Third section the judgment upon the church itself second picture of judgment

And brought back the thirty pieces of silver.—The way of spurious penitence in contradistinction to the genuine repentance of Peter. His first disposition is to attempt some outward rectification of his deed in the sight of men, without previous humiliation before God, and seeking of refuge with Him. In connection with this, it is also a question whether he did not also entertain the hope of a still higher reward for his betrayal. The second stage and feature is expressed in the word ἀνεχώρησε, the force of which is too little understood [and not adequately rendered in our authorized version by “he departed”]. It conveys to us the idea that “he retired or withdrew” into solitude—desolation, a desert place—“and went away thence and hanged himself.”—The third stage was that of absolute despair. The precise time when Judas brought back the thirty pieces of silver is not mentioned. But from the circumstance that Matthew connects it with the leading away of Jesus unto Pilate, we infer that he approached the priests and elders during the time of their appeal to the Roman governor, and the transactions connected with it. We can readily conceive that many opportunities for this may have offered, when they were not otherwise engaged, as, for example, during the examination before Herod.

Matthew 27:4. I (have) erred.^[FN11]—Luther translates ἥμαρτον here: I have done (did) evil; de Wette as the authorized Engl. Version]: I have sinned. The word bears either construction. Accordingly, we prefer rendering it, I (have) erred, which seems to express the mind and the views of Judas more fully. The desire to make his guilt appear as small as possible is also evident from the explanation which he offers of his conduct.—In that I betrayed innocent blood, i.e, that by my betrayal I have caused the bloody death of one who is innocent. This admission may be taken as a grand testimony in favor of the innocence of Jesus, which must be added to that of Pilate, and to the indirect testimony of the Sanhedrin itself, which could prefer no other accusation against Jesus than that He had designated Himself the Messiah and the Son of God. If Judas could have recalled any circumstance, however trifling, which might have cast a shadow upon the Lord, we may readily believe he would gladly have appeased his conscience in that manner. Still this declaration about innocent blood cannot in any way be construed into the testimony of a penitent disciple. It seems to us that, in his remorse and anguish, Judas, with his carnal millennarian views, would now view Jesus in the light of an innocent enthusiast. The balance of evidence is strongly against the reading αἷμα δίκαιον.

What is it to us? see thou to it!—Bengel: Impii in facto consortes post factum deserunt.

Matthew 27:5. In the temple.—Meyer rightly calls attention to the distinct and definite meaning of the expression. “It is neither beside the temple (Kypke), nor in the council-chamber, Gazith (Grotius), nor is it equivalent to ἐν τῷ ἱερῷ (Fritzsche and others); but—as the term ναός always implies, and in the sense which every reader must attach to the preposition ἐν—in the temple-building, i.e, in the holy place where the priests were. Thither Judas now cast the pieces of silver. In his despair, he had penetrated where priests alone were allowed to enter.” If, as seems probable, this took place on the morning of Christ’s death, we can readily understand how he found the temple empty, and thus was able to cast down the money in the sanctuary, as a testimony against the hierarchy. “There lay that blood-money, the price of the betrayal of innocent blood, from which the field was called, The field of blood—a. testimony against Israel.” Hengstenberg, Christologie, iii2, p464.

And he withdrew himself (anchorite-like into solitude), and went away hence.—We have here not one movement of Judas, but two: the verb ἀνεχώρησε is separated and distinguished by καί from ἀπελθών, and the latter indicates the going away from the deed, which had been designated by ἀνεχώρησε. From the locality where his suicide took place, we may infer that he had first attempted to retire from the world, and to lead a life of penitence as an anchorite in the valley of Gehinnom. But his despair allowed him no rest, and he committed that awful deed which the religion and the history of his people (Saul, Ahithophel) alike condemned.

