Gospel of Judas

[Mikki]

I've watched it last night at NatGeo and it was quite disturbing. Considering modern-day Christians picture Judas as the biggest villain of all, the 'Gospel of Judas' states that Judas is a hero. Anybody watched it?

The Gospel of Judas

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[Null17]

I saw the adverts but didn't get to see the show. From what I remember from Theology class there are actually a lot of Gospels that weren't included in today's bible for various reasons that I don't remember

[Abctest123]

its a bit ironic that i found the news article on the Gospel of Judas the night after i came home from my church, after just finished watching Passion of the Chris. a bit creepy if i do say so myself.

[J@3]

I saw something on the news about this, lol @ Christianity + others.

[cyanide]

From what I remember from Theology class there are actually a lot of Gospels that weren't included in today's bible for various reasons that I don't remember

Yup, over a hundred of them were omitted when they were developing the canon for the Bible at the Council of Nicea, I believe it was.

I think there's a Gospel of Mary Magdalene out there too... and there's a Gospel of James.

[Sac-1]

I saw it on Primetime.

[shadowgrin]

Saw it too, interesting to say the least.

Considering modern-day Christians picture Judas as the biggest villain of all, the 'Gospel of Judas' states that Judas is a hero.

As said in the movie Devil's Advocate, "consider the source" (sic)
If I were a gospel writer, I would also make myself look good in it. The same can also be said of the writers of the 4 main gospels.

From what I remember from Theology class there are actually a lot of Gospels that weren't included in today's bible

If memory serves me right, they are called as the gnostic gospels.

Yup, over a hundred of them were omitted when they were developing the canon for the Bible at the Council of Nicea, I believe it was.

I think there's a Gospel of Mary Magdalene out there too... and there's a Gospel of James.

That's why it helps to keep an open mind on the content of the other gospels. It opened my eyes long ago when I learned that some old closed-minded fools back then determined what gospels I should and shouldn't read. Nice way of hindering free will.

[Cable]

If I were a gospel writer, I would also make myself look good in it. The same can also be said of the writers of the 4 main gospels.

Actually, it's not certain who wrote at least one of the Gospels, if not the others. The Gospel of John was written around 100 AD, way too late for John to have written it himself. The same can be said about the Gospel of Judas; it has been dated to around 300 AD, so it's impossible for Judas to have written it, even ignoring the fact that he was said to have hung himself after Jesus' death.

I didn't watch it, but we talked about it in class. We also talked about how the movie Jesus Christ Superstar doesn't neccessarily portray Judas as the 'bad guy', but rather it shows that he felt guilty and only did it because he felt they were losing control. I'm not sure what my teacher meant by that, but that's what he said. I don't think Judas was ever portrayed as evil, considering he hung himself in shame after.

[shadowgrin]

^ You're right about the gospels not having a definite author. All of the gospels that have been discovered, including the main 4, were not really written by the authors themselves. It was more or less copied/transcribed from the actual writings of the authors, so embelishment or inaccuracies might happen when the material gets passed down from generation to generation.

It's also hard to imagine Judas' role as a traitor (and bound for the depths of hell) because if it wasn't for Judas then Christ wouldn't be crucified and there would be no resurrection. The only fault I could think of that Judas did is commiting suicide (out of shame or guilt). What a wuss.