Long after midnight, Judas leads a large group of soldiers, senior priests, Pharisees, and others into the Garden of Gethsemane. The priests conspired to pay Judas 30 pieces of silver to betray Jesus.
Was 30 pieces of silver a lot or a little at that time?
30 pieces of silver are:
The cost of a slave at that time. But this is optional. Prices and wages were more or less stable, because money is a precious metal. Fluctuations are caused by force majeure - crop failure, natural disaster. But slaves are not a stable “commodity”. It depends on gender, age, healthy teeth, etc.
Nobody wanted to buy Jews, because such slaves, even under pain of death, did not work on the Sabbath, and who needs a slave with a day off? Maybe they should also get paid leave and pension contributions and trade unions?
When Rome destroyed Jerusalem, they sold all the Jews (except those who escaped - these were mostly Christians) into slavery. But then the price dropped to zero and they were simply given away for free. Thus the Jews were scattered throughout the whole earth.
The minimum subsistence level for a family at that time was 2 denarii per week. That is, they will not die of hunger.
One person could live normally for six months.
It's like a high salary for a month and a half.
Today it is difficult to say how much it is. Maybe like 50,000 rubles.
The canonical version considers the amount sufficient for betrayal, since it could be used to purchase a plot of land within the city.
A shekel (a piece of silver) is equal to 4 denarii. A denarius is the daily wages of a worker in a vineyard (Matt. 20:2) or the cost of a quinix of wheat (a man's daily ration) (Rev. 6:6).
You need to work in the vineyard for about 4 months to get thirty pieces of silver. Again, the ointment with which Mary of Bethany anointed Jesus (Mark 14:5) cost 300 denarii, which is equal to 75 pieces of silver or a little less than a year of work in the vineyard.
Before this, when Judas was released from the Passover supper, he apparently went straight to the senior priests. They immediately gathered their servants and also a detachment of soldiers. Perhaps Judas led them first to the place where Jesus celebrated the Passover with His apostles. Finding that they are gone, large group, carrying weapons, lanterns and lamps, followed Judah from Jerusalem and through the Kidron Valley.
Leading the procession to the Mount of Olives, Judas is confident that he knows where to find Jesus. During the past week, Jesus and the apostles, while traveling between Bethany and Jerusalem, often stopped in the Garden of Gethsemane to rest and talk. But how will the soldiers recognize Jesus now, if He may have hidden in the darkness under olive trees? They may have never seen Him before. Therefore Judas provides a sign, saying: "Whomever I kiss, he is the same; take Him and lead him carefully."
A kiss was a common greeting in those days (1 Thess. 5:26) and a sign of friendship. Therefore, it is incompatible with betrayal and evil. It is a sign of friendship and trust, just like eating together. But Judas used the kiss for his own treacherous purposes!
Judas leads a large crowd into the garden, sees Jesus with His apostles, and goes straight to Him. "Rejoice, Rabbi!" - he says and kisses Him tenderly.
"Friend, why have you come?" - Jesus asks sharply. Answering his own question, He then says: “Judas, do you betray the Son of Man with a kiss?” But enough has been said about His traitor! Jesus steps forward into the light of burning lanterns and lamps and asks: “Whom are you looking for?”
“It is I,” Jesus answers and stands boldly before them all. Amazed at His courage and not knowing what to expect, the men step back and fall to the ground.
“I said that it is I,” Jesus continues calmly. “So, if you are looking for Me, leave them, let them go.” Even at this critical moment, Jesus continues to care for His disciples!
Not long before, in the upper room, Jesus had told His Heavenly Father in prayer that He had kept His faithful apostles and not one of them was lost, “except the son of perdition.” He, therefore, asks His followers to fulfill His word.
Jesus deliberately wanted to allow Himself to be arrested and suffer. He made no attempt to avoid what was about to happen.
