Pointus Pilate

(Greek: Πόντιος Πιλᾶτος, Pontios Pīlātos), known in the English-speaking world as Pontius Pilate (  /ˈpɒntʃəs ˈpaɪlət/), was the fifth Prefect of the Roman province of Judaea, from AD 26–36.[1][2] He is best known as the judge at Jesus' trial and the man who authorized the crucifixion of Jesus. As prefect, he served under Emperor Tiberius. The sources for Pilate's life are the four canonical gospels, a brief mention by Tacitus, and an inscription known as the Pilate Stone, which confirms his historicity and establishes his title as prefect.


Based on these sources, it appears that Pilate was an equestrian of the Pontiac family, and succeeded Valerius Gratus as prefect of Judaea in AD 26. Once in his post he offended the religious sensibilities of his subjects, leading to harsh criticism from Philo and Josephus. According to Josephus, he was ordered back to Rome after harshly suppressing a Samaritan uprising, arriving just after the death of Tiberius (according to Flavius Josephus' Jewish Antiquities 18.89) which occurred on March 16 in the year 37. He was replaced by Marcellus.

In all four gospel accounts, Pilate appears in association with the responsibility for the death of Jesus. In the Gospel of Matthew, Pilate washes his hands to show that he was not responsible for the execution of Jesus and reluctantly sends him to his death. The Gospel of Mark, depicting Jesus as innocent of plotting against the Roman Empire, portrays Pilate as reluctant to execute Jesus. In the Gospel of Luke, Pilate not only agrees that Jesus did not conspire against Rome, but Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch of Galilee, also finds nothing treasonable in Jesus' actions. Scholars have long debated how to interpret Pilate's portrayal in the sources. Some Biblical scholars have argued that the Gospel accounts are not historically accurate; with some believing Pilate was a mythical character. The discovery of the Pilate Stone in 1961 confirmed his historicity.

Titles and duties

Bronze prutah minted by Pontius Pilate.

Reverse: Greek letters TIBEPIOY KAICAPOC (Tiberius Emperor) and date LIS (year 16 = AD 29/30) surrounding simpulum (libation ladle). Obverse: Greek letters IOYLIA KAICAPOC (Julia, the Emperor's (mother)), three bound heads of barley, and the outer two heads drooping. Pontius Pilate's title was traditionally thought to have been procurator, since Tacitus speaks of him as such. However, an inscription on a limestone block known as the Pilate Stone — a dedication to Tiberius Caesar Augustus — that was discovered in 1961 in the ruins of an amphitheatre at Caesarea Maritime refers to Pilate as "Prefect of Judaea".[11]