And hanged or strangled himself.—Meyer (following de Wette) observes: “We must not be led by the statement in Acts 1:18 to attach any other than its primary meaning to the word ἀπάγχομαι (such as, he was consumed by anguish of conscience, Grotius, Hammond, Heinsius, etc.), as the only one which accords with the simple historical narrative. To reconcile the difference, it is generally assumed, that after having hanged himself, Judas fell down headlong. In that case, Matthew would simply have recorded one part, and Luke the other, of his sad end (thus Kuinoel, Fritzsche, Olshausen, etc.). This cutting in pieces of the narrative, Isaiah, however, not only arbitrary, but unsupported by Acts 1:18, which does not even explicitly record the fact of a suicide,” etc. Accordingly, Meyer supposes that there were two different traditions about the end of the betrayer, the relative historical value of which cannot be exactly determined, bearing to the end that Judas had met with a violent and fearful death, in a manner which tradition variously represented as suicide by hanging (Matthew), or as falling headlong and bursting asunder in the midst ( Acts 1:18), or finally, as a swelling of the body, and crushing by carts and wagons (Papias according to Œcum.).” In considering this question, we must, in the first place, avoid being confused by the apocryphal legend. (See the passage in Winer, art. Judas, Note4.) Next, we must bear in mind the different point from which Matthew here, and Peter in Acts 1. view the same event. Matthew simply records the successive stages of Judas’s despair, terminating in suicide by hanging himself. Peter, on the other hand, views the death of Judas as the condign reward of a wicked part, in opposition to the part of the apostleship which he was to have obtained. Viewed in this light, Judas had first voluntarily gotten the reward of iniquity, and ultimately (involuntarily) a field, upon which he fell dying, all his bowels gushing out. That the words of Peter do not mean that Judas had purchased a field with the thirty pieces of silver, appears from the rhetorical character of his address, in which he assumes a knowledge of the facts of the case, and by the explanatory clause, added to the words: he purchased—and fall ing headlong, etc. The expression, “purchased” or gained for himself, is ironical, with special reference to the circumstance that he hanged himself in the field which was afterward purchased for the thirty pieces of silver. Accordingly, we adopt the view so vividly sketched by Casaubonus. That writer suggests that Judas (according to Matthew) hanged himself over a precipice in the valley Of Gehinnom. The branch broke, or the rope was torn, and Judas (according to the report of Peter) fell down headlong and burst asunder. Winer, indeed, carpingly objects, that the effects described by Peter could in that case only have resulted if the body had fallen on jagged pieces of rock. But we may safely leave a criticism which is driven into difficulties in search of rocks, among the rocky valleys around Jerusalem.

Matthew 27:6. It is not lawful.—Wetstein: Argumento ducto ex Deuteronomy 13:18. Sanhedr. fol112.—Thus unconsciously condemning their own hypocrisy who had paid this same price of blood.

Matthew 27:7. And they took counsel;—i.e, resolved in council. No doubt this took place after the crucifixion, although soon afterward.—And bought the potter’s field.—Evidently a well-known place. A field used for potteries would, of course, be a waste and comparatively valueless spot.—To bury strangers in.—The expression does not refer to Jews from other countries (as Meyer supposes), who in a religious point of view were not strangers, nor to professing heathens, who were left to themselves, but to Gentile proselytes (of the gate), to whom a certain regard was due, while priestly exclusiveness would not allow them to repose in properly consecrated graves. Thus, even in this act of cheap charity and pious provision on the part of a Sanhedrin which slew the Lord of glory, Pharisaism remained true to itself. The price of blood and the field of blood are declared quite suited for “strangers.” The field of blood, or Aceldama ( Acts 1:19), is on the steep face of the southern hill, opposite Mount Zion, which bounds the valley of Ben Hinnom. Tradition points out the spot. “In a corner where some graves or natural caves, in a semi-dilapidated condition, are found, is the Aceldama or field of blood of tradition. In support of the accuracy of this view, I may state, that above it there is a considerable stratum of white clay, where I repeatedly observed people working. Eusebius and Jerome are the first who mention the tradition in the Onomasticon. This place of sepulture, which till the fourteenth century belonged to the Latins, became afterward the property of the Armenians. Probably it ceased to be used for interments since the last century, although it is impossible exactly to determine the date. A large vaulted sepulchre in a rock, or rather a cave, served to indicate the locality of the field of blood.” Krafft, Topogr. of Jerus, p193.—The field of blood adjoins “the Hill of Evil Counsel,” where Caiaphas, according to tradition, possessed a country house, in which the death of Jesus had been resolved upon ( Matthew 26:3). Braune confounds this with the Hill of Offence, on the southern top of the Mount of Olives. In the Middle Ages it was believed that the soil of the Aceldama had the power of consuming bodies in one, or at least in a few days. Accordingly, shiploads of it were, during the thirteenth century, transported to the Campo Santo at Pisa.

