Wisdom
John 11
O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! (Romans 11)
Those men were smart, Annas, Caiaphas, and the others in their small group of leaders. They had it all figured out and their plan worked, brilliantly, it appeared. You have to give them credit, because they seemingly thought of everything.
You know them. Caiaphas is the high priest, following his father-in-law, Annas. In our day, the high priest is appointed by the Roman governor. And so, he holds his position and rules at the pleasure of Pontius Pilate. If that seems odd to you, don’t forget that above all else, the Romans seek, and insist, on peace in the lands that they occupy. And, since those opposed to Rome are invariably religious zealots, it makes sense for the governor to hold the high priest accountable by putting down any unrest from among our ranks.
Now that I have explained this background, let me go back to the beginning and tell you exactly how smart these men are.
Oh, and who am I? Well, you might just call me an observer. Yes, I was someone on the outside of their plans concerning Jesus, but close enough to see how it all played out. I suppose you could call me a bystander. And I must add that watching it all, I was impressed. How could you not be impressed with their plan? Its execution (pardon the term) was flawless.
So, here’s how it all went down.
The beginnings of their plans went back to the rumors about Jesus. Or perhaps I should say, the stories about Jesus that were circulating in Jerusalem. To say that they were shocking would be an understatement. Even assuming some exaggeration in the retelling, the stories of miracle healings, and of crowds clamoring to hear Jesus teach caused great concern among our leaders. And His apparent love for the outsiders and outcasts in our nation made Jesus appear to be a challenge to their power, how they looked down on sinners, the sick and the poor. And I am sure that you remember how Jesus called out their hypocrisy. (Matthew 23)
As long as Jesus stayed in Galilee, our leaders could simply follow his movements without much worry. But eventually, they assumed that Jesus would come to Jerusalem; and He did, followed by crowds of people. Of course, that alarmed them. Along the way, Jesus raised a man from the dead, a man named Lazarus. That occurred in Bethany, just a short distance from Jerusalem. Many of our citizens witnessed this miracle. I was one of them.
Here is what John the Apostle wrote about what happened next:
Many of the Jews, therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did believed in him. But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. So the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the council and said, “What are we to do? This man is performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation.” But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing at all! You do not understand that it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed.” He did not say this on his own, but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus was about to die for the nation, and not for the nation only, but to gather into one the dispersed children of God. So from that day on they planned to put him to death. (John 11)
And so, the plan began to take shape in earnest. You must understand that a very small group of men met in secret to consider what to do about Jesus. The others on the council were not consulted until much later. They were expected to obey their leaders, and they did.
Clearly, neutralizing or better, eliminating Jesus was the idea. But they faced several challenges in their planning. Let me cite them for you:
First of all, Jesus was popular, especially among the poor. Crowds gathered around Him when He taught. Having Jesus arrested by the temple police would easily point blame to our leaders, who were openly hostile to Him. This tactic was actually tried, but it failed when the temple police claimed that they’d never heard anyone teach like Jesus (John 9). Anyway, our leaders did not want to smear their reputation with any impression of trickery or heavy-handedness.
One option was to simply put Jesus away, to have Him imprisoned for an easy-to-prove crime. Perhaps he could be marginalized in that way, perhaps even forgotten. No Roman authority would oppose that. But it wouldn’t fully solve the problem of Jesus. Yes, He’d be out of the way, but His followers could still be active. Caiaphas remembered how, even after John the Baptizer was imprisoned by Herod, his followers continued to spread his message. No, Caiaphas reasoned, Jesus must be permanently silenced and there was only one way to do that.
Second, for claiming that He was the Son of God, Jesus could be convicted of blasphemy, a religious crime that carried the capital penalty of stoning. Again, no Roman authority would be needed for that. However, stoning Jesus would not be popular with the crowds, who would blame our leaders and turn Jesus into a martyr in their eyes.
The third option, the one that Caiaphas devised, was brilliant. In effect, he planned to manipulate Pilate into having the Romans kill Jesus, thereby keeping his hands clean of any unpopular move. And this option carried an additional benefit to Caiaphas and the council: unlike a clandestine assassination, the death of Jesus would be carried out publicly for all to see. And more, it would require crucifixion, a painful and humiliating death reserved for the worst of criminals. As a result, Jesus would be held up for public shame, and even though innocent, He would die, not as a hero, or as the Messiah as some claimed, but instead, as a criminal.
But how to do it? After all, Jesus had committed no crime that might carry the death penalty.
