Romans Knew How to Kill

In the early 1990s, when I was in seminary, critical scholars wondered if Jesus was killed or just fainted on the cross or grave and resuscitated to life. They wondered about the mystery of the resurrection. My German-American and Cambridge graduate teacher repeatedly reminded us, “The Romans knew how to kill.” The Romans knew the difference between an almost-dead and a totally dead person. They wouldn’t have confused between those resuscitated and resurrected to life.

Jesus commissioned his disciples and sent them to villages and cities in Galilee and Judea. That raised Herod the Great’s concern.

“Herod the tetrarch heard all that was happening and people declaring that John [the baptizer] has been raised from the dead or Elijah has appeared or a prophet of the old has been raised to life, said, ‘I decapitated John.’ ‘Who is this that I am hearing about?’ Saying these, he desired to see Jesus.” (John 9:7–9)

Herod the Tetrarch, i.e., Herod Antipas (the fifth son of Herod the Great), knew death. His father had killed his three older half-brothers – Antipater, Alexander, and Aristobulus. In addition, he had killed over six thousand Pharisees, Sadducees, sons of Hasmoneans, and children in Bethlehem and its vicinity. His biological brother, Herod Archelaus, who replaced his father in Jerusalem, had killed thousands of Hebrews and had been exiled to France by Caesar. Antipas might not have killed as many people as his father and brother, but he had decapitated John the baptizer. He knew that; he had seen John’s head on a platter that he presented to his stepdaughter, Salome, at the request of her mother (his brother’s wife) Herodias. So, when the people claimed that John had reincarnated in the form of Jesus, his words were simple, “I decapitated John.”

Romans and Herodians knew how to kill! They weren’t as suspicious of John’s and Jesus’s death as the modern critics are. They knew their victims were dead.

Herod Antipas, however, was curious. He knew Jesus wasn’t the decapitated John. Yet, he knew he was someone with power and authority. So, he hoped to see him.

This story parallels another incident that we’ll see later.

“Jesus asked his disciples, ‘What does the crowd say I am?’ They replied, ‘John the baptizer, Elijah, or a prophet of the old but resurrected.’ Jesus asked them, ‘What do you say?’ Peter answered, ‘The Christ of God.’” (Luke 9:18b–20)

People in Jesus’s time didn’t exactly know who he was. He was more than the son of a carpenter named Joseph or Mary’s son. His miracles testified to that (as Nicodemus testified, John 3). Who was he? Perhaps Elijah, a prophet of the old like Elisha, Isaiah, or even John, who had been resurrected. But Antipas knew it couldn’t be John as he had decapitated. He knew how to kill and place a head on a platter for his stepdaughter. The only options were (a) Jesus was a headless John or (b) someone else. The former couldn’t be true; it must be the latter. But he wanted to make sure who Jesus was by seeing him.

Two thousand years later, we still wonder, “Who was or is Jesus?” What matters is that he wasn’t John, Elijah, or a prophet of old resurrected, like Moses, David, or Isaiah. He was and is unique. He is the visible skeleton/body/person of the invisible God. The tangible presence of the intangible God. And in him, we find forgiveness and love.

He is not a decapitated John!