THEY TOOK JESUS to the high priest, and all the chief priests, elders and teachers of the law came together. 54Peter followed him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest. There he sat with the guards and warmed himself at the fire.
55The chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were looking for evidence against Jesus so that they could put him to death, but they did not find any. 56Many testified falsely against him, but their statements did not agree. 57Then some stood up and gave this false testimony against him: 58“We heard him say, ‘I will destroy this man-made temple and in three days will build another, not made by man.’” 59Yet even then their testimony did not agree.
60Then the high priest stood up before them and asked Jesus, “Are you not going to answer? What is this testimony that these men are bringing against you?” 61But Jesus remained silent and gave no answer.
Again the high priest asked him, “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?”
62“I am,” said Jesus. “And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven.”
63The high priest tore his clothes. “Why do we need any more witnesses?” he asked. 64“You have heard the blasphemy. What do you think?”
They all condemned him as worthy of death. 65Then some began to spit at him; they blindfolded him, struck him with their fists, and said, “Prophesy!” And the guards took him and beat him.
66While Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the servant girls of the high priest came by. 67When she saw Peter warming himself, she looked closely at him.
“You also were with that Nazarene, Jesus,” she said.
68But he denied it. “I don’t know or understand what you’re talking about,” he said, and went out into the entryway.
69When the servant girl saw him there, she said again to those standing around, “This fellow is one of them.” 70Again he denied it.
After a little while, those standing near said to Peter, “Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean.”
71He began to call down curses on himself, and he swore to them, “I don’t know this man you’re talking about.”
72Immediately the rooster crowed the second time. Then Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken to him: “Before the rooster crows twice you will disown me three times.” And he broke down and wept.
Original Meaning
OLIVETTE GENEST’S STUDY reveals interesting structural parallels in Mark’s presentation of Jesus’ hearing before the Sanhedrin (14:53–72), his trial before Pilate (15:1–22), his crucifixion (15:23–33), and his death and burial (15:34–47).1 In each scene, the first element focuses on Jesus. The second element interprets who Jesus is and highlights a Christological title. The mockery ironically expresses some truth about Jesus: Jesus is a prophet, the King of the Jews, the Messiah, and the Savior of others. But he is more. In the last scene, the centurion correctly identifies him as the Son of God. The third element depicts the stance or response of others to Jesus, and each scene concludes with an exit or interlude that leads into the next.
1. The Hearing Before the Sanhedrin (14:53–73)
a. Jesus led to the high priest for the hearing (14:53–64)
b. Mockery of Jesus as a prophet (14:65)
c. Peter denies Jesus (14:66–72a)
d. Exit (14:72b)
2. The Trial Before Pilate (15:1–22)
a. Jesus led to Pilate for trial (15:1–15)
b. Mockery of Jesus as the King of the Jews (15:16–20)
c. Simon of Cyrene carries Jesus’ cross (15:21)
d. Exit (15:22)
3. The Crucifixion (15:23–33)
a. Jesus’ crucifixion (15:23–27)
b. Mockery of Jesus as Savior, Messiah, and King of Israel (15:29–32a)
c. The ones crucified with him revile him (15:32b)
d. Darkness covers the whole land (15:33)
4. The Death and Burial (15:34–47)
a. Jesus’ death (15:34–38)
b. The centurion confesses Jesus to be the Son of God (15:39)
c. The women watch from afar (15:40–41)
d. The burial of Jesus (15:42–47)
The Hearing Before the Sanhedrin (14:53–65)
MARK’S TRIAL SCENE pins the primary responsibility and initiative for Jesus’ death on the high priest and his Sanhedrin. Though Mark tells us that “all” the Sanhedrin has gathered (14:53), we should not assume that it consisted of the seventy-one members dictated by the later rabbinic tractate on the Sanhedrin (m. Sanh. 1:6).2 In the first century, it was not “a fixed body regularly in session.”3 Presumably the high priest convenes a council of whatever members he can gather at this late hour of the night. Nocturnal trials were abnormal (see Acts 4:3–5) and were later forbidden under rabbinic law. A hearing in the middle of the night suggests the kangaroo justice of a lynch mob dressed in hooded sheets, but it also shows that these leaders are under time constraints.
