“Barabbas” by Romans
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Tonight, in light of the Season we are entering, we are going to begin a Biblical study of the Trial of Jesus Christ. This coming Friday, April 15th, Christians all over the world will be commemorating “Good Friday” as it has come to be known, the day on which Christ was crucified. Before His crucifixion, as I am sure you are all well aware, Jesus was on trial before the Roman Governor Pontius Pilate. I want to revisit and examine that trial for some things that I think you may have missed...
Every time I have watched, “The Passion of the Christ,” I am struck as I watch that scene with Jesus and Barabbas standing before Pilate. Normally, when we get to that part of the account of Jesus' trial before Pilate, after he is chosen by the mob to be released, we kick Barabbas to the curb, and forget about him as if he were nothing more than a meaningless and even an unnecessary footnote.
After all, even if Barabbas had never been born, or did not appear on that Judgment Platform at the same time that Jesus was being tried, the crowd would have continued to call for Jesus' crucifixion. But Barabbas was there! It occurred to me that Barabbas was not a footnote at all in the flow of events.
I finally recognized after missing it for most of my adult life, that Barabbas was actually an essential, even a critically essential part of this story: He was, at that moment in history, a profound and a significant symbol in God's Plan of Salvation.
Let's notice the flow of events from Matthew's Gospel: We'll break into that flow of events beginning in Matthew 27:15: “Now at that feast the governor was wont to release unto the people a prisoner, whom they would. 16 And they had then a notable prisoner, called Barabbas.
17 Therefore when they were gathered together, Pilate said unto them, Whom will ye that I release unto you? Barabbas, or Jesus which is called Christ?” The New King James Version translates “notable prisoner” as “notorious prisoner.” The name “Barabbas” was a household name. He was the Al Capone of his day.
We know whom the mob chose. We'll look at that in greater detail later. For right now, instead of summarily discarding Barabbas as a footnote, let's stop, instead, and zoom in on his presence, at that precise moment in history, on that Judgment Platform with Jesus. Was Barabbas guilty, and worthy of death, in this case by crucifixion? Notice the Scriptural notations regarding Barabbas:
John 18:40 tells us, “Now Barabbas was a robber.” Notice: It did not merely say that he was charged with robbery. No... it said he "was a robber." Also consider: Clarke's Commentary says, “Barabbas was a robber - The later Syriac has in the margin that he was a chief robber, a captain of bandits, and it is probable that this was the case. He was not only a person who lived by plunder, but shed the blood of many of those whom he and his gang robbed, and rose up against the Roman government...”
A robber was a merciless and brutal criminal who did not just rob his victims, he brutalized them as well. A thief was just a “stealer” who stole items often without the owner even being present, or stole merchandise from the market. In stark contrast, above and beyond mere theft, a robber was a sadistic fiend who took pleasure in robbing and then torturing and/or killing his victims.
In His Parable of the Good Samaritan Jesus spoke of a man who, in his travels, “fell among thieves (KJV), which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.” The original Greek says, however, that he “fell among robbers”! The Barabbas Gang often left their victims all the way dead, not just half dead.
When the mob came to arrest Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, the KJV's translation has Jesus asking in Matthew's, Mark's and Luke's Gospels: “Are ye come out as against a thief?” In each case, however, the original Greek says, “...against a robber?” Robbers were a scourge on society. The mob that came against Jesus regarded Jesus as if He were just as much a scourge on the culture, their religion and their nation.
In preparing this Discussion, I read that there were towns and communities that were abandoned in those days because the roads leading from their towns to other towns were swarming with robbers. The Romans' response to these brutal and merciless criminals was to sentence them to an equally brutal and merciless punishment: scourging, and crucifixion. There was to this day in my opinion, no more heinous a punishment that has ever been devised than crucifixion.
More lights began to turn on for me as I gave a second look at Jesus being crucified between two “thieves” (Matthew 27:38). I checked the original Greek for that as well to see what it said. I wondered if there were any connection between those two thieves and Barabbas. To my amazement, there, too, the original Greek says that Jesus was crucified between two “robbers,” and not two thieves.
