Resources > Adventure Link CSI Jerusalem...A Not So Automatic Pilate Posted by Rev. Jeff Dixon, Senior Equipping Minister, Covenant Community Church on Mar 23, 2005, 09:00

The Adventure Link

CSI: Jerusalem

A Not So Automatic Pilate

Our investigation continues with Jesus now before Pilate.

At this point in our investigation Pilate decided to bring Jesus into the Praetorium and examine Him. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all give a very abbreviated account of the examination: “Jesus stood before the governor. And the governor asked Him, saying, ‘Are You the King of the Jews?’ So Jesus said to him, ‘It is as you say’ ” (Matthew 27:11).

John gives a fuller account of the exchange that took place:

Then Pilate entered the Praetorium again, called Jesus, and said to Him, “Are You the King of the Jews?” Jesus answered him, “Are you speaking for yourself about this, or did others tell you this concerning Me?” Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered You to me. What have You done?” Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from here.” Pilate therefore said to Him, “Are You a king then?” Jesus answered, “You say rightly that I am a king. For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” (John 18:33–37)

Pilate clearly was aware that the Sanhedrin’s charges against Jesus were baseless.

But he was in a dilemma.

On the one hand, he could not afford to aggravate the Sanhedrin. On the other hand, he did not want to be made their puppet.

By bringing Jesus inside and questioning Him directly, he perhaps hoped to get a better assessment of the facts of the case, so that he could understand why the Sanhedrin felt Jesus posed such an urgent danger. Jesus’ replies probably convinced Pilate that the whole matter was an internal religious dispute. It was clear that Jesus did claim to be a king. But it was also clear that His “kingdom” posed no immediate political threat to Rome.

The whole exchange seems to have only heightened Pilate’s exasperation. He was evidently surprised and somewhat taken aback when Jesus answered his first question with a question. Pilate retorted with yet another question, then demanded that Jesus explain what He had done to merit so much animosity from the Sanhedrin. Jesus responded by answering Pilate’s first question in a way that must have seemed cryptic to Pilate. He had no capacity for understanding what Jesus meant by a kingdom that is “not of this world”—much less what He meant by “truth.”

“Pilate said to Him, ‘What is truth?’ ” (John 18:38). It was a rhetorical question, merely an expression of Pilate’s extreme frustration. It also reveals Pilate’s cynical pragmatism about matters of truth. “Truth” to Pilate was defined in utilitarian terms. He stood ready to embrace as “truth” anything that advanced his political agenda. He was not interested in any other kind of truth—especially spiritual truth. He hadn’t asked the question because he was looking for an answer. The real truth that Pilate was really concerned about was finding a way out of the political dilemma the Sanhedrin had placed him in.

By then a crowd seems to have been forming at the Praetorium. The sight of the whole Sanhedrin marching Jesus through the streets, then standing outside Pilate’s house while Pilate examined Him, could hardly have escaped the notice of Jerusalem’s citizenry. Word was already getting around the city, and people were coming to find out what the fuss was all about. The Sanhedrin was perfectly positioned to begin poisoning the well of public opinion by spreading rumors and accusations against Jesus as the crowd began to form. Because of the people’s natural distrust of Roman authority, Pilate’s unwillingness to do the Sanhedrin’s bidding may have actually intensified the sentiment against Jesus. Furthermore, according to Luke, when Pilate declared Jesus innocent, the members of the Sanhedrin “were the more fierce” in their accusations against Him (Luke 23:5).

At this point, Jesus was probably being held by Roman soldiers next to Pilate on the balcony of the Praetorium. Matthew writes, “And while He was being accused by the chief priests and elders, He answered nothing. Then Pilate said to Him, ‘Do You not hear how many things they testify against You?’ But He answered him not one word, so that the governor marveled greatly” (Matthew 27:12–14).

Pilate knew full well that Jesus was innocent of the wrongs they accused Him of. He could see that the Sanhedrin was motivated by envy (v. 18). He had examined Jesus and found no fault in Him. He had already publicly pronounced Him innocent. The case should have been closed, Jesus should have been released, and Pilate should have dispersed the mob. But he was still too fearful of the political implications of offending the Sanhedrin.

Pilate had presided over countless criminal trials.

