas. The procession is thought to cross only the inner open court to the rooms in which Caiaphas lived. These are patent impossibilities.

Recognizing this and using a few inferior texts, some resort to the means of putting v. 24 after v. 14. A few, however, think they have found a better way. They permit v. 24 to remain where it is but they regard the aorist ἀπέστειλεν as a pluperfect: “Annas had sent him to Caiaphas.” They make this a parenthetical statement, saying that Annas did nothing at all with Jesus who had been sent to him, that Annas only sent Jesus on to Caiaphas for the preliminary examination. Even R. 841 thinks this possible because John uses οὗν. The reverse is true. The οὗν denies a parenthesis; οὗν means “accordingly,” when the abortive effort of Annas was concluded he sent Jesus to Caiaphas.

A parenthetical remark, bringing in a point that pertains to the entire preceding narrative, would have to be introduced by δέ, which John always uses for such belated remarks. And even δέ would leave us in doubt, for it would have to be followed by the past perfect to make the statement parenthetical. Followed as it is by an aorist, the natural sense of δέ would be continuative, “and Annas did send,” namely when his investigation had been concluded.

From Annas Jesus is sent to the Sanhedrin under Caiaphas (v. 24). Now in v. 28 John reports that from Caiaphas Jesus was brought to the praetorium of Pilate. This means that John omits the entire trial of Jesus before the Sanhedrin, both the trial in the night and the confirmation of the sentence at a second session in the early morning. John, then, has nothing to add to the accounts of the synoptists on these proceedings of the Sanhedrin. John intends to contribute only the account of the action before Annas, which the synoptists omit. John helps us to piece the story together with greater certainty.

We see that Matt. 26:57 follows the action before Annas; we also see that Luke 22:54 is identical with John 18:13, and that Luke 22:63–65 happened at the close of the trial at night and is all that Luke records of this trial. Not satisfied with this course of events, a variety of other combinations is offered. John 18:19–24 is placed into the session of the Sanhedrin, and the “high priest” in John’s narrative becomes Caiaphas. Perhaps the Sanhedrin held only one session. The evangelists are made to contradict each other, and we are given a choice between three clashing versions, that of Matthew and Mark, that of John, with a third by Luke that is midway between the other two. The net result is that the credibility of our witnesses is destroyed—they are either ignorant on vital points, or perhaps worse.

We must pick and choose among their testimony, being always certain that some of it is false. Any choice that we make is subjective, it is like the findings of a puzzled jury confronted with conflicting testimony. We refuse to be drawn into the maze which special pleaders have thus created. The testimony of the evangelists is reliable throughout. Each agrees with the other. None tells the complete story, but what each reports joins harmoniously with what the others report.

John 18:25

25 The synoptists tell the story of Peter’s denials in one consecutive narrative. Yet Luke 22:59 reports that the third denial followed the other two after what happened to Jesus during this hour (v. 19–24). Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. They said, therefore, to him, Certainly, thou, too, art one of the disciples? He denied and said, I am not! John reports only the first (v. 17, etc.) and the third denial (v. 25–27).

After the first denial Peter tried to leave the courtyard and went into the πυλών (Matt. 26:71), the long covered entry that led from the courtyard through the building to the street. Here two maids and a man again charged Peter with being a disciple, and the cock crowed, but Peter failed to hear or to note this. Driven back out of the entry passage, Peter returned to the court. For something like an hour (Luke 22:59) Peter had respite. The supposition that he talked loudly and freely in order to pass himself off as belonging to the crowd has no support and is unlikely. Loud talking would have precipitated the third inquiry as to his identity and would not have given him an hour’s rest.

Peter himself brought on the second denial by going into the entry in order to leave. What brought on the third the writers do not indicate.

John’s account parallels Matt. 26:73–75; Mark 14:70b–72; Luke 22:59–62. It was at the first denial that Peter sat (Luke 22:55); John alone tells us that he stood by the fire warming himself at the third denial. The sitting and the standing are no discrepancy whatever. This time a concerted effort is made. From Matthew we gather that several of the men talked together about Peter and then came and confronted him. From Luke we learn that one of these spoke for the rest and made a confident assertion.

Mark and John refer only to bystanders, John writing only, “they said to him.” We see that John intends to be quite brief. Hence he also records only the confident question that, surely, Peter is a disciple and makes no reference to Peter’s Galilean dialect. Likewise he summarizes when he writes that Peter denied the allegation and said, “I am not.” He says nothing about Peter’s oaths and cursing, as do Matthew and Mark. This answers the assumption that John’s Gospel intends to blacken Peter as much as possible; the contrary is true, John is very gentle with Peter.

John 18:26

26 Now, however, John adds a detail omitted by the synoptists: Says one of the servants of the high priest, being a kinsman of him whose ear Peter cut off, Did not I myself see thee in the garden with him? Again, therefore, Peter denied, and immediately a cock crowed. Because we know that Peter made three denials, some have thought that John, too, records all three. They find the second in v. 25, and the third in v. 26. But these two verses belong together and report the third denial. Without a connective λέγει continues the story of v. 25.

Peter’s denial is itself denied by the kinsman of Malchus who is rather certain that he himself (emphatic ἐγώ) saw Peter in Gethsemane. We know that Peter was hard beset. This time a number of men confronted him; this time they adduce evidence that Peter is lying. Matthew and Mark refer to Peter’s Galilean dialect. John informs us that the evidence was not only circumstantial but actually direct. The net was drawn tight about Peter.

It is this evidence that makes him resort to oaths and self-cursings. Peter feels that he must rend that net, no matter what the cost. Besides, having twice denied, he feels that it would be fatal, indeed, now to admit. One lie compels others until the liar is submerged.

John’s knowledge is detailed and exact. He knows that the man whose ear Peter cut off is the servant of the high priest Annas, and that his name is Malchus (see v. 10). He even knows that this other man is a relative of Malchus and was present in Gethsemane. John probably also knew this man’s name. While he does not say that this man saw Peter slash at Malchus, the implication in the relative clause is that he did see the act. What John reports thus attests itself.

Yet this kinsman of Malchus is not absolutely sure, and that is why Peter dares to go on with his denial. While οὑκ implies a positive answer in the questioner’s mind, the answer of the person questioned may be either positive or negative. The phrase ἐντῷκήπῳ has been stressed over against ἐξῆλθε in v. 4, and the latter is then read in a modified way, namely that Jesus did not come through the garden gate but “came out” from the interior of the garden close to its entrance. But in many instances ἐν means “at” and this suffices here.

John 18:27

27 Peter clings to his denial. John says no more. At that moment a cock raised his voice. The prophecy of Jesus was fulfilled. The crowing was timed with the denial by the gracious power of providence. John says no more.

We know the rest from the other records. On the crowing of cocks at night see 13:38. It must have been approaching three o’clock. John helps us to understand how Peter at this time could receive the Savior’s look of pity out in the courtyard of Annas. Jesus was being led from the palace of Annas through the courtyard, out the way in which he had been brought in, through the entry passage through which Peter tried to escape about an hour before. As Jesus passed through, surrounded by a heavy guard, his eyes sought those of Peter and found them.

In the palace everything was over. Nobody concerned himself about the wretched liar and perjurer who went out unobserved and was no sooner out than he broke into repentant sobs.

