Ib. [p. 871.] Luke ill. 1.  “Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Juries, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests, the word of God came unto John.”  There is a passage in Josephus very nearly parallel to this, and which may at least serve to vindicate the evangelist from objection, with respect to his giving the title of high priest specifically to two persons at the same time:  “Quadratus sent two others of the most powerful men of the Jews, as also the high priests Jonathan and Ananias.” (De Bell. lib. ix. c. 12, sect. 6.) That Annas was a person in an eminent station, and possessed an authority coordinate with, or next to, that of the high print properly so called, may he inferred from Saint John’s Gospel, which in the history of Christ’s crucifixion relates that “the soldiers led him away to Annas first.” (xviii.13.) And this might be noticed as an example of undesigned coincidence in the two evangelists.

Again, [p. 870.] Acts iv. 6.  Annas is called the high priest, though Caiaphas was in the office of the high priesthood.  In like manner in Josephus, (Lib. ii. c. 20, sect. 3.) “Joseph the son of Gorion, and the high priest Ananus, were chosen to be supreme governors of all things in the city.”  Yet Ananus, though here called the high priest Ananus, was not then in the office of the high priesthood.  The truth is, there is an indeterminateness in the use of this title in the Gospel:(Mark xiv. 53.) sometimes it is applied exclusively to the person who held the office at the time; sometimes to one or two more, who probably shared with him some of the powers or functions of the office; and sometimes to such of the priests as were eminent by their station or character; and there is the very same indeterminateness in Josephus.

XXIV. [p. 347.] John xix. 19, 20.  “And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross.”  That such was the custom of the Romans on these occasions appears from passages of Suetonius and Dio Cassius:  “Pattrem familias—­canibus objecit, cure hoc titulo, Impie locutus parmularius.”  Suet.  Domit. cap. x.  And in Dio Cassius we have the following:  “Having led him through the midst of the court or assembly, with a writing signifying the cause of his death, and afterwards crucifying him.”  Book liv.

Ib.  “And it was written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin.”  That it was also usual about this time in Jerusalem to set up advertisements in different languages, is gathered from the account which Josephus gives of an expostulatory message from Titus to the Jews when the city was almost in his hands; in which he says, Did ye not erect pillars with inscriptions on them, in the Greek and in our language, “Let no one pass beyond these bounds”?

XXV. [p. 352.] Matt. xxvii. 26.  “When he had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified.”

The following passages occur in Josephus: