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(Matt. 27:6-8 and Acts 1:18, 19)
(Matt. 27:9, 10).

There are two difficulties connected with these scriptures :
     I. The two purchases recorded in Matt. 27:6-8, and Acts 1:18, 19, respectively; and
    II. The fulfillment of the prophecy connected with the former purchase (Matt. 27:9, 10).


For there were two.  One by "the chief priests", recorded in Matt. 27:6; and the other by Judas Iscariot recorded in Acts 1:18.  The proofs are as follows: -



2.  What the chief priests bought was "a field" (Gr. agros).

What Judas had acquired (see 3, below) was what in English we call a "Place" (Gr. chorion = a farm, or small property.)

The two are quite distinct, and the difference is preserved both in the Greek text and in the Syriac version  (See note 3, p. 136).

3.  The verbs also are different.  In Matt. 27:7 the verb is agorazo = to buy in the open market (from agora = a market place); while in Acts 1:18, the verb is ktaomai = to acquire possession of (See Luke 18:12;  21:19;  Acts 22:28), and is rendered "provide" in Matt. 10:9.  Its noun, ktema = a possession (Occ. Matt. 19:22.  Mark 10:22.  Acts 2:45; 5:1).

4.  How and when Judas had become possessed of this "place" we are not told in so many words; but we are left in no doubt, from the plain statement in John 12:6 that "he was a thief, and had the bag".  The "place" was bought with this stolen money, "the reward (or wages) of iniquity".  This is a Hebrew idiom (like our Eng. "money ill-got"), used for money obtained by unrighteousness (Ap. 128. VII. 1; cp. Num. 22:7.  2Pet. 2:15).  This stolen money is wrongly assumed to be the same as the "thirty pieces of silver".

5.  The two places had different names.  The "field" purchased by the chief priests was originally known as "the potter's field", but was afterward called "agros haimatos" = the field of blood; i.e. a field bought with the price of blood ("blood" being put by the Fig. Metonymy (of the Subject), Ap. 6, for murder or blood-guiltiness).

The "possession" which Judas had acquired bore an Aramaic name, "Hakal dema" (see Ap. 94. (III.) 3,
p. 135), which is transliterated Akeldama, or according to some Akeldamach, or Hacheldamach = "place" (Gr. chorion) of blood" :  a similar meaning but from a different reason :  viz. Judas' suicide.  It is thus shown that there is no discrepancy between Matt. 27:6-8 and Acts 1:18, 19.

(Matt 27:9,10)

Many solutions have been proposed to meet the two difficulties connected with Matt 27:9, 10.













That this cannot be the solution may be shown from the following reasons : --


    2.  As to the "thirty pieces of silver", Zechariah speaks of them with approval, while in Matthew they are not so spoken of.  "A goodly price" ('eder hayekar) denotes amplitude, sufficiency, while the Verb yakar means to be priced, prized, precious and there is not the slightest evidence that Zechariah spoke of the amount as being paltry, or that the offer of it was, in any sense and insult.  But this latter is the sense in Matt. 27:9, 10.


    4.  The waiting of  "the poor of the flock" was not hostile, but friendly, as in Prov. 27:18.  Out of above 450 occurrences of the Heb. shamar, less than fourteen are in a hostile sense.

    5.  In the disposal of the silver, the sense of the Verb "cast" is to be determined by the context (not by the Verb itself).  In Zech. 11, the context shows it to be in a good sense, as in Ex. 15:25.  1Kings 19:19. 2Kings 2:21; 4:41; 6:6.  2Chron. 24:10, 11.

    6.  The "potter" is the fashioner and his work was not necessarily confined to fashioning "clay", but it extended to metals.  Cp. Gen. 2:7, 8.  Ps. 33:15; 94:9.  Isa. 43:1, 6, 10, 21; 44:2, 9-12, 21, 24; 45:6, 7;  54:16, 17.  Out of the sixty-two occurrences of the Verb (yazar), more than three-fouths have nothing  whatever to do with the work of a "potter"


    8.  The material, "silver", would be useless to a "potter" but necessary to a fashioner of metallic vessels, or for the payment of artizans who wrought them (2Kings 12:11-16; 22:4-7.  2Chron. 24:11-13).  One might as well cast clay to a silversmith as silver to a potter.

    9.  The prophecy of Zechariah is rich in reference to metals; and only the books of Numbers (31:22) and Ezekiel name as many.  In Zechariah we find six named: Gold, six times (4:2, 12; 6:11; 13:9; 14:14).  Fine gold, once (9:3).  Silver, six times, (6:11; 9:3; 11:12, 13; 13:9; 14:14).  Brass, once (6:1, marg.).  Lead, twice (5:7, 8).  Tin, once (4:10, marg.).  Seventeen references in all.

    10.  Zechariah is full of refs to what the prophet saw and said but there are only two refs. to what he did; and both of these have references to "silver" (6:11; 11:13).

    11.  The Septuagint, and its revision by Symmachus, read "cast them (i.e. the thirty pieces of silver) into the furnace (Gr. eis to choneuterion), showing that, before Matthew was written, yotzer was interpreted as referring not to a "potter" but to a fashioner of metals.




    15.  Matthew not only quotes Jeremiah's spoken words, but names him as the speaker.  This is in keeping with Matt. 2:17, 18.  Jeremiah is likewise named in Matt. 16:14; but nowhere else in all the New Test.

iii.  The conclusion.  From all this we gather that the passage in Matthew (27:9, 10) cannot have any reference to Zech. 11:10-13.

    1.  If  Jeremiah's spoken words have anything to do with what is recorded in Jer. 32:6-9, 43, 44, then in the reference to them other words are interjected by way of parenthetical explanation.  These are not to be confused with the quoted words.  They may be combined thus: --

"Then was fulfilled that which was SPOKEN by Jeremiah the prophet saying; 'And they took the thirty pieces of silver [the price of him who was priced, whom they of the sons of Israel did price], and they gave them for the potter's field, as the LORD appointed me.'"

Thus Matthew quotes that which was "SPOKEN" by Jeremiah the prophet and combines with the actual quotation a parenthetical reference to the price at which the prophet Zechariah had been priced.

    2.  Had the sum of money been twenty pieces of silver instead of thirty, a similar remark might well have been interjected thus: --

"Then was fulfilled that which was SPOKEN by Jeremiah the prophet saying; 'And they took the twenty pieces of silver [the price of him whom his brethren sold into Egypt], and they gave them for the potter's field'", &c.

    3.  Or, had the reference been to the compensation for an injury done to another man's servant, as in Ex. 21:32, a similar parenthetical remark might have been introduced thus: --


A designed parenthetical insertion by the inspired Evangelist of a reference to  Zechariah, in a direct quotation from the prophet Jeremiah, is very different from a "mistake" or "a slip of the pen", "a lapse of memory" or a "corruption of the text", which need an apology.

The quotation itself, as well as the parenthetical reference are both similarly exact.