Nicodemus
Nicodemus came to Jesus by night, possibly taking the hill road to the Mount of Olives. He had heard that Jesus was in the habit of spending his nights there. He had somehow manage to preserve an open-mindedness that flung its windows to God's sunshine and free air. Nicodemus was the first of his importance to approach the carpenter, Nicodemus had come late, to avoid observation. He would speak for Jesus in the Sanhedrin, a brave thing. The master in Israel would have know of the brazen serpent that Moses made at God's command and set on a high pole 'bringing life to all who would look toward it as they lay wounded.'
The conservation was a long one, lasting perhaps throughout the night. 'You are a teacher in Israel and do not know these things' What then do you teach, if you do not teach the action of the Spirit on the soul?. Nicodemus was a wealthy man of good heart. It was well known that Nicodemus counseled caution in all matters for fear of Roman reprisals. When Nicodemus said 'We know,' it shows that some of the Pharisees besides Nicodemus believed that Jesus came as a teacher from God. Even among rulers, scribes, Pharisees, and wealthy members of the Sanhedrin, Jesus found believers and followers. He was too honest not to recognize as a teacher come from God, compromise his dignity and possibly his safety to meet him in public. Then Nicodemus ventured on a timid word 'Are you not to try before you condemn him.'
Nicodemus is remembered as an outstanding Pharisee and teacher of the Law, an honest, upright man. A benevolent Christian of some distinction, a guiding light of the Great Sanhedrin. It was he who provided the hundred pounds of myrrh and aloes for Jesus' burial. If he be the Nakdimon Ben Gorion of the Talmud, he outlived the fall of Jerusalem, and his family was reduced from wealth to horrible poverty. The Talmud refers to him as being a disciple.
According to tradition, some time later Nicodemus became a professed disciple of Jesus after the resurrection and was baptized by Peter and John. The Jews then stripped him of his office, beat him, and drove him from Jerusalem and his kinsmen Gamaliel received and sheltered him in his country house till death and finally gave him an honorable burial near the body of St. Stephen. Nicodemus is also to have suffered at Rome during the rage of Domitian's persecution.
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Nicodemus was a Jewish Rabbi and a friend of Jesus. Nicodemus was a rich man, a ruler, a Pharisee, and a member of the Sanhedrin.
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