The King James translators considered the two words synonymous. Thieves and robbers both steal what does not belong to them. In the early 1600's there was, perhaps no significant difference between the two categories of criminal behavior. Jesus was crucified between two “robbers,” and not two thieves. I was on to something, but what was I seeing? Was I letting my imagination run away with me or could I find actual proof of this connection?
I remembered reading in Scripture that Barabbas had committed murder in an insurrection. I found it in Mark 15:7, but I was stunned when I read the account in the NKJV: "And there was one named Barabbas, who was chained with his fellow rebels; they had committed murder in the rebellion." “Fellow rebels”!
The two robbers crucified on either side of Jesus were part of the Barabbas Gang! That means that all along there was scheduled to be crucified three prisoners that morning: The Romans had caught, tried and convicted the Barabbas Gang: Barabbas and his two accomplices, the two robbers!
All three of them had to have been right there in a staging area of a sort, awaiting crucifixion. I say that for three reasons: 1.) Barabbas, himself, was right there, for Pilate to have been able to offer him as a choice, and then release him when he was chosen.
2.) The thief who was railing on Jesus said, “If thou be Christ, save thyself and us” (Luke 23:39). He had to have heard Jesus' accusers and Pilate all calling Jesus “Christ” during the trial (Luke 23:2, ). How else would he have recognized Jesus on the cross, after the savage scourging He suffered?
3.) Let's take a fresh look at the words of the “good thief.” He says to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom” (Luke 23:42). “Lord”? “Kingdom”? Are these terms something that one criminal nailed to a cross would have said to another crucified man? No... not unless he heard the charges, and Jesus' response to Pilate that, “My kingdom is not of this world:” (John 18:36). And he would have had to have been right there in order to hear that exchange.
More lights came on, and brought into sharper focus for me more familiar details of that scene: Think, now, of the words of the “good thief,” as he rebuked his fellow robber for railing against Jesus. He had already been scourged, and here he says from the cross he was nailed to, “Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds:” (Luke 23:40-41).
Would a petty shoplifter or pickpocket ever say he deserved to be crucified for his deeds? Think of how despicable his crimes had to be, even in his own mind, to consider that being crucified a “due reward”! The smoke continued to clear and suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, I now was able to see Pilate's behavior in a completely new light, and from a radically new perspective:
When Pilate gave the mob a choice between releasing Jesus or Barabbas, he was actually “sweetening the pot” in favor of releasing Jesus by offering them their King, or Public Enemy #1! Barabbas, remember, was a “notorious prisoner.” Surely people in that crowd knew of him, and knew some of his victims! So Pilate's offer would be, today, like the Governor of Massachusetts asking a crowd outside a Boston Courthouse: “Whom shall I release to you? Billy Graham? Or The Boston Strangler?” I believe Pilate was sure they would choose Jesus to be released!
The reason I believe that is that Barabbas had committed murder in an insurrection. What is an insurrection? It's an uprising against the government; it's an attempt to overthrow the government. Who gets killed by the rebels in an insurrection? In this case it would have been Roman soldiers and/or Roman Officials! And Pilate offered as one of the two choices, to release the Leader, no less, not only of that insurrection, but of a malicious gang of robbers. He must have fully believed that the mob would never choose Barabbas!
I know that this is perhaps an unusual or unexpected position I am taking on Pilate's motives and behavior, but I am not the first person to recognize Pilate's genuine efforts to free Jesus. Peter, himself, also reached that same conclusion, and said so in so many words! When he and John had just healed that lame man outside the Temple, we read Peter's words to the crowd that gathered.
We read in Acts 3:12-13: “Ye men of Israel, why marvel ye at this? or why look ye so earnestly on us, as though by our own power or holiness we had made this man to walk? The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified his Son Jesus; whom ye delivered up, and denied him in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go...” As far as Peter was concerned, Pilate was “determined” to let Jesus go free!
The mob chose Barabbas to be released instead of Jesus!! Pilate's motives are clearly revealed, here, when we read of his incredulous reaction: Beginning in Matthew 27:22: “What shall I do then with Jesus which is called Christ? They all say unto him, Let him be crucified.
