The most striking difference between the two gospel passages is the fact that in Mark’s passage Pilate was “wishing to satisfy the crowd” whereas in John’s version there is no such mention that Pilate wanted to satisfy the crowd. This is an interesting point because, at that point in time, what Roman authority would be willing to show such indecision as to compromise his power? In John’s text, Pilate has simply made a decision to hand over Jesus to them to be crucified. In context this would seem to mean “handed him over to the chief priests.” Luke 23:25 has a similar ambiguity. There is a polemic tendency in the gospels to place the guilt of the crucifixion on the Jewish authorities and to exonerate the Romans from blame. But John later mentions the Roman soldiers, and it was to these soldiers that Pilate handed Jesus over.

There are some political issues that can be raised based on this analysis. First of all, the release of Barabbas has many implicit political undertones. Pilate’s power may be in question if he were to go against the crowd’s wish to crucify Jesus. If he were to release Jesus the crowd would turn into a mob and enact a riot, possibly starting a coup d'état. This would seriously affect Pilate’s standing in the Roman government and could eventually lead to the stripping of his governance. If Pilate were to concur with the Jewish crowd they would no doubt hold him in high regards for the rest of his reign over the area. This, however, could be seen as an act of cowardice by a high ranking official with the Roman government and ultimately lead to his expulsion from office. It seems as though this is a no-win situation, except for Barabbas, and in due course the Jewish people will get what is coming to them.

In these short passages there is a third difference between Mark and John. Nowhere in John’s passion narrative does it specifically state Pilate releasing Barabbas. It is implied, however, in John that Barabbas was to be released but this is unique in that John uses misunderstanding and irony to bring forth the narrative and uses symbols to relay the author’s message to the implied reader. This ties into the first difference between the two passages where Pilate wants to satisfy the crowd beca

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