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The Bible presents two conflicting |
Judas
Hangs Himself |
How Did the
“Field of Blood” Get Its Name?
Faith-building stories that were fictional adaptations of Old Testament tales,
and that were in circulation long before they reached the ears of the gospel
writers, had a Judas betray a Jesus, the long-awaited savior, then repent and
give up his blood money to buy a field. Hence the name, "Field of
Blood."
Later, a story about Judas' spiritual death--his "bursting"--evolved
out of a wineskin-bursting parable about men who cannot absorb new ideas.
In the beginning, this story did not include an "explanation" of the
Field of Blood name because the first tellers of the story knew that Judas
didn't die a physical death by bursting. With the passage of perhaps
decades, the story came to be taken as literal truth by those who hadn't heard
the story of Judas hanging himself, but recalled the name, Field of Blood, so
they assumed that the blood in the Field of Blood was blood from Judas'
intestines. This is the story that reached the pen of the credulous
writer of Acts.
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Matthew says that Judas hanged
himself, while Luke (the author of Acts) says that he fell and his guts
spilled out. Both of these accounts cannot be true. Either one is, or
neither is. No matter which is the case, at least one account is wrong, and this
means that the Bible is not error-free. Early in the morning, all the
chief priests and the elders of the people came to the decision to put Jesus
to death. They bound him, led him away and handed him over to Pilate, the governor.
When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized
with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and
the elders. "I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed
innocent blood." "What is that to us?" they replied.
"That's your responsibility." So Judas threw the money into the
temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself. (Matthew 27:1-5
NIV) In those days Peter stood up
among the believers (a group numbering about a hundred and twenty) and said,
"Brothers, the Scripture had to be fulfilled which the Holy Spirit spoke
long ago through the mouth of David concerning Judas, who served as guide for
those who arrested Jesus--he was one of our number and shared in this
ministry." With the reward he got for his wickedness, Judas bought
a field; there he fell headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines
spilled out. (Acts 1:15-18 NIV) |
Post to errancy on January 2,
2003:
The Matthew writer may indeed have received second-hand the story about Judas
hanging himself, but the story equally easily could have originated from the
writer. So, we cannot say if the story is hearsay, or not. In any
case, it is almost perfectly clear that the story is fiction clumsily based on
misunderstood passages in the books by Jeremiah and Zechariah, so whether the
Matthew writer recorded his own fiction, or someone else's, doesn't really
matter.
There's more evidence of hearsay in the Lukan passage. As I argued in a
previous post, there are indications that the original "bursting"
story was never intended by its tellers to be anything other than a
metaphorical description of Judas' spiritual death (Judas' failure to accept
Jesus' teachings was compared to an old wineskin's bursting when new wine is
poured inside). When the story eventually reached "Luke," his
failure to warn the readers that Judas did not literally burst open indicates
that he did indeed receive the story second-hand.
Thus, you could use the word "hearsay" for the bursting story, in my
opinion, but not do so safely with the Matthean one. I think you would be
safer stating that the Matthew story is a inept fabrication based on
misinterpreted Old Testament passages, while Luke's story is a misconception
based on the wineskin metaphor.
===========
Post to errancy:
Matthew says that Judas hanged
himself, while the writer in Acts seems to indicate that Judas fell and his
guts spilled out. Here are the relevant verses:
The writer in Matthew wrote, "When Judas...saw that Jesus was condemned,
he was seized with remorse...Then he went away and hanged
himself."(Matthew 27:1-5 NIV)
However, Acts describes Judas "dying" when his guts burst open in a
fall: "With the reward he got for his wickedness, Judas bought a
field; there he fell headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines
spilled out." (Acts 1:15-18 NIV)
I believe the author (Luke) of this passage in Acts was using literary license
to construct a fictional spiritual death scene in which Judas' "bursting
guts" were not literally bursting guts, but were represented his failure
to accept the new teachings of Jesus, which to Luke evidently was like the
spiritual death he alluded to in his gospel:
"And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine
will burst the skins, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be
ruined." (Luke 5:37)
Old skins cannot expand to accommodate the gases released from still-fermenting
new fine, while new ones are still elastic enough to accommodate the release of
gas. Luke expected his readers would see that Judas was holding on to the old
law, the old way of thinking, and was unable to accommodate the new teachings
of Jesus and thus "burst open" just as does an old wineskin filled
with new wine. Luke clearly never meant for his readers to take his description
of Judas literally.
===========
Since my last post I’ve located
Turkel’s apologetic for Judas’ death.
It’s at
http://www.tektonics.org/judasdeath.html
Turkel wrote:
However, my preference is for the
solution offered [in the book] Judas Iscariot and the Myth of Jewish Evil [180],
[where the author] notes that the phrase translated "becoming
headlong" (prenes genomenos) is a mere transcription error away
from being "becoming swollen" (presthes genomenos). The latter
may well be what was originally written, and as such might describe Judas' body
swelling up after hanging for a while.