The high priests, taking the pieces of silver, said: it is not permissible to put them in the church treasury, because this is the price of blood. Having held a meeting, they bought a potter's land with them for the burial of strangers; Therefore, that land is called the “land of blood” to this day. (Matt.27:6-8)
"Land of Blood" controversy
Of all the evangelical weather forecasters, only Matthew voices the amount of thirty pieces of silver, and he also reports on the purchase of “land of blood” (Akeldam) by the high priests: “Having held a meeting, they bought with them a potter’s land for the burial of strangers...” (Matthew 27:7 ). Perhaps Matthew gleaned a clue to the betrayal from the Book of the Prophet Zechariah: “And I will say to them: if it pleases you, then give Me My wages; if not, don’t give it; and they will weigh out thirty pieces of silver as payment to Me. And the Lord said to me: throw them into the church storehouse - the high price at which they valued Me! And I took thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the Lord for the potter” (Zech. 11:12-13).
According to the Acts of the Apostles, Judas “acquired the land with unjust wages...” (Acts 1:18).
The Lutheran Heritage Foundation explains the contradiction this way: the high priests bought the land, but because they did it with Judas's money (and possibly on his behalf), the purchase is attributed to Judas himself.
Serious difficulties still arise when trying to explain the difference in spelling:
- The word “field” (Ancient Greek agros) comes after the verb agorazo - “to buy on the open market” (from agora - “marketplace”) (Matt. 27:7);
- The word “plot” (Ancient Greek chorion - land ownership or small farm) comes after the verb ktaomai - “to take possession of” (Acts 1:18).
By the way, many on the Internet are asking the question: “On what day of the week did Judas betray Jesus?”
I answer: From Wednesday to Thursday the betrayal by Judas took place, and on Friday Jesus was crucified.
The motivation for betrayal is also perceived ambiguously
The canonical motives for the betrayal of Judas are considered to be: love of money and the participation of Satan. But theologians do not have a common opinion:
- Matthew considers the motive for betrayal to be the love of money: “Then one of the twelve, called Judas Iscariot, went to the high priests and said: What will you give me, and I will betray Him to you? They offered him thirty pieces of silver” (Matthew 26:14-15);
- Mark also insists on the sole and dominant role of the love of money: “And Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Him to them. When they heard it, they rejoiced and promised to give him pieces of silver” (Mark 14:10-11);
- Luke combines, considering the motive for betrayal both the love of money and the participation of Satan: “But Satan entered into Judas” (Luke 22:3), “... and he went and spoke with the high priests and rulers, how to betray Him to them. They rejoiced and agreed to give him money” (Luke 22:4-5);
- John is silent about money and insists on the participation of Satan: “And after this piece Satan entered into him” (John 13:27).
- The evangelists themselves “do not attach primary importance to Judas’s love of money if they directly and clearly point to Satan as the main culprit”;
- From the stories of the evangelists, “it is not clear that the traitor put silver pieces in the foreground”;
- Judas was content with only thirty pieces of silver;
- Judas easily parted with the money;
- Would a “pathetic worshiper of a golden image” have ventured to make a deal, believing in the divinity of Jesus?
In the same article M.D. Muretov calls three contradictions that “Satan controlled Judas without the latter’s free self-determination”:
- Not knowing what he was doing, Judas could not repent heavily;
- Before the Sanhedrin, Judas blames himself, not Satan;
- Jesus predicts that he will be betrayed by man, not Satan.
- Organizing a rebellion against Roman oppression;
- Disappointment in the teachings of Jesus;
- Self-sacrifice;
- God's will;
- Judas is a secret agent of Rome or the Sanhedrin;
- Judas fulfills Jesus' request
Criticism of the non-canonical perception of Judas Iscariot
According to supporters of the non-canonical version of betrayal, Judas' motivation does not seem ridiculous at all, since every person has free will. Judas could well have been a money-loving man, as can be seen from the Gospel: “Mary, taking a pound of pure precious ointment of spikenard, anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the fragrance of the world. Then one of his disciples, Judas Simon Iscariot, who wanted to betray him, said: “Why not sell this ointment for three hundred denarii and give it to the poor?” He said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was thief. He had a money box with him and carried what was put in it"; “And as Judas had a box, some thought that Jesus was saying to him: buy what we need for the holiday, or to give something to the poor.”
