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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comRobertson Word Pictures - Matthew 26:15 - 26:15
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
What are ye willing to give me? (ti thelete moi dounai̇) This “brings out the chaffering aspect of the transaction” (Vincent). “Mary and Judas extreme opposites: she freely spending in love, he willing to sell his Master for money” (Bruce). And her act of love provoked Judas to his despicable deed, this rebuke of Jesus added to all the rest.
And I will deliver him unto you (kagō hūmin paradōsō auton). The use of kai with a co-ordinate clause is a colloquialism (common in the Koiné as in the Hebrew use of wav. “A colloquialism or a Hebraism, the traitor mean in style as in spirit” (Bruce). The use of egō seems to mean “I though one of his disciples will hand him over to you if you give me enough.”
They weighed unto him (hoi de estēsan auto). They placed the money in the balances or scales. “Coined money was in use, but the shekels may have been weighed out in antique fashion by men careful to do an iniquitous thing in the most orthodox way” (Bruce). It is not known whether the Sanhedrin had offered a reward for the arrest of Jesus or not.
Thirty pieces of silver (triakonta arguria). A reference to Zec 11:12. If a man’s ox gored a servant, he had to pay this amount (Exo 21:32). Some manuscripts have statēras (staters). These thirty silver shekels were equal to 120 denarii, less than five English pounds, less than twenty-five dollars, the current price of a slave. There was no doubt contempt for Jesus in the minds of both the Sanhedrin and Judas in this bargain.