John 18

John 18:1-40

The Gospel According to John John 18:1-40 - John 19:1-16 John 18:1-27. This is the first of our last seven studies in the Gospel according to John. The seven of them will deal with the final section of John’s writing from the standpoint of his own scheme. Now everything is climacteric. Chapters eighteen, nineteen, twenty, and twenty-one give us the story of the ultimate Sign. As we have followed the narrative along the line of our Lord’s public ministry, we have seen sixteen signs, eight of them in the realm of works, eight of them in the realm of words.

Now we reach what I have already described as the ultimate Sign. For the interpretation of that designation we go back to chapter two, where we have the account of our Lord going up to Jerusalem, and cleansing the Temple. In connection with that He was challenged, “What sign showest Thou unto us, seeing that Thou doest these things?” They asked Him for a sign that would demonstrate His authority for the things He was doing. To that He replied in what to them must have been mysterious language. John tells us immediately after recording His answer, that the disciples did not understand Him then, but they came to understand Him afterwards. He said, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” On another occasion, not recorded by John, Jesus said, “An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet; for as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the fish; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” On both these occasions our Lord declared that the only sign which would completely and finally reveal Him and the secret of His authority, would be that to which He referred at first as their destroying of the temple which He would raise; and on the other occasion, taking the similitude of Jonah’s story, declaring that He would be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

In other words, our Lord declared at the beginning, and again on one definite occasion at least, that the ultimate sign of His authority would be His death and His resurrection. He named the two things which, in their merging, would constitute the sign, the ultimate sign, the dissolution of the temple of His body at the hands of His enemies; and His raising of it again. Death and resurrection.

These last four chapters then, eighteen to twenty-one, have to do with these two things. It may be well to survey the whole scheme. In the first eleven verses of chapter eighteen (John 18:1-11) we have the prelude, the story of the garden and the betrayal. Beginning at the twelfth verse of chapter eighteen, and running over to the sixteenth verse of chapter nineteen, we have the account of two trials, the religious and the political; before the priests and before Pilate. In chapter nineteen, in a few verses, seventeen to thirty-seven (John 19:17-37), we have the story of the crucifixion. In what remains of the chapter, beginning at the thirty-eighth verse, and running through the forty-second (John 19:38-42), a very brief paragraph, we have the story of the burial of the dead body of Jesus. Then in chapters twenty and twenty-one we see the risen Jesus.

In these first twenty-seven verses of chapter eighteen (John 18:1-27) we have two movements; first the betrayal in the garden; and then, the trial before the priests.

How then do we see our Lord in this story of the garden? There are two things that are supremely evident; first His majesty, and then His meekness.

Let us look first at the things that mark His majesty. John is careful to tell us where this took place, and that in an arresting and beautiful way. “When Jesus had spoken these words, He went forth with His disciples over the winter torrent of the Cedars, where was a garden, into which He entered.” Mark that word “entered.” It was undoubtedly a private garden, into which Jesus had the right of entry. It was not a public place.

“Now Judas also, which betrayed Him, knew the place.” It is possible to be familiar with the Most Holy Places, and do the most damnable deeds. He knew the place. “For Jesus oft-times resorted thither with His disciples.” That is to say that Jesus often gathered there with His disciples. Thus it was familiar ground to which He went.

It is evident then that when our Lord had ended His prayer, He did not hide. He went to a place where He knew Judas could find Him. With majesty He was moving forward. He had ordered Judas, a little while before, to be quick about the business, when He said to him in the upper room, “That thou doest, do quickly.” Then Jesus, when He had done with the group round about Him, went to the garden, knowing that Judas knew where He was going. “Judas then, having received the band of soldiers,” that is a cohort, a whole company of Roman soldiers. His enemies were determined to settle the business for ever. Their obtaining of a cohort undoubtedly suggested that they anticipated trouble in the arrest of Jesus. They took with them also “officers from the chief priests,” that is, the Temple police. John names “the chief priests and the Pharisees.” The chief priests were not Pharisees; they were Sadducees. Thus two bitterly opposed parties, theologically and politically, were united in their determination to put an end to Jesus.

They came “with lanterns and torches and weapons” notwithstanding the fact that the paschal moon was riding high in the heavens. They thought He might be lurking and hiding somewhere, and might offer resistance.

