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J.K. Granberg-Michaelson writes in this week’s SojoMail that Pontius Pilate used fear and blame to mask unjust actions — and there’s a lesson for us in that part of the resurrection story as Trump defies court orders:
For all the powerful moments in the story of the Passion, this year I can’t help thinking about the decisive role that the public — the crowd — plays in the story. On Palm Sunday, crowds meet Jesus’ entrance to Jerusalem with cries of Hosanna, meaning “Save us!” as they cried out for deliverance from the occupying regime of the Roman Empire. But by the time Jesus is hauled before Pontius Pilate and charged with blasphemy, the crowd’s cries have changed to “Crucify him! Crucify him!” a dark mirror of its earlier role.
We must take pains here not to fall into the antisemitic trope that assigns blame for Jesus’ death to Jewish religious leaders or the Jewish people as a whole. Noting passages in the gospels (Matthew 27:20, Mark 15:11, Luke 23:5) which insist the crowd had been manipulated by local religious leaders, scholars such as Nathanael Andrade argue that this antisemitic interpretation actually reflects early Christians’ desire to avoid drawing the ire of the Roman occupation and distance themselves from the Jewish people. In reality, it is Pilate — a public official for the occupying regime of the Roman Empire — who bears the primary responsibility for condemning Jesus to death. Reading these passages today, Jesus’ trial is a striking example of the interplay between the political power brokers who condemn Jesus to death and the crowds who cried out to Jesus days earlier for deliverance. While Pilate is responsible, he uses the crowd’s actions as cover, absolving himself of responsibility for deciding Jesus’ fate. Reading this story amid the deeply concerning judicial drama playing out in real time between the Trump administration and courts, I’m reminded of the role we all can play when we collectively act — or fail to act — in support of justice
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