For centuries, anti-Semitic individuals have claimed that the Jews killed Jesus. I understand why they make this claim, but is it biblical? Is it true?

The roots of this accusation go back a long way. John Chrysostom, considered a saint and church father who lived in the 4th century, wrote:

The Jews are the most worthless of all men. They are lecherous, greedy and rapacious. They are perfidious murderers of Christ. The Jews are the odious assassins of Christ and for killing God there is no expiation possible, no indulgence or pardon. Christians may never cease vengeance and the Jews must live in servitude forever. God always hated the Jews. It is incumbent upon Christians to hate Jews.

When Constantine established Christianity (and a false Sabbath) as the official religion of the Roman Empire in 312, he issued many anti-Jewish laws. Jews were forbidden to accept converts, while every enticement was used to make them forsake Judaism. At the Council of Nicea in 325, he said, “It is right to demand what our reason approves and that we should have nothing in common with the Jews.”

As Christianity in its Roman Catholic distortion became the dominant religion of Europe, those who rejected it became known as anti-Christ. The main group of rejecters was the Jewish people who therefore were considered by the church to be the “anti-Christ” suffering continual persecution. In Spain in 613, all Jews who refused to be baptized had to leave the country. A few years later the remaining Jews were dispossessed and given to wealthy “pious” Christians as slaves.

The first Crusade in 1096 saw fierce persecution of Jewish communities as the Crusaders began their journeys to the “Holy Land” to “liberate” it from the Muslims. They said, “We are going to fight Christ’s enemies in Palestine (i.e. the Muslims), but should we forget his enemies in our midst (i.e. the Jews)?” 12,000 Jews were killed in the cities along the River Rhine alone. When the Crusaders captured Jerusalem in 1099, they massacred all the Jews and Muslims they could find. And they did this in the name of Christ.

In 1215, Pope Innocent III (who was anything but innocent) condemned the Jews to eternal slavery by decreeing:

The Jews against whom the blood of Jesus Christ calls out, although they ought not to be killed, lest the Christian people forget the Divine Law, yet as wanderers ought they remain upon the earth until their countenance be filled with shame. (Epistle to the Count of Nevers)

The first ritual murder charge against the Jewish community was in Norwich in 1144 when the Jews were accused of killing a Christian child at Passover time to drain his blood in order to make Passover matzos. This hideous charge has resurfaced time and again, most recently in the Muslim world, leading to massacres of the Jews. In 1290, King Edward I expelled all Jews from England.

In 1478, the Spanish Inquisition was directed against heretics—Jews and non-Catholic Christians. In 1492, Jews were given the choice of forced baptism or expulsion from Spain. 300,000 left penniless.

Martin Luther hoped initially he would attract Jews to his Protestant faith, understanding that they could not accept the superstitions and persecutions of Rome. But when they rejected his attempts to convert them, he turned on them and uttered these words, words used by the Nazis in their propaganda:

What shall we Christians do with this damned, rejected race of the Jews? First their synagogues should be set on fire. Secondly their homes should likewise be broken down and destroyed. Thirdly they should be deprived of their prayer books and Talmuds. Fourthly their rabbis must be forbidden under threat of death to teach any more. Fifthly passport and traveling privileges should be absolutely forbidden to the Jews. Sixthly they ought to be stopped from usury. Seventhly let the young and strong Jews and Jewesses be given the flail, the axe, the spade, the distaff, and spindle and let them earn their bread by the sweat of their noses. To sum up, dear princes and nobles who have Jews in your domains, if this advice of mine does not suit you, then find a better one, so that you and we may all be free of this insufferable devilish burden—the Jews.

In the late 19th century, the Russian Orthodox Church instigated violent attacks on Jewish communities of the kind portrayed in the film Fiddler on the Roof. They devised a solution to the “Jewish problem”—one third extermination, one third forcible conversion to Christianity, and one third expulsion.

