John 18:24

Ver. 24. “ Annas therefore sent him bound to Caiaphas, the high- priest. ”

This verse has always perplexed those who have held that at John 18:15 Jesus was led to the house of Caiaphas, and that the session which John has just described is the great session of the Sanhedrim, which is related by the Synoptics. This twofold error is what has occasioned the transposition of this verse in some documents to a place after John 18:13 (see the critical note on that verse). It is this likewise which has led some interpreters, such as Calvin, Lucke, Tholuck, de Wette, Langen, to take ἀπέστειλαν in the sense of the pluperfect, had sent. But when the aorist has the sense of the pluperfect, the context clearly indicates it. Precisely the contrary is here the case. Besides, the particle οὖν, therefore, if it is authentic, excludes this explanation, and it is even probable that this is precisely the reason which has made some reject it and others change it into δέ, now: “ Now, Annas had sent....”

By inserting this notice here, the evangelist simply wished, as by the πρῶτον, first, of John 18:13, to reserve a place expressly for the session in the house of Caiaphas, which was indeed otherwise important, and of which he does not give an account. Comp. John 18:1 (for the scene in Gethsemane) and John 18:5 (for the kiss of Judas). Lutteroth gives to this verse a sentimental cast. There is, according to him, a picture here; John means to say: Behold! This Jesus, thus struck by the officer, was standing there with His hands bound, in the condition in which Annas had [previously] sent Him to Caiaphas! But this sense has nothing in common with the simplicity and sobriety of the apostolic narrative; it implies, moreover, the pluperfect sense as here given to the aorist.

Jesus had undoubtedly been unbound during the examination; after this scene, Annas causes Him to be bound again, in order to send Him to the house of Caiaphas. Probably He was unbound a second time during the session of the Sanhedrim. This explains why in Matthew 27:2 and Mark 15:1, He is bound anew at the time of leading Him away to Pilate. To Caiaphas: in the part of the palace where Caiaphas lived, and where were the official apartments and the hall for the meetings of the Sanhedrim. This body had been called together in the interval; for all the members were in Jerusalem for the feast. The title of high-priest reminds us of the wholly official character of the session which was in preparation, as well as that of the place where it occurred.