---
title: Mark 14:60
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/mark-14-60/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/mark-14-60.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Mark 14:60
testament: NT
section: Gospels
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Mark 14:60

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> So the high priest stood up before them and questioned Jesus, “Have You no answer? What are these men testifying against You?”

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "Then the high priest stood up in their midst and questioned Jesus, saying: 'Do you say nothing in reply? What is it these men are testifying against you?'"

## JW Usage

JW commentary on the trial scene treats the high priest's questioning as the climax of a politically motivated proceeding, not as a forensic test of Jesus's identity. The verse functions as connective tissue between the failed false-witness phase and the question that elicits Jesus's "I am" in v. 62. Watchtower publications avoid lingering on the trial because the high priest's reaction in v. 63 (tearing his robes) is difficult to square with the JW claim that Jesus never claimed to be God.

## Protestant Usage

Notice the high priest's gambit. After the false witnesses failed, Caiaphas stood up and addressed Jesus directly. Jesus had remained silent before the contradictory testimony — the silence is itself a fulfilment of Isaiah 53:7 ("he opened not his mouth"). The high priest's question presses for a deity claim because the legal framework around blasphemy is the only charge that would produce a death sentence under Jewish law. The structure of the verse anticipates v. 61's question and v. 62's answer. Read Mark 14:60 with v. 61 as the lead-in to the central deity-claim moment of the Synoptic trial narrative.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [The Trial That Proved Jesus Claimed to Be God](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/mark14-trial-deity-claim.md) — Mark 14:60-64 [Deity of Christ]
- [The Son of Man on the Clouds — A Divine Prerogative](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/daniel7-son-of-man-deity.md) — Daniel 7:13-14 [Deity of Christ]