A reader writes:
I had the TV on last night on a BBC channel (I’m in Italy right now on vacation and its one of the few English channels I have) and I saw an ad for a TV show on the Gospel of Judas Iscariot and how it could shake the foundations of Christianity and turn everything we know about Jesus upside-down (I’m paraphrasing). Its obvious that this is shameless sensationalism in the vein of the Da Vinci Code, but I was wondering what you know about the text they are refering to?
I’ve been aware of the so-called "Gospel of Judas" for some time, and rumor is that it’ll be released by Easter.
In fact, the National Geographic Channel is going to be doing a special on it on April 9th at 8 p.m. (Eastern?), apparently.
Here’s the scoop:
In the second century there was a non-canonical work that was known as "the Gospel of Judas," and it was used by a sect of Gnostics called the Cainites who Irenaeus attacked in his work Against Heresies. According to Irenaeus,
Others [i.e., the Cainites] again declare that Cain derived his being from the Power above, and acknowledge that Esau, Korah, the Sodomites, and all such persons, are related to themselves. On this account, they add, they have been assailed by the Creator, yet no one of them has suffered injury. For Sophia was in the habit of carrying off that which belonged to her from them to herself. They declare that Judas the traitor was thoroughly acquainted with these things, and that he alone, knowing the truth as no others did, accomplished the mystery of the betrayal; by him all things, both earthly and heavenly, were thus thrown into confusion. They produce a fictitious history of this kind, which they style the Gospel of Judas [Against Heresies 1:31:1].
Despite being mentioned here, the Gospel of Judas was lost to history, but a copy of it (or, rather, of most of it) turned up on the antiquities market in the latter half of the 20th century. It was finally purchased and has been undergoing translation and preparation for publication in the last few years.
With Da Vinci madness in the air, I’m sure that the Gospel of Judas will be all over the airwaves and the Net once it’s finally published (possibly next week), so the time is ripe to do a heads-up on it.
It’ll all be much ado about not much, though, because this thing ain’t written by the historical Judas. It’s a second century forgery (assuming that it’s not a 20th century forgery of a forgery) that will tell us more about hte beliefs of certain Gnostics than it will about the events of Christ’s life.
It has historical value insofar as it is used to learn more about early Gnosticism. But the press’ll misrepresent the story, breathlessly wondering "What if it’s true?" when it just ain’t true. The press’ll try to press it into service as a window into the ministry of Jesus, and that’s precisely what it’s not.
So, forewarned is forearmed.
