Mat 27:1-25 | PNT | STEP | Jesus Crucified SUMMARY OF MATTHEW 27: Christ Delivered to Pilate. Judas Hangs Himself. Jesus Before Pilate. Barabbas and Christ. Pilate's Wife's Intercession. Pilate Acquits Jesus, but Yields to the Clamor. Jesus Scourged, Mocked, Taken to Golgotha, Crucified. Mocked on the Cross. Reviled by the Thieves. It Is Finished. The Veil of the Temple Rent. The Centurion's Confession. Pilate Yields the Body of Jesus to Joseph. Buried in the New Tomb. The Tomb Sealed and Guarded. When the morning was come . Jesus had already been condemned, but another meeting of the Sanhedrin after daylight was necessary to give its legal effect, as condemnations to death could not be made in the night. That was the object of this meeting. For a fuller account of it, see . For account of Christ before Pilate and the crucifixion, compare .

Matthew 27:1-25

Jesus Crucified SUMMARY OF MATTHEW 27: Christ Delivered to Pilate. Judas Hangs Himself. Jesus Before Pilate. Barabbas and Christ. Pilate's Wife's Intercession. Pilate Acquits Jesus, but Yields to the Clamor. Jesus Scourged, Mocked, Taken to Golgotha, Crucified. Mocked on the Cross. Reviled by the Thieves. It Is Finished. The Veil of the Temple Rent. The Centurion's Confession. Pilate Yields the Body of Jesus to Joseph. Buried in the New Tomb. The Tomb Sealed and Guarded.

When the morning was come. Jesus had already been condemned, but another meeting of the Sanhedrin after daylight was necessary to give its legal effect, as condemnations to death could not be made in the night. That was the object of this meeting. For a fuller account of it, see Lu 22:66-71. For account of Christ before Pilate and the crucifixion, compare Mr 15:1-47 Lu 23:1-56 Joh 18:1-38. Delivered him to Pontius Pilate. The first mention of the Roman procurator by that name. He was both military and civil commander, usually dwelt at Caesarea, but came up to Jerusalem at the passover feasts to preserve order. The Sanhedrin could not put Jesus to death, as the Roman rulers demanded that all cases of capital punishment be referred to them.

The governor. The whole province of which Judea was a part was called Syria, and was ruled by a "proconsul". The divisions of one of the great proconsulships were ruled by "procurators", translated "governors". Pontius Pilate, Felix (Ac 23:24) and Festus (Ac 25:1) are examples of the latter. Then Judas . . . saw that he was condemned. The annals of men record no sadder history than that of Judas, impelled by avarice and resentment to betray his Master for money, and only to awake to the nature of his awful crime when it was too late. The language here suggests that Judas had hoped that the betrayed Jesus would deliver himself from his enemies.

Repented. Not, in the Greek, the word used for "repent" in Ac 2:38 and elsewhere, but one that means, rather, "remorse". The first, "metanoeo", means "to change the mind or purpose"; the other, "metamellomai", "to carry a burden of sorrow over the past". One promises a change in the future; the other is born of despair; Peter repented; Judas regretted. I have sinned in that I have betrayed innocent blood. The Jewish law demanded that if new testimony was offered after condemnation the case should again be heard. Perhaps Judas thought his testimony to the innocence of Christ might, under the circumstances, be heard.

What [is that] to us? No words could more emphatically declare the utter disregard of the Jewish rulers to justice. They concerned themselves not in the slightest concerning the innocence or guilt of Christ; they cared only to procure his death. Cast down the pieces of silver in the temple. Where he had this interview with the Sanhedrin.

Went and hanged himself. So have done, since, thousands of criminals when the blackness of their crime had revealed itself to them. How often a man after the committal of a murder shoots himself! It is not lawful for to put them into the treasury. These men were not too scrupulous to send the innocent to death, to shed the blood of the innocent, but were too scrupulous to put blood money into the treasury. They could pay blood money, but could not take it back. The potter's field. A field that had been used for the purpose of making pottery until it was worthless for other purposes and could be bought cheap. Potters' fields are still found in the Kedron Valley south of the city.