He had seen hundreds—perhaps thousands—of accused criminals. All of them, innocent and guilty alike, vigorously protested their innocence at every opportunity. Never before had Pilate encountered anyone so manifestly innocent who nonetheless declined to speak in His own defense. Pilate was astonished and bewildered at Jesus’ serene and majestic silence. He practically begged Jesus to lash back verbally at His accusers. But Jesus held His silence.

What was there to say? Whom was there to convince? What charges were on the table worth answering? Pilate had already declared Him innocent of any wrongdoing. The Sanhedrin also knew of His innocence and were simply determined to put Him to death anyway. It would have changed nothing for Jesus to speak in His own defense at this point, and so He held His peace.

Once again, this was all a perfect fulfillment of the divine plan. Hundreds of years before, Isaiah wrote of Christ’s sacrificial self-offering: “He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth” (Isaiah 53:7).

Why didn’t Pilate simply dismiss the case at once and send everyone home? That should have been automatic...done in an instant...and the situation was over. But that did not happen.

Our investigation explores why Pilate did not do what he normally would have done in an instant. The Sanhedrin had placed him in a very serious dilemma. He could not afford to offend them. Both his judgment and his fitness to rule Judea were already being questioned by his superiors in Rome. It was well known throughout the empire that the religious and political zeal of the Jews made Judea one of the most difficult of all Roman provinces to govern. The task required a statesman with the utmost maturity, tact, sound judgment, and an iron will. After four years of Pilate’s rule in Judea, many in the Roman senate were not certain he was truly fit to be governor there.

Josephus records that Pilate got started off on the wrong foot soon after he was appointed to office, when he decided to contravene a longstanding Roman policy and have his armies carry their standards—featuring Caesar’s likeness—into the city of Jerusalem. Previous governors had refrained from bringing any ensigns or emblems with Caesar’s likeness into the city because of the Jews’ deep conviction that all such images were idolatrous and in direct violation of the second commandment. Pilate, however, came to office with the conviction that it was time to enforce in Jerusalem the policies that were practiced everywhere else throughout the empire. On his orders, soldiers brought their standards into the city under cover of darkness one night soon after Pilate’s governorship began. The next morning all Jerusalem awoke to the scandalous sight of Roman soldiers bearing Caesar’s image.

The people of Jerusalem were incensed. A large horde of protestors traveled to Caesarea (where Pilate lived) to confront him directly about the policy. They implored him to remove the images from Jerusalem. Pilate, an angry and obdurate man, had no sympathy whatsoever for Jewish religious scruples and via a messenger declared his intention to leave the images in place. He refused even to meet with the protestors for five days. When the crowd persisted, Pilate, utterly exasperated, agreed to meet with them in the local amphitheater. It was merely a ploy to herd the protesters into a trap. Once there, Pilate ordered his soldiers to surround the crowd; then he threatened to behead them all if they did not cease and desist. It was a foolish and impetuous threat. There was no way Pilate could carry out such a massacre. But as far as the people of Israel were concerned, even if Pilate were serious about the threat, they were perfectly willing to die rather than allow Roman images to defile their holy city. Many of them deliberately bared their necks and fell to the ground before the sword-wielding soldiers.

Pilate was forced to yield, and the standards with Caesar’s image were removed from Jerusalem. But neither the Roman senate nor Pilate’s subjects were happy with his actions. He had been sent by Rome to Jerusalem to keep the peace, and yet one of his first acts had nearly provoked a riot. Moreover, his hot temper and lack of tact had almost turned the situation into a massacre. Pilate’s superiors were not pleased. But the incident seemed to intensify Pilate’s hatred of the Jewish religion, and throughout his reign, he deliberately did things that provoked the Jewish religious leaders.

On one occasion, for example, he used money from the temple treasury for the building of an aqueduct to Jerusalem. Some believed his real design was to supply water to an army in order to lay siege to the city. All of Jerusalem was once again in an uproar against him, and on Pilate’s next visit to the city, a large crowd of protestors gathered. This time, knowing the folly of making threats he could not carry out, Pilate quelled the protest by sending soldiers into the crowd dressed as civilians. On Pilate’s signal they drew clubs and swords from under their robes and forcibly dispersed the crowd, killing several people in the process.

