And they had then a notable prisoner,.... The Vulgate Latin reads, "he had"; that is, Pilate, who had committed him to prison, and under whose power he was: for the Jews had lost all authority of this kind, at least in capital cases. This prisoner is called a "notable" one; that is, a famous, or rather an infamous one: he was a thief, and a robber, and had been guilty of sedition; had made, or joined with others in an insurrection, and had committed murder in it; and so, on more accounts than one, was deserving of death: nor could it be otherwise expected by himself, or others, but that he should die: his name was
called Barabbas; that is, as the Syriac version reads it, בר אבא, which signifies "the son of a father": a father's child that was spoiled and ruined, and a child of his father the devil. This was a name common among the Jews. Frequent mention is made of R. Abba h, and Bar Abba is the son of Abba: hence we read of Abba Bar Abba i, and of R. Samuel Bar Abba k and of R. Simeon Bar Abba l, and of R. Chijah Bar Abba m. In Munster's Hebrew Gospel it is read רבה
בר, "Bar Rabbah, the son of a master"; and so Jerom says, that in the Gospel according to the Hebrews it is interpreted, "the son of their master"; but the former is the right name, and the true sense of the word. The Ethiopic version adds, "the prince", or "chief of robbers, and all knew him"; and the Arabic, instead of a "prisoner", reads, a "thief", as he was.
h Juchasin, fol. 70. 1, &c. i T. Bab. Beracot, fol. 18. 2. & Hieros Pesachim, fol. 32. 1. & Juchasin, fol. 104. 1. k T. Hieros. Pesachim, fol. 32. 1. l T. Hieros. Succa, fol. 53. 3. Juchasin, fol. 105. 1. m T. Hieros. Succa, fol, 55. 3. Juchasin, fol. 91. 2.