Matthew 27b

We are nearing the end of Jesus’ ordeal. Accusations are made, Jesus has no answer; or rather Jesus offers no answer. He knows what he is doing; he cannot avoid the cross. 

 The ‘grand jury’ deliberation is finished, and the prosecutors have extracted a charge; but will it hold water? They presented it, but Pilate was not impressed. His questions to Jesus went unanswered, except the question “Are you the king of the Jews?” Jesus gave an oblique answer which, in first century idiom, meant ‘Yes, it is as you say.”

 Pilate then meets with the chief priests and elders again and tries a ploy to defuse the situation. He offers to release a prisoner during Passover holy days and asks them to choose which one: Jesus the Messiah or Jesus Barabbas, a convicted criminal and terrorist. Pilate choses to let the Jews make the decision. Perhaps that is a way of heeding his wife’s advice: “Have nothing to do with this innocent man.”

27: 20-23.   Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus killed. The governor again said to them, “Which of the two do you want me to release for you?” And they said, “Barabbas.” Pilate said to them, “Then what should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” All of them said, “Let him be crucified!” Then he asked, “Why, what evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Let him be crucified!”

 Sounds like a chance, but the fix is in. What argument could the chief priests and elders make that would sway the crowd? There are times, particularly outside Jerusalem, when the crowds were not supportive of their so-called leaders. Yet, they all oppose the occupying power. The Jews have no power to judge their own affairs; notice that they say: “Let him be crucified.” 

 The chief priests and elders may have argued that Jesus was a failed prophet and a poor excuse for the leader of opposition to Rome. The man who talked big has now grown silent in the face of Roman power. Their chances might be better with Barabbas. This could have been their line of reasoning, however we can not confirm it because Matthew has not told us.  

 Pilate misread the crowd. Last week, when Jesus entered Jerusalem, the crowd at the gate was supportive of Jesus, but that crowd was mainly made up of Jesus’ disciples and followers from Galilee. The crowd that the chief priests and elders have put together is likely from Jerusalem and surrounding Judea. Who else would the temple leaders summon? It is not so much that the crowd is fickle; rather, this is a different crowd. 

 27: 24-26.  So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this (righteous) man’s blood; see to it yourselves.” Then the people as a whole answered, “His blood be on us and on our children!” So he released Barabbas for them, and after flogging Jesus he handed him over to be crucified.

 Pilate’s primary concern has been to see that the people do not riot. That would bring violent repression, and the incident would have to be reported to Rome. Josephus, the Jewish historian, tells Pilate’s story this way.

 First, he records Jesus’ crucifixion: “...Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross” (Josephus The Antiquities of the Jews, 18.3.1).

 On another occasion, Pilate tried to set up the standards or ensigns of the legions in the temple, which, as you can imagine, caused a great outcry. The Jews who were gathered called Pilate’s bluff about the soldiers cutting them to pieces. They fell down and bared their necks. Pilate removed the standards (Josephus, The Wars of the Jews, 2.9.2-3).

 Then came Pilate’s last mistake. An armed crowd of Samaritans intended to climb Mount Gerizim, “but Pilate prevented their going up, by seizing upon the roads with a great band of horsemen and footmen, who fell upon those that were gotten together in the village; and when they came to an action, some of them they slew, and others of them they put to flight, and took a great many alive, the principal of whom … Pilate ordered to be slain. … (Then) the Samaritan senate sent an embassy to Vitellius … and accused Pilate of the murder of those that were killed…. So Vitellius … ordered Pilate to go to Rome to answer before the emperor the accusation of the Jews (Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews, 18.4.1-2). 

  Josephus’ history implies that Pilate was always on the edge, and at times stepped over into needless violence. Perhaps that is why Pilate attempted to “wash his hands” of the judgment of a righteous Jew. However, that was not really possible since Pilate was still responsible for final order.

 In Matthew’s story, Pilate is not the first to try to distance himself from the guilt of condemning an innocent man. The chief priests and elders handed him over to Pilate. Judas came to the chief priests and elders to confess and give back the blood money. They refused to take responsibility by saying, “What is that to us? See to it yourself.” Pilate tries to shift responsibility to the crowd by giving them a choice of who to release. But the crowd foils his plan by crying out “Let him be crucified,” thus throwing the decision back in Pilate’s lap. Then Pilate performed a hand washing to shift the blame elsewhere. His declaration is interesting: “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.” Isn’t that what the chief priests and elders said to Judas? 

 Matthew alone (not the other gospels) then reports what the crowd says, and the Christian misreading of this idiom (common saying) has released un-Christian hatred ever since. Christians must be more careful in their interpretation of Scripture. When Pilate says he will not accept blood responsibility (though he can’t deny it), Matthew has the crowds shouting, “His blood be on us and on our children.”

 First, consider that the crowd did not make this statement up. It is a standard formula for oath-taking as we do by saying, “Cross my heart and hope to die.” It can be found in both the Old Testament (Ezekiel 33:4) and the New Testament (Acts 18: 6). 

 Second, a similar proverb had become so common that God had to stop its misuse.

“What do you mean by repeating this proverb concerning the land of Israel, “The parents have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge”? As I live, says the Lord God, this proverb shall no more be used by you in Israel. Know that all lives are mine; the life of the parent as well as the life of the child is mine: it is only the person who sins who shall die” (Ezekiel 18: 2-4).  

 Third, consider whether or not the crowd really has the power to make this curse stick. God alone has the power to bless or curse as he sees fit. Remember that God prevented Balaam from cursing the Israelites even though Balak paid Balaam to pronounce such a curse (Numbers 22-24). 

 Fourth, the death of Christ on the cross removed the curse of the law, and so death’s sting is drawn (Galatians 3: 13, I Corinthians 15: 55-56). Neither this crowd or their children are permanently doomed. 

 And, this brings us to the most crucial point. Read closer and read deeper. What has been the theology of the blood of Christ in Matthew so far? At the Passover table, Jesus “took a cup, and after giving thanks he gave it to them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.”

 Consider, then, the double meaning of what the crowd has said (Timothy B. Cargal, “His Blood be Upon Us and Upon our Children: A Matthean Double Entendre?, New Testament Studies (2009) 37:1: 101-112). Blood may lead to vengeance and often does when men act in the Bible and as recently as yesterday. That is perhaps what the crowds meant. But, in the economy of God, everything is capable of having an additional meaning. Look at the difference between what the high priest said and the unintended meaning of what he said.

“Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, ‘You know nothing at all! You do not understand that it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed’. He did not say this on his own, but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus was about to die for the nation, and not for the nation only, but to gather into one the dispersed children of God” (John 11: 49-52).

 So, what are we to make of what the crowd shouted? That we may join in a wave of anti-Semitism, a period of abuse, even a holocaust? Or, does the blood of Jesus on their heads carry with it the possibility of forgiveness? Consider that the majority of Christians in the First Century were Jews, and that in every century there have been Jewish Christians. Matthew, writing in the last quarter of the century, may have had in mind the fall of Jerusalem (70 AD), but if so, that event is long past.

As N. T. Wright, a theologian for whom I have a lot of respect, said: 

“The tragic and horrible later use of Matthew 27.25 (“his blood be on us, and on our children”) as an excuse for (so-called) ‘Christian’ anti-semitism is a gross distortion of its original meaning, where the reference is surely to the fall of Jerusalem” (Jesus and the Victory of God, 1996. Page 546). 

  The blood of Jesus means salvation not retribution. This is the joy of Easter.