When morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people made a plan against Jesus to put him to death. 2 They tied him up, led him away, and handed him over to Pilate the governor.
3 Then Judas, the one who had handed him over, saw that Jesus had been condemned. He was filled with regret and brought the thirty silver coins back to the chief priests and elders. 4 “I sinned when I handed over innocent blood,” he said.
“What is that to us?” they said. “That’s your problem.”
5 He threw the silver coins into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
6 The chief priests picked up the coins and said, “It’s not lawful to put this into the temple treasury, since it’s blood money.” 7 So they made a plan and used the money to buy the Potter’s Field as a burial place for foreigners. 8 That is why that field has been called the Field of Blood to this day. 9 Then what was spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: “And they took the thirty silver coins, the price set on him by the sons of Israel — the price they had put on him —[1] 10 and they gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord directed me.”
11 Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor questioned him. “Are you the king of the Jews?” he asked.
“You say so,” Jesus replied.
12 But when the chief priests and elders accused him, he gave no answer. 13 Then Pilate said to him, “Don’t you hear how many things they’re testifying against you?” 14 But Jesus did not answer him — not even a single word — so that the governor was greatly amazed.
15 Now at the festival the governor customarily released one prisoner to the crowd, whomever they wanted. 16 At that time they had a notorious prisoner named Jesus Barabbas.[2] 17 So when the crowd had gathered, Pilate said to them, “Which one do you want me to release to you — Jesus Barabbas, or Jesus who is called the Anointed One?” 18 He knew it was out of envy that they had handed Jesus over.
19 While Pilate was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent him a message: “Have nothing to do with that innocent man, for I have suffered terribly today in a dream because of him.”
20 But the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus killed. 21 The governor answered them, “Which of the two do you want me to release to you?”
“Barabbas,” they said.
22 Pilate said to them, “Then what should I do with Jesus who is called the Anointed One?”
They all said, “Let him be crucified!”
23 He said, “Why? What evil has he done?”
But they shouted all the louder, “Let him be crucified!”
24 When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere and that a riot was starting instead, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. “I am innocent of this man’s blood,” he said. “You see to it.”[3]
25 And all the people answered, “His blood be on us and on our children!”
26 Then he released Barabbas to them. But he had Jesus flogged, and then handed him over to be crucified.
27 Then the governor’s soldiers took Jesus into the governor’s headquarters and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him. 28 They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him. 29 They twisted together a crown of thorns and placed it on his head, and put a reed in his right hand. Then they knelt down in front of him and mocked him, saying, “Hail, king of the Jews!” 30 They spat on him, took the reed, and beat him on the head with it. 31 After they had finished mocking him, they took off the robe, put his own clothes back on him, and led him away to crucify him.
32 As they were going out, they found a man from Cyrene named Simon. They forced him to carry Jesus’s cross.[4]
33 They came to a place called Golgotha — which means “Place of the Skull” — 34 and they gave Jesus wine mixed with something bitter to drink. But after tasting it, he refused to drink it.[5]
35 When they had crucified him, they divided up his clothes by casting lots. 36 Then they sat down and kept watch over him there. 37 Above his head they placed the written charge against him: “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.”
38 Two bandits were crucified with him at the same time, one on his right and one on his left. 39 Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads 40 and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days — save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross!”
41 In the same way the chief priests, along with the scribes and elders, mocked him. They said, 42 “He saved others, but he can’t save himself! He’s the king of Israel — let him come down now from the cross, and we’ll believe in him. 43 He trusted in God; let God rescue him now if he wants him. After all, he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’” 44 Even the bandits who were crucified with him taunted him the same way.
45 From noon until three in the afternoon, darkness came over the whole land. 46 About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” — which means, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
47 When some of those standing there heard it, they said, “This man is calling for Elijah.”
48 Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge. He filled it with sour wine, put it on a reed, and offered it to Jesus to drink. 49 But the rest said, “Leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.”
50 Then Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and released his spirit.
51 And look — the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks split apart. 52 The tombs were opened, and many bodies of the holy ones who had fallen asleep were raised. 53 After Jesus’s resurrection, they came out of the tombs, entered the holy city, and appeared to many people.
54 When the officer and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and everything that happened, they were terrified. “Truly this man was the Son of God!” they said.
55 Many women were there, watching from a distance. They had followed Jesus from Galilee, serving him. 56 Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of Zebedee’s sons.
57 When evening came, a rich man from Arimathea arrived, named Joseph. He himself had also become a disciple of Jesus. 58 He went to Pilate and asked for Jesus’s body. Then Pilate ordered that it be given to him. 59 Joseph took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, 60 and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had cut out of the rock. Then he rolled a large stone across the entrance of the tomb and went away. 61 Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were there, sitting opposite the tomb.
62 The next day — that is, the day after Preparation Day — the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate. 63 “Sir,” they said, “we remember that while that deceiver was still alive, he said, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ 64 So give the order to secure the tomb until the third day. Otherwise his disciples might come and steal the body and tell the people, ‘He has been raised from the dead.’ Then this last deception would be worse than the first.”
65 Pilate said to them, “You have a guard. Go, make it as secure as you know how.” 66 So they went and secured the tomb by sealing the stone and posting the guard.
Notes
Note 1. The quoted words about the thirty coins and the potter’s field match Zechariah 11:12-13 far more closely than anything in Jeremiah, and interpreters have puzzled over the attribution for centuries. Matthew may be weaving Zechariah together with Jeremiah’s imagery of a potter and of buying a field (Jeremiah 18-19, 32) and naming only the more prominent prophet. Ancient writers often cited a cluster of texts under one name. ↩
Note 2. In Aramaic “Bar-abba” means “son of the father.” Some manuscripts — and Origen, writing in the third century — give the prisoner’s full name as “Jesus Barabbas,” the same first name as Jesus of Nazareth; the critical text this edition follows prints it. ↩
Note 3. Washing the hands to disclaim guilt for a death was a Jewish gesture, not a Roman one: Deuteronomy 21:6-7 has the elders of a town wash their hands over an unsolved killing and declare, “Our hands did not shed this blood.” ↩
Note 4. Cyrene was a Greek city in what is now Libya, and it had a large, long-established Jewish community; Cyrenian Jews were numerous enough in Jerusalem to have their own synagogue (Acts 6:9). Simon was likely one of the many diaspora pilgrims in the city for the festival. ↩
Note 5. The Greek is cholē — bile, or anything bitter. The detail echoes Psalm 69:21, “they gave me gall for my food, and for my thirst gave me vinegar to drink.” A bitter drink offered to the condemned is often read as a dulling draught. ↩