The Purchase of

"The Potters Field"

(Matthew 27:6-8, and Acts 1:18,

19)

and the Fulfilment of the

Prophecy

(Matthew 27:9, 10).

This Is Appendix 161 From The Companion Bible.

There are two difficulties connected with these scriptures:

I. The two purchases recorded in Matthew 27:6 - 8, and Acts 1:18,

19, respectively; and

II. The fulfilment of the prophecy connected with the former

purchase (Matthew 27:9, 10.

I. THE TWO PURCHASES.

For there were two. One by "the chief priests", recorded in

Matthew 27:6; and the other by Judas Iscariot, recorded in Acts

1:18. The proofs are as follows:

1. The purchase of Judas was made some time before that

of the chief priests; for there would have been no time to

arrange and carry this out between the betrayal and the

condemnation.

The purchase of the chief priests was made after Judas

had returned the money.

2. What the chief priests bought was "a field" (Greek

agros).

What Judas had acquired (see 3, below) was what in

English we call "Place" (Greek 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 1 below).

3. The verbs also are different. In Matthew 27:7 the verbs

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 Matthew 10:9. Its

noun, ktema = a possession (occurs Matthew 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 English

"money ill-got"), used for money obtained

unrighteousness (Appendix 128. VII. 1; compare

Numbers 22:7. 2Peter 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; that is to say, a field

bought with the price of blood ("blood" being part by

Figure of Speech Metonymy (of the Subject), Appendix

6, for murder, or blood-guiltiness).

The "possession" which Judas had acquired bore an

Aramaic name, "Hakal dema' " (see Appendix 94 (III.)

3), which is transliterated Akeldama, or according to

some Akeldamach, or Hacheldamach = "place (Greek

chorion) of blood": a similar meaning but from a

different reason: videlicet, Judas's suicide. It is thus

shown that there is no discrepancy between Matthew

27:6 - 8 and Acts 1: 18, 19.

II. THE FULFILMENT OF THE PROPHECY (Matthew 27:9,

10.)

Many solutions have been proposed to meet the two

difficulties connected with Matthew 27:9, 10.

i. As to the first difficulty, the words quoted from

Jeremiah are not found in his written prophecy: and it

has been suggested

1. That "Matthew quoted from

memory" (Augustine and others).

2. That the passage was originally in Jeremiah, but

the Jews cut it out (Eusebius and others); though

no evidence for this is produced.

3. That it was contained in another writing by

Jeremiah, which is now lost (Origen and others).

4. That Jeremiah is put for the whole body of the

prophets (Bishop Lightfoot and others), though

no such words can be found in the other

prophets.

5. That it was "a slip of the pen" on the part of

Matthew (Dean Alford).

6. That the mistake was allowed by the Holy Spirit

on purpose that we may not trouble ourselves as

to who the writers were, but receive all prophecy

as direct from God. Who spake by them (Bishop

Wordsworth).

7. That some annotator wrote "Jeremiah" in the

margin and it "crept" into the text (Smith's Bible

Dictionary).

These suggestions only create difficulties much more

grave than the one which they attempt to remove. But

all of them are met and answered by the simple fact that

Matthew does not say it was written by Jeremiah, but

that it was "spoken" by him.

This makes all the difference: for some prophecies

were spoken (and not written), some were written (and

not spoken), while others were both spoken and written.

Of course, by Figure of speech, Metonymy (of Cause,

Appendix 6), one may be said to "say" what he has

written; but we need not go out of our way to use this

figure, if by so doing we create the very difficulty we

are seeking to solve. There is all the difference in the

world between to rhethen (= that which was spoken),

and ho gegraptai (= that which stands written).

ii. As to the second difficulty: that the prophecy attributed

to Jeremiah is really written in Zechariah 11:10 - 13, it is

created by the suggestion contained in the margin of the

Authorized Version.

