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There is an amazing thing happening out there, in this post-Easter world. I admit to being a spellbound observer of the whole thing. Here’s the play by play:

Bellona Times started the ball rolling with a riff on a Francis Bacon essay that treats Pontius Pilate as a sympathetic colonial bureaucrat who had been tricked by Jesus into fulfilling a prophecy he wanted no part of:

Pilate’s patience is remarkable. Like later totalitarian regimes, neither imperial Rome nor Tudor England held truck with silence; self-incrimination was their favorite evidence, and they had no scruples about getting it.

In fact, the reader can’t help but be struck by the gospels’ generosity toward Pontius Pilate, increasing over time as the early Jewish cult became more reliant on Roman gentiles for protection and converts. The Romans weren’t going to take the fall for this one.

The Gospel of John, being written last, sketches an especially sympathetic portrait (elaborated by Bulgakov, among others), of a colonial bureaucrat hamstrung into damnation by politics, confusion, and self-fulfilling prophecy.

And the Happy Tutor chimed in with

Jesus has come bear witness to truth, but only for those who will hear his voice, and only they who are already “of the truth” can do that. To which Pilate, demonstrating his incomprehension, showing that he does not hear, that he is not of the truth, asks the already cliched question, “What thing is truth.” It is not Pilate who jests, but Jesus. In this dance of deadly wit none can say that Jesus bore false witness against himself. He simply dissembled the truth that he, though innocent, might be condemned. Truth, Jesus shows us, is best conveyed by misdirection. For, had Jesus told the truth outright, it would have set him free in the flesh, subdued in the spirit.

And then he adds this from his comments:

I was stunned reading the Gospel passage at how deep the game was, that Jesus with Pilate, for what high stakes, how Jesus bluffed Pilate into crucifying him, against Pilate’s own better judgement. Pilate was back into a corner. Yet what is the story of the crucifixion, if not a story of bearing witness. There are two planes, flesh and spirit, and Jesus operated on both, while Pilate, saying, “What is truth,” could not escape the order of the flesh, or even imagine the order of the spirit. So, Christ’s Kingdom, as Caesar feared, came on earth. Amazing.

The scripture passages of interest here are in John 18 and John 19. Reading them again I actually held my breath. It’s high drama as Jesus is turned in and interrogated by the high priests and then delivered to Pilate to do the dirty work. Pilate doesn’t want to be executioner and once he realizes what’s going on he tries to release Jesus, but the crowd wants a thief instead, and wants the colonial adminstrator to put to death this man. And there was a time pressure because this all happened on the Friday afternoon before Passover and they had to get it over with before the sabbath set in.

In the midst of all this chaos Pilate asks his question: What is truth? But he doesn’t hang around for the answer. Bacon has him jesting, but maybe he was just throwing that one out there, as if he recognized that he and Jesus were locked in a story that was going to end only one way. Jesus is certain of the outcome and engineers it with a set of skillful and evasive answers to Pilate’s questions about whether or not Jesus is really the King of the Jews. For his part, Pilate must have been ready to throw his hands up that this decision has come to him, late on a Friday and so obviously pre-determined with a defendant who doesn’t seem willing to help himself.

But as the situation unfolds, Pilate finds himself not only in a bind, but also a trap, and in the end he frets a little. Jesus gets into his head and the crowd calls his bluff.

When the chief priests therefore and officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify [him], crucify [him]. Pilate saith unto them, Take ye him, and crucify [him]: for I find no fault in him.

The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.

When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid;

The Happy Tutor writes “So, Christ’s Kingdom, as Caesar feared, came on earth. Amazing.” And this leads me back to Bacon, who concludes:

Certainly, it is heaven upon earth, to have a man’s mind move in charity, rest in providence, and turn upon the poles of truth.