Mark 14:57 Commentary and Bible Study

Then came witnesses referring to events in John 2. This seemed to raise their hopes of at last finding something definite and substantial to charge him with. ‘We heard him say, I will destroy this temple that is made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands.’ This sounded like a word spoken against the temple of God. ‘He said he will destroy this sacred house.’ That was a capital offence among the Jews, so he must be executed. What little sense they made of his words! Actually Christ had said something quite different. It was a word of prophecy about what they would do to him. It was not he who would destroy the temple, but they who would do it, and so blind were they that they brought this witness against him, even while they were in the process of fulfilling it themselves by their murderous actions. He had said, ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up’ (John 2:19). John tells us that he was referring to ‘the temple of his body’ (John 2:21), which they were about to have nailed to the cross, and he would indeed raise it up in three days, in spite of all their attempts to destroy him. They could do nothing to harm him ultimately, but all their attempts to do so only helped to fulfil God’s plan. So this witness was a twisting and a distortion. ‘But neither so did their witness agree together.’ They brought these kinds of charges, but even that was not well fabricated and done.