Nov 2. John 18. Tom Benton

Pilate's Seven Questions

After writing about Jesus' prayer in John 17, John moves the narrative along quickly to Jesus' arrest, Peter's denials, and the high priest's questioning. As Jesus began his prayer in John 17:1, "Father, the hour has come." Jesus had surrendered to the forces moving against him and that were soon to fulfill the prophecies made about him.

At end of John 18, Jesus is brought before Pilate, the highest local Roman authority and the one the Jews hoped would sentence Jesus to death, an act that they were forbidden to carry out under Roman law (John 18:31)  Here, and into John 19, we find seven questions Pilate asks Jesus. In reading these passages, I thought about John's purpose for his book, "that you may believe" (John 20:31) and how these seven questions may have changed Pilate's belief, and can possibly change ours.

First Pilate asks about the charge the Jews brought against him: "Are you the king of the Jews?". The rooster had crowed, and the day was beginning after a long night for Jesus, a night of deep agonizing prayer followed by being arrested and questioned by the Jewish religious leaders, probably with little rest. To Pilate, he must have looked more like a worn-out poor beggar than one who could make any claim to be a king.

Jesus answers with a question: was thinking Jesus to be a king Pilate’s own idea or did others talk to Pilate about him? Pilate replies with his second question: "Am I a Jew?". It was the Jews who told Pilate that Jesus was a king, not his own conviction. Pilate asks his next question, the third: "What is it you have done?" Jesus responds that his kingdom is not what Pilate may expect it to be: it's from another place, and the very reason he was born was to testify to truth.

This leads to Pilate's fourth question: "What is truth?"  The Jews were telling him that this man threatened Rome as a rival king, and the "king" himself was saying strange things about his supposed "kingdom". Pilate struggled to know what was true: is Jesus the King or just another teacher, prophet or morally-good man? Many years later, I struggled with the same question when I began studying the Bible: what is the truth about Jesus?

Pilate then decides to give the crowd a choice: a real criminal named Barabbas or the one who is claiming to be a king. They choose to release the criminal, but Pilate wants no part of sending him to his death, saying he finds "no basis for a charge against him" (John 19:6).

What happens next disturbs Pilate: the Jewish leaders tell him that Jesus must die because he claimed to be the Son of God. Pilate then goes to Jesus with his fifth question: "Where do you come from?" (John 19:9). Was this man really from God? Pilate gets no answer from the silent Jesus.

Pilate asks Jesus two final questions: "Do you refuse to speak to me?" and "Don't you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?" (John 19:10). Jesus' answer changes Pilate's decision: Jesus tells him that Pilate only has power because it was given to him from above. Pilate then believes Jesus, or at least he believes Jesus is more than what he thought at first. He tries to set Jesus free but is influenced by the crowd to hand Jesus over for crucifixion.

As I think about Pilate's seven questions, I ask myself: Who do I think Jesus is? What has he done to show himself to me? What is the truth about him? Is He really from God? Do I realize I have the power to reject him and crucify him, or instead to accept him as my King and to follow him?

Orthodox Coptic church tradition says that Pilate was so convicted by Jesus’ answers to his seven questions that he became a Christian and was martyred for his faith. What about us? Do you and I really believe Jesus is the King? Like Pilate, we can go from handing Jesus over to crucifixion to giving our lives over to Jesus our King.