Now mark the majesty of these next four verses. “Jesus therefore, knowing all the things that were coming upon Him, went forth.” That statement is full of significance, bearing out and emphasizing the fact that the pathway of Jesus to His Cross was not the pathway of a Victim. All the way He knew all that was coming to Him. Perfectly familiar with it all, He “went forth,” went forth in majesty, never more majestic than when His eyes were set upon His Cross.

This statement that “He went forth” means that He left the garden. He went forth from it. He went outside.

There and then happened a remarkable thing, which was a supreme evidence of His majesty. He faced them. He said, “Whom seek ye?” They said, “Jesus the Nazarene.” He then said, “I am.” Our versions render it “I am He.” Quite literally He simply said, “I am.” When He did so, a cohort of Roman soldiers, the Temple police, the rulers themselves, Judas guiding them, went backwards and fell to the ground. Some burst of majesty halted them. There may have been the emerging of something we cannot interpret, a flaming of glory. I think rather that something in the mien of Jesus as He stood confronting His enemies caused their shrinking and fall.

They could not lay a hand on Him. Right to the very margin He revealed the fact referred to again and again, as we have seen in the process of the Gospel, that no man could lay hands upon Him until His hour was come. His hour had now come, but even now, all the cohort and the police of the Temple and the elders were powerless of themselves to lay any hand on Him. “I am,” He said, and they went backwards, and fell. Thus the majesty of Jesus was revealed.

Then He said to them a second time, “Whom seek ye?” And they repeated themselves, “Jesus the Nazarene.” Said He, “I told you that I am; if therefore ye seek Me, let these go their way.” A beautiful merging of His mercy and of His majesty. He knew perfectly well that if they were arrested, they would all break down even more swiftly and terribly. So He said, Let them go; take Me alone.

Then Simon drew his sword and struck a blow for Jesus. I like Simon. He had got something in him. I know it was wrong. It was honest zeal, but it was zeal without knowledge. The other evangelists record that the last act of supernatural and Divine surgery wrought by Jesus was rendered necessary by the blundering zeal of a disciple.

I sometimes think that our Lord is still often healing wounds that zeal-without-knowledge people make on other souls. What said our Lord? “Put up the sword into the sheath; the cup which the Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it?” That was zeal with knowledge. Simon did not understand, and struck a blow. It was a poor blow. When a man unsheathes his sword, and aims at a man’s head, and only gets his ear, it is a poor business. It was zeal, but he was nervous when he struck that blow.

That is not the way, said Jesus. “The cup which the Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it?” And so Gethsemane is seen in John, although he does not tell the story. From other evangelists we know He had been talking to His Father about the cup. “If it be possible, let this cup pass away from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.” There was shrinking, and yet complete fellowship with His Father’s will. Now, John shows the result of that. “The cup that the Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it?” Simon’s was zeal without knowledge. That of Jesus was zeal with knowledge,-“the zeal of Thine house hath eaten Me up” said the prophetic writing long before, knowing all that was coming upon Him. This cup that I am pressing to My lips, so potent and so bitter, that no human soul will ever understand it, shall I not drink it? This was the word of an ultimate majesty, and the revelation of complete meekness.

Then they bound Him. I never read it without laughing. Yes they bound Him, and see how many it took to do it; the band, and the council, and the chief captain, he is specially named, and all the police. They rushed at Him, and they bound Him. They bound Him? They thought they bound Him. What did bind Him? Love for me! Love for you I That was what bound Him; not the hempen cords of those foolish men, but the eternal cords of the Divine Love.

Still they bound Him, and they took Him to Annas. John only gives an account of the arraignment of Jesus before Annas, which was quite a preliminary matter. He tells us in the twenty-fourth verse (John 18:24) that Annas bound Him again, and sent Him to Caiaphas. John omits entirely the account of our Lord’s examination before Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim, recorded by Matthew and Mark. At verse twenty-eight (John 18:28) we read, “They led Jesus therefore from Caiaphas into the palace.” Thus omitting the appearing before Caiaphas, and the Sanhedrim, John gives the story of the preliminary arraignment of Jesus.

