Pontius Pilate: A Novel

by Paul L Maier

  She succeeded in her mission the next day, for during that famous week, Jesus appeared at the temple on a daily basis to address the people. Insulated by a bevy of women attendants and several auxiliary guardsmen, Procula came within fifty feet of the young prophet, but was afraid to press forward to meet him. There were too many people, and she did not want to make a scene.

  Pilate took the news of her reconnaissance at the temple with less displeasure than she had feared, because he was curious about what Jesus had to say.

  “You should have heard the man, Pilate,” she recounted. “He held the people spellbound. When he was finished speaking, some Pharisees shouldered their way to the front of the crowd and brought up something which you’ll find rather interesting, I think. They asked him, ‘Master, what is your opinion: is it lawful to pay the tribute money to Caesar or not?’”

  Pilate’s eyes widened with concern. “What did he say, Procula? Recall it exactly. I don’t have to tell you that the fate of this Jesus may depend on how he answered that question.”

  “My girls gave me a running translation. He said, ‘You hypocrites. Trying to trap me in my words, are you? Show me a piece of tribute money.’ So they handed him a silver coin. He held it up and asked, ‘Whose image is this, and whose inscription?’ ‘Caesar’s,’ they replied, and Jesus said, ‘Then pay Caesar whatever is due Caesar, and pay God whatever is due God.’”

  “Ingenious,” Pilate admitted, “ingenious. Even Cicero would have been proud of that line.”

  “Then the Pharisees—”

  “I mean, look how sharp were the horns of that dilemma. If he’d said it was wrong to pay the tribute, he’d have been a hero to the people, but I’d have had to arrest him for treason. If he’d simply answered that it was right to pay the tax, the crowds would have called him a Roman lackey.”

  “Anyway,” continued Procula, “the Pharisees disappeared. Then one of the lawyers asked him, ‘Rabbi, what is the greatest commandment in the Torah?’ and one of my Jewish girls said it was an awful question. Their Law is supposed to be equally great in all its parts. But Jesus replied, ‘God is one. Love him with all your heart, soul, and mind; and your neighbor as yourself.’ There was dead silence until someone cried, ‘Wise Rabbi, in one sentence you have summarized the whole Law!’ Then the people actually cheered. Imagine, at the temple.”

  “How did this sit with the authorities?”

  “How do you think? Then Jesus launched a bitter attack on them. ‘Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!’ he said, several times. Once he called them ‘blind fools.’ Then, I think, ‘a brood of vipers.’ Even ‘whitewashed tombs,’ nice outside, decaying inside.”

  “How could they take that kind of language?”

  “The people…remember?”

  “Yes. I see it now. That’s why Caiaphas couldn’t arrest this Jesus despite his notices—the people. But now what will he do?” He paused and then smiled, “Caiaphas had better not come to me for help. For once he’s on the hook, while I can relax and watch him wriggle…Yes,” he murmured contentedly, “this is one Passover I think I’m going to enjoy.”

  On Wednesday, Pilate set up his court. The first two days in Jerusalem he had been imperial fiscal agent. For the rest of the week and part of the next he would be provincial judge. Appeals, capital cases, all local disputes between Jew and gentile, and any political offenses involving a threat to the Roman administration would come before his tribunal. Because Pilate’s visits to Jerusalem were so infrequent, his docket was bulging.

  Court was held in the main reception hall of the Herodian palace, now stripped of its golden shields, with Pilate sitting on a raised dais. Sessions lasted from early in the morning until noon, and then, because there were so many cases, from two to four o’clock in the afternoon. In Rome, courts usually had large juries, but in provinces like Judea, the prefect constituted judge and jury. However, he had to conduct trials carefully, since law was a Roman specialty.

  It was an exhausting day for Pilate, including two acquittals, one condemnation to imprisonment, and one capital sentence. In the last, the condemned was crucified before nightfall. Perhaps humanely, punishment, in Roman justice, was inflicted at once.

