Matthew 26 - Introduction

CHAPTER 26.

THE PASSION HISTORY.

These Chapter s give with exceptional fulness and minuteness of detail the story of Christ's last sufferings and relative incidents. The story finds a place in all four Gospels (Mark 14:15; Luke 22:23; John 18:19), showing the intense interest felt by Christians of the apostolic age in all that related to the Passion of their Lord. Of the three strata of evangelic tradition relating respectively to what Jesus taught, what He did, and what He suffered, the last-named probably came first in origin. Men could wait for the words and deeds, but not for the awful tale of suffering. Even Holtzmann, who puts the teaching first, recognises the Passion drama as the nucleus of the tradition as to memorable facts and experiences. In the formation of the Passion chronicle the main facts would naturally come first; around this nucleus would gather gradually accretions of minor incidents, till by the time the written records began to be compiled the collection of memorabilia had assumed the form it bears, say, in the Gospel of Mark; the historic truth on the solemn subject, at least as far as it could be ascertained. The passionless tone of the narrative in all four Gospels is remarkable; the story is told in subdued accent, in few simple words, as if the narrator had no interest in the matter save that of the historian: ἀπαθῶς ἅπαντα διηγοῦνται, καὶ μόνης τῆς ἀληθείας φροντίζουσι. Euthy. Zig. ad Matthew 26:67.

Chapter 26 and parallels contain the anointing, the betrayal, the Holy Supper, the agony, the apprehension, the trial, the denial by Peter.