The Gospel Of Judas Essay

The Gospel of Judas, a text considered heretical by the early Christian church in the second century and erased from history, was newly discovered in Egypt in the year 1978. This ancient gospel, written in Coptic, tells about the relationship between Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve apostles, and Jesus. The gospel was deemed forbidden because it portrays Judas’ betrayal of Jesus as an order from Jesus himself which is a major difference from the one scene illustrated in the New Testament gospels. The Gospel of Judas was, and still is, a highly controversial document because the text voices an opinion that challenged the orthodox views of early Christian church fathers. When compared to the canonized gospels, its content revealed numerous

A believer must gain ‘gnosis,’ or knowledge, and die from their physical body in order to be reunited with God. The Gospel of Judas contains many scenes which connect the importance of death to the belief the spark of God being trapped inside of the human shell. In verse 43, Jesus says, “…their bodies will die but their souls will be alive, and they will be taken up.” This verse is significant because it directly accounts for the Gnostic view of death as the mean of freeing one’s self from the prison of his or her body. A surprising dissimilarity between this gospel and the canonized gospels is absence of the crucifixion scene in the Gospel of Judas. The gospel ends abruptly with Judas betrayal of Jesus which created tension between the emerging orthodox church and the Gnostics. There is no account of death or resurrection in this gospel because the body is unimportant since it dies and it is the spirit that lives. On the contrary, New Testament gospels depict Jesus’ death and resurrection as the means of salvation. In this view, the body dies and is resurrected by God because the physical body is held in high regard. The explanation as to why the Gospel of Judas was written is not known, but through speculation, its affinities to Gnosticism highlight its purpose within the diversity of early