Mark 15:5 Commentary and Bible Study

He wouldn’t answer to any charge other than that he was a king: the one thing that is true. He is the King of glory, the King of heaven. He is the Son of God, the Messiah, who has come to take away the sins of all those who will be redeemed and to that alone he will acknowledge, yes, he is a king. Otherwise, he is silent before the people. ‘He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth’ (Isaiah 53:7).The silence of the Lord Jesus is a matter of amazement to Pilate. He has never see a prisoner who is facing the death sentence behave like this before. In his experience the prospect of death is always enough to make the hardest criminal start to defend themselves, but not to say nothing. This man is a mystery to him. As John records Pilate says, ‘Speakest thou not unto me? knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?’ (John 19:10). But Pilate understand little about what is really going on, and the momentous events which will lead to the redemption of all God’s chosen people. Jesus almost seems to excuse Pilate when he answers, ‘Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin’ (John 19:11). No one in Jesus’ position has ever spoken to Pilate like that before.Among the accusations the Jews throw at Christ is that ‘he stirreth up the people, teaching throughout all Jewry, beginning from Galilee to this place’ (Luke 23:5). It is on hearing this that Pilate decides to send Jesus to Herod (Tetrarch of Galilee), who happens to be in Jerusalem for the feast, as Luke records. He breaks off and sends Jesus to Herod (that is not found in Matthew or Mark), and the second part of the civil trial takes place before Herod, as recorded in Luke 23:6-12. The third part takes place when Jesus is returned by Herod to Pilate, and it is then that Pilate reconvenes the hearing and offers to release one of the prisoners at the feast according to tradition.