John purposely divides the story of Peter, placing the examination by Annas between the two parts. This means that after Jesus entered the palace Peter was caught in his first two denials, and just before Jesus came out again Peter was caught in the third. Yet some find contradictions in the accounts of the evangelists. They read v. 24 as though Jesus had already been led away to Caiaphas when Peter was assailed a third time. So, they say, John makes it impossible for Jesus to have looked upon Peter. We have given our answer to such claims.

3. The Trial Before Pilate, 18:28–40

John 18:28

28 Matt. 26:59–68; Mark 14:55–65 report the trial before the Sanhedrin; Luke 22:66–71 report the session in the early morning. Trials at night were illegal; and the death sentence could not be pronounced on the day of the trial, at least one day had to intervene. In the case of Jesus both of these legal provisions were violated. A semblance of legality was secured by holding a second session of the Sanhedrin in the morning. This was not an adjourned session, nor was its object only to decide on how to carry out the death sentence upon Jesus; it was a formal second session, conserving the point of having two sessions in capital cases, and in this second session Jesus was made to repeat his alleged blasphemy, thereby sealing his fate in a kind of legal manner. We hear of no discussion concerning the execution of the death sentence. It seems that the Sanhedrin accepted the legal plan of obtaining the Roman governor’s confirmation of the Jewish verdict.

Accordingly they brought Jesus from Caiaphas to the Praetorium, and it was early. The sessions of the Sanhedrin were most likely held in the regular hall of assembly. For forty years prior to the destruction of Jerusalem the Sanhedrin no longer met in the hall situated in the Temple area; though just where they met no one states. Matt. 26:3 reports a meeting held in the αὑλή or hall of Caiaphas. It is not likely that the trial of Jesus was held in this hall of the high priest’s palace. John does not write “to Pilate” but here designates the place to which Jesus was taken, namely the Praetorium, because in the next statement he must tell us that the Jews dared not enter this building.

The Praetorium is the seat of the praetor or commander of the soldiery, who was Pilate, the governor. This must have been the castle Antonia and not Herod’s palace, since Herod himself occupied that at this very time. while Josephus (Wars, 2, 14, 8) reports that Florus, the governor, set up his judgment seat before Herod’s palace, this does not apply to Pilate. What John tells us is that Jesus was transferred from the court of the Sanhedrin to that of Pilate.

John thus frankly omits mention of the two sessions of the Sanhedrin, although he indicates that they were held. For one thing, he is satisfied to make no additions to the accounts which the synoptists present on these two sessions; on the other hand, he is able to amplify materially the rather brief statements of the synoptists on the trial before Pilate. Thus the section in v. 28–32 is entirely new except the statement that Jesus was conducted to Pilate. Perhaps, too, as some think, John deemed the trial before the Gentile judge more important for attesting the character and the divinity of Jesus for his many Gentile readers than the trial before the Sanhedrin. The remark that it was “early,” πρωΐα (supply ὥρα), indicates that as soon as the daylight session of the Sanhedrin has confirmed the death sentence upon Jesus, the Sanhedrin took Jesus to Pilate in order at once to secure its execution. Roman courts were open from dawn to sunset, hence no special credit is due to Pilate for being ready to act at this early hour of the morning, between six and seven o’clock.

And they on their part did not go into the Praetorium in order that they might not be defiled but might eat the Passover. A great procession arrives at the Praetorium: Jesus guarded by a heavy contingent of “the underlings” or police force of the Sanhedrin, all the high dignitaries of the Sanhedrin probably with some of their personal servants, most of the other Sanhedrists, and a crowd of common people who had discovered the extraordinary proceedings that were in progress. The heavy police force and the presence of the high priests and the Sanhedrists is to prevent a rescue of Jesus by his numerous friends among the Passover pilgrims, and at the same time to impress the governor with the gravity of the case against Jesus with a view to gain his prompt assent to the verdict of the Sanhedrin. The Jews are using all their resources to gain their end. It is unwarranted to think that only representatives of the Sanhedrin or a small delegation went with Jesus. Having arrived at the Praetorium, a halt is made outside, and the Roman guard at the entrance is sent to call the governor.

The emphatic αὑτοί merely draws attention to the Sanhedrists. No contrast with Jesus is indicated as though Jesus was turned over to the Roman guard and marched into the Praetorium. It is only supposition when Pilate is thought to have lent the cohort for the arrest of Jesus, so that he thus knows all about the case of Jesus and is ready and waiting to receive Jesus at this early hour. If this were true, Pilate would have kept Jesus in his own hands and would never have turned him over to the Sanhedrin for trial. No; Pilate has not been apprised of the case. No guard has orders to accept a prisoner from the Sanhedrin.

With their prisoner in their own midst, these Jews halt and wait for Pilate to come out.

They fear to become defiled by entering a Gentile abode, especially also because on this day such defilement would debar them from eating the Passover. The Old Testament ceremonial regulations contained no item to this effect, only the rabbis extended the law of defilement to include entrance into Gentile habitations. These rabbinical prohibitions were general and not restricted merely to the Passover week and not based on the presence of leaven in Gentile houses. Here we see men openly bent on no less a crime than judicial murder yet stickling about a human tradition devoid of divine sanction. They swallow camels but strain at gnats. The aorists μιανθῶσιν and φάγωσι convey the idea of actual defilement and of actual eating.

Since the Quartodeciman controversy near the end of the second century debate has been carried on concerning John’s expression “to eat the Passover.” The opponents of the Quartodecimans, whom many still follow, are positive that here “the Passover” means the Passover lamb; hence that John here corrects the synoptists. Whereas the synoptists place the eating of the lamb on Thursday evening, thus making Thursday the 14th of Nisan, John, they say, places the eating of the lamb on Friday evening and makes Friday the 14th of Nisan. We have already shown in 12:1 and in 13:1, that John agrees perfectly with the synoptists. In the present connection it is impossible to make the eating of the Passover mean the eating of the Paschal lamb. For the defilement which these Jews feared would not have debarred them from eating the Paschal lamb if this lamb was to be eaten on Friday evening. Defilement of this type lasted only until sundown and could then be removed by a bath.

The Paschal lamb was not eaten until some time after sundown. Already this settles the contention of the opponents of the Quartodecimans and that of the moderns who have John contradict the synoptists. It settles the case so completely that only unsupported denial has been offered and an attempt to make an exception of the defilement on this festal day. But Num. 19:22, coupled with the apocryphal Judith 12:7–9 as an illustration, makes denial fruitless.

“To eat the Passover” may, of course, mean to eat the Paschal lamb, when the connection so requires; but it may also mean to eat of the other sacrificial feasts, the so-called Chagigah, during the seven days of the celebration. The Chagigah on the 15th of Nisan (Friday) was especially attractive. Whereas the eating of the lamb on Thursday evening was a sad and a solemn celebration, the Chagigah of sacrificial meats on Friday was regarded as a feast of great joy. This, however, was eaten during the afternoon before sundown. It was this happy feast the Jewish leaders and their followers did not care to miss because of defilement by entering the Praetorium. The other New Testament references to the eating of the Passover are wholly indecisive, and to stress them, as is done, is useless, because they refer to the Paschal lamb and occur in no connections such as our present passage.

