Then the band, and the tribune, and the servants of the Jews, took Jesus and bound Him. And they led Him away to Annas first, for he was father-in-law to Caiaphas, who was the high priest of that year. Now Caiaphas was he who had given the counsel to the Jews, that it was expedient that one man should die for the people. - John 18:12-14
1. We leave to scholars the discussion of the relations between Annas and Caiaphas, who the two were, why Annas is also called the high priest, and why Our Lord is taken first to him, before appearing in the lawful court. It is enough for us to know the simple facts, and to meditate upon the procession. We can follow Our Lord down that hill of Olivet, which He had ascended and descended so often, particularly of late, not only when going to and from the Garden, but in the glorious procession of Palm Sunday it was not far from here that He had stopped that procession and burst into tears at the sight of the doomed city before Him and in His many journeys to and from Bethany, which lay in the other valley. Many a time, then, must Our Lord have thought of all that would happen on that road, as He passed along it during these last years. We watch Him now dragged along; we remember He is "bound"; we hear the prophecy which hints that He fell in the brook; we ask ourselves what must have been the sight of Him that entered the city gate among that crowd in the darkness. What a contrast to that which entered by that same gate on the Sunday preceding!
2. Who was this Annas? He was first of all a Sadducee, one of those who, as Saint Matthew tells us, "say there is no resurrection," or who, as Saint Luke writes in the Acts of the Apostles, "say there is no resurrection, neither Angel, nor spirit"; one of those who, when they had once tried to catch Our Lord, had been so confuted that "the multitudes hearing it, were in admiration at His doctrine"; one, therefore, who was not likely to make much account of the hereafter, or of Him who spoke of His own resurrection and return. He was one who had been many times high priest himself, who had secured that his sons-in-law should succeed him; one of those who, so far as it was possible, had converted his family into a kind of Jewish royal house, which would resist any kind of intruder.
3. And who was Caiaphas? He, too, was a Sadducee; he believed in no future life, there fore, perhaps, believed in no Kingdom of the Messiah. Moreover, he was high priest of that year; into such hands had the priesthood fallen even since the days of Zachary, and the Presentation in the Temple, even during the very thirty years that Our Lord was living on the earth! And for his principles, Saint John recalls the scene when, after the raising of Lazarus, the Council gathered in alarm and asked each other: "What shall we do, for this man doth many miracles?" And Caiaphas answered: "You know nothing. Neither do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not." A man, then, whose principle was expediency, whose right was might.
Summary
1. The first steps in the Passion should be traced from Olivet to the house of Annas.
2. Annas the Sadducee, the unbeliever, the maker of a false royal house.
3. Caiaphas the Sadducee, the one who first "devised to put Him to death."
- from The Crown of Sorrow, by Archbishop Alban Goodier