Did Judas Repent?

“Then when Judas, who had betrayed Him, saw that He had been condemned, he felt remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, ‘I have sinned by betraying innocent blood.’ But they said, ‘What is that to us? See to that yourself!’ And he threw the pieces of silver into the sanctuary and departed; and he went away and hanged himself” (Matthew 27:3–5).We are not told where Judas was during the Jewish mock trials. He doubtless had followed the multitude from the Mount of Olives to Annas’s house and was waiting nearby, perhaps in the courtyard where Peter was. It is possible that he was called as one of the witnesses against Jesus, but that seems unlikely. Judas still had the onus of being a disciple of Jesus, and, in any case, the very fact he was a traitor would have made his testimony suspect. Because Judas had fulfilled his usefulness to them, the chief priests and elders wanted nothing more to do with him. He was now a rejected outcast-to them, to the disciples, and to Jewish society in general. . . .