¹ Carmichael, , The Death of Jesus (1966) pp. 9–10Google Scholar.

² e.g. Theologians like Schuerer, , Die Geschichte des juedischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi (3rd ed. 1901)Google Scholar; Goguel, , Jesus and the Origins of Christianity (1960)Google Scholar; Wellhausen, , Einleitung in die drei ersten Evangelien (2nd ed. 1911)Google Scholar; et al. Historians like Mommsen, , Roemisches Strafrecht (1899, Reprint 1955)Google Scholar; Meyer, , Ursprung und Anfänge des Christentums (5th ed. 1924, Reprint 1962)Google Scholar; Klausner, , Jesus of Nazareth (4th ed. 1933, Hebrew)Google Scholar; et al.

³ Powell, , The Trial of Jesus Christ (1949) p. 14Google Scholar: “We share the traditional Christian belief that there is weighty historical and other evidence to justify a belief beyond reasonable doubt that the writers of the Gospels had personal knowledge and information of the matters about which they wrote …”.

⁴ MacRuer, , The Trial of Jesus (1964)Google Scholar Introduction p. ix: “The record as contained in the four Gospels is accepted as fact. Where the authors are at variance with one another, their differences are considered just as those found in the evidence of honest witnesses. All evidence is affected by the capacity of the witness to observe, his powers of accurate recollection, his gift of expression, and, where his evidence depends on the words of others, the accuracy of the information communicated to him. It is for Biblical scholars to debate the authenticity of the Gospel records and how far one version of the same event is to be preferred to another. The approach of the layman is to accept what he finds, and in doing so to treat the respective accounts as supplementing one another.”

⁵ Winter, , On the Trial of Jesus (1961) p. 2Google Scholar: “The Gospels were not written for the purpose of guiding historians. The use which their authors intended for the Gospels was religious, not historical. When the evangelists wrote down their accounts of Jesus' trial, they did so not with a view to preserving a record for historical research, but in order to convey a religious message.”

And see Lietzmann, , History of the Early Church (1961) vol. 1 p. 223Google Scholar: the Evangelist John “only employs tradition to add detail and graphic quality. On the whole, however, in the free exercise of his fantasy, he goes far beyond the old limitations in presenting, and in meaning to present, not history but theology.”

Sjoeberg, , Der verborgene Menschensohn in den Evangelien (1955) p. 216Google Scholar: “Die evangelische Ueberlieferung ist Glaubenszeugnis, nicht Geschichtsschreibung.”

For a compromise view, see Goguel, loc. cit., vol. 1 p. 135: “…the four (Gospel) accounts preserved in the New Testament are not meant to serve exclusively either a biographical or a historical purpose, but … their aim is also practical, and definitely religious.” And see Bornkamm, , Jesus von Nazareth (1965) 12 ffGoogle Scholar.

⁶ Dibelius, , Formgeschichte des Evangeliums (3rd ed. 1959) p. 214Google Scholar: “Kein Augenoder Ohrenzeuge stand der Gemeinde … zu Diensten bis zu der in aller Oeffentlichkeit vorgenommenen Kreuzigung.” And see Winter, loc. cit., p. 6.

⁷ Tacitus, , Annales, 15, 44Google Scholar.

⁸ Josephus, , Antiquitates Judaicae, 18, 3, 3Google Scholar.

⁹ Cf. Bultmann, , Jesus (1926) p. 12Google Scholar: “In my opinion, we can sum up what can be known of the life and personality of Jesus as simply nothing.” For the various theories of the non-historicity of Jesus, see Goguel, loc. cit., pp. 61–69.

¹⁰ Until about the year 60, Rome “appeared as the protector of the Christians against the Jews. Thereafter Rome became the great persecutor…. Not only the God of heaven and earth but a malefactor crucified by the Government of Rome was declared to have an authority exceeding that of the emperor of Rome. The cult of Christ and the cult of Caesar were incompatible …”. (Bainton, , Early Christianity (1960) pp. 21, 23Google Scholar.) That the monotheism of the Jews nevertheless continued to be suffered by the Roman authorities and to be exempted from the Imperial cult, brought the anger and the envy of the persecuted Christians to the boiling point.

¹¹ John 18, 31.

¹² Allon, Gedalya, Studies in the History of Israel (1957) vol. 1 p. 105Google Scholar (in Hebrew), states that the High Priest possibly desired only to find out the truth about the rumours which had reached him concerning the activities and teachings of Jesus. And see text over n. 81, below.

¹³ Y. Sanhedrin 1, 1; 7, 1; B. Sanhedrin 41a; B. Avoda Zara 8a, et al.

¹⁴ Cullmann, , Der Staat im Neuen Testament (1961) 30Google Scholar. And see Bienert, , “Von der Kollektivschuld am Tode Jesu” in Das Christentum und Juden (1966) 40Google Scholar.

¹⁵ This is the view correctly taken by Winter, loc. cit. p. 10 et passim, and by T. A. Burkill in two recent papers quoted ibid. p. 154, mainly for the reason that there are reliable records to the effect that the Sanhedrin did in fact exercise capital jurisdiction during the forty years preceding the destruction of the Temple; and if the tradition were that such jurisdiction had already ceased forty years before the destruction of the Temple, there would be no point to the other (better) tradition that with the destruction of the Temple, capital sentences became obsolete (B. Sanhedrin 52b, B. Ketubot 30a, Mehilta of R. Shimon bar Yohai to Exodus 21, 14).

