John 18:1–14

Jesus Is Betrayed and Arrested

After saying these things, Jesus crossed the Kidron Valley with his disciples and entered a grove of olive trees. ²Judas, the betrayer, knew this place, because Jesus had often gone there with his disciples. ³The leading priests and Pharisees had given Judas a contingent of Roman soldiers and Temple guards to accompany him. Now with blazing torches, lanterns, and weapons, they arrived at the olive grove.

⁴Jesus fully realized all that was going to happen to him, so he stepped forward to meet them. “Who are you looking for?” he asked.

⁵“Jesus the Nazarene,” they replied.

“I Am he,” Jesus said. (Judas, who betrayed him, was standing with them.) ⁶As Jesus said “I Am he,” they all drew back and fell to the ground! ⁷Once more he asked them, “Who are you looking for?”

And again they replied, “Jesus the Nazarene.”

⁸“I told you that I Am he,” Jesus said. “And since I am the one you want, let these others go.” ⁹He did this to fulfill his own statement: “I did not lose a single one of those you have given me.”

¹⁰Then Simon Peter drew a sword and slashed off the right ear of Malchus, the high priest’s slave. ¹¹But Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword back into its sheath. Shall I not drink from the cup of suffering the Father has given me?”

Jesus at the High Priest’s House

¹²So the soldiers, their commanding officer, and the Temple guards arrested Jesus and tied him up. ¹³First they took him to Annas, since he was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, the high priest at that time. ¹⁴Caiaphas was the one who had told the other Jewish leaders, “It’s better that one man should die for the people.”