In many ways Annas was one of the most remarkable personalities flung up in Judaism at that time. Five of his sons occupied the high-priestly office. In the line of succession, Annas should have been high priest, but on some political ground, Rome objected to him, but consented that Caiaphas his son-in-law should be appointed. Annas probably was not eager to occupy the position of high priest. He was making money too fast. He had become one of the wealthiest men of the time by extortion. He had retained, some believe, his position as president of the Sanhedrim. At any rate he was so much in power, that when they arrested Jesus, they took Him first to the house of Annas.

Two of the disciples of Jesus went as far as that house. One of them went into the court, that is, the open space in front of Annas’ house. That one unquestionably was John the writer of the story. The other was Peter. The rest of the disciples seem by now to have gone. John went right in. Peter halted at the gate, and stood outside. It is at least suggestive that the man who went right in was not molested. The molestation of Peter began as he halted outside. John seems to have felt that his co-apostle was in danger, for when he got in, he remembered Peter was outside, and went to the door, and spoke to the girl in charge of the door, and she let Peter in.

I wonder why John told us it was cold that night. At that season of the year, the nights were hardly ever cold. But John says it was cold that night. I wonder if it was not the chill of fear, dread, apprehension: of the things that were happening. Peter was cold, and he stopped to warm himself at a fire built by the enemies of Jesus. A very dangerous thing to do. If any try to get warmth from fires built by His enemies, they are in danger.

The formal interrogatory before Annas was brief. Annas asked Him concerning His disciples and His teaching. It is self-evident that he was hoping to get our Lord to declare Himself, His ideals and His purposes and His teaching, and to name His disciples, and show how far they were infected or affected by His teaching. He was looking for something upon which he could fasten, in order to prefer a charge against Jesus, which would bring Him within the power of the authorities who could deal with Him, and put Him to death. This was not an enquirer, wanting to know. This was an enemy, hoping there in the flush of the morning to bring Jesus within the grip of the government.

The question was probably most courteously asked. In effect, Annas said, Tell us what is it all about? What is Your teaching? And what are You and Your disciples attempting to do? Our Lord answered in majesty and in anger. There is no question about the anger in this. That is proven by the action of the officer who struck Him. It was the tone in which He spoke which provoked the act. In what He said, the emphasis was on the personal pronoun. The “I” is emphatic. “I have spoken openly to the world; I ever taught in the synagogues, and in the Temple, where all the Jews come together; and in secret spake I nothing.” The declaration was a contrast between His method, and that of His enemies.

A secret plotting against Him had been going forward, of which He was aware. He said, Why do you ask? You know. Or, if you do want to know, ask these who are all round about Me. I have spoken in public, I have spoken openly; I have not been having secret meetings; I have not been plotting against any earthly government. All I have done is in the open.

Because of the anger manifest in this reply an officer said, “Answerest Thou the high priest so?” Mark the “so.” He was rebuking Annas, and the officer smote Him. He did not answer the officer concerning the method of His speech, but, again referring to all His teaching, all that which He said had been spoken openly, He said, “If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil; but if well, why smitest thou Me?”

It was over. Annas had no more to say. The next thing was to bind Him again, and to send Him to Caiaphas.

Simon Peter was still standing there, warming himself, and they came to him again. The first denial had taken place when a saucy servant maid had taunted him. Now they came again, asking him, “Art thou also one of His disciples?” He denied. But “one of the servants of the high priest, being a kinsman of him whose ear Peter cut off, saith, Did not I see thee in the garden with Him?” Peter denied again. John did not tell us about the cursing and swearing. That was recorded by others, especially in the story of Mark, for which Peter himself was responsible.

John tells us of the tragedy, he “denied again; and straightway the cock crew.” Neither does he tell about the look of Jesus. He leaves it there. It is a tragic story. Zeal without knowledge struck a blow, and then weakened, wavered, and three times over, before the flush of morning was upon the sky, said, he did not know Him, did not belong to Him. I read it with fear. “Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed, lest he fall.” John 18:28-40 - John 19:1-16. As we saw in our last meditation, John gives us the account of our Lord’s arraignment before Annas, and tells that Annas sent Him bound to Caiaphas. He omits altogether the story of the examination before Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim, and resumes at the point where they sent Him to Pilate, after the Sanhedrim had sentenced Him to death. “They led Jesus therefore from Caiaphas into the palace.”

