Mark 15:6-15
Now at that feast [Pilate] released unto them one prisoner, whomsoever they desired. And there was one named Barabbas, which lay bound with them that had made insurrection with him, who had committed murder
in the insurrection. And the multitude crying aloud began to desire him to do as he had ever done unto them. But Pilate answered them, saying, Will ye that I release unto you the King of the Jews? For he knew that the chief priests had delivered Him for envy. But the chief priests moved the people, that he should rather release Barabbas unto them. And Pilate answered and said again unto them, What will ye then that I shall do unto Him whom ye call the King of the Jews? And they cried out again, Crucify Him. Then Pilate said unto them, Why, what evil hath He done? And they cried out the more exceedingly, Crucify Him. And so Pilate, willing to content the people, released Barabbas unto them, and delivered Jesus, when he had scourged Him, to be crucified.
Five days before the events of our reading, Jesus made His triumphant entry into Jerusalem riding a donkey to fulfill the prophecy recorded in Zachariah 9:9. The Jews in the city hailed His arrival, praised His name, and pretty much crowned Him their king. He had a few encounters with the Priests and Pharisees during the week concerning the scriptures, but it was nothing the Word of God had any trouble in correcting mistaken ideas. The day before was the Passover and Jesus ate the traditional meal with His twelve chosen disciples. But that Thursday night was to be an unusual night.
During the Passover meal, Jesus broke with tradition and instituted what is now known as The Lord’s Supper. During this time the disciple Judas Iscariot left the group to go to the priests to betray Jesus to them. Later that night Jesus took the disciples Peter, John, and James with Him to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray before the next day’s events. It was while in the Garden that Judas betrayed Jesus to the priests. Jesus was arrested by the Roman military, His disciples abandoned Him, Peter denying knowing Jesus, and He stood trials before the Jewish priests, the Roman governor Pontius Pilate, the Jewish puppet king Herod, and once again to stand before Pilate. Pilate believed Jesus innocent of the charges against Him and tried everything he could do to get Jesus released.
Pilate declared to the crowd he found no fault in Jesus, nothing that He should have been arrested over. The book of Mark tells us Pilate knew the priests turned Jesus over to him out of jealousy. Pilate had Jesus flogged, whipped, and he planned on releasing Jesus after that. According to Roman law, a prisoner would be sentenced to death or flogged and released. And the flogging was horrific in itself. The leather of the whip was braided around pieces of metal or bone, so the flesh on the back would be torn and ripped off during the ordeal. The maximum amount of lashes allowed by Roman law was 40, but the count was set at 39, in case the man doing the whipping got a bit overzealous.
According to custom, a prisoner was to be released on the festival of Passover, and Pilate was bound to this custom. The book of Matthew stated that Pilate offered the crowd a choice of who to release, either Jesus or a man named Barabbas. Throughout the Gospels, Barabbas has been described as notable, to mean notorious, in Matthew, a murderer and guilty of insurrection in both Mark and Luke, and a thief in the book of John; certainly by all accounts not a good or decent man. To Pilate, this should have solved the issue about Jesus’ release. After all, once insurrections were put down by the Romans, some stiff penalties were levied against the people, like early curfews, bans against large gatherings, and an increase in taxes were common; and Barabbas was part of the reason any penalties were in place, plus this was not a man the people should want walking the streets. Imagine Pilate’s surprise when the Jews cried “Give us Barabbas.” According to John, Pilate was told if he released Jesus he would not be a friend to Caesar. If Pilate was found not being a friend of Caesar, he would have lost his governorship and all political influence and aspirations, and that’s on the good side. After this Pilate had no choice but to hand Jesus over to death by crucifixion and release Barabbas.
What needs to be asked is who was this Barabbas that Pilate offered to free? In all of scriptures he is only mentioned at this time. In some of the more ancient texts of Matthew, Barabbas is identified as Jesus Barabbas. The early church father Origen, this would have been around 220 AD, was troubled by this fact and Barabbas’ first name was the same as Christ’s and had it dropped obviously so this terrible man would not be so closely identified with the Savior. An interesting note about his name; Barabbas in the Aramaic is written as bar-Abba, which means “son of the father”; so his name is Jesus son of the father.
