Then led they Jesus from Caiaphas unto the hall of judgment: and it was early; and they themselves went not into the judgment hall, lest they should be defiled; but that they might eat the passover.
All Commentaries on John 18:28 Go To John 18
Cyril of Alexandria
AD 444
Judge righteous judgment, and Thou shalt not slay the innocent and just man, were the express injunctions of the Law and the Word of God. These miserable men could not help being ashamed of their lack of charges against Him; but, finding their fury against Christ to be without excuse, and being prevented from killing Him with their own hands by the approach of the atoning sacrifice (for they were about to sacrifice the Paschal lamb, according to the Law, which yet with them had lost its power), they bring Him to Pilate; trusting, in their gross folly, that they would not be quite implicated in the charge of shedding blood unjustly if they did not slay Him themselves, but only brought Him to suffer death at the hands of another; though what was in their hearts was altogether at variance with the Mosaic Law. And we must convict them, besides, of the greatest folly in acting as follows. For, while sentencing the sinless One to the doom of death, and bringing down upon their own heads the guilt of so frightful an impiety, they yet shun the threshold of the judgment hall, as though it would cause them to be defiled, and anxiously shrink from having intercourse with men who were still unclean. For they believed, I suppose, that stones, and the bodies of men who were their brethren, could defile the soul of man; but deemed that the worst of all crimes, the most unjust shedding of blood, stained them not a whit. And, marvel of marvels, the most absurd and irrational idea of all, they think themselves purified by the slaughter of a lamb, which typified for us nothing but the shadow of the mystery that is in Christ; and, while honouring the type of what is coming to pass, they scorn the reality itself. For while they were performing that which was but the semblance of His Atonement, they were defiled by the shedding of the Blood of Christ. Christ, then, said well when He called them whited sepulchres, outwardly adorned with the superficial embellishments of art, but inwardly full of evil odours and detestable impurity; and when, in another place, He said that they strained out the gnat and swallowed the camel. For while they were often exact about matters that were, so to say, wholly unimportant and insignificant, or, rather, about a mere nothing (for what is the gnat?), they made of no account the most weighty of all the charges against themselves, and made clean the outside of the cup and platter, while they regarded not at all the uncleanness within. For see how, though the prophet Jeremiah said plainly: Wash thy heart from wickedness, O Jerusalem, that thou mayest be saved, they were thoroughly convinced that the inward impiety of the soul mattered not a whit; and, when they brought Christ to Pilate, they shrank from places as accursed, and from the bodies of uncircumcised men; and if they did not commit the lawless act with their own hands, they yet made Pilate, as it were, minister to their cruelty, and in their stupidity imagined that they remained free from all blame. It may well excite our wonder to find that the holy prophets were well aware even of this impiety of theirs; for the blessed Isaiah said concerning them: Woe unto the wicked I for the reward of his hands shall be given him. And Ezekiel also: As thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee: thy reward shall return upon thine own head. Moreover, the inspired Psalmist exclaims: Render to them their desert; give them according to the work of their hands. For as they led Christ, the Saviour of all, captive to the Roman officers, so they received in their turn their reward, and were abandoned to the dominion of Rome, and were spoiled by the hand of their conquerors. For so fearful was the war that was kindled against them, and so frightful the extremities in which they were involved, that, if it had been possible, some, nay many, among them would rather have chosen to go into the mountains and rocks, and die there, before they saw the war----a choice which Christ foretold that they would make, when He said: When ye see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then shall ye say to the mountains, Cover us; and to the hills, Fall on us.
