NOTES for Mat 26:14-25
In today's passage from the Gospel according to Matthew, two things are striking. First, Judas Iscariot, having decided to betray Jesus, came to the chief priests without knowing what reward they would give him. He was driven not only by a desire for money, or more precisely for some definite sum, but also by something else.
Who knows what it was? A rejection of Christ's teaching and the understanding that his own heart was closed to the Teacher? Perhaps annoyance that the Messiah did not want to seize power by force, and therefore that Judas himself could not fight while supporting Him? We can only wonder, but one thing is clear: at that moment everything had gathered into one great lump that needed only the slightest push... And the considerable sum, thirty pieces of silver (later a plot of land was bought with them; see Matt 27:3-7), plays the role of that push.
And the second thing that is surprising in the account of the Last Supper is that Jesus says almost directly who will betray Him. It would seem that anyone could have followed whose hand was in the dish at that moment and tried to stop the evildoer. And Judas himself, realizing that Jesus knew everything, could have stopped. But the lump is no longer simply rolling; it is flying down the mountain, carrying out what was written by the prophets.