Did Matthew wrongly quote Jeremiah instead of Zechariah?
Introduction and Background
This article is not for the faint of heart. It is a very deep dive in to an issue that puzzled me for three years. I will explore all of the alternative explanations I came across and why they do not work. I will then put forward what I found to be the most satisfying resolution of this crucial issue. Did Matthew quote a prophecy from Zechariah as referring to Jeremiah?
Matthew 27:3–10 reads,
“Then Judas, His betrayer, seeing that He had been condemned, was remorseful and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.”
And they said, “What is that to us? You see to it!”
Then he threw down the pieces of silver in the temple and departed, and went and hanged himself.
But the chief priests took the silver pieces and said, “It is not lawful to put them into the treasury, because they are the price of blood.” And they consulted together and bought with them the potter’s field, to bury strangers in. Therefore that field has been called the Field of Blood to this day.
Then was fulfilled what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, saying, “And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the value of Him who was priced, whom they of the children of Israel priced, and gave them for the potter’s field, as the Lord directed me.”
The issue with the above is that the prophecy appears, not in the book of Jeremiah, but in Zechariah. It reads,
“Then I said to them, “If it is agreeable to you, give me my wages; and if not, refrain.” So they weighed out for my wages thirty pieces of silver.
And the Lord said to me, “Throw it to the potter” — that princely price they set on me. So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the Lord for the potter.”
(Zechariah 11:12–13)
Understandably, this is very problematic for a number of reasons. If the Holy Spirit inspired the writers of scripture, why did He not inspire Matthew to quote the correct author? If Matthew cannot even cite the author of his prophecies right, how can we trust he has cited Jesus correctly? How can we trust his account recorded in the gospel? Did Matthew make a mistake? And if he did, what impact does that have on our estimation of not just Matthew but the inspiration of scripture as a whole?
Explanations and their shortcomings
The first explanation is that Matthew made a mistake. He had in mind Jeremiah 32:6–44 where God instructed the prophet to buy a field as a sign that the city will be inhabited by people again and then he confuses that with Zechariah. If this is true then it does raise the questions we asked not just about the gospel of Matthew but the whole of scripture as well. So this take, far from resolving the problem, creates a lot more problems for the integrity of scripture as a whole.
The second explanation is that the spirit of Jeremiah was upon Zechariah when he prophesied in those portions cited by Matthew. Now, I love and respect our Christian thinkers and brothers but this is Muslim apologetics level of argumentation here. The obvious problem with this explanation is that it is an unfalsifiable claim. How exactly do we objectively prove that the spirit of Jeremiah was indeed inside Zechariah? Then similar to the first explanation, where do we draw the line? How do we know the spirit of Isaiah was not in Micah when he prophesied in chapter 4:1–4 of his book? Furthermore, is it not the Spirit of God that is within the prophets as they prophesy? Does Zechariah himself not say,
“…refusing to hear the law and the words which the Lord of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets…”
(Zechariah 7:12)
So once again, this explanation does not really work.
The third explanation proffered is that in the ancient scrolls, Jeremiah was the opening section of the prophets so it became a form of “shorthand” to refer to all the prophets. The problem here is two fold. First, why is there no other instance of this happening in the gospel of Matthew, the gospels as a whole or the rest of the New Testament? Matthew specifically cites Isaiah,
“that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying:
“He Himself took our infirmities
And bore our sicknesses.””
(Matthew 8:17)
Matthew also cites other prophecies without referring to the prophetic authors as Jeremiah, neither does Jesus or any other of the New Testament authors. As a result, this explanation again fails as it is not consistent with any treatment of the prophets we see in scripture.
The fourth explanation is that the original reading does not say in Matthew 27:9, “Then was fulfilled what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet…” but rather, “Then was fulfilled what was spoke by the prophets…”. Now this resolves the problem perfectly, all is well with the world again! But wait a minute! The earliest and most well attested manuscript readings say “Spoken by Jeremiah the prophet…” so this explanation just pretends the issue does not exist to begin with rather than grapple with it.
In summary, the above explanations seem to either admit this is a problem and move on or pretend the problem does not exist and move on. This is why they ultimately fail. They avoid actually grappling with the problem.
