There in the house of Annas, Jesus is being questioned, not for the first time.  People question Jesus all the time, even in our times—maybe especially in our times of proud, defiant, belligerent self-affirmation: the cult of self-affirmation  Cults haven’t gone away; they’ve been politicized, which means empowered.  Those committed to tearing down what Christianity has built are getting stronger, organized.  They believe they’re heroes of equality, justice, and freedom.  Never forget—for people immersed in this culture, this society, these politics, it is cursedly hard to believe all we say and claim for Jesus.  For those without faith, or with only a flicker, all we say and claim is too much.  There was a time when it was illegal to compel speech; now, it seems compelled silence is the legal order of the day.  It’s not law that makes it legal.

If we recall some of the details of the story, you might just remember that a man named Caiaphas is high priest.  Jesus is not taken to Caiaphas.  He is taken to Annas, a former high priest and the father-in-law of Caiaphas.  Annas appears to be the power behind the power.  Annas makes the decisions; Caiaphas sees to it they are carried out.  Jesus is in the lion’s den: no friends, there.  It grieves me to think that, in some instances, Jesus seems to have precious few friends even in the churches.  Many acquaintances but few friends.  Always being questioned, so rarely being listened to.  Quick to argue and slow to obey.

Annas asks Jesus “about his disciples and his teaching” (18:19).  Does he want Jesus to name names—get the list together for the secret police?  How many?  Where can they be found?  Well, here we are.  Did Annas ever get around to asking Jesus why those people were his disciples?  He didn’t care.

Jesus is questioned about his teaching.  Just what, exactly, do you teach?  Do you really say?  The serpent slyly asked Eve if God Himself had really said that to do as her heart desired would bring death.  Did He say that?  Why, everybody knows we’re most fully alive passionately pursuing our heart’s deepest desires!  It was that arch occultist, heroin addict, and guru to the rock stars Aleister Crowley whose creed was “Do as thou wilt.”  Only, what’s in control of that thou?  What’s governing that will?

“What do you teach?  What is this you have been teaching?”  In one sense, Jesus was not teaching what could not already be found in the rabbis before him.  Maybe one of the key differences is that Jesus, unlike the wise, holy sages, put the teaching into practice.  But Jesus wasn’t just teaching a way of life, a way of living for God.  Jesus was also teaching that he was the way to Life: a divine claim, a God claim.  That remains as scandalous now as then, so scandalous that even among those preaching today it can seem like an easier, safer, better bet to stick to talking about the way to live rather than the way to Life.  Stories about nice people doing nice things.  Laugh, sing happy songs, and leave happy.  That’s one camp.  Another tells us we aren’t doing anything worthwhile if we aren’t reordering the world: revolution now!

Change.  I think God wants to change us.  Jesus is always challenging us.  The problem in the churches, the Jesus-claiming churches, isn’t so much in what is being taught, though; the problem isn’t even the basic beliefs animating the teaching.  The problem, as always, is what is not being taught, not being said, what (silently) gets left out.  Complicit silence.

Annas probes for the way to get Jesus out of his life and reconsolidate the power behind the power.  As he is questioned, challenged, Jesus responds this way: “I have spoken openly to the world [. . . .] I always taught in synagogues or at the temple, where all the Jews come together.  I said nothing in secret” (18:20).  Anyone can testify!  If only we would.  This is not a hidden teaching; we are not some secret society, insisting publicly upon our harmlessness and innocence.  If we were so harmless, our faith wouldn’t be under such constant pressure.  If what Jesus teaches seems hidden, obscure, it is because hearts and minds are not accustomed to it and not open to it.  People haven’t heard enough of it, though plenty always have had enough of it.

Jesus said let those with ears to hear listen (Mt 11:15, 13:9).  How to have such ears?  Has God not given the ear for listening?  All we need do is listen; so many are deaf, deafened by the world.  And Jesus causes the deaf to hear: this night of his betrayal, he healed a man whose ear had been cut off, by one of Jesus’ own followers!  Jesus is always crying out to any who will listen.  “But to this day,” Moses tells the Israelites so near to the Promised Land, “the LORD has not given you minds that understand, nor eyes that see, nor ears that hear!” (Dt 29:4).  God has withheld?  No, God has not forced.  I’m reminded of Isaiah: “go, and say to this people, ‘Listen carefully, but do not understand.  Watch closely, but learn nothing’ [. . . .] they will not see with their eyes, nor hear with their ears, nor understand with their hearts and turn to Me for healing” (Is 6:9-10).  The healing is there, held out to us.  It’s like that old Norman Rockwell illustration: a busy city street, people hurrying, looking down or on ahead, on their ways, and the soaring church there before them with the sign “Lift up thine eyes.”  And they would not.

Do we detect a note of impatience or defiance in what Jesus says to the power behind the power in Jerusalem?  “Why question me?  Ask those who heard me.  Surely they know what I said” (18:21).  Jesus has sounded impatient before . . . frustrated seems closer to the truth, to my ears.  I wonder, though.  We know that at least two of Jesus’ closest followers were there, in the confines of the compound that dreadful night.  Peter was in the central courtyard, probably not entirely out of earshot of the interrogation inside.  We have strong reason to suspect John was there, too.  The courage of testimony, the courage of witness—stand up for Jesus!  But John and Peter knew that would be the end, for them.  To give their testimony there, and then?  Madness.  “Dang.  I don’t know.  Don’t ask me!”

But if what Jesus had taught hadn’t gotten through to anyone, if his words would leave no lasting impact, if what people heard had no resemblance to what he had truly taught, weren’t the priests making a much bigger thing out of this than they needed to?  Isaiah had wondered aloud who had really heard, who had truly taken the prophet’s words to heart (Is 53:1).  Maybe Jesus had his moments of concern, also.  Can you and I genuinely say that we’ve taken all of the teaching of Jesus to heart?  Many teachings crowd our hearts!  They aren’t all from God.

When Jesus does speak there before that group determined to have him killed, what follows seems sadly predictable.  Jesus speaks, and “one of the officials nearby slapped him in the face. ‘Is this the way you answer the high priest?’ he demanded” (18:22).  All any of them needed was the slightest reason to lash out, take out all their anger and frustration on Jesus: he was ruining everything!  They have him where they want him.  John, who records without comment, wants the shock of that slap to register.  We would never do that to Jesus!  Haven’t we?  Whenever we sin, pursue our way over God’s way, haven’t we?  And we who know Jesus and his teaching, how shall we answer before God?

What amazes me is the calmness and self-control—I almost want to say the charity, the meekness of his response: “‘If I said something wrong,’ Jesus replied, ‘testify as to what is wrong.  But if I spoke the truth, why did you strike me?’” (18:23).  It’s not a question of truth, though, is it?  Any more than it’s a question of truth in the eyes, hearts, and hands of the powers in this world.  It’s a question of conformity and obeisance: are you going to do as we tell you or not?  But Jesus isn’t interested in what so obsesses the powers here below.  Jesus answers to a higher power.  As always, Jesus is focused on identifying, recognizing, and speaking truth.

“Then Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest” (18:24).  Bound, the one who has power to bind in this life and the next, bound, the one who has full power to set free, in this life and the next.  Bound for public execution.  Let all see, and be warned!  Annas knows Caiaphas knows what to do; he also knows Caiaphas will see that it’s done, obedient to power.  And Jesus?  He shows us, all along, the power of obedience.