In any case, exchanging God-man for money is not Christian, not human, and not legal. And from this position, Judas is a negative person who evokes only negative emotions.
Based on materials from the Bible, Wikipedia and the book “The Most a famous person who ever lived."
First, let's look at the weight.
Silver coins - that is, silver coins - are most likely the silver shekel that circulated in the era of Christ. Such a coin is approximately the size of the current two-ruble coin.
It weighed approximately 14-16 grams of silver and was equivalent (also in weight) to 4 Greek drachms - a tetradrachm.
That is why Mikhail Bulgakov in “The Master and Margarita” wrote in the scene of the murder of Judas:
How much did you receive now? Speak up if you want to save a life!
Hope flared up in Judas's heart. He cried desperately:
Thirty tetradrachms! Thirty tetradrachms! Everything I received is with me. Here's the money! Take it, but give your life!
In total, if we take the average weight between a tetradrachm and a shekel as a basis, this is approximately 15 grams of silver.
That is, Judas was given approximately 450 grams.
Is it a lot or a little?
Let's calculate according to the precious metals exchange rate
The purchase and sale rate of precious metals of the Central Bank of Russia: silver went for 13 rubles. 98 kopecks per gram. And the dollar exchange rate on the same date is 31 rubles. 03 kop.
And today Judas, if, as in ancient times, coins circulated not only according to a certain value, but also according to the weight of the precious metal, for 450 grams of silver he would have collected 6,291 rubles - approximately 203 dollars.
According to a soldier's salary
But, as you know, money is also the equivalent of wages.
About the times of Christ and wages in Jerusalem (now, as we know, Jerusalem), we know, for example, quite accurately that a soldier received one denarius per day, and in 1 shekel there were approximately 4 denarii (that is, in a tetradrachm - 4 denarii ) 30 pieces of silver, so this is approximately 120 denarii.
A Russian soldier today is entitled to 500 rubles a month, that is, about 16 rubles 60 kopecks a day. That is, if we “equate” this daily “soldier’s payment” to the denarius of a Roman soldier, then Judas received about 2,000 rubles, approximately 65 dollars.
But this is in terms of the salary of a conscript soldier.
Under Judas, soldiers, both Roman and others, were hired, as they would say now - contract soldiers. Today, our contract soldier entering the service receives 8,500 rubles a month.
We carry out the same operations: 8,500 per month is 283 rubles per day, multiply by 120 (equating “pay of a Russian contractor per day” to “denarius per day”), it comes out - 33,960. That is, at this rate Judas received $1,094 with "kopecks".
And finally, let's take the wages of a day laborer!
Just like the average salary of a soldier, we know that in Judea a hired worker received an average of 1 or 2 denarii per day, depending on his qualifications.
It happened that you received 4 denarii a day, but this is if you are a master mason or carpenter.
So let's stick to the average: 2 denarii per day.
That is, Judas received the wages of an average day laborer for 2 months (120 drachmas divided by 2, that’s 60 days).
Judas, it turns out, would have received 36,380 rubles. Or - about 1180 dollars!
At this “day” rate, it would be most profitable for him to sell his Teacher.
Naturally, we can consider a dozen more criteria: by the nominal value of coins of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation (two-ruble silver coins, for example), by conversion to rent, by the price of gasoline... And so on. But it seems to me that since we have reached two criteria - daily wages and the cost of silver itself - this is some kind of more or less fair connection.
What can you do with a couple thousand dollars?
Buy square meter an average apartment in a new building under construction, a couple of acres of land away from Moscow, vacation in Turkey or Egypt. Yes! Or better yet, go to Jerusalem for a week.
