47
So the head cohanim and the P'rushim called a meeting of the Sanhedrin and said, "What are we going to do? -- for this man is performing many miracles.
48
If we let him keep going on this way, everyone will trust in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both the Temple and the nation."
49
But one of them, Kayafa, who was cohen gadol that year, said to them, "You people don't know anything!
50
You don't see that it's better for you if one man dies on behalf of the people, so that the whole nation won't be destroyed."
51
Now he didn't speak this way on his own initiative; rather, since he was cohen gadol that year, he was prophesying that Yeshua was about to die on behalf of the nation,
52
and not for the nation alone, but so that he might gather into one the scattered children of God.
53
From that day on, they made plans to have him put to death.
54
Therefore Yeshua no longer walked around openly among the Judeans but went away from there into the region near the desert, to a town called Efrayim, and stayed there with his talmidim.
55
The Judean festival of Pesach was near, and many people went up from the country to Yerushalayim to perform the purification ceremony prior to Pesach.
56
They were looking for Yeshua, and as they stood in the Temple courts they said to each other, "What do you think? that he simply won't come to the festival?"
57
Moreover, the head cohanim and the P'rushim had given orders that anyone knowing Yeshua's whereabouts should inform them, so that they could have him arrested.