The title used by the governors of the region varied over the period of the New Testament. When Samaria, Judea proper and Idumea were first amalgamated into the Roman Judaea Province (which some modern historians spell Judaea), [12] from AD 6 to the outbreak of the First Jewish Revolt in 66, officials of the Equestrian order (the lower rank of governors) governed. They held the Roman title of prefect until Herod Agrippa I was named King of the Jews by Claudius. After Herod Agrippa's death in 44, when Judaea reverted to direct Roman rule, the governor held the title procurator. When applied to governors, this term procurator, otherwise used for financial officers, connotes no difference in rank or function from the title known as prefect. Contemporary archaeological finds and documents such as the Pilate Inscription from Caesarea attest to the governor's more accurate official title only for the years 6 through 44: prefect. The logical conclusion is that texts that identify Pilate as procurator are more likely following Tacitus or are unaware of the pre-44 practice. The procurators' and prefects' primary functions were military, but as representatives of the empire they were responsible for the collection of imperial taxes, and also had limited judicial functions. Other civil administration lay in the hands of local government: the municipal councils or ethnic governments such as — in the district of Judaea and Jerusalem — the Sanhedrin and its president the High Priest. But the power of appointment of the High Priest resided in the Roman legate of Syria or the prefect of Judaea in Pilate's day and until 41. For example, Caiaphas was appointed High Priest of Herod's Temple by Prefect Valerius Gratus and deposed by Syrian Legate Lucius Vitellius. After that time and until 66, the Jewish client kings exercised this privilege. Normally, Pilate resided in Caesarea but travelled throughout the province, especially to Jerusalem, in the course of performing his duties. During the Passover, a festival of deep national as well as religious significance for the Jews, Pilate, as governor or prefect, would have been expected to be in Jerusalem to keep order. He would not ordinarily be visible to the throngs of worshippers because of the Jewish people's deep sensitivity to their status as a Roman province. Equestrians such as Pilate could command legionary forces but only small ones, and so in military situations, he would have to yield to his superior, the legate of Syria, who would descend into Palestine with his legions as necessary. As governor of Judaea, Pilate would have small auxiliary forces of locally recruited soldiers stationed regularly in Caesarea and Jerusalem, such as the Antonia Fortress, and temporarily anywhere else that might require a military presence. The total number of soldiers at his disposal numbered in the range of 3000. According to the canonical Christian Gospels, Pilate presided at the trial of Jesus and, despite stating that he personally found him not guilty of a crime meriting death, handed him over to crucifixion. Pilate is thus a pivotal character in the New Testament accounts of Jesus. According to the New Testament, Jesus was brought to Pilate by the Sanhedrin, who had arrested Jesus and questioned him themselves. The Sanhedrin had, according to the Gospels, only been given answers by Jesus that they considered blasphemous pursuant to Mosaic Law, which was unlikely to be deemed a capital offense by Pilate interpreting Roman law. The Gospel of Luke records that members of the Sanhedrin then took Jesus before Pilate where they accused him of sedition against Rome by opposing the payment of taxes to Caesar and calling himself a king. Fomenting tax resistance was a capital offense. Pilate was responsible for imperial tax collections in Judaea. Jesus had asked the tax collector Levi, at work in his tax booth in Capernaum, to quit his post. Jesus also appears to have influenced Zacchaeus, "a chief tax collector" in Jericho, which is in Pilate's tax jurisdiction, to resign. Pilate's main question to Jesus was whether he considered himself to be the King of the Jews, and thus a political threat. Mark in the NIV translation states: "Are you the king of the Jews?" asked Pilate. "It is as you say," Jesus replied. However, quite a number of other translations render Jesus' reply as variations of the phrase: "Thou sayest it."(King James Version, Mark 15:2); "So you say." (Good News Bible, Mark 15:2). Whatever degree of confirmation modern interpreters would derive from this answer of Jesus, according to the New Testament, it was not enough for Pilate to view Jesus as a real political threat. In the same Gospel of Mark, 15 verse 5 of King James Version we read, that "Pilate marvelled" ("was amazed" in Good News Bible). Following the Roman custom, Pilate ordered a sign posted above Jesus on the cross stating "Jesus of Nazareth, The King of the Jews" to give public notice of the legal charge against him for his crucifixion. The chief priests protested that the public charge on the sign should read that Jesus claimed to be King of the Jews. Pilate refused to change the posted charge, saying "What I have written, I have written." This may have been to emphasize Rome's supremacy in crucifying a Jewish king; it is likely, though, that Pilate was quite irritated by the fact that the Jewish leaders had used him as a marionette and thus compelled him to sentence Jesus to death contrary to his own will (according to Matthew 27:19, even Pilate's wife spoke to him on Jesus' behalf). The Gospel of Luke also reports that such questions were asked of Jesus; in Luke's case it being the priests that repeatedly accused him, though Luke states that Jesus remained silent to such inquisition, causing Pilate to hand Jesus over to the jurisdiction (Galilee) of Herod Antipas. Although initially excited with curiosity at meeting Jesus, of whom he had heard much, Herod (according to Luke) ended up mocking Jesus and so sent him back to Pilate. This intermediate episode with Herod is not reported by the other Gospels, which appear to present a continuous and singular trial in front of Pilate. Luke, however, made further reference to this involvement of Herod along with Pilate in Jesus' execution and linked it with the prophecy about the Messianic King found in Psalm 2, as we can read in Luke's other book, Acts 4:24-28. This explains why he counted this episode important. Unlike the synoptic gospels, the Gospel of John gives more detail about that dialog taking place between Jesus and Pilate. In John, Jesus seems to confirm the fact of his kingship, although immediately explaining, that "[his] kingdom [was] not of this world"; of far greater importance for the followers of Christ is his own definition of the goal of his ministry on earth at the time. According to Jesus, as we find it written in John 18:37, Jesus thus describes his mission: " [I] came into the world ... to bear witness to the truth; and all who are on the side of truth listen to [my] voice", to which Pilate famously replied, "What is truth?" (John 18:38)... Whatever it be that some modern critics want to deduce from those differences, the end result was the same for Jesus and Pilate, as it was in all the other three Gospels (Mathew, Mark, Luke). In the same chapter of John 18 verse 38 (King James Version, compare with other versions) the conclusion Pilate made from this interrogation: "I find in him no fault at all". Pilate agrees to condemn Jesus to crucifixion, after the Jewish leaders explained to him that Jesus presented a threat to Roman occupation through his claim to the throne of King David as King of Israel in the royal line of David. The crowd in Pilate's courtyard, according to the Synoptic, had been coached by the Pharisees and Sadducees to shout against Jesus. The Gospel of Matthew adds that before condemning Jesus to death, Pilate washes his hands with water in front of the crowd, saying, "I am innocent of this man's blood; you will see."

