Lange Commentary - Luke 23:1 - 23:4

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Lange Commentary - Luke 23:1 - 23:4


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

3. Pilate and Herod

a. JESUS LED TO PILATE, INTERROGATED BY HIM, AND FOUND INNOCENT (Luk_23:1-4)

1And the whole multitude of them arose, and led him unto Pilate. 2And they began to accuse him, saying, We found this fellow perverting the nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Cesar, saying that he himself is Christ a king. 3And Pilate asked him, saying, Art thou the King of the Jews? And he answered him and said, Thou sayest it. 4Then said Pilate to the chief priests and to the people [crowds, ὄ÷ëïõò ], I find no fault in this man.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Luk_23:1. And led Him.—The solemn leading away of our Lord to Pilate, and His delivery to him, is one of the particulars of the history of the Passion which all the Evangelists visibly emphasize. No wonder, for the process herewith enters upon an entirely new stadium, and passes now from the spiritual to the secular sphere. As to the time and manner of the leading away, as to the sequence of events and the character of the judge, see Lange on Mat_27:1. As respects this whole trial, compare, moreover, besides the writers whom inter alios, Hase, Leben Jesu, § 3, gives, the Dissertatio, by the Dutch divine, P. J. J. Mounier, De Pilati in causa servatoris agendi ratione, L. B. 1825. As respects the source from which we draw our knowledge of what here took place, the gospel of Nicodemus, it is true, contains some traits, which, on internal grounds, appear credible, but, on the whole, it has only this value, that we know from it how, in the fifth and sixth century, they represented to themselves this process. In the Acts, and in the epistles also, there are not wanting descriptive allusions to that which took place under the Roman Procurator (Act_3:13-14; Act_4:27; 1Ti_6:13). But here, also, the four gospels remain the chief source, belying here in no way their respective peculiarities. While the Synoptics, namely, delineate to us especially the public side of the trial, John alone makes known to us what passed between our Lord and the Procurator in private. Matthew, who more than the others, even in the beginning of his gospel, speaks of dreams and visions, is the only one who gives account of the remarkable dream of Pilate’s wife, as well, too, as of the genuinely Israelitish ceremony of the washing of Pilate’s hands. Mark describes, in his way, briefly, vigorously, rapidly, how the Lion of the tribe of Judah hurries over the field of conflict to His complete triumph. Luke has enriched the delineation of this trial with a new particular, with the appearance before Herod, but at the same time condenses the occurrences more closely, takes more account of arranging the facts than of the sequence of time, and even passes over in almost entire silence the scourging and mocking by the Roman soldiers. The actual commencement of the trial John alone describes, Luk_18:28-32. On the other hand, we owe to Luke, Luk_23:2, the very precise statement of the actual ground of accusation with which the chief priests open the series of their charges.

Unto Pilate.—The question whether we, by the ðñáéôþñéïí , have to understand the well-known tower Antonia, or the palace of Herod, we believe that we must answer in the former sense; for it was in the tower Antonia that the Roman garrison lay, and the Procurator, therefore, during his temporary abode in the capital, might best lodge there. Tradition does not permit us to identify the places named, and it is entirely arbitrary to consider the palace of Herod as the established and ordinary residence of the Procurators in their visits to Jerusalem. Josephus, De Bell. Jdg_2:14; Jdg_2:8; Philo, De Legatione Judœorum, p. 1034, to whom appeal is commonly made in favor of Herod’s palace, leave it entirely undecided whether this palace was always, and also at the time of Jesus, the residence of the governor. The above tower Antonia we are to look for on the northeast side of the temple mountain, while the place “Gabbatha,” according to Josephus, also lay between the tower Antonia and the western corner of the temple, immediately before the judgment-hall.

