The Death of Judas Iscariot

Immediately after the ascension of Jesus, several of His relatives, some faithful women, and the eleven Apostles gathered in the upper room, devoting themselves to prayer and waiting for the Holy Spirit to come (Acts 1:1–14). Other followers of Jesus were also present with them in Jerusalem, as we see in today’s passage, with the total group of people numbering about 120 (v. 15). At this point, an important question had to be answered: Who would take the place of Judas Iscariot alongside the eleven Apostles?

Peter, we read in today’s passage, explained to the company of men and women that the loss of Judas fulfilled biblical prophecy (vv. 16–17). Luke inserts a parenthetical comment that reveals what happened to Judas after he betrayed Jesus and handed Him over to the Jewish authorities (see Luke 22:3–6, 47–53). Judas, Acts 1:18 tells us, took the blood money he had received from the Jewish leaders, acquired a field, and then fell headlong into the field, where “all his bowels gushed out” in his death. This record has been the subject of some controversy because of its differences with the account of Judas’ death in Matthew 27:3–10. Matthew tells us that Judas tried to return the silver that he had received from the priests and elders for betraying an innocent man and threw it at their feet when they would not take it back. He then hanged himself, and the leaders took the funds and bought the potter’s field as a place to bury strangers. These accounts are easily reconciled. Even though the priests took the money and purchased the field, Luke is not wrong to say that Judas acquired it. After all, the money was available only because Judas first received it. Ultimately, it was because of his act that the Jews bought the field. Also, after hanging for some time, Judas’ body would have fallen to the ground and produced the grisly scene that Luke describes in Acts 1:18–19.

We read in Acts 1:20 the two prophecies fulfilled in the death of Judas. The first, Psalm 69:25, is one line from a prayer of David in which the king asks for his impenitent enemies to lose everything and for their line to come to an end. The second, Psalm 109:8, is from another prayer of David wherein he asks for an official who betrayed him to be replaced with a man actually fit for the office. These prayers find their ultimate realization in the circumstances surrounding the death of Jesus, the perfect Davidic King who alone is fully undeserving of the hatred of others.