Jewish deicide

In all gospel accounts, Pilate is reluctant to condemn Jesus, but is eventually forced to give in when the crowd becomes unruly and the Jewish leaders remind him that Jesus’ claim to be king is a challenge to Roman rule and to the Roman deification of Caesar. Roman magistrates had wide discretion in executing their tasks, and some readers question whether Pilate would have been so captive to the demands of the crowd. Pilate was later recalled to Rome for his harsh treatment of the Jews. With the Edict of Milan in AD 313, the state-sponsored persecution of Christians came to an end, and Christianity became officially tolerated as one of the religions of the Roman Empire. Afterwards, in 325 the First Ecumenical Council at Nicaea promulgated a creed which was amended at the subsequent First Council of Constantinople in 381. The Nicene Creed incorporated for the first time the clause was crucified under Pontius Pilate (which had already been long established in the Old Roman Symbol, an ancient form of the Apostles' Creed dating as far back as the 2nd century AD) in a creed that was intended to be authoritative for all Christians in the Roman Empire.

Pilate's reluctance to execute Jesus in the gospels has been seen as reflecting the authors' agenda. It has thus been argued that gospel accounts place the blame on the Jews, not on Rome, in line with the authors' alleged goal of making peace with the Roman Empire and vilifying the Jews.

Pilate in Jewish literature

In chronicling the history of the Roman administrators in Judaea, ancient Jewish writers Philo and Josephus describe some of the other events and incidents that took place during Pilate's tenure. Both report that Pilate repeatedly caused near-insurrections among the Jews because of his insensitivity to Jewish customs. Josephus notes that while Pilate's predecessors had respected Jewish customs by removing all images and effigies on their standards when entering Jerusalem, Pilate allowed his soldiers to bring them into the city at night. When the citizens of Jerusalem discovered these the following day, they appealed to Pilate to remove the ensigns of Caesar from the city. After five days of deliberation, Pilate had his soldiers surround the demonstrators, threatening them with death, which they were willing to accept rather than submit to desecration of Mosaic Law. Pilate finally removed the images. The incident proved to be an early example of effective resistance to tyranny by aggressive, nonviolent means. Philo describes a later, similar incident in which Pilate was chastened by Emperor Tiberius after antagonizing the Jews by setting up gold-coated shields in Herod's palace in Jerusalem. The shields were ostensibly to honour Tiberius, and this time did not contain engraved images. Philo writes that the shields were set up "not so much to honour Tiberius as to annoy the multitude." The Jews protested the installation of the shields at first to Pilate, and then, when he declined to remove them, by writing to Tiberius. Philo reports that upon reading the letters, Tiberius "wrote to Pilate with a host of reproaches and rebukes for his audacious violation of precedent and bade him at once take down the shields and have them transferred from the capital to Caesarea. Josephus recounts another incident in which Pilate spent money from the Temple to build an aqueduct. When Jews again protested his actions, Pilate had soldiers hidden in the crowd of Jews while addressing them. After giving the signal, Pilate's soldiers randomly attacked, beat, and killed scores of Jews to silence their petitions. In describing his personality, Philo writes that Pilate had "vindictiveness and furious temper," and was "naturally inflexible, a blend of self-will and relentlessness." He writes that Pilate feared a delegation that the Jews might send to Tiberius protesting the gold-coated shields, because "if they actually sent an embassy they would also expose the rest of his conduct as governor by stating in full the briberies, the insults, the robberies, the outrages and wanton injuries, the executions without trial constantly repeated, the ceaseless and supremely grievous cruelty. Pilate's term as prefect of Judaea ended after an incident recounted by Josephus. A large group of Samaritans had been persuaded by an unnamed man to go to Mount Grasim in order to see sacred artefacts allegedly buried by Moses. But at a village named Tirathana, before the crowd could ascend the mountain, Pilate sent in "a detachment of cavalry and heavy-armed infantry, who in an encounter with the first comers in the village slew some in a pitched battle and put the others to flight. Many prisoners were taken, of whom Pilate put to death the principal leaders and those who were most influential."[27] The Samaritans then complained to Vitellius, Roman governor of Syria, who sent Pilate to Rome to explain his actions regarding this incident to Tiberius. However, by the time Pilate got to Rome, Tiberius had died.

