One frequently hears of an indigent person being found dead in the cold, in their apartment, etc.
Lacking funds for a private burial they are buried in what is commonly called a Potter’s Field. What is the origin of this term?
Cartooniverse
When Judas Escariot (damn those biblical spellings) betrayed Jesus ti the Pharasees, they paid him 20 pieces of silver. Judas got himself a case of the guilties after what he had done, and tried to retirn the cash afterwards, but the two faced bastys at the temple would not take the funds because it was “Blood Money” and therefore not worthy.
This drove ol’ Judas intoa suicidal fit. He took himself over to the field that was used by the potters of the area to gather clay, and hung himself.
So the Pharasees used the blood money to buy the field, and turned it into a burial site for the poor.
I’m sure there is something rich in religious sybology here, but I seem to have missed it. Maybe His4ever will cruise in and enlighten us further.
From Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary:
potter’s field
Function: noun
Etymology: from the mention in Matthew 27:7 of the purchase of a potter’s field for use as a graveyard
Date: 1777
: a public burial place for paupers, unknown persons, and criminals
The appropriate biblical passages, Matthew 27:5-10:
There is no indication that Judas either killed himself at (as Telcontar states), or was buried in, that potter’s field.
Acts 1:18
*Note, the “hanging” in Matthew occurs before the crucifixion, but he blowed up real good after the resurrection. Also Matthew says that the rabbis bought the potters field, Acts says that Judas bought the field himself.
Well, it was his money. Don’t have my Bible with me so I can’t check out the interpretation.
I am glad to see that knowledge of the Bible is on the way out. Judas Iscariot was paid thirty pieces of silver.
Regards,
Agback
Some info from Asimov’s Guide to the Bible.
Matthew verse 9 is actually wrong - the verse isn’t from Jeremiah. It’s Zecharaiah 11:13 that says “…And I took the thirty pieces of silver and cast them to the potter in the house of the Lord”. (KJV) And “potter” there is a mistranslation. The RSV translates “potter” in Zecharaiah as “treasury”.
Fraid I don’t know anything more about it that what the Bible says.
And the chief priests took the silver pieces, and said, It is not lawful for to put them into the treasury, because it is the price of blood. And they took counsel, and bought with them the potter’s field, to bury strangers in. Wherefore that field was called, The field of blood, unto this day. Matthew 27:6-8
'scuse the hijack, but in his last works, Karaoke and Cold Lazarus, Dennis Potter told about a screenwriter called Daniel Feeld. The plays are semi-autobiographical: so Potter’s Feeld (Potter = Feeld).
I’ve never heard the phrase, but my first thought was that it had something to do with the mean old capitalist named Potter in It’s a Wonderful Life. Obviously I was way off.
VERY cool. Well, thank you all. I must admit a near absolute ignorance of Biblical details.
I wanna dig deeper here, however. ( small pun, I know. ). If he was in a clay field used by potters, his body wouldn’t decompose very quickly, now would it? Why chose that field?
Why wouldn’t he decompose quickly? My yard is mostly clay, and all my bulbs rot instantly.
** Busts self in nut with cartoon mallet ** Stupid Ignorance!
Not so far off, actually. There was a reference to Potter’s Field in It’s a Wonderful Life. The town where all the poor people lived is called Potter’s Field, and mean old Mr. Potter starts to lose a good part of his business when Bailey Park takes off, funded by the Building and Loan. Then Potter has this conversation with his rent collector Reineman:
REINEMAN: Look, Mr. Potter, it’s no skin off my nose. I’m just your little rent collector. But you can’t laugh off this Bailey Park any more. Look at it.
A buzzer is heard, and Potter snaps on the dictaphone on his desk.
SECRETARY’S VOICE: Congressman Blatz is here to see you.
POTTER (to dictaphone): Oh, tell the congressman to wait.
(to Reineman)
Go on.
REINEMAN: Fifteen years ago, a half-dozen houses stuck here and there.
(indicating map)
There’s the old cemetery, squirrels, buttercups, daisies. Used to hunt rabbits there myself. Look at it today. Dozens of the prettiest little homes you ever saw. Ninety
per cent owned by suckers who used to pay rent to you. Your Potter’s Field, my dear Mr. Employer, is becoming just that. And are the local yokels making with
those David and Goliath wisecracks!
POTTER: Oh, they are, are they? Even though they know the Baileys haven’t made a dime out of it.
REINEMAN: You know very well why. The Baileys were all chumps. Every one of these homes is worth twice what it cost the Building and Loan to build. If I
were you, Mr. Potter . . .
POTTER (interrupting): Well, you are not me.
REINEMAN (as he leaves): As I say, it’s no skin off my nose. But one of these days this bright young man is going to be asking George Bailey for a job.
I work in the the Religion department at the local public library, and we get asked this question from time to time. We’ve never been able to get a satisifactory explanation for what, exactly, the potters in question had to do with the field mentioned in Matthew, just that the association with blood money made it a place to bury furriners and other undesirable types.