Matthew 27:2

2 . The Delivery to Pontius Pilate St Mark 15:1 ; St Luke 23:1 ; St John 18:28 ; “then led they Jesus from Caiaphas unto the hall of Judgment (or Prætorium ), and it was early.” 2 . Pontius Pilate the governor ] Pontius Pilate was the governor, or more accurately, the Procurator of Judæa, which after the banishment of Archelaus (see ch. Matthew 2:22 ) had been placed under the direct government of Rome, and attached as a dependency to Syria. Pilate filled this office during the last ten years of the reign of Tiberius, to whom as Procurator in an imperial province he was directly responsible. In the year a. d. 35 or 36, he was sent to Rome on a charge of cruelty to the Samaritans. The death of Tiberius probably deferred his trial, and according to Eusebius, “wearied with his misfortunes,” he put himself to death. In character Pilate appears to have been impolitic, cruel and weak. On three signal occasions he had trampled on the religious feelings of the Jews, and repressed their resistance with merciless severity. A further instance of cruelty, combined with profanation, is alluded to, St Luke 13:1 : “the Galilæans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.” The name Pontius connects Pilate with the gens of the Pontii, to which the great Samnite General, C. Pontius Telesinus, belonged. (Read history of second and third Samnite wars, b. c. 327–290.) The cognomen Pilatus probably signifies “armed with a pilum ” (javelin).

Tacitus mentions Pontius Pilate in a well-known passage ( Ann. xv. 44), Auctor nominis ejus Christus Tiberio imperitante per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio affectus erat. “Christus, from whom the Christians are called, suffered death in the reign of Tiberius, under the procurator, P. Pilate.” Many traditions have gathered round the name of Pontius Pilate. According to one, he was banished to Vienne in the south of France; according to another, he ended a restless life by plunging into a deep and gloomy lake on Mount Pilatus, near Lucerne. The shallow pool, often dry in the summer months, sufficiently disproves this story. The usual residence of the Roman Procurator in Judæa was Cæsarea Stratonis (see map). The wish of the Sanhedrin in delivering Jesus to Pilate was to have their sentence confirmed without enquiry, see ch. Matthew 26:66 .

Matthew 27:2 . δήσαντες : no mention of binding before in Mt.’s narrative. If Jesus was bound at His apprehension the fetters must have been taken off during the trial.— ἀπήγαγον , etc., they led Him away and delivered Him to Pontius Pilate. No mention at this point what they had resolved to say to Pilate. That comes out in Pilate’s questioning. Pilate was a very undesirable judge to come to with such a cause a poor representative of Roman authority; as described by Philo. and Josephus, as destitute of fear of God or respect for justice, as the unjust judge of the parable; but, like him, accessible on the side of self-interest, as, no doubt, the Sanhedrists knew very well.— τῷ ἡγεμόνι , the governor; a general title for one exercising supreme authority as representing the emperor. The more specific title was ἐπίτροπος , procurator. The ordinary residence of procurators was Caesarea, on the sea coast, but it was their custom to be in Jerusalem at passover time, with a detachment of soldiers, to watch over the public peace.

CHAPTER 27 Mt 27:1-10. Jesus Led Away to Pilate—Remorse and Suicide of Judas. ( = Mr 15:1; Lu 23:1; Joh 18:28). Jesus Led Away to Pilate (Mt 27:1, 2). For the exposition of this portion, see on [1367]Joh 18:28, &c. Remorse and Suicide of Judas (Mt 27:3-10). This portion is peculiar to Matthew. On the progress of guilt in the traitor, see on [1368]Mr 14:1-11; [1369]Joh 13:21-30.

(2) Pontius Pilate. —It may be well to bring together the chief known facts as to the previous history of the Governor, or more accurately, the Procurator, of Judæa, whose name is conspicuous as occupying a solitary prominence in the creeds of Christendom. He must have belonged, by birth or adoption, to the gens of the Pontii, one of whom, C. Pontius Telesinus, had been the leader of the Samnites in their second and third wars against Rome B.C. 321-292. The cognomen Pilatus means “armed with the pilum or javelin,” and may have had its origin in some early military achievement. As applied, however, to Mount Pilatus in Switzerland, it has been conjectured that it is a contracted form of Pileatus, from pilea a cap, and is applied to the mountain as having for the most part, a cloud-capped summit. When Judæa became formally subject to the empire, on the deposition of Archelaus, a procurator, or collector of revenue, invested with judicial power, was appointed to govern it, subject to the Governor of Syria ( Luke 2:2 ), and resided commonly at Cæsarea. Pontius Pilate, of whose previous career we know nothing, was appointed, A.D. 25-26, as the sixth holder of that office. His administration had already, prior to our Lord’s trial, been marked by a series of outrages on Jewish feelings. (1) He had removed the head-quarters of his army from Cæsarea to Jerusalem, and the troops brought their standards with the image of the emperor into the Holy City.