Matthew 27:9. That which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet.—De Wette observes: “Neither this nor any similar passage is found in Jeremiah. Accordingly, some Codd. and Versions omit these words. But a similar passage occurs in Zechariah 11:12. Hence Cod22, Syr. p. in m. read Ζαχαρίου. But even Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, and Augustine found the common reading, which, in fairness, cannot be disputed. Origen, Homil. 35, supposes that the passage is found in an apocryphal book of Jeremiah. Jerome found the passage in an apocryphal writing of Jeremiah, which a Nazarene showed him, but he thought it was borrowed from Zechariah. To us it seems probable that the Evangelist has been misled by the statement in Jeremiah 18:2, to name that prophet instead of Zechariah. The quotation from Zechariah is freely made, the phraseology being different both from the Hebrew text and from the Sept.” The following are various attempts at removing the difficulty: 1. It was a mistake of memory (Augustine)^[FN12]; 2. the reading “Jeremiah” is spurious (Rupert von Deutz, etc.); 3. it occurred in a work of Jeremiah which has been lost (Origen, etc.); 4. it was an oral statement of that prophet (Calovius, etc.); 5. the Jews have expunged the passage from the book of Jeremiah (Eusebius). “If the passage has been found in an Arabic book, or in a Sahidic or Coptic lectionary, these must be regarded as interpolations from our passage.” Meyer,^[FN13]—In reference to the above, we remark,—1. That it is very improbable our Evangelist should have confounded the prophecies of Zechariah—with which he evidently was quite familiar, quoting without naming them, as in Matthew 21:5; Matthew 26:31—with those of Jeremiah 2. It seems impossible to identify the passage before us with Jeremiah 18:2, since it contains no reference to a purchase on the part of the prophet3. On the other hand, however, we find a connection between the quotation of Matthew and Jeremiah 32:8, especially Matthew 27:14 : “Thus saith Jehovah of hosts, the God of Israel, Take these evidences [letters], this evidence of the purchase which is sealed, and this evidence which is open, and put them in an earthen vessel, that they may continue many days. For thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, Houses, and fields, and vineyards, shall be possessed [in German, purchased] again in this land.” These words must be taken along with Matthew 27:8, where the Lord commanded the prophet to act in this manner. These words are now paraphrased by the Evangelist, in connection with materials furnished by Zechariah and by Jewish history, so as to exhibit the πλήρωσις of what the prophet intended to convey, viz, that the boldest purchase should yet be made, by which the price set upon the Messiah would be given for a potter’s field to be a burying-place for pious pilgrims. The meaning of the quotation is as follows: At the command of the Lord, Jeremiah bought a field at Anathoth, at a time when Jerusalem seemed to be in the hands of the king of Babylon, in order thereby symbolically to express the idea that Jerusalem was still a place of hope, and that it had a blessed future in store. Thus unconsciously had the Sanhedrin, by its purchase of the potter’s field as a burying-place for strangers, symbolically and prophetically expressed the idea that Jerusalem was yet destined to be the place of pilgrimage of countless worshippers. Thus they unconsciously prophesied, as Caiaphas did, according to John 11:50; and thus had they fulfilled the prediction of Jeremiah ( Matthew 27:15; Matthew 27:43-44). 4. The Evangelist sums up in a brief sentence the grand thought of Jeremiah (as he had done in Matthew 2:23), referring in it to Zechariah 11:12, without, however, quoting that passage. There the typical Shepherd of the people of God (who is the same as Jehovah himself) has His price fixed by His sheep. They give it as thirty pieces of silver, the well-known price of a slave. Jehovah says: “Cast it to the potter, אֶל־הַיּוצֵר: a goodly price that I was prized at by them.” (On the meaning of these obscure words, comp. the author’s “Leben Jem,” ii3, p1494.) The Sept. adds, by way of explanation, “to the melting-pot.” (An anomalous explanation by Hitzig, mentioned by Meyer, who thinks he finds in it a rectification of the Sept. and the punctuation of the text.) This is to imply that the money was impure, and required to be melted over again5. Matthew also distinctly alludes to Genesis 37:28—the purchase-money of Joseph when sold by his brethren6. Accordingly, the passage in question combines four different quotations: (a)“And they took the thirty pieces of silver,” which is derived from the narrative, with a special reference to Zechariah; (b)“the price of Him that was valued”—also after Zechariah; (c) “whom they bought of the children of Israel” [as in the margin of the authorized version]—after Genesis 37; (d) “and gave them for the potter’s field”—the narrative of the text, with a special reference to Zechariah; (e) “as the Lord appointed to me”—the key of the whole passage, quoted from Jeremiah 32:6; Jeremiah 32:8. They gave the whole price for which they bought and sold the Saviour for a potter’s field, to serve as a place of burial for believing Gentile pilgrims. Thus, while sealing their own doom, they have unconsciously made Jerusalem a city of the future—but of a future which shall bring advantage to believing Gentile pilgrims—they have purchased for them a resting-place in death.