Grappling with the issue
Point 1 — How did quotations work in the first century?
When we quote people today, we expect a word for word quotation from the source with quotation marks. This is just not how quotations worked in the first century. Ideas from various portions of scripture were sometimes merged into one quote, the portions of a scripture relevant to an idea he is espousing and others left out, sometimes, and the one which is more pertinent here, a quote from two sources was merged into one and then the more popular of the sources was referenced by name. We see this in the gospel of Mark,
“As it is written in Isaiah the prophet,
“Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way,
the voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight’”
(Mark 1:2–3, ESV)
The quote above is a merging of two prophecies, one from Isaiah and another from Malachi but only Isaiah is mentioned here.
We can also see these various styles of quotation and exposition of the Hebrew scriptures in the Jewish sources (The Talmud and the various Midrashim).
Point 2 — What does it mean for prophecy to be fulfilled?
From our 21st century western lens, we sometimes have a very static understanding of what fulfilled prophecy means. We think prophecy is the scriptures saying something like “The Messiah would be born in Bethlehem Ephrathah” (Micah 5:2) and Jesus actually being born in Bethlehem Ephrathah and thus the prophecy is fulfilled. Now, this would count as fulfilled prophecy BUT THIS IS NOT THE ONLY meaning or perspective on what fulfilled prophecy actually is to a first century Jew.
To a first century Jew, events taking place in real time that neatly fall into a pattern in the Hebrew scriptures would be a fulfilled prophecy. So for example Matthew says,
“When he arose, he took the young Child and His mother by night and departed for Egypt, and was there until the death of Herod, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt I called My Son.”
(Matthew 2:14–15)
So Matthew sees Jesus’ family exiting Egypt fitting in to the pattern of Israel leaving Egypt during the Exodus as parallels, he thus counts it as fulfilled prophecy. Now before you go up in arms about this, note that Jesus did the something similar as well. He tells the Pharisees and scribes,
“He answered and said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written:
‘This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. And in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’
For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men — the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do.”
(Mark 7:6–8)
Jesus equated this unrelated prophecy of Isaiah to a direct fulfilment in the Pharisees. This is because the actions of the Pharisees and scribes neatly fitted into the pattern of the prophecy of Isaiah.
The whole book of Hebrews also draws on this premise — of enacting of Hebrew scripture patterns being fulfilled in Jesus’ death and suffering on the cross — in portraying Jesus as the ultimate High Priest.
Point 3 — Why mention Jeremiah at all?
Jeremiah does mention a certain “Valley of Hinnom” in his prophecies.
“Thus says the Lord: “Go and get a potter’s earthen flask, and take some of the elders of the people and some of the elders of the priests. And go out to the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, which is by the entry of the Potsherd Gate; and proclaim there the words that I will tell you, and say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: “Behold, I will bring such a catastrophe on this place, that whoever hears of it, his ears will tingle.
“Because they have forsaken Me and made this an alien place, because they have burned incense in it to other gods whom neither they, their fathers, nor the kings of Judah have known, and have filled this place with the blood of the innocents (they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind), therefore behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “that this place shall no more be called Tophet or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. And I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place, and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies and by the hands of those who seek their lives; their corpses I will give as meat for the birds of the heaven and for the beasts of the earth. I will make this city desolate and a hissing; everyone who passes by it will be astonished and hiss because of all its plagues. And I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and everyone shall eat the flesh of his friend in the siege and in the desperation with which their enemies and those who seek their lives shall drive them to despair.” ’
“Then you shall break the flask in the sight of the men who go with you, and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts: “Even so I will break this people and this city, as one breaks a potter’s vessel, which cannot be made whole again; and they shall bury them in Tophet till there is no place to bury.”
(Jeremiah 19:1–11)
Why is this relevant? Because the Valley of Hinnom was the exact same “Field of Blood” the chief priests bought in Matthew 27:7–9. Note that the prophecy in Zechariah never mentions a field. It mentions the house of the Lord and the potter as well as thirty pieces of silver but never a field. Jeremiah on the other hand mentions a field, and not just any field, the exact same field that the chief priests were buying at the time.
