Commentary - Matthew 27:1-10

Bird's-eye view

In this brief but dense passage, Matthew shows us the final political and legal machinations that deliver Jesus into the hands of the Gentiles, and in parallel, the final spiritual machinations that deliver Judas into the hands of the devil. The religious authorities, having secured their man, now move to make his death official and state-sanctioned. They are fastidious about their process, yet utterly blind to the monumental injustice they are perpetrating. At the same time, Judas, the instrument of their success, is undone by a counterfeit repentance. His remorse is a worldly sorrow that leads to death, a stark contrast to the godly sorrow that leads to life. The passage culminates with the religious leaders' hypocrisy on full display as they meticulously handle the blood money, inadvertently fulfilling a deep and tangled prophecy concerning the price of the Shepherd of Israel. It is a grim picture of human depravity, religious hypocrisy, and the meticulous sovereignty of God working all of it to its appointed end.

Outline

The Text

Matthew 27:1

Now when morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people took counsel together against Jesus to put Him to death;

The night trials were a sham, full of illegalities, but now the sun is up. This is the official meeting, the one for the record books. Notice the players: "all the chief priests and the elders of the people." This is the Sanhedrin, the ruling council of Israel. They are all in on it. This is not a rogue faction; this is an official act of the leadership of God's covenant people. Their purpose is explicit: "to put Him to death." There is no more pretense of an investigation. The verdict was decided before the trial began. They are not seeking justice; they are seeking a legal mechanism for a murder they have already committed in their hearts. This is what religion becomes when it is detached from God Himself. It becomes a tool for managing our own righteousness and for eliminating any threat to it, the ultimate threat being God in the flesh standing before you.

Matthew 27:2

and they bound Him, and led Him away and delivered Him to Pilate the governor.

They bound Him. He who spoke galaxies into existence allows Himself to be tied up with rope. This is the great condescension. They had to bind Him because they were, and remain, terrified of Him. A bound Christ is a manageable Christ. Or so they think. They lead Him away, a public spectacle. And they deliver Him to Pilate. Why? Because under Roman occupation, the Sanhedrin did not have the authority to carry out a death sentence. They need the Gentile sword to do their dirty work. This is a profound moment of spiritual treason. The leaders of Israel, who should have been guarding the people from pagan defilement, are now actively seeking a partnership with a pagan ruler to murder their own Messiah. They are handing over the King of the Jews to a foreign power. This is the final rejection, a formal abdication of their role as shepherds of Israel.

Matthew 27:3

Then when Judas, who had betrayed Him, saw that He had been condemned, he felt remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders,

Here we pivot from the cold, calculating evil of the priests to the hot, frantic evil of the traitor. Judas sees the outcome: condemnation. Perhaps he thought Jesus would perform a last-minute miracle, escape their clutches, and establish His kingdom, with Judas getting both his money and a spot in the new administration. He miscalculated. He wanted to force Jesus' hand, but he only succeeded in forcing his own damnation. He "felt remorse." The Greek word here is not the one for true repentance. It is a word for regret, a change of feeling, not a change of heart and mind. He is sorry for the consequences, not for the sin itself. Worldly sorrow produces death. He returns the money, a frantic attempt to undo what has been done. But you cannot unscramble an egg, and you cannot un-betray the Son of God.

Matthew 27:4

saying, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.” But they said, “What is that to us? See to that yourself!”

Judas makes a confession: "I have sinned." He even identifies the specific sin: "betraying innocent blood." This is a true statement. It is a doctrinally sound confession. But it is made to the wrong audience. He goes back to his co-conspirators, the chief priests and elders, seeking absolution from them. But they are a bank, not a church. They deal in transactions, not forgiveness. Their reply is one of the coldest lines in all of Scripture: "What is that to us? See to that yourself!" They were happy to use him, but they have no pastoral concern for his soul. They wash their hands of him. This is how the devil operates. He uses you, and then he discards you. Sin always promises partnership but delivers only isolation.

Matthew 27:5

And he threw the pieces of silver into the sanctuary and departed; and he went away and hanged himself.

His attempt at restitution is rejected. In a final act of impotent rage and despair, he throws the money into the Temple, defiling the holy place with the price of his treachery. Then he departs. He leaves the presence of the priests, he leaves the city, and ultimately, he seeks to leave his own existence. He went and hanged himself. This is the endpoint of worldly sorrow. Remorse without repentance, guilt without grace, leads only to despair. Peter would deny Christ three times and weep bitterly, and that weeping would lead him to restoration. Judas regrets his action and goes out and destroys himself. The difference is not the gravity of the sin, but the object of their faith. Peter, even in his failure, still had a hope tethered to Christ. Judas's hope was in the deal he had made, and when the deal went sour, he had nothing left.

Matthew 27:6

And the chief priests took the pieces of silver and said, “It is not lawful to put them into the temple treasury, since it is the price of blood.”

