Raymond E. Brown, The Death of the Messiah,
v.2: Appendix V: Jewish Groups and Authorities Mentioned in the Passion Narratives, pp 1419-1434

(detailed summary)


Jewish Groups and Authorities Mentioned in the Passion Narratives


Table of Contents

  1. Jewish Groups Mentioned in the Passion Narratives
    1. Terms for Such Groups and Their Respective Gospel Usage
    2. Individual Gospel Portrayals
  2. Jewish Authorities Described as Hostile to Jesus
    1. High Priest, Chief Priests
    2. Scribes
    3. Elders
    4. Captains of the Temple
    5. Pharisees
    6. Rulers


Next chapter: Appendix VI - The Sacrifice of Isaac and the Passion

List of chapters

  1. Jewish Groups Mentioned in the Passion Narratives

    1. Terms for Such Groups and Their Respective Gospel Usage

      When delimiting the passion narrative from the moment Jesus leaves the last supper room to the moment he is laid in the tomb, different groups are named by the Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles and the Gospel of Peter.

      • Crowd (ochlos): Mark, Matthew, Luke, Gospel of Peter
      • Nation (ethnos): Luke, John
      • People (laos): Matthew, Luke, Acts, Gospel of Peter
      • The Jews: Matthew, John, Acts, Gospel of Peter
      • Men Of Israel, sons of Israel, nation of Israel: Matthew, Acts
      • Inhabitants of Jerusalem, Daughters of Jerusalem, crowd of Jerusalem: Luke, Acts, Gospel of Peter

    2. Individual Gospel Portrayals

      The analysis must be done by author, for one may present a group as favorable to Jesus, while the other presents it as hostile, or, within the same gospel, a group may be favorable to Jesus during his ministry, but hostile during his passion.

      1. Mark

        Throughout Jesus' ministry, the crowds (ochlos) are not hostile to Jesus, even in Jerusalem as they listen to him with great delight. On the other hand, at the time of the passion, it is hostile crowds that accompany Judas to arrest Jesus. There is no need to mention a different group, because on the narrative level, these crowds are one of the actors in the drama, and in the end they are not favorable to Jesus.

      2. Matthew

        His presentation of the crowds is copied from Mark, and so the crowd is favorable throughout Jesus' ministry, and he even has his own scene of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem before an enthusiastic crowd. But during the passion narrative this crowd is hostile and even demands that Jesus be crucified. By using other terms ("all the people", "the Jews", "the sons of Israel"), he emphasizes this hostility.

      3. Luke

        In his gospel, it is the chief priests and the temple captains who offer Judas money to deliver Jesus to them without the knowledge of the crowd. In the passion narrative itself, there are three mentions of the word "crowd": they are initially hostile at the time of his arrest, they are uncharacterized at the time of the trial before Pilate, and finally they weep at what has been done to Jesus. Rather, it is the term "people" (laos) that Luke uses extensively and whose characterization can be summarized as "the God of Israel, because he has visited his people, accomplished their liberation" (1:68). After the cleansing of the temple, it is this people that frustrates the authorities' efforts to destroy Jesus, because they like to listen to him. If these people appear before Pilate to cry out against Jesus, Luke makes a distinction between the people who are content to watch the crucifixion and those who mock him. What to conclude? There is no emphasis in the gospel on presenting a group hostile to Jesus.

        It is the opposite in the Acts of the Apostles. It was "the men of Israel" who killed Jesus, it was the people or the men of Israel who handed him over to Pilate and demanded the killing of the Holy One, the author of life; "the Jews", the people of Jerusalem and the authorities are responsible for his death. In short, Acts leaves us with the sense of a Jewish community very hostile to Jesus.

      4. John

        The fourth gospel does not use the terms "crowd" or "people" to describe the groups hostile to Jesus. Instead, it uses the term "nation" with the collaboration of the chief priests, and especially the term "Jew" to designate the groups that want Jesus dead; this emphasizes the collective effort to eliminate Jesus.

      5. Gospel of Peter

        There is no hostile involvement of the Roman authorities in the crucifixion of Jesus in this gospel, for all the responsibility falls on the shoulders of the Jews: the Jewish king Herod, the Jewish authorities (the scribes, the Pharisees and the elders), and the Jews or the Jewish people.

      The evidence is unanimous that a Jewish group cooperated with the Jewish authorities to arrest Jesus and approve his crucifixion. This does not mean that all this is historical. But considering the fact that at the time the gospels were written there was tension and hostility between Christians and Jews, and that we are nevertheless given a nuanced picture of the crowd which is sometimes favorable, sometimes hostile, the picture painted by the gospels can be considered plausible. Moreover, when the crowd or the people are presented as hostile to Jesus, most of the time this hostility is not spontaneous, but comes from the persuasion by the Jewish authorities.