Luk_23:2. And they began.—It is not easy for them so to introduce the case as to make from the very beginning a favorable impression upon Pilate. The substance as well as the tone of their address betrays plainly enough that they intend this. Ôïῦôïí , first, äåéêôéêῶò , without statement of name, with visible contempt: åὕñïìåí , with affected gravity, with which the subsequent declaration of Pilate that he had found no fault in Him, he, as little as Herod, Luk_23:14, singularly contrasts: ôὸ ἕèíïò ἡìῶí , with the full warmth of genuine friends of the people, who cannot endure that their true interests should be set at stake. Comp. Joh_7:49. The accusation itself is threefold. First, He perverts the people, äéáóôñÝöïíôá . Properly, He “gives them a false direction,” He brings them from the good way on which they themselves and the Romans with them would be so glad to see them walk. Moreover, He forbids to give tribute to the Emperor, since He—and this is the ground as well of the one as of the other offence—finally declares concerning Himself that He is Christ a King. Not without ground do they as yet intentionally avoid speaking of a king of the Jews, although it at once appears that Pilate interprets their indefinite expression in no less significance. With noticeable tact they place first not the religious but the political side of their imputations, and then, before making the attempt to prove, at least in some measure, their false accusation, they wait until Pilate himself shall inquire for the grounds of their assertion. He, however, already knows the Jews well enough, and therefore appeals as quickly as possible from the accusers to the Accused.

Luk_23:3. Art thou the King of the Jews?—Pilate, not unacquainted with the prevailing Messianic hope, formulates his question very precisely, and seeks to find out whether Jesus is really the promised and long-sighed-for King of Israel. To this question our Lord cannot possibly answer otherwise than, without delay and without the least equivocalness, with Yes. By denial or silence He would have come into contradiction with Himself. And if it is alleged that our Lord would have had to define more particularly the sense in which He called Himself so, since otherwise a misunderstanding on the part of the heathen ruler would have been possible, we may confidently assume that the tone as well as the manner in which He uttered His answer was fully calculated to excite the Procurator to a more particular investigation. And indeed He attains this purpose, inasmuch as Pilate takes Him apart with himself, that He may now more particularly explain and give the reason for His affirmative answer.

Luk_23:4. I find no fault in this man.—According to Meyer, Pilate finds in the confession itself the token of innocence.—“It is, in his view, the expression of the fixed idea of an enthusiast.” Possible, certainly, although for this opinion not a single proof can be given, but the question would still remain whether such an instantaneous and merely subjective impression would have entitled the Procurator, without further investigation, to declare the Accused at once innocent, and, secondly, if his declaration had been accepted, to relieve him immediately of any further prosecution. We are much more disposed to assume that Pilate, after the first public audience, which all the Synoptics give, ordered then the private hearing, which John alone has preserved, and only in consequence of this uttered the declaration of innocence which Luke, Luk_23:4; Joh_18:38, relate. In the private interview of Pilate with Jesus, the charge preferred Luk_23:2, it is manifest, is tacitly presupposed. Here, also, Luke remains really unintelligible if he is not complemented from John.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. The leading away of Jesus is one of the most remarkable turning points in the history of the Passion. It serves not only to fulfil our Lord’s declaration that He should be delivered over to the Gentiles, Luk_18:32, but it also brings the Passion of our Lord into direct connection with the history of the world, the reins of which, at that time, God had, as it were, placed in the hands of the Romans. It becomes the means of bringing to Him, again according to His own declaration, the death on the cross, but previously prepares, through the declaration of Pilate which it elicits, the revelation of His innocence and majesty. The Jews’ rejection of the Messiah is here already, in principle, decided, and with it, at the same time, also, the destruction of the City and of the Temple. While the Sanhedrim, therefore, is leading Him away, it declares therewith that it will not have this Messiah, and gives the promised salvation out of its own hands into the impure hands of heathens. From this hour Israel’s Passover becomes an empty echo, and Israel itself, like an impure leaven, is purged out of the house of God, the church of Christ. But thus do they, at the same time, help to fulfil God’s everlasting counsel, that all things should be comprehended under one head in Christ, Eph_1:10. From the moment when the Great Sufferer trod the threshold of the heathen dwelling, the wall of partition which was between is broken down, Eph_2:14-16, and the heathen world invited in to a nobler feast of freedom than Israel was able to celebrate in the paschal night. As the night, Act_16:9-10, was for the spiritual weal of Europe a decisive one, so was this morning for the salvation of the whole heathen world.

2. It is one of the most adorable ways of the providence of God, that at the very time at which Christ must die, a man stood at the head of the government in Judea, who in every respect was most peculiarly fitted to be, in his ignorance, a minister of the counsel of God for the salvation of the world,—on the one hand, receptive enough to recognize the truth, courageous enough to declare it and to confess several times the innocence of our Lord, conscientious enough to omit no effort to deliver Him; but, on the other hand, moreover, so weak that he loved honor among men rather than honor from God, and so selfish that his own honor lay more at heart with him than the cause of the innocent.—We feel that just such a man must the secular judge have been, under whom the Deliverer of the world should suffer death.

