I am reading this one at a snail’s pace… sorry! Chapter 5 deals with the Roman governors that were placed in Palestine around and after the time of Jesus. In his clever way of retelling history to meet his thesis’ needs, Reza gives a very scaled back version of the various events leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem and seemingly lumps Jesus into a group that likely did not even exist yet – the zealots. Here, he states emphatically that the Gospels’ description of Pontius Pilate could not have been accurate (he uses the phrase “pure fiction”) due to the fact that Pilate dealt so harshly with so many other revolutionaries.

One thing that is not shown here, and something followers of Jesus are usually quick to state, is that Jesus was not a violent revolutionary. He did not attack the governing bodies, the leaders or anyone else for that matter. While these “zealous messiahs” rose and fell by the sword, Jesus was different. There is no record anywhere of Jesus being anything close to a violent person. In fact, most accounts of Him marvel at the fact that this entire movement did not seem to want to strike at the iron of destruction and freedom for the Jews, but a freedom for all, by following God and His forgiving ways.

With this truth concept in mind, there is another way to view Reza’s statement. While Reza refuses to believe that a heartless, ruthless, but effective governor like Pilate would ever “wash his hands” of a conviction like Jesus, it is more than possible. Let’s assume Pilate heard of Jesus and then inquired of Him to see what this “rebellion” was all about. Let’s assume that Jesus, unlike others, would have stated that His kingdom was not of this world (I shouldn’t need to cite this) and that He was not after the emperor or anyone else’s head for that matter. Would Pilate have dealt with Jesus so ruthlessly? At this point, if I were Pilate, I would be stunned and want nothing to do with this. No one could state what Jesus had done that was evil and the entire notion that Jesus’ head was better served detached from His body would have made little to no sense. This seems more than likely and is another interesting factor not even considered in his book.