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 WHY WAS JESUS EXECUTED? It's easiest to see this by looking at the story backwards. Jesus was executed by order of Pontius Pilate, the Roman prefect, who governed Judea as part of the Roman Empire. Judea was essentially an occupied country, and the Roman army was in charge. Pilate's first question to Jesus was, "Are you the king of the Jews?" and this was the charge for which Jesus was eventually crucified. In other words, Jesus was tried by Pilate for conspiracy to overthrow the puppet king set up by the Roman occupation. But Jesus was originally arrested, the four Gospels tell us, by the Jewish religious authorities. They tried him themselves before they sent him to Pilate, and found him guilty of blasphemy. The religious authorities wanted to be rid of Jesus partly because his teachings undermined their power, and also because his popularity with the people threatened them. But as their power depended on the Romans, they and the Romans had essentially the same problem with Jesus: he had been welcomed by the crowds into Jerusalem as the Messiah, a king from God. He looked like a revolutionary who would cause trouble, and they wanted him stopped. More questions about Jesus' death |
Picture: the Isenheim Altarpiece, by Matthias Grünewald, painted in the 16th century. |
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