The Sanhedrin, as they appear in the 2004 film The Passion of the Christ
The Sanhedrin was an assembly of between 23 and 71 rabbis appointed to sit as a tribunal in every city in ancient Israel. A lesser court had 23 judges, while the one Great Sanhedrin had 71 judges, serving as a supreme court. The Sanhedrin convened for every day except for festivals and Shabbat, and, in 30 AD, the Sanhedrin bribed Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus to the Romans, as he challenged their authority. Following the destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans, the Sanhedrin moved to Galilee, and it was disbanded in 425 AD due to persecution by the Eastern Roman Empire, perhaps due to their role in the death of Jesus.