What did Jesus say to Pilate?

The religious authorities had now handed Jesus over to the civil governor, and verses 11-26 relate what transpired before him. When examined by Pilate before the multitude Jesus only uttered two words, "Thou sayest," the equivalent of one English word, "Yes," He confessed that He indeed was the King of the Jews, which was the specific charge laid at His door in the presence of the Roman power. The three Synoptic Gospels agree on this point. John records other questions raised by Pilate and answered by the Lord in the comparative privacy of the judgment hall, and three times he records Pilate going out from thence to the people. As far as the public examination was concerned Jesus "answered nothing," for there was really nothing to answer; as Pilate very soon perceived, though he marvelled greatly. He was well versed in the subtle ways of the Jews and his acute legal mind soon discerned that envy was at the bottom of the prosecution. On the other hand he feared the people and wished to stand well with them.

We see Him now before Pilate, the Gentile governor, where He was to be condemned to die; the Jews had no power and right to execute any one. First He was condemned by the Jews and delivered into the hands of the Gentiles, who also condemned Him. The crowning sin of the world was therefore committed by both, the Jews and the Gentiles. Israel 's long promised Messiah and King was delivered by His own people into the hands of the Roman governor, the Gentile power, which was oppressing them. The charge which the leaders of the nation had brought against the Lord before Pilate was the charge of being a rebel; one who made himself king in opposition to the Roman authority. An immense multitude of people must have followed Him to the Praetorium. The governor questions Him without delay, "Art thou the King of the Jews?" The answer comes at once from his lips "Thou sayest." How brief and full of dignity! Then the accusation of the chief priests and elders began. One after the other spoke. They accused Him urgently, we read in the Gospel of Mark. Perhaps one tried to outdo the other in slandering Him and speaking malicious lies about Him. The Holy Spirit has not given us the detailed accusations they brought against Him; they all were undoubtedly of a political nature. But there He stood, the lamb of God and opened not His mouth. How calm He was in that Babel of voices. There was no need for Him to defend Himself against these unjust accusations. And the Gentile governor, the sharp, worldly, Roman politician wonders at that strange behaviour. Many a time accused criminals had been brought before him and he had witnessed their eagerness in defending themselves. Here stands one in his presence, who does not open His mouth. Nor does He say another word to Pilate after he had questioned him, so that Pilate wondered exceedingly. Such a prisoner had never been before him. He knew he was guiltless.

"They led then Jesus from Caiaphas to the praetorium;335 and it was early; and they entered not into the praetorium that they might not be defiled but eat the Passover. Pilate then went out unto them, and saith, What accusation do ye bring against this man? They answered and said to him, If this (man) were not an evil-doer, we should not have delivered Him up to thee. Pilate therefore said to them, Take ye Him, and judge Him according to your law. The Jews said to him, It is not allowed to us to put anyone to death; that the word of Jesus might be fulfilled which He said signifying by what death He should die. Pilate then again entered into the praetorium, and called Jesus and said to Him, Art thou the King of the Jews? Jesus answered, Of thyself sayest thou this, or did others say (it) to thee about Me? Pilate answered, Am I a Jew? Thy nation and the chief priests delivered Thee up to me: what didst Thou? Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if My kingdom were of this world, My servants (ὑπηρ.) would fight that I might not be delivered up to the Jews; but now My kingdom is not from hence. Pilate then said to Him, Art Thou then a King? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a King. I have been born for this, and for this I have come into the world, that I might bear witness to the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth My voice. Pilate saith to Him, What is truth? And having said this, he again went out unto the Jews, and saith to them, I find no fault in him; but ye have a custom that I should release one to you at the Passover: will ye therefore that I release to you the King of the Jews? They all cried then again, saying, Not this (man) but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber" (verses 28-40). ℵBCpmLX, cursives, Cyr., for the Text. Rec., "said" with most.

