is in Matt. 27:18. There are certain manuscripts which give Jesus as the first name of Barabbas. The RSV notes this reading, and both Moffatt and the NEB accept it as correct, so that the translation of that verse becomes: ‘Which would you like me to release to you—Jesus Bar-Abbas, or Jesus called Messiah?’ If that reading is correct, as it well may be, the choice before the mob is even more vivid and dramatic. By the second century the name Jesus was vanishing as an ordinary name. Amongst the Jews