Yet πάσχα itself is used in the wide sense to designate the entire week of the festival, as in 2:23; 18:39; etc. Zahn is right: “To stake everything upon one little subordinate clause, … and to leave out of consideration everything that is said elsewhere in the book, and the clear relation of the whole narrative to the older accounts, is not exegetical accuracy, but violates the laws of historical interpretation,” Introduction to the New Testament, III, 283 (also his elaborate notes). Again he remarks that it is quite incredible to believe that with an entirely incidental expression, not at all connected with the Passover as such or with the actions of Jesus but solely with the scruples of the Jews, John should wish to overthrow a view of his readers which he has left entirely undisturbed throughout all of his preceding chapters. As decisive for the wider use of the expression “to eat the Passover” compare in the Old Testament Deut. 16:2, etc.; 2 Chron. 35:6, etc.

John 18:29

29 Pilate, accordingly, went out to them outside and says, What accusation are you bringing against this man? It was not graciousness on Pilate’s part or consideration for the religious scruples of the Jews that made him come, not merely to the entrance of the Praetorium, but altogether “outside.” The Roman court proceedings were conducted in the most public manner, even on the street or in a market place as occasion arose. So here, in front of the Praetorium, Pilate now opens court. He takes his seat in the judge’s chair on the rostrum and begins in the regular manner of a Roman trial. The Roman method was not inquisitorial but dealt with straightforward accusations. Pilate assumes that the Sanhedrists have come with one or more charges against Jesus; he takes them to be the accusers.

Hence his demand to hear the accusation. Jesus, too, faces Pilate. “Against this man” means that Pilate pointed to Jesus as the one whom the Jews evidently intended to accuse. The Romans dealt with the accusers and the accused face to face. Jesus had not been turned over to the Roman soldiers and been led inside. Pilate has often been praised for being ready so early, for coming outside, etc. These were matters of course with the Romans.

So in demanding the accusation Pilate proceeded as a Roman judge should.

John 18:30

30 But this is the last thing the Sanhedrists desire. They want no retrial of Jesus under a Roman judge; they want Pilate to accept their verdict and on the strength of this verdict to order the execution of Jesus. They answered and said to him, If this were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered him up to thee. The readings vary but have the same meaning: κακοποιός, κακὸνποιήσας, “one who did evil,” and κακὸνποιών, “one who does evil.” The protasis is one of present unreality, and the apodosis one of past unreality. Both are negative in form but strongly positive in substance: Since there is no question about his being an evildoer, we have delivered him up to thee. The demonstration the Sanhedrists were putting on certainly looked as though Jesus must be a terrible criminal.

And yet, if his criminality was so enormous and so unquestionable, why all this demonstration, the appearance of the high priest in persona accompanied by all these other dignitaries? Why not state the charge and the evidence if everything is so terrible and also so assured and let Pilate see for himself? With their negative conditional sentence the Sanhedrists do not state what they want Pilate to do in the case. This they leave entirely to inference. Pilate is to sign the Jewish verdict and to make it his own by ordering the execution of Jesus forthwith. They are the judges, Pilate is to be the executioner.

By their numbers and their great show of certainty the Sanhedrists hope to crowd Pilate into assent.

Their statement implies that the Sanhedrin has tried Jesus and has in due legal form condemned him as a criminal so dangerous that they are now delivering him up to Pilate for immediate execution. To Pilate’s ear the term “evildoer” could mean only one thing, namely that Jesus was a great criminal against the Roman law. This is what the Sanhedrists intend Pilate to understand. But this charge against Jesus and this report of the trial to which the Sanhedrin had subjected him are a barefaced lie. No criminality against Roman law had been even as much as intimated against Jesus at his trial. The death sentence had been pronounced upon him for calling himself the Son of God in the presence of the Sanhedrin, this self-designation being construed by his judges as an utterance of blasphemy.

They had not even attempted to prove that Jesus was not the Son of God. They dared not reveal the facts to Pilate, for he would at once have turned them away from his tribunal. The Romans would never entertain a religious charge that lay outside of Roman law and pertained only to the religious notions of a subject nation. That is why these Sanhedrists come to Pilate with a bold lie. Yet they flatter Pilate. They come to him as recognizing his authority, for are they not delivering Jesus up to him?

Can Pilate ask more of them? These Sanhedrists, however, safeguard themselves in the event that after all Pilate should investigate the case or should insist on something like a trial by himself. By calling Jesus an “evildoer” they make it possible to bring any number of charges against Jesus that would condemn him under Roman law. If they must they will yet prove Jesus guilty under this alien law.

John 18:31

31 Cunning as was the reply of the Jews, Pilate is not deceived. He refuses to play the role of a mere executioner for the verdict of the Sanhedrin. His pride and the sense of official dignity, not merely as a Roman judge, but as the governor and the representative of the emperor, assert themselves. Pilate, therefore, said to them, Take him yourselves and judge him according to your law. The answer of Pilate is more to the point than is sometimes recognized. The Sanhedrists have, indeed, appeared before the tribunal in full force, from which fact he could, and no doubt did, conclude that the Sanhedrin had already tried Jesus.

But their spokesmen had as yet failed to inform Pilate of this important fact. Like other vital points, Pilate is to take also this for granted. He is aware of the omission and therefore acts as though he thinks the Sanhedrists have not yet tried Jesus in their own court. This explains the neutral verb κρίνειν, “to judge,” “to try a case,” which cannot be considered as κατακρίνειν, “to condemn,” “to render the verdict, guilty.”

When Pilate came out and took the seat of the judge he assumed that the Sanhedrists had come as the accusers with Jesus as the accused, and according to Roman procedure he had at once demanded to hear the accusation, holding himself ready to begin the trial in due form. Now, however, Pilate learns that this is not at all the intention of the Sanhedrists. They are not here to have the governor try this “evildoer.” They say that they are delivering him up to Pilate but they fail to say why. This omission also has not escaped Pilate. To be sure, he sees what the Sanhedrists want, but he is certainly right not to accept mere intimations. Pilate, therefore, declines to receive the man delivered up to him in such a manner.

He is ready to act as a Roman judge, namely to hear and to try the case. If this is not what the Jews want, Pilate very properly turns the case back to the Sanhedrists. Let them try the man according to their own law. We find no irony nor mockery in Pilate’s reply. His reference to the law of the Jews is also in order. They are free to try all manner of cases according to their own law, and as yet Pilate has not been informed by them that this case exceeds the jurisdiction of their law.

In other words, the Jews are not frank, hence Pilate keeps to his legal position as governor and judge and just to what these Sanhedrists actually say and no more.

The Jews said to him, For us it is not lawful to put anyone to death. Even now the Jews do not supply the omissions we have noted. Even now Pilate is left to draw certain necessary inferences. All that they say is that the Roman power has deprived them of the right to execute criminals. The jus vitae et necis is reserved for the Roman governor. All that the Jews could inflict was expulsion from the synagogue and scourging with rods up to a certain number of blows.

It was bitter enough for the Sanhedrists to admit what they do under the compulsion of the present circumstances. But now at last they reveal, although still indirectly, what their purpose is in coming to Pilate. Jesus is to be put to death according to the findings of their supreme court, and their court is without legal power to execute anyone. Pilate alone has this power. The fact that Jesus has already been tried by the Jews is only intimated, and the order that they try him is thus represented as being pointless. They are concerned only about the execution of Jesus, and Pilate is to infer that they are delivering Jesus up to him only for the purpose of being executed.

This reply of the Jews indicates that they did not understand Pilate’s word to grant them permission to try Jesus and, if he is found guilty of death, to execute him. They dared not even to misunderstand Pilate’s word to this effect.