These proceedings form a preparatory investigation before the Sanhedrin delivers Jesus to the Roman governor for final deliberation. A debate continues among scholars, but the evidence strongly suggests that the Jewish leaders did not have the power of capital punishment (John 18:31).4 Apparently, it is not enough to arrest and flog Jesus, which was in their power; the ruling priests want him dead and disgraced before the crowds. They presume his guilt, because he is a threat. The hearing will serve to convince anyone with misgivings that he is worthy of death and will fix the charge they will present to the Roman governor.
Josephus reports a similar case concerning a peasant prophet named Jesus, son of Ananias (J. W. 6.5.1 § 300–309). Just before the outbreak of the war against Rome this prophet stood in the temple and denounced the city and the sanctuary with piercing and unrelenting woes. The leading citizens, incensed by his cries, arrested and beat him. When he continued his cries day and night, the magistrates brought him before the Roman governor, Albinus, for more severe punishment. He had him flayed to the bone; but when he continued his dirge, the governor pronounced him a maniac and let him go. The governor presently in charge in Judea, Pontius Pilate, is no rubber stamp, and the ruling priests know they need to present a convincing case so that the Roman governor will not just scourge him and then let him go.
Mark has told us that the high priests, teachers of the law, and elders have been “looking for a way to kill him” (11:18), “for a way to arrest him” (12:12), and “for some sly way to arrest Jesus and kill him” (14:1). Now that they have arrested him, they “are looking for evidence against Jesus” (14:55) that will put a noose around his neck. The law allowed the condemnation of an accused person only on the evidence of two or more witnesses who agreed (Num. 35:30; Deut. 17:6; 19:15–21; see Sus. 51–61). Mark relates that many volunteer testimony against Jesus, and he fastens on one particular charge. Certain ones testify that Jesus said, “I will destroy this man-made temple and in three days will build another, not made by man” (14:58).5
The Targum on Isaiah 53:5 and the Targum on Zechariah 6:5 specified that the Messiah would build the new temple. These traditions were compiled at a later time, but they may preserve a popular expectation in the first century. If so, the accusers may obliquely be denouncing Jesus for claiming to be the Messiah. It makes sense of the high priest’s frustrated question when he asks him point-blank if he is the Christ (14:61).
Mark reports twice, however, that the witnesses cannot agree (14:56, 59) and that their testimony is false (14:56–57). In other words, false witnesses try to frame Jesus. But the reader knows that Jesus has indeed made menacing noises against this man-made temple with his daring protest against the money changers and dove sellers. He also predicted privately to his disciples that the vast temple complex would be destroyed (13:1–2). Since what the witnesses say about Jesus’ stance toward the temple seems close to the truth, and since this charge resurfaces when passersby taunt him with it while he hangs from the cross (15:29), how is their testimony false?
Mark may consider the testimony to be false because any witness against Jesus has to be a false witness, particularly if he is trumping up charges against him (see Pss. 27:12; 35:11; 109:2). Perhaps Mark regards their testimony to be false because of a technicality.6 Jesus never explicitly said that he would destroy the temple and rebuild it. He only implied that God had judged it and would allow it to be destroyed. Most likely, however, Mark emphasizes that the testimony of the witnesses is false primarily because of the second element in the charge. His first readers may have held out hopes that Jesus as the Messiah would build another temple. Since Scripture mentions that David’s offspring would build a house for God’s name, some probably assumed that Jesus would do that (2 Sam. 7:13). Mark therefore makes it clear that Jesus never claimed he would build another earthly temple, and thus no one should expect any kind of earthly temple. In Mark’s view, the temple was destroyed when Jesus died, making its atonement sacrifices superfluous. The temple where God now lives has nothing to do with buildings (see Acts 7:48; 17:24).
Like the Suffering Servant and the Righteous One of the Psalms, Jesus remains silent before his false accusers (Pss. 38:12–15; 39:9; Isa. 53:7).7 His silence shows defiant contempt for their opportunism and lack of principle. False witnesses who cannot get their stories straight provide no help, and they do not pursue the charge of speaking against the temple further. The high priest takes charge and asks Jesus directly, “Are you the Christ, the son of the Blessed One?” (14:61). He piously avoids God’s name with a circumlocution while using underhanded means to get rid of an enemy.
