Red Rag

Geoff Honnor, who can’t decide whether he wants to see the Passion flick, sums up my earlier post thus:

From what Rob can work out, it’s not entirely clear that Jesus was a Revolutionary per se, but he shapes promisingly as the sort of guy who would be a reliable Left faction vote in a tight corner.

Stephen Hill responded with one of the funniest comments I’ve read:

Jesus will never make prime-minister if he’s in the left. Although after Judas ratted on his faction and switched to the right it seemed all over for his leadership hopes. That was until Jude’s leadership prospects plummeted when it was discovered he pocketed 10 silver coins, which allegedly motivated his decision to cross the floor and support Herod’s stick-them-on-sticks act. This leaves the right looking for a new candidate, maybe they’ll lock in Mary Magadalene to pick up the womens vote.

Mind you Jesus’s curing lepers policy is getting some resonance among the community. However, this hasn’t stopped the left favouring the installation of Matthew for his tax-and-spend policies. Whether they’ll be able to knock Pilate of in the polls (despite his unpopularity) is still uncertain, there seems to have been some tension at the last supper.

Very good. A nine out of ten, at least.

My suggestion that Jesus was considered a political threat was based on an essay I wrote for a unit called “Society and Politics in the Time of Christ,” under the tutelage of Professor Brian McGing of the School of Classics at Trinity College Dublin. It was one of the most fascinating units I’ve taken. I’ve reproduced the essay (with a few minor grammatical alterations) below, if you’re interested in the subject.

Are there good reasons to think that Jesus was executed because he was a rebel against Rome?

In about 6BC a man was born who would change the world. [1] Although many at the time did not recognise the ultimate significance of his life and death, he is considered the Christ by a significant proportion of the global population, and a prophet by many more people. Nevertheless, through this (and perhaps because of it), the nature of Jesus’ life has been debated since the early days of Christianity. As Leonardo Boff wrote, the question

has been given the most diverse answers down through the centuries: the answers of faith, of critical science, of philosophy, of psychology, of sociology, and of turbulent youth in search of a radical meaning for life. [2]

The political and social situation in Judaea at the time of Jesus was turbulent. Rome reintroduced direct government of the region only a few short years after Jesus’ birth. Although the Jewish people have only a very limited history of self-governance, the Romans had not been particularly effective in the region, and a climate of nationalism had developed in the population. [3]

Unfortunately, there is only limited information available about the life of Jesus. Apart from the canonical and extracanonical gospels there are secular Jewish histories by Josephus and Philo, although these do not help much: Josephus’ reference to Jesus is now accepted to have been considerably embellished in the transcription process. [4] Thus the nature of Jesus’ life will be debated for as long as Christianity exists, as no clear conclusion can be drawn from the little documentation we have.

References in ancient sources to revolutionary groups, bandits and other insurrectionists [5] have led to the proposition that Jesus was executed because he was a rebel against Rome. This notion may have some basis, because certainly to Roman eyes any charismatic leader who took large groups into the desert would have been looked upon with suspicion. However, it would be less defensible to argue that Jesus was inciting rebellion against the authorities.

The obvious sources to consult in determining the reasons for Jesus’ execution are the Passion Narratives that describe his arrest, trial and execution. The four canonical gospels give reasonably detailed accounts of these events, because they are arguably the most important in the New Testament. The accounts give us an insight into the events leading up to Jesus’ execution, and hence allow us to analyse the reasons Pilate may have used to justify the sentence of crucifixion. [6]

Over the years, there has been much criticism of reliance on the gospels as historical texts. They are, in essence, faith documents that have been altered over many centuries before arriving at their modern form.

The Christ of faith ought to be well distinguished from the historical Jesus. Hundreds of Lives of Christ were written from [1768 to 1904]. Each scholar sought to distinguish and discard the gospel texts regarded as nonhistorical or as dogmatic interpretations of the communities and thereby get at the really historical figure of Jesus. [7]

However it cannot be denied, even by such scholars, that the gospels were based on at least a grain of historical truth. Moreover, given the limited alternative information on Jesus, we would be unwise to ignore them completely.

