This newly discovered Gospel purports to show that, not only was Judas not the villain portrayed in the standard New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, it suggests that Jesus himself asked Judas to betray him to the authorities:
"Jesus said to Judas, 'Look, you have been told everything. You will exceed all of them. For you will sacrifice the man that clothes me.' "In interpreting this quote, most seem to assume that 'the man that clothes me' is a weird, gnostic reference to Jesus himself. But, suppose the man that Jesus is referring to is not himself? Suppose it is someone else, perhaps a man who "clothes" Jesus.
Of course, the logic of someone else being sacrificed in Jesus place would seriously undermine the belief system of the world's 1.6 billion Christians. If Jesus didn't die for my sins, who did? Did anyone die for my sins, or am I responsible?
I'm sure many Christians think that a substitute for the sacrifice of Jesus is beyond belief. However, the Judeo-Christian history is replete with God using subsititutions all the way back to the time when Abraham slaughtered a lamb instead of his son Isaac.
The Islamic perspective is that Jesus did not die on the cross at all, was substituted, escaped, and was brought to heaven (An obscure gnostic sect also held this belief):
...They said, “We killed the Messiah Jesus, son of Mary, the messenger of God." They did not kill him, nor did they crucify him, but the likeness of him was put on another man (and they killed that man)... (Qur'an, 4:157)The parenthesis in the above quote is an interpretation, and the Qur'an does not explicitly say that another man was substituted in place of Jesus. However, the substitution theory gains legitimacy as we fill in the blanks with quotes such as those found in Judas' recently discovered Gospel.
Christianity
Judas
Islam
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Anti-Semitism's Muse
Without Judas, History Might Have Hijacked Another Villain
By DAVID GIBSON
IN churches around the world today, Christians will hear the familiar story of Christ's Passion that begins Holy Week: the triumphal entry into Jerusalem, the betrayal at the hands of Judas Iscariot, the death on the cross.
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Karen Bleier/Agence France-Presse -- Getty Images
ENIGMATIC Jesus and Judas in a depiction from a National Geographic display.
In Ancient Document, Judas, Minus the Betrayal (April 7, 2006) But in the publication last week of what is described as an ancient text called the Gospel of Judas, Judas is portrayed not as the treacherous apostle but rather as a hero of the Easter story who helps fulfill salvation history by betraying his beloved Jesus at the messiah's own bidding.
A feast for theological debate, surely, but after centuries of Christian rancor and persecution directed at Jews, much of it magnified through the lens of a caricatured Judas, a question of history arises, too. Would the terrible legacy of anti-Semitism have been different had a text like the Gospel of Judas been in the Christian canon from the start? If, in effect, the "bad Judas" were not in the picture?
Jewish and Christian scholars agree that the dynamic of early Christianity — a Jewish sect that failed to win over its own people — almost guaranteed a divorce with all the bitterness of a family feud. At first, Jewish authorities had the upper hand. But very quickly, as the Romans waged war against the Jews and as Christianity drew huge numbers of converts from the Gentile world, the tables turned, and Christians became the dominant camp. Even as a powerful force, however, Christian believers often adopted the victim's posture and took every opportunity to batter the increasingly beleaguered Jews.
In this campaign, Judas Iscariot became the perfect foil.
"Every great hero story needs a great villain, and Judas serves that literary purpose," said the Rev. James Martin, a Jesuit priest and author who was a theological adviser last year to the Off-Broadway play "The Last Days of Judas Iscariot."
It didn't take some Christian apologists long to discover that. In the second century, a bishop, Papias, was already relating a legend that Judas ended his days so bloated he could not see out of his swollen eyes and could not walk down a wide road. Papias wrote that Judas stank and urinated pus and worms, and was so immobile he was crushed by a chariot. By the Middle Ages, the ugly archetype of Judas as the personification of Judaism began to take hold: a hunched figure with a large nose and red hair who would do anything for money, including betray Christians. Dante cast Judas into the lowest ring of his "Inferno," and the Passion plays that became part of the Holy Week traditions often showed Judas being tormented in hell by demons. (The Roman Catholic Church never officially pronounced on the eternal fate of Judas.)
But scholars say it can be dangerous to overplay the role of Judas in the history of anti-Semitism because it might obscure the underlying causes of tensions between Christians and Jews. Even if Judas is erased from the Passion narratives, there are many more passages in the New Testament that foes of Judaism can seize on.
Erasing Judas "would change the iconography but it would not change the problem of anti-Judaism in a general sense," said Amy-Jill Levine, a professor of New Testament studies at Vanderbilt Divinity School and an adviser to National Geographic for its television account of the research it sponsored on the Judas papyrus. "Even if you turn Judas into a hero he is still just one character," Ms. Levine said. "The Passion narratives are much more complex."
Ms. Levine and others say that gospel passages like the famous "blood cry" of Matthew 27:25 were initially far more responsible for Christian animus against Jews than was the figure of Judas.
Rabbi Lawrence Schiffman, a professor of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University and an expert on early Christianity, notes that in the canonical Gospel of John, Jesus urges Judas to carry out his betrayal without delay so that God's will might be done: "What you are going to do, do quickly." It is much the same message as that in the Judas gospel.
If the account in John had been dominant through Christian history, rather than the gospel accounts that condemn Judas, Rabbi Schiffman said, "then that would have led to interpretations in which one of the bigger Christian symbols of anti-Semitism would have been removed."
Still, scholars also suspect that if Judas as the great traitor hadn't existed, Christians would probably have invented someone like him to legitimate the messy process of their religious separation from Judaism. The likeliest candidate for an alternative Jewish bad guy, they say, would be Caiaphas, the high priest who handed Jesus over to Pontius Pilate and the Romans. "You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish," Caiaphas says in John.
