Jesus is led from Caiaphas to Pilate (Notes)

Saint Matthew - Chapter 27

Jesus is led from Caiaphas to Pilate. J-J Tissot

[1] Mane autem facto, consilium inierunt omnes principes sacerdotum et seniores populi adversus Jesum, ut eum morti traderent.
And when morning was come, all the chief priests and ancients of the people took counsel against Jesus, that they might put him to death.

[2] Et vinctum adduxerunt eum, et tradiderunt Pontio Pilato praesidi.
And they brought him bound, and delivered him to Pontius Pilate the governor.

And when they had bound Him, they led Him away, and delivered Him to Pontius Pilate the governor. “For,” as S. Jerome says, “it was the Jewish custom to bind and deliver to the judge those they had condemned to death.” Here then was Samson bound by Delilah, Christ by the Synagogue. Origen says truly, “They bound Jesus who looseth from bonds; who saith to them that are in bonds, ‘Go forth’ (Isa. 49:9); who looseth the fetters, and saith, ‘Let us break their bands asunder.’ ” For Jesus was bound that He might set us free by taking on Himself the bonds and the punishment of our sins.

They brought. Caiaphas, i.e., and all the other members of the Council, to crush by the weight of their authority both Jesus and Pilate alike. For if Pilate refused to ratify their sentence, they would be able to accuse him of aiming at the sovereignty of Judæa, and being thus an enemy of Cæsar, and so force him in this way, even against his will, to condemn Him to death.

Delivered to Pontius Pilate. Why? Some think from what is said in the Talmud that the Jews were forbidden to put any one to death. But see Deut. 21:23; Num. 25:4; Josh. 13:29; 2 Sam. 21:6 and 9.

But the fact was that the Romans had taken away from the Jews the power of life and death (John 18:31). Ananus was deposed from the High-Priesthood for killing James the Lord’s brother and others, without the consent of the Roman governor. The stoning of S. Stephen was only an outbreak of popular fury.

There were also other reasons. 
1. To remove from themselves the discredit of His death, as though it had arisen merely from envy. 
2. To dishonour Him as much as they could, by getting Him condemned by Pilate to the ignominious death of crucifixion, the punishment of rebels. They themselves had condemned Him of blasphemy, which was punished by stoning (Lev. 24:16). 
3. To dishonour Him the more by causing Him to be put to death as a profane person, by one, too, who was himself profaning the holy feast of the Passover (see S. Chrysostom, Hom. lxxxvi. in Matt.; S. Augustine, Tract. cxiv. in John; and S. Cyril, Lib. xii. in Joan. cap. 6).


But a retaliatory punishment was inflicted on the Jews; for as they delivered up Christ to Pilate, so were they in turn delivered up to be destroyed by Titus and Vespasian (S. Cyril on John, cap. xviii.; Theophylact, and Victorinus on Mark xiv).

Saint John - Chapter 18

[28] Adducunt ergo Jesum a Caipha in praetorium. Erat autem mane : et ipsi non introierunt in praetorium, ut non contaminarentur, sed ut manducarent Pascha.
Then they led Jesus from Caiphas to the governor's hall. And it was morning; and they went not into the hall, that they might not be defiled, but that they might eat the pasch.

From The Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ, by J-J Tissot (1897)

The crowds accompanying Jesus now all hastened down the steep streets leading from the his eye on to the Roman quarter of the town where the Praetorium was situated.  There, in the Antonia citadel, dwelt Pilate the Governor, and in it also were the barracks of the Roman garrison.  Jesus has been stripped of the garments He had worn when He had left the guest-chamber the evening before.  They were much soiled, and bore witness all too clearly to the cruel treatment to which their wearer had been subjected during the night; if the governor had seen them he might have turned their condition to the advantage of the prisoner, for he might have chosen to consider the status they were in as an insult to his own dignity, as well as an outrage on humanity.  Jesus therefore wore nothing now but his seamless undergarment and the rest of His clothes, which were of a reddish colour, were not restored to Him until just before He was compelled to carry His cross.
The procession went down the Tyropœon valley which was crossed by means of bridges.  It was then a very deep depression, completely separating the Temple from the town, but it became filled up in the various subsequent sieges.  The crowds which had collected the evening before were now augmented by a fresh concourse of people; the judges before whom Jesus had been taken in the morning were hastening along on their assess with their scribes to be present at the examination by the Governor.  They stand in greater dread of the Roman representative, for the contempt with which he treats them on every fresh opportunity does not tend to inspire them with confidence, and they feel that they must be on the spot to accuse Jesus and if need be to rouse up the people and incite them to demand the death of Him they have themselves already condemned.
The weather is no overcast, a slight rain fell in the morning and still continues to fall at intervals, the road is slippery and many fall by the way.  Jesus Himself is waved through.  In the lower quarters of the town where the people had been aroused during the night by the tumult which had been going on, the excitement and disorder have begun, and everyone is already flocking in the direction of the Antonia Citadel, where the events of the new day are to be inaugurated.

d

Totus tuus ego sum 

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:
Ad Jesum per Mariam