lpetrich

The crowd of Jerusalem citizens seems much like a lynch mob to me, and Matt 27:25 is almost absurdly out of character for a lynch mob. I've never heard of lynch-mob participants considering their activities anything fundamentally wrong, or something that their descendants will also be guilty of -- just the opposite. From Lynching, US lynchers often took pictures of their handiwork, and a Southern politician went on record as stating
Most recently, the killers of Libyan dictator Muammar Khadafy were essentially a lynch mob, and they did not show any regret for their actions. Their critics among fellow Libyan militiamen wanted him captured alive, but that was as far as it went.

His body was then placed on display for a few days, and then buried at a secret location.

Diogenes the Cynic

Yes, that entire passage is a piece of anti-Jewish, polemic fiction, and yes, it's decidedly implausible.

Eldarion Lathria

I also can't imagine a Roman official submitting to a lynch mob's demands. Would he not have ordered out the legion and dispersed that crowd with a volley or three. To surrender to the mob would be to show weakness to a subject race.

Eldarion Lathria

Toto

Robert Price had an alternative explanation for the blood libel in his Nov 8 Bible Geek podcast (I've forgotten the details...)

steve_bnk

As a Jew the JC figure would have been scandalous.

An unmarried man openly socisaizing with an unmarried woman.

Infering god was his father, blasphemy.

Imagine a blashemous Muslim parallel to JC wandering around in Pakistan, Iraq, Iran, or Saudi Arabia today.

Solo

Price thinks that the cry for Jesus blood by the people and the acceptance of responsibility for it in generations to come might have meant to consecrate the New Covenant. I.e. he thinks the cry does not necessarily inculpates the Jewish people. He also said the idea might seem crazy at first.

It's an interesting take, especially with what Pilate says while washing his hands. So I would say that the cry was meant to inculpate the Sanhedrin-led mob, and 'the children' in the self-curse simply point to Matthew's own time. I do not think Mt 27:25 is anti-Jewish (anti-semitism as racial creed rose in the 2nd half of 19th century !), but reflects the nasty Jewish sectarianism that developped in the diaspora after the war of 66-72.

Jiri

lpetrich

Our other sources on Pontius Pilate, Philo and Josephus, describe him as very ruthless, so believing in JC's innocence would have been out of character for him.

As to lack of guilt about lynching, various US Southern Senators would filibuster anti-lynching bills. Here's a contemporary news story about one of them in 1922. The filibustering senator claimed that the bill was partisan and sectional, and was for Northern Republicans getting the black vote. He also claimed that bad black people would interpret that bill as an excuse to do Very Bad Things, and that good black people do not need any more legal protection than what they now have.

Also, I recall an Al Jazeera story about Muammar Khadafy's death that featured a Libyan militia commander feeling rather sore about the idea that the late dictator deserved anything less than lynching. "Are we supposed to kiss his head?"

Khadafy's burial reminds me of another implausibility: Joseph of Arimathea getting Jesus Christ buried in a tomb. That seems like VIP treatment rather than what might be appropriate for a troublemaker. Left out for the dogs and vultures would be more likely, or at most, burial in some commoner graveyard.

steve_bnk

Rome had two rules

1. Anything that increased wealth and promoted order was supported.
2. Anything conflicting with #1 was ruthlessly suprpessed.

In a time of intense anti Roman sentiment and Jewish nationalism, the JC of the story would be on the Roman side. Give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's.

Vivisector

I think the most common explanation might be, it didn't happen the way Matthew describes it. As you've pointed out, what's known of Pilate doesn't suggest he's the type of guy to give in to a mob. The alternative that's been suggested is that this scene represents shifting responsibility for Jesus's death away from the Romans and toward the Jews, something that would have made sense following the first war (further suggested by the blood piece).

Cheers,

V.

Diogenes the Cynic

Jesus wasn't saying anything blasphemous, and wasn't teaching anything contrary to mainstream Jewish tradition. At most (and I don't even think this much is probable), he claimed to be the Messiah, but that was not a blasphemous or illegal claim under Jewish law (the Messiah, in Jewish expectation, was not God or a literal "son of" God, but just the human heir to the throne of David). As to the "son of God" language (assuming he even used it), that phrase was an honorific for Davidic kings, not a claim to literal divine descendancy, and it was not blasphemous. Nothing Jesus is alleged to have taught would have bothered the Temple priests or Jewish mobs. Going Steven Seagal in the courtyard would have pissed of everybody, though.

Also, while claiming to be the Messiah was (and is) no crime under Jewish law, it was, ironically, a crime under ROMAN law because it was a de facto challenge to Roman authority, and if he had any following at all, an act of sedition.