This is a most graphic story. The scene is the Praetorium, which undoubtedly was the residence of Pilate, and there he held court. As we read, we find the scene alternating between the outside and the inside of the Praetorium. There are seven movements. The first things recorded took place outside, and are recorded in verses twenty-eight to thirty-two of chapter eighteen (John 18:28-32). In verses thirty-two to the first sentence in verse thirty-eight (John 18:32-38) we are inside.

From the rest of verse thirty-eight to forty (John 18-38-40) we are outside. In the nineteenth chapter in the first three verses (John 19:1-3) we are inside. In verses four to seven (John 19:4-7) we are outside. In verses eight to eleven (John 19:8-11) we are inside. In verses twelve to sixteen (John 19:12-16) we are outside. The whole story is that of Jesus and Pilate, with a background of priests and rulers and a rabble.

Here we have the Gentile world as represented in the person of Pilate, confronting Jesus. Pilate was the embodiment of the Roman Empire; all its might and all its majesty were vested in him as an executive. All the way through the question about Jesus is a question of Kingship. Everything revolves around that. Three times over Pilate went inside the Praetorium, taking Jesus with him, leaving the crowd outside. These two are seen confronting each other.

The priestly trials were over, the arraignment before Annas, and the examination before Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim. Religion had decided to kill Jesus, and now the civil trial goes forward. We see Jesus no longer in the presence of religion, but of government.

The first movement, outside the Praetorium, is revealed in verses twenty-eight to thirty-two. In that first movement Pilate put an official question to the men who brought Jesus to him. They had made up their minds that Jesus must die. That is why they brought Him to Pilate. They were anxious that they should not be ritually defiled, so as to prevent them eating the Passover. Therefore they did not enter the Praetorium.

Jesus had spoken of straining at a gnat, and swallowing a camel. That is what they were doing. Pilate’s question was in legal form. These Jewish rulers had brought a prisoner before him. His was the official court of appeal in all these matters. He represented the Roman Empire, and he asked them, “What accusation bring ye against this Man?” Sometimes it is possible to discover the tone in which a question is asked by the answer that is given to it.

So here. They replied, “If this Man were not an evil-doer we should not have delivered Him up unto thee.” What made them say that? Pilate had a perfect right to ask. Their reply shows that the question was one of contempt and scorn for them. As though he had said, What now? What accusation do you bring against this Man?

What is the meaning of this coming to me? He had not yet come face to face with Jesus. That was the spirit of Pilate as he met them. This cold, dispassionate Roman procurator, a remarkable personality, a freed slave, rising to a position of power through the influence of the emperor’s mother and wife, was impatient with these priests and rulers, and this troublesome mob of Jews. Angrily they replied, “If this Man were not an evil-doer, if He were not a malefactor, we should not have delivered Him up unto thee.”

Pilate therefore said, “Take Him yourselves, and judge Him according to your law.” In other words, he refused to consider the accusation; he refused to take the case. Then the Jews said, “It is not lawful for us to put any man to death.” Pilate saw at once that the thing was more serious than he had understood. He discovered that what they sought was not an investigation, but a sentence, that they had brought Jesus there, determined upon His death. They would not have brought Him there had they not themselves at the time been deprived of the power to inflict the death penalty. They had gone as far as they could. They had had their interrogatory in the house of Annas, and before Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim. They considered Him to be worthy of death; and now they came to Pilate because, while they could pronounce a sentence, they could not carry it into effect. Pilate thus discovered that these people had not come to him to investigate an accusation, but to promulgate a sentence.

The second movement in verses thirty-three to thirty-eight took place inside. The priests and the crowd were left out. “Pilate therefore entered again into the Praetorium, and called Jesus, and said unto Him, Art Thou the King of the Jews?” While it was an interrogation, the form of the sentence in the Greek is arresting. “Thou art the King of the Jews?” The emphatic word is “Thou,” and is placed first, as Pilate said it. He said, “Thou art the King of the Jews?” Quite evidently he knew the accusation they were bringing against Him, although he had asked them for an official statement of it. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all tell us that these were the first words of Pilate to Jesus. Face to face with Him inside the Praetorium, the whole emphasis of his question is on the “Thou.” There was a touch of scorn in the question. “Jesus answered, Sayest thou this of thyself, or did others tell it thee concerning Me?” Have you already had that judgment from others, or is your question the result of your own wondering? A tremendously searching question.