John 18:32

32 John adds that the Jews said what they did in order that the word of Jesus might be fulfilled which he spoke signifying the manner of death he was about to die. The word to which John refers he himself at the time marked for us as bearing this sense, namely 12:32, 33. Hence we need not fall back on passages in the synoptists which expressly mention crucifixion. John has the singular “the word,” and the participle σημαίνων, “signify,” and thus is not quoting. See the exposition of 12:33. Like the death itself so also the manner and the form of the death of Jesus were under God’s control.

Jesus was not to suffer death by stoning, crushing, and mutilating his holy head, the death penalty customary among the Jews (Stephen), but by crucifixion, the form of execution used by the Romans for slaves, traitors, and the worst types of criminals. Human prognostication would have surmised that the Jewish rejection of Jesus would result in the Jewish mode of execution; divine prophecy foresaw the reality and foretold that. Thus the Sanhedrists came to say just what Jesus had indicated long before this time. But more must be said. God himself so shaped the course of events that finally, when the Jews had Jesus in their power, they could bring him to death only in this one way. When they sought to stone him they always failed in the attempt, and, if they contemplated secret assassination, they failed also in this.

Providence left only one avenue open when the hour arrived and God was ready to let Jesus lay down his life. The Jews themselves would not have chosen this avenue; they chose it, nevertheless, because they found none other open for their purpose, and because they were determined not to swerve from that purpose.

John 18:33

33 The altercation between Pilate and the Sanhedrists, which led up to the presentation of actual charges against Jesus, is recorded only by John. The Jews were compelled to make charges. Luke 23:2 records them: “We found this fellow perverting the nation, forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, saying that he himself is Christ, a King.” It is thus that John proceeds: Accordingly, Pilate entered again into the Praetorium and called Jesus and said to him, Thou, art thou the king of the Jews? This implies that Pilate takes up the case and proceeds with an actual trial. And this in turn means that, just as Luke 23:2 reports, the Sanhedrists yielded and presented specific charges: 1) that by his activity Jesus had perverted the Jewish nation; 2) that he had forbidden to pay the taxes levied on the Jews by Caesar; 3) that he was proclaiming himself as the King of the Jewish nation. We are astounded to hear these indictments and that the Sanhedrists declare that they “have found” these charges to be facts, i.e., that at their own trial the Sanhedrists had proved these charges against Jesus.

Every word is an absolute lie. These charges are the inventions of the moment, so formulated in order to force a hearing from the Roman governor. Only too well the Sanhedrists know that he would most certainly refuse to entertain such a charge as the one on which they had based their verdict, namely that Jesus said that he was the Son of God. Pagan Rome let the religion of its conquered nations alone. Yet we need not at all be astounded at these Jews—men who plot murder will not scruple about employing lying witnesses at their own trial and lies of their own at the trial under another judge. Those who seek a criminal end are ready to use the necessary criminal means.

Such was the moral state of the Jewish leadership.

Pilate accepts these charges as, indeed, he must. He takes the most direct means for investigating them. He re-enters the Praetorium, orders Jesus inside, and questions him. Until this time Jesus stood where the Jewish police force had halted with him. We have no reason to understand ἐφώνησε to mean that Pilate called Jesus as one who was already inside the building. Not until Pilate had accepted the charges against the prisoner would he accept the prisoner himself.

We may set it down as certain that the officers of the Jews did not lead Jesus into the building. Pilate’s soldiers took him from their hands. Jesus passed over to the jurisdiction of Pilate and the Romans. The supposition that Pilate questioned Jesus in total privacy is without evidence. The Roman manner of conducting trials avoided secrecy. Those who cared to hear were free to hear.

Pilate might have questioned Jesus from his judgment seat outside of the Praetorium, but this would have left the prisoner in the hands of the Jewish police force. Therefore Pilate goes inside and by this move has the prisoner turned over to him. The Sanhedrists might come along to hear for themselves if they desired to hear what defense Jesus would make. The proposition with which they had come to Pilate was not of such a kind as to make him accomodate himself to their unpleasant scruples about defilement any more than was absolutely necessary.

Of the charges preferred against Jesus Pilate selects the main one. He rightly judges that with this one the other two will stand or fall. The Jews charge that Jesus claims to be Christ, “a king.” Cunningly they add the latter term, for Pilate’s mind must understand this in a political sense, as a reference to a king claiming secular power, and thus wanting to be the head of a Jewish rebellion against the authority of the Roman emperor. This is the very kingship Jesus had repudiated (6:15). When at the time of his entry into Jerusalem he allowed himself to be acclaimed “the King of Israel” (12:13), the entire proceeding was without the least political tinge. The Sanhedrists put into Jesus’ own mouth the words “that he himself is Christ, a King,” and that they have established this as a fact at their trial (Luke 23:2).

They make it appear that they are wonderfully loyal to Caesar, quick to render a verdict of death against this Jewish king, only asking of Pilate that he carry out this verdict. Yet we cannot say that Pilate is impressed. He has never before known these Jews to be so loyal; quite the contrary, they submit to Caesar’s taxation only because of Caesar’s power. As the governor of the Jews, Pilate has kept a watchful eye on every movement in the land under his jurisdiction. He has never heard of earthly royal pretensions on the part of Jesus. No reports have come to him that this man was gathering a force to oust the Romans.

What he knew about Jesus—and he must have known something (Matt. 27:19)—was of an entirely different nature. Yet the accusation of the Sanhedrists is positive; they have even heard Jesus say that he is a king. Thus Pilate is compelled to find out the truth in this charge.

It is thus that Pilate asks, “Thou, art thou the king of the Jews?” We see the thought of Pilate and note that he understands the term “king” in a common political sense. He could take the word in no other sense, for the Jews themselves, whose direct charge he is investigating, expect their Messiah to be a grand earthly king. The notion of a spiritual King, the opposite of a secular king, is foreign to their minds. They should have expected such a King, but they certainly did not; and certainly Pilate could have no conception of this kind. The emphasis is on σύ: “Thou, art thou,” etc.? Pilate’s question is tinged strongly with incredulity.

He cannot bring himself to think that this man, humbly clad as he is, arrested alone without adherents or followers, can be making pretensions to earthly royal power. Has the question also a touch of mockery? It seems so. Pilate despised the people over whom he ruled. The personal dignity of Jesus does not seem to have registered with Pilate thus early. Pilate’s opinion of the Jews at first included also this Jew Jesus. “The King of the Jews”—did this Jew think himself to be the Jewish king?

Grand king he would be if he did! Pilate’s mind had quite a different picture of what earthly kings looked like.

The attempt is made to regard John’s account of the trial before Pilate as complete in itself, although throughout his Gospel we see that John presupposes our knowledge of the records of the synoptists. If nothing intervenes between v. 31, 32 and v. 33, the question must be answered as to how Pilate comes to examine Jesus and then how he comes to ask Jesus about his being the king of the Jews. Both points are answered perfectly if we read John in connection with Luke 23:2. Both points are left to our imagination if we fail to do this. Some think that Pilate ordered out the cohort to help arrest Jesus and that thus he knew that Jesus was charged with pretending to be a Ring. If this were the case, the cohort would have been ordered to bring Jesus to Pilate and not to Annas.