For the first time in the Gospel, “the Son of God” title (cf. 1:1) appears on the lips of a human character in the story. Only demons (3:11; 5:7) and the voice from the cloud (1:11; 9:7) have uttered it until now. Also for the first time in the Gospel (see 1:34; 3:11–12; 8:30; 9:9, 30–31), Jesus publicly accepts that he is the Messiah, with his reply: “I am.” The title of this Gospel is “the beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (1:1); Jesus now himself affirms his identity before the high priest and his council and continues with, “And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One [lit., Power] and coming on the clouds of heaven.”8
The drama heightens as the high priest labels his response “blasphemy” and tears his garment to underscore his judgment. This gesture was an ancient way of expressing distress, mourning, or outrage (see Josh. 7:6; 2 Sam. 1:11; 2 Kings 18:37; 19:1; Isa. 37:1; Jer. 36:24; Joel 2:13; Acts 14:14) and is a fitting response to perceived blasphemy, but it also may be a grandstanding display to get others to see things his way. To the high priest, the evidence is conclusive: Jesus has incriminated himself, and the council unanimously condemns him. They judge him to be worthy of death (see 3:29).
What is blasphemous about the answer in 14:62?9 We must not allow technical definitions of blasphemy (see Lev. 24:16) to govern our answer. What different persons regard as blasphemous rarely fits any technical definition. Some argue that Jesus’ open admission that he is the Messiah is considered blasphemous since he presumes on God’s prerogative to name the Messiah. But the high priest’s reaction follows Jesus’ complete statement that they will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of God. This answer combines a messianic tradition from Psalm 110 with an apocalyptic tradition from Daniel 7.
The result is radical. In the messianic tradition the king of Israel was invited to take his seat at the right hand of God. The seating symbolized the king’s temporal sharing of God’s power. The king was established on Zion and occupied the throne of God’s kingship over Israel as God’s representative on earth (1 Chron. 28:5; 29:23; 2 Chron. 9:8). This passage was interpreted messianically, but no Old Testament passage explicitly conferred on the Messiah full equality with God on a heavenly plane. Jesus earlier appealed to Psalm 110:1 to question how the Christ is David’s son if David called him Lord (Mark 12:35–37). That question suggests that as far as Jesus is concerned, the Christ is something more than simply the Son of David, an earthly ruler. Jesus extends that image here with the allusion to Daniel 7:13, “coming with the clouds of heaven.”
The vision of Daniel 7 takes place in the clouds of heaven, on the divine level. “One like a son of man” comes to the Ancient of Days and receives divine power (Dan. 7:14). The vision never specifically identifies who this “son of man” is, however. Is he a real person or an abstraction? In 7:18, he represents the saints of the Most High; is he their angel or only a symbol of them? Is he a human or some divine being? Daniel 7 has no royal messianic overtones, and the “one like a son of man” does not share the throne. Jesus’ answer combines these two different traditions so that they interpret each other. On the one hand, the “one like a son of man” is no longer some mysterious apparition but a real human being, a descendant of David in whom the messianic prophecies are realized. On the other hand, the sitting down at God’s right hand is no longer simply a symbol of royal dignity. It represents divine power exercised on the heavenly plane.10
In other words, Jesus claims to be more than the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One. He understands his Sonship to be on a higher plane than that implied in Psalm 2:7 and 2 Samuel 7:14 for the Davidic king. His affirmation far surpasses any current conception about the Messiah, because he implies that he has divine authority, and they will one day see it. This implication would be blasphemy if it proved to be wrong.11 Either the high priest is correct that Jesus is a deluded blasphemer, or Jesus is correct and the high priest is the deluded blasphemer. The high priest is shocked, for Jesus’ confession confirms his suspicions that Jesus is guilty of hybris against God, not only claiming to be the Messiah, the Son of God, but also claiming the divine right of judgment at the end time. The reader may be shocked that this Son of Man is now certain to die.
Hooker comments: “In contrast to the claims of the false messiahs proclaiming ‘I am’ (13:6), Jesus’ words will be substantiated.”12 Jesus assures his captors that they will see it. “Seeing” relates to witnessing his vindication (see Isa. 40:5; Wis. 2:21–3:4; 5:1–2), when a higher court will overturn the decision of this lower court.13 Jesus has told his disciples that some of them would see the kingdom coming with power (Mark 9:1). All these leaders can see now is a rustic from Galilee, who was easily captured when one of his own followers betrayed him. The rest of his small band vanished harmlessly into the darkness. To imagine this man as God’s Messiah, let alone as the one who exercises the power of God, must have seemed laughable to them if it were not so offensive. Those who gather around Jesus’ cross can see nothing either. They demand to see something dramatic (15:32, 35, 36), but nothing seems to happen. They can see nothing this side of the cross. But others will see something after his death. A Gentile centurion who watches him die blurts out his confession (15:39). For the disciples, the seeing will take place in Galilee, after the resurrection (14:28; 16:7).