  2. Jewish Authorities Described as Hostile to Jesus

    A word of caution is in order. The statistical picture in relation to the different groups that we will present does not necessarily reflect the perception that the first listeners or readers had of their respective involvement in Jesus' death. For example, since Mark mentions the scribes more often than the elders, one may get the impression that they played a greater role, whereas the opposite is true of Matthew. Similarly, the fact that the Pharisees are not mentioned in Mark's passion narrative does not mean that in the minds of the early hearers and readers of the gospel the Pharisees had no responsibility for Jesus' death. In Mark's account, the authorities (the scribes, Pharisees, Herodians, chief priests, elders and Sadducees) form a common front against Jesus, and therefore a unified collective character against Jesus.

    1. High Priest, Chief Priests

      In the singular, the Greek term is archiereus (high priest), in the plural archiereis (chief priests), for there could be only one high priest at a time. In principle, it was a hereditary office of a descendant of Aaron through Zadok, and an office for life (Num 35:25). But it was a bit more complicated during the two hundred years of foreign rule when the Greek and Roman authorities deposed and appointed them at their pleasure. A long reign like that of Caiaphas (from 18 to 37 AD) was exceptional. In the plural, archiereis refers to the high priests who were deposed, along with the members of the priestly family from which they came, as well as those who had certain special priestly duties; in short, the term refers to the priestly aristocracy of Jerusalem who exercised some authority over the temple and its treasury.

      According to the Synoptics, Jesus had no contact with them, except at the end of his life when he went to Jerusalem for the first time, so that they are first named only in the passion announcements. The picture is more complex in John, where Jesus went to Jerusalem several times during his ministry, so that on some occasions the chief priests are presented as planning his elimination (Jn 7:32,45; 11:47-57; 12:10). Their motives are not known, but Jesus' statements about the temple provoke some opposition. Apart from the question of his messiahship, what is said about their apprehensions fits well with a powerful and well-to-do aristocracy: "We found this man disturbing our nation: he prevents paying tribute to Caesar and calls himself Messiah, king" (Lk 23:2); "If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will intervene and destroy our holy place and our nation" (Jn 11:48). Finally, let us not forget that they did not act alone, for all decisions were made by the Sanhedrin, where the scribes and the elders also sat.

    2. Scribes

      The term grammateis appears only in the synoptic gospels. Unlike with the chief priests, the encounter with the scribes takes place before Jesus arrives in Jerusalem, and very often they are accompanied by the Pharisees: "the scribes of the Pharisees" (Mk 2:16), "the Pharisees and the scribes" (Lk 5:30). They are presented as teachers preoccupied with religious matters, and it is in an unfriendly way that they question the behavior of Jesus and his disciples. Those who came from Jerusalem were particularly hostile to Jesus (Mk 3:22). Once Jesus is in Jerusalem, they are associated with the chief priests to oppose Jesus (Mk 14:1; Lk 22:2). Matthew is the one who most clearly associates the scribes of Galilee and those of Jerusalem with Jesus curses against the scribes and Pharisees. In short, there would be two types of scribes: there would be scribes of Pharisaic tendency whom Jesus met especially in Galilee and whom he irritated by his religious practice; then there would be those from Jerusalem, members of the Sanhedrin, who together with the chief priests, wanted Jesus dead. But it is unlikely that Mark's reader perceived such a distinction.

    3. Elders

      The term presbyteroi is a generic term that can refer to many individuals. Our interest is limited to those who wanted Jesus dead. These elders appear only in the synoptic gospels, and only in Jerusalem, and are always associated with the chief priests. The gospels do not make their role explicit. So we have to turn to the Old Testament for some insight.

      The zĕqēnîm ("elders") were the leaders of the city (Jdg 8:14) to establish community policy and administer justice (Rt 4:2, 9, 11). Towards the end of the monarchy, a powerful group of elders is found in Jerusalem and it is they who decide the fate of Jeremiah (Jer 26:16-17). And one of Jeremiah's letters begins: "Thus says the Lord: Go and buy yourself a gargoyle and choose some elders from among the people and from among the priests" (Jer 29:1); the expression "elders from among the people" appears in Matthew (21:23; 26:3, 47). After the exile, an aristocracy of elders is found in Jerusalem who have authority in certain areas, such as property transactions (see Ezra 10:8). During this period, a form of senate developed, eventually called the Sanhedrin, of which they would be a part along with the chief priests. According to the Jewish historian Josephus, these elders shared the vision of the Sadducees, and were people of great reputation and influence; they were part of a non-priestly aristocracy, a nobility because of their heredity and wealth. Joseph of Arimathea may have been one of them. Matthew mentions them more than the other evangelists, but it is not clear why.