Judas did not have time to buy anything. He either hanged himself or was killed. And with the money returned to them, the priests bought the so-called Potter’s Land, otherwise known as Akeldama (“field of blood”) for the funeral of wanderers, of whom so many came to Jerusalem...
Oh! I was wrong. It is most profitable today to count 30 pieces of silver at the numismatic value of a tetradrachm. It ranges (depending on preservation and dating) - from 1,200 to 3,000 dollars.
Judas would have been killed!
Under one hundred thousand “bucks”.
Having betrayed Christ, Judas returned the money to the high priests, and land was purchased with it for the burial of strangers:
| 3 Then Judas, who had betrayed Him, saw that He was condemned and, repenting, returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and elders, 4 saying, “I have sinned in betraying innocent blood.” They said to him: What is that to us? take a look yourself. 5 And, having thrown pieces of silver in the temple, he came out, went and hanged himself. 6 The high priests took pieces of silver, they said: it is impermissible to put them in the church treasury, because this is the price of blood. 7 Having taken counsel, they bought a potter's land with them for the burying of strangers; 8 Therefore that land is called “the land of blood” to this day. 9 Then was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet Jeremiah, saying, “And they took thirty silver coins, the price of the One who was valued, whom the children of Israel valued, 10 and gave them for the potter’s ground, as the Lord said to me. |
| 6 And Jeremiah said, “This is the word of the Lord to me: 7 Behold, Hanameel, the son of Shallum your uncle, comes to you to say, “Buy for yourself my field, which is in Anathoth, for by right of kinship you must buy it.” 8 And Hanameel, the son of my uncle, came to me, according to the word of the Lord, into the courtyard of the guard and said to me, “Buy my field, which is in Anathoth, in the land of Benjamin, for the right of inheritance is thine and the right of redemption is thine; buy it for yourself." Then I knew that it was the word of the Lord. 9 And I bought a field from Hanameel my uncle's son, which is in Anathoth, and weighed out to him seven shekels of silver and ten silver coins; 10 And he wrote it in a book and sealed it, and called witnesses to it, and weighed out the silver on the scales. 11 And I took the bill of sale, both sealed according to the law and statute, and also open; 12 And I gave the bill of sale to Baruch the son of Neriah the son of Maaseiah, in the sight of Hanameel the son of my uncle, and in the sight of the witnesses who signed the bill of sale, in the sight of all the Jews that sat in the courtyard of the guard; 13 And he commanded Baruch in their presence: 14 Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Take these records, this sealed bill of sale, and this open record, and put them in an earthen vessel, that they may remain there many days. |
In addition, exactly 30 pieces of silver are mentioned in the Book of the Prophet Zechariah:
The plot also echoes the following passage from the book of Exodus, which talks about thirty shekels of silver, at which a slave who died a violent death was valued:
The question of why a prophecy, whose wording is closer to the prophecy of Zechariah, is inscribed with the name of Jeremiah, while there is no place with such a wording in the canonical book of the prophet Jeremiah, has been discussed by Christian exegetes since ancient times.
Identification of pieces of silver with specific coins
It is not obvious from the text of the New Testament which specific silver coins are meant. These could be Roman denarii or quinarii, ancient Greek drachms, didrachms, staters or tetradrachms. However, the 30 pieces of silver are usually identified with Tyrian staters or tetradrachms.
In New Testament times, one drachma was equal to a denarius. The denarius, in turn, was the standard daily wage for a skilled agricultural worker (see, for example, the Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard in Matthew) or a Roman legionnaire. If we accept the version that a piece of silver is a tetradrachm (4 drachmas equal to 4 denarii), then 30 pieces of silver is 120 denarii or a four-month salary for a seven-day work week. The purchasing power of 30 pieces of silver is evidenced by the fact that for this money a plot of land was purchased for a cemetery near the capital of Judea, Jerusalem.
