The Death of Judas- Is there a Contradiction?

I’ve been thinking quite a bit recently about the apparent contradiction between Luke and Matthew’s accounts of the death of Judas. This discrepancy has long been one of the main issues involved in the debate on the doctrine of inerrancy- the belief that the Bible, in the original writings, are without error due to the superintendence by the Holy Spirit. On a superficial look, it seems that these differences would be contradictory and that the idea of inerrancy is defeated. Here are the accounts:

“And throwing the money down into the temple, Judas left and hanged himself.”
Matthew 27.5

“Judas bought a field a field with the reward he got from his wrong-doing, and falling head-first, his body burst open in the middle and his intestines spilled out.”
Acts 1.18

So which was it? It seems a pretty simple, open and shut case- right? Well, not so quick. Interested in what the textual history showed for Acts, I looked up the verse in the NA²⁷ and UBS⁴ to see what textual variations were found for Acts 1.18. I went to the verse in Acts, because I date it a little later than the book of Matthew, since Matthew and Luke were published roughly around the same time, and Acts following. I was surprised to find that the NA²⁷ only mentioned two variants, which really didn’t change the meaning of the text, and that the USB (which lists fewer variants- only those which are “important” to the meaning of the text) didn’t list any! Acknowledging that I still have a lot to learn about textual criticism, this spoke volumes to me (and if the following reason is wrong, please correct me!). The reason this was so surprising is that there was apparently no textual history of scribes trying to smooth this verse out to better match Matthew’s version. In various other areas, particularly the synoptic Gospels, we find many times that scribes have tried to smooth out what seem to be apparent contradictions, and we would expect them to do so here. The fact that they did not says a couple of things to me: 1. They were aware that it was not, in fact, a contradiction, and 2. they had adequate knowledge of what Matthew and Luke were portraying in their accounts, and that it was widely understood not to be a contradiction at the time. The lack of variations to smooth this “problem” out seems to speak volumes.

Here is the greek for Act 1.18:
οὗτος μὲν οὖν ἐκτήσατο χωρίον ἐκ μισθοῦ τῆς ἀδικίας καὶ πρηνὴς γενόμενος ἐλάκησεν μέσος καὶ ἐξεχύθη πάντα τὰ σπλάγχνα αὐτοῦ

Here is the text with the variants from NA²⁷:
οὗτος μὲν οὖν ἐκτήσατο χωρίον ἐκ μισθοῦ τῆς ἀδικίας αὐτοῦ καὶ πεπησμενος ἐλάκησεν μέσος καὶ ἐξεχύθη πάντα τὰ σπλάγχνα αὐτοῦ

The differences being the addition of αὐτοῦ, which seems to have been added to clarify “his wrong-doing,” which is implicit in the text, and the change from πρηνὴς γενόμενος to πεπησμενος, which really is more of a stylistic change it seems.

Essentially, what this means is that the text as we have it is original, and presented no problem to the early readers, as there was no attempts that we know of to smooth out the problem.

As I see it, there are a few ways that we can take this text:

There is a contradiction here, which shows us that the Bible contains errors. As I just stated, this doesn’t seem to be the understanding of the original audience, neither must we jump to that conclusion. To assume it is an error, is to assume that Luke’s account renders Matthew’s account as impossible, or vice versa. I think that we can easily explain the apparent contradiction. I will list three ways of viewing that text that are possible alternatives.

Both are historically and factually accurate. This is the general evangelical apologetic, which states that both are true. In order for there to be a contradiction, as I said above, one account must make the other account impossible. In terms of logic, we can state it this way:

A != -A or
A can not equal not A

We must ask ourselves, does Matthew or Luke’s account render the other as impossible? If we think about it, I think we can safely say that no, they do not. Matthew’s account has Judas hanging himself. Luke’s account has him falling, and then splitting open. These two accounts fit neatly together. The presupposition of Judas falling is that he was, prior to falling, at a higher point from which he could fall. If he was hanging from a tree, this makes perfect and logical sense. The two obviously do not exclude each other from being possible. If we realize that Judas has been dead awhile, it also makes sense that his body would be in such a state of bloat and decomposition that we should have no problem with it rupturing. This view has Luke supplementing information, rather than contradiction. Since Judas hanged himself during passover, and before the Sabbath, it is likely that he hung for awhile, as no one would want to defile themselves by touching his body until after both Passover and Sabbath. This gave time for gravity to pool Judas’ blood, causing a lot of bloating.

At this point, this is the view that I hold, though I have been considering two other options.