A man like Pilate would not turn a reputed Jewish king over to Jews. Some think that Pilate did this nevertheless and therefore arose early, anticipating that the Sanhedrin would bring Jesus to him. Then why does Pilate at first refuse to try Jesus? If he knows the charge against Jesus, why does he demand to hear the charge? Not until we read v. 33 do we see that Pilate has the charge, and, of course, then he takes the case. The weak feature of these explanations is the fact that the Jews plotted to kill Jesus on any pretext they might find.

They tried false witnesses and failed. Not until then did they prefer the charge of blasphemy when Jesus declared himself to be the Son of God. They tried to crowd Pilate into ordering Jesus’ death forthwith and here again they failed. Not until they were compelled to meet Pilate’s demand for charges did the Jews invent their charges, including Jesus’ kingship. And it is thus that Pilate proceeds to try Jesus and asks the question John reports.

John 18:34

34 Jesus answered, Dost thou say this of thyself, or did others say it to thee concerning me? The synoptists, who also report Pilate’s question, follow it with only the final answer of Jesus, which John mentions in v. 37. The fact that this final answer was preceded by additional dialog we learn only from John. By answering as he does Jesus acknowledges Pilate’s authority in general and his right to question him in particular. Here, too, he renders unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, thereby also rendering unto God what is God’s. Pilate probably expected Jesus to say, “I am not!” The synoptists report that Jesus said, “Thou sayest it!” meaning, “I am, indeed, a King!” But we at once see that neither of these two answers is really in place.

Jesus is witnessing a good confession before Pilate, 1 Tim. 6:13. He is not merely dodging the charge of the Jews in order to escape; nor is he admitting the charge, which, as it was made by the Jews, is false. From John we learn that Jesus, like a true witness (8:14) though testifying concerning himself, put Pilate off with no half-truth and left his judge under no misunderstanding. The lying Jews have no scruples in leaving Pilate under the impression that Jesus claims to be a secular king. In this sense Pilate, too, asks this question, and in this sense Jesus might simply deny the allegation. But this would be only half of the truth, and all half-truths are virtual lies, because those who have no more think that they have the whole truth.

In a very real sense Jesus is indeed a king. On the other hand, were Jesus simply to reply to Pilate that he is a king, he would leave Pilate under the impression that Jesus admits the lying allegation of the Jews concerning his secular kingship. The synoptists, who abbreviate the answer of Jesus, at once report that Pilate pronounces the charge of the Jews false, and thus they reveal that Pilate had learned the full truth concerning Jesus’ kingship. John informs us how Pilate obtained the whole truth.

Before replying Jesus asks a question. This is not done because Jesus does not know whether Pilate is asking his question ἀφ’ ἑαυτοῦ, “from himself,” or only on the allegation of ἄλλοι; but because Jesus deems it necessary for Pilate himself to realize clearly that his reference to “the king of the Jews” only echoes the charge of the Jews. Jesus, Pilate is to understand, will shape his reply on the original question accordingly. By asking his question Jesus allows Pilate himself to say what otherwise Jesus would have to state; and it is better for Pilate to assert emphatically that he has in mind only the charge of the Jews than for Jesus to point this out to Pilate. For with their “Christ, a king,” the Jews had in mind a false Christ who was trying to be a common earthly king (like Herod of Galilee); yet Pilate said “the King of the Jews,” which, rightly understood, means, “the true Messianic and eternal king promised to the Jews.” If Pilate had anything like this in mind he would be inserting into his question something “from himself,” something beyond what “others” such as the Jews had told him. Pilate does not intend this, and Jesus makes him say it. For this is the King who Jesus is, and this is what Jesus will make clear to Pilate in a moment.

The question of Jesus is misunderstood when it is regarded as a demand to know who his accusers are, Jesus here using his legal right to make that demand. Such a demand would be an empty gesture. Jesus knows who is accusing him, has heard the accusation with his own ears, and is not trifling with Pilate by asking him a vacuous question. Also the question with its alternatives “of thyself … or others” is not a demand to have the accusers named. A common misconception understands “from thyself” to mean, “Hast thou a personal interest in asking about my kingship?” with the alternative, “Or dost thou ask only as a judge?” Preachers often regard the counterquestion of Jesus in this way and then attach their homiletical applications to this sense. They overlook the fact that it is entirely too early in the contact of Jesus with Pilate for him to try to touch the soul of his judge.

Jesus does this presently, he is not hasty in a matter so vital, by his haste defeating his own end. A third misunderstanding takes “from thyself” to mean: as a Roman would understand the word “a king,” and takes “others” to mean: as the Jews would understand “Christ, a king.” The Roman would think of a secular king, and the Jews of a theocratic king. But the Jews intend that Pilate should think only of a secular king, and that they themselves are not thinking of a theocratic, divine king. What Jesus actually does by his question is that he makes Pilate say that he is asking his question only in the sense intended by the Jews and is adding nothing beyond that sense, nothing emanating “from himself.”

John 18:35

35 This appears from Pilate’s reply. Pilate answered, Am I a Jew? Thine own nation and the high priests did deliver thee up to me. What didst thou do? The first question with its negative interrogative word μήτι is like an exclamation, “Thou certainly dost not suppose that I am a Jew!” The emphasis is on ἐγώ spoken with full Roman pride and with scorn for the predicate “a Jew.” Pilate implies that nobody but a Jew would dream of charging Jesus with wanting to be a king. As little as one would charge Pilate, the haughty Roman governor, with being a Jew, real or pretended, so little, Pilate says, would he, the Roman, think of charging Jesus, this lone captive Jew, with being the Jewish king, real or pretended.

The quick reply of Pilate voices disdainful pride. We are not ready to add that he felt insulted by the question of Jesus. While that question surprised him, he did not resent it or rebuke Jesus.

A Roman like Pilate would not “from himself” investigate any kingship that anyone might attribute to Jesus. The only reason why Pilate makes this investigation is because the own nation of Jesus, together with their chief leaders, the high priests, have with this strange charge delivered Jesus up to Pilate. Pilate uses ἔθνος, “nation” in the secular sense, referring to the entire crowd of Jews assembled before the Praetorium, which became greater every moment. He specifies especially “the high priests,” the entire connection of Caiaphas and Annas, the heads of this “nation,” who ruled it with their limited authority. This plural “high priests” is important for determining that “the high priest” mentioned in v. 15 and the following is Annas. Pilate knew of more than one man who bore the title “high priest.” The aorist παρέδωκαν is frequently used to indicate an action that has just occurred, whereas we prefer the perfect.

Pilate bothers with the present business only because this action of the Jews compels him to do so. And this action, it seems to him, could have been precipitated only by something that Jesus has done. Hence the question, “What didst thou do?” another aorist where the perfect is customary with us.

John 18:36

36 Jesus has cleared the mind of Pilate for understanding the answer he now gives to Pilate’s original question. Jesus answered, The kingship that is mine is not of this world. If the kingship that is mine were of this world, my own underlings would fight that I be not delivered up to the Jews; but now the kingship that is mine is not from hence. The answer is full and complete on the negative side; this negative provokes Pilate to ask for the positive, which he then receives with equal completeness. To Pilate anything like a kingship of Jesus seems incredible; Jesus speaks of his kingship as something that is self-evident. The term βασιλεία may refer to either “kingdom,” the territory or the subjects ruled by a king.

