Note 12 — Chapter II · MACHINATIONS OF THE ENEMIES OF JESUS; TREACHERY OF JUDAS; LAST SUPPER WITH HIS DISCIPLES.

Of the further statements also, as to the points in which Jesus gave offence to the hierarchy of his nation, those which the synoptists have alone, or in common with John, are credible; those which are peculiar to the latter, not so. Among those which are common to both sides, the solemn entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem, and the strong attachment of the people to him, were equally natural causes of offence with his discourses and actions in opposition to the sabbatical institutions, in whatever the latter may have consisted: on the contrary, the manner in which, according to the fourth gospel, the Jews take offence at the declarations of Jesus concerning himself as the Son of God, is, according to our earlier analysis,12 as inconceivable, as it is consistent with the common order of things that the polemical tone towards the Pharisees which the first Evangelists all lend to Jesus, should irritate the party attacked. Thus no new or more profound insight into the causes and motives of the reaction against Jesus, is to be obtained from the fourth gospel: but the information which the synoptists have preserved to us fully suffices to make that fact intelligible.