The gospels generally agree on the important elements of the Passion. Jesus was arrested by Jewish leaders and tried by them according to Jewish law. Upon their decision of his guilt, he was taken before Pontius Pilate. However, it is clear that the Roman leader would not have been interested in Jesus’ guilt under Jewish law. This is supported by the text of Luke:

And the whole multitude of them arose and brought him unto Pilate. And they began to accuse him, saying, “We have found this man subverting our nation, and forbidding the payment of taxes to Caesar, and saying he is Christ the king”. So Pilate asked him, saying, “Art thou the king of the Jews? [8]

The Jewish authorities knew that Pilate would not be interested in their theological disputes, so they accused Jesus of crimes against Rome. Their claims were of sedition and insurrection. Pilate was certainly interested in any potential threat to Roman authority, and hence investigated the matter.

The representation of Pilate in the story is very interesting. In all of the gospels he is said to have initially found Jesus innocent of any crime. [9] However, John suggests that when Jesus was set to be released, “the Jews started aloud, saying, ‘If thou release this man, thou art no friend of Caesar’s’,” whereupon Pilate renewed the trial process and agreed, begrudgingly, to crucify Jesus. [10] This seems to be an accurate suggestion: Pilate was certainly in an area of great hostility towards Roman authority, and was probably worried about his career should riots take place. Indeed, if we are to believe Philo, Pilate was out of favour with the Romans.

The magnates … sent letters of very earnest application to Tiberius. When he had read them through what language he used about Pilate, what threats he made! The violence of his anger, though he was not easily roused to anger, it is needless to describe since the facts speak for themselves. [11]

Josephus was more staid in his criticisms of Pilate, but did describe a number of confrontations with the Jews that would no doubt have been disapproved of by the Emperor. [12]

The overall interpretation of events offered by the gospels is, then, that “it was out of envy that [the Jewish leaders] had delivered [Jesus] up” and that Pilate found Jesus guilty based on Roman law. [13] According to Andrew M. Greeley,

The temptation [to consider Jesus a political activist] is all the more attractive because the charge for which Jesus was executed was pretty clearly one of Zealotry; he did have some criticism of the existing world in common with them. [14]

However, the gospels also suggest that even if Pilate did not consider Jesus a threat, he ordered the crucifixion to avert rioting. In Matthew, the symbolic washing of the hands occurs only after “Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, but rather that a tumult was arising”. [15] So it seems that Jesus was executed because he posed a threat, either directly or indirectly, to stability in Jerusalem.

Another important way to test the “treason” theory of Jesus’ execution is to compare him to other people in Judaea at the time who were clearly rebels against Roman authority. Historical documents tell us a great deal about many nationalist Jewish movements in the run-up to the Jewish Revolt. Bandits, followers of the Fourth Philosophy, pretenders to the throne, false prophets, miracle workers, Zealots and Sicarii all posed some form of threat to Roman authority.

However, while all of these groups opposed in some way the Roman occupation of Judaea, they were distinct from each other. They had different reasons, aims and methods of resistance. For example, according to Hobsbawm’s theory, the phenomenon of banditry exists due to excessive poverty or hardship. [16] On the other hand, Josephus tells us that Judas the Galilean and his followers based their opposition on a religious belief:

But the fourth sect of Jewish philosophy, Judas the Galilean was the author. These men agree in all other things with the Pharisaic notions; but they have an inviolable attachment to liberty; and say that God is to be their only Ruler and Lord. [17]

However, in many respects these groups have common features, which can be summarised as follows:

I. The majority led groups into the desert for meetings. [18]
II. The majority made religious as well as nationalist claims. [19]
III. The majority carried weapons.
IV. The majority encouraged others to join their cause. [20]
V. The Roman punishment for such insurrectionists was death by crucifixion.

