Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Matthew 27:8
Wherefore that field was called, The field of blood, unto this day.
The field of blood – The field purchased by the price of blood. The name by which this field was called was Aceldama, Act 1:19. It was just without the walls of Jerusalem, on the south of Mount Zion. It is now used as a burying-place by the Armenian Christians in Jerusalem, who have a magnificent convent on Mount Zion – Missionary Herald, 1824, p. 66. See the plan of Jerusalem.
To this day – That is, to the day when Matthew wrote this gospel, about 30 years after the field was purchased.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 8. The field of blood] In vain do the wicked attempt to conceal themselves; God makes them instrumental in discovering their own wickedness. Judas, by returning the money, and the priests, by laying it out, raise to themselves an eternal monument – the one of his treachery, the others of their perfidiousness, and both of the innocence of Jesus Christ. As, long as the Jewish polity continued, it might be said, “This is the field that was bought from the potter with the money which Judas got from the high priests for betraying his Master; which he, in deep compunction of spirit, brought back to them, and they bought this ground for a burial-place for strangers: for as it was the price of the blood of an innocent man, they did not think proper to let it rest in the treasury of the temple where the traitor had thrown it, who afterwards, in despair, went and hanged himself.” What a standing proof must this have been of the innocence of Christ, and of their perfidy!
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Wherefore that field was called,…. Not by the priests and elders, but by the common people, who knew by what money it was purchased,
the field of blood; or “Aceldama”, which so signifies, as in Ac 1:19, not called the field of the priests, the purchasers; nor the field of the strangers, for whom it was bought; but the field of blood, being purchased with that money, for which innocent blood was betrayed; and this name it bore
unto this day; in which Matthew wrote his Gospel, about eight years after, as is thought. Jerom x says, that in his time this field was shown on the south side of Mount Sion.
x De locis Hebraicis.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The field of blood ( ). This name was attached to it because it was the price of blood and that is not inconsistent with Ac 1:18f. Today potter’s field carries the idea here started of burial place for strangers who have no where else to lie ( ), probably at first Jews from elsewhere dying in Jerusalem. In Ac 1:19 it is called
Aceldama or
place of blood ( ) for the reason that Judas’ blood was shed there, here because it was purchased by blood money. Both reasons could be true.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
8. For a burying-place to strangers. The more that wicked men endeavor to conceal their enormities, the more does the Lord watch over them to bring those enormities to light. They hoped that, by an honorable disguise, they would bury their crime, were they to purchase a barren field for burying strangers. But the wonderful providence of God turns this arrangement to an opposite result, so that this field became a perpetual memorial of that treason, which had formerly been little known. For it was not themselves that gave this name to the place, but after the occurrence was generally known, the field was called, by common consent, The field of blood; as if God had commanded that their disgrace should be in every man’s mouth. It was a plausible design to provide a burying-place for strangers, if any of those who came up to Jerusalem from distant countries, for the purpose of sacrificing, should happen to die there. As some of them were of the Gentiles, I do not disapprove of the opinion of some ancient writers, that this symbol held out the hope of salvation to the Gentiles, because they were included in the price of the death of Christ; but as that opinion is more ingenious than solid, I leave it undetermined. The word corbana, (treasury,) is Chaldaic, and is derived from the Hebrew word ( קרבן), ( corban,) of which we have spoken elsewhere.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(8) The field of blood.St. Luke (Act. 1:19) gives the Aramaic form, Akeldama, but assigns the death of Judas in a field which he had bought as the origin of the name. It is possible that two spots may have been known by the same name for distinct reasons, and the fact that two places have been shown as the Field of Blood from the time of Jerome downwards, is, as far as it goes, in favour of this view. It is equally possible, on the other hand, that Judas may have gone, before or after the purchase, to the ground which, bought with his money, was, in some sense his own, and there ended his despair, dying literally in Gehenna, and buried, not in the grave of his fathers at Kerioth, but as an outcast, with none to mourn over him, in the cemetery of the aliens.
