Hey Minimalist

[A Theist]

You're obviously well versed in history and I came across something when re-reading Luke that I found a bit odd. ...and not just the part about Mary's 10 year pregnancy that I posted on earlier.

Luke 23:12 And the same day Pilate and Herod were made friends together: for before they were at enmity between themselves.

So apparently the trial of Jesus brought them together. Is there anything from history that they had any enmity toward one other or that they later became friends?

Not that I'm questioning anything I read in Holey scripture, of course.

According to what's known of Pilate he was a vindictive and abrasive individual who had antagonized the Jews on a few occasions nearly causing an insurrection. He also offended the Jews again and was chastened by Tiberius when he placed gold coated shields dedicated to the Emperor in Herod's Palace. Evidently, there appears to have been some animosity there...

From Wikipedia...

Philo describes a later, similar incident in which Pilate was chastened by Emperor Tiberius after antagonizing the Jews by setting up gold-coated shields in Herod's Palace in Jerusalem. The shields were ostensibly to honor Tiberius, and this time did not contain engraved images. Philo writes that the shields were set up "not so much to honour Tiberius as to annoy the multitude." The Jews protested the installation of the shields at first to Pilate, and then, when he declined to remove them, by writing to Tiberius. Philo reports that upon reading the letters, Tiberius "wrote to Pilate with a host of reproaches and rebukes for his audacious violation of precedent and bade him at once take down the shields and have them transferred from the capital to Caesarea."[34]

Josephus recounts another incident in which Pilate spent money from the Temple to build an aqueduct. When Jews again protested his actions, Pilate had soldiers hidden in the crowd of Jews while addressing them. After giving the signal, Pilate's soldiers randomly attacked, beat, and killed scores of Jews to silence their petitions.[35]

In describing his personality, Philo writes that Pilate had "vindictiveness and furious temper", and was "naturally inflexible, a blend of self-will and relentlessness". He writes that Pilate feared a delegation that the Jews might send to Tiberius protesting the gold-coated shields, because "if they actually sent an embassy they would also expose the rest of his conduct as governor by stating in full the briberies, the insults, the robberies, the outrages and wanton injuries, the executions without trial constantly repeated, the ceaseless and supremely grievous cruelty".[34]