Matthew 27:6-10 6But the chief priests, after taking the money, said, “It is not lawful to put these into the treasury, since it is blood money.” 7And they took counsel, after taking the coins, they bought with them the Potter’s Field as a burial place for foreigners. 8Therefore, that field has been called the Field of Blood to today. 9Then the word by the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled, saying, “And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of him on whom a price had been set by the sons of Israel, 10and they gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord directed me.”
The chief priests got their money back, but now it had been stained with Judas’ blood. The time period of these events is not stated, but likely this happened over the course of the next few days and not the day of Jesus’ crucifixion. This implies that the chief priests had not changed their thinking about Jesus or his disciples. Getting the money back presented them with a problem. Judas threw the money back into the temple, so the money was part of the treasury of the temple complex. But the Jewish leaders had some sense of holiness and believed that money that was associated with someone’s death should not be part of the treasury. Whose blood did they mean, Judas’ or Jesus’? Were they just trying to relieve their guilty consciences, since both men died because of the decisions of the Jewish leaders?
They met together gain (like verse 1), trying to figure out what to do with the money. Someone came up with a brilliant idea. There was a piece of land for sale called the “Potter’s Field” that was the same price as the thirty pieces of silver. The name implies that people knew about this lot and had given it a name. Many neighborhoods have empty lots that are given names over time. The Jews had a good idea about making this a cemetery since the money was tainted with the blood of the Messiah and his betrayer.
The new nickname for the plot of ground must have given an ominous, haunted sense to those who walked by it. Only foreigners would be able to be buried there because of its taint of guilt, violence, and death. Matthew’s quote of Scripture is a combination of several passages from Jeremiah 19:1–13, 32:6–9, and Zechariah 11:12, 13. The Jews may have thought they were acting on their own genius but they were fulfilling the plan of God. Their guilt would live on for generations as people looked at the field and wondered about the story behind it.
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