23 And the governor said, Why, what evil hath he done? But they cried out the more, saying, Let him be crucified. 24 When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but that rather a tumult was made, he took water, and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this just person: see ye to it.”
Matthew Henry also recognized Pilate's motive to release Jesus: “Whether of the twain (saith Pilate) will ye that I release unto you? He hoped that he had gained his point, to have Jesus released. But, to his great surprise, they said Barabbas...
Pilate, being amazed at their choice of Barabbas, was willing to hope that it was rather from a fondness for him than from an enmity to Jesus; and therefore he puts it to them, “What shall I do then with Jesus? Shall I release him likewise, for the greater honour of your feast, or will you leave it to me?” No, they all said, Let him be crucified.”
As I re-watched, "The Passion of the Christ," I paid particular attention to the Barabbas character on the screen. It was interesting how he was depicted in that movie. He was a wild-eyed, unshaven, unkempt, snarling Neanderthal of a criminal. But I look at him, now, in a new way, and from a perspective that I never had years ago.
I will go into further detail about what prompted that new perspective a little later. But as I watched the proceedings, it finally penetrated my thick skull that here was a guilty individual, both fully expecting and deserving to die for his crimes. Instead, the unthinkable happened: He was chosen to be released without punishment!
The Greek word for “released” is apoluo -- pronounced: ap-ol-OO'-o. It means "to free fully or pardon:" Throughout the New Testament, apoluo is also translated: (let) depart, dismiss, forgive, let go, loose, send away, release, and set at liberty.
Jesus used this Greek word, "apoluo," in one of His Parables. In Matthew 18, Jesus is presenting the Parable of the servant who owed his master ten thousand talents is an unimaginable sum – what we would call, today, a gazillion dollars. The servant begged his lord to not put him and his family in prison, but rather to give him the time to pay it back some how, as if that were within the realm of possibility. It was not.
Then in verse 27, Jesus continued the flow of the Parable: "Then the lord of that servant was moved with compassion, and loosed (apoluo) him, and forgave him the debt" (Matthew 18:27). Pilate, using the same Greek word, loosed... released... dismissed... freed fully Barabbas. Why? The mob, intent on seeing Jesus crucified, chose Barabbas to be released, and demanded Jesus' crucifxion. Ultimately, they got their way.
Jesus took the punishment that Barabbas deserved. Jesus suffered the death penalty in the place of a man who deserved to die... a man who was, instead, released without so much as a scratch...
The guilty Barabbas did not deserve to be released. Barabbas did not ask Pilate, the judge in this case, to release him. It was the Judge's idea to set in motion the events that concluded with the release of Barabbas, without his being punished. Barabbas was given an absolutely unmerited pardon.
Wait a minute... “Unmerited pardon...” Where have I heard that term before? That is what Barabbas received but isn't that how we also define Grace? And isn't that exactly what God gives us? Don't we receive unmerited pardon because, as with Barabbas, Jesus took upon Himself the death penalty that each of us deserve?
Jesus died... for our our sins... for our rebellion... and for our iniquity. As Isaiah phrased it in Isaiah 53:5: "But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed."
Now I want to share with you why I paid attention to Barabbas as I never had formerly. As I said earlier, even if Barabbas had not been standing before Pilate's Judgment Seat that morning, we would still have had a picture of the Jesus Christ the innocent and spotless Lamb of God, laying down His Life, and taking away the sin of the world.
Barabbas' presence there, however, paints for us such a more complete picture of Jesus' substitutionary Role in God's Plan of Salvation. We have, in that one scene, the Judge, in the person of Pilate, releasing the guilty prisoner Barabbas, and without punishment, for his lawlessness and rebellion. And then, in that same scene, the same Judge who had repeatedly declared Jesus innocent, ordered Jesus to be executed by crucifixion, and on the very cross intended for Barabbas.
The reason I stopped to pay close attention to that scene in the movie, The Passion of The Christ, is because I had looked up the meaning of the name: “Barabbas.” Does anyone know what his name means? In Hebrew, the prefix "Bar" means "son of." Notice in this verse how that prefix is used: Mark 10:46: "And they came to Jericho: and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging."
