But he was clearly convinced that Jesus was innocent. He judged Him to be an amiable enthusiast, from whom Rome had nothing to fear. So he went out and pronounced His acquittal: "I find in Him no fault at all."
[1] On Pilate there is an essay of extraordinary subtlety and power in Candlish's Scripture Characters.
[2] An eloquent account in Keim (vi., p. 80, English tr.), who gives the authorities: "in part a tyrant's stronghold, and in part a fairy pleasure-house."
[3] Acts xviii. 14-16.
[4] ethnos, not laos: they were speaking to a heathen.
[5] Keim calls it "a very flagrant lie."
[6] "Socrates, quum omnium sapientissime sanctissimeque vixisset, ita in judicio capitis pro se dixit, ut non supplex aut reus, sed magister aut dominus videretur judicum."—CICERO.
CHAPTER V.
JESUS AND HEROD
Pilate had tried Jesus and found Him innocent; and so he frankly told the members of the Sanhedrim, thereby reversing their sentence. What ought to have followed? Of course Jesus ought to have been released and, if necessary, protected from the feeling of the Jews.