Russian anti-Semites produced the pamphlet, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion alleging a Jewish conspiracy to take over the world. This was regarded as a proven fact by Nazi Germany and was part of their propaganda effort to condition people for the “Final Solution,” the extermination of six million European Jews in the ovens of the Holocaust. Today the same story is being peddled in the Muslim world to whip up hatred for Israel and the Jewish people. It doesn’t take much effort.

This brief history of Jewish suffering shows that much of it has been instigated by people who claimed to be Christians. The main accusation that has been brought against the Jewish people by the professing church is that “the Jews killed Jesus.”

Many of the Jews brought this upon themselves in Matthew 27:25, as the mob said “Give us Barabbas, and may His (Jesus’) blood be upon us and our children.”

But Jesus Himself prayed from the cross, “Father forgive them; for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34), thus expressing God’s will that even those responsible for the death of Jesus, whether Jewish or Gentile, should find forgiveness through His name.

Peter did place human responsibility for the death of Jesus on those who had called for Him to be crucified:

The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified his Son Jesus; whom ye delivered up, and denied him in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go. But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you; And killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof we are witnesses (Acts 3:13-15).

This was not to say that every Jew alive was responsible, because Peter himself was Jewish as were all the followers of Jesus at that time. It was certainly not to say that subsequent generations of Jews who had no connection with the decision to call for Jesus’ death were responsible. It was to say that there were people actually listening to Peter speak at that very moment, who were complicit on that fateful day. They were in the mob (Matthew 27:25).

But even to them there was a message of hope and forgiveness. Peter said:

And now, brethren, I know that through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers. But those things, which God before had shewed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath so fulfilled. Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out (Acts 3:17-19).

The people who called for the death of Jesus were partially responsible for the miscarriage of justice that took place. However, they were ignorant of the spiritual meaning of it, hence Jesus’ words, “They know not what they do.” The purpose of the preaching of the Apostles was to tell them why Jesus died and rose again and to show them how they too could find forgiveness and eternal salvation by repenting of their sin and believing in His name.

While it is true that the religious leaders of the day opposed Jesus, as they did the prophets before Him, it is also true that many of the Jews believed in and accepted Jesus as their Savior (Acts 4:4; 8:5-6; 17:2; 11:21; John 12:11). The Apostles were all Jews, converted to Jesus, save one (Judas).

Jesus lays down His own life

In John’s Gospel, Jesus makes an interesting statement about His death:

Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father (John 10:17-18).

The implication of this is clear. Jesus Himself takes responsibility for His own death. It happens at the time and manner of His Father’s choosing, in order that He might fulfill the Father’s will by dying as the sacrifice for the sins of the world and rising again from the dead to give eternal life to those who receive Him. No human being, Jewish or Gentile, has the right or the power to take Jesus’ life from Him against His will, according to this verse.

This fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah 53, which states concerning the sufferings of the Messiah, “It pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief” (Isaiah 53:10).

The Gospels take up this idea as we see Jesus submitting Himself to the will of God in order to redeem the world. His prayer in Gethsemane:

O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt (Matthew 26:39).

“This cup” refers to the second death, the ultimate reward of unrighteousness. It was necessary for Him to go through this suffering in order that He might be “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

It was God’s will that the plan of Salvation be fulfilled according to Jesus’ offer to lay down His life for the salvation of humanity (Psalm 40:6-17).

Both Jews and Gentiles had to make a choice, whether to believe in the salvation offered by the Messiah or to reject it. Of course, many Jewish people did reject the apostles’ message, exactly as happens when the same message is presented to people around the world, to whichever race they belong. There was a division among the Jews of Jesus’ day about Him between those who were for Him and those who were against Him. This same division takes place today among all people of the world wherever the Gospel is preached.

The verse that tells us who was responsible for the death of Jesus is found in Acts 4:24-28:

“The apostles lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is: Who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen rage, and the people imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ. For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together, to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.”