John 18:35Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Pilate himself says this when he declares, "Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered You to me. What have You done?"

By this he wished to justify himself. But since he had said, "Are You the King of the Jews?" Jesus rebukes him.

You have, of course, heard this from the Jews. Why, then, do you not make a more exact investigation?

They said that I am an evildoer. Ask, then, what evil I have done. But you do not do this. You simply state the charge.

"Do you say this of yourself," or at the prompting of others? Pilate could not immediately say that he had heard it from them.

He simply refers to the people and says, "They delivered You to me." Therefore it is necessary to ask You what You have done.

Therefore Pilate rightly answers that His betrayers are Jews, and he shifts the blame away from himself.

Pilate does not say that he has heard it from others, but simply refers to the people's opinion and says, "They delivered You to me. What have You done?"

These seem to be the words of one who is grieved and embittered. "For," he says, "what have You done?"

He now makes manifest the robber-like gathering of the Jews, and as it were displays this assembly of accusers.

He says something like the following: it is not for me to know your laws, for I am not a Jew.

This belongs most of all to Your countrymen and fellow-nurtured people, who perhaps know that they have brought one subject to the death penalty.

In this way he accuses himself, for to say, "What have You done?" means nothing other than this.

The Evangelist took great care to relate as fully as possible what occurred at the trial itself, and that Pilate asked Jesus, "What have You done?"

Through this it was entirely possible to know the absence of crimes.

Although nothing was specified and our Savior Christ was not convicted of anything, nevertheless, in the end, an impious and most unjust condemnation to death followed.

"Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered You to me." By this he removed from himself the suspicion that he had said of himself that Jesus was the King of the Jews.

He showed that he had heard this from the Jews. Then, by saying, "What have You done?" he indicated quite clearly that this very thing was charged against Him as a crime.

It is as though he said, "If You do not acknowledge Yourself as King, what have You done that You have been brought to me?"

As if it would not be surprising if one who calls himself king were brought to a judge for punishment.

But if he does not call himself so, then one must ask him what else he has done to deserve being brought before the judge.

See the explanation of the words: "And the governor asked Him, saying, 'Are You the King of the Jews?'" (Mt 27:11). These verses are also explained there.

"Am I a Jew?" Pilate said. "What concern have I with these subtleties?

But Your nation and its leaders, the chief priests, have brought You to me for judgment. They accuse You of assuming royal authority.

Tell me, then, what have You done that gave them occasion to bring such an accusation against You? Do You Yourself acknowledge Yourself to be a king?"

Despite the soundness of this question, it seemed not entirely appropriate to the Roman nobleman, who was invested with the right to execute and to pardon.

"Am I a Jew?" Pilate answered with arrogance. In other words, am I to involve myself in the prejudices by which the Jewish people are blinded, and whose violation they charge against You?

"Your fellow citizens and the chief priests have delivered You" as guilty of appropriating the name of king.

Because of this, I as procurator, whose duty is to confirm the Sanhedrin's sentences, must against my will arrange an interrogation of You.

Yet until now I myself have seen nothing from You contrary to the laws. "So, what have You done?"

That is, how have You given cause for the thought that, in the opinion of Your accusers, You seek a kingdom? Answer.

Pilate answers hastily, as a Roman ought to answer: "Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered You to me. What have You done?"

By these words Pilate, not without skill, placed the burden of explanation on the Accused.

Pilate remarked with irritation that he was not a Jew, after all, so as to understand everything in a religious sense.

Praetors in Rome and propraetors in the provinces usually had quaestors with them, whose duty was the preliminary investigation of a case.

Before the Roman tribunal appeared the accuser who lodged the complaint, the accused, and the witnesses whose testimony had to decide the guilt or innocence of the defendant.

The praetor or propraetor himself received the complaint. At the end of the process, having decided the case one way or another, he himself announced the judicial decision.

But interrogations of the accuser, the witnesses, and the accused were the work of the quaestor. Friedlieb, Archäolog. d. Leidensgesch., p. 105.

Pilate had no quaestor of his own, and therefore he conducts the whole judicial process himself.

Jesus answered, and so forth. The first three Evangelists, giving the interrogation on this point briefly, mention only the Lord's brief affirmative answer to this question (Mt 27:11; Mk 15:2; Lk 23:3).

John sets forth the matter in greater detail, in order to clarify the concept of the character of Christ's Kingdom.

To Pilate's question the Lord also answered with a question, whose purpose was to clarify this point of the accusation.

Pilate probably expected a direct negative answer to his question. But the matter was not as simple as it seemed to him. The concept of king had to be clarified as applied to the Accused One.

The Lord speaks of Himself as King not in the Roman political sense, but in the Jewish theocratic sense.

The proud prefect, who until then had seemed a friend of truth, was offended that an unpleasant truth was shown to him.

He was made to see how incautious his question was. He begins by expressing contempt for the Jew's faith in the Messiah.

I am not a Jew, he says, to share the Jew's dreams about the Messiah. Therefore I do not know whether You have designs on the kingdom, or what kind of designs You have.

Here respect for truth is also visible. But why should Pilate despise faith in the Messiah?

Ah, faith in the Messiah, the Savior of the world, is needed, very much needed, even by people far better than Pilate.

Even the best of the pagans nourished it in the soul. The faith of the Jews of that time in the Messiah as an earthly king is another matter.