The Gospel of Judas Iscariot

What does it matter?

They're both dead and long gone. So Judas may or may not have been a horrible traitor to Jesus. Either way - so what? How does it affect anything today?

Maybe someone can clue me in to why this is so important to Christians.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Jerrica

If Christianity is wrong about Judas, then what else are they wrong about?

I don't know. The entire religion is up for question, don't you think?

Like any religion, it takes faith to believe in. And everything is open to broad interpretation.

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It has been an accepted, undeniable, unquestionable FACT that Judas betrayed Jesus.

And according to the Christians, it is a FACT that Jesus is a zombie. I don't really believe in their ideas of "fact."

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So what if that fact was fiction? What else of the Christian faith has been misinterpreted or misrepresented by political forces? The Gospel of Judas was deliberately suppressed and destroyed by the early church. Why? Because Jesus having asked Judas to betray him threatens Jesus identity as an omniscient being. Ok, Jesus knew he was going to be crucified, say Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. But does that remain such an amazing feat if you ASKED your friend to turn you in for the purpose of martyrdom?

Man, now you're talking like a crazy person.

I don't personally believe in any of it. I was just curious why it matters so much that Christians had it all wrong.

Whats it going to change? Pretty much nothing, right?

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Is knowing that you're going to die because you planned your own death the same as knowing you were going to die because you have some great cosmic knowledge? No. Besides all that, Judas has been demonized and reviled for thousands of years. PArt of it may simply be about setting the record straight. I mean, a few years ago, the Vatican apologised for the Sack of Constantinople. The church is very much a historical entity and is responsible for shaping the world and human perception. They are accountable for the truths they fabricate.

Uh. I think you're giving The Vatican way too much credit. Especially in today's age. Unless you're a diehard Christian, I don't see why it adds up to anything of consequence.

I get this imposing feeling that you're a huge Dan Brown fan, though.

So, despite my being an atheist, I really don't see why any of this would matter to a regular, average Christian church-goer. In fact, I would think its pretty awesome Judas wasn't actually a traitor to Jesus. If he was Jesus' best buddy, isn't that super happy great for them?

And if you're thinking that maybe you're going to sway some of the Christians around here, you best guess again.

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by Jerrica

Sassafrass...

The question of Judas' betrayal matters to Christians on a level of fundamental belief and truth. Christianity has been a political tool since its inception.

Yea, you haven't been reading Dan Brown at all!

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This is still true today. Like it or not, Christianity has influenced almost every aspect of Western life, and has played a pivotal role in the course of history.

So have a lot of things, sir. That makes it neither right or wrong, good or bad. It just kind of exists. The power was given from the people to the church through faith and faith alone.

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The Vatican is and was a political machine, but it is not the only Christian organization that has been involved in politics. Beginning even before Constantine, and progressing right to the present, Christian beliefs have influenced culture and basic human understanding, and thus have influenced the world.

Are you going to state anything that people don't know anytime soon.

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North America is what it is today in large part because of the worldview of Christian followers. Religion, more than anything else, defines who people are as a group. It defines their way of life, their actions, their reality. To your average Christian, to the butts-in-pews, this might not make a fundamental difference right now. But to Christian theologians and philosophers, this might be a significant revelation, or may lead to a new perspective on the Bible and its meaning.

I think you're making some really SWEEPING generalizations there.

I am sure the Average Joe Christian won't give a shit if Judas was Jesus' bestest friend forever. THATS the point I am making.

We all know that the church hides shit, contorts shit, and that very little in religion should be taken literally. People skew things when they're in power. Okay, yea, no big revelation there. Tell us something we don't know.

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If Judas is no longer the typical sinful human, if he is a loyal friend, what does this mean to the eternal forgiveness of sins via the passion? Judas is a metaphor for all the fundamentally flawed human beings that Christ had to save by dying.

Matter of interpretation, really. If thats what you want to think about Judas, you're free to. I happen to not agree with it, but whatever.

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If Judas wasn't so flawed, if he was actually the most loyal of all the Apostles, what does this say about us? Jesus died because of Judas's sin, and FOR our sins. If one of those is wrong, is the other wrong too?

I like how you're taking the Bible as some kind of fact. You realize it's been twisted a million times in order to control the populus in question, right?

Any real Christian would probably not define their personal value as a human being based off of what Judas may or may not have done to Jesus. Thats absolutely ridiculous.

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And I'm not giving the Vatican too much credit. They were an extremely wealthy, extremely important political contingent for centuries. This is not really debatable. It is true. No historian would argue with this.

Yea, and no one is arguing with you either. Cut to the chase already.

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Please don't think I'm trying to be evangelical; I'm not. I'm an atheist as well, but I don't really care what people believe, either way. On a personal level, I find the whole thing extremely interesting, and I think it makes political sense for the church to have suppressed the GoJ at the time it disappeared.

It makes sense for them to surpress whatever may put their own intentions in jeopardy, yes. Or, to dismiss their OWN faults.

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IMO, the most fascinating part of religion is how it effects the people who believe it, and the world they control.

Uh huh.

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Oh, and while Dan Brown tells amusing stories (but is a terrible, terrible writer), I am able to draw the line between fact and fiction; something many Christians are having a hard time doing.

You can not convince someone with faith in something that there IS fact and not. They think God is fact.

Much like yourself, they see fact in something that just isn't there.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.