Zechariah 11-14

I told them, “If you think it best, give me my pay; but if not, keep it.” So they paid me thirty pieces of silver. And the Lord said to me, “Throw it to the potter”—the handsome price at which they valued me! So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them to the potter at the house of the Lord. (Zechariah‬ ‭11:12-13‬)

These two verses from the prophet, Zechariah, prompt me to think of this:

When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver 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.

The chief priests picked up the coins and said, “It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money.” So they decided to use the money to buy the potter’s field as a burial place for foreigners. That is why it has been called the Field of Blood to this day.

Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the Prophet was fulfilled: “They took the thirty pieces of silver, the price set on him by the people of Israel, and they used them to buy the potter’s field, as the Lord commanded me. (Matthew‬ ‭27:3-10‬)

The term, “thirty pieces of silver,” ties Matthew’s Gospel and Zechariah’s prophecy together, yet the prophecy “fulfillment” in the gospel is attributed to Jeremiah the Prophet. What’s up with that? Somewhere along the line I suspect a conflation of interests, since one part of Jeremiah’s story involves his buying a field (Jeremiah, chapter 32) and another part involves his dealings with a potter and with pottery (Jeremiah, chapters 18 and 19).