John 18 starts the account of the most famous arrest and trial in human history. John’s
story and the Synoptic story is the same, but, as we would expect, there are
differences. John’s telling of the story is distinctive.
First of all because of John we find out many more details. For
example this writer tells us there were also Roman soldiers involved in the
arrest (18:3), he tells us the name of the man whose ear Peter cuts off, it’s Malchus,
and that he is the servant of the High Priest (18: 10).
John explains how Peter got into the High Priest’s courtyard.
In the Synoptics there is no explanation. As I said in my first lesson, this
puts quite a question mark over John the son of Zebedee, the son of a Galilean
fisherman being the ‘other disciple’, because it says, twice, that this
disciple was known to the High Priest. The word for known used here is
‘gnosis’, which means much more than just an acquaintance.This man is so well
known that the maid just sees him and lets him in – and then Peter. Later we
find out that he knows that one of the people who challenged Peter was a
relative of Malchus (18: 26). This writer has inside knowledge of the High
Priest’s household. It was someone with authority in Jerusalem; and that was
not John Zebedee.
Then in this Gospel we also have much more about Jesus’ and Pilate.
We are told about two fascinating conversations between Pilate and Jesus,
inside Pilate’s residence (18: 33 – 38; 19: 9 – 11). How does the writer know
about these conversations? One answer is that Jesus talked about this after his
resurrection. Another is that as our writer was a very important man in
Jerusalem, he had friends who worked with Pilate, and they were there when
Pilate talked to Jesus. They told the writer.
As well as more detail than the Synoptics, what also makes John’s
account distinctive is the strong emphasis on irony and identity. I want to
show you how these two subjects can be seen throughout our text which is from
18:1 – 19:16
The first irony or contrast is that the scene begins in a what
was probably a walled garden, probably lent to Jesus by a wealthy supporter In
English we have the word Paradise, and this comes from the old Persian word, para
daiza, which means a walled garden. It is a place of safety and
tranquillity. The quiet of the garden, the noise of the soldiers. Contrast and
irony. We will meet another garden at the end of chapter 19.
The second irony is that these soldiers come with torches and
lanterns and weapons. Torches for the light of the world.
The next irony is that instead of having to find the man they
want to arrest that man steps forward. So instead of them asking where Jesus
is, Jesus steps forward and says ‘Whom do you seek?’.
This begins the emphasis on identity. Who do you want to
arrest? Who is this person? The whole Gospel has been asking – who is Jesus? Now
in the trial we have to take sides. We cannot stay in the middle.
The emphasis on identity continues. The soldiers say ‘Jesus
of Nazareth’ and Jesus says ‘I am he’. There is something about how he says
this that overwhelms them and the soldiers draw back and fall down. For this ‘I
am’ is not just Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph the carpenter. In the ‘I
am’ is the name of God. This is God in the flesh.
Something strange happened when Jesus said ‘I am’. We don’t
know exactly what. The soldiers fall, then recover, and then ask the same
question and Jesus gives the same answer. Underlining again the identity of
Jesus – fully man, Jesus of Nazareth; fully God, ‘I am’.
Jesus wants to make sure his disciples can go, and then we
have the irony that is Peter. It only starts here. It will get much worse. He
is a warning to all of us. The irony is that he wants to be brave – but who
does he attack? A servant who was almost certainly unarmed, not a soldier with
a sword who could fight back. He wants to be a man, but he is more like a
coward.
And then there is the irony that – as always – Peter thinks
he understands the situation. He has completely misunderstood, and Jesus tells
him so. Don’t you understand that this is happening because this is what my
Father wants to happen, this is the cup I have to drink. And that is who I am.
I obey my Father.
We stay with Peter and back comes the issue of identity into
the story. Jesus told the soldiers who he was; but brave Peter doesn’t want to
say who he is. So when the girl, not a big soldier, asks him whether he is a
follower of Jesus like the other disciple (18:17), he said, ‘I am not’. Jesus
says, ‘I am who I am’; but Peter here says, ‘I am not who I am’.