The two charges that emerge from this hearing are religious in nature and have to do with the temple (14:57–58) and the Messiah (14:61–62).14 They will resurface as two taunts at the cross: 15:29–30: “So! You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, come down from the cross and save yourself!” and 15:32: “Let this Christ, this King of Israel, come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe.” Two events occur at Jesus’ death that parallel these taunts. The temple veil is torn from top to bottom (15:38), and a Roman centurion confesses, “Surely this man was the Son of God” (15:39).
The hearing before the Sanhedrin, which has made a mockery of justice, concludes with callous mockery of Jesus. Certain people spit on Jesus as a sign of repudiation (Num. 12:14; Deut. 25:9), slap him around, cover his face, and taunt him to prophesy. In the parallels in Matthew 26:68 and Luke 22:64, the taunt becomes a question, “Who struck you?” Mark has only the mocking command to prophesy. They may be playing a childish game of blind man’s bluff, or these brutal assailants want Jesus to predict something since many believed that the Messiah was supposed to have a prophetic gift (see Isa. 11:2–4).15
The reader can see the irony of all this. Three of Jesus’ prophecies have been fulfilled or are being fulfilled at this very moment. Jesus has told his disciples that the Son of Man “will be betrayed to the chief priests and teachers of the law. They will condemn him to death and will hand him over to the Gentiles, who will mock him and spit on him, flog him and kill him. Three days later he will rise” (10:33–34). That prophecy forms a precise outline of what is happening in Mark’s Passion narrative. He was betrayed to the high priests (14:10–52) and condemned to death (14:53–64). He is about to be handed over to the Gentiles (15:1–20), who will mock him, scourge him, and finally kill him (15:21–47). After three days, he will be raised (16:1–8).
Besides this key prophecy, Jesus also predicted that the disciples would be scattered when the shepherd was struck (14:27), and this prophecy was sadly fulfilled (14:50). He also prophesied that Peter would deny him three times this very night before the rooster crowed twice (14:30). Peter’s denials are occurring at this very moment, and only Mark notes that the rooster crowed a second time when Peter had denied him the third time (14:72), fulfilling that prophecy to the letter.
All of these negative prophecies are being fulfilled, but Jesus has just uttered another prophecy in this scene that is of a greater magnitude: They will see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of Power, coming with the clouds of heaven (14:62; see 8:38; 13:26). Having seen Jesus’ prophecies fulfilled to the letter, the reader knows that this prophecy is neither blasphemous nor ridiculous and can trust that it also will be fulfilled. Jesus will be vindicated in his resurrection and will judge his oppressors. The blindfolded Jesus is therefore the only one who sees, while his tormentors are blinded by their hatred.
Peter’s Denial (14:53–54, 66–72)
MARK INTRODUCES THE setting for Peter’s denial of Jesus in 14:54, immediately after introducing the setting for Jesus’ hearing before the Sanhedrin (14:53), in order to show that both take place simultaneously. While Jesus undergoes interrogation, Peter waits outside in the courtyard.16 Jesus’ examination is his final and climactic encounter with the hostile authorities. He openly acknowledges his identity (14:61–62), which results in his condemnation, mockery, and beating. The scene then shifts back to Peter, warming himself by the fire (lit., “the light”). While Jesus boldly confesses before the high priest, Peter denies before one of the high priest’s servant girls that he ever knew Jesus.
If Mark were simply interested in giving a factual report about what Peter did during the trial of Jesus, he leaves us with many loose ends. The report of Peter’s denials ends abruptly (14:72), with no indication of what happens to him after his wretched exit. We are left with questions such as: Why was Peter not arrested when he was identified? How did he escape? What did he do next? The conclusion of the incident contains an enigmatic reference to Peter’s breaking down in tears. Does this mean that he repented? Mark does not tell us, and Peter drops out of the narrative the same way that he drops out of Acts (Acts 12:17), with many questions left up in the air.
