Matthew 27:16, was Barabbas also named Jesus?
Some texts of Matthew 27 name the prisoner Jesus Barabbas; others call him Barabbas alone. The difference makes the crowd's choice explicitly a choice between two men named Jesus.
The APB text at this verse
The manuscripts, editions, and versions
The committee record at this verse
The APB is translated by a committee of language models that works blind. The translators are never told they are translating the Bible, never given a book name or a verse number, and never shown the witnesses listed above. Where the manuscripts disagree, the choice between readings is made before translation by the same kind of translator working the same way: it sees the competing readings and the witnesses by age and class, but never a reference or a manuscript name. There are 14,877 such places. For APB 4.0 every one was decided again in October 2026. GPT-6.1 Sol decided every one first. Claude Fable 5.1, from another model family, decided 2,483 of them second, including every place where the first translator left the base text. A departure from the base text needs both translators to agree and the first to be at least 0.8 confident. There is no third translator, so the base text stands when the two disagree. APB 4.0 is translated over those decisions. Whatever was done at this verse was done on the language and the evidence alone, and the record is public.
“The base text reads (nothing). The copies also carry Ἰησοῦν [early greek manuscript tradition]; the committee kept the base text. The committee retains the default because harmonization explains the addition and omission has broader support.”
“The base text reads Ἰησοῦν. The copies also carry the omission [greek majuscule; early greek manuscript tradition; later majority tradition]; the committee kept the base text.”
The committee's textual decision record contains conflicting entries: one keeps a base text without Jesus, while the other keeps a base text with it. The first explains, "The committee retains the default because harmonization explains the addition and omission has broader support." The second states, "The base text reads Ἰησοῦν." It also records that the committee kept that base text. GPT-6.1 Sol (OpenAI) was the first and only translator to decide this unit; no second translator considered it. The committee's printed text has Jesus Barabbas in Matthew 27:16 and repeats the double name in Matthew 27:17.
The argument for each reading
If “Jesus Barabbas”
The case for Jesus Barabbas combines the double name printed by Nestle-Aland 28 with an explanation for its removal. A scribe could object to giving a notorious prisoner the name Jesus and omit it. The witness description for Westcott-Hort itself treats removal as easier to explain than invention, even though that edition prints Barabbas alone. With the double name, the crowd chooses between Jesus Barabbas and Jesus who is called Christ. The shared name makes the contrast explicit. This explanation gives a reason for omission, but it does not establish how every copy came to have its reading.
If “Barabbas” alone
The case for Barabbas alone rests on the breadth of support for omission. Westcott-Hort prints the shorter name, and its witness description reports that most manuscripts do not have Jesus at this point. One committee textual note also gives harmonization as an explanation for the addition. On that account, the double name could have entered this sentence through alignment with the wording of the surrounding scene. The competing explanation is that scribes removed the name because they objected to its association with the prisoner. The shorter reading preserves the crowd's choice while leaving Barabbas without the shared first name in this verse.
The uncertain point is whether Matthew 27:16 gives Barabbas the additional name Jesus. The conflicting committee entries also leave the relationship between the recorded decisions and the printed wording unresolved. Either reading identifies the prisoner as Barabbas and preserves the crowd's choice between him and Jesus who is called Christ. The variant changes how explicitly the two men share a name; it does not by itself settle a doctrine.
Related entries
Witness readings for critical editions are quoted from the SBLGNT apparatus (CC BY 4.0); Hebrew text from the Westminster Leningrad Codex (Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible). Readings of ancient manuscripts and versions are cited from the sources linked above.