Matthew 27:9. Of Him that was valued or priced, τοῦ τετιμηένου.—Meyer thinks that “the expression is intended to give the Hebrew הַיְקָר (pretii). But the Evangelist evidently read הַיָּקָר (cari, œstimati), and applies it to Jesus as the valued One κατ ̓ ἐξοχήν; Euthym. Zigabenus: τοῦ παντίμου χριστοῦ, comp. Theophylact, and of late Ewald: the invaluably valuable One, who nevertheless was valued at so low a price.” This view implies not only that Matthew had intended closely to follow Zechariah, but that he had at the same time misunderstood and misrepresented him. It attaches to the verb τιμάω a twofold and a contradictory sense. The meaning of the words really is: “of Him that was valued”—the sense favored by most critics, including de Wette and Hofmann. Nor is there any tautology about it, as the words δ Ìνἐτι μήσαντο ἀπό mean: whom by valuing they purchased, or, whom they bought. Thus the expression, “of Him that was valued,” would seem specially to refer to the passage in Zechariah—the priests being the subject of the verb ἐτιμήσαντο.—Whom they bought of the children of Israel (=Jacob).—This does not mean that Christ had been valued by the whole people (Hofmann); nor, at the instigation of the children of Israel (Meyer); nor, from among the children of Israel, i.e, for a man of Israel (Baumgarten-Crusius); but, bought from the children of Israel (Castellio, Luther, and others). Judas is here the representative of the whole treacherous nation; and the passage alludes to the sons of Jacob, who sold Joseph.—For the potter’s field, εἰςτόν,—for the purchase thereof. The allusion here to Zechariah 11:13 is very slight. The passage in the prophet, “Cast it אֶל־הַיּוֹצֵר” (and that, as appears from the sequel, in the temple), is rendered by the Sept. εἰς τὸ χωνευτήριον, to the melting furnace. Hitzig proposes to read יוֹצָר, the treasure, hence, Cast it into the temple treasury. But, irrespective of the fact, that this is merely an arbitrary conjecture, it would give a wrong meaning, as the small price was to be treated with contempt, not with honor and distinction. Hengstenberg explains it: Cast it to the potter=the executioner. But these two terms are certainly not identical. The potter forms the vessels for the temple, and puts the old into new forms. Accordingly, we conjecture that in the court of the temple, where the various vessels were arranged, there was a place bearing the inscription “To the potter,” which was equivalent to “the melting furnace.” Into this receptacle, designated by its inscription, Jehovah directs the thirty pieces of silver to be cast.—Thus “to the old iron” cast the price, according to which they have valued Him as equal with “old iron.” Gerlach regards the thirty pieces of silver as the hire of a shepherd for a year. But it is well known to have been the price for a slave.—As the Lord appointed to me.—Referring not to the passage in Zechariah, but to the narrative of Jeremiah referred to, that the Lord had commanded him, by way of symbol, to purchase the field at Anathoth.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. On the Character of Judas, see our previous remarks. For more detailed treatises about his call to the apostolate, comp. Heubner, Comment, p418. On the defence set up for Judas by a section of the Gnostics and of the Menonites, and by some modern writers, see Heubner, p420.

