Luke 13:1 - Meaning and Application

Here we have news brought to Christ about the death of some Galileans, whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices (Luke 13:1). The story is brief, and no ancient historian records it in this exact form. Pilate was the Roman governor, and this was a brutal act of power, done in the very temple court.

The exact case is not clear, but the point is plain. Some think these Galileans belonged to the party of Judas of Galilee, who resisted Caesar’s rule (Acts 5:37). Others think Pilate only suspected them of that group and killed them harshly because he could not reach the real rebels. Since they were Galileans, Herod’s subjects, this insult may have helped stir up the later quarrel between Herod and Pilate (Luke 23:12).

What makes the event worse is where it happened, among their sacrifices. They may have been offering the sacrifices themselves, since that part of the work was sometimes started before the priest took over. In any case, the place and the duty gave them no protection. Even the altar, which should have been a place of safety, became a place of danger and death.

These people may have heard of the event and simply told it to Jesus as sad news. If so, they likely expected him to mourn with them, since the Galileans were their countrymen. We should also pay attention to sad events and share them rightly, so that they move both others and us to sober thought.

It may also have been told to support what Jesus had just said about making peace with God before death comes. In that sense, the report gave a fresh example of people being suddenly taken away. Events like this help explain God’s word and press it on our hearts.

Perhaps they also hoped to stir Jesus, who was from Galilee, to seek revenge on Pilate through Herod or some other way. If so, they were completely mistaken. Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem to be handed over to Pilate himself, and his blood would be poured out as a sacrifice.

There may have been another motive too. They may have been trying to warn Jesus away from Jerusalem, fearing Pilate might do the same to him. They may even have thought Pilate would accuse these Galileans, as he might accuse Jesus later, of coming to worship while secretly planning rebellion. So they may have urged him to stay away for the moment.

Jesus’ answer shows that they spoke with a spiteful meaning. They seemed to suggest that, although Pilate was unjust, these men must have been bad in secret, or God would not have allowed such a death. That is a cruel judgment. Rather than admit they could be treated as martyrs, even while dying at worship, people often imagine they must have been greater sinners than others, especially if they are not from their own group.

Jesus then answered with another story of sudden death, which worked much the same way. The tower of Siloam had fallen and killed eighteen people, burying them in the ruins. However it happened, it was another tragic reminder that people can be taken suddenly, just as birds are caught in a snare when trouble comes unexpectedly (Ecclesiastes 9:12).

Jesus warned his listeners not to draw the wrong lesson from these events. They must not suppose that such sufferers were worse sinners than everyone else. “Do you think these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no” (Luke 13:2-3). Calamities do not let us rank people’s guilt by the size of their suffering.

He also likely answered in a way that turned their judgment back on them. If they were eager to criticize the Galileans, he reminded them of another sudden death closer to home, the men killed at Siloam. What we give out in this kind of judgment often comes back to us.

“Do you think those eighteen people on whom the tower of Siloam fell were worse debtors to divine justice than all the other people in Jerusalem? I tell you, no.” We must hold to this rule, whether it helps us or hurts us, that we cannot judge a person’s sin by his suffering in this world. Many are thrown into the furnace like gold, to be refined, not like dross and chaff to be destroyed.

So we should not be harsh in judging those who suffer more than their neighbors, as Job’s friends were with him. If we do, we may end up condemning “the generation of the righteous” (Psalm 72:14). If we are going to judge at all, we have enough to do by judging ourselves. In truth, we cannot tell love or hatred from all that happens before us, because “all things come alike to all” (Ecclesiastes 9:1-2).

We might just as reasonably say that oppressors, even Pilate, the Roman governor, are the holiest people, since they seem to have power and success. In the same way, we could say that the oppressed, including those Galileans, who are full of grief and have no comforter, are the greatest sinners. Even the priests and Levites, who served at the altar, did not comfort them. So in judging others, let us do to them as we would want them to do to us, because as we judge, we will be judged. “Do not judge, so that you will not be judged” (Matthew 7:1).

From these stories, Christ drew a call to repentance, adding this warning to each one: “Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3-5). This means, first, that we all deserve to perish as much as they did. If God had dealt with us according to our sins, even according to the sin in our holy things, our blood would long ago have been mixed with our sacrifices by God’s justice.

This should make us less severe in judging others, not only because we are sinners, but because we are as great sinners as they are. We have as much sin to repent of as they had to suffer for. It also means that we all must repent. We must be sorry for what we have done wrong and stop doing it. God’s judgments on others are loud calls for us to repent. Christ used every event to press this great duty on us. He came not only to make room for repentance and give hope, but also to command it.

It also means that repentance is the way to escape destruction, and it is a sure way. Iniquity will not ruin you, but only on this condition. If we do not repent, we will surely perish, just as others have perished before us. Some give special weight to the word “likewise,” and take it as a warning of the destruction that was coming on the Jewish people, especially Jerusalem, which the Romans destroyed at Passover. Then, like the Galileans, their blood was mixed with their sacrifices. Many in Jerusalem and elsewhere were also killed when walls and buildings fell on them, as those who died under the tower of Siloam did.

Still, the warning reaches farther than that. Unless we repent, we will perish forever, just as they perished out of this world. The same Jesus who calls us to repent because the kingdom of heaven is near also calls us to repent because otherwise we will perish. He has set life and death, good and evil, before us and left the choice to us.

Finally, the death of those who have been harsh and severe in judging others will be especially terrible if they die without repentance.