In russian language
- The contemptuous expression “thirty pieces of silver” is a popular phrase or phraseological unit in the Russian language, used to mean the price of betrayal. The word “unmercenary” is associated with thirty pieces of silver in the Russian language, denoting not only the face of saints in the Orthodox Church, especially famous for their selflessness, non-covetousness, renunciation of wealth, generosity for the sake of their Christian faith; but also in the everyday speech of disinterested people, indifferent to wealth and material gain.
see also
- Joseph is a character from the Pentateuch, the son of Jacob from Rachel, sold into slavery by his brothers for 20 pieces of silver
- Srebrenik - the first silver coin, minted in Ancient Rus' at the end of the 10th - beginning of the 11th century
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Notes
- Bible. Books of the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. M.: Publishing House of the Moscow Patriarchate, 1998. - 1376 p. - S. 1050
- , With. 710-711.
- .
- , .
- , article "".
- , With. 90, 163.
- , article "".
Literature
- A Brief Bible Reference. - (according to publication on the website “”), 2009.
- Mattingly G. Coins of Rome. From ancient times to the fall Western Empire. - M.: Collector's Books, 2005. - ISBN 1-932525-37-8.
- Nikifor, archimandrite.// Biblical encyclopedia of Archimandrite Nicephorus. - M., 1891-1892.
- Newman B., Stein F. Commentaries on the Gospel of Matthew. A manual for translators of the Holy Scriptures / Trans. from English edited by A.L. Khosroeva. - RBO, 1998. - ISBN 5-85524-068-1 (Russian).
- Nystrom E. . - 1868.
- . - Association for the Study of Jewish Communities in the Diaspora, 1976-2009.
Links
Website- mentions in Russian fiction:
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Excerpt characterizing the Thirty Pieces of Silver
Le coup de theater avait rate. [The end of the theatrical performance failed.]Russian troops passed through Moscow from two o'clock in the morning until two o'clock in the afternoon, carrying with them the last residents and wounded who were leaving.
The biggest crush during the movement of troops occurred on the Kamenny, Moskvoretsky and Yauzsky bridges.
While, bifurcated around the Kremlin, the troops crowded onto the Moskvoretsky and Kamenny bridges, a huge number of soldiers, taking advantage of the stop and crowded conditions, returned from the bridges and stealthily and silently snuck past St. Basil's and under the Borovitsky Gate back up the hill to Red Square, on which, by some instinct, they felt that they could easily take someone else’s property. The same crowd of people, as if for cheap goods, filled Gostiny Dvor in all its passages and passages. But there were no tenderly sugary, alluring voices of the hotel guests, there were no peddlers and a motley female crowd of buyers - there were only the uniforms and greatcoats of soldiers without guns, silently leaving with burdens and entering the ranks without burdens. Merchants and peasants (there were few of them), as if lost, walked among the soldiers, unlocked and locked their shops, and themselves and the fellows carried their goods somewhere. Drummers stood on the square near Gostiny Dvor and beat the collection. But the sound of the drum forced the robber soldiers not, as before, to run to the call, but, on the contrary, forced them to run further away from the drum. Between the soldiers, along the benches and aisles, people in gray caftans and with shaved heads could be seen. Two officers, one in a scarf over his uniform, on a thin dark gray horse, the other in an overcoat, on foot, stood at the corner of Ilyinka and talked about something. The third officer galloped up to them.
“The general ordered everyone to be expelled now at any cost.” What the hell, it’s like nothing else! Half the people fled.
“Where are you going?.. Where are you going?” he shouted at three infantry soldiers who, without guns, having picked up the skirts of their greatcoats, slipped past him into the ranks. - Stop, rascals!
- Yes, please collect them! - answered another officer. – You can’t collect them; we have to go quickly so that the last ones don’t leave, that’s all!
- How to go? they stood there, huddled on the bridge and didn’t move. Or put a chain so that the last ones don’t run away?
- Yes, go there! Get them out! - the senior officer shouted.