And now what a contrast we have. Peter stands and warms
himself by a charcoal fire with the very soldiers who were going to mock and
possibly even take Jesus to the cross. He refuses to say who he is. That
charcoal fire comes to epitomise Peter’s terrible failure, for around that
fire, twice more (v. 25, and v.26) Peter denies that he knows Jesus. And he
denies that he knows anything about what he did to Malchus. Peter is not
telling the truth. Christ inside, I am, Peter outside, I am not.
There is more to say about irony and contrast and identity in
this appearance of Jesus before the high priest (18: 19 – 24)
There is the contrast that the high priest is meeting at
night, in secret, while Jesus spoke in the temple and in the synagogues in the
day. Jesus works in the day. His enemies work at night.
There is also the irony that Jesus knows more than the High
Priest or his officers about the procedure for dealing with people who are
accused. In the Jewish system, the judge had to first examine the witnesses before
coming to the accused, but here the high priest tries to examine Jesus. But
Jesus knows that this is wrong, and so it is Jesus who interrogates the High
Priest, and tells him what the correct protocol is – ‘ask those who have heard
me.’ And the soldier has no right to hit Jesus – as Jesus points out (v. 23)
This then bring us to the deeper issue of identity.
We are in the house of Annas, but he is not the actual High
Priest; but the writer says that Jesus was examined by ‘the high priest’. So,
was Caiaphas there? That is possible, but then in v. 24 we read that Annas
sends Jesus to Caiaphas. So – we are a little confused. Who is the real high
priest? I think the writer does this deliberately.
And then, with the way the proceedings go, in secret, wrong
procedure, with the hitting, we wonder – how can this man be the one who
represent man before God.
So again the question comes – who is the real high priest?
And the answer is of course, the one who is accused. The false high priest is
examining the real high priest, the man who will truly represent man before
God.
As said, Annas sends Jesus to Caiaphas (18:24), and the
writer assumes that we know about the early morning meeting of the Sanhedrin
from the Synoptics - Matthew 27, Mark 15, Luke 22. So the writer goes straight
to the trial with Pilate (18:28)
The Romans worked from dawn till about eleven in the morning.
So the Jews with Jesus come to Pilate’s office, very early in the morning. And
there is intense irony. The Jewish leaders think they will become defiled if
they enter Pilate’s residence, this would mean they might have to wait a week
till they became ritually clean, and so they would miss the Passover. In v.28
the writer doesn’t mean the Passover meal, because that was the night before,
Jesus ate the Passover meal with his disciples. He means the Passover feast
which lasted the week.
They wanted to share in it, so here’s the irony. These Jews
want to stay clean outside to be a part of the Passover; but they want to kill
the Passover lamb.
Now identity. Because they won’t go inside, Pilate has to go
out to them (18:29), then he goes inside to talk more privately with Jesus
(18:33); then he goes outside again (18:38); and then inside again (19:9);
finally he comes out for the last time (19:13)
Inside and outside. As so often in this Gospel there is
another level of meaning here. Yes, this actually happened. Physically Pilate
was going inside and outside. But this also underlines that Pilate is
undecided, he is conflicted, he is double-minded. He both wants to release
Jesus, but he also wants to stay a friend of Caesar. This ultimately is about
identity. As we will see in this story there is a lot of emphasis on who Jesus
is – but in asking who Jesus is, Pilate – and all of us – are deciding who we
are. Are we going to be faithful to what we know is true, on the inside, and so
define ourselves as someone of integrity; or are we going to give in to the
pressure on the outside, and so define ourselves as someone who is dishonest and
untrustworthy.
Pilate has surely heard of Jesus and the claims that he is
the Jewish Messiah, and he probably knew that the arrest had happened, because
some Roman soldiers were involved. So the Jews are expecting him to now take
the next step and sentence Jesus to death. They don’t want another trial.
And so when Pilate asks, what accusation do you bring against
this man, the Jews don’t give an answer. They just say this man must be evil
because we have brought him to you. Pilate doesn’t like this and tells them to
judge Jesus with their law. That’s no good for the Jews. They want Jesus dead,
but they don’t want to kill him secretly because then the crowd would blame
them. They wanted the Romans to execute him publicly, so they would then deal
with any uproar from the crowd. And, as they say, correctly, in v. 31, that it
wasn’t lawful for them to put anyone to death.
There are at least three ironies here.