Other scholars, relying either on the Forty Years tradition or on other data, hold that the Sanhedrin at that time were no longer authorized to carry out any executions, even if they did still pass capital sentences (e.g. Schuerer, loc. cit. vol. 2 p. 209); or that in order to pass capital sentences, they had first to obtain special authorization from the Roman procurator (e.g. Zucker, , Studien zur juedischen Selbstverwaltung im Altertum (1936) p. 82Google Scholar; Lengle, , Roemisches Strafrecht bei Cicero und den Historikern (1934) p. 51)Google Scholar; or that any capital sentence passed by the Sanhedrin was appealable to, or subject to the confirmation of, the Roman procurator (e.g. Dubnow, , History of the Jews (Hebrew) (2nd ed. 1936) vol. 2 p. 220)Google Scholar; or that the Sanhedrin had been reduced to a fact-finding body, with powers of conviction but not sentence (see n. 12, above, and Allon, , History of the Jews in the times of Mishna and Talmud (Hebrew) (3rd ed. 1958) vol. 1 p. 129)Google Scholar.

The Forty Years tradition is found in the Talmudic sources in two versions: one (the Jerusalemite) speaks of the cessation of capital jurisdiction (“forty years before the destruction of the Temple, the capital laws were taken away from Israel.” Y. Sanhedrin 7, 1); the other (the Babylonian) speaks of the banishment, forty years before the destruction of the Temple, of the Sanhedrin from its hall of justice in the Temple precincts to a “shop”, where according to law no Sanhedrial jurisdiction could be exercised (see Deuteronomy 17, 8–10Google Scholar). The Jerusalemite version contains also a reference to the cessation of civil jurisdiction: the “civil laws were taken away from Israel” at the time of Rabbi Shimon bar Yohai (Y. Sanhedrin 7, 1) or at the time of Shimon ben Shetah, about a century earlier (Y. Sanhedrin 1, 1); but it is a fact that civil jurisdiction did not cease either with the destruction of the Temple or during the times of any of the said scholars. The dictum of R. Shimon bar Yohai, reported there, that he praises God (for the cessation of civil jurisdiction), because he was not wise enough to adjudicate in civil matters, seems to indicate that this “taking away” of either criminal or civil laws is not to be taken literally, but rather by way of self-consolation for the restriction of judicial autonomy (the more so as the same R. Shimon bar Yohai is elsewhere reported to have regarded himself as one of the two outstanding geniuses then alive: B. Sukkah 45b).

As for the Babylonian tradition, the story is that when Rabbi Yishmael, the son of Rabbi Yossei, fell ill, his disciples asked him to leave with them some of the traditions he had received from his father; and he said to them, forty years before the destruction of the Temple, the Sanhedrin was banished and sat in a shop. Then ensues a discussion between the scholars: Rabbi Yitzhak bar Avdimi took the tradition to mean that the Sanhedrin ceased to try non-capital cases, whereas Rav Nahman bar Yitzhak took it to mean that they ceased to try capital offences. And the reason for the Sanhedrin to leave the Temple and sit in a shop given by the scholars was that they (the Sanhedrin) saw that the murderers multiplied so that they could not cope with them—whereupon they decided to leave the hall of justice so as not to be found derelict of their judicial duties (B. Avoda Zara 8b). R. Yishmael belonged to the fifth generation of the Tannaites, which means that the events here described could not have taken place prior to about the year 180; R. Nahman bar Yitzhak, who first interpreted the tradition as meaning a cessation of jurisdiction in capital cases, belonged to the fourth generation of the Amoraites (about the year 350), and need have known nothing of any parallel Jerusalemite tradition (it often happened that Beraithot, such as the Jerusalemite one here described, were unknown to later scholars: see B. Shabbat 19b, et al.) —so that the theory of the cessation of capital jurisdiction forty years before the destruction of the Temple, must be dated at about 300 years (or more) later. This in itself deprives it of historical reliability but the reason then given therefor, that the Sanhedrin were unable to cope with the volume of capital cases to be tried and advisedly perpetrated some kind of hoax in order to get rid of them, seems to me to prove conclusively that there is no truth in the tradition. The number of murderers and other violent offenders may, indeed, at that time have considerably increased, but so far from the Sanhedrin not being able to cope with them, they must have been vitally interested to demonstrate to the Roman occupation authorities that they were perfectly able to cope with any amount of judicial work and to bear full responsibility for the maintenance of law and order within the Jewish population. The dictum of Rav Nahman bar Yitzhak, and the spurious reason given therefor, are, however, easily explained if we bear in mind that it was exactly forty years before the destruction of the Temple that (according to Christian tradition) Jesus had been tried and crucified (in the year 29 or 30); that in the fourth century, in which Rav Nahman lived, the Christian religion had already become the official religion of the Roman emperors and Jews had started to be accused of, and persecuted for, the death of Jesus; and that a Jewish religious and historical tradition to the effect that at the time of Jesus' death, the Jewish courts no longer exercised capital juris-diction, might have been a valuable weapon in the apologetic struggle, that the Jews could have had no hand in the trial and execution of Jesus.

¹⁶ Mark 15, 2; Matthew 27, 11; Luke 23, 3; John 18, 37.