2. The Repentance of Judas.—Terrible and mysterious as is the guilt, so awful and sad is the repentance of the traitor, as it ultimately terminates in the blackness of despair. The ancients were wont to place it side by side with the penitence of Cain, as the counterpart of true repentance. Thus much is evident, that from first to last his penitence was unhealthy and godless. For its source and origin was not his guilt, but the consequences resulting from it (“when Judas saw that,” etc.). Secondly, in its course and progress it did not appear as repentance toward God, in the economy of salvation. We see him seeking first to offer human satisfaction before the priests; next, retiring as a penitent into solitude; and lastly, casting himself, in his suicide, headlong into the abyss of despair. We note the opposite of all this in Peter. Here we have first bitter weeping, repentance toward God, and return to Christ; and then human satisfaction, offered in the strength of the pardoned soul and in newness of life. Lastly, there is the sad termination in the case of Judas,—his repentance being the sorrow of the world, which worketh death ( 2 Corinthians 7:10). At the outset, he wants the genuineness and sincerity in dealing with an offended God which constitutes the grand characteristic of true repentance; during the course of it, that faith which flies for refuge to the sovereign mercy of God, who is able and willing to pardon; and hence, in the end, the victory of hope and love over despair. Heubner remarks: “When the conscience of a sinner awakens and fills him with terror he is hopelessly lost if he lose faith—faith in the grace of God, who is able and willing to pardon, and faith in an atoning and all-sufficient Saviour. Hence it is absolutely necessary to keep firm hold of faith.” However, ingenuousness and truth are the condition of ability to believe. He that doeth the truth cometh to the light. The same writer remarks; “Satan has two arts by which he seduces men. Before we sin he cries out: Spera! and after we have sinned: Despera!” (See the quotation from Luther, Works, vol. xix1498.)