The irony here is so thick you could cut it with a knife. These men, who have just orchestrated the judicial murder of an innocent man, are now having a committee meeting about the proper handling of the funds. They are sticklers for the ceremonial law. They will not taint the temple treasury with "blood money." This is the very definition of straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel. They are meticulously religious about the symbols while being utterly profane about the reality. They are concerned about the defilement of the temple treasury, but not about the defilement of their own souls. This is the dead end of all legalism. It majors in the minors and is blind to the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faithfulness.

Matthew 27:7

And taking counsel together, they bought with the money the Potter’s Field as a burial place for strangers.

They take counsel again. They are very procedural. And they decide on an act of public charity. They buy a field to bury strangers in, foreigners, the unclean. They use the blood money to perform a good deed. On the surface, it looks pious. But it is a whitewashed tomb. They are using the proceeds of the greatest crime in history to polish their public image. They are laundering the money, and their consciences, by turning it into a charitable foundation. This is how corrupt institutions perpetuate themselves. They use the dividends of their wickedness to perform acts of public benevolence, and everyone is supposed to be impressed.

Matthew 27:8

For this reason that field has been called the Field of Blood to this day.

But you cannot rename reality. The people on the street knew what that field was bought with. They called it the Field of Blood, and the name stuck. Matthew, writing decades later, notes that it is still called that. The priests' attempt to cover their tracks failed. The very land testified against them. God has a way of making the rocks cry out. Their memorial of charity became a monument to their crime.

Matthew 27:9

Then that which was spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled, saying, “AND THEY TOOK THE THIRTY PIECES OF SILVER, THE PRICE OF THE ONE WHOSE PRICE HAD BEEN SET by the sons of Israel;

Now Matthew connects all these sordid details to the grand tapestry of God's sovereign plan. He quotes a prophecy. He attributes it to Jeremiah, which has caused some consternation for commentators because the language is found more directly in Zechariah 11. But this is not a copy-paste error. In ancient Jewish practice, when quoting from a collection of prophets, you would sometimes cite the major prophet of that collection, in this case Jeremiah. More than that, Matthew is likely conflating two prophetic streams. Jeremiah 32 speaks of buying a field as a sign of future hope and redemption for Israel. Zechariah 11 speaks of the rejected shepherd being valued at thirty pieces of silver, the price of a slave, which is then thrown "to the potter." Matthew, under the inspiration of the Spirit, sees these two streams converging here. The leaders of Israel have priced their Shepherd-King at the cost of a gored slave, and that money has been used to buy a potter's field. God is weaving together the threads of judgment and a strange kind of hope, even in this dark moment.

Matthew 27:10

AND THEY GAVE THEM FOR THE POTTER’S FIELD, AS THE LORD DIRECTED ME.”

This is the capstone. All of this, the betrayal, the price, the remorse, the hypocrisy of the priests, the purchase of the field, was done "as the Lord directed me." The "me" refers back to the prophet. God was directing the prophetic word and the symbolic actions of His prophets centuries before, and He is directing the sinful actions of these men now. This does not absolve them of their guilt. They acted according to their own wicked hearts. But their wickedness was harnessed by an omnipotent and sovereign God to fulfill His own redemptive purpose. He is the master weaver, and He uses even the black threads of human sin to create the beautiful tapestry of our salvation. The price of blood, used to buy a field of blood for the burial of strangers, was all part of the plan to purchase a people for God from every tribe and tongue and nation, making them no longer strangers, but sons.

Application

First, we must examine the nature of our own repentance. It is easy to feel remorse when our sin is exposed and the consequences come crashing down. That is what Judas felt. But godly sorrow is different. It is not sorrow for being caught, but sorrow for having offended a holy and loving God. It is a sorrow that does not run away from God in despair, but runs to Him in faith, seeking the forgiveness that was purchased by the very "innocent blood" Judas betrayed. We must distinguish between the ice of remorse shattering and the ice of repentance melting.

Second, we see the deadening effect of religious hypocrisy. The priests were experts in the letter of the law, but they were ignorant of its spirit. They were clean on the outside and corrupt on the inside. We must be ruthless in rooting this out of our own hearts. It is not enough to manage our external behavior. God desires truth in the inward parts. True religion is not about maintaining a set of rules; it is about loving the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and loving your neighbor as yourself. The priests did neither.

Finally, we are driven to marvel at the sovereignty of God. In this ugly story of betrayal, greed, and religious corruption, God is not a passive observer. He is the one directing all things according to the counsel of His will. This does not make Him the author of sin, but it does make Him the master of it. He takes the most wicked act in human history, the murder of His own Son, and turns it into the very means of our salvation. This should give us immense confidence. If God can bring the greatest good out of the greatest evil, then we can trust that He is able to work all things, even the sins and sorrows of our own lives, together for our good and for His glory.