Mark is not interested, however, in solely reporting what happened to Peter; rather, he wants to draw the reader into what Peter’s denial means by connecting it to Jesus’ trial. Peter’s trial in the courtyard is a parody of his Lord’s. He may have remembered his rash pledge to die with Jesus and tries to follow through, but he only trails from a safe distance (Mark 14:54) after Jesus’ arrest. He then sits with Jesus’ captors. While Jesus is under fire inside, Peter warms himself by the fire outside (14:54, 66). As Jesus confesses under immense pressure and hostility that seals his fate, Peter capitulates under the gentlest of pressure and lies to save himself.
Peter’s threefold denial matches his threefold failure to watch with Jesus in Gethsemane, and it shows him to be much like the shallow rocky ground in the parable of the sower. When tribulation comes, the word that has been received with joy begins to wilt under persecution’s scorching heat, and people fall away (4:16–17). He is accused of having been “with … Jesus” (14:67). As the scene develops, we see that he would rather be “with” the crowd, cozying up to the warm fire. But the waiting mob will not accept this outsider in their group, even when he tries to join in their rancor against his Master.
In the first denial Peter’s courage disintegrates before the private suspicions of a female servant. He responds to her initial query with evasion, “I don’t know or understand what you’re talking about” (14:68). He says more than he intends. The phrase “know and/or understand” is a loaded one (see 4:12–13; 6:52; 8:17–18; 9:32). The disciples have repeatedly displayed their failure to know and understand; Peter’s repudiation of Jesus is the culmination of this process.
Peter moves away from the light into the vestibule. The pressure increases, however, as the female servant voices her suspicions about Peter to others. “This fellow is one of them” (14:69). Peter keeps on denying (imperfect tense) and betrays his Galilean accent. They then say, “Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean!” Galileans would probably stand out like a sore thumb in the high priest’s courtyard. Anyone with access to the high priest’s palace probably held the prejudice that all Galileans were alike, a bunch of rebellious riffraff.
In his third denial, Peter invokes a curse. The verb “call down curses” has no object in the Greek text. It may be that he calls down curses on himself, as the NIV translates it. He denies Jesus under oath and curses himself if he is lying. Or he may have pronounced a curse on Jesus.17 The younger Pliny reported to the emperor Trajan as special commissioner to Pontus-Bithynia (ca. 110) that when he interrogated suspected Christians, he asked the prisoner three times, “Are you a Christian?” with threats of punishment. The accused proved his or her innocence by cursing Jesus—something, Pliny insists, “those who are really Christians cannot be made to do” (Epistles 10.96.3, 10.96.5). This curse was proof enough to the authorities that the person was not a Christian. In the Martyrdom of Polycarp 9:3, the proconsul tells the bishop, “Swear and I will release you.” Polycarp replies, “Eighty-six years I have served him, and he had done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my King who has saved me?” According to Justin Martyr, the Jewish rebel leader Bar Kochba (132–135) gave Christians the choice between death and cursing Christ (1 Apol. 31.6). Cursing Christ therefore was proof that one was not a Christian. In my opinion, Mark implies that Peter commits this blasphemy. This would make Peter’s fall all the more dreadful and his restoration all the more remarkable.
Things happen exactly as Jesus said that they would: Peter would deny him three times before the rooster crowed twice. Mark now tells us that the rooster crowed a second time.18 That implies that the first crowing gave Peter early warning, yet he persisted in his denial of Jesus. A textual variant in 14:68 after Peter’s first denial has the rooster crowing the first time. It is ironic that a rooster, renowned for its foolish pride, reminds Peter of Jesus’ prediction that he would deny him three times (14:30). The king of the chicken coop rules the roost and struts around, thinking that he is king of the world. The rooster fits perfectly Peter’s cocky boastfulness in 14:29, but it is the crowing of the rooster that snaps him to awareness of what he has just done. This belongs to a common biblical theme, where human beings are rebuked by the so-called lower creation (see Balaam’s ass and Jonah’s worm).19
Peter’s flight into the darkness comes too late now to save him from his shame. The violence of his sorrow is emphasized by the verb epiballo, but it is hard to translate.20 It means “to throw over” or “to cast upon.” Perhaps “he threw himself down,” or “he broke down and wept” (NIV, NRSV), or “he dashed outside” (see Matt. 26:75; Luke 22:62). He does not rend his garments as the high priest did, but he does rend his heart (cf. Joel 2:12–13) over his great sin. When Peter confessed Jesus as the Christ (Mark 8:29), Jesus admonished his disciples, “If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels” (8:38). Billows of shame now wash over Peter because he was ashamed to be associated with Jesus.
