Remember all the hype last year surrounding the National Geographic Society’s release of The Gospel of Judas? Remember how the NGS said that the Gospel of Judas actually proved that Judas didn’t betray Jesus but rather that Judas was merely honoring Jesus’ request to betray him and hand him over to be killed? Remember how conservative Biblical scholars panned The Gospel of Judas? Turns out the conservative scholars were right and the National Geographic Society now has some explaining to do to.<\/p>\n
April D. DeConick, a professor of Biblical studies at Rice University\u00a0and the author of \u201cThe Thirteenth Apostle: What the Gospel of Judas Really Says,\u201d writes in today’s New York Times<\/a>:<\/p>\n So what does the Gospel of Judas really say? It says that Judas is a specific demon called the \u201cThirteenth.\u201d In certain Gnostic traditions, this is the given name of the king of demons \u2014 an entity known as Ialdabaoth who lives in the 13th realm above the earth. Judas is his human alter ego, his undercover agent in the world. These Gnostics equated Ialdabaoth with the Hebrew Yahweh, whom they saw as a jealous and wrathful deity and an opponent of the supreme God whom Jesus came to earth to reveal.<\/p>\n Whoever wrote the Gospel of Judas was a harsh critic of mainstream Christianity and its rituals. Because Judas is a demon working for Ialdabaoth, the author believed, when Judas sacrifices Jesus he does so to the demons, not to the supreme God. This mocks mainstream Christians\u2019 belief in the atoning value of Jesus\u2019 death and in the effectiveness of the Eucharist.<\/p>\n How could these serious mistakes (by the National Geographic Society) have been made? Were they genuine errors or was something more deliberate going on? This is the question of the hour, and I do not have a satisfactory answer.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Remember all the hype last year surrounding the National Geographic Society’s release of The Gospel of Judas? Remember how the NGS said that the Gospel of Judas actually proved that Judas didn’t betray Jesus but rather that Judas was merely … Continue reading