10. *Speakest thou not to me?* In the original the pronoun, standing at the head of the clause, is emphatic. Speakest thou not _to me_, the representative of Roman power, who have authority (ἐξουσίαν) to liberate or crucify thee? *Knowest thou not that I have power*, &c. The more probable order of the clauses is: “I have power to release thee, and I have power to crucify thee,” the motive of hope standing before that of fear. 11. Respondit Iesus: Non 11. Jesus answered: Thou haberes potestatem adversum me shouldest not have any power ullam, nisi tibi datum esset against me, unless it were desuper. Propterea qui me given thee from above. tradidit tibi, maius peccatum Therefore he that hath habet. delivered me to thee, hath the greater sin. 11. Pilate’s claim to unlimited power over Him makes Jesus again break silence. His words are an implicit admission that Pilate possesses power over Him, but at the same time a reminder that there was One greater than even a Roman governor, without whose permission Pilate could do nothing against Him. *Unless it were given thee from above.* From the original, in which we have ἦν δεδομένον, not ἦν δεδομένη (datum, not data), it is clear that the verb has not “power” for its subject, but is to be taken impersonally: Unless it were given thee from above _to have such power_. “From above” has been taken by some to refer to the Sanhedrim, as if Christ here referred to it as a higher tribunal than Pilate’s; but this view cannot be admitted. Not only is it opposed to the ordinary sense of ἄνωθεν (iii. 31; James i. 17; iii. 15, 17), but it would make our Lord say that Pilate had received his power from the Sanhedrim—a statement which would not be correct. “From above”, then, means: from heaven or from God. *Therefore he that hath delivered* (παραδούς, not παραδιδούς) *me to thee hath the greater sin*. Some, as Kuinoel, hold that διὰ τοῦτο is here merely a formula of transition (like the Hebrew לבן, Judg. viii. 7, &c.), of which no account is to be taken. The meaning is then sufficiently clear. But if, as most commentators take for granted, we are to give διὰ τοῦτο its ordinary inferential force, the connection is very obscure, and has been variously explained. (_a_) Some thus: Because you exercise your power _unwillingly_ therefore your sin is less than that of Caiphas and the Sanhedrim, who have delivered me to you, and are forcing you to condemn me. But it is rightly objected against this interpretation, that the word “unwillingly,” upon which it turns, is neither expressed nor suggested in the text.