The officer in the scarf got off his horse, called the drummer and went with him under the arches. Several soldiers began to run in a crowd. The merchant, with red pimples on his cheeks near his nose, with a calmly unshakable expression of calculation on his well-fed face, hastily and dapperly, waving his arms, approached the officer.
“Your honor,” he said, “do me a favor and protect me.” It’s not a small matter for us, it’s our pleasure! Please, I’ll take out the cloth now, at least two pieces for a noble man, with our pleasure! Because we feel, well, this is just robbery! You're welcome! Perhaps they would have posted a guard, or at least given a lock...
Several merchants crowded around the officer.
- Eh! it's a waste of time to lie! - said one of them, thin, with a stern face. “When you take off your head, you don’t cry over your hair.” Take whatever you like! “And he waved his hand with an energetic gesture and turned sideways to the officer.
“It’s good for you, Ivan Sidorich, to speak,” the first merchant spoke angrily. - You are welcome, your honor.
- What should I say! – the thin man shouted. “I have a hundred thousand goods in three shops here.” Can you save it when the army has left? Eh, people, God’s power cannot be broken by hands!
“Please, your honor,” said the first merchant, bowing. The officer stood in bewilderment, and indecision was visible on his face.
- What do I care! - he suddenly shouted and walked with quick steps forward along the row. In one open shop, blows and curses were heard, and while the officer was approaching it, a man in a gray overcoat and with a shaved head jumped out of the door.
This man, bending over, rushed past the merchants and the officer. The officer attacked the soldiers who were in the shop. But at that time, terrible screams of a huge crowd were heard on the Moskvoretsky Bridge, and the officer ran out onto the square.
- What's happened? What's happened? - he asked, but his comrade was already galloping towards the screams, past St. Basil the Blessed. The officer mounted and rode after him. When he arrived at the bridge, he saw two cannons removed from their limbers, infantry walking across the bridge, several fallen carts, several frightened faces and the laughing faces of soldiers. Near the cannons stood one cart drawn by a pair. Behind the cart, four greyhound dogs in collars huddled behind the wheels. There was a mountain of things on the cart, and at the very top, next to the children's chair, a woman was sitting with her legs turned upside down, screaming shrilly and desperately. The comrades told the officer that the scream of the crowd and the squeals of the woman occurred because General Ermolov, who drove into this crowd, having learned that the soldiers were scattering among the shops and crowds of residents were blocking the bridge, ordered the guns to be removed from the limbers and an example was made that he would shoot at the bridge . The crowd, knocking down the carts, crushing each other, screaming desperately, crowding in, cleared the bridge, and the troops moved forward.
Meanwhile, the city itself was empty. There was almost no one on the streets. The gates and shops were all locked; here and there near the taverns lonely screams or drunken singing could be heard. No one drove along the streets, and pedestrian footsteps were rarely heard. On Povarskaya it was completely quiet and deserted. In the huge courtyard of the Rostovs' house there were scraps of hay and droppings from a transport train, and not a single person was visible. In the Rostov house, which was left with all its good things, two people were in the large living room. These were the janitor Ignat and the Cossack Mishka, Vasilich’s grandson, who remained in Moscow with his grandfather. Mishka opened the clavichord and played it with one finger. The janitor, arms akimbo and smiling joyfully, stood in front of a large mirror.
- That’s clever! A? Uncle Ignat! - the boy said, suddenly starting to clap the keys with both hands.
- Look! - Ignat answered, marveling at how his face smiled more and more in the mirror.
- Shameless! Really, shameless! – the voice of Mavra Kuzminishna, who quietly entered, spoke from behind them. - Eka, thick-horned, he bares his teeth. Take you on this! Everything there is not tidy, Vasilich is knocked off his feet. Give it time!
Ignat, adjusting his belt, stopped smiling and submissively lowered his eyes, walked out of the room.
“Auntie, I’ll go easy,” said the boy.
- I'll give you a light one. Little shooter! – Mavra Kuzminishna shouted, raising her hand at him. - Go and set up a samovar for grandfather.
