Paragraph 14:55–59

The chief priests and other leaders wanted to find witnesses who would testify that Jesus had disobeyed the law in a serious way. This testimony would give the leaders a reason to say that Jesus should be killed as a criminal. Jewish law required that at least two witnesses must accuse a person of doing the same offense. Only then could he be put to death. But the Jewish leaders were not able to find two witnesses who accused Jesus of exactly the same offense.

14:55a

The previous verse takes place in the courtyard. It focuses on what Peter was doing. Here in 14:55 the focus changes back to the Jewish leaders inside the high priest’s house (14:53). Indicate this change of focus in a way that is natural in your language. In some languages it may be helpful to specifically indicate the change. For example:

As for the chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin, they were looking…
-or-
Meanwhile, inside the high priest’s house, the chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were looking…

Now the chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin: The whole Sanhedrin included the chief priests, the elders, and the scribes. These three groups were all mentioned in 14:53b (see the note there). Here the chief priests were probably mentioned separately because they led the trial.

chief priests: This is the same term as in 14:53b. Translate it here as you did there.

the whole Sanhedrin: In this context the whole Sanhedrin refers to all the members of the council who were present at Jesus’ trial. The chief priests have already been mentioned specifically. Because of this, it may be more natural in some languages to say “and all the other members of the Sanhedrin.”

Sanhedrin: The word Sanhedrin is a Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible has borrowed. It means “council” and refers to the Jewish court with the highest authority over their people.

Here are some other ways to translate Sanhedrin:

council (Revised Standard Version, Good News Bible)
-or-
Jewish council (New Century Version)
-or-
highest group of Jewish leaders

14:55b

were seeking testimony against Jesus:

The clause
were seeking testimony against Jesus shows that the Council thought Jesus was guilty of doing things that they thought he should die for. They had already decided that they wanted the death penalty for Jesus. According to the normal practice of the Council, this hearing was unfair. Normally the Council would first listen to the witnesses before they made a decision.) The phrase were seeking testimony against Jesus indicates that the council members were trying to find people who would say that Jesus had disobeyed the law.

testimony against Jesus: The phrase testimony against Jesus refers to the testimony that witnesses would give about Jesus. The council members wanted witnesses to say that Jesus had broken the law in a serious way.

Here are some other ways to translate this:

tried to find some evidence against Jesus (Good News Bible)
-or-
were trying to find witnesses who would testify against Jesus (New Living Translation, 1996 edition)
-or-
searched for people who would say how Jesus had disobeyed the law

testimony: The word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as testimony is a legal term. It refers to a statement that a witness gives about a crime.

14:55c

to put Him to death: This clause indicates the purpose for the testimony mentioned in 14:55b. The testimony of the witnesses would give the leaders a reason to say that Jesus should be killed as a criminal.

Because the Jews were ruled by the Romans, the Jewish council did not have the authority to put someone to death. They would need to convince the Roman authorities to agree with their decision to condemn Jesus to be killed. In some languages you may need to imply this in some way. For example:

so that they could cause him to be put to death
-or-
evidence…that would warrant a death sentence (Revised English Bible)

General Comment on 14:55a–c

In some languages it may be clearer to reorder 14:55a–c. For example:

55aThe chief priests and the whole Jewish council 55cwanted the Roman authorities to put Jesus to death. 55bSo they tried to find evidence that he had violated the law.

14:55d

but they did not find any: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as but they did not find any indicates that the leaders did not hear any evidence that Jesus had done anything wrong. None of the testimony that the leaders heard proved that Jesus had broken the law. In some languages it may be necessary to make this meaning more explicit. For example:

but they did not find any true/convincing evidence against Jesus
-or-
but they did not get/hear any adequate testimony against him

© 2008 by SIL International®

Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0

All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.