Who Killed Jesus?

‘Suffered under Pontius Pilate’? Who Really Crucified Jesus? Summary of a lecture given by Dr Helen Bond (Senior Lecturer in New Testament, Faculty of Divinity, University of Edinburgh) to the Hull & District Theological Society, Wednesday 13 October 2010.

Summary by David Bagchi

The reliability of the gospel accounts

 The accounts of Jesus’s capture and crucifixion differ between the four gospels.  They are agreed only on the narrative of his arrest and of his appearance before Pilate. It therefore makes most sense to consider each gospel account in its own terms.

 Matthew reflects the hurt of the ‘parting of the ways’ from the Jews.  Only Matthew records that Pilate washed his hands to declare himself innocent of Jesus’s blood (Matt. 27:24).  This is an unmistakable reference to the law of Moses (Deut 21:6): any Jew would have understood the reference and seen Pilate behaving here like a pious Jew, though Matthew’s chief concern is with converting Gentiles.  The chief concern of Luke is to legitimize the Gentile mission. While both Mark and Matthew attribute the mockery of Jesus to Pilate’s soldiers (Mk 15:16-20; Matt. 27:27-31), Luke transfers the blame from the Romans to the high priest’s servants (Lk 22:63-65) and to Herod Antipas and his soldiers (Lk 23:11) – though even Antipas can find no guilt in Jesus (Lk 23:15).

Do these differences between the gospel writers mean that the story of Jesus being handed over to the Roman authorities for trial and execution is all fabrication, as certain scholars have held (notably J.D. Crossan and ‘The Jesus Seminar’)?  For them, Jesus was a historical figure who was unquestionably killed, but there was no high-level trial. His death would have been a routine and casual act at the hands of an occupying power for whom life was cheap.

Against this, there is the interesting parallel case of Jesus ben Ananias, who from around AD 62 was preaching the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple.  According to Josephus (The Jewish War, Book 6, ch. 5, section 3) this Jesus was handed over to the Roman procurator Albinus.  So the picture presented by the gospels of the procedure adopted with regard to the first Jesus looks broadly plausible. Indeed, the picture presented by John’s Gospel (which is normally regarded as the least historical) seems to be the most historically plausible.

 

Who killed Jesus?

 There are two main ‘suspects’ – Pilate (the Roman prefect) and Caiaphas (the high priest).

Caiaphas certainly had a motive.  His primary concern was the safety of the Temple, and he would have thought cooperation with the Romans the only sure way of insuring that.  All the gospels are agreed that Jesus did indeed speak against and make threats against the Temple, and this would have been sufficient to have sealed his fate (being handed over to the Roman authorities, as Jesus ben Ananias would be).  Even the cleansing of the Temple (recorded in all gospels) is now seen by scholars as a threat made against the Temple.  This action was in a way even stronger than his verbal threats, and the fact that he had a following would have made him seem even more dangerous. 

Pilate also had a clear motive.  He was the military prefect of Judaea, so security was his principal concern.  The security situation in Jerusalem at the time of the Passover was a particular concern, which is why he leaves his usual base in Caesarea to go there then.  The portrait presented by extra-biblical sources such as Philo and Josephus is over a violent and brutal man, so the rather wishy-washy character presented by Luke does not ring true.  He was not a man to have spent any time agonizing over the fate of a peasant.  Both Jesus’s entry into Jerusalem with a public demonstration of support, and his possible claiming of kingship, would have been sufficient in themselves to sign his death warrant, for someone such as Pilate. 

So, who did kill Jesus? Perhaps the safest verdict is that it was a combination of the two.