Character Profile: Who Was ‘Bar-Abba’?

How to cite this article: Ze’ev Safrai, “Who Was ‘Bar-Abba’?” Jerusalem Perspective (2026) [https://www.jerusalemperspective.com/36041/].

As is well known, prior to the crucifixion of Jesus, Pilate offered the Jewish crowd the option of releasing one of the prisoners who was about to be executed.^[1] This episode appears in all four Gospels^[2] and became a highly influential theological foundation for the perceived obligation to persecute Jews and exact vengeance upon them for choosing Barabbas (Bar-Abba in Hebrew) as the prisoner to be released instead of Jesus. Few ancient narratives have had such far‑reaching historical impact. This narrative played a major role in shaping the relationship between Christianity, throughout its generations, and historical Judaism.

It should be noted that in Matthew the attribution of guilt to the Jews is emphasized more strongly than in the other Gospels. According to Matthew, the Jews not only demanded the crucifixion of the Jewish Messiah, but explicitly accepted responsibility for it: “His blood be on us and on our children” (Matt. 27:25). The other Gospels limit themselves to reporting the crowd’s cry, “Crucify him” (Mark 15:13-14; Luke 23:21, 23; John 19:6). In John, the scene of preferring Barabbas over Jesus is extremely brief, and the entire crucifixion narrative is shorter than in the other Gospels. Perhaps the author sought to downplay Jewish culpability, though other reasons may also explain the brevity.

In the extensive research there is a dispute as to whether the narrative of the Gospels is historically accurate, or whether it is a later composition intended to defame the Jewish masses, a motif that was important to Christianity in the period following the founding of the new religion.^[3] Naturally, the historical debate carries major theological implications, which somewhat overshadow the historical discussion. This article will focus solely on historical considerations, and on the implications of historical plausibility for the degree of historical accuracy of the Gospel of John.

Against this background, one can better understand the preference of the Jerusalem public to pardon Bar-Abba, a political rebel, over Jesus, a religious leader who was an outsider both socially and geographically. It is therefore unsurprising that the Jewish populace chose to rescue a lēstēs who fought against Roman rule, a man “of our own,” rather than the Galilean leader whose religious character was, at least in Jewish eyes, “questionable.”

In the course of the discussion, we have pointed to two details preserved only in the Gospel of John, which are either less anti‑Jewish or more realistic than those in the other Gospels.^[4] This is not to claim that this feature characterizes the entire Gospel tradition. The question of the “original” Gospel has occupied scholarship for many years, and each theory rests on numerous considerations. We have added two details not previously discussed, and the overall picture requires a much broader inquiry.

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Notes

1. On the Jewish origin of the customary prisoner release at Passover and other Jewish holidays, see Ze’ev Safrai, “The So-called ‘Privilegium Paschale’ in Light of Jewish Sources,” Jerusalem Perspective (2026) [https://www.jerusalemperspective.com/35651/]. ↩
2. Matt. 27:15-26; Mark 15:6-15; Luke 23:17-25; John 18:39-40. ↩
3. John Curran, “Pilate, Barabbas, and the Privilegium Paschale: Law and Leverage in Roman Judaea,” Journal for the Study of the New Testament 47.4 (2025): 501-525; H. Z. Maccoby, “Jesus and Barabbas,” New Testament Studies 16.1 (1969): 55-60. ↩
4. See also Safrai, “The So-called ‘Privilegium Paschale’ in Light of Jewish Sources.” ↩