But this is it. There is nothing in the Bible and no texts outside of the Bible that give any information about him or any indications what happened to this man after his release. We can only wonder; did he witness the crucifixion of the Man that got him released? Did he come to believe the message of Christ and gain salvation? Did he return to his life of insurrection and eventually lose his life, both physical and spiritual, in one of his attacks against the Romans? Did Barabbas even think about Jesus and what happened that day? I would like to believe that Jesus’ actions that day had some effect on Barabbas, but sadly, we don’t have the answer. All that we do know is when given a choice between a Jesus and Barabbas the Jews, spurred on by the jealous priests and scribes, called for the release of murderer Barabbas.
The story of Barabbas, almost a just a small side tale in the story of the crucifixion, it can be seen in a much larger parable. As the Father watched the events unfold that day He, too, stood with the Jews and listened to Pilate as he offered a choice between Jesus and Barabbas. And like the Jews God said “Give Us Barabbas!” For God knew if Jesus was released, He final sacrifice for sin, the atoning act that would cleanse all mankind of their sins would not have come to pass. All people would be subject to God’s righteous judgment and suffer the punishment for their sins, the punishment of eternal death and damnation. But God would not allow people to suffer what we so rightly deserve. He allowed His Son to take our place in punishment.
In just a few hours, Jesus would be suffering through His crucifixion. He would feel the full wrath and punishment from the Father for the sins of all people. He would pray for our forgiveness, saying we do not know what we do. From the depths of hell He would cry out “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?”, “My God, God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” The Lord of Life would surrender Himself to death, and cry out those words so we would never have experience separation from God. With this grand act of love, the debt of our sins had been paid and God forgave us our sins. Our fallen and lost condition, one that we had lived under since Adam and Eve fell in the Garden of Eden had been lifted from us and our original unblemished state is restored to us. This allows us to enter into a relationship with God, one where He identifies Himself as our Father, and us as His sons and daughters. God’s family will live with Him in Heaven, spending eternity in delight in God’s presence. This is the conclusion of Jesus’ sacrifice, the saving of His creation, the conclusion of God saying “Give Us Barabbas!”
In a sense, we are all Barabbas. We are all the ones who were in prison, the prison of transgressions and sins. We were the ones that were set next to Jesus and a choice on who to release had to be made. And like Barabbas, the guilty ones, all mankind, were the ones who were chosen while the innocent one, Jesus, was sentenced to death. We are the ones guilty of insurrection, of trying to overthrow God in our lives, we are the murderers and thieves, along with other crimes against God that earned our death warrant. We are the ones that should stand before God and be judged guilty and suffer punishment. But also like Barabbas we were given a release, a pardon, from all our crimes.
But unlike Pilate, God’s decision to release the guilty was not to calm down a crowd or to keep His status with another. His reason was much simpler, His reason was love. God loved His creation way too much to allow us to be forever separated from Him. This saving act was set in place before creation began. After Adam and Eve sinned against the Lord, they were given the promise of the Savior and people awaited His coming. God reaffirmed and retold this promise to His people throughout the Old Testament. He gave to us the lineage of Jesus all the way back to Adam. He told us the signs to look for that would signal the Savior’s birth. We are told the Savior would perform miracles and speak in parables. We are given the details of His suffering and death. We were even given the town of His birth. We were told all of this so when He came we would not miss His arrival. And all of this was done for us out of love, a love so deep that we in our sinful state cannot fully understand it.
Barabbas. We all know he was given his freedom in the place of our Lord. He has less than a dozen verses written about him in the Bible and then disappeared as quickly as he appeared but he has become an important figure in Scriptures. His was the final earthly action that sent Jesus to the cross. In a tale that parallels the state we found ourselves in, Barabbas’ story becomes a parable of sorts. A parable that shows to us what God has done for us and what God gave up and endured when He said “Give Us Barabbas!” Amen.