Pilate in the apocrypha

Little enough is known about Pilate, but tradition has tried to fill the gap. A body of legend grew up around the dramatic figure of Pontius Pilate, about whom the Christian faithful hungered to learn more than the canonical Gospels revealed. Eusebius (Historian Ecclesiae ii: 7) quotes some early apocryphal accounts that he does not name, which already relate that Pilate fell under misfortunes in the reign of Caligula (37–41), was exiled to Gaul and eventually committed suicide there in Vienne. Other details come from less creditable sources. His body, says the Mors Pilate ("Death of Pilate"), was thrown first into the Tiber, but the waters were so disturbed by evil spirits that the body was taken to Vienne and sunk in the Rhône: a monument at Vienne, called Pilate's tomb, is still to be seen. As the waters of the Rhone likewise rejected Pilate's corpse, it was again removed and sunk in the lake at Lausanne. The sequence was a simple way to harmonise conflicting local traditions. The corpse's final disposition was in a deep and lonely mountain tarn, which, according to later tradition, was on a mountain, still called Pilatus (actually Pilatus or "cloud capped"), overlooking Lucerne. Every Good Friday, the body is said to emerge from the waters and wash its hands. There are many other legends about Pilate in the folklore of Germany, particularly about his birth, according to which Pilate was born in the Franconia city of Forchheim or the small village of Hausen only 5 km away from it. His death was (unusually) dramatised in a medieval mystery play cycle from Cornwall, the Cornish Ordinalia. Pilate's role in the events leading to the crucifixion lent themselves to melodrama, even tragedy, and Pilate often has a role in medieval mystery plays. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, Claudia Procula is commemorated as a saint, [29] but not Pilate, because in the Gospel accounts Claudia urged Pilate not to have anything to do with Jesus. In some Eastern Orthodox traditions, Pilate committed suicide out of remorse for having sentenced Jesus to death. In Switzerland, near Lucerne, is Mount Pilatus. An old tradition is that Pilate went here and was banished to the mountain as a punishment for his crime against Christ.

Gospel of Peter

The fragmentary apocryphal Gospel of Peter exonerates Pilate of responsibility for the crucifixion of Jesus, placing it instead on Herod and the Jews, who unlike Pilate refuse to "wash their hands". After the soldiers see three men and a cross miraculously walking out of the tomb they report to Pilate who reiterates his innocence: "I am pure from the blood of the Son of God". He then commands the soldiers not to tell anyone what they have seen so that they would not "fall into the hands of the people of the Jews and be stoned".

