Albert Barnes Commentary Matthew 26:62-63

"And the high priest stood up, and said unto him, Answerest thou nothing? what is it which these witness against thee? But Jesus held his peace. And the high priest said unto him, I adjure thee by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou art the Christ, the Son of God." — Matthew 26:62-63 (ASV)

Jesus held his peace. He was silent. He knew that the evidence did not even appear to amount to anything worth a reply. He knew that they were aware of that, and, sensing this, the high priest attempted to draw something from him on which they could condemn him.

I adjure thee by the living God. I put you on your oath before God. This was the usual form of administering an oath among the Jews. It implies calling God to witness the truth of what was said. The law concerning witnesses also made it a violation of an oath to conceal any part of the truth. And though our Savior might have felt that such a question, put in such a manner, was very improper or unlawful, yet he also knew that to be silent would be construed as a denial of his being the Christ.

The question was probably put in anger. They had utterly failed in their proof. They had no way left to accomplish their purpose of condemning him but to draw it from his own lips. This cunning question was therefore proposed. The difficulty of the question consisted in this: if he confessed that he was the Son of God, they stood ready to condemn him for blasphemy; if he denied it, they were prepared to condemn him for being an impostor, for deluding the people under the pretense of being the Messiah.

The living God. Jehovah is called the living God, in opposition to idols, which were without life.

The Christ. The Messiah, the Anointed. (See Barnes on Matthew 1:1).

The Son of God. The Jews uniformly expected that the Messiah would be the Son of God. In their view, it also denoted that he would be Divine, or equal to the Father (John 10:31–36). To claim that title was, therefore, in their view, blasphemy; and as they had determined beforehand in their own minds that he was not the Messiah, they were ready at once to accuse him of blasphemy.