    4. Captains of the Temple

      In the plot to arrest Jesus, while Mark features the chief priests and scribes, and Matthew opts instead for the chief priests and elders of the people, Luke speaks instead of the conspiracy of the chief priests and strategoi (captains) (Lk 22:4). The Greek term refers to one who led an army (which gave us the term "strategy"), and is usually translated as "captains." Let us look at other references in Luke:

      • Lk 22: 52: "Then Jesus said to those who had come against him, the chief priests, the captains of the temple and the elders, "You went out with swords and clubs, just as you did for a bandit!"
      • Acts 4: 1-3: "Peter and John were still talking to the people when the priests, the captain of the temple and the Sadducees approached them... They had them arrested and put in prison until the next day"
      • Acts 5: 26: "Then the captain went with the servants to bring the apostles back, but without violence, for they feared that the people would throw stones at them"

      The figure that emerges is that of someone who was part of the Sanhedrin and exercised command over certain collaborators.

      Flavius Josephus makes a number of references to this figure: it is to the stratēgos first that the incident of the massive bronze gate of the temple opening by itself is reported; the high priest Ananias and his stratēgos are sent in chains to Rome by the governor of Syria; and finally the stratēgos Eleazar had a scribe, son of the high priest Ananias, in his service. If we add the data that comes to us from the Mishna, we get the picture of a priest who had the high responsibility of maintaining order in the temple and its surroundings, even assuming from time to time the role of deputy high priest.

      The fact that Luke sometimes uses the term in the plural is a source of confusion. Perhaps he meant to include the subordinates of the temple commander in this role, mimicking the way we refer to the chief priests. In short, under the high priest there was another priest, a senior member of the Sanhedrin, who had authority to maintain order in temple affairs, and thus a special role in arrests and trials. Since the stratēgos is part of the group of chief priests, it is not necessary to add him as a specific group that made up the Sanhedrin along with the chief priests, scribes and elders. However, we are left with the question: why did Luke insist on distinguishing them?

    5. Pharisees

      The pharisees are virtually absent from the passion narratives in the Synoptics, if we except for this mention in the episode of the guards at the tomb in Matthew. In Mt 21:45-46, the Pharisees are presented with the chief priests to plot against Jesus, but this episode, absent in Mark and Luke, is an addition in Matthew to generalize their role. John, on the other hand, presents the Pharisees who join the chief priests in an attempt to arrest Jesus (Jn 7:32-49). The fourth gospel probably reflects the situation of his church in the 80s or 90s when, after the destruction of the temple, the Pharisees became the main opposition group to the Johannine community. But even in John there is only one reference to the Pharisees in the passion narrative.

      What to conclude? In Christian memory, there is no record that the Pharisees played a major role in the crucifixion of Jesus. Of course, it is possible that some of the scribes who took part in the decision of the Sanhedrin were of Pharisaic leaning, but Christian memory does not retain the idea that this decision was based on their leaning. Moreover, the reasons for condemning Jesus are not related to the disputes with them during his ministry. But for the gospel listener, the opposition of the Pharisees and scribes during Jesus' ministry and the decision of the chief priests, scribes and elders to put him to death were probably seen as one big coherent whole. Indeed, historically, the conflict with the scribes and Pharisees may have facilitated the Sanhedrin's decision, as it was assured of no opposition.

    6. Rulers

      Only Luke mentions the archontes among the Jewish authorities hostile to Jesus (Lk 23:13, 35). But this Greek term is very generic and can apply to princes and magistrates as well as to the governor and any man of importance. Let us therefore limit ourselves to those in Jerusalem who were involved in the case of Jesus, as told by Luke and John.

      In Jn 3:1 Nicodemus is a Pharisee and an archōn who expresses an interest in Jesus' teaching. On the other hand, elsewhere in John's gospel, we have a contrasting picture: on the one hand, we have this word from the Pharisees, "Among the archontes or among the Pharisees, is there one who believed in him?" (Jn 7:38); on the other hand, the evangelist remarks, "Yet among the archontes themselves, many had believed in him; but because of the Pharisees, they dared not confess him, lest they be put out of the synagogue" (Jn 12:42). But John addresses an audience with little interest in the subdivisions of the Jewish authorities and projects onto the time of Jesus an oppositional tactic of the Jewish synagogue characteristic of the 80s or 90s.

      Luke writes in Acts 13:27-29, "The people of Jerusalem and their rulers (archontes) did not recognize Jesus ... they asked Pilate to have him killed, and when they had fulfilled all that was written about him, they took him down from the wood and laid him in a tomb." This description corresponds to what Luke writes about the role of the Sanhedrin in his gospel, and thus covers the chief priests, the captains of the temple, the elders and the scribes (Lk 22:52,66). Similarly, in Lk 23:35 the archontes mock Jesus, a scene also found in Mark/Matthew where it is the chief priests and scribes who mock. The archontes appear with the elders, scribes, and chief priests in Acts 4:5-8, just as it is the archontes and chief priests that Pilate summons in Lk 23:13, and it is these latter two groups that are said to be responsible for Jesus' death in Lk 24:20. In short, the archontes appear to refer to the components of the Sanhedrin that condemned Jesus, and the use of such a generic term gives the impression that it is the Jewish authorities who are against Jesus.