Bridging Contexts
PETER’S DENIALS BRIDGE easily into our contemporary setting; two other issues in the trial scene, however, need special attention. The first has to do with how a figure associated with power and glory, the Son of Man, could be connected to suffering and death. The second has to do with the Christian penchant throughout history to blame the Jewish people for Jesus’ death.
The Son of Man: Power Blended with Suffering
THE MEANING OF the term son of man in the Judaism of Jesus’ day is an elusive subject, which emerges again in Jesus’ dramatic answer to the high priest. In Daniel 7 and in the popular apocalyptic work 1 Enoch, this enigmatic figure is associated with power, glory, heavenly exaltation, and judgment, and he is distinct from the righteous community in that he does not suffer what the community does. Collins concludes that he is a supernatural being in Daniel:
The fact that he is preserved from their sufferings makes him a figure of pure power and glory and an ideal embodiment of the hopes of the persecuted righteous. The efficaciousness of the “Son of Man” figure requires that he be conceived as other than the community, since he must possess the power and exultation which they lack.21
In Mark, we see the Son of Man associated with power that is blended with suffering and weakness. Jesus openly declares that he is the Messiah only when there is no possibility that crowds will rise up to crown him king. His admission seals the case against him and ensures that he will die. If Jesus is the Son of Man who will sit on the right hand of Power and come in the clouds of heaven, one must completely rethink what one believes about the Messiah and about power. Jesus as the Messiah is far less than many people hoped, because he never raises a finger against anyone and passively submits to death. As the Messiah, he is far more than anyone hoped, because he divinely exercises the power of God. God’s power is revealed in weakness, however. Anyone looking for mighty displays of force, miraculous feats, or startling prophecies will see nothing. In bridging the contexts, we should examine our expectations of where and how we will see God’s power working in our world.
Assigning Guilt
THE JEWISH HEARING before the high priest has become a sensitive issue for scholars in recent years. Some scholars have accused Mark of concocting this hearing before the council in a devious attempt to curry favor with Roman officialdom by shifting the blame for Jesus’ death to the Jews. This interpretation has convinced many, not so much because it is based on sound historical arguments, but because it exonerates the Jews from guilt. For centuries they have been cursed as the murderers of God, and this charge has been used as a pretext for horrendous evil committed against them.
Paul Winter, for example, has carefully developed the argument that the Roman governor initiated Jesus’ arrest and that the Jewish leaders were uninvolved in his condemnation. Life experiences affect what one looks for and one’s analysis of evidence. Winter himself was a Jew who barely escaped from Czechoslovakia before the Nazis took over. At the end of the war he was a senior liaison officer charged with care of persons liberated from concentration and forced labor camps. He learned that his mother, sister, and other close relations died in the extermination camps. I believe his research, which he conducted at great cost to himself, is seriously flawed, but his concerns to remove the onus of guilt for the death of Jesus from his people is legitimate.
We must be sensitive not to single out one group of people as responsible for Jesus’ death. Those who were specifically guilty of orchestrating his death were the Jewish priestly leaders. In the trial before Pilate, they incite the crowd to call for Jesus’ crucifixion (15:11). They represent the “rulers of this age,” who have been seized by evil (1 Cor. 2:8; Col. 2:15), and this is not a category of persons limited to any one race or nation. The same kinds of people have plotted evil against others in back rooms from time immemorial. These leaders are little different from the Nazi officials who gathered at Wahnsee and planned the “final solution” to eradicate Jews from Europe. Mark’s account of Jesus’ trial and crucifixion has nothing to do with the guilt of the Jewish people. It has everything to do with persons who abuse power for their own ends and cloak their evil with religiosity, thinking that their ends justify the means.
