NOTES for Luk 20:5-6
The question Jesus asked the Pharisees about John and his preaching with baptism was, of course, not accidental. It was not accidental precisely because it became the answer to the question about Himself, about His authority and His ministry. In essence, the Savior's question becomes for the Pharisees speaking with Him a test of sincerity and honesty, first of all before themselves. It would seem that the issue concerns things not only different, but incomparable: John, though great, is only a prophet, while Jesus is the Messiah and Son of God.
But this difference is not so important in this case. What matters is only what the Pharisees asking Jesus about His authority are ready to see and hear. And they would best answer this question for themselves. The question about John precisely leads them to such an answer. Here the issue is not the Messiah, but only a prophet, yet a prophet whom the people honored and against whom it was dangerous to speak.
It is quite possible that if the same Pharisees had directly answered Jesus what they thought, "from men," His answer to them would have been different. He deprives no one of freedom; He requires only honesty and sincerity. A person can be mistaken, can see everything in a wrong light; more than that, from the point of view of the Savior Himself all people are mistaken to one degree or another, since no human being sees reality as He sees it.
In every concrete situation, as much is open to Him as to His heavenly Father, and no human being can say this about himself. But what matters to Him is not our infallibility, but our inner wholeness. The very wholeness inseparable from sincerity and honesty before oneself, and therefore before others. Jesus asks the Pharisees a question whose answer should have shown them themselves whether they had this wholeness. And it turned out that Jesus' interlocutors failed the test.
They did not answer His question not because they did not know the answer, but because they were afraid. And yielding to fear is the simplest and most widespread way of destroying that very inner wholeness. But then it made no sense for Jesus to answer the question posed by His interlocutors: He would have had to speak in one way or another about the Kingdom, where a person with a divided heart and divided thoughts cannot enter. The Pharisees' answer to Jesus' question became also the answer to the question they themselves had asked. A sad answer, but the only possible one.