3. By the delivery of our Lord to Pilate, the heathen world now becomes partaker with the Jewish world in the greatest wickedness that has ever been committed. In this it appears that the true light is hated as well by those who are under the law as by those who are without the law, and the judgment Rom_3:19-20, appears as a perfectly righteous one. But, at the same time, there is also revealed therein the grace of God, as having appeared to all who believe, without respect of persons, Rom_3:21-31.

4. The very manner in which the chief priests here introduce the secular process reveals from the very beginning the part which they are now resolved to play. No means, even slander, is too base for them; for we can only call it thoroughly conscious slander when they, after what had taken place three days before, Luk_20:20-25, yet venture with bold brow to assert that our Lord had forbidden the payment of taxes. Sometimes they come creeping, sometimes they spitefully erect themselves, and prove therewith that they do homage to the principle: the end sanctifies the means. And scarcely have they failed in one attempt when they proceed immediately with desperate stubbornness to another. So much more gloriously beams over against this night of wickedness the glory of the immaculate innocence of the Lord, to which Pilate must repeatedly bear witness. In union with other voices which were audible in honor of the moral purity of Jesus In the last hours of His life, from different sides, the testimony of Pilate also serves to strengthen us in our most holy faith, that the Lamb of God is indeed an ἀìíὸò ἄìùìïò êáὶ ἄóðéëïò . The connection in which this sinlessness of our Lord stands with the atoning virtue of His death, is something which it is the business of Dogmatics to bring to view.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

The early morning hour of the most remarkable day of the world’s history.—The most terrible injustice practised under the forms of law.—The King of the Jews delivered into the hands of the Gentiles.—Christ the centre of the union of the Jewish and the heathen world: 1. The sins of both He, a. reveals, b. bears, c. covers; 2. both He reconciles in one body, a. with God, b. with one another, c. with heaven, Col_1:19-20.—Slander against our Lord and His people: 1. Inexhaustible in its weapons; 2. impotent for victory.—Jesus the Faithful Witness, Rev_1:5.—“Thou sayest it”: 1. The truth; 2. the dignity; 3. the requirement, of this utterance.—The first favorable impression which the Accused makes upon His yet impartial judge.—The immaculate innocence of the Suffering One: 1. Slandered; 2. vindicated; 3. crowned.—The praiseworthy manner in which Pilate opens the trial of Jesus, in contrast with the lamentable way in which he ends it.—Pilate the image of the natural man in his relation to Christ.

Starke:—They who would otherwise have no communion with one another easily become one when one must help the other to carry out his evil schemes.—Quesnel:—There is no course of life so righteous and innocent that it cannot be accused and persecuted.—Brentius:—Judge not at once, but hear also the other side.—Nova Bibl. Tub.:—One finds often even more uprightness in a heathen than in a Christian judge.—Osiander:—Christ has suffered not for His sin but for ours, 2Co_5:21.—Heubner:—The preacher of obedience is charged with insurrection.—Jesus, it is true, has caused the greatest imaginable commotions.—Arndt:—The first hearing of Jesus before the Procurator; how Pilate has to do: 1. With the Jews; 2. with our Lord.—Krummacher:—Christ before Pilate: 1. The leading away of Jesus to Pilate; 2. His entry into the judgment-hall; 3. the beginning of the judicial proceeding.—The accusations.—Christ a King.—The Lamb of God.—Tholuck:—The history of the Passion makes evident in Pilate to what degree the human heart is capable of becoming shallow and frivolous.—J. B. Hasebroeck, Preacher in Amsterdam:—Pilate: 1. As man: 2. as Judges 3. as witness to us.

Footnotes:

Luk_23:2.—With Lachmann, Tischendorf, [Meyer, Tregelles,] we read on the authority of B., D., [Cod. Sin., H.,] K., L., M., [R.,] Cursives, &c., ἔèíïò ἡìῶí . [Alford omits it, regarding it as a probable reminiscence of Luk_7:5.—C. C. S.]