IS "THOU HAST SAID" (SU EIPAS) AN AFFIRMATIVE ANSWER IN THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

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When the Jewish authorities asked Jesus in the Gospel of Mark if he the Messiah, the Son of the Beloved One, he answers "I am" (Ego eimi) (Mark 14:62). Historical Jesus scholar Marcus Borg, sought to soften this by translating Jesus' answer as question: "Am I?"*

The context itself, however, with Jesus' answer being regarded as a straightforward admission of "guilt," the High Priest's response of rending his garments, Jesus being immediately declared worthy of the death penalty, and so on, effectively rules out the possibility of Borg's being correct. Had Jesus really only said "Am I?" What should have followed would have been the High Priest's saying something like "Well, you tell us."

Yet when we come to Matthew, who most scholars believe used Mark as one of his sources, we find that he has Jesus answering not with "I am" (Ego eimi), but with "Thou hast said." [su eipas]. So the question is, is Matthew trying to soften Jesus' answer like Borg did? In short, did Jesus' answer still mean for Matthew, "Yes, I am"? 

The answer? Yes actually it did.

Earlier in Matthew (26:25) after he announces that one of the twelve is going to betray him, each of the disciples ask, "Is it I?" But when Judas Iscariot does the same, Jesus again answers him back: "Thou hast said" [su eipas].  In other words, "Yes, Judas, it is you."  These two instances of the use of su eipas are actually the only ones in twhe New Testament.

Two other indicators that su eipas was intended by Matthew as an affirmative response, rather than an equivocation, as Borg wanted to portray it, is that fact that, (1) as in Mark, the immediate reaction of the Jewish authorities indicates they took the words to bean admission of Jesus's guilt as a messianic pretender, and (2) Unlike Borg, Matthew clearly believed that Jesus not only claimed to be, but actually was, the Messiah of Israel. He says so in the very first verse of his Gospel: "The book of the genealogy of Jesus Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham."

_______ *Marcus J. Borg, Jesus, Uncovering the Life, Teachings and Relevence of a Religious Revolutionary (HarperSanFrancisco, 2006), 263. See also, Marcus J. Borg & John Dominic Crossan, The Last Week: A Day-by Day Account of Jesus’s Final Week in Jerusalem (HarperSanFransisco, 2006), 130-31



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