Mavra Kuzminishna, brushing off the dust, closed the clavichord and, sighing heavily, left the living room and locked the front door.
Coming out into the courtyard, Mavra Kuzminishna thought about where she should go now: should she drink tea in Vasilich’s outbuilding or tidy up what had not yet been tidied up in the pantry?
Quick steps were heard in the quiet street. The steps stopped at the gate; the latch began to knock under the hand that was trying to unlock it.
Mavra Kuzminishna approached the gate.
- Who do you need?
- Count, Count Ilya Andreich Rostov.
- Who are you?
- I'm an officer. “I would like to see,” said the Russian pleasant and lordly voice.
Mavra Kuzminishna unlocked the gate. And a round-faced officer, about eighteen years old, with a face similar to the Rostovs, entered the courtyard.
- We left, father. “We deigned to leave at vespers yesterday,” Mavra Kuzmipishna said affectionately.
The young officer, standing at the gate, as if hesitant to enter or not to enter, clicked his tongue.
“Oh, what a shame!..” he said. - I wish I had yesterday... Oh, what a pity!..
Mavra Kuzminishna, meanwhile, carefully and sympathetically examined the familiar features of the Rostov breed in the face of the young man, and the tattered overcoat, and the worn-out boots that he was wearing.
- Why did you need a count? – she asked.
- Yeah... what to do! - the officer said with annoyance and grabbed the gate, as if intending to leave. He stopped again, undecided.
– Do you see? - he suddenly said. “I am a relative of the count, and he has always been very kind to me.” So, you see (he looked at his cloak and boots with a kind and cheerful smile), and he was worn out, and there was no money; so I wanted to ask the Count...
Mavra Kuzminishna did not let him finish.
- You should wait a minute, father. Just a minute,” she said. And as soon as the officer released his hand from the gate, Mavra Kuzminishna turned and with a quick old woman’s step walked into the backyard to her outbuilding.
While Mavra Kuzminishna was running to her place, the officer, with his head down and looking at his torn boots, smiling slightly, walked around the yard. “What a pity that I didn’t find my uncle. What a nice old lady! Where did she run? And how can I find out which streets are the closest to catch up with the regiment, which should now approach Rogozhskaya? - the young officer thought at this time. Mavra Kuzminishna, with a frightened and at the same time determined face, carrying a folded checkered handkerchief in her hands, came out from around the corner. Without walking a few steps, she unfolded the handkerchief, took out a white twenty-five-ruble note from it and hastily gave it to the officer.
“If their Lordships were at home, it would be known, they would definitely be related, but maybe... now...” Mavra Kuzminishna became shy and confused. But the officer, without refusing and without haste, took the piece of paper and thanked Mavra Kuzminishna. “As if the count were at home,” Mavra Kuzminishna kept saying apologetically. - Christ is with you, father! God bless you,” said Mavra Kuzminishna, bowing and seeing him off. The officer, as if laughing at himself, smiling and shaking his head, almost at a trot ran through the empty streets to catch up with his regiment to the Yauzsky Bridge.
And Mavra Kuzminishna stood for a long time with wet eyes in front of the closed gate, thoughtfully shaking her head and feeling an unexpected surge of maternal tenderness and pity for the officer unknown to her.
In the unfinished house on Varvarka, below which there was a drinking house, drunken screams and songs were heard. About ten factory workers were sitting on benches near tables in a small dirty room. All of them, drunk, sweaty, with dull eyes, straining and opening their mouths wide, they sang some kind of song. They sang separately, with difficulty, with effort, obviously not because they wanted to sing, but only to prove that they were drunk and partying. One of them, a tall, blond fellow in a clear blue scent, stood above them. His face with a thin, straight nose would be beautiful if it were not for his thin, pursed, constantly moving lips and dull, frowning, motionless eyes. He stood over those who were singing, and, apparently imagining something, solemnly and angularly waved his white hand rolled up to the elbow over their heads, the dirty fingers of which he unnaturally tried to spread out. The sleeve of his tunic was constantly falling down, and the fellow diligently rolled it up again with his left hand, as if there was something particularly important in the fact that this white, sinewy, waving arm was certainly bare. In the middle of the song, screams of fighting and blows were heard in the hallway and on the porch. The tall fellow waved his hand.
