What was jesus guilty of

Jesus was accused of blasphemy by the Jewish leaders. Blasphemy is a religious offence, when a person says or does something regarded as being disrespectful to God. Blasphemy was taken very seriously and the punishment was death by stoning. After Jesus was arrested, he was put on trial by the Sanhedrin. This was the highest ruling council of the Jews. There were 70 members, mostly made up of Sadducees , Pharisees and priests plus the leader who was the high priest. When Jesus was on trial the high priest was Caiaphas.

The Sanhedrin was still allowed to exist under Roman rule, but their power was limited. Crimes against Judaism would have been punished by stoning. Whatever the charges, it is established that they were serious since Rome reserved crucifixion for what it regarded as the worst criminals.

One possibility is that Jesus was a Jewish nationalist who was linked to violent political uprising against the Roman occupation led by the nationalist Zealot movement. The sign placed on his cross, which read "King of the Jews," may support this interpretation. If Jesus were linked to violent insurrection, this would have resulted in charges of sedition and punishment by crucifixion.

This perspective was advanced by Jesus' brother James after his death. Many legal issues immediately confront anyone approaching the trial of Jesus, but none is more fundamental than determining which legal rules applied to such a case in Jerusalem in the early decades of the first century.

Consider, for example, the commonly asserted prohibition that Jewish trials could not be conducted at night. This rule is found in the Talmud, but the Talmud was not written until many years after the destruction of Jerusalem—a generation after the death of Jesus.

Moreover, the Talmud was written by the religious descendants of the Pharisees and thus represents the views of the Pharisees. In first-century Jerusalem, however, the Pharisees and the Sadducees disagreed on many legal technicalities, and it is unknown what the Sadducees thought about trials at night. It is unclear whether the Sadducees, the lay nobility who were the leaders of the Sanhedrin, [3] would have had any legal objections to a nighttime arrest, hearing, and conviction.

Similar legal problems are encountered at just about every turn in pondering the Jewish and Roman trials of Jesus. Several factual perplexities also hinder our understanding. For example, was the trial actually held at night? It is clear that Jesus was arrested at night, but perhaps that happened well into the night and near the predawn hours. Luke, in fact, says that it was day before the trials actually began see Luke , although it must have been very early in the morning, since many things happened between the time Jesus was arrested and when He was taken to Golgotha about nine in the morning see Mark It is worth noting that it was customary among the Romans to be at work before daybreak, but without knowing when the trial actually began or ended, it is hard to know whether the rule against nighttime trials was violated, even assuming that there was a prevailing law against such proceedings at the time of Jesus.

Moreover, verbal ambiguities make legal analysis in many cases quite difficult. Does this mean that His accusers thought He fooled them maliciously, carelessly, or perhaps even unwittingly? Did they think that He was deceptively encouraging them to commit sin or erroneously teaching them to think incorrectly or tricking them into apostasy?

Did they think that His deception was simple antisocial misrepresentation, or was it illegal fraud? Without knowing more about what His accusers meant, it is hard to know why they thought His words or doings were deceptive in a way that warranted the death penalty.

But most of all, how could the general concerns of the chief priests and the Romans have been translated into a specific legal cause of action against Jesus? Yes see Matthew —66; Mark —64 , but there must have been more to the case than this in ancient trials, legal causes of action were often added one on top of the other.

If blasphemy alone had been the issue, one would expect that Jesus would have been stoned by the Jews, [5] which was the biblically prescribed mode of execution for blasphemy see Leviticus ; Acts ; And because Pilate and the Romans would have cared very little about a Jewish accusation of blasphemy, scholars have often concluded that Jesus must have been executed for some other reason, perhaps on charges of treason against Rome, since He was accused of having called Himself the king of the Jews and this appellation ended up on the placard placed by Pilate above Jesus on the cross.

But it is very hard to see any substance to a claim of treason against Jesus. Such considerations lead to the persistent question, what might have been the main legal cause of action that carried the most weight against Jesus and led to His crucifixion? A solution to this problem is in the Gospel of John. All readers of the New Testament must choose between either relying primarily on John and then secondarily on the synoptics to fill in the gaps, or relying primarily on the synoptics and then secondarily on John.

He was one of the leading Apostles, along with Peter and James. John was at Golgotha and would have known as much as possible about what was happening and why. Was this Judas? Or Nicodemus? More likely, it was the Apostle John himself, who was thus an eyewitness of these legal proceedings.

Here lies the key to understanding the legal cause of action that they lodged against Jesus as they brought Him to Pilate. In certain cases, both Jews and Romans had strict laws that punished magicians, sorcerers, fortune-tellers, diviners, those in contact with spirits, and miracle workers. Of course, Jewish law recognized that there were good uses of supernatural powers as well as bad.

Jewish attitudes toward magic were mixed. Equally interesting is the fact that Roman law also proscribed certain uses of magic and divination.

Roman law and society at that time considered magicians, along with brigands, pirates, astrologers, philosophers, and prophets, as enemies of the Roman order. For these people, gods both good and evil were everywhere; thus, unseen spirits and demons were taken seriously as a constant potential threat. Especially when combined with maiestas anything that insulted, suborned, or threatened the emperor , condoning any such use of supernatural powers would easily make a person an enemy of Caesar see John Was Jesus falsely accused and falsely convicted?

God that is, Jesus cannot be rightly convicted of blasphemy. It's a matter of perspective. The Sanhedrin convicted Jesus of blasphemy because they did not believe he was God, just as the judge did not believe the man was innocent.

Essentially, it's unjust judgment on the part of the judges. However, Jesus was God, and therefore, he was falsely accused and falsely convicted. And after examining him before you, behold, I did not find this man guilty of any of your charges against him. Look, nothing deserving death has been done by him. It seems that Jesus was not found guilty of anything worthy of death. Under Roman rule, the Jews were allowed to judge smaller matters, but capital punishment was reserved for Rome alone.

Neither Pilate nor Herod found any guilt in Jesus at all on any matter that was pertinent. The Jews found Him guilty of blasphemy, but that was just based on His claim to Deity. They never figured out whether He was or not. Since Jesus was, indeed, God, He was not guilty of blasphemy. On this point, I disagree with the answer you cited.

Jesus did, indeed, claim to be God, that was true. Consequently, Jesus was not guilty of any of the crimes of which He was accused, either in the trial among the Jewish leaders or in the trial before Pilate and Herod.

Jesus was a follower of the Mosaic laws and it is a blasphemy to be judged by pagan courts , hence he cringed to be judged by the authority he did not deem fit and responding or participating in the pagan roman courts would amount to getting judged by laws other then revealed in the Old testament. This is abundantly clear from the account of Jesus when he barged into the temple and showed contempt of the temple.

Regarding Jews claiming that Jesus claimed divinity then, It is very clear from the bible that Jews wanted to eliminate Jesus as the Rabbis perceived Jesus a threat to their business of religion.