Obviously, there are exceptions to these general rules, but for the most part they hold true. These clear parallels between anti-Roman groups in Judaea give us some basis on which to judge how the authorities would have looked upon Jesus — was he a threat of the same nature as these groups, or not?

Let us look now at how Jesus fits this template.

I. The majority led groups into the desert for meetings.

It is clear from the gospels that Jesus did frequently travel into the desert. To Roman eyes, such excursions away from the general population were potentially to incite rebellion. The gospels suggest that Jesus was merely preaching a religious message, but the Romans must have been concerned when large groups would meet in the wilderness to hear someone talk. Matthew describes such a meeting:

And the great multitudes followed him from Galilee and Decapolis and Jerusalem and Judaea and from beyond the Jordan. And seeing the multitudes, he went up into the mountain; and when he was seated his disciples came unto him. And opening his mouth he taught them… [21]

This can be paralleled with Josephus’ account of an event close to the end of Pilate’s reign:

So they came thither armed, and thought the discourse of the man probable; and as they abode at a certain village, which was called Tirabaltha, they got the rest together to them, and desired to go up the mountain in a great multitude together. But Pilate prevented their going up… [22]

The similarities are plain — large groups conspired to withdraw to the mountains. The differences are that Josephus’ account mentions that the group was armed, and that Pilate intervened. That he stopped this group might be explained because the event occurred much later in his governorship; he might have been better able to predict threats. [23] The issue of weaponry is discussed below.

Furthermore, the false prophets and miracle workers who occasionally appear in the ancient sources tended to promise miracles to those who followed them into the desert. [24] Jesus, too, performed miracles while walking in the wilderness. The feeding of the masses with only five loaves and two fishes involves not only a miracle in the wilderness, but also a large crowd:

And when Jesus heard he withdrew thence in a boat unto a desert place. And the crowds hearing of it followed him on foot from the towns. And on landing he saw a great crowd, and he was moved with compassion towards whem and healed their sick. … And after bidding the crowds recline upon the grass, he took the five loaves and two fishes, and looking up to heaven he blessed and broke the loaves… And all ate and had their fill… [25]

II. The majority made both religious and nationalist claims.

Jesus clearly made religious claims, such as the formation of a new covenant with God. [26] He was well known for his preaching and was essentially a devout Jew:

The historian, then, declares unreservedly that, as far as he can judge, there is no room for doubt that Jesus took the obligations of a devout Jew very seriously… [27]

However, his nationalist claims are based on religious views, and are therefore less clear than might otherwise be the case. Followers of the Fourth Philosophy, for example, were very straightforward in their beliefs: Nobody but God should rule them, including the Romans. [28]

Jesus, on the other hand, spoke about “God’s Kingdom”, a concept that is not concrete and has been interpreted in various different ways over the years. For example, Boff argues that

The kingdom of God that Christ announces is not a liberation from this or that evil, from the political oppression of the Romans, from the economic difficulties of the people, or from sin alone. The kingdom of God cannot be narrowed down to any one aspect. … One fact is clearly deducible from the above discussion: the kingdom of God, contrary to what many Christians think, does not signify something that is purely spiritual or outside this world. [29]

It is clear that the kingdom of God as Jesus saw it was a total transformation of the existing social order — including (but not limited to) the removal of Roman rule. However, it is not clear that the Romans knew of his beliefs, or that they considered the political content of his message to be significant. Indeed, Pilate’s initial reluctance to convict Jesus suggest that he saw no real political threat.

III. The majority carried weapons.

many of the forms of resistance in Judaea relied on armed conflict. Banditry obviously necessitated weapons for criminal activity and self-defence, and Sicarii were so named because they would conceal a dagger (sicarus) with which to assassinate people. Hard-line Zealotry involved the use of guerilla tactics to “provoke the salvific intervention of God”. [30] The Essenes who segregated themselves at Qumran also advocated a final battle, and were “deeply involved in revolutionary militarism”. [31]

That Jesus did not offer armed resistance is clear. Although it has been suggested that some of his disciples were formerly guerillas, [32] Jesus himself did not condone the use of violence. One scene that is contained in all four gospels is that of Gethsemane:

And seeing what was coming, they that were about him said, “Lord, shall we smite with the sword?” And a certain one of them smote [a man] and cut off his right ear. Whereupon Jesus answered and said, “Suffer ye even on this.” And he touched the ear and healed him. And Jesus said unto [those] that were come against him, “Are ye come out as against a robber with swords and clubs?” [33]

The passage suggests several things:

1. That Jesus did not condone or support the man who used his sword.
2. That those who opposed Jesus knew he would be unarmed.
3. That he was so much against violence that he would even heal his enemy.