¹⁷ Carmichael,loc. cit., takes the charge of Jesus before Pilate to have been one of armed insurrection, not only of unarmed conspiracy to revolt; and the main indication thereof he sees in Jesus' having stormed the Temple and expelled the sellers and buyers and moneylenders (Matthew 21, 12), which he would supposedly not have been able to do unarmed. But, first, we find no hint of any such—naturally much graver—charge in any of the Gospel accounts, and, secondly, Jesus' activities within the Temple may have constituted an offence under Jewish law and enraged the Temple authorities, but was presumably not of much concern to Pilate.

¹⁸ Mommsen, cit. 437–38.

¹⁹ Matthew 24, 37; Mark 15, 25; Luke 23, 38; John, 19, 19.

²⁰ “Titulus qui causam poenae indicat” (Suetonius); see Winter, loc. cit. p. 205, and Goguel, loc. cit. p. 521 note 2.

²¹ Digesta 48, 4, 1; 48, 4, 11.

²² Ulpian 1, 18, 6, 8: “qui provincias regunt, ius gladii habent.” Mommsen, loc. cit. p. 244 note 3 seems wrong in thinking that the procurators of Judaea had no ius gladii.

²³ Acts 25, 10–12Google Scholar.

²⁴ Josephus, loc. cit. 20, 6, 2.

²⁵ Digesta 48, 4, 4. And see Mommsen, loc. cit. p. 558.

²⁶ Digesta, 1, 16, 6 and 50, 17, 70.

²⁷ Winter, loc. cit. p. 55–56 quoting Philo, , Legatio ad Gaium, 38, 301Google Scholar.

²⁸ Matthew 27, 20, Mark, 15, 8, and Luke 23, 1, speak of the “multitude”; in Luke 23, 4 and 13 we find “the chief priests and the people”; in John 18, 31 and 38 the reference is simply to the “Jews.”

²⁹ so MacRuer, loc. cit. p. 69 ff.

^29a See n. 10 above.

^29b See n. 11 above.

³⁰ Mark 15, 12–14.

³¹ e.g. Kautsky, , Der Ursprung des Christentums (1908) pp. 426 ffGoogle Scholar.; Winter, loc. cit. p. 57.

³² Matthew 21, 8–10.

³³ Luke 20, 19.

³⁴ John 12, 19.

³⁵ Mark 14, 2.

³⁶ Matthew 27, 15; Mark 15, 6; Luke 23, 17.

³⁷ Matthew 27, 20; Mark 15, 11.

³⁸ Prof.Flusser, D., in a review of Winter's book (Tarbitz vol. 31, 1960 p. 117)Google Scholar (Hebrew), maintains that the priests claimed the release of Barabbas because the execution of a Jewish nationalist zealot might have caused a public uprising. It appears to me that as far as public sentiment was concerned, the same must be said of Jesus himself, though he had earned popular affection otherwise than by nationalist fervour. According to Cullmann, cit. 29, 34, Jesus himself was convicted and executed by Pontius Pilate as a zealot, as Barabbas was.

³⁹ Luke 23, 4.

⁴⁰ Winter, loc. cit. pp. 91 ff. There is no support for the theory that the rule authorizing a prisoner to partake of the Passover lamb, if he were released on the eve of the feast (Mishna Pessahim 8, 6), would indicate a custom to release prisoners on that day (cf. Flusser, ibid. note 38).

⁴¹ Codex Theodosius 9, 38Google Scholar (De Indulgentis Criminum), paras, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8.

^41a See n. 25, above.

^41b See n. 35, above.

⁴² Mark 14, 1.

⁴³ Matthew 26, 47; Mark 14, 43.

⁴⁴ Luke 22, 52.

⁴⁵ John 18, 3.

⁴⁶ John 18, 12.

⁴⁷ Winter, loc. cit. p. 48.

⁴⁸ Goguel, loc. cit. p. 469.

⁴⁹ Winter, loc. cit. p. 47.

⁵⁰ John 11, 57.

⁵¹ Winter, loc. cit. p. 147.

⁵² John 11, 47–53.

⁵³ John 11, 48.

⁵⁴ Goguel, loc. cit. p. 512.

⁵⁵ Blinzler, , Der Prozess Jesu (3rd ed. 1960)Google Scholar, passim, bitterly complains that it is today widely agreed that there was no Jewish trial against Jesus: “this point of view is shared by almost all the monographs which have appeared in latter years on the subject and which deserve any attention.” But he himself firmly maintains the historicity of the Jewish trial.

⁵⁶ Mishna Middot 5, 4; B. Sanhedrin 86b.

⁵⁷ B. Sanhedrin 32a.

⁵⁸ Tossefta Shavuot 3, 8.

⁵⁹ Tossefta Sanhedrin 11, 1.

⁶⁰ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 5.

⁶¹ To this effect see MacRuer, loc. cit. p. 52: “The Hebrew trial had closed. Steeped as it was in illegality, it had been a mockery of judicial procedure throughout. Jesus was unlawfully arrested and unlawfully interrogated …. The court was unlawfully convened by night. No lawful charge supported by the evidence of two witnesses was ever formulated…. As he stood at the bar of justice, he was unlawfully sworn as witness against himself. He was unlawfully condemned to death on words from his own mouth….” To the same effect see also Innes, Taylor, The Trial of Jesus Christ p. 23Google Scholar.

