Jesus’ last week

About the year 30 ce Jesus and his disciples went to Jerusalem from Galilee to observe Passover. Presumably they went a week early, as did tens of thousands of other Jews (perhaps as many as 200,000 or 300,000), in order to be cleansed of “corpse-impurity,” in accordance with Numbers 9:10–12 and 19:1–22. The Gospels do not mention purification, but they do place Jesus near the Temple in the days preceding Passover. He entered Jerusalem on a donkey, perhaps intending to recall Zechariah 9:9, which Matthew (21:5) quotes: “your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey.” This touched off a demonstration by his followers, who hailed Jesus as either “Son of David” (Matthew 21:9) or as “the one who comes in the name of the Lord” (Mark 11:9). Matthew speaks of “crowds,” which suggests that many people were involved, but the demonstration was probably fairly small. Jerusalem at Passover was dangerous; it was well known to both Caiaphas, who governed the city, and Pilate, the prefect to whom the high priest was responsible, that the festivals were likely times of uprisings. Pilate’s troops patrolled the roofs of the porticoes of the Temple. A large demonstration would probably have led to Jesus’ immediate arrest, but, because he lived for several more days, it is likely that the crowd was relatively small.

Jesus spent some time teaching and debating (Mark 12) and also told his disciples that the Temple would be destroyed (Mark 13:1–2). On one of the days of purification prior to the Passover sacrifice and meal, he performed his most dramatic symbolic action. He entered the part of the temple precincts where worshipers exchanged coins to pay the annual temple tax of two drachmas or bought pigeons to sacrifice for inadvertent transgressions of the law and as purificatory offerings after childbirth. Jesus turned over some of the tables (Mark 11:15–17), which led “the chief priests and the scribes” (“and the principal men of the people,” Luke adds) to plan to have him executed (Mark 11:18; Luke 19:47; cf. Mark 14:1–2).

Later the disciples found a room for the Passover meal, and one of them bought an animal and sacrificed it in the Temple (Mark 14:12–16; verse 16 states simply, “they prepared the passover”). Judas Iscariot, however, one of the 12, betrayed Jesus to the authorities. At the meal, Jesus blessed the bread and wine, designating the bread “my body” and the wine “my blood of the covenant” (Mark 14:22–25) or “the new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22:20 and 1 Corinthians 11:25). He also stated that he would not drink wine again until he drank it with the disciples in the kingdom (Matthew 26:29).

After supper, Jesus took his disciples to the Mount of Olives to pray. While he was there, Judas led armed men sent by the chief priests to arrest him (Mark 14:43–52). They took Jesus to Caiaphas, who had gathered some of his councillors (called collectively the Sanhedrin). Jesus was first accused of threatening to destroy the Temple, but this charge was not substantiated. Caiaphas then asked him if he was “the Christ, the Son of God.” According to Mark (14:61–62), Jesus said “yes” and then predicted the arrival of the Son of Man. According to Matthew (26:63–64), he said, “You say so, but [emphasis added] I tell you that you will see the Son of Man,” apparently implying the answer was no. According to Luke he was more ambiguous: “If I tell you, you will not believe” and “You say that I am” (22:67–70). (Some scholars believe that the New International Version misrepresents Jesus’ answer in Matthew and Luke.)

Whatever the answer, Caiaphas evidently had already decided that Jesus had to die. He cried “blasphemy” and rent his own garments, a dramatic sign of mourning that the Hebrew Bible prohibits the high priest from making (Leviticus 21:10). The gesture was effective, and the councillors agreed that Jesus should be sent to Pilate with the recommendation to execute him.

It is doubtful that the titles Messiah and Son of God were actually the issue because there was no set meaning for either in 1st-century Judaism. As Mark, reprised by Matthew and Luke, presents the scene, when the attempt to have Jesus executed for threatening the Temple failed, Caiaphas simply declared whatever Jesus said (about which we must remain uncertain) to be blasphemy. This may be what convinced the council to recommend Jesus’ execution. It appears, however, that the charges against Jesus that Caiaphas transmitted to Pilate (Mark 15:1–2, 26) may have included the accusation that Jesus claimed to be “king of the Jews.”

Although Pilate did not care about the fine points of Jewish law or Jesus’ alleged blasphemy, most likely he saw Jesus as a potential troublemaker and therefore ordered his execution. The Gospels of Matthew, Luke, and John ascribe a rather good character to Pilate and show him as troubled over the decision but yielding to Jewish insistence (Matthew 27:11–26; Luke 21:1–25; John 18:28–40). In Luke, for example, Pilate states three times that he finds no fault with Jesus. This passage suggests that the early church, faced with making its way in the Roman Empire, did not wish its leader to be thought of as being truly guilty in Roman eyes. From other evidence Pilate is known to have been callous, cruel, and given to wanton executions (Philo, On the Embassy to Gaius, 300–302). He was finally dismissed from office for executing a group of Samaritans (Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews, 18.85–89), and he probably sent Jesus to his death without anguishing over the decision.