Acts of Pilate

The 4th century apocryphal text that is called the Acts of Pilate presents itself in a preface (missing in some MSS) as derived from the official acts preserved in the praetorian at Jerusalem. Though the alleged Hebrew original of the document is attributed to Nicodemus, the title Gospel of Nicodemus for this fictional account only appeared in mediaeval times, after the document had been substantially elaborated. Nothing in the text suggests that it is in fact a translation from Hebrew or Aramaic. This text gained wide credit in the middle Ages, and has considerably affected the legends surrounding the events of the crucifixion, which, taken together, are called the Passion. Its popularity is attested by the number of languages in which it exists, each of these being represented by two or more variant "editions": Greek (the original), Coptic, and Armenian and Latin versions. The Latin versions were printed several times in the 15th and 16th centuries. One class of the Latin manuscripts contain as an appendix or continuation, the Cura Sanitatis Tiberii, the oldest form of the Veronica legend. The Acts of Pilate consist of three sections, whose styles reveal three authors, writing at three different times. The first section (1–11) contains a fanciful and dramatic circumstantial account of the trial of Jesus, based upon Luke 23. The second part (12–16) regards the Resurrection. An appendix, detailing the Descensus ad Infernos was added to the Greek text. This legend of a Harrowing of Hell has chiefly flourished in Latin, and was translated into many European versions. It doesn't exist in the eastern versions, Syriac and Armenian that derive directly from Greek versions. In it, Leucius and Charinus, the two souls raised from the dead after the Crucifixion, relate to the Sanhedrin the circumstances of Christ's descent to Limbo. (Leucius Charinus is the traditional name to which many late apocryphal Acta of Apostles is attached.) Eusebius (325), although he mentions an Acta Pilate that had been referred to by Justin and Tertullian and other pseudo-Acts of this kind, shows no acquaintance with this work. Almost surely it is of later origin, and scholars agree in assigning it to the middle of the 4th century. Epiphanies refers to an Acta Pilate similar to this, as early as 376, but there are indications that the current Greek text, the earliest extant form, is a revision of an earlier one. Justin the Martyr - The First and Second Apology of Justin Chapter 35-"And that these things did happen, you can ascertain from the Acts of Pontius Pilate." The Apology letters were written and addressed by name to the Roman Emperor Pius and the Roman Governor Urbicus. All three of these men lived between 138-161.

Minor Pilate literature

Bronze coin of Pontius Pilate Jerusalem mint AD 26 - 36.

There is a pseudepigrapha letter reporting on the crucifixion, purporting to have been sent by Pontius Pilate to the Emperor Claudius, embodied in the pseudepigrapha known as the Acts of Peter and Paul, of which the Catholic Encyclopaedia states, "This composition is clearly apocryphal though unexpectedly brief and restrained." There is no internal relation between this feigned letter and the 4th-century Acts of Pilate (Acta Pilate). This Epistle or Report of Pilate is also inserted into the Pseudo-Marcellus Passio sanctorum Petri ET Pauli ("Passion of Saints Peter and Paul"). We thus have it in both Greek and Latin versions. The Mors Pilate ("Death of Pilate") legend is a Latin tradition, thus treating Pilate as a monster, not a saint; it is attached usually to the more sympathetic Gospel of Nicodemus of Greek origin. The narrative of the Mors Pilate set of manuscripts is set in motion by an illness of Tiberius, who sends Volusanius to Judaea to fetch the Christ for a cure. In Judaea Pilate covers for the fact that Christ has been crucified, and asks for a delay. But Volusanius encounters Veronica who informs him of the truth but sends him back to Rome with her Veronica of Christ's face on her kerchief, which heals Tiberius. Tiberius then calls for Pontius Pilate, but when Pilate appears, he is wearing the seamless robe of the Christ and Tiberius' heart is softened, but only until Pilate is induced to doff the garment, whereupon he is treated to a ghastly execution. His body, when thrown into the Tiber, however, raises such storm demons that it is sent to Vienne (via gehennae) in France and thrown to the Rhone. That river's spirits reject it too, and the body is driven east into "Losania", where it is plunged in the bay of the lake near Lucerne, near Mont Pilatus — originally Mons Pilatus or "cloud-capped", as John Ruskin pointed out in Modern Painters — whence the uncorrupting corpse rises every Good Friday to sit on the bank and wash unavailing hands. This version combined with anecdotes of Pilate’s wicked early life was incorporated in Jacobus de Voragine's Golden Legend, which ensured a wide circulation for it in the later middle Ages. Other legendary versions of Pilate's death exist: Antoine de la Sale reported from a travel in central Italy on some local traditions asserting that after death the body of Pontius Pilate was driven until a little lake near Vettore Peak (2478 m in Sibillini Mounts) and plunged in. The lake, today, is still named Lago di Pilate. In the Cornish cycle of mystery plays, the "death of Pilate" forms a dramatic scene in the Resurrexio Domini cycle. More of Pilate's fictional correspondence is found in the minor Pilate apocrypha, the Anaphora Pilate (Relation of Pilate), an Epistle of Herod to Pilate, and an Epistle of Pilate to Herod, spurious texts that are no older than the 5th century.