- Sabbath! – he shouted imperiously. - Fight, guys! - And he, without ceasing to roll up his sleeve, went out onto the porch.
The factory workers followed him. The factory workers, who were drinking in the tavern that morning under the leadership of a tall fellow, brought skins from the factory to the kisser, and for this they were given wine. The blacksmiths from the neighboring cousins, hearing the noise in the tavern and believing that the tavern was broken, wanted to break into it by force. A fight broke out on the porch.
The kisser was fighting with the blacksmith at the door, and while the factory workers were coming out, the blacksmith broke away from the kisser and fell face down on the pavement.
Another blacksmith was rushing through the door, leaning on the kisser with his chest.
The fellow with his sleeve rolled up hit the blacksmith in the face as he rushed through the door and shouted wildly:
- Guys! They're beating our people!
At this time, the first blacksmith rose from the ground and, scratching the blood on his broken face, shouted in a crying voice:
- Guard! Killed!.. Killed a man! Brothers!..
- Oh, fathers, they killed him to death, they killed a man! - the woman squealed as she came out of the neighboring gate. A crowd of people gathered around the bloody blacksmith.
“It’s not enough that you robbed people, took off their shirts,” said someone’s voice, turning to the kisser, “why did you kill a person?” Robber!
The tall fellow, standing on the porch, looked with dull eyes first at the kisser, then at the blacksmiths, as if wondering who he should fight with now.
- Murderer! – he suddenly shouted at the kisser. - Knit it, guys!
- Why, I tied up one such and such! - the kisser shouted, waving off the people who attacked him, and, tearing off his hat, he threw it on the ground. As if this action had some mysteriously threatening significance, the factory workers who surrounded the kisser stopped in indecision.
“Brother, I know the order very well.” I'll get to the private part. Do you think I won't make it? Nowadays no one is ordered to commit robbery! – the kisser shouted, raising his hat.
- And let's go, look! And let's go... look! - the kisser and the tall fellow repeated one after another, and both moved forward along the street together. The bloody blacksmith walked next to them. Factory workers and strangers followed them, talking and shouting.
At the corner of Maroseyka, opposite a large house with locked shutters, on which there was a sign of a shoemaker, stood with sad faces about twenty shoemakers, thin, exhausted people in dressing gowns and tattered tunics.
- He will treat the people properly! - said a thin craftsman with a scraggly beard and frowning eyebrows. - Well, he sucked our blood - and that’s it. He drove us, drove us - all week. And now he brought it to the last end, and left.
Seeing the people and the bloody man, the worker who had been speaking fell silent, and all the shoemakers, with hasty curiosity, joined the moving crowd.
-Where are the people going?
“We know where, he’s going to the authorities.”
- Well, did our power really not take over?
According to Biblical legends, this is payment to Judas Iscariot from the Jewish priests for betraying Jesus Christ. The fact itself can be viewed in two ways, for one simple reason - even at that time, 30 pieces of silver were very few.
Options:
- Christianity has become one of the most significant world religions, and the image of Judas was necessary in order to show the pettiness and misunderstanding of humanity of the fundamentals of existence;
- it was necessary to create an image of a hero, and for this an antipode was simply necessary, in the role of which one of Christ’s disciples acted.
At present, the phrase “thirty pieces of silver” is a symbol of betrayal, but exclusively thanks to Christian traditions.
Another opinion was expressed about the legend by Leonid Andreev in the story “Judas Iscariot”. Despite the fact that the work became a classic, during the author’s lifetime there were many discussions and reproaches about what was written, namely that Judas committed betrayal out of love for the teacher and out of devotion, unlike the other students.