(end apology)
This explanation raises a question
more important than the one which it attempts to answer: If the Acts author wanted his audience to
understand that Judas’ swelling was the result of his hanging himself and being
left to rot on the tree for days, then why in the world did he not have the
good sense to say so? It makes no sense
for the author to tell us that Judas’ guts burst without telling us why it
happened. One's guts bursting out is
such a rare event that surely if Luke believed that this extraordinary thing is
what actually happened to Judas, he would have made certain to provide the
extraordinary explanation for its occurrence.
The fact that he didn’t do this is strong evidence that Luke didn’t
believe Judas’ guts literally burst open.
In an earlier post I explained why I think Luke wanted his readers to
believe that the “guts bursting” description was just Luke’s metaphor for a
spiritual death suffered by Judas, who like the old wineskin was unable to
contain the new “wine” (teachings) of Jesus.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The key to understanding what Luke
wanted us to understand is found in the following passage:
“And no one pours new wine into
old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run
out and the wineskins will be ruined.” (Luke 5:37)
Old skins cannot expand to
accommodate the gases released from still-fermenting new fine, while new ones
are still elastic enough to accommodate the release of gas. Luke was expecting
his readers would see that Judas was holding on to the old law, the old way of
thinking, and was unable to accommodate the new teachings of Jesus; thus, the
Judas with the old ideas burst open just as does an old wineskin filled with
new wine. Luke clearly never meant for his readers to take his description of
Judas literally.
The only place in the New
Testament (NIV) where the words "burst" are used are in the three
parallel verses dealing with wineskins, and the one place in the rest of
the New Testament where the word is used to describe what happened to Judas.
Here are the references:
Matthew 9:17 Neither do men pour
new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will
run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new
wineskins, and both are preserved."
Mark 2:22 And no one pours new
wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both
the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new
wineskins."
Luke 5:37 And no one pours new
wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the
wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined.
Acts 1:18 Acts 1 Acts 1:17-19
(With the reward he got for his wickedness, Judas bought a field; there he fell
headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines spilled out.
This is not a coincidence, I
believe; Luke is telling us in Acts that just as old wineskins burst when new
wine is poured into them, so did the one with old ideas and beliefs (Judas)
"burst" when new teachings (from Jesus) tried to enter him.
-----
Post to forum on February 13,
2003:
The Matthean author tells his
readers that Jesus' blood paid for the field, and that's why the field
is called the Field of Blood. However, in the Acts passage below, the writer
gives us a completely different reason for the name of the field. This author
tells us that the field is called the Field of Blood because Judas's
blood and guts were spilled over it:
Now this man purchased a field with
the reward of iniquity; and falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst,
and all his bowels gushed out. (Acts 1:18)
Which is it? Jesus' blood paid for
the field, and that's why it's called the Field of Blood? Or, Judas's blood was
spilled on it, and that's why it's called the Field of Blood? The contrast between
the two different explanations is much too stark to imagine that they are
compatible. Thus, there seems to be a contradiction here.
---
The notion that the Acts author
knew that Judas burst after the tree branch broke, but didn't think his readers
needed to know about the hanging, is just too silly to take seriously. The
ultimate cause of the death was the hanging from the tree. If there's no
hanging, there would be no bloating, and no falling. Thus, the hanging is the
crucial element of the story, but yet the Acts author doesn't think he should
mention it? That's just too far-fetched to be believed.
March 4, 2004:
Some apologists argue that the
"falling headlong" in Acts actually was originally
"swollen."
According
to this theory, then, we have Luke in Acts 1:15-18 saying that Judas' swollen
belly burst open, spilling his blood.
It think it is quite likely that this is exactly what the Lukan author
was saying, but I do not think this is actually what happened. How likely is it that Judas really did
become so swollen that he burst open while walking across his field? With the
"falling headlong" replaced by "swollen," we do not even
have the falling down on sharp rocks to explain how Judas burst open. Surely, we are not supposed to imagine that
he spontaneously popped open in the field, like a balloon overfilled with
air. Furthermore, how come the Acts
author doesn't bother to tell us how Judas became swollen, if it really
happened?
I believe the bursting story is a
totally fictional one based on the wineskin in Jesus' parable:
And no one pours new wine into old
wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins, the wine will run out
and the wineskins will be ruined. No, new wine must be poured into new
wineskins. And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for he says, 'The
old is better.' " (Luke 5:37; see also, Matthew 9:17).
Jesus is saying that those who
have lived by the old law cannot accept the new one, just as the old wineskin
can hold only old wine, not new wine.
This would have been the case with Judas, who could abide the old
teachings, but not Jesus' new teachings, else he wouldn't have betrayed
him. Thus, in the Acts verse, we have a
Judas whose belly was like a wineskin swollen by the gases of the fermenting
new wine. Just as an old wineskin
cannot swell enough to accommodate this new wine, and therefore bursts open and
spills its red liquid, then so did the swollen Judas burst apart because he
could not adapt to the new law, and his blood spilled to the ground.