Excerpt from Expositers commentary on MT. 27:9-10 by D.A. Carson

We have been going through the prophets lately, and that means we are looking at all the NT quotes in prophetic literature. In doing so, we find some interesting and puzzling quotations. Verses that dont seem predictive become "fulfilled" verses attributed to Jeremiah seem irrelevant to the NT context and not in context with the OT book?! This is definately not the norm or absolute of NT references, but it happens enough. One of the more tricky ones is Matthew' quoting of the blended citation of Jeremiah and Zechariah. Here is what D.A. Carson has to say about in his commentary:

D.A. Carson’s Commentary on Matthew 27:9-10

Three aspects of this complex quotation need discussion.

1. The ascription to Jeremiah.

On the face of it, the quotation is a rough rendering of Zec 11:12-13. The only obvious allusions to Jeremiah are 18:2-6; 32:6-15—Jeremiah did visit a potter and buy a field. It is difficult to imagine why Matthew mentioned Jeremiah instead of Zechariah, even though Jeremiah is important in this gospel (cf. 2:17; 16:14).

We should first note that no extant version of Zec 11 refers to a field; thus Matthew’s attributing the quotation to Jeremiah suggests we ought to look to that book. Jeremiah 19:1-13 is the obvious candidate, where Jeremiah is told to purchase a potter’s jar and take some elders and priests to the Valley of Ben Hinnom. There he is to warn of the destruction of Jerusalem for her sin, illustrated by smashing the jar. A further linguistic link is “innocent blood” (Jer 19:4); and thematic links include renaming a locality associated with potters (19:1) with a name (“Valley of Slaughter”) denoting violence (19:6). The place will henceforth be used as a burial ground (19:11), as a token of God’s judgment. In other words, the quotation appears to refer to Jer 19:1-13, along with phraseology drawn mostly from Zec 11:12-13. Such fusing of sources under one “quotation” is not unknown elsewhere in Scripture (e.g., Mk 1:2-3). Jeremiah alone is mentioned, perhaps because he is the more important of the two prophets, and perhaps also because Jer 19 is more important as to prophecy and fulfillment.

1. Meaning 

How did Matthew understand the OT texts he was quoting? The question is not easy, because the two OT passages themselves can be variously explained. It appears that in Zec 11 the “buyers” (v. 5) and the three shepherds (vv. 5, 8, 17) apparently represent Israel’s leaders, who are slaughtering the sheep. God commands Zechariah to shepherd the “flock marked for slaughter” (v. 7), and he tries to clean up the leadership by sacking the false shepherds. But he discovers that not only is the leadership corrupt, but the flock detests him (v. 8). Thus Zechariah comes to understand the Lord’s decision to have no more pity on the people of the land (v. 6).

Zechariah decides to resign (11:9-10), exposing the flock to ravages. Because he has broken the contract, he cannot claim his pay (presumably from the “buyers”); but they pay him off with thirty pieces of silver (v. 12). But now the Lord tells Zechariah to throw this “handsome price at which they priced me” (probably ironical) to the potter in the “house of the LORD.”

The parallel between Zec 11 and Mt 26-27 is not exact. In Zechariah the money is paid to the good shepherd; in Matthew it is paid to Judas and returned to the Jewish leaders. In Zechariah the money goes directly to the “potter” in the temple; in Matthew, after being thrown into the temple, it purchases “the potter’s field.” Nevertheless the central parallel is stunning: in both instances the Lord’s shepherd is rejected by the people of Israel and valued at the price of a slave. And in both instances the money is flung into the temple and ends up purchasing something that pollutes and points to the destruction of the nation (see comments on 15:7-9; 21:42).

(3)Fulfillment

In the light of these relationships between the events surrounding Jesus’ death and the two key OT passages that make up Matthew’s quotation, what does the evangelist mean by saying that the prophecy “was fulfilled”? As in 2:17, the form of this introductory formula shrinks from making Judas’s horrible crime the immediate result of the Lord’s word, while nevertheless insisting that all has taken place in fulfillment of Scripture (cf. 1:22 with 2:17). What we find in Matthew, including vv. 9-10, is not identification of the text with an event but fulfillment of the text in an event, based on a broad typology governing how both Jesus and Matthew read the OT (see comments on 2:15; 8:17; 13:35; 26:28, 54). Because of this typological model, Matthew can introduce the commonly noticed changes: e.g., the one on whom a price is set is no longer the prophet (“me,” Zec 11:13), but Jesus.