In Matt 23:31 and Luke 11:47 Jesus accuses his Jewish opponents of killing prophets. The gospel texts provide no basis for this charge, other than the conflict that Jesus seems to be facing at the moment. Even the one prophetic figure whose death has affected Jesus, John the Baptist, was not killed in Jerusalem, but was executed, according to the gospel accounts, by Herod Antipas who ruled Galilee and Perea. On the contrary, the accusation of killing prophets and the success of the Israelite prophetic materials in getting proclaimed, recorded, transmitted, and canonized stand in tension with each other. Where does this idea come from and what makes it a viable assumption in the kinds of accusations made by Jesus in these texts?