Unto this day.The phrase suggests here, as again in Mat. 28:15, an interval, more or less considerable, between the events and the record. (Comp. the Introduction as to the date of the Gospel.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
8. The field of blood The name stood as a memento of the direful sale and execution. The name, “called in their proper tongue Aceldama,” is at the present day traditionally given to a spot south of the Valley of Hinnom. Unto this day Unto the time that Matthew writes. This was perhaps about eight years of interval. Sceptics have quoted this phrase in proof that Matthew was written in a later age. But it is a curious coincidence, that we fell upon this phrase a few days since in a New York newspaper, in regard to an event not more than eight years distant.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘For which reason that field was called, the field of blood, to this day.’
‘For which reason’ might look back to the decision of the Chief Priests, or it may look back on the whole story. The name ‘field of blood’ might well have piously been given to it by the now ultra-pious Chief Priests in recognition of where its purchase price had come from. It sounds like a typical piece of false piety. But more popularly, in the public imagination, the name may well have also been seen as pointing to Judas’ gruesome death as a result of which the price had been obtained (Act 1:19), especially if it was the field where Judas hung himself.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
8 Wherefore that field was called, The field of blood, unto this day.
Ver. 8. Was called the field of blood ] Not the burial place for strangers, as they would have had it called (thinking thereby to have gotten themselves an eternal commendation, for their love and liberality to strangers), but “the field of blood” (so the Vulgate would needs call it, much against these masters’ minds), for a lasting monument of their detestable villany, which they thought to have carried so cleanly, that the world should have been never the wiser; and therefore they would not kill Christ themselves as they did Stephen; but, to decline the envy, delivered him up to Pilate to be put to death. It is hard if hypocrites be not, by one means or other, detected; how else should their names rot?
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
8. ] . ., . See Act 1:19 .
. ] This expression shews that a considerable time had elapsed since the event, before Matthew’s Gospel was published.
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Mat 27:8 . = aceldama , Act 1:18 , name otherwise explained there. : phrase frequent in O. T. history; sign of late date of Gospel, thinks De Wette.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
8.] . .,- . See Act 1:19.
.] This expression shews that a considerable time had elapsed since the event, before Matthews Gospel was published.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Mat 27:8. , …, was called, etc.) A public testimony to the fact. The appellation of the field, though originating with the common people, was not fortuitous.-, of blood) See Mat 27:6.- , unto this day) St Matthew wrote some time after [the events which he recorded]; cf. ch. Mat 28:15.
Adrichonius says- This soil (namely, that of the Field of Blood) possesseth a wonderful virtue, and one almost passing belief, viz., that within four and twenty hours it reduces the bodies of the dead to dust, which virtue, even when carried into other regions, it still preserves; for when, by command of the Empress Helena, as much earth, they say, as 270 vessels could hold, was taken from this field to Rome, and unloaded close by the Vatican Mount, on to that which the inhabitants call CAMPO SANTO, although it has changed its country, yet daily experience shows that it retains its power: for, rejecting Romans, it admits to sepulture only the bodies of strangers, the whole substance of whose flesh it here also entirely consumes within four and twenty hours, leaving only the bones. This statement is partly confirmed, partly denied, by recent travellers.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
that: Act 1:19
unto: Mat 28:15, Deu 34:6, Jos 4:9, Jdg 1:26, 2Ch 5:9
Reciprocal: 1Ch 4:43 – unto this day
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
27:8
The field of blood was so called because it was purchased with the money that had been paid to Judas for his betrayal of Jesus. The priests had called it the price of blood (verse 6), and thought it was not fitting to put such “tainted money” into the treasury of the temple.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Mat 27:8. The field of blood. Akeldama, Act 1:19. The stain of the blood money remained in the name. It belonged to the Latins until the fourteenth century and afterwards became the property of the Armenians. Until the present century it was used as a burial place.
Unto this day, i.e., when Matthew wrote.