⁶² e.g. Jaubert, Annie, La Date de la Cène (1957), passimGoogle Scholar.

⁶³ e.g. Blinzler, , loc. cit., and “Das Synedrium von Jerusalem und die Strafprozessordnung der Mischna”, in: Zeitschrift fuer Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft, (1961) vol. 52 pp. 54 ffGoogle Scholar. Also Powell, loc. cit. pp. 75, 86 ff.

⁶⁴ For the teachings of the Pharisees in contradistinction to the Sadducees, see Herford, R. Travers, Pharisaism, Its Aim and Its Method (1912)Google Scholar; Finkelstein, , The Pharisees (3rd ed. 1962)Google Scholar.

⁶⁵ Numeri 11, 16 and 24; Exodus 24, 1 and 9.

⁶⁶ Kings 18, 37 (and see Proverbs 31, 6 for the “strong drink” Jesus was given on the cross: Mark, 15, 23).

⁶⁷ Rabbi Elazar ben Tsaddok reported that when he was a child sitting on his father's shoulders (which fits in with the relevant time), he saw the execution by fire of an adulteress, and the mode of execution was contrary to law (Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 2).

⁶⁸ John 8, 5: “Now Moses in the Law commanded us that the woman taken in adultery should be stoned.”

⁶⁹ Mishna Sanhedrin 11, 1.

⁷⁰ John 8, 7 following Deuteronomy 22, 21.

⁷¹ “Because the courts of those days were not learned enough”: B. Sanhedrin 52b. And cf. Noerr, , “Rechtsgeschichtliche Probleme in den Evangelien”, in: (1966) 3 Kontextus 99Google Scholar.

⁷² See text over n. 195 below. A man found riding a horse on the Sabbath was stoned, though he had not under the law incurred capital punishment (B. Sanhedrin 46a). And see Y. Hagiga 2, 2.

⁷³ The cases reported in nn. 72 and 195 have also been explained as exceptional emergency measures: see Maimonides, , Hilchot Sanhedrin 24, 4Google Scholar.

⁷⁴ The only time a Sadducean court is expressly mentionel in the Talmud, occurs in connection with the trial reported to have been seen by R. Elazar ben Tsaddok (n. 67, above): B. Sanhedrin 52b.

⁷⁵ Deuteronomy 17, 6 and 19, 15.

⁷⁶ Biblical confessions are found in Joshua 7, 19–20, and in 2 Samuel, 1, 16.

⁷⁷ Blinzler (Synedrium, ZNW, loc. cit. at p. 60) mentions the witnesses rule as Sadducean law, but fails to offer an explanation as to the absence of trustworthy and admissible witnesses in the (Sadducean) trial of Jesus.

⁷⁸ e.g. Lietzmann, , Der Prozess Jesu, in: Kleine Schriften (1958) vol. 2Google Scholar; Brandt, , Evangelische Geschichte und Ursprung des Christentums (1893)Google Scholar; Zucker, loc. cit. p. 89; Baer, , “Some Aspects of Judaism as Presented in the Synoptic Gospels” in: (1966) 31 Zion 145Google Scholar (Hebrew); Cullmann, cit. 33; Bieneret cit. 43.

^78a Bienert, ibid., draws attention to the fact that the word used in Mark 15, 1 is “symboulion”, meaning council session, and not “crisis” or ‘crima’, meaning court session.

⁷⁹ John, 18, 28.

⁸⁰ Winter, loc. cit., p. 138: On the night of his arrest, “Jesus was interrogated by a member of the high priest's staff who also questioned witnesses and drew up a charge sheet which was approved by Jewish magistrates in the morning following the arrest.” And see at p. 48, ibid.: “preparing an indictment for the actual trial.” And see Cullmann, cit. 32: the role played by the Jewish authorities was confined to indicting Jesus before the Romans.

⁸¹ Allon, , Studies in the History of Israel, Vol. 1 at p. 105 (in Hebrew)Google Scholar.

⁸² Digesta 47, 23, 2: “Si plures simul agant populari actione, praetor eligat idoneiorem.”

⁸³ Mommsen, loc. cit. pp. 490–503.

⁸⁴ Matthew 27, 1: “all the chief priests and elders”; Mark 15, 1: “the chief priests”; Luke 23, 1: “the whole multitude of them.”

⁸⁵ John 18, 19.

^85a The theory that the Sanhedrin acted as an investigating or fact-finding or consultative body on its own initiative, and not on the initiative of the Roman authorities (propounded by Allon, Cullmann, Bienert, cit.), will be accepted, though with conclusions at variance with those of the said writers.

^85b See n. 27 above.

^85c See n. 52 above.

⁸⁶ Matthew 26, 47–49; Mark 14, 43–45; Luke 22, 47–48; John 18, 2–3. Notwithstanding this unanimity among the Gospels, the historicity of Judas' betrayal has been doubted by many scholars: see Goguel, loc. cit. p. 496.

⁸⁷ Luke 22, 52–53; Mark 14, 48–49.

⁸⁸ Matthew 26, 57; Mark 14, 53; Luke 22, 54.

⁸⁹ John 18, 12 and 24.

⁹⁰ Matthew 26, 56; Mark 14, 50.

⁹¹ Luke 22, 63–64.

⁹² John, 18, 22.

