Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: VOLUME III. REPORT OF CAIAPHAS TO THE SANHEDRIN CONCERNING THE EXECUTION OF JESUS. Records of the Jerusalem Sanhedrin, by Eliezer Pyran, B. 22. Taken in Constantinople, October 16, 1883. Caiaphas, priest of the Most High God, to the masters of Irael, greeting: In obedience to your call for a reason of my action in the case of Jesus of Nazareth, and in defense of my conduct, I beg leave to submit the following for your consideration: I would assure you that it was not on account of personal, malice, envy or hate, that existed in my own nature, nor for the want of a willingness upon my part to conform to the Jewish law in its strictest sense. I had but very little personal knowledge of the Nazarene. The most I knew of this man, was from outside sources. Nor was it because he claimed to be king of the Jews, nor- because he said he was the Son of God; (I would that he were, ) nor because he prophesied or ignored the holy temple. No, nor allof these combined. There is a cause, and a more weighty matter, back of all these things that controlled my action in the matter. Therefore, I hope you will investigate the reasons that I may give strictly on legal principles. In order that you may be able to see, and weigh the question fully, and remember the responsibility that rests upon me according to the laws of our nation, I will ask you to go back with me to the chronicles of our history as a commonwealth. First, our faith is pledged to one living and true God, this God being indescribable, unchangeable and incomprehensible, and of course unnameable. But yet in our daily communications with, and our applications to him, he has been pleased to give us his name, or his several names, according to his relations to us, and they are found nowhere, only in the ark of his holy temple…