"Art Thou the King of the Jews?" was Pilate's first question. What made him ask that "Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or did others tell it thee of Me?" was the Lord's reply. Pilate told Him. It was His own nation and the chief priests who had delivered Him up. Those whose King He was had thus publicly refused Him. His own nation and their religious leaders sought His execution. Pilate, therefore, was justified in putting his next question: "What hast Thou done?" Again the Lord spoke: "My kingdom is not of this world: if My kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is My kingdom not from hence" (36). A King whose kingdom was not of this world could be no rival to Caesar. A King whose servants fought not on His behalf was clearly not one who had by His claim brought Himself within the meshes of Roman law as a traitor. He was a King; but His kingdom was not from hence. He was not a malefactor. He had done nothing wrong. That of which the Jews accused Him He admitted, but explained. He owned He was a King. He thus witnessed a good confession before Pontius Pilate (1 Tim. 6:13). But as His kingdom was not of earth, it conflicted not with the Emperor's throne. The things, the rights of Caesar were left untouched. The Lord's answer a few days before to the Pharisees and the Herodians about paying tribute to Caesar (Matt. 22:21) should have brought blushes to their cheeks, as they formulated such a charge against Him.

A second time Pilate asked the question, "Art Thou a King then?" Was he surprised at the Lord's answer, viewing Him, it may be, as a mere visionary, and that a harmless one? A kingdom He had, but not of this world. A King He was, whose servants were not called to fight with weapons of earthly warfare in their Sovereign's interest. Who before had seen a King like that? But more surprises were in store for the governor as the Lord replied, "Thou sayest that I am a King. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Every one that is of the truth hears My voice" (John 18:37). Who ever heard a prisoner thus speak before his judge? He who spoke was a man, for He was born. But He came into the world for a purpose. He does not now say that He was sent. Is there not here an intimation of His existence before His conception in the womb of the Virgin? What mere man could say, "For this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth"?

Now the count in the indictment just mentioned by the Jews was one Pilate could not ignore, if substantiated by proof. For the Romans allowed the Jews the exercise of their laws, though the power of carrying out capital punishment was denied them. That allegation, then, on the part of the people raised a grave question. Still it lay with Pilate to see if there was anything in it. This he endeavoured to find out. But the silence on the Lord's part acted as a check. Would He treat the governor in that way? Was He not aware of the large powers with which as Procurator Pilate was entrusted? A word from him could set the Lord free. A word from him could consign Him to death by crucifixion. A last rejoinder from the Lord now came. Pilate's authority was not disputed. But whence came it? "Thou couldest have no power against Me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered Me to thee has greater sin" (11). "There is no power but of God; and those that be are ordained of God"; so wrote the Apostle Paul in his Epistle to the Romans (13:1). "By Me kings reign, and princes decree justice. By Me princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges of the earth"; so speaks Wisdom in the Old Testament (Prov. 8:15-16). Pilate had authority, but it was delegated authority. It was from above — i.e. from God. To judge righteous judgment therefore became him. This the high priest, as the official voice of the Sanhedrin, had not done in delivering the Lord to the secular power — the Roman Procurator. In righteousness he should have acted differently. He had condemned the Lord for blasphemy; but Dan. 7:13, 22, showed, that One who is man could also be God. To that Scripture the Lord had twice referred him (Matt. 26:64; Luke 22:69). He had therefore greater sin. Would Pilate follow his example, and condemn the Lord? If the high priest had greater sin, Pilate in such a case would not be guiltless.

These last words of Christ, the last that Pilate heard from His lips, till they shall meet again, when the Procurator will be before Him whom he was about to condemn to death, and then hear the Lord's judgment about him — these last words evidently impressed the governor. What prisoner had ever spoken in that way to him? No such words, we may be sure, fell from the lips of the two thieves, when their sentence was to be pronounced. But the words of Christ, "the greater sin," apparently struck home to that man of the world. Conscience may for a time be stifled, but conscience has a voice. Was Pilate's conscience aroused, warning him against injustice? It looked like it; for he sought, we read, to release his prisoner (John 19:12). But, unhappy man! the Jews, bent on the Lord's condemnation and execution, cried out, "If thou let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend; whosoever makes himself a king speaks against Caesar" (12). Conscious that his government had not been always upright, Pilate feared exposure to the emperor at the hands of the Jews. "The fear of man brings a snare" (Prov. 29:25). So he prepared to yield to their wishes. And now outside the Praetorium, at a place called in Aramaic Gabbatha, where the judgment seat was set, Pilate appeared again in public, and made one more, though feeble, attempt to escape condemning the Lord. "Behold your King!" he exclaimed. But the fresh sight of the Lord only evoked a fresh demand for His death. "Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him," were cries which rent the air. Interposing anew with the question, "Shall I crucify your King?" the answer came from the chief priests, "We have no king but Caesar." The Lord rejected as their Messiah, the die was cast. Pilate pronounced sentence, and gave his prisoner to the Jews to crucify. So Antichrist some day must come (v. 43) to bring awful trouble on the nation, ere their King, their rejected Messiah, shall appear to deliver and to bless them (Zech. 12).

