The Wrong Choice

Hello everyone.

Today, we will continue with Jesus on his journey toward the Cross.  In my last post, we saw Jesus appear before Pilate, who shipped him off to Herod.  However, Pilate couldn't get rid of Jesus that easily.  Herod, frustrated that Jesus wouldn't perform any miracles, simply returned Jesus to Pilate.  We pick up the story here in verse 13: 

13 Pilate called together the chief priests, the rulers and the people, 14 and said to them, “You have brought this man to me, claiming that he misleads the people. See, I have examined him in front of you, and I have found nothing to the charges that you are making against this man. 15 Neither did Herod.  He sent him back to me.  So, listen to this! He has not done anything worthy of death.” 16 So, I will have him beaten and then I will let him go.” (17* It was required that he release one man to them at the Passover feast.) 

18 But the crowd shouted together, “Kill him.  Release Barabbas to us.” 19 Barabbus had been put in prison for an insurrection that had happened in the city and for murder. 20 Pilate again spoke to the crowd, because he wanted to release Jesus. 21 However, they continued shouting, “Crucify him!”

22 In his third attempt, Pilate asked the crowd, “Why?  What terrible thing has he done? I find nothing in him that is worthy of death, so I will have him beaten and then let him go. The crowd continued demanding in loud voices that Jesus be crucified. It was those voices that ultimately prevailed. 24 Pilate made the decision to give in to their demands. 25 He released the one they had asked for, the one who had been put in prison for insurrection and murder, and handed Jesus over for what they were wanting. 

         * Some manuscripts do not include verse 17. 

In Jesus’ second appearance before Pilate, Pilate brings the accusers in and tells them that he finds no merit to their charges.  They have tried desperately to get Pilate to buy into the idea that Jesus was a threat to Rome, and Pilate is just not buying it.  Pilate makes the point that he has made his examination of Jesus right in front of them, and they really have no case.  He also points out that they were not able to convince Herod either.  Ἀνακρίνας (Anakrinas) The word Pilate uses here means “to hear a case in a judicial sense."  So Pilate has heard their case and he minds no merit to it. 

Pilate seems to just want to let Jesus go, but in order to appease the Jewsih leadership, he offers to have Jesus beaten.  That is not enough to please the chief priests and the rest of Jesus' accusers. By now, the leadership has managed to get the crowd all stirred up.  They begin to shout that Jesus should be killed and that they wanted Barabbas released.  

Verse 17 is not included in some manuscripts.  I have included it in parenthesis.  It is a statement that it was required that Pilate would release one man to the Jewish people during the Passover.  The crowd here is demanding that this one man not be Jesus, but instead be Barabbas.  Barabbas was a noted murderer and insurrectionist.  Mark 15:11 tells us that the chief priests stirred up the crowd against Jesus. Luke omits this.  It does seem odd that the crowd would be so supportive of Jesus for so long, and now be screaming for his death.  Is it a different crowd from those crowds that he taught in the temple each day?  Is human nature just that fickle and easily persuaded? It is hard to say. 

It is odd that Barabbas, who was a threat to Rome, was the one that the leadership was asking that he be set free.  Meanwhile, they were pleading a case against Jesus, accusing him of that very thing. “Jesus came offering peace, and was rejected in favor of a revolutionary who promoted murder.” (Stein, 582.) It is clear that the choice here is a choice between good and evil, a righteous man and a murderer.  They choose the murderer. 

In verse 22, Pilate again attempts to appease the crowd by offering to have Jesus beaten, but then letting him go.  Pilate seems confounded by the crowd’s intense desire for killing Jesus.  Pilate cannot figure out what Jesus has done that has aroused so much viciousness and passion for his death. However, the voices shouting for Jesus’ death are the ones that prevail.  Those voices prevail over truth, reason, logic and common sense.  Pilate, against his own better judgment, gives in to their demands.

It becomes a battle of wills.  Pilate and crowd.  The crowd wins. Pilate tried three times to release Jesus, but the crowd refused any kind of compromise, insisting on crucifixion, the most viscous form of execution imaginable.  Pilate is a politician.  Eventually, policians give in to political expediency, and Pilate does. He releases Barabbas and turn Jesus over to be crucified.  The guilty one goes free and the innocent one is executed.