I AM Barabbas
Mark 15:1-20
Maximilian Kolbe was a Polish Catholic priest before and during World War II. Even while Poland was occupied by German troops, he remained at his monastery. It was a monastery that put out several anti-German publications, and because of that, it drew the attention of German officials. Father Kolbe, now Saint Kolbe, was arrested by the Gestapo in 1941 for hiding Jewish people and sent to Auschwitz. While there he continued to work as a priest, offering comfort to his fellow inmates. Conditions in the camp were, as you can imagine, awful.
Later that year, three inmates of the camp seemed to have escaped. To punish the rest of the inmates and stop any further desire to try to escape, the deputy director of Auschwitz ordered that ten men be chosen at random to be starved to death in an underground bunker. It would be a slow death as they existed in deplorable conditions without food until their bodies gave out.
One of the men selected to die cried out “My wife! My children!” At which point Father Kolbe volunteered to take his place. And the commander was so surprised, he allowed it. Father Kolbe took the place of another man and died a slow, agonizing death in that underground bunker, deprived of food until his body gave out.
We’re nearing the end of our journey through Mark. In fact, we’ll wrap it up on Easter Sunday. Jesus has endured a sham of a trial conducted under cover of darkness – a trial that happened during the night, out of sight, before the Jewish council. Mark tells us that the witnesses who appeared before the council couldn’t get their stories to line up. It’s a case that even a rookie defense attorney could have won. Except that the Sanhedrin, the Jewish council, wanted Jesus gone. They wound up finding him guilty of heresy – claiming to be the Son of God. Under Jewish law, heresy was a crime punishable by death. Unfortunately for the council, they couldn’t actually carry out a death sentence. Rome alone could do that. That meant that Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, would have to sentence him to death. And Pilate wouldn’t care about a common heretic who posed no threat to Rome’s rule. They needed a different charge for that. Turn with me to Mark 15:1-20. We’re going to start with Vv. 1-5.
The priests needed something other than blasphemy to charge Jesus with before Pilate. They settled on a charge of high treason, something Pilate would take very, very seriously. He wasn’t usually in Jerusalem. His capital was elsewhere. He was in Jerusalem, along with a strong contingent of Roman soldiers, to keep an eye on the often-rebellious Jewish people during the Passover celebration.
Most Roman governors of Judea did the same. They wanted a strong Roman presence in the city during the Passover. Why? Because wanna be messiahs often rose up in Jerusalem during Passover and sought to stir up the people to rebel against Rome. Throwing off their political oppressors – and they WERE an oppressed people – was a core component of the Jewish psyche.
So the chief priests seized on the concept of the messiah as someone who would lead their people to victory over Rome, and said that Jesus claimed to be the King of the Jews. Pilate didn’t care about someone claiming to be God. But a king? That needed careful consideration. As governor, Pilate basically had two mandates: keep the taxes flowing into Rome, and keep the peace. Don’t allow any insurrection or rebellion to take root.
The chief priests sent Jesus to him bound like a dangerous criminal. Look at V. 1. Their security measures throughout this ordeal have been laughably overdone. They sent men armed with clubs and swords to arrest a peaceful rabbi while he prayed. A man who had never lifted a finger to harm anyone. The most violent thing he’d ever done was turn over some tables in the temple courts. He’d never raised a sword against anyone. He’d taught, told stories, healed, even raised a couple of people from the dead. He’d never incited a riot. In fact, he tried hard NOT to – telling those he healed to stay silent about who had healed them. And now they send him to Pilate bound like a murderer. It’s laughable – the disconnect between the life Jesus lived and the way he’s been treated.
Well, Pilate carefully examined Jesus. But he couldn’t find any evidence that the man standing before him was a dangerous man – a threat to Rome. When he asked Jesus outright, “Are you the king of the Jews?” Jesus answered with a cryptic, “You have said so.” Basically, he said, “That’s what you say.” And then he kept silent. And as the priests leveled more and more accusations against him, his silence became more profound. He answered none of the charges. Pilate was amazed, and maybe a little impressed. But he couldn’t find any substantive reason to condemn this man to death. He had a problem.
It was a problem because releasing Jesus could cause a riot, if the priests were able to incite the people – and Jerusalem was teeming with people – to riot. And that would get him in trouble with Rome. And Pilate vulnerable. His main ally in the upper echelons of Roman leadership had been murdered. Any mistakes and he was probably out.
But he thought he could outmaneuver them. Each year during the Passover, Pilate absolved and released one person who had been condemned by Rome to die. He did this to try to keep favor with the people, because they often didn’t agree with the sentences handed down by Roman officials. It was just more evidence of heavy-handed Roman rule, a reminder that they didn’t have control over their own affairs. Releasing one condemned criminal was supposed to be a reminder of Rome’s mercy. Look at Vv. 6-15.
Pilate thought that if the people were allowed to choose between Jesus and one of death-row, condemned-to-die criminals, surely they would choose to have Jesus released. I mean, the people liked him. They flocked to him. And he certainly hadn’t done anything deserving of a death sentence.
Unfortunately for Pilate, they chose the other man – Barabbas. To be fair, the people likely viewed Barabbas as a hero of sorts. He was in prison and condemned to die because he’d participated in one of the Jews’ many insurrections, and in the process, he’d killed a man. They likely saw him as a freedom fighter arrested, imprisoned, and sentenced to die by the oppressive Romans.