The guilt for Jesus’ death, therefore, is not to be apportioned to any one group. The trustees of Israel’s national religious shrine bear the greatest responsibility for taking the initiative to put Jesus to death. But Pilate bears responsibility for taking no responsibility. To the shame of Christians, the stress on Jewish corporate guilt for this crime has been too easily transferred into the social, economic, and political realms, with horrendous consequences in this very century. Claude Montefiore, commenting on Matthew 27:25, wrote that it was “a terrible verse; a horrible mention … one of those phrases which have been responsible for oceans of human blood and a ceaseless stream of misery and desolation.”22 He wrote before World War II. The result of Christian persecution of Jews means that the cross does not represent the forgiving love of God to most Jews but the age-old charge of deicide and justification for the pogrom.
I doubt that we would have done much differently had we been in their position. Anyone who has ever dealt with persons in positions of power, whether in the religious world or the secular world, knows that they are just as capable of doing the same things as these ruling priests did. They scheme to destroy people’s lives, shamelessly lie, manipulate crowds, and try to cover up their dirty work with slick propaganda. This is nothing new, and this violence continues today. Innocent victims are made scapegoats and are framed, tortured, and eliminated. Few voices cry out for justice. We may feel more comfortable finding a scapegoat to blame for the great evil perpetrated against God’s Son, but we cannot evade our own guilt. We do not become saints by establishing the culpability of others. The cross reveals that all humankind is guilty. We must look to ourselves and our leaders, who would crucify Jesus afresh.
Contemporary Significance
MARK SHOWS THAT Jesus suffered the greatest injustice. He was the victim of lies and innuendo, frame-ups, and a rigged jury. What makes this worse is that Jesus’ condemnation was not done in a fit of mindless passion. Those who were supposedly the wisest and the holiest in the land had Jesus killed after deliberate proceedings, coldly and rationally.23 We cannot help but abhor these leaders for their malicious corruption. But we must see that those who hate revolutionary ideas and feel responsible to God for keeping intact their vision of the American way of life, for example, would probably have acted in exactly the same way.
The traditional aristocracy, charged with the preservation of law and order and the Jewish way of life, carried out what they thought were the best interests of the country. These interests just happened to coincide with their best interests. The high priest’s speech in John 11:50, although interpreted theologically, provides a clear motivation for their actions: They were removing a troublemaker who posed a grave danger to the whole nation if he roused the crowds. The Romans would step in to quell the movement with their normal heavy-handed brutality. The Romans charged these leaders with keeping the peace; if the peace was not kept, their power was in jeopardy. They were not unlike the men who tried to set up Martin Luther King, Jr., and did not shed a tear when he was shot. Jesus was killed by self-serving religious leaders in control of the temple, who were intent on preserving their power.
The king in John Steinbeck’s novel The Short Reign of Pippin IV says: “Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts, perhaps the fear of a loss of power.”24 The Jewish leaders feared what the Romans might do to them, not what God might do. They were swollen with ecclesiastical pride and filled with professional jealousy at the success of a true religious leader. They were embedded in a prosperous and mighty institution, and institutions can forget their original purpose and become concerned only with self-preservation. Even institutions dedicated to God can become taken over by evil and can try to thwart God’s will rather than serving as an agent of God’s will. Jesus confronted a corrupt institution and threatened its existence. What happened next should not surprise us. Confront them today and see what happens. Wink writes:
What killed Jesus was not irreligion, but religion itself; not lawlessness, but precisely the law; not anarchy, but the upholders of order. It was not the bestial but those considered best who crucified the one in whom the divine Wisdom was visibly incarnate. And because he was not only innocent, but the very embodiment of true religion, true law, and true order, this victim exposed their violence for what it was: not the defense of society, but an attack against God.25
Jesus was innocent of the charges. The Jewish leaders were guilty, but we cannot blackball the whole lot. Every group of religious people has in its midst the wily and unscrupulous ecclesiastical politician, the fanatically righteous headhunter, the spineless toady who stands up for nothing, the turncoat who will switch to whatever he thinks will be the winning side to further his career, and the pious who are intent on mercy and justice. These first-century Jewish religionists are not the only ones who were guilty. They embody the universal guilt of all religious people. Pilate was also guilty, and he embodies the universal guilt of an idolatrous state. Judas too was guilty; he betrayed his Master.