First of all there is the irony that the Jews – the subject
people – can answer the Roman governor, the representative of the king in such
a rude way. He is evil because we have brought him to you, now do what you have
to do. It makes us wonder who is really in control here – the Jewish leaders,
or Pilate.
But, secondly, then we have the irony that these Jews have to
ask Pilate to deal with what Pilate rightly sees is essentially a Jewish
matter. The Jews need the help of the Romans, the Jews – who in Chapter 8 said
they were not slaves of anyone, cannot run their own affairs.
And then in v. 32 we have the irony that while both the Jews
and Pilate think they are the ones who are controlling events, it’s not. It is
Jesus – the prisoner, the one who seemingly has the least power in the scene –
he is the One who has determined how he is going to be executed. Back in
chapter 3 he told Nicodemus that the Son of Man was to be lifted up. He repeats
this after the Greeks come to see him in Chapter 12, ‘And I, when I am lifted
up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.’
The issue of Jesus’s identity is again underlined outside
Pilate’s headquarters. Pilate says – ‘What accusation do you bring against this
man? This man. Really? Is this just an ordinary man, Pilate? And the Jews
answer, ‘If this man…’ Really Caiaphas, is Jesus just a man?
As we go in with Pilate to his residence we see that in fact
Pilate already thinks that Jesus is more than a man. He might be a king. So he
asks (18:33). ‘Are you the king of the Jews?’ Who is Jesus?
Now more irony. Pilate, the most powerful man in Palestine,
has asked Jesus a question. We expect Jesus to give an
answer. But what happens – Jesus asks Pilate a question: are you genuinely
asking me, or are you just repeating what you have heard? What irony. And that
takes us to identity. Who is the most powerful person here, who in this scene
really has power?
Pilate says with contempt, ‘Am I a Jew?’ Of course I am not.
But this brings more irony. For while throughout this account we see Pilate’s
loathing for the Jews – yet, he eventually sides with them against Jesus.
There is also the issue of identity. For Pilate asks, ‘Am I a
Jew?’ and the simple answer is no, you’re a Roman, you’re a Gentile. You don’t
belong to the people of God. It’s clear. Or is it? Because we have learned in
the prologue that even though the Jews reject Jesus, if anyone accepts him,
they can become children of God. Pilate can join God’s family. And in a very
short time Jesus will invite him to do just that. So are you a Jew – a member
of God’s family, we don’t know yet Pilate. The in and out of the narrative
shows up that Pilate has not decided on his final identity.
We stay with identity. Jesus now does tell Pilate who He is.
He is a king, but his kingdom is not of this world. That is proved by the fact
nobody is fighting for him after his arrest. We know that this means he is the
King in the Kingdom of God.
Jesus also adds something else about his Kingship. It is a
kingship that bears witness to the truth – and we know that Jesus is the way
and the truth and the life. His kingdom is about what is trustworthy and real.
He is the light of the world, and his light shines on what is true.
Now we have a wonderful irony and a very sad irony.
The wonderful irony is that Jesus has come to listen to
Pilate ask him questions; but now Jesus invites Pilate to listen to him.
Pilate – if you are of the truth, if you follow integrity,
you will be listening to me right now, because everyone who is of the truth,
listens to me.
That must have been quite a moment. There must have been a
pause. A silence as Pilate – a man made in the image of God – realised what
Jesus was saying. Jesus was saying – Pilate, follow me, I am the truth That is
wonderful.
But Pilate’s response. What sad irony. Here is Pilate,
standing in front of truth incarnate, and he says, ‘What is truth?’ It is the
answer of a man who is starting to choose his identity, a man who rejects what
he knows is true by trying to say there is no truth, there is no meaning to
life. Pilate’s answer is full of cynicism, and this is hiding his rejection of
God.
Still Pilate goes out and tells the Jewish crowd that Jesus
is innocent. Here is more and more irony. Here we have the Gentile ruler, the
enemy, trying to save the Jewish Messiah from the Jews. And this particular
ruler, Pilate, had a reputation for being cruel. We heard about that in Luke
13, about how he mixed the blood of executed Jews with the sacrifices.
But there he stands saying Jesus is innocent. He will say this
two more times.