  But these were merely routine cases. The more important trials would come in the following week, culminating in the case of Rome versus Bar-Abbas. This was the major one, for which Pilate began preparing even now. Not that he had any doubt of Bar-Abbas’s guilt, but this trial would far and away attract more of Jerusalem than any of the other cases. The man on the street had already tried the political brigand, and was speculating only on whether the governor might devise some unusual means of executing him. Pilate’s problem would be to avoid that temptation, while showing Rome’s wrath at murderous insurgents like Bar-Abbas. On that occasion too, Pilate sensed, he would be judged by a fellow judge. Herod Antipas had just arrived in Jerusalem for the Pesach, as the Jews called their Passover, and he would hardly miss the opportunity of evaluating Pilate’s performance at the Bar-Abbas trial.

  Late that night, Caiaphas’s servant Malchus appeared at the palace to deliver this note:

  Joseph Caiaphas, High Priest, to Pontius

  Pilatus, praefectus Iudaeae, Peace!

  Were it not a matter of utmost urgency, involving the security of the state, I would not disturb you at this hour. Yeshu Hannosri, a deceiver and false prophet who has broken our Law on repeated occasions and whose heresy has been condemned by the Great Sanhedrin, is in Jerusalem for the Pesach. You must have noticed his great following, which could break out into seditious rioting at any moment. So dangerous is the situation that, although the Sanhedrin has issued warrants for his arrest, we have not dared apprehend him because of the people. Our decision now is to arrest Yeshu at night, when he will not be surrounded by supporters. A close adherent of his has defected and will inform us of his nocturnal whereabouts so that our temple guard may arrest him.

  We respectfully request that a large contingent from your Antonia garrison assist our guard. Of the vast numbers of pilgrims camped on the hills surrounding Jerusalem, how many are followers of Yeshu, who would attack our police if they knew we had the deceiver in custody? If you are amenable, we can arrive at a mutual strategy concerning time and place for the arrest. The blessings of peace be yours.

  Pilate hated to make decisions when he was sleepy and preparing for bed. He resented the intrusion, but he had little choice in the matter. Gritting his jaw so that the muscles bulged a bit below the ear lobes, he dictated a reply to an aide, who handed it to Malchus:

  Pontius Pilatus to Joseph Caiaphas, greeting.

  I sympathize with your concern. We also have been kept informed of Jesus the Nazarene over the past months, and have been ready to arrest him if he preached rebellion. Thus far, it appears, he has not. He may well have offended you on religious grounds, but I am hardly qualified to judge on that score.

  Accordingly, I do not feel justified in committing Roman auxiliaries to apprehend Jesus, even if the temple guard would make the actual arrest. I feel certain that if your police proceed with any strength, they will have no trouble arresting Jesus by night. Were our troops to join yours, would this not advertise your purpose to all the pilgrims? If your men are attacked, our garrison will, of course, march to their immediate assistance. Farewell.

  There was an unexpressed reason for Pilate’s refusing his auxiliaries. Why should he, rather than Caiaphas, bear the popular opprobrium for arresting a prophet? Certainly the people would be inclined to blame Rome, rather than their own countrymen in the temple guard. He would not make Antipas’s mistake and cut down a Jewish prophet, especially not in his present, probationary status. In fact, it looked as if Caiaphas also disdained the role of prophet-killer, and was trying to wrap himself in a Roman mantle for the distasteful task.

  At that moment, the high priest was meeting with his father-in-law Annas and the inner council of the Sanhedrin at his mansion, not far from the Herodian palace in tha
t part of Jerusalem called the Upper City. The Sanhedrists were unanimously in favor of arresting Jesus, but divided on whether the arrest should take place before or after the Passover. Those who favored delay argued that there would hardly be enough time for trial and punishment before the Pesach, and no prosecution was possible once the feast got under way. Better to wait until the close of Passover week and the departure of the pilgrims—then apprehend the man.

  “But what if Yeshu leaves then also, surrounded by his followers?” Caiaphas asked.

  “What may sooner happen is this,” Annas interposed. “The deceiver will use the Pesach as the time to raise his followers against us. You know what he said and did at the temple! Therefore we must strike at once.”

