“What I shall do to him you call the King of the Jews?” compared with “What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth?”

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Giuseppe
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“What I shall do to him you call the King of the Jews?” compared with “What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth?”

Post by Giuseppe »

David Oliver Smith sees a curious analogy between Pilate and the demon:


1:24—An unclean spirit in the Synagogue recognizes Jesus and says “What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? “Thou hast come to destroy us.” “I have known thee who thou art, the Holy One of God.”


15:12—Pilate asks the crowd, “What I shall do to him you call the King of the Jews?” 13 They shouted back, “Crucify him!”

Pilate and the unclean spirit both ask what is to be done. The unclean spirit will be destroyed and Jesus will be crucified. The unclean spirit knows who Jesus is, but Pilate does not.
1:25—Jesus tells unclean spirit to “be silent.”
15:1–5—Pilate questions Jesus, and he remains silent.
Now that Christ has been revealed, unclean spirits and demons have been silenced. Jesus has finished his ministry and everything has been said, he is silent.

(Smith, David Oliver. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Paul: The Influence of the Epistles on the Synoptic Gospels, p.241)

I think that both the episodes, since, as proved by Smith, share the same pattern:

question, answer/half-answer/no answer, punition/glorification

...derive from the same tradition that ended in a Gnostic book.
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