Irony – and identity. Pilate asks the crowd if they want him
to release ‘the king of the Jews’. The writer will never let us forget that
Jesus is a king. Jesus’ identity is clear. But what about Pilate. If he has
authority, why is he asking the crowd? Is he the ruler or do the crowds have
the last word. Who are you Pilate?
The crowd want Barabbas. What contrast, what irony. Barabbas
is a violent man, probably a murderer, probably a Zealot, that is what the
Greek word implies. And the Chief Priests hated the Zealots because they
threatened the status quo. And yet this is the man they want instead of the
Prince of Peace.
Pilate hopes by flogging and warning Jesus this will appease
the Jews and they will agree to Jesus being released. This was not the flogging
that came before a crucifixion. That was terrible. This was still bad, but
lighter.
In verses 2 – 3 there is more terrible irony and a further
emphasis on identity. Pilate has mocked the idea that Jesus is ‘the king of the
Jews’, now the soldiers do the same, with brutality. The crown of thorns, the
purple robe, saying with malice, ‘Hail King of the Jews’, and then hitting him.
They do this because they think that Jesus is just an upstart
peasant Jew from Nazareth, but He is the King not just of the Jews, he is the
King of the universe. And then the irony goes deeper. Because of their mockery,
Jesus is showing the nature of his kingship – he is the king who suffers for
others – for these very soldiers who are mocking him.
After this beating, Pilate brings Jesus out again to the
crowd, and again says that Jesus is innocent.
v. 5 is very poignant and full of layers of meaning. It is an
extraordinary verse. So Jesus
came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to
them, “Behold the man!”
The writer wants us to see Jesus coming out – his face full
of blood, his eyes swollen, the mockery of the crown of thorns and the purple
robe.
It is an incredibly sad picture.
And Pilate says – Behold. Pilate – the Gentile, the cruel ruler – he is telling the
Jews to look. To see. To understand. We remember the first words of John the
Baptist when he saw Jesus, ‘Behold, the lamb of God’. Behold, pause, take this
in.
Behold the man.
For Pilate, he looks and it is easy, this man is no threat to
anyone. But that is ironic, because man is very dangerous. Jesus here
shows what man is like…this is what man does to man. And that violence is in
our own hearts. It is also ironic, because this is the man who will judge the
whole world. He will judge Pilate, He will judge you and me.
The writer is also asking us to behold.
Yes, we need to look at Jesus the man. Someone whose body was
just like ours. We need to understand that he suffered.
But we also need to see the crown of thorns and the purple
robe. This is the King. He has become man, and this suffering are his robes of
royalty. He did not deserve these robes, but he wears them, so we can have
royal robes that we do not deserve.
Some when they behold the suffering Jesus will bow in
worship; others, as we see in v. 6 will say ‘Crucify him!
This Gospel has always been black and white. From above or
from below; from the devil or from God; jus. Either worship – or, ‘Crucify
him’.
For the third time (19:6) Pilate says Jesus is innocent, so
again the same irony I have mentioned.
But the Jews are determined. They now come out with the real
reason why they have brought Jesus to Pilate. Blasphemy. And the punishment for
that is death. It is written in Leviticus 24:16 ‘Anyone who blasphemes the name
of the Lord must be put to death’.
Jesus’ blasphemy is that he has made himself the Son of God.
Again we – the reader – have to think about Jesus’ identity. Is He the Son of God?
If so, then there is no blasphemy; but is He isn’t, then we have to side with
the Jews. At this point there is no middle ground.
This makes Pilate more afraid. This brings up another irony.
The Jews, the people of God, have rejected Jesus as a charlatan, a deceiver, a
pretender. They are not afraid of Jesus. But Pilate – the cruel pagan) ruler, he
takes this seriously. Pilate, like other Romans, was superstitious, and he
would have believed that the Jesus might be a sort of seer a holy man (that is
what Pilate’s wife called him), someone who is in touch with the gods. And that
unnerved him.
We go inside again and Pilate asks a very important question
about identity: ‘Where are you from?’ You see he is more open than the Jews.
They just said – Nazareth. Pilate knows this, but he sees that there is more
than Nazareth to Jesus.