The people were excited into frenzy, and rushed in crowds to Cæsarea to implore him to spare them this outrage on their religion. After five days of obstinacy and a partial attempt to suppress the tumult, Pilate at last yielded (Jos. Ant. xvii. 3, §§ 1, 2; Wars, ii. 9, §§ 2-4). (2) He had hung up in his palace at Jerusalem gilt shields inscribed with the names of heathen deities, and would not remove them till an express order came from Tiberius (Philo, Leg. ad Caium, c. 38). (3) He had taken money from the Corban, or treasury of the Temple, for the construction of an aqueduct. This led to another tumult, which was suppressed by the slaughter not of the rioters only, but also of casual spectators (Jos. Wars, ii. 9, § 4). (4) Lastly, on some unknown occasion, he had slain some Galileans while they were in the very act of sacrificing ( Luke 13:1 ), and this had probably caused the ill-feeling between him and the tetrarch Antipas mentioned in Luke 23:12 . It is well to bear in mind these antecedents of the man, as notes of character, as we follow him through the series of vacillations which we now have to trace.

Matthew 27:2 Δήσαντες ] The shackles which had been put upon. Jesus at the time of His arrest ( Matthew 26:50 , comp. with John 18:12 ), and which He still wore when He was led away from Annas to Caiaphas ( John 18:24 ), would seem, from what is here stated, to have been either wholly or partially removed during the trial. With the view of His being securely conducted to the residence of the procurator, they take the precaution to put their prisoner in chains again. It is not expressly affirmed, either by Matthew or Mark, that the ἀπήγαγον was the work of the members of the Sanhedrim in pleno (as generally supposed, Weiss and Keim also sharing in the opinion); and, indeed, it is scarcely probable that they would have so far incurred the risk of a popular tumult (comp. Matthew 26:5 ). The statement in Luke 23:1 is unquestionably the product of a later tradition. As for Matthew and Mark, they seem to assume that merely a deputation accompanied the prisoner, though doubtless it would be large enough to be in keeping with the importance of the occasion. Comp. also on Matthew 27:3 . παρέδωκαν αὐτὸν Ποντίῳ , κ . τ . λ .] For after Judaea became a Roman province (from the time that King Archelaus was dethroned, 759 U.C.), the Sanhedrim had lost the jus gladii . Comp. on John 18:31 .

On Pontius Pilate, the fifth procurator of Judaea, who was successor to Valerius Gratus, and who, after holding office for ten years (from A.D. 26 onwards), was summoned to Rome at the instance of Vitellius, then governor of Syria, to answer to certain charges made against him, and then (according to Euseb. ii. 7) banished to Vienne, where he is said to have committed suicide, see Ewald, Gesch. Chr. p. 87 ff.; Leyrer in Herzog’s Encykl . XI. p. 663 ff.; Gerlach, d. Röm. Statthalter in Syr. u. Jud. p. 53 ff.; Hausrath, Zeitgesch . I. p. 312 ff. For certain Christian legends regarding His death, consult Tischendorf’s Evang. Apocr . p. 426 ff. Caesarea was the place where the procurators usually resided ( Acts 23:23 f., Matthew 24:27 , Matthew 25:1 ); but, as it was the Passover season, Pilate was in Jerusalem (to be ready, in fact, to quell any disturbance that might arise, comp. on Matthew 26:5 ), where he lived in the praetorium (see on Matthew 27:27 ). τῷ ἡγεμόνι ] principi . The more precise designation would have been τῷ ἐπιτρόπῳ , procuratori . Comp. Joseph. Antt. xviii. 3. 1 : Πιλάτος δὲ ὁ τῆς Ἰουδαίας ἡγεμών . On the comprehensive sense in which ἡγεμών is frequently used, see Krebs, Obss . p. 61 ff.

Ver. 1,2. Mark saith, Mark 15:1 , And straightway in the morning the chief priests held a consultation with the elders and scribes and the whole council, and bound Jesus, and carried him away, and delivered him to Pilate. Luke saith, Luke 23:1 , And the whole multitude of them arose, and led him to Pilate. John saith, John 18:28 , Then led they Jesus from Caiaphas unto the hall of judgment: and it was early; and they themselves went not into the judgment hall, lest they should be defiled; but that they might eat the passover. If any ask why having condemned Christ, they did not put him to death. John tells us, John 18:31 , it was not lawful for them to put any one to death. They had already out of their malice to Christ broken several of their own canons, or rules observed in ordinary capital causes, sitting in the night time, and upon a festival day. They must have notoriously broken another, if they had themselves on that day put him to death. It should seem by their stoning Stephen, Acts 7:59 , they had a power in some cases to put persons to death; but Christ was to be crucified, and as to that kind of death they had no power: See Poole on "John 18:31" . Besides that, we must consider it was the passover day, and stoning any man to death required a concourse of people to throw stones, and they were afraid of tumults. The Roman governor had the militia in his power, and could better prevent and suppress tumults than they could do.

Finally, Christ was by his death to give testimony to his kingly office; and the Jews, as we shall hear, had this to charge him with, That he made himself a King: this was a civil cause, and to be condemned by Pilate the Roman governor amongst them. In the morning, therefore, consulting how to put Christ to death, they delivered him to Pontius Pilate, having first bound him; for though he was bound upon his first apprehension, yet it is probable that they had loosed him when he came into the hall of the high priest, and now bind him a second time, when they carried him before Pilate. John tells us, that they would not themselves go into the judgment hall, lest they should be defiled; but that they might eat the passover; which words have in them a difficulty, and also give us an account of a most unaccountable superstition. For the passover, they had eaten it the night before. But we must know, that not the paschal lamb only, but all the sacrifices offered any of the seven days, were also called the passover, Deu 16:1,2 , &c. It was now the first day of unleavened bread, but there were to be offerings this day of which they were to eat, which in a large sense are called the passover. But how unaccountable was the superstition of these hypocrites!