⁹³ According to Mark 14, 12 it was the night of Passover itself: if so, the matters submitted in the text apply a fortiori.

⁹⁴ See n. 57.

⁹⁵ See nn. 32–35 and text.

⁹⁶ Leviticus 19, 16.

⁹⁷ B. Sanhedrin 73–74.

⁹⁸ Allon, , History of the Jews in Palestine in the Time of Mishna and Talmud, vol. 1 at p. 28 (Hebrew)Google Scholar.

⁹⁹ According to a report in Josephus, loc. cit. 18, 1, 4, the Pharisees gradually became the majority in the Sanhedrin, because “the people would not have otherwise endured it any longer.”

¹⁰⁰ Urbach, , Standing and Leadership in the World of Palestinian Sages (1965) (Hebrew) p. 40Google Scholar.

¹⁰¹ The Gospels, true to their premise of a Jewish trial which had been prearranged for the purpose of putting Jesus to death, speak of “witnesses against Jesus to put him to death”: Matthew 26, 59; Mark 14, 55.

¹⁰² Mark 14, 56.

¹⁰³ Matthew 26, 60; Mark 14, 56–57.

¹⁰⁴ John 18, 20.

¹⁰⁵ Jesus' dictum, attested by the “false witnesses”, that he would destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days, is reported in John 2, 19, to have been made by him to the Jews assembled in the Temple at Passover!

^105a See n. 59 above.

^105b See n. 18 above.

¹⁰⁶ Mark 14, 61; Matthew 26, 63.

¹⁰⁷ Mark 14, 61. The version in Matthew 26, 63 is “Christ the Son of God”; in Luke 22, 67: “Art thou the Christ?”

¹⁰⁸ Mark 14, 62; Matthew 26, 64. The version in Luke 22, 69–70 is: “Hereafter shall the Son of Man sit on the right hand of the power of God. Then said they all, Art thou then the Son of God? And he said unto them, Ye say that I am.”

¹⁰⁹ John 18, 19.

¹¹⁰ e.g. Bauer, Fritz, “Der Prozess Jesus” in: (1965) 4 Tribune, 1716Google Scholar.

¹¹¹ The doctrine appears, of course, in the Gospels (Matthew 1, 20; Luke 1, 35; et al.), but was even by them never put in the mouth of Jesus. It was laid down as binding dogma as late as the Council of Nicaea (325). See Bainton, loc. cit. p. 166.

¹¹² Matthew 5, 9.

¹¹³ Matthew 5, 44–45; similarly Luke 6, 35.

¹¹⁴ Luke 3, 23–31; Matthew 1, 6–16. And see Romans 1, 3.

¹¹⁵ Exodus 28, 41; Leviticus 8, 12 and 16, 32; Numeri 3, 3; et al.

¹¹⁶ Judges 9, 15; 1 Samuel 9, 16; 10, 1; 15, 1; 16, 12; 2 Samuel 2, 4; 3, 39; 2 Kings 11, 12; Psalms 99, 21; et al.

¹¹⁷ 1 Kings 19, 17; Isaiah 61, 1; et al.

¹¹⁸ Genesis 31, 13; Exodus 30, 26–29; Numeri 7, 1; et al.

¹¹⁹ e.g. Ezekiel.

¹²⁰ Daniel 7, 13–14. Cf. Goguel, loc. cit. pp. 574–75.

¹²¹ e.g. Jeremiah 4, 13.

¹²² e.g. Psalms 110, 1. And compare the story in B. Hagiga 14a and Sanhedrin 38b, according to which Rabbi Akiba maintained that David occupied a seat next to the throne of God, and was rebuked by one of the scholars that he made fun of holiness.

¹²³ According to Goguel, loc. cit. p. 509, this messianic declaration of Jesus “is absolutely authentic. It cannot have been invented either by Jews or by Christians. The former would have been the last to place in the mouth of Jesus words which would justify the claims made by his disciples. The latter, if they had wished to express their faith in a declaration attributed to their master, would not have simply affirmed their expectation of the parousia, but would also have expressed their faith in the certainty of the resurrection, which was its guarantee.”

Other scholars (like Lietzmann, loc. cit.) have doubted the authenticity of Jesus' messianic declaration, mainly for the reason that the concept of the Son of God was Greek and not Jewish. See Wendland, , “Die Hellenistisch-Roemische Kultur in ihren Beziehungen zu Judentum und Christentum” (Handbuch zum Neuen Testament, vol. 1, 3rd ed. 1912), p. 220 ffGoogle Scholar.

¹²⁴ Matthew 26, 65; Mark, 14, 63–64. The version in Luke 22, 71 is: “And they said, what need we any further witness? for we ourselves have heard of his own mouth”; but there is no mention of tearing clothes.

¹²⁵ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 5. And see B. Moed Kattan 25a.

¹²⁶ Mishna Makkot 3, 15 and Keritot 1, 1.

¹²⁷ Strack, and Billerbeck, , Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud und Midrasch (1922) vol. 1 p. 1018Google Scholar.

And cf. Wellhausen, , Das Evangelium Marci (1903) p. 132Google Scholar: “Nach juedischen Begriffen lag darin unmoeglich eine Gotteslaesterung, dass jemand sagte, er sei der Christus, der Sohn Gottes.”

¹²⁸ Leviticus 24, 15–16: “Whosoever curses his God, shall bear his sin; but if he pronounces the Name of God, he shall be put to death.”

