The Gospel of Judas

[Shadow Blade]

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Hey, I don't know if you guys are aware that a so-called-new book to the bible has been found. Yep. The book of Judas Iscariot (The dude that betrayed Jesus). I was just wondering what you guys want to say on the topic.

At any rate I got this info. from Historic Perfection. I thought it would be worth reading, before posting.[/COLOR][/SIZE]

[QUOTE=www.historicperfection.com][size=2]Discovery of the Book of Judas
Today archaeologists in Lebanon announced the discovery of a new biblical scroll, the Book of Judas. Biblical scholar Art Vandelay says ?These scrolls are unequivocally the most important find within the Christian community in the last 500 years. The Book of Judas will redefine the events that led to the crucifixion of Jesus.? As the public waits for a full release of the document, we here at Historic Perfection were able to obtain an advanced excerpt.

"Last night I was at this dope *** club getting my buzz on, when two fine *** bitches walk right by me. A player has got to play so it was time to spin some game. I darted in and within minutes the ladies were totally digging my ****. Then, out of nowhere, comes Jesus. JC pulls his water into wine shtick, totally name drops that his dad is God, and the next thing I know the skanks are heading back to his crib. No lie, I am going to **** his **** up real soon."

Judas 5:14[/QUOTE][/size]

[SIZE=1][COLOR=SlateGray]Dang. That seems to be a bit exaggerated, huh? A lot of messed up language. Any way, here's another excerpt from News Week. A bit more reliable.[/COLOR][/SIZE]

[QUOTE=News Week][size=2]Sealed With a Kiss
A long-lost early Christian text says Jesus asked Judas to betray him.

By David Gates
Newsweek

April 17, 2006 issue - Even Jesus recognized that there was something paradoxical about his betrayal by Judas Iscariot?in three of the four canonical Gospels, with a kiss. "And truly the Son of man goeth, as it was determined," he says in Luke 22, "but woe unto that man by whom he is betrayed!" In other words, Judas is damned for helping bring about the salvation of humankind. This is doctrinally explicable: in the working out of God's plan, some people get damned. But in human terms, it's as puzzling as that kiss?which either is gratuitously cruel (he could have just pointed) or suggests that the self-divided Judas is already having the seller's remorse that leads, in Matthew, to suicide. And Jesus knows all along who will sell him out. In John's account of the Last Supper, he tells Judas: "That thou doest, do quickly"?and Judas "went immediately out." In shame and terror, we assume. But it sounds almost as if he were obeying an order that both of them understood.

We've always known that there was a Gospel of Judas, which might clear some of this up. In the year 180, Irenaeus, a church father in Lyon who specialized in rooting out heresy, denounced it as "fictional." The Gospel was in vogue for a few hundred years, then disappeared from history?until last week. The National Geographic Society has just published a translation of the long-lost work, with a companion volume explaining its provenance and exploring its meaning. Actually, it's a translation of a translation: the scribe wrote in Coptic, circa 300, from a Greek original, surely lost forever. This Gospel tells us that Judas was Jesus' only true disciple, to whom he imparted secret mystic knowledge, and whom he asked to turn him in to the Romans, in order to free his spirit from its fleshly prison.

The story of the manuscript resembles an Indiana Jones movie?or, more to the point, a Dan Brown novel. (An unseen hand must have arranged for the Gospel of Judas to be published while the "Da Vinci Code" craze still had life in it.) The crumbling papyrus?13 sheets, in more than 1,000 fragments, written on both sides?was found in a cave in the Egyptian desert in the 1970s, passed from one antiquities dealer to another, and ended up in a safe-deposit box in Hicksville, N.Y. In 1983, scholar James M. Robinson, who created the team that restored the Nag Hammadi manuscripts?source of the similarly contrarian Gnostic Gospels?was told that the Gospel of Judas was up for sale in Geneva. He couldn't come up with the $3 million. In 2000, it was offered to Yale, which begged off; an Ohio dealer briefly stored it in a freezer. At last, its price reportedly down to $1 million, the manuscript ended up with the Maecenas Foundation for Ancient Art, which started restoration, translation and authentication.