I find it interesting in examining scholarly treatises and hearing sermons that we try to get different ones of these perpetrators off the hook. Some want to exonerate the Jewish leaders because the Jewish people have endured centuries’ worth of undeserved blame. Gentiles now feel guilty over what has been done to the Jews in the name of Christianity and try to rid them of any connection at all in the death of Jesus. It was all Pilate’s doing; no Jews were involved. Those in the pew more commonly absolve Pilate of guilt and regard him as a sad victim of circumstance. All kinds of justifications for Judas’s betrayal have been proposed.
I am convinced that such attempts to excuse these original miscreants are ultimately attempts to excuse ourselves. Nobody is guilty. It was all God’s plan, so that leaves only God to take responsibility. Schweizer rings the bell when he concludes: “Whoever is conscious of his own negligence in obedience, of his own failure to love, of the lethargy of his own heart in the midst of the demands of everyday life, cannot escape from his responsibility before God for Jesus’ death by fixing the blame upon some other person.”26 When we read this account, we must see how easily we can become a crafty high priest, a devious Judas, a lying false witness, a cowardly Peter, a wishy-washy governor, a mindless member of a hate-filled crowd, a coarse soldier, and an absent disciple hidden for fear. Then we realize that it is we who are on trial before Jesus and not vice versa.
The sad plight of Peter, the rock who disintegrates into a pile of sand, evokes our horror and sympathy. We understand how tempting it is to withdraw from others who get into difficulty with the authorities. In private we may say, “We are behind you all the way.” And we usually are—way behind. We can learn from examples of bravery, including Jesus himself, who fearlessly confessed and then withstood the withering assault from those who hated him. The examples of the many martyrs of the faith throughout the centuries who bravely resisted unto death can inspire us. Yet the vivid portrayal of Peter’s abject failure perhaps teaches us best. The account of his dismal collapse could only have come from his own testimony, which he told to help others. The readers of Mark’s Gospel certainly know that his repudiation of Christ was not the end for Peter, that he was restored (16:7), that he went on to preach boldly the gospel, and that his faith cost him his life. The poignancy of his denials in an hour of crisis becomes both a warning and a solace to others.
Sins of omission lead to sins of commission.27 Three times Peter failed to understand Jesus’ announcement of his suffering. Three times he did not heed Jesus’ urgent appeal to watch, stay awake, and pray. Three times he denied Jesus. The sin of boastful rivalry led him to think that he was different from all the others—“I will not” (14:29). He relied on his own strength and fell farther than the other disciples. Paul’s warning to the Corinthians is apropos: “So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!” (1 Cor. 10:12). The sin of spiritual complacency kept Peter from watching as his Lord commanded. In 1 Peter 1:7, Peter speaks of being tested by fire and warns about a fiery ordeal of suffering that will come on Christians (4:7). We never know when our faith or allegiance might be tested, however. Fiery ordeals might slip up on us while we warm ourselves by comfortable fires, as Peter did (Mark 14:54, 67).
Many Christians today do not face the fierce persecution that engulfed the first Christians. Few today are forced to choose between Christ and imprisonment or execution. Consequently, our denials of Christ may take more subtle forms, such as timid silence. We may not want to be identified as Christians. We do not speak out against those who sarcastically dismiss Christianity as a fantasy. We try to blend into the crowd of our Master’s enemies because we do not want to be jeered by others or to rock any boats.
The Christian faith calls for us to stand out from others. When the Hall of Fame baseball player Mickey Mantle was on the verge of death after years of abusing his body with alcohol, his many friends gathered around his hospital bed to say their farewells. One former teammate who came to his bedside was Bobby Richardson. As a Christian he had not joined the wild partying of his mates and had become a minister after his retirement from the game. Mickey Mantle used to make fun of him as “the milk drinker”; but as his life ebbed away, he most wanted to talk with Bobby Richardson. The testimony of Bobby’s life amid the jeers had made its impact.
One can also take solace from the account of Peter’s denials. Peter was the most prominent of Jesus’ disciples, yet he was still a sinner in need of God’s mercy. He thought he would die for Jesus, but he needed Jesus to die for him. His failure reveals the truth of Jesus’ statement in Mark 2:17: “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Mark is the Gospel of the second chance. The angel’s command in 16:7, “Go, tell his disciples and Peter,” holds the promise of his restoration. There were probably members in Mark’s church who already had betrayed and denied their Lord. If Peter could be restored after denying his Lord and even cursing him, then there was hope for others who might be guilty of the same or worse.28 Peter’s tears of remorse mark the beginning of that restoration.