Here the issue is not as to any subjects or any domain that accept Jesus as king, but as to Jesus’ own person, who and what he really is. Moreover, Jesus is the opposite of all earthly kings. They are actual kings because their subjects make them kings; in and of themselves they are not at all kings. Jesus is king with a kingship that is independent of any subjects, with a kingship that inevitably creates its subjects. In this sense Jesus says three times in succession ἡβασιλείαἡἐμή, with emphasis on the possessive adjective: “the kingship that is mine,” over against the kingship that belongs to all other kings. The kingship of Jesus is in a class by itself, in its very nature is infinitely superior to that of all merely secular kings.

The repetitions of this designation compel Pilate to pay attention to the claim of Jesus.

The origin of Jesus’ kingship explains its unique character: it is “not of this world.” Take the whole wide world as it is. It has produced many earthly kings and rulers. They all sprang out of (ἐκ) this world and were kings that corresponded to such an origin. This king Jesus came out of heaven as the Son of God and thus holds a kingship of an entirely different type. It is foolish to place him in the category of secular kings or to rank his kingship with theirs. Pilate was right when, on taking Jesus over from the Jews for trial, he saw nothing resembling earthly kingship in Jesus. He was wrong in concluding that therefore Jesus had no kingship and was in no sense a king.

The plainest kind of proof lies at hand to establish the fact that the kingship inhering in Jesus is not of this world, is not one that clashes with the imperial secular authority of Caesar or of any earthly ruler. If the kingship of Jesus were of this world like that of earthly rulers, Jesus would have what they have, namely ὑπηρέται of his own, a host of men who would uphold him as king, who would fight with earthly weapons to prevent his dethronement by delivery into hostile Jewish hands. The conditional sentence is one of present unreality, εἰ with the imperfect plus the imperfect with ἄν, R. 1015. Pilate sees that Jesus was delivered up to the Jews who in turn delivered him up to Pilate. Where are the underlings of Jesus that rallied around him, who fought or are now fighting in his behalf? Has Pilate heard of a fighting force that was gathered by Jesus?

Have the Jews dared to charge that he assembled such a force? The proof is utterly plain: Jesus is not a king of this kind. The ἵνα clause is subfinal, introducing the purport or object rather than the purpose, R. 993. With a logical (not temporal) νῦν Jesus states the evident conclusion: “but now the kingship that is mine is not from hence.”

By declining to interpret ἡβασιλεία as “the kingdom,” we are relieved of trying to explain what Pilate could have understood by this kingdom that is “not of this world.” In the positive part of Jesus’ answer (v. 37), which merely presents the other side, we see that Jesus does not speak of his kingdom, namely his subjects, but of himself as king, describing just what his kingship is. As regards the ὑπηρέται, some have thought that Jesus refers to the angels, the twelve legions that would come at his command; but this is untenable, for if Jesus were a mere earthly king, how could he have an army of heavenly warriors at his command? What Jesus says is that earthly kings have earthly defenders, as Caesar has his Praetorian guards in Rome, as the Sanhedrin has its police force, as even Pilate has his soldier cohort. Nor can Jesus have in mind disciples, either the eleven or his adherents in general. These men were attached to him spiritually as their spiritual king. In the conditional sentence Jesus speaks only of what would be the case if he were a common earthly king.

He is speaking hypothetically: if he were an earthly king (but he is not) he would have earthly defenders (but he has none whatever). When the disciples and Peter tried to assume that role, they were promptly squelched.

John 18:37

37 Pilate, therefore, said to him, So, then, thou art a king? With οὗν John indicates that Pilate’s question results from Jesus’ reply. On οὑκοῦν, igitur, without negative force (hence not non igitur, or in questions nonne igitur) see R. 1165, 1175; it is found only here in the New Testament. The question shows that Pilate understands what Jesus has said and also that he is satisfied that the Jewish charge of pretending to earthly or political kingship is false. Yet Jesus frankly and even emphatically claims a certain kind of kingship, one that is entirely new to this Roman pagan. Pilate is well satisfied regarding the negative feature of this kingship, with the fact that it is “not of this world.” But what, then, is this kingship if it is “not of this world”?

Pilate asks for a positive explanation which Jesus also proceeds to furnish. The question of Pilate contains a note of surprise. So after all there is something in the Jewish charge which denominates this prisoner as “a king.” He sees through the Jewish falsification which seeks to make Jesus a secular king. But this leaves him curious to know what kind of a king he really is, or rather what this peculiar claim of Jesus to kingship signifies. The question has a touch of incredulity, for a kingship “not of this world” is a total novelty to Pilate. Some would add a tinge of mockery; but this is unwarranted, for σύ is now put at the end of the question, and while it is still emphatic, it is not like the σύ in the first question.

Pilate, moreover, drops the specific designation “the king of the Jews” and uses only the general term “a king,” i.e., some kind of a king, wondering what this may be.

Jesus answered: Thou sayest that I am a king. I for my part have been born to this end and have come into the world to this end that I testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice. Jesus affirms that he is, indeed, a king. Pilate has understood correctly. We must translate ὅτι, “that,” introducing what Pilate says, not “because,” for the reason that Jesus is a king does not move Pilate to ask what he does.

Jesus repeats Pilate’s statement about his being a king in order to emphasize that fact, just as he thrice spoke of his kingship. The statement has no ἐγώ at the end, needing no such emphasis, as also the best texts show. The form of affirmation here used, “Thou sayest,” etc., is idiomatic (Matt. 27:11; Mark 15:2; Luke 23:3; Matt. 26:64). The synoptists also report this answer of Jesus as they do the reply to the original question of Pilate in v. 33. They omit what John tells us intervened.

Jesus now states fully and clearly just what kind of a king he is. The pronoun ἐγώ is full of majesty; “I for my part” in contrast with all others who ever have been termed kings. He uses two verbs: “have been born,” “have come into the world.” These perfects have the usual meaning: having been born and having come, Jesus is now here. Jesus was born a king, he has not usurped his kingship, he is most legitimately the king that he is. He speaks of his incarnation. But he must say more.

Also many earthly kings are born to the throne, inheriting their earthly kingship in a legitimate earthly way by right of succession. By being born Jesus “has come into the world.” This is not a mere synonym for having been born, nor a figurative expression for assuming his office. “I have come into the world” is never used by Jesus in such a sense. Nor is the sense merely that the world is the place or the theater into which Jesus has come to exercise his kingship. “I have come” goes back of “I have been born”; it declares the pre-existence of Jesus. From another world he came into this world, from heaven to this earth (16:28). He might have said, “I was sent”; but this would imply a Sender, namely the Father. The Jews would understand that since they had the revelation of the Father and the promise of the Father to send them his Son.

Pilate is a pagan who knows nothing about these promises. Then, too, kings are not sent, for they are themselves supreme unless, like Herod, they be only inferior kings, subject to an emperor. So Jesus says, “I have come” by will and act of my own as behooves a supreme king, to say nothing of a king who is the very Son of God. Yet we must hold to the strong reference to the human nature of Jesus in his kingship. He has come and has entered this world by having been born a man. He is the king for us, not merely according to his divine nature, but according to both natures, which are joined in his person.

By his birth he made himself the king. “King” is always used in a soteriological sense.

