Innocent Blood Traditions in Early Judaism and the Death of Jesus in Matthew

How does Matthew’s use of the “innocent blood” motif illuminate the vexed question of the gospel’s attitude to Israel (the theological question) and its relation to contemporary Judaism (the socio-historical question)? Matt 27:25 plays a key role in the debate; it yields in current scholarship two opposite readings, one describing God’s final rejection of Israel and one describing God’s redemption of Israel, both in the blood of the son. This study agrees that 27:25 is central but argues that the opposing readings point to the lack of an appropriate control. That control may be found in two parts: first in the literary logic of the gospel in which 27:25 forms part of a central narrative sequence, the theme of innocent blood, and secondly in the relation of the innocent blood theme to two distinct traditions of interpretation, one found in Second Temple literature and the other in rabbinic literature. These traditions reflect on the problem of blood and its consequence for the land through the lens of two different scriptural stories: the story of Cain’s bloodshed and the flood in Genesis 3-6, and the story of the blood of Zechariah in 2 Chronicles 24; they show significant concinnities with Matthew’s theme of innocent blood. To trace these traditions is to discover a vision reflecting, in the wake of exile, on the fate of the holy city and its people through a scriptural history of blood poured out upon the ground and its consequence both for devastation and for new life. In this context, Matt 27:25 and the theme of innocent blood reveal a thoroughly Jewish way of reading scripture that finds in the stories of the faith the key to the logic of history, and in the fate of the people a divine purpose embracing both judgement and hope.