When dawn had broken on Friday, following the trial before Caiaphas, the Sanhedrin appears to have held a more formal meeting at which it ratified Jesus' condemnation. Though the Jews had declared a sentence of death against the Nazarene, the Roman authorities alone had power to impose and carry out this sentence. So his captors brought Jesus to Pontius Pilate, the provincial governor (see Matt. 27:1, 2; Mark 15:1; Luke 23:1; John 18:28).
At this point Matthew inserts the record of Judas' awakening to the terrible consequences of his treachery. When he found the chief priests and elders unimpressed by his repentance at having betrayed an innocent man, he cast down the thirty pieces of silver in the temple and committed suicide (see 27:3-10).
Pilate's first question of Jesus' captors, "What accusation bring ye against this man?" drew an evasive answer. "If he were not a malefactor, we would not have delivered him up unto thee." His reply that they should judge him according to Jewish law exposed their real intention, that he be put to death (see John 18: 29-31). Subtly they changed the wording of their own charge of blasphemy to make it appeal to a Roman official. Jesus, they asserted, had forbidden payment of taxes to the Roman government, and had claimed to be a king (see Luke 23: 2).