That this cannot be the solution may be shown from

the following reasons:-

1. Zechariah 11:10 - 13 contains no reference either

to a "field" or to its purchase. Indeed, the word

"field" (shadah) does not occur in the whole of

Zechariah except in 10:1, which has nothing to

do with the subject at all.

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, an insult. But this latter is the

sense in Matthew 27:9, 10.

3. The givers were "the poor of the flock". This

enhanced the value. "The worth of the price"

was accepted as "goodly" on that account, as in

Mark 12:43, 44. 2 Corinthians 8:12.

4. The waiting of the "poor of the flock" was not

hostile, but friendly, as in Proverbs 27:18. Out of

above 450 occurrences of the Hebrew 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 Zechariah 11, the context

shows it to be in a good sense, as in Exodus

15:25. 1 Kings 19:19. 2 Kings 2:21; 4:41; 6:6. 2

Chronicles 24:10, 11.

6. The "potter" is the fashioner, and his work was

not necessarily confined to fashioning "clay",

but it extended to metals. Compare Genesis 2:7,

8. Psalms 33:15; 94:9. Isaiah 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 threefourths

have nothing whatever to do with the

work of a "potter".

7. A "potter" in connection with the Temple, or its

service, is unknown to fact, or to Scripture.

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 (2 Kings 12:11 - 16; 22:4 - 7. 2

Chronicles 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, 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, margin). Lead, twice (5:7, 8). Tin, once

(4:10, margin). Seventeen references in all.

10. Zechariah is full of references to what the

prophet saw and said; but there are only two

references to what he did; and both of these have

reference to "silver" (6:11; 11:13).

11. The Septuagint, and its revision by Symmachus,

read "cast them (that is to say, the thirty pieces

of silver) into the furnace" (Greek eis to

choneuterion), showing that, before Matthew

was written, yotzer was interpreted as referring

not to a "potter" but to a fashioner of metals.

12. The persons, also, are different. In Matthew we

have "they took", "they gave", "the price of

him"; in Zechariah we read "I took", "I cast",

"I was valued".

13. In Matthew the money was given "for the field",

and in Zechariah it was cast "unto the

fashioner".

14. Matthew names three parties as being concerned

in the transaction; Zechariah names only one.

15. Matthew not only quotes Jeremiah's spoken

words, but names him as the speaker. This is in

keeping with Matthew 2:17, 18. Jeremiah is

likewise named in Matthew 16:14; but nowhere

else in all the New Testament.

iii. The conclusion. From all this we gather that the passage

is Matthew (27:9, 10) cannot have any reference to

Zechariah 11:10 - 13.

(1) If Jeremiah's spoken words have anything to do with what

is recorded in Jeremiah 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' ", etc.

(3) Or, had the reference been to the compensation for an

injury done to another man's servant, as in Exodus 21:32, a

similar parenthetical remark might have been introduced thus:-

"Then was fulfilled that which was SPOKEN by Jeremiah the

prophet, saying: 'And they took the thirty pieces of silver [the

price given in Israel to the master whose servant had been

injured by an ox], and they gave them for the potter's field' ",

etc.

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.

NOTES

1 Of these, the Aramaic (or Syriac), that is to say, the Peshitto, is the

most important, ranking as superior in authority to the oldest Greek

manuscripts, and dating from as early as A.D. 170.

Though the Syrian Church was divided by the Third and Fourth

General Councils in the fifth century, into three, and eventually into

yet more, hostile communions, which have lasted for 1,400 years with

all their bitter controversies, yet the same version is ready to-day in the

rival churches. Their manuscripts have flowed into the libraries of the

West. "yet they all exhibit a text in every important respect the

same." Peshitto means a version simple and plain, without the

addition of allegorical or mystical glosses.

Hence we have given this authority, where needed throughout our

notes, as being of more value than the modern critical Greek texts; and

have noted (for the most part) only those "various readings" with

which the Syriac agrees.

Appendix