3. Suicide: Saul, Ahithophel, Judas.—“Suicide, if not freely and voluntarily committed, but arising from physical disturbance, may expect pardon from God.” In his “Table talk,” Luther expressly says (Walch’s edition, Matthew 48 § 13, p1039), “that all cases of suicide are not condemned.” (Which may be added to Stäudlin’s History of the opinions on Suicide, p116.) Heubner: “When suicide is committed freely, and with full consciousness and reflection, it is always the result of sinful estrangement and alienation from the Creator, and of despair in everlasting love. True, it is very generally also the consequence of gross sins which torment the soul, and of violent passions. These alone, however, do not lead men to their eternal downfall; it is unbelief alone. Hence it is that suicides are now so much more common.”—What makes suicide at once detestable and horrifying Isaiah, in the first place, the false and wicked combination of the most extreme contradictions,—self-love and self-abandonment, deliverance and destruction, healing and murder, rebellion against God and forth stepping to His judgment-bar; in the second place, the fact that the self-murderer perverts to his own destruction that moment which God had appointed to be the crisis of his perfected salvation (see Acts 16:27); in the third place, the circumstance that the self-murderer, regardless of consequences, anticipates and neutralizes, in a cowardly and wicked manner, the act of free surrender of the soul to God in death, which is its highest spiritual form (see the author’s Positive Dogmatik, p1243). Suicide Isaiah, so to speak, the theatrical exhibition and full development of sin’s self-destructive nature, and is the natural type of eternal self-condemnation. Truth accordingly must never in its testimony cease to war against suicide, regarded in itself; she cannot compromise with it, but must ever condemn it as the evidence of despairing unbelief. But as suicide is often the result of bodily and mental weakness, the twin child of madness, we should deal with actual cases in a forbearing, mild, and cautious spirit. We should act similarly in those cases where remorse in after-life leads to suicide, though that act appears to be merely the natural consequence of the preceding heinous crime committed by the miserable persons. The spiritual suicide of Judas was consummated in the moment of his treachery against his Lord and Master. Heubner’s statement: “We may fall ever so low, if we only hold fast the faith,” is as liable to misconception as many similar remarks of Luther. Faith is ethical in its very nature, and cannot be separated from moral laws. Unon other points connected with suicide, consult the Systems of Ethics. We should not return to the confessional, because the reserve of ungodly men and their brooding lead them to self-destruction; but we should, throughout the Evangelical Church, recommend the practice of a free confession of heart.

4. Appropriation of the Blood-Money.—“Hypocritical conscientiousness. Their scruples arose from Deuteronomy 23:18 :—‘Thou shalt not bring the hire of a whore, or the price of a dog, into the house of the Lord thy God for any vow; for even both these are an abomination unto the Lord thy God.’ The instruments of the wicked are a source of disgust and dread to them, especially those to whom the stain of blood attaches as a memorial of their guilt. They are agents to awaken conscience, and threaten punishment. These wretches suffered blood to stain their hands and lie upon their consciences, but they would not allow the temple treasury to be defiled. The money-chest they valued above their conscience. They would not transgress by receiving defiled money, for they feared to render their treasury valueless: this was their reverence for God ( Matthew 23:24). There is a proper solicitude, however, which we should all have, to keep our property undefiled.”—“They appropriated the money to a charitable purpose; but it is impossible to remove the guilt and disgrace of former days by acts of mercy.” Heubner. Similar institutions were common in the Middle Ages. The cloister of Königsfelden in Switzerland was the fruit of Queen Agnes’ bloody vengeance.

5. The Field of Blood.—Even in the acts of charity performed by the Sanhedrin, the characteristic traits of its members come to view; the most complete hypocrisy, making the money-chest of God’s house more sacred than God Himself and God’s acre.^[FN14] They purchase for a paltry sum, and that the price of blood, a field of blood, to inter pious pilgrims from heathen nations, who were not reckoned to be fully Jewish proselytes. So the charity of the Middle Ages sought out beggars upon whom to expend its kind offices, and these it furnished with beggars’ broth. Unconsciously, these hypocrites were compelled to perpetuate the memory of their sinful acts; and in this Acts, besides, was given unconsciously a plastic type of the Sanhedrin. Without willing it, they had to fulfil Jeremiah’s prophecy. The purchase of the potter’s field to be a resting-place for foreign pilgrims becomes prophetical of this, that Jerusalem, Palestine, and Israel’s entire inheritance, was destined to be a resting place for the believing Gentile world.

6. Here for the first time Christian grave-yards took the place of isolated sepulchres, as was the custom among the Jews. And who was probably the first interred in that field? This history preaches mildness and tenderness.