So “Bar” means “son of.” Abba, or Abbas in the Greek, Barabbas means, “son of the father.” Jesus, the innocent Son of God literally took the place of the guilty Barabbas, (son of the father), on the cross. Jesus received undeserved punishment for our sins, while Barabbas, symbolically representing us, was chosen to be released without any punishment!
Now think about this. This is important: No matter what his name was, it could have been Daniel or David or Fred or any other name... but think of how much more clear and powerful it is for us that a man named, Barabbas, whose name means "son of the father," is in understanding what God has done for us. Jesus, the Son of God, was nailed to the cross of the guilty man whose name means, “son of the father”!
Now, some of you may be saying, "Jesus is the Son of the Father. How can you be saying, 'Barabbas is the son of the father'?" That is correct. Jesus IS the Son of the Father. And He is "the only begotten Son of God" as we read in John 3:16.
I am only pointing out that the name Barabbas MEANS, "son of the father," which provides a deeper significance to his being chosen, even though he was guilty, to be released without punishment. Can you appreciate the picture God provided us?
But let's examine this a bit more deeply: Are we ever called, “sons of the father” in those exact words? No... But we do read in Isaiah 46:10: “Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:”
God knows what He has planned from ancient times: When were our names written in the Book of Life? Revelation tells us that they were written there “from the Foundation of the world” (Revelation 13:8). Barabbas, “son of the father,” being chosen to be released without being punished stood there symbolizing us, even in God's eyes: We read that God “calleth those things which be not as though they were.” The guilty “son of the father,” deserving of punishment, was chosen to be released without punishment!
Notice also how we are spoken of in Hebrews 2:10: “For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings."
Are we not the sons who are spoken of in that preceding verse, released, receiving unmerited pardon, and ultimately brought to glory by and through our being spared, and our punishment being paid in full by Jesus on the cross?
Consider also, beginning in Galatians 4:4: “But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, 5 To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. 6 And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." Abba. There it is again. Abba. Father. Barabbas means, "son of the father." That is us!
Also consider Romans 8:15: "For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father." There is Abba, again! Now consider John 1:12: "But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.” Finally, there is 1 John 3:1: "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God..."
Barabbas, as I personally and incorrectly regarded him for so long, was not a mere disposable footnote of history. The scene on that Judgment Platform was rich in spiritual symbolism: There Barabbas, guilty and worthy of punishment for his lawlessness, but chosen to be released without a scratch, and Jesus, repeatedly declared innocent, but condemned to death, taking the punishment that Barabbas deserved. And we cry out that that was such on outrageous miscarriage of justice! And it was!
But that was and is a picture of me. I am Barabbas. And so are each of you. I am, and each of you are, the guilty son of the Father, undeservedly having been chosen to be released without the punishment I deserved for my lawlessness and rebellion! As with the historic Barabbas, Jesus took my place. Jesus took my punishment. Jesus died the death I deserved for my misdeeds. And He died the death that each of you deserved for your misdeeds.
As so often happens when I prepare these Discussions, when I think it is complete, and when I think all the ducks are in a row, I save the document file, turn off my laptop and go on to other things thinking I am done... but I begin to see other doors opening, and other lights coming on in areas that were formerly closed and dark. I turned off the laptop and closed the lid, and then...
I began to see that the picture of our Salvation, so vividly portayed in this Spiritual Symbolism was not complete. The two players in this drama may have each left that Judgment Platform, one to his freedom and the Other to His death, but this symbolic picture was not complete for us as sons of the Father.
And, so as not to exclude any of our sisters in Christ, we read in Galatians 3:26: “For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus,” and everything I have shared here, applies to all of us. Jesus' going to the cross did not merely pay for our sins... He did far more than merely take away our sins... we read the astounding verse in 2 Corinthians 5:21: “For he {God} hath made him {Christ} to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”
I also began to see that the when, the Who and the why of believers being chosen was radically different from Barabbas' being chosen. As Jesus' trial was in progress, Barabbas was chosen to be released, and without punishment, by a blood-thirst mob determined to have Jesus crucified. We were also chosen: But when were we chosen and by Whom, and why were we chosen?