¹²⁹ Deuteronomy 18, 20; B. Sanhedrin 89a.

¹³⁰ Jesus' casting out of the Temple of moneylenders etc. (above, n. 17) may have amounted to a breach of the peace but was apparently not being held against him. Winter, loc. cit. p. 172, rightly points to the political, as distinguished from the theological, significance of any messianic claims. For the common appearance of messiahs at that time, see Pickl, , The Messia (1946)Google Scholar, quoted by Winter, ibid.

¹³¹ Acts 5, 26–39Google Scholar.

¹³² Cf. Finkelstein, , Akiba—Scholar, Saint, Martyr (1962) pp. 9–10Google Scholar.

¹³³ The contrary opinion of Jost, , Geschichte des Judentums und seiner Sekten (1857) vol. 1 p. 408Google Scholar, that the outcome of the proceedings in Jesus' case proves the absence from the night meeting of Rabban Gamliel, appears to be in the nature of a petitio principii.

¹³⁴ Genesis 37, 29 and 34; Numeri 14, 6; Joshua 7, 6; Judges 11, 35; 2 Samuel 1, 11 and 3, 31; 1 Kings 21, 27; Job 1, 20 and 2, 12; Esther 4, 1; et al. The instance reported in Esther 4, 1 shows that it was not unusual to tear one's clothes on receiving bad news: B. Moed Kattan 26a; e.g. on hearing of the outbreak of war (Shulhan Aruh, Yorei Deah 340, 36). The tearing of clothes appears mostly as the spontaneous reaction to disaster or to bad news; were it (in this particular instance) a compliance with rules, it would have been done by all present; the High Priest alone acted spontaneously.

¹³⁵ Matthew 26, 67–68.

¹³⁶ Mark 14, 65.

¹³⁷ Luke 22, 63–64.

^137a See n. 92 above.

¹³⁸ John 18, 23.

¹³⁹ The Biblical command, Love thy neighbour as thyself (Leviticus 19, 18), was invoked to exhort judges to make the end of a prisoner sentenced to death as light and fair as humanly possible: Sanhedrin 45a et al. And even raising a hand to strike another, is considered sinful: ibid. 58b.

¹⁴⁰ Baer, loc. cit. p. 139, quotes a letter from Plinius (Epistulae X 96) describing the procedure followed by him in interrogating persons suspected of being Christians, and writes that “the course of the proceedings in the interrogation of Jesus resembles the procedure of Roman criminal law: at the first stage of the interrogation, witnesses against the accused are summoned and testimonies and accusations heard; on further investigation, some of the evidence is found inadmissible or inconsistent… finally, the High Priest tries to extract a confession of his guilt.” But Plinius, in the letter quoted, does not speak of the summoning and interrogating of witnesses, but only of interrogating the suspects themselves: he would question them and requestion them until they would confess. Nor do we have any record of Roman criminal procedure in which the interrogation of the accused was postponed until after the examination of witnesses: the proceedings started with the questioning of the accused. Cf. Codex Theodosius 9, 3, 1: when an accused person is produced in court, he must at once be submitted to the “quaestio”, i.e. questioning (Mommsen, loc. cit. p. 137 note 3 and pp. 403 ff.).

¹⁴¹ Mommsen, loc. cit. pp. 938–39.

¹⁴² Matthew 27, 30; Mark 15, 19.

¹⁴³ John 18, 28.

¹⁴⁴ Luke 23, 1.

¹⁴⁵ Matthew 27, 2; Mark 15, 1.

¹⁴⁶ Klausner, loc. cit. pp. 18–54, maintains that the deficiency of the talmudic sources in this respect is not surprising; he points out that we would scarcely know anything about the Maccabean revolt, for instance, if we had been restricted to accounts in the Talmud. According to him, Jesus lived in that stormy period when attention was concentrated on other, more important events, and thus he passed through Jewish history almost unnoticed.

¹⁴⁷ Deuteronomy 13, 8–9.

¹⁴⁸ B. Sanhedrin 43a (text quoted from Dikdukei Sofrim ad loc.)

¹⁴⁹ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 4.

¹⁵⁰ Goguel, loc. cit. vol. 1, p. 72.

¹⁵¹ Deuteronomy 21, 22–23.

¹⁵² Buechler, , “Die Todesstrafen der Bibel und der juedisch-nachbiblischen Zeit”, in: Monatsschrift fuer Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judentums vol. 50 (1906) pp. 701–02Google Scholar.

¹⁵³ Mishna Sanhedrin 6, 1.

¹⁵⁴ B. Sanhedrin 46b: the sentencing procedure (including the call for further defence witnesses) should be drawn out until shortly before sunset, then the execution and finally the hanging should take place.

¹⁵⁶ B. Sanhedrin 33b.

¹⁵⁷ John 11, 53. And see n. 52 and text.

¹⁵⁸ John 11, 57.

¹⁵⁹ Goguel, loc. cit. vol. 1, pp. 72–3.

¹⁶⁰ B. Sanhedriri 67a (text quoted from Dikdukei Sofrim ad loc.)

¹⁶¹ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 10.

¹⁶² Tohseffta Sanhedrin 12, 11; Y. Sanhedrin 7, 25.

¹⁶³ This is the view of Bacher, in: (1905) 17 Jewish Quarterly R. 176.

