Brooklyn Museum - Pilate Washes His Hands (Pilate se lave les mains) - James Tissot

The term "blood curse" refers to a

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chri ...

passage from the

Gospel of Matthew The Gospel of Matthew), or simply Matthew. It is most commonly abbreviated as "Matt." is the first book of the New Testament of the Bible and one of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells how Israel's Messiah, Jesus, comes to his people and form ...

, which describes events taking place in

Pilate's court In the canonical gospels, Pilate's court refers to the trial of Jesus in praetorium before Pontius Pilate, preceded by the Sanhedrin Trial. In the Gospel of Luke, Pilate finds that Jesus, being from Galilee, belonged to Herod Antipas' jurisdi ...

before the

crucifixion of Jesus The crucifixion and death of Jesus occurred in 1st-century Judea, most likely in AD 30 or AD 33. It is described in the four canonical gospels, referred to in the New Testament epistles, attested to by other ancient sources, and consid ...

and specifically the apparent willingness of the Jewish crowd to accept liability for Jesus' death.''The Historical Jesus Through Catholic and Jewish Eyes''. Bryan F. Le Beau, Leonard J. Greenspoon and Dennis Hamm, eds. Trinity Press International, 2000. pp. 105-106.

Biblical narrative

reads:

Interpretation

This passage has no counterpart in the other Gospels and is probably related to the

destruction of Jerusalem The siege of Jerusalem of 70 CE was the decisive event of the First Jewish–Roman War (66–73 CE), in which the Roman army led by future emperor Titus besieged Jerusalem, the center of Jewish rebel resistance in the Roman province of Jud ...

in the year 70 CE. German Protestant theologian

Ulrich Luz Ulrich Luz (23 February 1938 – 13 October 2019) was a Swiss theologian and professor emeritus at the University of Bern. Early life He was born on 23 February 1938 in Männedorf. He studied Protestant theology in Zurich, Göttingen and Basel u ...

(b. 1938) describes it as "redactional fiction" invented by the author of the Matthew Gospel. Some writers, viewing it as part of Matthew's anti-Jewish polemic, see in it the seeds of later

Christian antisemitism Antisemitism in Christianity, a form of religious antisemitism, is the feeling of hostility which some Christian Churches, Christian groups, and ordinary Christians have towards the Jewish religion and the Jewish people. Antisemitic Christian rh ...

. In the view of the late Graham Stanton, a British New Testament scholar in the Reformed tradition, "Matthew's anti-Jewish polemic should be seen as part of the self-definition of the Christian minority which is acutely aware of the rejection and hostility of its 'mother' Judaism." Howard Clark Kee has written, "The bitter words he atthewattributes to the Jews have caused endless harm in arrousing anti-Jewish emotions." Donald A. Hagner, a Presbyterian New Testament scholar and theologian, has written, "It cannot be denied that this statement, unfortunately, has been used to promote anti-Semitism. The statement is formulaic, and the reference to 'our children' does not make them guilty of the death of Jesus, let alone children or Jews of later generations."

Anglican views

N. T. Wright Nicholas Thomas Wright (born 1 December 1948), known as N. T. Wright or Tom Wright, is an English New Testament scholar, Pauline theologian and Anglican bishop. He was the bishop of Durham from 2003 to 2010. He then became research profe ...

, an Anglican New Testament scholar and theologian, has stated, "The tragic and horrible later use of Matthew 27.25 ('his blood be on us, and on our children') as an excuse for ''soi-disant'' 'Christian' anti-semitism is a gross distortion of its original meaning, where the reference is surely to the fall of Jerusalem." Anglican theologian

Rowan Williams Rowan Douglas Williams, Baron Williams of Oystermouth, (born 14 June 1950) is a Welsh Anglican bishop, theologian and poet. He was the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury, a position he held from December 2002 to December 2012. Previously the Bish ...

, then

Archbishop of Wales The post of Archbishop of Wales was created in 1920 when the Church in Wales was separated from the Church of England and disestablished. The four historic Welsh dioceses had previously formed part of the Province of Canterbury, and so came unde ...

, and who would soon become Archbishop of Canterbury, has written of Matthew's Gospel being made "the tool of the most corrupt and murderous misreading of the passion stories that has disfigured the Church's record".

Catholic views

In the catechism which was produced by the

Council of Trent The Council of Trent ( la, Concilium Tridentinum), held between 1545 and 1563 in Trent (or Trento), now in northern Italy, was the 19th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. Prompted by the Protestant Reformation, it has been described a ...

in the mid-16th century, the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

taught the belief that the collectivity of sinful humanity was responsible for the death of Jesus, not only the Jews. In the

Second Vatican Council The Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the , or , was the 21st ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church. The council met in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome for four periods (or sessions), each lasting between 8 and ...

(1962–1965), the Catholic Church under

Pope Paul VI Pope Paul VI ( la, Paulus VI; it, Paolo VI; born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini, ; 26 September 18976 August 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 21 June 1963 to his death in Augus ...

issued the declaration ''

Nostra aetate (from Latin: "In our time") is the incipit of the Declaration on the Relation of the Church with Non-Christian Religions of the Second Vatican Council. Passed by a vote of 2,221 to 88 of the assembled bishops, this declaration was promulgated ...

'' that repudiated the idea of a collective, multigenerational Jewish guilt for the crucifixion of Jesus. It declared that the accusation could not be made "against all the Jews, without distinction, then alive, nor against the Jews of today".

Pope Benedict XVI Pope Benedict XVI ( la, Benedictus XVI; it, Benedetto XVI; german: link=no, Benedikt XVI.; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, , on 16 April 1927) is a retired prelate of the Catholic church who served as the head of the Church and the soverei ...

in his 2011 book '' Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week'' wrote:

Chrysostom

St. John Chrysostom John Chrysostom (; gr, Ἰωάννης ὁ Χρυσόστομος; 14 September 407) was an important Early Church Father who served as archbishop of Constantinople. He is known for his preaching and public speaking, his denunciation of ...

delivered a series of eight homilies to his Antioch congregation directed at members who continued to observe Jewish feasts and fasts. Critical of this, he cast Judaism and the synagogues in his city in a critical and negative light. His homilies were expressed in the conventional polemical form. As quoted by

St. Thomas Aquinas Thomas Aquinas, OP (; it, Tommaso d'Aquino, lit=Thomas of Aquino; 1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest who was an influential philosopher, theologian and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism; he is known ...

in his ''Catena Aurea'' (1263), Chrysostom said: Historian Paul Johnson said that Chrysostom's homilies "became the pattern for anti-Jewish tirades, making the fullest possible use (and misuse) of key passages in the gospels of Saints Matthew and John." Johnson, Paul, ''A History of the Jews'', (HarperPerennial: 1988), p. 165.

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