Is that the result of your own thinking, or are you repeating what someone else has said? Pilate found himself face to face with Someone he had probably never met before, and certainly a personality such as he had never known before. He answered Him angrily: “Am I a Jew? Thine own nation and the chief priests delivered Thee unto me.” Then he said this amazing thing, “What hast Thou done?” Having manifested scorn in his first question, Jesus had asked him the question that had searched him, and he was angry. Yet this Roman judge did that most unusual thing, he asked the prisoner to give him the reason for His being there. “What hast Thou done?” “Jesus answered, My Kingdom is not of this world; if My Kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now is My Kingdom not from hence.” What an amazing reply. The judge was asking what He was there for, what had He done, and He answered Pilate, representing the Roman Empire, and what He said concerned His Kingdom. He spoke of “My Kingdom,” and the emphatic word in the Greek throughout is the pronoun “My.” “My Kingdom is not of this world; if My Kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight.” The word He used of His disciples was arresting and suggestive. It is the only place in the New Testament where that word is applied to the followers of Jesus Christ. It is a word suggesting dignity, those holding office within a Kingdom. This was the voice of the King.

The Prisoner, confronting Pilate, the embodiment of the Roman Empire, and representative of the Gentile world, when asked why He was there as a Prisoner, did not answer, but talked about His Kingdom, and told this man who represented the kingdom wholly of this world, depending for its authority upon the mailed fist, upon soldiers, cohorts, and armies, that His Kingdom was not of this world. If it were, said He, My officers, My statesmen would fight. My Kingdom is not from hence. It is not built up by the world, nor by worldly methods.

There are senses in which this reply of Jesus does not seem relevant to what Pilate was doing; but it had a relevancy to the Divine over-ruling, of all Pilate was doing. ‘‘My Kingdom is not of this world." “Pilate therefore said unto Him, Art Thou a King then?” Are you admitting that You are a King? I asked You if You were King of the Jews, and You gave me no direct answer. “Art Thou a King then?”

“Jesus answered. Thou sayest that I am a King.” Thou sayest that which I am, a King. He definitely thus claimed Kingship. Then He told Pilate the nature of His Kingdom. “To this end have I been born, and to this end am I come into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Everyone that is of the truth heareth My voice.” His Kingdom is the Kingdom of truth. He came into the world to bear witness to the truth.

If once the truth triumphed in human life and history there would be no problems left for us to solve at Geneva or London, or anywhere else! Rudyard Kipling speaks of God somewhere, and says of Him that He is “the God of things as they are.” So He is; that is to say, He is the God of truth. Paul in writing to Timothy said that He “witnessed a good confession” before Pilate. That confession was marked by this strange, mystic dignity, claiming Kingship, not of the world; but in the realm of truth.

Then Pilate looked at Him and said, “What is truth?” He was arrested now. He had heard things he had never heard before. He knew much about empire on a worldly basis, an empire governed by force. But here was One, a Prisoner, claiming to be a King, and that in the realm of truth. And so he said, “What is truth?” I do not agree with Bacon in his great essay on Truth, when he begins by saying, " ‘What is truth?’ said the jesting Pilate, and did not wait for a reply." Pilate was not jesting. Pilate never felt less like jesting than he did that day.

Here suddenly brought face to face with something startling, he said, “What is truth?” I think that probably there was cynicism in the enquiry, concerning the world in which he lived. It was as though he had said, Truth! What is it? He was not denying that there is such a thing as truth; but he was saying in effect, If that is the nature of Your Kingdom, You have not much chance of realization in a world like this. “What is truth?”

Then he again went out. The account is in verses thirty-eight, the second part, to verse forty. John again has condensed into very brief words this story. We have it far more particularly in the other evangelists, but he gives enough for his purpose. When Pilate went out, he pronounced the official sentence of acquittal. What he said was the official sentence of a Roman judge, acquitting the prisoner-Not guilty! would be our formula. He went out and said, “I find no crime in Him,” then suggested that he should release Him.