John 19:10-11. Mortified by the Lord's silence, Pilate boasts of his power to crucify or release the Lord at his own will, only to learn from the Lord that he has no power at all against Him except it be given from above. The Lord was about to do the great work whereby God is glorified and sinners that believe are blessed, and so man is allowed to use his power to carry out the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. Nevertheless, God will be righteous in dealing with the sin of man in crucifying the Lord of glory. Jew and Gentile are guilty of this, the greatest crime ever committed, but the Jews that delivered their Messiah to the Roman power are guilty of the greater sin.

We may be sure that, had any sinful man — had any one of us — been in His place, men would have had the record of a very different word. We should either have denied the divine origin of the power in which Pilate boasted, in order to press upon him, according to our thoughts, the consequences of its use, or have admitted it, in order to put him aside contemptuously in affected superiority; and thus would have said, either," God never gave you the power to act thus;" or, "Thou couldest have no power at all against me except it were given thee from above, and therefore I have to do with God and have nothing to do with thee." But His word was, "Thou couldest have no power at all against me except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin." In this perfectly wise answer responsibility is owned, though in the same breath with God's sovereignty, and yet each is perfectly in its place. It is as though He had said, God has allowed this — allowed them to have power, but they have used that power to have their own way, and it is manifest that it is their own way, and not God's, and so God marks the various steps in guilt.

Then, in the rejection of Christ, it was not merely the manifestation of man's sin, but the utter hatred of man's heart against God; "They have HATED both ME and MY FATHER." Thus the tree was proved to be utterly bad, and the more it was digged about and dunged, the more bad fruit it produced. Cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground? Then Pontius Pilate, who, being the governor of Judea, was the representative of the authority which God had put into man's hand, and which the Lord owned, when Pilate said to Him, "Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?" To which the Lord replied, "Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above," thus teaching Pilate that, having received the power from God, he was responsible to God for the exercise of it. And how did he use it? In condemning God's Son.

And the Roman emperors, though not so absolute in their rule as their Babylonian predecessors, "reserved to themselves and to their local representatives the right of judicial execution. The Jews admitted to Pilate their lack of this authority: "It is not lawful," they said, "for us to put any man to death" (John 18:31). This authority was in the hands of the Roman governor who arrogantly and insolently said to his Just and Holy prisoner, "Speakest thou not unto me? knowest thou not that I have power [authority] to crucify thee, and have power [authority] to release thee? "(John 19:10). This authority of Pilate Jesus did not deny, but rather traced that authority to its true source — not to his imperial master at Rome but to the Sovereign Ruler of all: Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above" (cp. Rom. 13:1-4). Never was this judicial authority more flagrantly abused than it was by Pilate, the representative of the Roman empire. Weakly submitting to the will of the Jews, he freed Barabbas the malefactor whom he should have executed for murder, and condemned Jesus the Benefactor to be crucified.

They claim that He should die. Pilate goes again, and asks, "Whence art thou"; and when He did not answer, he says, "Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee? Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above; therefore he that delivereth me unto thee hath the greater sin. And from henceforth Pilate sought to release him." The Jews cry, to work on his fears, "Thou art not Caesar's friend." "Therefore he that delivereth me unto thee hath the greater sin." Pilate had no power against Him really at all. If he believed that He was the Son of God, and there was at any rate fear in his conscience, he was helping on the devil's work against the Son of God, and any way he saw that in the Jews it was hypocrisy and envy.