  This opinion carried. They would now alert all members of the Sanhedrin to be available at a moment’s notice. The temple police were to arrest Jesus when this could be done conveniently. It would have to be at night, when he was away from the crowds. It would have to be in or near Jerusalem, for if the guard were sent as far as his lodging place at Bethany, the thousands of tenters on the eastern hillsides might get word of his arrest and raise a riot.

  To fulfill all these conditions required the services of an insider who could alert them when Jesus was in such a vulnerable position. They found such a man, or rather, he had found them.

  “His name,” said Caiaphas, “is Judas Ish-Kerioth, a mercenary sort, willing to sell out his teacher for thirty denarii. But there may be more to it. You see, he’s the only non-Galilean among Yeshu’s disciples. Probably he realized his heretical allegiance and wanted to relieve his guilt by coming to us. He said he’d try to get their plans for tomorrow night.”

  “How difficult do you suppose it will be to deal with Pilate?” Annas asked.

  They had the answer when Malchus arrived with Pilate’s reply. Caiaphas read it aloud, then commented, “He won’t commit his auxiliaries, but he suggests that our temple guard should have no trouble making the arrest. Reading between his lines, I think we get the following message: ‘This is your affair. Rome won’t interfere.’”

  Thursday was equally crowded for Pilate. Again his tribunal was besieged with cases, but fewer people than usual attended court as observers, since the day of preparation for the Passover began that sundown. Others, including many Galileans, would eat the Pesach meal that evening, for there was a divergent calculation among the Jews as to whether the week of Passover celebration began then or the following day. The majority, with the priestly establishment of Jerusalem, would begin celebrating at sundown Friday.

  Pilate’s docket fell behind schedule, so again he resorted to an afternoon session of his court. The two most serious cases of the day were now introduced, a pair of highwaymen who had assaulted and robbed a small group of Passover pilgrims trudging up the desolate Jericho-Jerusalem road on their way to the Holy City. The brigands encountered resistance and killed several of the party before despoiling them, but their luck failed them almost immediately. A patrol of Roman troops from the Jericho garrison, guided by surviving pilgrims, flushed them out of the hills and sent them, shackled, to Jerusalem.

  In Roman law, prosecutors were private, not governmental, individuals, so Pilate opened the trial by calling on three women of the assaulted party to act as plaintiffs. Tears and hatred in their eyes, they pointed accusing fingers at the two highwaymen and charged them with robbery and murder. Witnesses, including other pilgrims in the party, as well as several auxiliaries from the Roman patrol, then gave evidence for the prosecution.

  The defense in the case was very weak. The bandits had no attorney and tried to defend themselves. They supplied a witness who claimed they were in Jerusalem at the time of the felony, but the alibi fell apart when written evidence was introduced into the trial. The Jericho patrol had extracted signed confessions from the two just after capture.

  Both sides now presented summations, the Roman patrol captain prompting the women on what to say, while the brigands threw themselves on the mercy of the court. Finally, it was time for sentencing or acquittal.

  But the proof of guilt was conclusive. The only complication in what would otherwise have been a simple case was the problem of sentence and execution. It was too late in the day for crucifixion, and yet punishment had to follow immediately upon sentencing. Pilate solved the matter by announcing, “Judgment and sentence will be suspended until tomorrow morning. This court is adjourned.”

  At the temple, a priest who had been carefully scanning the darkening heavens shouted that he could see three stars overhead. Answering trumpets shattered the hush of evening. For the Jews, a new day, Friday, Nisan 14, had begun, since they reckoned from sundown to sundown. Pilate heard the trumpet flourish while dining with Procula. For them it was still Thursday, April 2, since Romans counted from midnight to midnight.

  In a borrowed upper room a few blocks directly south of the Herodian palace, a group of thirteen men were eating an early Passover Seder of unleavened bread, greens, bitter herbs, meat, and wine. It represented the diet of the Israelites on the night before their hurried exodus from Egypt some 1,300 years earlier. Yet this meal had a different ending. The controversial teacher from Galilee distributed bread and wine around the table and then, strangely, called it his body and blood.

  But the thirteen diners now dwindled to twelve. It seems that one of them, Judas Ish-Kerioth, had pressing business elsewhere.