In the end, whoever wound up shouldering the role of the Passion's villain, experts say that it would have had little effect on the course of history between these sibling religions. But those same experts also believe that the current debates provoked by the Judas gospel, while not undoing a painful history, could help Christian-Jewish relations now and in the future.
"Maybe if Judas can be 'rehabilitated,' then perhaps some of those old issues could be set aside," said Marvin Meyer, a bible scholar at Chapman University and an expert on the Judas gospel who will appear on tonight's National Geographic program.
"If you take away Judas as the bad guy, it is one step back from blaming all the Jews," Rabbi Schiffman said. "It could have led to less anti-Semitism." But, he emphasized, "it would not have eliminated anti-Semitism."
David Gibson writes frequently about religion. His latest book, on Pope Benedict XVI, will be published in the fall.
Anti-Semitism's Muse, part 2
Boy, am I glad that somebody found another story about Judas to patch
up differences among Christians and Jews. In my own opinion, I am sick
and tired of hearing how Judas (the Jew!) finked on Jesus. All my
life, both childhood and adulthood, I have had to listen to this crap
about Judas denying Jesus, fingering him and turning him in.
Aha, now, thanks to National Geographic, which I always remember for
showing me naked breasts in my teenage years (in living color), Judas
is not a bad guy at all, and guess what that means?
It means that the Jews are not bad people after all. They didn't
collectively turn Jesus in to the Romans, they didn't turn their
collective backs on him after all. Long live Judas, the new Good Guy
of the Jews. Maybe now my Christian friends will go one step further
and admit that maybe, yes, just maybe, the Jews didn't reject Jesus at
all, as the old Gospels say, but just had a little difference of
opinion over who he really was.
No more, in churches around the world during Holy Week, will
Christians will hear the familiar story of Christ's Passion: the
triumphal entry into Jerusalem, the betrayal at the hands of Judas
(the Jew!) Iscariot, well, you know the story well.
Now, thanks to National Geographic, Judas the Jew is portrayed not as
the treacherous Jewish apostle but rather as a new Jewish hero of the
Easter story who helps fulfill Christian history by doing Jesus' own
bidding. I love it. Long live the Jews!
After centuries of Christian rancor and persecution directed at Jews,
much of it magnified through the lens of a caricatured Judas, it's
nice to know that Judas was not a traitor after all. Thank God. Thank
you, National Geographic.
"Every great Christian hero story needs a great Jewish villain, and
Judas serves that literary purpose well," according to some Christian
pundits in the past.
In the second century, a bishop, Papias, was already relating a legend
that Judas (the damned Jew!) ended his days so bloated he could not
see out of his swollen eyes and could not walk down a wide road. Spit
on that Jew!
Papias also wrote that Judas stank and urinated pus and worms, and was
so immobile he was crushed by a chariot. And it gets worse, my dear
Christian and Jewish readers: by the Middle Ages, the ugly archetype
of Judas the Jew as the personification of Judaism began to take hold:
a hunched figure with a large nose and red hair who would do anything
for money, including betray Christians. I kid you not: this is the
gospel truth of Middle Ages stereotypes. Deal with it.
Hey, even Dante cast Judas the Jew into the lowest ring of his
"Inferno," and the Passion plays that became part of the Holy Week
traditions often showed Judas (always the Jew!) being tormented in
hell by demons. (But you know what? The Roman Catholic Church never
officially pronounced on the eternal fate of Judas. Thank you. Thank
you.)
However, I have on good authority that some scholars still suspect
that if the anti-Semitic slur of Judas as the great Jewish traitor
hadn't existed, Christians would probably have invented someone like
him to keep anti-Semitism alive. The Church, one must admit, no matter
which side of the aisle you sit on, invented anti-Semitism and turned
it into an art.
But now, Christian-Jewish relations can become warm and friendly again.
With Judas 'rehabilitated,' all things are possible. Long live the
National Geographic enterprise!
"If you take away Judas as the bad guy, it is one step back from
blaming all the Jews," my spiritual advisor says. "It will lead to
less anti-Semitism in the church."
I'm glad. It's as simple as that. Another piece of old religious
propaganda bites the bullet. I'm so glad.
I view organized Christianity generally (and the Roman Church in particular) as a highly toxic faith path, irremediably tainted by the anti-Semitism, homophobia, and mysogeny that have peppered its history from its beginnings. (My attitude in this matter, incidentally, is not dissimilar to unorthodoxically Christian Maya Angelou's opinion about the "N-word". She wouldn't tolerate its use -- not even "friendlily" among African-Americans -- because she regarded it as POISON, plain and simple. Dr. Angelou said that poison is poison regardless of who is dishing it out and regardless of the intended context. In other words, if you see the skull and crossbones on the bottle, RUN the other way! Whatever you do,DON'T open it!!!) Ultimately, I blame the churches (with a few heroic exceptions, to be sure -- but only a FEW -- for the Holocaust itself. I think the "puffed up" organized churches need an annual (or even semi-annual) Day of Atonement more than the Jews EVER did. Once in 2000 years (John Paul VI)does not a sufficient (or sufficiently humbling)apology make. No, not in the case of mental cruelty compounded by murder. Certainly not, at least, from THIS Jewish and gay and intelligent human being's standpoint. Yes, let's have a Yom Kippur for Rome, as she is certainly, in my own view, in desperate --DESPERATE -- need of one. Yes, I DO curse the darkness, which, I fear, has overwhelmed my MANY "single candle[s]".
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