¹⁶⁴ Cf. Arukh Completum, ed. Kohut, Alexander (1878), vol. 2, p. 119Google Scholar.

^164a Cf. Tossaffot ad B. Shabbat 104b; Klausner, cit. 20 ff.

¹⁶⁵ Mishna Avot 1, 6.

¹⁶⁶ B. Sota 46a, and B. Sanhedrin 107b (text quoted from Dikdukei Sofrim ad loc.).

¹⁶⁷ Buechler, loc. cit. p. 703. There are several manuscripts in which the words “the Nazarene” do not appear and only “Jesus” is mentioned: cf. Dikdukei Sofrim ad Sanhedrin 43a.

¹⁶⁸ B. Shabbat 104b; Tosseffta Shabbat 11, 14.

¹⁶⁹ See n. 162 and text.

¹⁷⁰ Cf. Dikdukei Sofrim ad Sanhedrin 107b. Some scholars conclude from the addition of the epithet that it is Jesus' association with Joshua ben Perahya which is “anachronistic”: see e.g. Levy, Woerterbuch ueber die Talmudim und Midraschim, Title Jeshu.

¹⁷¹ Cf. Dikdukei Sofrim ad Sanhedrin 67a.

¹⁷² Stauffer, , Jerusalem und Rom im Zeitalter Jesus Christi (1957) pp. 123 ffGoogle Scholar.

¹⁷³ Winter, loc. cit. pp. 62 ff.

¹⁷⁴ e.g. Targumim ad Genesis 40, 19 and 22; Deuteronomy 21, 23; Joshua 8, 29 and 10, 26; 2 Samuel 4, 12 and 21, 12; Esther 2, 23; 5, 14; 7, 10; 9, 13.

¹⁷⁵ Thus e.g. Yehuda, Ben, Thesaurus Totius Hebraitatis (Hebrew) vol. 11, p. 5482Google Scholar

¹⁷⁶ Exodus 26, 17; 1 Kings 7, 28; Y. Ta'anit 4, 7.

¹⁷⁷ Bezold, , Babylonisch-Assyrisches Glossar (1925) p. 106bGoogle Scholar.

¹⁷⁸ B. Sanhedrin 46b; Sifrei ad Deuteronomy 21, 22; Midrash Tanna'im ad ibid. (Ed. Hoffman, p. 132.)

¹⁷⁹ Deuteronomy 21, 22–23 (and see n. 151). The recent Philadelphia translation (Jewish Publication Society of America) renders the last sentence thus: “for an impaled body is an affront to God” (p. 364). The authoritative Aramaic translation of Yonathan ben Uziel reads: “it is a curse before God to hang a man”.

¹⁸⁰ See n. 154 and text.

¹⁸¹ Mishna Sanhedrin 6, 4 (according to R. Jose).

¹⁸² B. Sanhedrin 45b; Sifrei ad Deuteronomy 21, 23; Maimonides, , Hilkhot Sanhedrin 16, 6Google Scholar.

¹⁸³ Stauffer, loc. cit., suggests that this public post mortem hanging is in reality a demonstration of joy and triumph, as if celebrating the destruction of the enemies of God or of the people. But any theory other than the deterrence theory appears to be incompatible with the strict prohibition of leaving the corpse hanging over-night and with the injunction to have it buried as soon as the hanging has fulfilled its purpose.

¹⁸⁴ e.g. Pharaoh of Egypt hanged his baker: Genensis 40, 22; Ahasveros of Persia hanged Haman: Esther 7, 9; the Philistines hanged Saul and Yonatan: 2 Samuel 21, 6–9–12.

¹⁸⁵ e.g.: Joshua hanged the King of Ai: Joshua 8, 29.

¹⁸⁶ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 1.

¹⁸⁷ B. Sanhedrin 52b, 84b, 89a.

¹⁸⁸ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 3.

¹⁸⁹ Ruth 1, 17.

¹⁹⁰ Midrash Ruth Rabba Cap. 1.

¹⁹¹ For the dating of these Targumim, see e.g. Zunz, , Die gottesdienstlichen Vortraege der Juden hhtorisch entwickelt (Hebrew translation 1954 p. 36)Google Scholar.

¹⁹² Ezra 6, 11.

¹⁹³ Thus e.g. Stauffer, loc. cit.

¹⁹⁴ Cf. von Henting, , Die Strafe (1954) vol. 1 p. 254Google Scholar; Herodotus 3, 125 and 159.

¹⁹⁵ Mishna Sanhedrin 6, 4 et al. See n. 72, above, and text below.

¹⁹⁶ e.g. Acts of Apostles 5, 30 and 10, 39.

¹⁹⁷ Y. Hagiga 2, 78; Rashi ad Sanhedrin 45b.

¹⁹⁸ Mishna Sanhedrin 6, 4.

¹⁹⁹ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 4.

²⁰⁰ Maimonides ad Mishna Sanhedrin 6, 6; Rashi ad Sanhedrin 45b.

²⁰¹ Mishna Sanhedrin 7, 11.

²⁰² B. Sanhedrin 67b; Maimonides, , Hilkhot Avoda Zara 11, 15Google Scholar.

²⁰³ Exodus 22, 17.

²⁰⁴ Deuteronomy 18, 10.

²⁰⁵ B. Sanhedrin 19a.

