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The Jewish elite who participated in the plot to kill Jesus from almost the very time He was born in Bethlehem will bear the shame of this back-door scheme forever.
The main plotters were King Herod the Great, Judas Iscariot, Herod Antipas, Annas and Caiphas the chief high priests.
Herod the Great
In an attempt to assassinate the baby Jesus, King Herod the Great was responsible for the “Massacre of the Innocents” whereby he ordered Hebrew Israelite Jewish male children under the age of 2-years-old to be massacred in and around Bethlehem (Matthew 2:16-18).
Herod the Great founded the Herod dynasty but was a puppet-king controlled by the Roman Emperor Augustus Caesar. Herod died of “Herod’s Evil,” an excruciatingly painful illness that remains a mystery according to the famous contemporary historian named Josephus (Antiquities 17.6.5).
After Herod died, then the Lord appeared to Joseph, Jesus’s earthly parent, in a vision giving instructions to take Jesus back to Israel from Egypt where Christ’s family had fled during the “Massacre of the Innocents” (Matthew 2:19-20).
Judas Iscariot
Being close to Jesus as one of the original 12 disciples, the not-so-innocent Judas approached the Jewish high priests and elders with an offer to betray Jesus in exchange for 30 pieces of silver.
Later, feeling the unbearable weight of guilt over betraying Jesus Christ, Judas returned the money and hanged himself in what is known as the “field of blood” (Matthew 26:14-16; 27:3-8).
Herod Antipas
Like Judas, Herod Antipas got in on the plot to kill Jesus about 30 years after Herod the Great kicked it off. Antipas was one of Herod the Great’s sons and tetrarch of Galilee - the jurisdiction Jesus’s hometown of Nazareth was part of.
So the Roman provincial governor of Judaea in Israel, Pontius Pilate sent Jesus under arrest to Antipas who had been wanting to see Christ in person.
When Jesus stood before him, Herod requested him to perform a miracle but Jesus didn’t budge.
Herod’s soldiers then mocked Christ by dressing him in a “gorgeous robe” before sending him back to Pilate who was Antipas’s new-found friend (Luke 23:1-12).
As another one of the puppet rulers under the Roman Empire in Israel, Antipas is also ill-famed for ordering the beheading of John the Baptist in order to appease his evil wife, Herodias (Matthew 14:1-12).
Annas
Annas was the first high priest who questioned Jesus after Christ was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane. Then he sent Jesus to chief high priest Caiphas - Annas' son-in-law (John 18).
Caiphas
After receiving the arrested Jesus from Annas, Joseph ben Caiphas, or simply Caiphas presided over the fake trial of Jesus conducted by the Jewish Sanhedrin religious leadership council in the dark of night (John 18).
Caiphas was yet another puppet of the Roman Empire, evidenced by his long tenure as chief high priest during the Roman occupation of Israel.
Contemporary historian Josephus wrote that Caiphas was installed as high priest by the Roman procurator Valerius Gratus after high priest Simon ben Camithus was removed (Antiquities 18.2.2).
Caiphas was the one who sent Jesus to Pontius Pilate.
Pilate then sent Jesus to be crucified, at the extreme and fervent insistence of the Jewish leaders and the people they stirred up against Christ.
Other Jews Involved
The scribes or teachers of the Jewish law, the sects known as the Sadducees and the Pharisees, plus the money changers who profited off a foreign currency exchange tax, possibly unscrupulous lenders, all had an interest in killing Jesus.
He had flipped all of their comfortable lives under Roman occupation upside down, even though his mission was not to overthrow the Roman Empire (Matthew 21:12).
Jesus had thousands upon thousands of followers and believers throughout his ministry of preaching, teaching, healing, feeding the hungry, prophesying and speaking truth to the power of the corrupt Jewish leadership.
The Jewish leaders stirred up the people with the lies, propaganda and false-witnessing that Jesus was a blasphemous fraud worthy of stoning to death according to Jewish law.
Some followers turned their backs on Jesus, but core Christians helped spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ all over the world with the help of the Holy Spirit.
The Lord will grant eternal life to his followers, while those who plotted to kill Him will surely suffer the consequences as they stand supercharged for crimes against God who will sit as the judge over all mankind upon His return.
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