The Jesus that is occasionally presented as an insurrectionist revolutionary is extremely unlikely. The available evidence suggests that he was a pacifist.

IV. The majority encouraged others to join their cause.

Naturally, a rebellion is useless unless it is supported by a large enough group of people to sustain it. The Zealots and the Essenes were involved in public debate and criticism of each other and other Jewish groups. The Fourth Philosophy (which led either to the Sicarii or the Zealots) tended, according to Josephus, to draw its members from the youth:

… for Judas [the Galilean] and Sadduc, who excited a fourth philosophic sect among us, and had a great many followers therein … which spread thence among the younger sort, who were zealous for it… [34]

Jesus, however, was not so specific in his recruitment. Indeed, while other Jews neglected women, children, criminals, prostitutes, the infirm, and tax-collectors, Jesus saw them as an untapped source of followers. He charged his apostles to seek out such people:

These twelve Jesus sent forth after he had charged them, saying: … “go ye rather unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as ye go, preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of the heavens is at hand’. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out the devils; freely ye have received, freely give.” [35]

Jesus acknowledged the power of miracles as propaganda in his efforts to gain a following, and had a carefully crafted recruitment strategy.

V. The Roman punishment for such insurrectionists was death by crucifixion.

The process of crucifixion was time-consuming and expensive. It is unlikely that so much effort would have been expended in order to punish a petty thief or a common robber. Roman thought involved the need to put rebels to death publicly and painfully, in order to set a clear example to their followers:

According to Roman custom those condemned to death on the cross (generally only slaves and rebels…) were first whipped without mercy. Then they had to carry the crossbar of the cross on their shoulders to the place of execution, where the vertical part was already in the ground. They were stripped, nailed to the crosspiece and raised up on the cross, which usually formed the shape of a T[,] … until they approached death by exhaustion, asphyxiation, hemorrhage, a burst heart, or collapse. [36]

Jesus was executed in the fashion reserved for insurrectionists, between two such rebels. As he hung nailed to the cross, Pilate ordered a notice reading, “Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews”, be displayed at the site. [37] This suggests that Rome considered him to be some type of political criminal.

When the evidence is considered in its totality, Jesus was almost certainly executed because he was a rebel against Rome. Pilate certainly would not have had him executed in such a manner for a minor transgression, and the Jewish authorities did not have the power to give a death sentence. [38] He certainly exhibited many of the behaviours of subversive groups: leading his followers into the desert, talking about the coming of a new kingdom, performing miracles and recruiting more support. This must have been disconcerting for Roman authorities.

A few aspects of the historical Jesus are problematic in this context. Pontius Pilate was hesitant to find him guilty of any crime. Jesus did not advocate violent resistance to Rome or even bear arms (though his followers did). Prior to Jesus, rebel groups are rarely mentioned in the ancient sources. But these are minor considerations that can be explained away, at least in part, by the dubious historicity of the gospels. They are faith documents offering a particular interpretation of Jesus’ life, rather than a strict account of the facts. As Meier explains, “A particular story that was not only historical but also quite unusual could easily take on, in the course of oral transmission, the conventional contours of the literary form… the specific features of the historical event being lost in the process.” [39]

Jesus was in all likelihood seen by Rome as a rebel against its authority. Whether he actively presented himself as such is another question for another essay. We know only that Jesus was a remarkable man who died a remarkable death, and that his story will continue to be reinterpreted many more millenia.