The high-priestly office constituted the most powerful religious, and one of the most powerful political, positions in Jewish Palestine; Caiaphas (high priest A.D. 18-36) retained it by giving the Romans what they wanted (E. Sanders 1993:265). That meant, of course, that threats to the political stability of Jerusalem would need to be dealt with swiftly and efficiently. And someone who caused a commotion in the temple in the dangerously crowded period just before Passover was clearly a threat to the public order. Although the plan to arrest Jesus away from the crowds was politically prudent, it was a stratagem of those who could not win by persuasion or demonstrations of God's power (21:46). When someone can win only by subterfuge and force, that person is not serving God—although, as here, God may well use such a one to execute his own purposes.