Here’s the thing – he HAD killed someone. He was guilty of a crime. There was no question about it. Whether the people thought that the killing was justified or not didn’t matter. He had been a part of an insurrection, a rebellion against Rome, and in the rebellion he’d killed someone.
And the people were walking a thin line. If their rebellious spirit got out of hand, Rome would come down on them in a much more heavy handed way. The Roman soldiers they dealt with were mostly local people – local non-Jews who had been conscripted into the army. If things got out of hand, they’d find themselves face to face with regulars from the heart of the empire – the highly trained soldiers of the main Roman force.
Yes, they were constantly flirting with rebellion, and probably approved of the actions of Barabbas. But his actions and the actions of others like him placed his own people at risk of a more heavy handed Roman presence than the one they already had to endure.
Jesus has healed, cast out demons, even raised the dead. Yes, his teaching was revolutionary, but not in the traditional sense. Yes, he would be inciting a rebellion, but not one against Rome. The rebellion he was leading was against Satan and the powers of sin and death that rule this world. His teaching emphasized the ways in which the kingdom of God opposes the ways of this world. His most violent action was turning over the tables of the moneychangers in the temple courts.
Barabbas was a rebellious man with murder in his heart. A man who would go to extremes to exert power in this world. A man who had taken human life in a rebellious act. The people chose Barabbas. And Jesus took his place. Jesus, the innocent one, would hang on the cross meant for Barabbas and others like him. Jesus, who had no interest in political upheaval or sedition, is crucified on Barabbas’ cross between two thieves. Barabbas, a criminal guilty of murder, goes free. Jesus takes his cross. Look at Vv. 16-20.
Pilate releases the criminal Barabbas to the people and orders the crucifixion of Jesus. And Jesus is led away, first to be scourged, and then humiliated.
The scourging itself often killed people. You know, people sometimes want us to tone down the bloody stuff when we’re talking about the crucifixion. Some people are, fairly, just squeamish. Other though … they just don’t want a bloody Savior beaten to within an inch of his life. They don’t want a bloody cross. Mark, and the other gospel writers too, makes us look right at it. They make us stare right at the pain and humiliation and blood and gore.
The cross that Jesus bore for you and for me wasn’t a bloodless cross. It wasn’t an easy thing. It wasn’t a small thing that Jesus went through. He didn’t go through it without feeling it. He felt every blow, every nail, every piece of torn flesh just as your or I would. It is no small thing that in the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus with every fiber of his being asked God to find another way to save humanity, and still submitted himself to the will of the Father and the cross. A bloodless cross and a stoic Jesus who isn’t phased by what he endured cheapens everything that Jesus did for you and for me. In fact, a bloodless cross cheapens you and me too.
The word Mark uses for the scourging of Jesus is a form of the word “flagellem.” It was a whip with multiple leather strands with knots tied into them that would deeply bruise the flesh of the one being beaten. And those strands were also laced with sharpened pieces of bone, lead, or bronze to tear away the flesh. Inner parts, including bones and organs, were often exposed during the beating. And there was no set number of times the poor soul being beaten could be hit.
Like crucifixion itself, it was a form of punishment so severe that even the worst of Roman criminals were exempted from it if they were Roman citizens. It was so horrible that, according to the historian Suetonius, even the cruel emperor Domitian was repelled by it.
After being beaten, they placed a purple cloak and a crown of thorns on him and mocked him, pretending to bow before this would be king. This would be king who WAS THE king. Not of Israel or of Rome or of any other human empire, but of the entire cosmos. In Psalm 139:13, David says, “For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.”
That isn’t just true of you and me, of David and Mary and Joseph and Peter and John. It was true of the priests who sought his death. It was true of Pilate, who condemned him to death. It was true of Barabbas. It was true of the man who beat him. It was true of the men who now mocked him. He had lovingly knit each one of them together. He knew the number of their days. He knew their hopes and their dreams and their fears and insecurities. He knew how many strands of hair were on their bodies. He knew them better than they knew themselves. He loved them more deeply than they had ever been loved. And he didn’t stop them from doing what they did to him.
I wonder if Barabbas knew the gift he had been given as Jesus took his place. I wonder if he watched as Jesus, took his place and was beaten and mocked. The gospel writers don’t tell us. But they do want us to understand this truth – you and I ARE Barabbas. He is a spiritual representation of each one of us. The one who should be punished, and who isn’t, because Jesus took his place, her place, my place, your place.
Why? Because he loves you. It’s a simple and as complicated as that. And that phrase – because he loves you – sounds so trite. So cheap. And our preference for a stoic savior and a bloodless cross plays right into that triteness. They cheapen his sacrifice, and so they cheapen us, because he did it FOR us.
Jesus, the cosmic king, the one BY WHOM and FOR WHOM all things were made and the one who hold all things together, THAT cosmic king, was mockingly anointed with spit, crowned with thorns, and enthroned on a cross. For the chief priests who wanted him dead. For Peter, who denied knowing him. For Pilate who condemned him. For the one who beat him and the ones who mocked him. And for each and every one of us.
The next time you feel unworthy of love. The next time you feel like you have no value or worth. The next time you look at yourself in the mirror and don’t like who or what you see, go to the cross. Not a sanitized, bloodless cross with a stoic savior who doesn’t feel the blows raining down on him. Go to the cross of Jesus, go to the suffering savior, and remember that he endured that for you. There is no greater statement of your eternal value than that. Go to the cross, and remember Barabbas, the condemned one, who walked away a free man while Jesus took his place, and remind yourself, “I AM Barabbas.” Let’s pray.