The phrase εἰςτοῦτο, “to this end,” is repeated and thus made emphatic. The appositional ἵνα. clause states what this end or object is: “that I testify to the truth”; this clause is not final, “that I should testify,” etc. While abstract nouns like ἀλήθεια may or may not have the article in the Greek, we should lose the meaning of Jesus if we here referred τῇἀληθείᾳ to truth in general. Jesus has not come to make known to us any and every truth or reality; he has not come only in a general way to declare true things. His work is to bring to us that specific truth which he saw and heard with his Father, the truth we need for our salvation, 14:6; 17:17. It is summarized in 3:16, and in 17:3.

When Jesus says that he testifies of this truth, this testifying is one that accords with his person as coming from heaven to earth. His is the original and thus fundamental divine testimony (1:18). Also others testify, but their testimony rests on that of Jesus. The aorist subjunctive denotes testifying that is fully accomplished; his testimony has left nothing to be added later.

The combination of “a king” and the work of testifying has caused some to think that Jesus here turns from his royal work to his prophetic work, or that he combines the prophet and the teacher with the king. Then efforts are made to justify Jesus for doing this. But Jesus keeps to his kingship. As the king of salvation he rules by means of his Word, and his Word is truth (17:17). His Word imparts knowledge, but his Word is always power, and that makes it tally with kingship; see the power of this Word in 5:21–29; Rom. 1:16; etc. Even the judgment is exercised through the Word, 12:48.

A strange king, indeed, in the eyes of a man like Pilate—covered with the majesty, the power, the triumphant glory of the truth! The Jews, indeed, had lied in making Pilate think that Jesus pretended to be a common king. That he was not. But what was he? Jesus opened an entirely new world to Pilate. Would Pilate be drawn into that wondrous world?

Jesus lays hold of Pilate’s heart. The hour of grace has come for Pilate, the blessed hour when the King of grace draws his heart, yet a fatal hour if that King’s grace is spurned. Jesus uses the third person, “Everyone who is of the truth.” This is perfect psychology. When unbelievers are to be won, an address in the second person often calls forth resentment. But who can resent a statement in the third person which simply holds up to the heart the picture of blessedness revealed in the believer? Some regard “everyone who is of the truth” as a description of a special class of men: those who by nature are better than others, who by a better use of their own natural and unregenerate powers have a love, desire, or affinity for truth, i.e., truth in general.

These are often termed “truth-seekers.” The supposition is that when the King of the Truth comes to them, they quickly accept him while the other great class, not caring for the truth, turns from him. Our own daily experience contradicts this supposition. The malefactor on Calvary, the publicans, the harlots, and the sinners were no “truth-seekers” but the very opposite; and yet Jesus won them. “The truth” is not shaped and fashioned by God to grip only a certain class of men but is designed for all men alike. All men are totally depraved (Eph. 2:12), all are equally lost, all need the same quickening, for all are alike spiritually dead (Eph. 2:1–9). These “truth-seekers” are as hard to win as the open and gross sinners against the moral law. Not before the saving truth reaches a man can it be seen whether he is “of the truth” but only after the truth has come to him.

And “to be of the truth” means to believe the truth Jesus has brought to him. Nor is ἐκ partitive in this connection; while it differentiates between those who are of the truth and those who are not of the truth, ἐκ denotes origin and thus only does it differentiate. To be “of the truth” refers to the same divine saving truth of which Jesus says that he has come to bring it with his testimony; we even again have the article.

Just as ὤν is timeless in this general proposition, so is the present ἀκούει, “he hears my voice” (10:16). Thus to hear is to believe; and thus to hear and to believe is to be of the truth. Jesus says, “he hears my voice.” Not only does his voice sound forth nothing but “the truth,” his voice is characteristic of his person. No one else has a voice like that of Jesus. When his voice sounds, we know that it is he and thus rush to his side. From the voices of all others the sheep flee (10:5). Compare 6:68, 69, and 8:43–45; also 3:6 as explaining 3:20, 21 and 8:47.

John 18:38

38 Pilate sensed what Jesus was attempting to do for his heart. Pilate says to him, What is truth? He says nothing further about Jesus’ kingship, nor does he dwell on other points of Jesus’ reply. He centers on the essential point “truth.” If, however, Pilate had asked in reply, “What is the truth?” he would have asked Jesus to tell him what he meant by the specific truth of which he was speaking. Pilate is not seeking to learn about this truth, nor, in fact, about any religious truth whatever, and thus he omits the article. Note that τί is the predicate (R. 411) and asks about the essence of the concept “truth” (R. 736).

But the tone is that of an indifferent worldling who by his question intends to say that anything in the nature of religious truth is a useless speculation. Some think that Pilate pitied Jesus because he endangered his life for the sake of such a hopeless thing as trying to propound anything like religious truth. Others think that Pilate’s question was a sneer. He may have shrugged his shoulders as he arose to leave. He does not sneer, his word is not one of contempt, for the sequel shows too plainly that Pilate was deeply impressed by Jesus. His word is simply that of the practical pagan skeptic.

The educated Roman world had many men of this type. They had no faith in their own gods although they continued the usual idolatrous rites. They were inwardly indifferent, cold, and haughty and adjusted themselves to an immoral world with an eye only to what they might selfishly squeeze out of such opportunities as it offered. The educated Pilate clan is still very numerous. When the divine truth and its heavenly King face them, they see nothing that they desire. Pilate, however, is not one of the worst type.

While he thrusts Jesus from his heart he does not fight him and his truth as so many of these worldly skeptics do.

And having said this, he again went out to the Jews and says to them, For my part I find no indictment in his case. Pilate awaits no answer on the part of Jesus regarding the truth he mentions in his question. He has heard enough to convince him that the Jewish charge against Jesus is baseless. So he breaks off the conversation abruptly and proceeds with the business in hand. He goes out to confront the Jews. Some think that he left Jesus inside and had him brought out later; but it was the Roman custom to confront the prisoner with his accusers.

Jesus was led out behind Pilate. Resuming the seat of judgment outside, Pilate delivers, his judicial finding. He acquits Jesus. The emphatic ἐγώ is in contrast with the Jews, and αἰτία is like our “indictment,” charging that a crime has been committed. See also 19:4. The phrase ἐναὑτῷ = in his case, R. 587, 6.

But this is all that Pilate does. He stops short and does not order the release of Jesus, giving him the necessary protection; he does not order the crowd of Jews to leave the premises and, if necessary, drive them away by ordering out the cohort. Here is the first fatal flaw in the action of Pilate.

Thus far John has supplemented the synoptists, but now he lets us follow their accounts, touching only briefly the incident with regard to Barabbas. At this point, then, we must insert the renewal of the Jewish accusations with excessive vehemence. Jesus, even on Pilate’s appeal to him, remains silent to the astonishment of Pilate. Hearing of Galilee, he sends Jesus to Herod who returns him without furnishing Pilate any relief. Summing up his own and Herod’s finding, Pilate offers to chastise Jesus and to let him go, Luke 23:13–16.

John 18:39

39 At this point Mark 15:6–8 helps us. New crowds augmented those already congregated before the Praetorium. Among them must have been many friends of Jesus, and these reminded Pilate of the annual custom of releasing a Jewish prisoner at the time of the Passover festival. This reminder made Pilate drop his proposal to scourge Jesus and thus to let him go. He saw an opportunity to effect the release of Jesus by way of this old custom. Here we insert what John now adds: But you have a custom that I release one to you at the Passover.