  Chapter 17

  There was an urgent rapping at the door of the high priest’s palace. Malchus opened it and brought Judas in to join Caiaphas and the leading Sanhedrists he was hosting at dinner. Judas was a swarthy, somewhat obsequious Judean of slender build.

  “Most Noble Excellency”—Judas bowed to the high priest—“they are planning to go to Oil-Press Garden across the Kidron after their Seder this evening. Soon now, I think. I just left their table.”

  “Yeshu, and the eleven others? Anyone else?” Caiaphas inquired, a touch of excitement in his manner.

  “No.”

  “You’re quite certain none of his other followers will be there?”

  “Yes. Yeshu said he wanted solitude for meditation. And they’re fond of the grove anyway, always going there by themselves.”

  “Are they armed?”

  “Only two of them have swords, Peter and James.”

  “How far along was their Seder when you left them?”

  “Nearly finished.”

  Caiaphas thought for a moment, then said, “The Lord has shown us that tonight must be the night, my colleagues, for it’s also our last chance to arrest Yeshu before the Pesach.”

  “Wait…a word, Caiaphas,” said Rabbi Ananias. “It will be very dark out there. How can we be sure to arrest the right man? It would he chaos if a mistake were made and Yeshu slipped away.”

  “If you will permit, Excellency,” said Judas, “I will identify Yeshu by giving him a kiss of salutation.”

  “Agreed. Malchus, tell the captain of the temple police to await us with his entire corps fully armed. And see that the members of the Sanhedrin are alerted.”

  “He’ll be brought to my place first?” Annas inquired.

  “Yes, Father.”

  Several hundred men, clutching swords, cudgels, and torches, filed out of the temple precincts, crossed the Kidron Valley, and quickly cordoned off the grove beyond. Judas led the officers and chief priests up to a small knot of people in the shadows of the garden. Singling out one figure whose perspiration gleamed in the moonlight, he kissed him.

  “Whom do you seek?” said Jesus.

  “Yeshu Hannosri,” an officer answered.

  “I am he. But do you take me for a bandit, that you have to use swords and staves to arrest me? Day after day I taught in the temple, yet you did not seize me there. But let the Scriptures be fulfilled.”

  Few arrests were made so easily. With a servant’s eagerness to please his master, Malchus was the first to reach out and grab Jesus. That was too much for one of his followers, a b
urly fisherman who pulled out his sword and slashed through Malchus’s right ear.

  Jesus intervened with a quick command. “Sheathe your weapon, Peter! All who take the sword die by the sword.” Sheepishly, Peter wiped the blade clean and shoved it hack into his scabbard.

  The other disciples looked terrified, cringing in a huddle of horror at the edge of the grove. Jesus saw it and said, “If I am the man you want, let these others go.” They ran away and lost themselves in the darkness among the olive trees. Jesus was bound and led back to Jerusalem.

  When the posse returned, Caiaphas learned the details of the arrest from Malchus, who was still clutching the right side of his head in bewilderment.

  “Splendid work, Malchus!” the high priest commended. “Oh…I’m sorry about the ear, but we’ll need you at the trial as evidence that they were armed and gave resistance. Now go and see the doctor.”

  Still dazed and in semi-shock, Malchus slowly removed his hand and showed Caiaphas a normal right ear, attached where it should be. “Yeshu,” he said, “picked it up…put it back…healed—”

  “Fool!” Caiaphas slapped him. “We have no time for your idle lies. Get hold of yourself! Now take this over to the Herodian palace.” He thrust a note into the servant’s hand and sent him out, muttering, “A little excitement and the knave hallucinates.”

  Pilate and Procula were preparing for bed when Malchus arrived with this message:

  Joseph Caiaphas to Pontius Pilatus, Peace. Our guard have arrested Yeshu Hannosri near the Kidron Valley. There was little resistance. But we urge you to keep the Antonia cohort on full alert from now until this case is concluded. Rioting may break out when the news reaches the people tomorrow. Yeshu will, of course, receive a fair trial by the Great Sanhedrin. Peace.

  “What does it say, Pilate?” asked Procula.