Don't be expecting this fragmented manuscript to read like the King James. Small sample: " '[Truly] I say to you, [ ... ] angel [ ... ] power will be able to see that [ ... ] these to whom [ ... ] holy generations [ ... ]' After Jesus said this, he departed." And not a minute too soon. The secret wisdom Jesus confides?when he's not laying out a hierarchy of angels, gods and more gods that makes Hinduism sound minimalist?is a lot like that of the Gnostic Gospels, which posit a strict enmity between flesh and spirit. Judas' betrayal of Jesus has sparked considerable anti-Semitism over the centuries, and the new Gospel may help Christians see beyond ancient?and historically unfounded?stereotypes. Or it may simply add to our sense of how inchoate and multifarious early Christianity was, before such church fathers as Irenaeus codified it.
Robinson, who tried to acquire the manuscript again in 1993, says the Gospel is a sensation?but only to scholars, not the public. His own book, "The Secrets of Judas," hardly oversells the translation. "It tells us nothing about the historical Jesus, nothing about the historical Judas," he told NEWSWEEK. "It only tells what, 100 years later, Gnostics were doing with the story they found in the canonical Gospels. I think purchasers are going to throw the book down in disgust." But right now, people are loving the idea that Jesus and Judas were dear friends who were in it together?it's such a downer to think the guy sinned and felt bad?and the hoopla machine is grinding away. The book. The book about the book. The National Geographic TV show about the book and the book about the book. The audiobook. (Can't wait to hear the passage above.) Last week, the public unveiling of the manuscript. Next year, the illustrated critical edition. Can the lipstick tie-in be far behind?[/QUOTE][/size]

[SIZE=1][COLOR=SlateGray] In this thread you can dicuss about what you think about this "New" Book. Whether or not you think the Gospel of Judas is just a gimmick or if you think it's true and why.[/COLOR][/SIZE]

[Hanabishi Recca]

Me being a christian, am against this whole thing.
I think it was a stupid idea to make a book about it.

Also is that text from the book?

[Anakoni Stark]

pure hilarirty right there dude, but then if you think about it, no one wants to read about the endeavors of some *follower* who eventually stabs Him in the back.

IT'S NOT WORTH READING, COMICAL OR NOT.

[Hanabishi Recca]

[QUOTE=Leon Fury]pure hilarirty right there dude, but then if you think about it, no one wants to read about the endeavors of some *follower* who eventually stabs Him in the back.

IT'S NOT WORTH READING, COMICAL OR NOT.[/QUOTE]

I agree. But you know someone is going to.
And is going to believe it.
That is what I am afraid of.
That is false stuff right there. But to know someone is going to read and believe it. It isn't cool.

[Shadow Blade]

[QUOTE=Hanabishi Recca]

Also is that text from the book?[/QUOTE]
[SIZE=1][COLOR=SlateGray]
Heck, I have no idea. According to Historic Perfection its what the scripture says from the book of Judas in mondern language, not New King James Version. But I agree, the Gospel of Judas is defiantly not bible material. I just thought it would be interesting if I showed to the Otakians.

Oh yeah, Leon Fury you have a good point.[/COLOR][/SIZE]

[Hanabishi Recca]

I love you guys ;)

Well, it isn't going to be something to read.

[Fasteriskhead]

Oh, good, I get to use this quote again: "There is nothing so entertaining as the discussion of a book nobody has read." Myself included, of course.

Criticism of the book itself aside (which should wait until I've actually read the thing), it's interesting that this thing has ended up becoming such a sensation. You never really got this kind of excitement from the general public when the older Nag Hammadi documents started appearing, for instance (academics, on the other hand, ate the stuff up). I blame the coattails of The Da Vinci Code, the fans of which are probably wetting their pants at the idea of secret teachings Jesus gave only to the one who finally turned him in. The only thing missing is a centuries-long conspiracy to keep said teachings under wraps... rather than, say, some random rich guy thoughtlessly storing the Judas codex in a bank vault in Ohio.

