Luke 22:56 - Printer Friendly

ESV: Then a servant girl, seeing him as he sat in the light and looking closely at him, said, “This man also was with him.”

NIV: A servant girl saw him seated there in the firelight. She looked closely at him and said, 'This man was with him.'

NASB: And a slave woman, seeing him as he sat in the firelight, and staring at him, said, 'This man was with Him as well.'

CSB: When a servant saw him sitting in the light, and looked closely at him, she said, "This man was with him too."

NLT: A servant girl noticed him in the firelight and began staring at him. Finally she said, 'This man was one of Jesus’ followers!'

KJV: But a certain maid beheld him as he sat by the fire, and earnestly looked upon him, and said, This man was also with him.

NKJV: And a certain servant girl, seeing him as he sat by the fire, looked intently at him and said, “This man was also with Him.”

Inside the estate of the high priest Caiaphas, an illegal court is challenging Jesus. Soon they will start beating Him. Peter, in the courtyard outside, has his own problems. He followed the mob that arrested Jesus when John, who knows the high priest, got him in (John 18:15–16). What does he do now? He can't rescue Jesus. He sits by the fire and tries to avoid attention.

The sequence of events seems straightforward when reading the Synoptic Gospels; John, who was there in person, adds more detail. The guards don't take Jesus to Caiaphas's house first; they take Him to Annas. Annas is a former high priest who holds so much influence he manages to get his sons and his son-in-law—Caiaphas—appointed as high priest after him. Annas is referred to as a "chief priest": a role not established by the Old Testament. It seems to refer to priests who have a particular amount of power and influence.

John asks a servant girl at Annas's house to let Peter in (John 18:16). This girl is the first to accuse Peter of being Jesus' disciples (John 18:17). We don't know if the girl to whom Luke is referring here is the same one from Annas's gate or another servant girl. Some scholars think Annas and Caiaphas lived next door to each other with an open gate between their estates; the girl could have followed Peter from Annas's gate to Caiaphas's courtyard.

The other theory is that when Jesus prophesied that Peter would deny Him three times (Luke 22:34), He didn't count the first time at Annas's gate since it didn't happen near the larger gathering of Sanhedrin members at Caiaphas's. We don't know why the girl recognizes that Peter knows Jesus. It may be because she knows John and John asked her to let Peter in. Or it may be that his accent gives him away as a Galilean (Matthew 26:73).

Luke 22:54–62 begins the account of Jesus' trials before the religious leaders. These continue through the end of the chapter (Luke 22:71). Peter tried to physically defend Jesus (Luke 22:49–50). Now, he stands next to a relative of the man he maimed (John 18:26). Matthew 26:58, 69–75, Mark 14:54, 66–72, and John 18:15–18, 25–27 heighten the tension by going back and forth between the religious authorities' attempts to destroy Jesus by getting Him to admit He is the Messiah and Peter's attempts to save himself by denying he follows Jesus.

Luke 22 is a long chapter which records events leading to Jesus' political trials and crucifixion. He has successfully taught crowds at the temple and proved His authority over the religious leaders (Luke 19:47—20). Meanwhile the leaders have spent the week planning to arrest Jesus and have Him killed (Luke 19:47–48). This chapter records the Last Supper, the arrest on the Mount of Olives, and the trials before the Jewish religious leaders. Matthew 26, Mark 14, and John 18 cover much of the same information.

Luke 23 continues Jesus' trials before Pilate and Herod Antipas. He is then led to the cross where He forgives His murderers and saves a thief before He dies. In Luke 24, Jesus rises from the dead, meets two disciples while they travel, and explains to them how the Old Testament prophesied the death of the Messiah. In the final scene of the gospel, Jesus is reunited with His disciples, blesses them, and ascends into heaven.

Luke was a traveling companion of Paul (Acts 16:10) and a physician (Colossians 4:14). Unlike Matthew, Mark, and John, Luke writes his gospel as an historian, rather than as a first-hand eyewitness. His extensive writings also include the book of Acts (Acts 1:1–3). These are deliberately organized, carefully researched accounts of those events. The gospel of Luke focuses on the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ. Luke's Gentile perspective presents Christ as a Savior for all people, offering both forgiveness and direction to those who follow Him.