The solution came to Caiaphas in stages. First, he bullied his council into convicting Jesus of blasphemy and called for His death. Not all of them truly agreed, but they followed the lead of Caiaphas and Annas and the others who were in on the plan. A few, like Nicodemus and Joseph, went along, but grudgingly. Later, both of them would see to the burial of Jesus.
Mattias Stom, Christ before Caiaphas
1630’s
Next, Caiaphas had to convince Pilate to see Jesus as a threat to the peace that Rome desired. I do not believe that he had any behind-the-scenes agreement with Pilate. Perhaps he knew Pilate all too well, knowing that he would fold under the pressure from the crowd that Caiaphas had assembled. And sure enough, Pilate, like the council, was manipulated into condemning Jesus, despite never stating a charge or citing a law that Jesus was guilty of violating.
It seemed that the prophecy from centuries before was playing out before our very eyes.
He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter
and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.
By a perversion of justice he was taken away.
Who could have imagined his future?
For he was cut off from the land of the living,
stricken for the transgression of my people.
They made his grave with the wicked
and his tomb with the rich,
although he had done no violence,
and there was no deceit in his mouth. (Isaiah 53)
And so, it was done. Pilate, hearing the “crucify him” cries from the crowd recruited by Caiaphas, assented to their wishes and sent Jesus off to His death. The hands of the council remained clean, or so they thought. The small group of council leaders rewarded themselves with a modest but private celebration.
Yet there were some warning signs of trouble that Caiaphas and the others missed. First, Judas. Yes, Judas, one of the closest followers of Jesus, suddenly appeared out of nowhere, offering to help. He was willing to betray Jesus, and he did, keeping the arrest out of sight of the crowds.
Caiaphas should have suspected something was amiss. But, pleased with himself and his own brilliance, he took the help of Judas without question. And Judas came through as promised.
Second, Caiaphas expected Jesus to defend Himself. He was prepared for that. But the silence of Jesus should have given Caiaphas pause to consider what was really happening. To me, as strange as it sounds, it seemed that Jesus actually wanted to be arrested and crucified.
And finally, the darkness and the earthquakes that accompanied the crucifixion of Jesus. There was no rational explanation for that. But Caiaphas, caught up in the euphoria of his success, dismissed these as mere coincidences.
So, was it “done” after all? Was the story really over as Caiaphas believed?
I think you know the answer to that. The story wasn’t over at all. Jesus was raised from the dead and appeared to many. It’s interesting, don’t you think, that both Jesus and Caiaphas spoke parallel prophecies, or so it seemed. Jesus prophesied that He would be killed and then raised from the dead. And Caiaphas prophesied that “Jesus was about to die for the nation, and not for the nation only, but to gather into one the dispersed children of God.”
As it turned out, both prophesies came true. Caiaphas, in his brilliance and arrogance, was outwitted by a higher intelligence, the very wisdom of our YHWH God. Thinking he was in charge, Caiaphas became the ultimate pawn in a game that was larger than he could imagine.
And what about me? Yes, I was a bystander to all of this, observing in awe their plans, and as surprised as any about the outcome, which can be nothing less than the higher plan of our God. Perhaps God always has a higher plan and though we may not see or understand it at the time, eventually, He gives us the insight into His amazing wisdom. We may even find ourselves, unwittingly, part of God’s plan. Just like Caiaphas, too wise for his own good.
Caiaphas surely knew these passages of scripture. But he went ahead, anyway.
Do you see people wise in their own eyes? There is more hope for fools than for them. (Proverbs 26)
… then I saw all the work of God, that no one can find out what is happening under the sun. However much they may toil in seeking, they will not find it out; even though those who are wise claim to know, they cannot find it out. (Ecclesiastes 8)
Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and shrewd in their own sight! (Isaiah 5)
… so I will again do amazing things with this people, shocking and amazing. The wisdom of their wise shall perish, and the discernment of the discerning shall be hidden. (Isaiah 29)
For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength. (1 Corinthians 1)
For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their craftiness,” … (1 Corinthians 3)
For me, I am rethinking a lot of things. Can I continue to be an observer? A bystander? Did something really important happen here? Something way beyond the human plans of Caiaphas? Something that our YHWH God Himself, in His ultimate wisdom has ordained? Yes, for me, I will ponder that and more, and consider, more than the words of Caiaphas, the words of Jesus.
I can’t explain it, but I do now believe that death could not hold Jesus, and that He truly lives.