To bury strangers in. A burial place for the poor. The Jews usually provided their own tombs. Peter, Ac 1:18, says that Judas fell down headlong and his bowels gushed out. The common explanation is that he hung himself on a tree overlooking the valley of Hinnom, that the rope gave way, and that he fell headlong upon the rocks below, a distance of forty to sixty feet. Then was fulfilled. The prophecy is found in Zec 11:12. Albert Barnes shows that a change of a single letter in the original would transform Zechariah into Jeremiah, and it is supposed that some early copyist made the mistake. Another explanation is that Jeremiah, in the Jewish arrangement of the prophets, stood first, and that his name was given to the whole book of prophecy. Jesus stood before the governor. In the judgment hall (Joh 18:28), which the Sanhedrin did not enter for fear of defilement. It was probably about seven a.m. that they presented themselves to Pilate, hoping that he would order their condemned prisoner to death without inquiry, but on his demand for charges they accuse Jesus of seeking to make himself King of the Jews. This charge causes Pilate to ask:

Art thou the King of the Jews? They had condemned Jesus for blasphemy, but now make a political charge, and Pilate's question is whether Jesus is claiming a temporal kingdom.

Thou sayest. Jesus was King, not of the Jews only, but men, and he admits the charge. He was King, however, in a spiritual sense, as he explained to Pilate (Joh 18:36). He answered nothing. He made no defense, just as he had done when before Caiaphas (Mt 26:62-64). He answered him to not a word. To their charges of seeking to establish a worldly kingdom and of stirring up sedition he returned not a word. His impressive silence moved Pilate deeply. At [that] feast. The passover. How the custom of releasing a prisoner at the passover arose is unknown, but such customs are common under arbitrary rules. A notable prisoner. A leader in an insurrection in which he had committed murder (Mr 15:7 Lu 23:19).

Barabbas. The word means "son of a father". Some have made him a type of the guilty human race which is released from punishment by the substitution of the innocent Christ. Therefore when they were gathered together. After the first examination, Pilate, finding that Jesus was from Galilee, sent him to Herod, tetrarch of Galilee, then in Jerusalem, to be tried by him as belonging to his jurisdiction. Herod, however, after trying to induce him to work a miracle and mocking him, sent him back (Lu 23:6-11). Now they had gathered after his return.

Barabbas, or Jesus? Pilate, desirous of releasing an innocent man, afraid to oppose the Sanhedrin, adopted this expedient in the hope that the increasing multitude of people would demand Christ rather than a blood-stained robber. When he was set down on the judgment seat. Probably while the people were deciding for which one to ask. The judgment seat was a kind of lofty official throne, placed on the pavement (Joh 19:13).

His wife sent unto him. On this sad day the voice of a Gentile woman was the only one that interceded for Christ. That she should speak of Jesus as a "righteous man", shows that she knew much of him and that he had already made a wide and deep impression.

A dream. It may have been entirely natural. She was probably already deeply interested in Jesus and knew that he was to be seized in the night. Her waking thoughts would be reflected in her sleep. Persuaded the multitude. To call for the release of Barabbas, instead of Christ. It is likely that few of the Galileans, so favorable to him, yet knew of his arrest. "The multitudes" were such as the authorities would summon at this early hour. They said, Barabbas. Pilate's artifice had failed. The Jewish nation had not only rejected its Messiah, but chosen a robber instead. Let him be crucified. This is the decision of the Jewish people. He shall suffer the fate which was due the crime of Barabbas who had been released in his stead. What evil hath he done? Pilate's struggle between his desire to be just and to please a body demanding a crime at his hands is pitiable. He repeats the question three times and offers to appease their rage by chastising the innocent (Lu 23:22). He had, however, lost his power when he began to parley with a mob. They, utterly unreasonable, only demand the move vehemently that Jesus be crucified. When Pilate saw that . . . a tumult was made. It was a dangerous time for a tumult, with more than a million Jews in Jerusalem, and probably not a thousand Roman soldiers in the castle. If one occurred, it would be reported to Rome, and he could hardly make a plausible defense to the emperor. He therefore yielded, and gave his sanction to confessed wrong, rather than endanger himself.

Washed [his] hands. A symbolic act, meaning that the responsibility of the sin was upon the Jewish authorities and people instead of himself. His blood [be] on us. That is, let us have the responsibility and suffer the punishment. A fearful legacy, and awfully inherited. The history of the Jews from that day on has been the darkest recorded in human annals.