Resolving the issue
Matthew is merging a quotation from both Zechariah and Jeremiah. The latter is mentioned because he is the more prominent of the two. This would be in line with Mark’s practice in the first chapter of the gospel he authored.
The pattern of Jesus being betrayed for 30 pieces of silver and that money being thrown into the house of the Lord as Zechariah stated and then being used to buy the very same field Jeremiah referenced in his prophecy would count as fulfilled prophecy from the paradigm of a first century Jew.
This would explain why Matthew mentions Jeremiah by name. The very idea of the field which appears nowhere in Zechariah and which is one of the central objects of that particular narrative makes Jeremiah an important part of Matthew’s point.
Further insights
If we zoom out, the overall narrative of Matthew is that the Jewish Messiah — Jesus Christ — came to the Jews as promised by God and the Jews have rejected Him. As a result, there will be judgment on the city and the people for their rejection of Him.
We see this overarching narrative in Matthew where Jesus from chapter 4 to chapter 11 performs public miracle after public miracle but then after the Pharisees flat out reject Him and attribute His miracles to Satan, He begins to speak in parables from that point forward,
“On the same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the sea. And great multitudes were gathered together to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore.
Then He spoke many things to them in parables, saying…”
(Matthew 13:1–3)
Jesus specifically states the purpose of the parables is to further blind those who reject Him. The effect of this would be to essentially seal their judgment,
“Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says:
‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, And seeing you will see and not perceive; For the hearts of this people have grown dull.
Their ears are hard of hearing, And their eyes they have closed,
Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, So that I should heal them.”
(Matthew 13:13–15)
Side note, notice Jesus once again classes their alignment to a scriptural pattern as fulfilled prophecy.
But I digress…
Now, the “Field of Blood” which the chief priests bought had been cursed by God through Jeremiah (see the quoted prophecy in Jeremiah 19 above). It was going to be a venue for judgment, particularly because they had, “filled this place with the blood of innocents”. Notice they just sentenced Jesus, an innocent man, to death. Judas himself in the opening sequence in Matthew 27 had said,
“I have sinned by betraying innocent blood”
The curse of Jeremiah was that “They will bury until there is no place to bury any more.” and what use did they put the field of blood to?
“And they consulted together and bought with them the potter’s field, to bury strangers in.”
Do we again see why Jeremiah is very relevant here? The parallels are so uncanny that to Matthew, this is nothing but prophecy being fulfilled even according to our very static 21st century western understanding of fulfilled prophecy.
The big picture is that to Matthew, all of this — the rejection of the Messiah, the innocent man being put to death, the field being bought (The Valley of Hinnom), the use to which it was being put i.e. to bury people, the curse of God upon the field that was bought — is a lead up to an impending and at this point inevitable judgment on Israel.
Jesus Himself, as if echoing Jeremiah’s prophecy, also mentioned that judgment was going to come upon Israel for all the prophets they murdered, i.e. “all the innocent blood” shed in the city,
“Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.”
(Matthew 23:34–36)
In 70AD, the judgment did come. The temple was destroyed and the city ransacked. There were indeed so many slain that there was no room to bury people in the Field of Blood. It could be argued that this is what Matthew saw coming in that prophetic event of the chief priests buying the accursed field.
Concluding thoughts
Now even if you disagree with the further insights and call it a bit of a reach, what is indisputable is that if for nothing, the mere fact that Jeremiah happens to prophesy about the same field the chief priests were buying at the time is more than sufficient justification for his name to be mentioned by Matthew.
An unrelated take away from this would be that the scriptures do sometimes cause us to grapple with some things. By far the easiest explanation here would be to scream, “mistake!” or “contradiction!” but more often than not, there are explanations waiting to be uncovered if we dig deep enough and your faith will be stronger and more robust for it when you come out on the other side.
Engage and grapple with scriptures you have a problem with, do not wave it away with your hand or prematurely conclude it is a contradiction. It just might be much deeper and way more consistent than you can ever think!
This is a very bespoke article and not everybody’s cup of tea so please do share this one around to anyone who you know will be interested in this stuff and have it handy for when anybody, particularly medium atheists, says Matthew got this prophecy wrong!