²⁰⁶ It was the same Shimon ben Shetah who acquitted a murderer caught in flangranti by one witness, because there was no second witnesses present: B. Sanhedrin 37b. And where a court had convicted one of two false witnesses of perjury and executed him, without trying and convicting the other, he denounced the execution as judicial murder: Tosseffta Sanhedrin, 6, 6.

²⁰⁷ The Biblical injunction, as so interpreted, had a fateful influence on medieval witch-hunts: see Hansen, , Zauberwahn, Inquisition und Hexenprozess im Mittelalter (1900, Reprint 1964) p. 13Google Scholar.

²⁰⁸ Jesus cried out with pain, six hours after he was nailed to the cross: Matthew 27, 46; Mark 15, 34.

²⁰⁹ Herodotus 9, 120.

²¹⁰ Suetonius, Claudius, Cap. 34.

²¹¹ Mommsen, loc. cit. pp. 918 ff.

²¹² Tacitus, , Annales, 14, 48Google Scholar.

²¹³ Digesta 48, 9, 9; Mommsen, loc. cit. p. 984; von Hentig, loc. cit. p. 254. And see n. 141 and text, above.

²¹⁴ Matthew 27, 30; Mark 15, 19.

²¹⁵ John 19, 31–34.

²¹⁶ For a detailed description of the consequences of crucifixion from the medical point of view, see Blinzler, loc. cit. pp. 185 ff.

²¹⁷ Mark 15, 36–37; John 19, 29–30.

²¹⁸ Antiquitates Judaicae 12, 4; but in apocryphical sources these mass executions are described as slaying by sword (2 Maccabees 5, 34), by burning (ibid. 7, 4) or as killings without particularizing any mode (ibid. 6, 9).

²¹⁹ Bellum Judaicum 5, 11, 1.

²²⁰ Antiquitates Judaicae 17, 10, 10.

²²¹ Bellum Judaicum 2, 308.

²²² Bellum Judaicum 7, 6, 4.

²²³ Mishna Ohaloth 3, 5. Maimonides ad loc. maintains that normally blood would be dripping from the man on the cross, and death would result from the loss of blood.

²²⁴ Mishna Yevamot 16, 3.

²²⁵ Maimonides, , Hilkhot Gerushin 13, 18Google Scholar; B. Yevamot 120b.

²²⁶ Y. Yevamot 16, 3.

²²⁷ Tosseffta Gittin 7, 1; B. Gittin 70b.

²²⁸ B. Shabbat 67a.

²²⁹ Rabbi Ovadja of Bartenura ad loc.

²³⁰ Y. Shabbat 6, 9.

²³¹ Mishna Shabbat 6, 10; Maimonides, , Hilkhot Shabbat 19, 13Google Scholar.

²³² Plinius, , Historia Naturalis, 28, 36Google Scholar.

²³³ On the Punishment of Stoning (1962) (Hebrew); and: “Prolegomena to the Theory and History of Jewish Law”, in: Essays in Jurisprudence in Honor of Roscoe Pound (1962) at pp. 74–76Google Scholar.

²³⁴ B. Sanhedrin 43a; Maimonides, , Hilkhot Sanhedrin 13, 2Google Scholar.

²³⁵ Leviticus 19, 18.

²³⁶ B. Sanhedrin 45a et al. See n. 139, above.

²³⁷ Matthew 27, 22–23; Mark 15, 13–14; Luke 23, 21; John 19, 6.

²³⁸ Matthew 27, 27–35; Mark 15, 16–24; John 19, 23.

²³⁹ Part II, above.

²⁴⁰ Luke 23, 27–28.

²⁴¹ Mark 15, 23.

²⁴² Cicero, , In Verrem, II 5, 64, 165Google Scholar.

²⁴³ Winter, loc. cit. pp. 73–74.

²⁴⁴ Mishna Sanhedrin 1, 4.

²⁴⁵ Even Winter, loc. cit. p. 70, states that “there is no evidence that a capital sentence passed by a Jewish court was ever carried out by strangling prior to the second century of the present era”.

²⁴⁶ See n. 15.

²⁴⁷ We still have cases of stoning in the relevant time: see e.g. B. Sanhedrin 46a. The stoning of Stephanus reported in Acts of Apostles 7, 38 appears to have been an act of lynching.

²⁴⁸ B. Pessahim 112a; Semahot 2, 7.

²⁴⁹ B. Yevamot 120b.

²⁵⁰ See n. 131 and text.

²⁵¹ Acts 5, 28–30.

²⁵² Acts 5, 33.

²⁵³ Acts 5, 36–37.

²⁵⁴ Matthew 27, 24–25.

²⁵⁵ See p. 339 ff. above.

²⁵⁶ Part II, above.

²⁵⁷ It was Jesus himself who—according to Matthew—had said that upon the scribes and Pharisees and hypocrites “may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth”: Matthew 23, 35.

²⁵⁸ Contra Judaeos, Cap. 8.

²⁵⁹ See e.g. 1 Thessalonians 2, 15: The Jews “both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men”.

(On the other hand, we find Paul, in another context, speaking of the “princes of this world” who, had they known God, “would not have crucified the Lord of glory”: 1 Corinthians 2, 8.)

²⁶⁰ See n. 5 and text.

²⁶¹ See nn. 3 and 4 and text.

²⁶² 1 Romans 2, 12.