Matthew 27 : 1 When the morning was come , all the chief priests and elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death : 2 And when they had bound him, they led him away , and delivered him to Pontius Pilate the governor. 3 Then Judas, which had betrayed him, when he saw that he was condemned , repented himself , and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, 4 Saying , I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said , What is that to us? see thou to that. 5 And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed , and went and hanged himself . 6 And the chief priests took the silver pieces, and said , It is not lawful for to put them into the treasury, because it is the price of blood. 7 And they took counsel, and bought with them the potter's field, to bury strangers in. 8 Wherefore that field was called , The field of blood, unto this day.
3 comments:
was looking at the Shekel of Tyre, which led to the following:
field of blood
Pisa
Akeldama
Onuphrius
— long beard, desert monk, swathed in greenery…
curious parallel, just sayin'.
part of the captcha is "green"
We live in a society where people will do pretty much anything for money. When they get the money it eventually brings them misery and a hardened heart. Money on the other hand, when given away, brings joy to the giver and blessings to the receiver. Giving away our life to others is one of the keys to true happiness.
John I thought you might be interested to know what I learned while studying Coins of the Bible some time back. You are (I believe) correct in your statement concerning Judas having received this type of coin from those who plotted to murder Jesus, as it would have been the currency most readily at hand. The Shekel of Tyre is often referred to as the "Temple Tax" coin, as it along with the half-shekel of Tyre were the only acceptable forms of currency for paying the temple tax at the temple. These coins were produced in Jerusalem by the Jews for this specific purpose. These coins were also the reason why there were 'moneychangers' outside the temple. The moneychangers would bark out exchange rates to those who had foreign currency, yet needed to enter the temple for worship. This is the clammer that caused Jesus to flip a few tables that day mentioned in scripture. Interestingly, the account in Matt 17 often subtitled "The Temple Tax" concerning the coin Peter extracting a coin from a fish's mouth at the instruction of Jesus, (again, I believe) refers to a different coin. The temple tax required EACH person to pay two drachma (Matt 17:24). Jesus told Peter that the single coin he (Peter) would remove from the fish's mouth would pay the tax for BOTH He and Peter (Matt17:27). This coin in my belief was the Alexander the Great tetradrachm (4 drachma & the required amount for TWO people to pay the temple tax), which was struck in over 52 cities across the kingdom for over 100 years after Alexander's death, and was the preferred coin of use between trade ships during this period of time.
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