The Betrayal and Arrest of Jesus

183:0.1Af­ter Je­sus had fi­nally awak­ened Pe­ter, James, and John, he sug­gested that they go to their tents and seek sleep in prepa­ra­tion for the du­ties of the mor­row. But by this time the three apos­tles were wide awake; they had been re­freshed by their short naps, and be­sides, they were stim­u­lated and aroused by the ar­rival on the scene of two ex­cited mes­sen­gers who in­quired for David Zeb­e­dee and quickly went in quest of him when Pe­ter in­formed them where he kept watch.

183:0.2Al­though eight of the apos­tles were sound asleep, the Greeks who were en­camped along­side them were more fear­ful of trou­ble, so much so that they had posted a sen­tinel to give the alarm in case dan­ger should arise. When these two mes­sen­gers hur­ried into camp, the Greek sen­tinel pro­ceeded to arouse all of his fel­low coun­try­men, who streamed forth from their tents, fully dressed and fully armed. All the camp was now aroused ex­cept the eight apos­tles. Pe­ter de­sired to call his as­so­ciates, but Je­sus def­i­nitely for­bade him. The Mas­ter mildly ad­mon­ished them all to re­turn to their tents, but they were re­luc­tant to com­ply with his sug­ges­tion.

183:0.3Fail­ing to dis­perse his fol­low­ers, the Mas­ter left them and walked down to­ward the olive press near the en­trance to Geth­sem­ane Park. Al­though the three apos­tles, the Greeks, and the other mem­bers of the camp hes­i­tated im­me­di­ately to fol­low him, John Mark has­tened around through the olive trees and se­creted him­self in a small shed near the olive press. Je­sus with­drew from the camp and from his friends in or­der that his ap­pre­hend­ers, when they ar­rived, might ar­rest him with­out dis­turb­ing his apos­tles. The Mas­ter feared to have his apos­tles awake and pres­ent at the time of his ar­rest lest the spec­ta­cle of Ju­das’s be­tray­ing him should so arouse their an­i­mos­ity that they would of­fer re­sis­tance to the sol­diers and would be taken into cus­tody with him. He feared that, if they should be ar­rested with him, they might also per­ish with him.

183:0.4Though Je­sus knew that the plan for his death had its ori­gin in the coun­cils of the rulers of the Jews, he was also aware that all such ne­far­i­ous schemes had the full ap­proval of Lu­cifer, Sa­tan, and Cali­gas­tia. And he well knew that these rebels of the realms would also be pleased to see all of the apos­tles de­stroyed with him.

183:0.5Je­sus sat down, alone, on the olive press, where he awaited the com­ing of the be­trayer, and he was seen at this time only by John Mark and an in­nu­mer­able host of ce­les­tial ob­servers.