Matthew is employing typology. This view has Matthew employing typology of the Old Testament in order to ascribe something to Judas. This view is pretty attractive to me for a few reasons: Matthew is known to use typology elsewhere in his gospel (most famously, in Matthew 2.15, in a quotation from Hosea 11.1). Before I explain this further, I want to state briefly that a view which takes into account typology does not allegorize the Old Testament, as some have claimed. Typology views events in the OT has being both historical and prophetic, although the prophetic fulfillment would not be recognized until it occurs. For example, when Paul says that Adam is a type of Christ, he is not saying that we should view Adam as allegory, but a historical person- one which finds positive fulfillment in Christ (in this case, positive fulfillment where Adam has failed). In Matthew’s use of Hosea, he is not allegorizing the Jewish Exodus, but is instead finding a fulfillment of the historical Exodus in Christ.

With that understanding of typology, we must ask ourselves what could Matthew be using as typological fulfillment in Judas? I see two possibilities.

Consider the account given in 2 Samuel 17.23:
“When Ahithophel saw that his counsel was not followed, he saddled his donkey and went off home to his own city. He set his house in order and hanged himself, and he died and was buried in the tomb of his father.”

In the Septuagint, we see that the unique combination of words used for “depart” and “hanged himself” that are used in Matthew are used here. Some commentators have shown that the Rabbinic interpretation of Psalm 41.9, “Even my close friend in whom I trusted, who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me,” was written about Ahithophel’s betrayel of King David as shown in 2 Samuel 17. This verse in Psalms is then quoted by Jesus and applied to Judas (John 13.18, cf Acts 1.16). The parallels, I think, are plain enough. Matthew, then, would not be making a statement about the mode of Judas’ death, but making the allusion to Ahithophel, who betrayed a Messianic figure, and then dead out of grief. Noting Matthew’s use of typology elsewhere, this is certainly a plausible explanation.

Another allusion to the Old Testament that Matthew could be making here is that to Deuteronomy 21.23, which states that anyone who is hanged on a tree is accursed. This passage would have been very familiar with Matthew’s Jewish readers, and would have caught the allusion very easily. Matthew, instead of stating the mode of Judas’ death, could have been making the spiritual condition of Judas clear, by declaring him accursed. There is much debate as to whether Judas actually repented of his sins, and thereby was saved before dying, or rather he was merely sorrowful and never truly repented. Matthew could be shedding light by using this allusion: Judas was in fact accursed, that is, cut-off from God. This does not have to be held as mutually exclusive with the view that both Matthew and Luke both are reporting historical facts, but we can also hold this view apart from it. Illusions like this are littered throughout the New Testament.

Though these views are attractive (less so if you think only those places that explicitly state the use of typology can be so used), I still think the strongest option is the first one- that both are historically and factually accurate.

Luke is speaking allegorically. This view holds that Matthew records how Judas dies, and Luke is attempting to convey some other sort of meaning apart from mode of death. Of the three views, I find this one extremely unlikely, but I want to include it here for the sake of not leaving something out. The word used for intestines in my translation is σπλάγχνα, and taken physically, it means the bowels. The word is often used in a nonphysical sense, however, to refer to the place of our emotions, or compassion. It is possible that Luke is using a word picture here to state something about Judas’ character by having his emotions or compassion leaving him in such a violent way. This would be understood in terms of what I said about above about the possible allusion to Deuteronomy 21.23. There are a few reasons why I think that this is not the case:

1. The verse itself is an editorial note, inserted by Luke. If we read the context, we see that it is found within a speech given by Peter. Most likely, Luke is inserting a comment here to give information about who Judas was for his readers, which is why most translations put this verse in parentheses. If Luke is giving this information to his readers, it seems best to take it as an insertion of historical fact, reminding them of who Judas was.
2. Luke seems to employ much less typology than that of Matthew. If we were to adopt a typological understanding, it would be best to find it in Matthew’s account.

Though the Matthean use of typology is an attractive view to me, I think it is best to understand the apparent contradiction in terms of the historical and factual reporting of both Matthew and Luke. That Judas, after betraying Christ, hanged himself and then at some later time he fell from his position on the tree, and his body, bloated and decomposing, split open allowing his insides to gush out. Whichever view we take, we can plainly see that assuming a contradiction here is unjustified. There also seems to be good historical witness that most readers of these two books failed to think of them in terms of contradiction, stemming from the lack of textual variants that appear to smooth the issue out. I think it is safe to affirm the inerrancy of the Bible in the face of such criticism of Luke and Matthew’s differing accounts on the death of Judas.