Annas was made high priest, not by God, but by Quirinius procounsel of Syria, about 7 AD and was removed from that position several years later by Valerius Gratus procurator of Judea. Four of Annas’s sons held the office of high priest along with Caiaphas, his son-in-law, who took that position in 25 AD. By Mosaic law, the high priest held his office for life (Num 3:10) and even though the Romans moved them in and out of office at their pleasure, all who held that office were designated by the term ‘high priest’ even if not currently in office, and Annas, being the oldest to have held that office, would have been looked upon as the real high priest by the Jews, who were not overly pleased with Roman rule in the first place. Since he and his family were the only high priests during his lifetime, it is certain that, as head of the household, Annas held a great deal of authority and was the real power in the land.

Numbers 3:10  Appoint Aaron and his sons to serve as priests; anyone else who approaches the sanctuary must be put to death.”

Either Annas and Caiaphas shared the same palace or they were in the same place that night, for when they move Jesus from one to the other, they use the same courtyard. Jesus was first taken to Annas for a couple of reasons:

First, it was illegal according to Jewish law to sentence a man on the same day of his trial and even though they were certainly not observing all of the legalities with Jesus because of the time constraints of the Feast and the Sabbath and their fear of an uprising by His followers, they made an effort to at least appear to be following the letter of the law. Before Annas, Jesus is given an informal examination which gives the semblance of a preliminary meeting and then taken before Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin for the trial and sentencing.

Secondly, there is some evidence that the profitable stalls in the Temple for the selling of inspected and acceptable sacrifices were the property of Annas and his family. Barclay quotes a section of the Talmud as, “Woe to the house of Annas! Woe to their serpent’s hiss! They are High Priests; their sons are keepers of the treasury; their sons-in-law are guardians of the Temple; and their servants beat the people with staves.” Those shops in the Temple which sold the inspected sacrifices for 15 to 20 times their cost in the streets of Jerusalem, were called “The Bazaars of Annas.” If Annas did indeed have a vested interest in this exploitive activity, he would have been very anxious to have seen Jesus so he could gloat over Him after what He had done that very week (Mark 11:15-17) and because of that action the religious leaders had started looking for a way to kill Him (Mark 11:18). Jesus had touched them where it hurt and He never had a chance for justice from them.

Mark 11:15-17  On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple area and began driving out those who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money-changers and the benches of those selling doves,  and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts.  And as he taught them, he said, “Is it not written: “‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it ‘a den of robbers’.”

Mark 11:18  The chief priests and the teachers of the law heard this and began looking for a way to kill him, for they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching.