THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW - Chapter 27 - Verse 10

Verse 10. And gave them. In Zechariah it is I gave them. Here it is represented as being given by the priests. The meaning is not, however, different. It is, that this price was given for the potter's field.

As the Lord appointed me. That is, commanded me. The meaning of the place in Zechariah is this: He was directed to go to the Jews as a prophet—a pastor of the people. They treated him, as they had done others, with great contempt. He asks them to give him his price— i.e., the price which they thought he and his pastoral labours were worth, or to show their estimate of his office. If they thought it of value, they were to pay him accordingly; if not, they were to "forbear"— that is, to give nothing. To show their great contempt of him and his office, and of God who had sent him, they gave him thirty pieces of silver, the price of a slave. This God commanded, or appointed him to give to the potter, or to throw into the pottery—to throw away. So in the time of Jesus the same thing was substantially repeated. Jesus came as the Messiah. They hated and rejected him. To show their contempt of him and his cause, they valued him at the price of a slave. This was thrown down in the temple, taken by the priests, and appropriated to the purchase of a field owned by a potter, worn out, and of little or no value; all showing at how low a price, through the whole transaction, the Son of God was estimated. Though the words quoted here are not precisely like those in Zechariah, yet the sense and general structure are the same.