When we were chosen? Ephesians 1:4a tells us: “According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world...” Just meditate on that incredible verse for a bit to let it fully sink in. We were chosen in Christ, “before the foundation of the world”! That is the same time frame Revelation says our names were written in the Book of Life: “from the Foundation of the world”!
Who chose us? In John 15, in verses 16a and 19b, Jesus said to His followers at the Last Supper, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you...” 19 “I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.” We also read in 1 Peter 2:9a: “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people...” Let's pause for just a second to realize Who is saying that He chose us.
If you compare Genesis 1 with John 1, we can see that the One Who became Jesus Christ, that Member of the Godhead Who kneeled down to breathe the breath of Life into that formation of clay that became Adam, and the One Who said if you sin you shall surely die, that same One was now saying, I have chosen you to be released from death ~the penalty of sin ~ to be released... freed... unpunished. I have come in the flesh to die in your place. Jesus is the One Who chose us!
Lest we get a big head about being chosen, let us remember what the Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 1:27 about our being chosen: “But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world... and God hath chosen the weak things...”
Finally, why were we chosen? To find that out, let's revisit the verses that identified Who chose us and read to see why we were chosen: John 15:16b: “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain...” Next, in Ephesians 1:4b we read: “According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:”
Let's read Paul's complete thought in 1 Corinthians 1:27, to see another reason why he chose us: “But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;”
Let's also finish this thought in 1 Peter 2:9b: “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:”
Albert Barnes writes of this: “That ye should show forth the praises of him - Margin, “virtues.” The Greek word means properly “good quality, excellence” of any kind. It means here the excellences of God - His goodness, His wondrous deeds, or those things which make it proper to praise Him. This shows one great object for which they were redeemed. It was that they might proclaim the glory of God, and keep up the remembrance of His wondrous deeds in the earth.
This is to be done: (a) By proper ascriptions of praise to him in public, family, and social worship; (b) By being always the avowed friends of God, ready ever to vindicate His government and ways; (c) By endeavoring to make known His excellences to all those who are ignorant of Him;
and, (d) By such a life as shall constantly proclaim His praise - as the sun, the moon, the stars, the hills, the streams, the flowers do, showing what God does. The consistent life of a devoted Christian is a constant setting forth of the praise of God, showing to all that the God who has made him such is worthy to be loved.
Who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light - Darkness is the emblem of ignorance, sin, and misery, and refers here to their condition before their conversion; light is the emblem of the opposite, and is a beautiful representation of the state of those who are brought to the knowledge of the gospel.
The word marvelous means wonderful; and the idea is, that the light of the gospel was such as was unusual, or not to be found elsewhere, as that excites wonder or surprise which we are not accustomed to see. The primary reference here is, undoubtedly, to those who had been pagans, and to the great change which had been produced by their having been brought to the knowledge of the truth as revealed in the gospel;
and, in regard to this, no one can doubt that the one state deserved to be characterized as darkness, and the other as light. The contrast was as great as that between midnight and noonday. But what is here said is substantially correct of all who are converted, and is often as strikingly true of those who have been brought up in Christian lands, as of those who have lived among the pagans.
The change in conversion is often so great and so rapid, the views and feelings are so different before and after conversion, that it seems like a sudden transition from midnight to noon. In all cases, also, of true conversion, though the change may not be so striking, or apparently so sudden, there is a change of which this may be regarded as substantially an accurate description.
In many cases the convert can adopt this language in all its fulness, as descriptive of his own conversion; in all cases of genuine conversion it is true that each one can say that he has been called from a state in which his mind was dark to one in which it is comparatively clear.”
As I continued to think on these things, more doors opened and more lights came on for me. I also began to also see that there were major departures between the historic Barabbas and his symbolizing believers. Yes, Barabbas wasn't punished, and Pilate had set him free, but there is more that needs to be examined, and there is much more, here, that needs to be considered.
And we will do just that ~ God willing ~ next week! I hope all of you hearing me or reading these words will join me as we continue this Series.
This concludes this evening's Discussion, “Barabbas.”
This Discussion was originally presented “live” on April 13th, 2022.
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