Luke 23:1-5 An Unholy Alliance-Bearing False Witness.

The religious council needed the state to push their case, so they frame there cause in such a way as to arouse the concern of the Roman authorities. They needed to bear false witness to achieve their cause. They state three things. Firstly they claim that He was perverting the nation-that is, seeking to get the Jewish people to rise up. This was a perennial fear of the authorities. Secondly, they stated that Jesus was forbidding the Jewish people from paying taxes to Caesar. Jesus stated the exact opposite (Mt. 22:15-22; Mk. 12:13-17). Thirdly, they stated that Jesus claimed to be a king, which was true, but not in the manner of a direct political threat to the authorities. Pilate didn’t ask Jesus if He was a king, he asked Him if He was “the King of the Jews” (v. 3 Cf. I Tim. 6:13; I Pet. 2:22). Pilate understood that Jesus was therefore no threat to him or the civil government (v. 4). He saw this as a Jewish issue. But the crowd insisted that Jesus was a threat to the Roman authorities (v. 5).