27. Thirty Pieces of Silver
I told them, "If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it." So they paid me thirty pieces of silver. And the Lord said to me, "Throw it to the potter"—the handsome price at which they valued me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them to the potter at the house of the Lord (Zechariah 11:12-13). Then one of the Twelve—the one called Judas Iscariot—went to the chief priests and asked, "What are you willing to give me if I deliver him over to you?" So they counted out for him thirty pieces of silver … Then what was spoken by … the prophet was fulfilled: "They took the thirty pieces of silver, the price set on him by the people of Israel, and they used them to buy the potter's field, as the Lord commanded me" (Matthew 26:14-15; 27:9-10). This is certainly one of the most strikingly detailed prophecies fulfilled in the final week of Christ's life. Had the prophecy foretold only the amount of money for which the Messiah would be betrayed, it would have been amazing enough, but the prediction of the specific purpose for which the money would be used makes it startling in its clarity and detail.
But think about the money itself. Have you ever wondered how much the amount for which Jesus was betrayed would be relative to our own time? Matthew, the tax collector, is the only gospel writer who mentions the exact amount. He tells us that it was enough to purchase a field in the time of Jesus, but we don't know whether it was a very large or a very small field, so that information doesn't help much.
We are also unsure as to exactly what the thirty pieces of silver were. They seem to have been silver coins – but we do not know which coins. There are several possibilities. All weighed about fourteen to fifteen grams (about half an ounce in weight), but the various possible coins ranged between twenty-five to ninety percent silver content, so it is impossible to determine their value without knowing which coins they were.
Yet the Bible does tell us the value of those thirty pieces of silver. We should remember that Matthew's Gospel was written to a Jewish audience. His readers would have been well aware of the biblical significance of the payment, as the Law of Moses prescribed exactly that amount as the compensation for the death of a slave (Exodus 21:32). We should see the added ironic significance here as thirty pieces of silver was not the price of a slave – as that would differ widely depending on age, health and other factors – but the normalized compensation for a slave's death.
It is likely that the religious authorities to whom Judas betrayed Jesus had this price in mind as one they spitefully felt was appropriate. They certainly would have remembered the scripture in Exodus – though they may not have thought of the prophecy in Zechariah 11 they were unwittingly fulfilling. If they did have that scripture in mind, they would have remembered Zechariah's sarcasm in calling thirty pieces of silver a "handsome amount."
It is interesting that Matthew gives us two contrasting accounts a few verses apart of the value set on Jesus by different people. In Matthew 26:6-9 we find the story of how someone who loved Jesus paid a great sum of money to provide the perfume to symbolically anoint him for his death, whereas in Matthew 26:14-15 those who did not love him unappreciatively paid to arrange his death.
The story has powerful lessons for us, too. Sadly, in our sins and failures, we have all betrayed the love the Son of God has shown us. It is significant that Matthew chose the same Greek word that he uses of Judas' betrayal (paradidomi) to describe the actions of the religious leaders who condemned Jesus (Matthew 27:18) and also of the Roman Governor Pilate (Matthew 27:26). We can extrapolate to say that ultimately we have all betrayed Jesus.
But there is also a more positive lesson for us in Matthew's account. A little earlier in his gospel Matthew records Jesus' own words regarding his purpose in life – that he came "… to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Matthew 20:28). We should never forget that the word "serve" here literally means much more than "occasional help," but total, slave-like service.
The price paid for Jesus was more fitting than those who betrayed him guessed. The thirty pieces of silver were indeed the price for the death of a slave, and for that purpose Jesus was born – to serve and to be a sacrifice. It is also the reason for our calling in him: if we are to follow in the steps of Christ to the fullest degree possible, we must realize that we are not called merely to find our own salvation. We are called to serve others and to be willing to sacrifice to do so.