Crucified as would-be “king of the Jews” (Mark 15:26 and parallels Matthew 27:37; Luke 23:38; John 19:19), Jesus also was taunted on the cross as the one who would destroy and rebuild the Temple (Mark 15:29). These two charges help to explain the decision to execute him. Jesus’ minor assault on the Temple and prediction of its destruction seem to be what led to his arrest. His own thinking was almost certainly that God would destroy the Temple as part of the new kingdom, perhaps rebuilding it himself (Mark 14:58). The Temple Scroll from Qumran has a similar expectation. Caiaphas and his advisers probably understood Jesus well enough: they knew that he was a prophet, not a demolition expert, and that his disciples could not damage the Temple seriously even if they were allowed to attack its walls with picks and sledges. But someone who spoke about the Temple’s destruction, and who turned over tables in its precincts, was clearly dangerous. These were inflammatory acts in a city that, at festival time, was prone to uprisings that could lead to the death of many thousands of Jews. Caiaphas probably had the thought that John 11:50 attributes to him, that “it is better to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed.” The high priest, under Roman rule, was responsible for keeping the peace, and he and his advisers acted accordingly.

The accusation that Jesus claimed to be “king of the Jews” was also sufficient to account for his execution. There is no direct evidence that Jesus ever said, “I am the king,” but his preaching on “the kingdom of God” was inflammatory. This phrase could have been interpreted several ways, but it certainly did not mean that Rome would continue to govern Judaea. Many people resented Roman rule, and Rome was quick to dispatch those who became too vocal in their opposition. Nevertheless, Pilate did not think that Jesus and his followers constituted a military threat. Had he thought so, he would have had the disciples, too, executed, either at the time or when they returned to Jerusalem to take up their new mission. Instead, the prefect limited his actions to their charismatic leader and turned Jesus over to his soldiers for execution. They took him and two thieves outside Jerusalem and crucified them.

Although Caiaphas did not think that Jesus could actually destroy the Temple, and Pilate did not believe that he could organize a serious revolt, inflammatory speech was a problem. Moreover, Jesus had a following, the city was packed with pilgrims who were celebrating the exodus from Egypt and Israel’s liberation from foreign bondage, and Jesus had committed a small act of violence in the sacred precincts. He was dangerous, and his execution is perfectly understandable in this historical context; that is, he was executed for being what he was, an eschatological prophet. Caiaphas and his councillors fulfilled their mandate to keep the peace and suppress any signs of an uprising. Pilate presumably acted from similar motives. It is unlikely that the responsible parties lost much sleep over their decision; they were doing their duty.

Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom and his apparent threats against the Temple were based on his view that the kingdom was at hand and that he and his disciples would soon feast in it. It is possible that even to the end he expected divine intervention because among his last words was the cry “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34).

The Resurrection

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What happened next changed history in a way quite different from what Jesus seems to have anticipated. Some of his followers claimed to have seen him after his death. The details are uncertain, since the sources disagree on who saw him and where he was seen (the final sections of Matthew, Luke, and John; the beginning of Acts; and the list in Paul’s first Letter to the Corinthians, 15:5–8). According to Matthew, an angel showed the empty tomb to Mary Magdalene and “the other Mary” and instructed them to tell the disciples to go to Galilee. While still in Jerusalem, the two Marys saw Jesus, who told them the same thing, and he appeared once more, to the disciples in Galilee. Matthew’s account is implied in Mark 14:28 and 16:7, though the Gospel of Mark does not have a resurrection story, ending instead with the empty tomb (Mark 16:8; translations print scribal additions in brackets). According to Luke, however, while the disciples remained in Jerusalem, the women (Mary Magdalene; Joanna; Mary, the mother of James; and “the other women”) found the empty tomb. “Two men in dazzling clothes” told them that Jesus had been raised. Later, Jesus appeared to two followers on the road to Emmaus (near Jerusalem), then to Peter, and later to the disciples. John (now including chapter 21, usually thought to be an appendix) mentions sightings in Galilee and Jerusalem. Acts provides a more extensive series of appearances than Luke, though written by the same author, but like it places all of these in or near Jerusalem. Paul’s list of people to whom Jesus appeared does not agree very closely with the other accounts (1 Corinthians 15:5–8).

Because of the uncertain evidence it is hard to say what really happened. Two points are important: the sources describe the resurrected Jesus as neither a resuscitated corpse, a badly wounded man staggering around, nor as a ghost. According to Luke, the first two disciples to see Jesus walked with him for several hours without recognizing him (24:13–32). Luke also reports that Jesus could disappear and reappear at will (24:31, 36). For Paul, the bodies of Christian believers will be transformed to be like the Lord’s, and the resurrection body will not be “flesh and blood” (1 Corinthians 15:42–53). According to these two authors, Jesus was substantially transformed, but he was not a ghost. Luke says this explicitly (24:37–39), and Paul insists on using the word body as part of the term spiritual body rather than spirit or ghost. Luke and Paul do not agree entirely, since Luke attributes “flesh and bones” to the risen Jesus (24:39). Luke’s account nevertheless requires a transformation. The authors, in other words, were trying to explain something for which they did not have a precise vocabulary, as Paul’s term spiritual body makes clear.

It is difficult to accuse these sources, or the first believers, of deliberate fraud. A plot to foster belief in the Resurrection would probably have resulted in a more consistent story. Instead, there seems to have been a competition: “I saw him,” “so did I,” “the women saw him first,” “no, I did; they didn’t see him at all,” and so on. Moreover, some of the witnesses of the Resurrection would give their lives for their belief. This also makes fraud unlikely.

The uncertainties are substantial, but, given the accounts in these sources, certainty is unobtainable. We may say of the disciples’ experiences of the Resurrection approximately what the sources allow us to say of the life and message of Jesus: we have fairly good general knowledge, though many details are uncertain or dubious.