CHAPTER III.

_THE DAY OF QUESTIONS――THE ENQUIRING GREEKS._ A.D. 30.

THUS far the efforts of the ruling powers had been of no avail. The authority of the Lord with the people remained unshaken, His career was unchecked, and they themselves had been humiliated in the very midst of the Temple-courts[460]. A formal council was therefore held (Mtt. xxii. 15), and it was resolved to organize some plan for _ensnaring_ Him in His speech (Mtt. xxii. 15; Mk. xii. 13), and beguiling Him into statements which might afford a pretext for delivering Him up to the Roman procurator (Lk. xx. 20). United, therefore, in one formidable conspiracy, the Pharisees[461], Sadducees[461], and Herodians[461], suborned (Lk. xx. 20) men, to all appearance right-minded and thoroughly in earnest, to propose various cases of conscience to Him as the Lord and Judge in the land[462].