Matthew 26:14-16 - Dummelow's Commentary on the Bible

Judas betrays Jesus (Mark 14:10; Luke 22:3). The exact date cannot be fixed. It may have been as early as Sunday night, or Monday. Matthew 26:16 implies a considerable interval between the betrayal and the arrest. The paltry sum for which Jesus was betrayed (the price of a slave, Exodus 21:32) has raised the question whether avarice was really the main motive of Judas. There have even been attempts to place his conduct in a favourable light, as if his desire was to bring about a rising of the people at the time of the feast, and so to constrain 'the dilatory Messiah to establish His kingdom by means of popular violence' (Paulus), or by the exercise of His supernatural power. This is possible, but not probable. Judas was thoroughly alienated from Jesus. He found his Master's ideals diverging more and more widely from his own. Instead of an earthly kingdom, in which Judas hoped to hold a lucrative position, Christ seemed to be aiming at an impracticable ideal, which might, perhaps, be very beautiful, but which certainly did not seem to be a practical way of making money. He had already embezzled money from the common purse, and he could not be ignorant that he was suspected and disliked by his colleagues, and that his true character had long been discerned by his Master. His former love and trust were now turned to hatred and contempt, and in a frenzy of disappointed ambition he betrayed Jesus. Yet, when the fatal deed was done, there came a revulsion of feeling, and he would fain have undone it.