But Jesus held his peace. And the high priest answered and said unto him, I adjure you by the living God, that you tell us whether you be the Christ, the Son of God.
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Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
And the High Priest said to Him, I adjure Thee by the Living God that Thou tell us whether Thou be the Christ, the Son of God. I, the High Priest, am the Vicar of God on earth, and therefore by the authority of God committed to me, I call God to witness, and conjure Thee to answer. Caiaphas here touches the essence of the whole matter. Jesus said that He was the Christ, sent with supreme power for the salvation of men. The Chief Priests pertinaciously denied it. He therefore asks the question not for information, but in order to condemn Him. For if He said He were, they condemned Him to death as a blasphemer; but if He said He were not, he would have replied, Why then didst Thou pass Thyself off with the people as Christ the Son of God? and would consequently have condemned Him as a false Prophet, in having made Himself equal with God, as the Jews urged against Him ( John 5:19). For the whole ground of their hatred against Him was that Hebrews , a Prayer of Manasseh , as it seemed, of ...
I adjure thee by the living God. They hoped this might make him own himself God; for which they were for stoning him. (John x. 31.)
St. Luke tells us, (xxii. 66,) that this question was put to Jesus, when it was day. St. Augustine thinks it was put to him first in the night, and again the next morning. We must not forget that when Christ was examined by the high priest, one of the servants standing by gave our blessed Redeemer a box on the ear, or on the face. See John xviii. 22. (Witham)
Our divine Saviour as God knew perfectly well, that whatever he said would be condemned; and therefore the more Jesus was silent to what was alleged against him, the more did the high priest try to extort an answer from him, that he might have some accusation against the Lord of glory. Hence he exclaimed in that violent manner: I adjure thee, or I command thee by the living God, Exorkizo se kata tou Theou zontos. The law for witnesses is to be found in Leviticus v. 1; where the witness is pronounced...
For the attempts at defense were unprofitable, no man hearing. For this was a show only of a court of justice, but in truth an onset of robbers, assailing Him without cause, as in a cave, or on a road.
And this he did to add force to the accusation, and to aggravate what He said, by the act. For since what had been said moved the hearers to fear, what they did about Stephen, Acts 7:59 stopping their ears, this high priest does here also.
