Perspective
While a great deal has been written on the Trial of Jesus, and from many different perspectives, I owe it to my listeners to reveal my principal sources. While I have read many works on the subject, two scholars stand out in my mind as indispensable resources -- Josef Blinzler and his great work, The Trial of Jesus (1959), and Fr. Raymond Brown, and his great (and monumental) work, The Death of the Messiah (1994). If I have gotten anything right about this subject, I attribute it to them; and if I have gotten anything wrong, it falls entirely to me.
While I draw much from the historical-critical method in parsing Biblical texts, I also approach Scripture as instructed by the Second Vatican Council in its document Verbum Dei, which affirmed the inerrancy of Scripture as Divinely inspired. Moreover, my Protestant brethren will also recognize my fidelity to the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, signed by more than 200 leading Evangelical theologians at the 1978 International Council on Biblical Inerrancy.
Finally, it is a deep and serious concern of mine to treat this subject in a way that is entirely respectful of the Jewish Faith and my Jewish brethren. It is a sad and undeniable fact that throughout the centuries, Jews have been persecuted for the death of Christ. And some of that persecution has come at the hands of the Church. Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have recognized this persecution and have asked forgiveness of it. The Second Vatican Council, in its document Nostra Aetate, exhorts us to accept that what happened to Jesus simply cannot be charged against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today.
I wish to punctuate this point, not only out of respect for my many Jewish friends, but because the issue of anti-Semitism remains an historically enduring problem, and it is, sadly and even bizarrely, very much alive today. We must oppose it, and all forms of it, as a sin against God and nature and humanity. As a committed Christian, I firmly believe two things: (1) The Jews were, and remain, God’s chosen people; and (2) We are all responsible for the death of Christ, including me.
While I draw much from the historical-critical method in parsing Biblical texts, I also approach Scripture as instructed by the Second Vatican Council in its document Verbum Dei, which affirmed the inerrancy of Scripture as Divinely inspired. Moreover, my Protestant brethren will also recognize my fidelity to the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, signed by more than 200 leading Evangelical theologians at the 1978 International Council on Biblical Inerrancy.
Finally, it is a deep and serious concern of mine to treat this subject in a way that is entirely respectful of the Jewish Faith and my Jewish brethren. It is a sad and undeniable fact that throughout the centuries, Jews have been persecuted for the death of Christ. And some of that persecution has come at the hands of the Church. Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI have recognized this persecution and have asked forgiveness of it. The Second Vatican Council, in its document Nostra Aetate, exhorts us to accept that what happened to Jesus simply cannot be charged against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today.
I wish to punctuate this point, not only out of respect for my many Jewish friends, but because the issue of anti-Semitism remains an historically enduring problem, and it is, sadly and even bizarrely, very much alive today. We must oppose it, and all forms of it, as a sin against God and nature and humanity. As a committed Christian, I firmly believe two things: (1) The Jews were, and remain, God’s chosen people; and (2) We are all responsible for the death of Christ, including me.