But evidently they were ready. They cried out, “Not this Man, but Barabbas.” From the other evangelists we learn that He was wont to release a prisoner to them at that season of the year. They were allowed freedom of choice, a prisoner, whom they would. But now he had limited their choice. He had offered them a choice between Barabbas and Jesus. As though he had said: It is a custom for you to ask from me the freedom of any prisoner. On this occasion you must choose between this Man and Barabbas. They cried for Barabbas. The next section is in the first three verses of chapter nineteen. Again the happening was inside. Here we are in the presence of something that is appallingly wicked. The judge had pronounced Him not guilty, had suggested that He go free, but when they chose Barabbas, he did a dastardly thing. He took Him back into the Praetorium, and he handed

Him over to scourging. The law provided that he stand by when the scourging was done. What was he doing? I have no hesitation in saying that he was making a concession to the clamour outside, in the hope that that would satisfy them. He was trying not to put Jesus to death, in spite of the clamour. So he did the most illegal thing, the most dastardly thing, gave a Prisoner to scourging Whom he had acquitted.

In verses four to seven, the scene is again outside. “Pilate went out again, and saith unto them.” He went out by himself, and said: “Behold, I bring Him out to you, that ye may know that I find no crime in Him.” Then Jesus “came forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple garment. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold, the Man!” What was Pilate doing? He had violated all justice in having Him scourged, and yet down in the heart and mind of him was the hope that the scourged and lacerated and thorn-crowned and bruised and bleeding Man would appeal to their pity. He said, “Behold, I bring Him out to you,” I bring Him forth to you, knowing that I have acquitted Him; but behold the Man. As they looked at Him, the chief priests and the officers cried out, “Crucify, crucify.”

Pilate said, “Take Him yourselves, and crucify Him; for I find no crime in Him.” Again he refused to put Him to death. He said, Take Him yourselves, and crucify Him, knowing perfectly well they could not do it. He was mocking them. And again I think he thought he had found a way out. Then immediately they said something else. “We have a law, and by that law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God.” At last they have told the truth. He had claimed to be the Son of God, and that had been their quarrel with Him all through, but they had never raised it in connection with His trial before Pilate until then.

Now, driven to desperation, they told this pagan Roman-for whom they had no respect, but whom they would get on their side for the death sentence,-the underlying reason of their hostility. He had claimed to be the Son of God. It was a clever stroke on their part, and it had its effect.

The next section from verse eight to verse eleven takes us inside once more. “When Pilate therefore heard this saying, he was the more afraid, and he entered into the palace again.” He went in and took Jesus with him. “He saith unto Jesus, Whence art Thou?” As though he had said, What do these men mean by saying Thou art the Son of God? If ever a man was sore perplexed and tempest-tossed, Pilate was. “Jesus gave him no answer,” a most remarkable statement. The question was of fear, resulting from this declaration of the Jews, and Jesus gave no answer.

Then, “Pilate therefore saith unto Him, Speakest Thou not unto me? knowest Thou not that I have authority to release Thee, and have authority to crucify Thee?” He was telling the truth on the human level. The priests had not. He had. The right of life and death was vested in him. The answer of Jesus was, “Thou wouldest have no authority against Me, except it were given thee from above; therefore he that delivered Me unto thee hath greater sin.” He was revealing His sense of the authority that rises higher than the throne of the Caesars, or any other; that all authority in the last analysis is in God. He was reminding this procurator that he had no authority except that which was derived.

Moreover He apportioned guilt. Caiaphas who had sinned against the spiritual, “hath greater sin” than Pilate, even though he was violating justice.

And so we come to the last section, verses twelve to sixteen, and we are outside once more. “Upon this Pilate sought to release Him. The Jews cried out, saying, If thou release this Man, thou art not Caesar’s friend; every one that maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar.” In that sentence the Jewish nation expressed, through its rulers, their final subjugation by Gentile power, and their rejection of their birthright inheritance. They bowed the neck to Caesar in order to murder Jesus. “When Pilate therefore heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment-seat at a place called The Pavement, but in Hebrew Gabbatha. Now it was the Preparation of the Passover; it was about the sixth hour.” He made one more effort to release Jesus as he said, “Behold, your King! They therefore cried out, Away with Him, away with Him, Crucify Him.” And again he said, now perhaps in defeat and disappointed mockery, “Shall I crucify your King?” Then the final word of the priests, “We have no king but Caesar.” “Then therefore he delivered Him unto them to be crucified.”