[eleanor]

[color=dimgray] I've only read the Newsweek article about this whole thing (that was when it actually was released, so I've forgotten some things), so I'm just here to ask a question. I'm not stating any opinions on the whole thing, because I really don't have a strong one. Why are Christians denying it so heavily? [/color]

[2010DigitalBoy]

[quote name='Lunox][color=dimgray'] I've only read the Newsweek article about this whole thing (that was when it actually was released, so I've forgotten some things), so I'm just here to ask a question. I'm not stating any opinions on the whole thing, because I really don't have a strong one. Why are Christians denying it so heavily? [/color][/quote]

Because the church always denies stuff like that...

Also, how did Judas even have a gospel? Didn't he kill himself after ratting out Jesus?

ANyway, the only thing I'm interested in involving Judas is Judas Priest. They kick metal ***!

[Retribution]

[quote name='Lunox][color=dimgray'] I've only read the Newsweek article about this whole thing (that was when it actually was released, so I've forgotten some things), so I'm just here to ask a question. I'm not stating any opinions on the whole thing, because I really don't have a strong one. Why are Christians denying it so heavily? [/color][/quote]
[size=1]Because it would effectively shatter the fragile basis of how Christ was crucified, and thusly ALOT of doctrine. People are also afraid of change, so breaking from a 2,000 year tradition would be difficult for some.

And it is a good question that Nomad Tical asks -- how does Judas have a gospel anyway? I mean, I'd love to read it, but he in theory hung himself, right?[/size]

[Touchstone]

Yeah, I heard about that too on the news. It was interesting, and would certainly be fun to read from a scholarly standpoint, but again there are lots of other gospels that are even more bizarre from factions that split off. Like one believed that there were [i]two[/i] Gods (I also heard that on the news...). There's also a gospel of Mary (obviously not written by her, nor was this was this one by Judas), which is more interesting in my opinion. She never gets her damn say through the whole gospels of the Bible!

[Shadow Blade]

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A gospel by Mary? That's gotta be a gimmick. I don't think [b]any[/b] women were able to write because it was against ancient laws, right? If they did were they stoned? [/color][/size]

[quote name='? Nomad Tical ?']Also, how did Judas even have a gospel? Didn't he kill himself after ratting out Jesus?[/quote]
[color=slategray][size=1]
In the bible it said he did kill himself, in the movie The Passion of the Christ he hung himself. In either theory he killed himself.[/color][/size]

[Touchstone]

[QUOTE=Shadow Blade][size=1][color=slategray]
A gospel by Mary? That's gotta be a gimmick. I don't think [b]any[/b] women were able to write because it was against ancient laws, right? If they did were they stoned? [/color][/size][/quote]

She didn't write it, others did long after she had died. Most of it is probably fictitious or legend, but it still would be interesting. The Gospels about Jesus were also all written decades or even centuries after he died. Most of the Bible is written by others after events happened.

This is where taking the Bible literally becomes impossible ;)

[Dagger]

EDIT: Argh, you beat me to it! :p

Yeah, the true authorship of all four Biblical Gospels is questionable. In that light, the fact that this text could almost certainly not have been written by Judas himself means almost nothing.

~Dagger~

[Kitchen Sink]

[QUOTE=Retribution][size=1]Because it would effectively shatter the fragile basis of how Christ was crucified, and thusly ALOT of doctrine. People are also afraid of change, so breaking from a 2,000 year tradition would be difficult for some.

And it is a good question that Nomad Tical asks -- how does Judas have a gospel anyway? I mean, I'd love to read it, but he in theory hung himself, right?[/size][/QUOTE]

I oppose it for the same reason I oppose Holy Blood, Holy Grail or the Da Vinci code, both 'finds' that reportedly discover some hidden truth about Jesus, or the early church, rely on evidence that has been written down or painted after the fact.

Da Vinci wasn't there to witness the event called the last supper, he paints a vision of it hundreds of years after the fact, with one character looking suspiciously like Mary Magdalene, and this is interpreted as being the revealer of lost truth, even though Da Vinci was a ,member of the priory of Sion, supposed gatekeepers to the secret of Jesus' bloodline, and he had invested interest to push that agenda?

The gospel of Judas was written years after the fact by another secretive sect, it contradicts the gospels and gives the treacherous traitor a halo. If I'm suspicious it is because of those reasons, not because the crucifixtion story is flimsy of hokey.