Jesus does not answer. Pilate closed down their earlier
conversation with his cynical, ‘What is truth?’ So Jesus has no reason to
engage in a serious conversation with him. This irks Pilate and – again with
identity – he tells Jesus that he has authority to execute him, or not execute
him.
Jesus makes it clear about where authority comes from. It is
from above. And that means that it is Jesus who has authority, which he now
exercises before the man who is meant to have authority. It is Jesus who gives
judgement about what is happening.
Jesus says there is sin involved here – and that will mean
judgement. The greater sin is with those who handed Jesus over – Annas,
Caiaphas, Judas – but, ‘greater’ means there is a lesser sin, and there is no
doubt what Jesus is talking about with this lesser sin. This is Pilate’s sin of
not releasing a man whom he knows is innocent. Pilate, you are involved with
sin. There will be judgement. Pilate understands, and so we read that he is now
very keen, almost desperate to release Jesus. He is frightened of this
judgement. But not frightened enough.
For now the Jews play their trump card: ‘If you release this
man who is claiming to be a king, you cannot be a friend of Caesar’. And they
were right. If Tiberius heard that Pilate had released a man trying to be a
king, Pilate would have immediately been sacked. In the Roman empire, the
emperor had no equals, no other kings were tolerated.
Now Pilate has to choose – between Caesar and Jesus. Again
irony. He chooses Caesar, a temporary king, who was going to sack Pilate anyway
in a few years. He rejects Jesus, the eternal king, who never sacks anyone who
comes to him.
Our passage ends with a scene of judgement. And again, irony
and identity dominate this final scene (19: 13 – 16)
Pilate has chosen to send an innocent man to his death for
his own political future. And yet it is Pilate who comes now to sit on the seat
of authority and judge Jesus. He is a wholly unworthy human judge, sitting
above the man who will be the perfect judge. This is intense irony.
The irony, as usual, puts light on identity. Who is Pilate?
Who is Jesus? Such is the brilliance of our writer that it is not even clear
who actually sits on that judgement seat. In the Greek it could read as Jesus, or
Pilate.
We assume it is Pilate. What a weak judge. The judge is meant
to make the final decision, but instead he gives that final decision to the
Jews, but in his question, he shows he has responsibility. He asks, ‘Shall I – shall
I – crucify your king?’
We end with three ironies.
One irony we learned about in the prologue, that Jesus came
to his own, and his own people did not receive him. It is much worse. They
violently reject him. At the time of the Passover, the time when Moses led the
Jews out of Egypt, these Jews send this Second Moses to the cross saying, ‘We
have no king but Caesar.
The second terrible irony. These Jews were sending Jesus to
the cross for blasphemy. But what do we have here? ‘We have no king but
Caesar’. Absolute blasphemy. For God was the only king for the true Jews. Not
just blasphemy, but this killed faith in a coming Messiah. Even if they did not
believe Jesus was the Messiah, they still should have said, ‘We have a king who
is coming’. But they don’t. Their only king is Caesar. In sending Jesus to the
cross, the Jews lose their own identity. They become like ordinary Romans.
For most of this lesson we have been with Pilate, the man who
went out and in, out and in, the double minded man Jesus’ brother, James talks
about. And so at the end the final irony. Here is the man with the most
authority in all of Palestine – but he has no authority. He delivers Jesus to
be crucified because of the crowd.
I hope you have seen how it is irony and identity that
dominate the writer’s telling of the most famous arrest and trial in human
history.
Why is there so much irony? What is the lesson for us? It is
about seeing. Jesus said ‘Come and see’, but there is so much that those around
Jesus – Peter, Annas, Caiaphas, Pilate, the crowd – there is so much they do
not see. They think they know what is happening, but they don’t. And so we have
torches going to the garden for the light of the world, we have secret hearings
in the middle of the night, we have people intent on deceit and murder not
wanting to be defiled, we have a man who does not understand that real authority
must rest on integrity. It is all about seeing
May God grant that we come to Jesus and see truly.
And identity. Who is Jesus? Who is Peter? Who is the High
Priest? Who is Pilate? Who is the judge
And so – who am I in this story, who are you? We cannot
encounter Jesus without having to decide who we are. As with Pilate, so with
us, we have to make a decision.
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