Are you willing, therefore, that I release to you the King of the Jews? Mark 15:8 shows that the multitude reminded Pilate of this custom, and, therefore, those are in error who think that Pilate bethought himself of this custom. Pilate had always followed it; in the spurious passage, Luke 23:17, it is called a necessity although it is John who informs us that it was followed only at the time of the Passover feast. How far back this custom dates, and how it originated, is not known. Perhaps it dates back as far as the era of the Maccabees. The release of a condemned prisoner was probably intended to symbolize the release of ancient Israel from its Egyptian bondage.

We have no reason to assume that the usual procedure was not followed in the present instance. The governor would nominate two candidates for release, and the people would choose one of the two. This Pilate now does, naming as the two candidates Barabbas and Jesus, Matt. 27:17. But in this case Pilate does more than simply to submit the choice to the Jews; he indicates the choice he desires the Jews to make, as we see from both Mark 15:9, and from John. After nominating the two candidates, Pilate asks whether the Jews are willing that he release their king to them. On the paratactic use of βούλεσθεὀπολύσω (most probably an aorist subjunctive) without a connective see R. 980, 935.

All the evangelists name Barabbas, which is a patronymic: “Son of Abba,” and “Abba” is most probably the honorable title of the father, a scribe or a rabbi, who was called “Abba” or “Father.” This ignoble son of a worthy father is selected by Pilate as the extreme opposite of Jesus in order that the Jews may surely choose Jesus for release. The reading “Jesus Barabbas” must be rejected together with the assumption that Pilate thought of Barabbas because he, too, had the name Jesus, and that thus one Jesus was pitted against another Jesus. We likewise decline the play on “Barabbas,” “Son of the Father,” and on the designation of Jesus as the Son of the Father, since the Scriptures in no way indicate that such a contrast is intended. Barabbas is merely named as other persons are named for us in the sacred record.

Pilate did Jesus the gravest injustice by nominating him along with Barabbas. Only convicted and condemned criminals were thus nominated, and Pilate himself had twice declared that he was able to find no indictment against Jesus. How, then, could he make such a nomination? The injustice began when Pilate after his first examination of Jesus (v. 38b) failed to release him as being guiltless. The injustice grew with every act that followed. Pilate was no longer functioning as a judge, dispensing justice, but as a weakling who finds himself cornered and caught and is ready to employ any and every means to escape.

By nominating Jesus as one of the pair he would be willing to release Pilate calls Jesus “the king of the Jews” just as he did in questioning Jesus (v. 33). Why does he use this title when he himself had learned from Jesus that Jesus was in no sense what Pilate and the Jews understood this to mean? When answering this question we must not overlook the mocking acclaim of the Roman soldiers in 19:3, Pilate’s mocking repetition of it in 19:14, 15, and the superscription Pilate placed on the cross, 19:19. Pilate uses this title to mock and to insult the Jews, especially the high priests and the Sanhedrists. The mockery is the more bitter and cuts to the quick because the Jews would love to be under a king of their own in complete independence of Rome; because Pilate knew that the Jewish leaders were envious and jealous of Jesus (Matt. 27:18; Mark 15:10), fearing to lose their prestige when so many of the people flocked to Jesus (11:48a); and because Jesus, standing bound and helpless between Roman guards, seemed a pitiful figure to be called a king. The keenness of the mockery lies also in the fact that Pilate’s offer sounds as though by granting the Jews the opportunity to have their king released, he is doing them a wonderful favor.

He practically says, “Do you not want your own king?”

But is Pilate not defeating his own end? He wants to release Jesus, he puts up the worst kind of a criminal as the alternate choice for release, he is sure that, restricted to the choice between these two, Jesus will be chosen. Why, then, does Pilate dose his offer with insult and mockery? Because Pilate is not only a weakling but also a fool. Throughout the means he uses to secure his end, though they seem shrewd and wise to him, only convince the Jews that presently Pilate will surrender to their will. Despising the Jews to begin with, he despises them to the utmost because of their undertaking to rid themselves of Jesus by making the governor their tool.

His vast pride, lacking the necessary courage to assert itself against the humiliation put upon it by these Jews, boils with inner resentment and anger. He is unable to check his tongue. He strikes back if only with a word; and the blow, wholly ineffectual, only marks him as what he is. Because of his past crimes and misdeeds, subject to denunciation before Caesar by these Jews, he now feels powerless and vents his helpless spite. Blind to all but the one effect of his word, namely to insult the Jewish leaders, he lets his tongue speak the words, “the king of the Jews.” And yet he thinks that Barabbas cannot possibly be chosen, at least not by the Jewish populace, so many of whom are certainly friendly to Jesus. Yes, he will give them Jesus, he will defeat these Jewish leaders, he will make them take Jesus off his hands as what they themselves called him, “a king”—“the king of the Jews”!

John 18:40

40 The choice was the prerogative of the people as such, not of the high priests or of the Sanhedrin in its official capacity. Hence a delay ensued which enabled the crowd to become united on the choice. Here we may insert the disquieting message sent by Pilate’s wife, Matt. 27:19. Quick action follows on the part of the Jewish leaders. They and their minions circulate through the crowd, throwing all their weight and their influence into the demand that Barabbas be chosen. Matt. 27:20.

When presently Pilate demands what the choice is, they, therefore, shouted again, saying, Not this one but Barabbas! Both Luke and John use strong verbs; a roar of voices unanimously calls for Barabbas. From Luke we learn that not even a small minority pleaded for Jesus or dissented from the choice of Barabbas. “Again” refers to the previous shouting which demanded that Pilate release a prisoner. This adverb plainly shows that John has in mind Mark 15:8, and that he is making only the briefest reference to the present episode of Barabbas. Because of the imperative idea in the shout we have μή as the negative, R. 1172, 1173. Jesus is not as much as named.

This Jewish crowd will not as much as sully its lips with the use of his name.

We may marvel at the fact that the entire crowd so readily did the bidding of the Sanhedrists. They were ruled by fear (7:13; 9:22; with which combine 19:38; 20:19). Fear sealed the lips of any who shrank from outright obedience. Perhaps the derogatory τοῦτον only echoes the designation the Sanhedrists applied to Jesus when belaboring the crowd to choose Barabbas. Pilate is dumbfounded. This was the last thing he expected.

He commits the further folly of arguing with the crowd, helplessly asking what he shall do with Jesus. He only provokes the crowd to cry, “Crucify, crucify him!” and to keep this up until he entirely capitulates. Luther, “But they would rather have begged for the devil to go free.” “But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you; and killed the Prince of Life, whom God hath raised from the dead,” Acts 3:14, 15. Pilate releases Barabbas, he has no alternative; Jesus is still left on his hands. The situation is really more desperate than ever for Pilate.

In a parenthetical remark, indicated as such by δέ, John adds: Now Barabbas was a robber. We feel the tragic note. Such a man the Jewish nation, represented by its leaders and a concourse of the ordinary people, chose in place of Jesus! Yet, whom they chose, his they were. By this choice they murdered Jesus and made themselves true moral brothers of the murderer Barabbas. John’s word is an understatement, for Barabbas was worse than a robber, namely a murderer, Mark 15:7, and an exceptional one at that, Matt. 27:16.

R. A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, by A. T. Robertson, fourth edition.

B.-D. Friedrich Blass’ Grammatik des neutestamentlichen Griechisch, vierte, voellig neugearbeitete Auflage besorgt von Albert Debrunner.

M.-M. The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament, by James Hope Moulton and George Milligan.