Philo, a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who was a contemporary of Jesus, recounted an incident in which Pilate had some gilded shields made and dedicated to Tiberius (who was Caesar at the time). He hung them in Herod’s Jerusalem palace. (The palace probably had a wall where such honorific shields were supposed to be hung; it was a common way of honoring people at the time.) According to Philo, the shields contained only an inscription with the name of the person who donated the shield and the person who was being honored. However, Pilate had apparently used an inscription that referred to the emperor with all his traditional titles—one of which declared him “divine.” The presence of the shields became highly offensive to the Jewish people. But this time the Jewish leaders threatened to appeal directly to Tiberius. According to Philo, they worded their threat in a most eloquent and subtle way:

Do not cause a sedition; do not make war upon us; do not destroy the peace which exists. The honour of the emperor is not identical with dishonour to the ancient laws; let it not be to you a pretence for heaping insult on our nation. Tiberius is not desirous that any of our laws or customs shall be destroyed. And if you yourself say that he is, show us either some command from him, or some letter, or something of the kind, that we, who have been sent to you as ambassadors, may cease to trouble you, and may address our supplications to your master.

Pilate was both alarmed and outraged by the Jewish leaders’ threat of an appeal to Tiberius, so he wrote to the emperor himself, setting forth an account of what had happened, obviously trying to paint himself in the most positive possible light. But Tiberius’s response was what Pilate feared worst. He was furious with Pilate over the matter. In Philo’s words:

Immediately, without putting any thing off till the next day, [Tiberius] wrote a letter reproaching and reviling [Pilate] in the most bitter manner for his act of unprecedented audacity and wickedness, and commanding him immediately to take down the shields and to convey them away from the metropolis of Judaea to Caesarea.

In the course of recounting that incident, Philo gives a description of Pilate’s character that certainly gives a fair measure of the reputation Pilate had among the Jews:

[Pilate] feared lest [the Jewish leaders] might in reality go on an embassy to the emperor, and might impeach him with respect to other particulars of his government, in respect of his corruption, and his acts of insolence, and his rapine, and his habit of insulting people, and his cruelty, and his continual murders of people untried and uncondemned, and his never ending and gratuitous, and most grievous inhumanity.

Clearly, Pilate was a harsh and ruthless governor.

Luke 13:1 mentions an incident involving some “Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.” That probably means he had them killed in the outer court of the temple while they were in Jerusalem to celebrate one of the feasts. They may have been particularly notorious insurrectionists, or they may have been agitators in some kind of riot. In any case, it provides one more example of why Pilate was so hated by those whom he ruled.

Yet it is clear that Pilate himself must have been deeply concerned by now about what Tiberius might do if his actions continued to provoke the Jewish people. One more notorious incident could result in Pilate’s removal from office. As a matter of fact, that is precisely what eventually occurred. Just a few years after this, a certain false prophet duped a Samaritan religious sect into believing Moses had hidden the sacred vessels from the tabernacle on Mount Gerizim. The sect began gathering in a village near Gerizim, hoping to see the vessels. When Pilate heard about the gathering, he assumed the worst and ordered the Roman army to investigate what he presumed to be an insurrectionist movement. A slaughter ensued in which hundreds were slain who actually posed no threat to Rome whatsoever. The Samaritans appealed to the Roman legate in Syria (Pilate’s immediate superior), and Pilate was called to Rome to answer the complaints against him. Before any hearing could occur, Tiberius died, and history records nothing more about Pilate—although legend suggests that he committed suicide.

It was obvious to everyone that Pilate was in a serious political predicament with Christ on trial before him. He had no legitimate grounds on which to execute Jesus, and yet he could not afford to anger the Jewish leaders over an issue they quite clearly regarded as urgent. For their part, the Sanhedrin were determined to press their charges against Jesus, knowing the leverage they had with Pilate, who didn’t need any more bad press going back to Rome.

Suddenly an idea occurred to Pilate that might help him extricate himself from this dilemma. It was prompted by something someone said in one of the many accusations that were made against Jesus: “He stirs up the people, teaching throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee to this place” (Luke 23:5). Galilee lay outside Pilate’s area of jurisdiction. It belonged to the region ruled by Herod Antipas. Pilate realized that if Jesus were a Galilean, he might be able to hand the whole controversy off to Herod, who was also in town for Passover season. Luke writes,