Took counsel: see Matthew 27.1 and 12.14. Good News Translation expresses it well: “reaching an agreement.”

Potter’s field was the former name of the field purchased with the money received from Judas. A potter is someone who makes pots from clay. Whether it was the field of the potter or of a potter is not clear (verse 10 has “the potter”), and translators can use either “the field of a potter” or “… the potter.” They can also have “the field called Potter’s Field.”

The field would be used to bury strangers in. This may be expressed in a separate sentence, such as “It can be used as a burial ground for foreigners.” Concerning the purchase, one scholar comments: “The unclean money is used for an unclean purpose, the purchase of a cemetery for foreigners, presumably Gentiles.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .