The Pulpit Commentary — John — Volume 1 — Section 108

Now, thC'ugh the fourth evangelist does not describe the scene before 01\inpbns as givon in the BJ:nop1ists, h~_!mplies that the ~ourt had come to a pseudo-decision, and hnd taken legal action (eh. xvm. 35), had "delivered" Jesus to the Romnn power, that it micrht c-xecut.c the ecclesiastical verdict. Moreover, there is one remarkable sentence in the Fourth Gospel which sketches the character of Caiaphas with entire accUl'aoy. The council of the Jews was in great trepidation lest the Homans would come and take away their place and nation, their personal and corporate authority. Caiaphas used their nlarm to propound the heartless and unjust doctrine: "Ye know nothing at all, nor consider tb~t it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, that the whole nation perish not" (eh. xi. 49, 50). Let them put Jesus to death on a false charge, and save themselves. "It was a happy chance that they could seem to vindicate their l~yalty wh(le they gratified their ba~red '.'(Westcott,' Introd.,' lxxii.). Caiaphas knew Ills own mmd thoroughly, and carried 1t through remorselessly. He insticrated and executed the tragic suit. John shows the spiritual obtuseness, the stone-blindness and religious fanaticism out of which the whole proceeding sprang. The character of Caiapbas becomes far more explicable from the key to it which is thus supplied by the Fourth Gospel. 'l'he portraiture of Pilate himself is fully given by the synoptists and the fourth evangelist; and, though the portrait is drawn in different materials, yet it is the same personage, and the particulars have a lifelike force which Renan and other hostile critics are candid enough to admit. In both series of events there is the same irresolu- tion and perplexity, the same desire to save the life of Jesus, if he could contrive it without injury to himself. There is the same desire as long as he dared to worry and tr6mple on the people and priests whom he bitterly hated. John gives an instance (xviii. 31) in which Pilate banters the leaders of the accusation with a scoffing permis- sion to judge the Prisoner by their own Law, and draws out from them their humiliating confession that they had no legal or admitted right to execute a man, nor did they want to risk the possible unpopularity of such a step. The synoptists all show that Pilate saw in a moment through the hollowness of the charge. A humiliated Victim of priestly malice could not, as a Jewish prince, occasion the smallest danger to the Roman state, and the mere silence of Jesus before such a charge greatly puzzled the governor. John, however, does more: he shows that Jesus, in a private audience, had confessed that he wa.s King; but that the words "king" and "kingdom " were used in no secular or temporal sense, that he was utterly without avowed support, and that he desired for his subjects only those who were loyal to heavenly truth. Luke gives the characteristic transmission of Jesus to the jurisdiction of Herod; and Matthew gives the message of Pilate's wife. Mark, with great particularity, details the demands of the people for a prisoner's pardon, which Pilate-as a drowning man clutches at e. straw-tried to use for the moment on behalf of Jesus. We see even from the lrand- --;;...;hing (described by Matthew) that Pilate's irresolution wa.s partly due to some sense of unseen powers, some spice of superstition in his nature, and a Roman soldier's Ull willin,,"Dess to do a base thing by power of his office as a governor. John gives a more subtle key in the certain spell which Christ had cast over him by declaring that he which had delivered the Heaven-sent King to his own secular court had committed " the greater sin." Our Gospel, however, as well as the synoptics, reveals the revolting weakness of the man, that he should have repeatedly admitted the innocence of Jesus, and yet have scourged him, and even allowed the most cruel indignities to be offered to One whom he knew to be blameless. He tried, indeed, to make ct1pital in the favour of Christ from the absolute contrast between the Jewish charge and the condition to ..-hich "the just Man" bad been reduced. John gives the truest explanation of the final capitulation of Pilate, entirely characteristic of biB nature: "If thou let this man go, thou art no friend to Caesar," and "We have no king but Cresar." Here was an ar"ument which he could not resist. He knew these rebellious Jews were lying in th~ir ~eeth while they ostentatiously descended to the lowest depths of national apostasy. He yielded to a clamour that might cost him his life if he were to di~regard it auy longer. Certainly Christ di,P.,d for Pilate. But quite in harmo~y with the curious composite passious of the moment, the Fourth Gospel emphasizes P1late's words, which be meant to be biting satire: "Your King;" "your King." The four Gospels ue Ullauim0us iu the main terms of the accusation written over the cross, " KING Ol'  THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN. cxi:x