The Gospel of Judas: Rewriting Early Christianity

by Simon J. Gathercole

"Judas" is synonymous with "traitor." But a newly discovered ancient text of the Gospel of Judas offers a picture of Judas Iscariot radically different from the Church's traditional understanding of him, and maintains that far from being the infamous betrayer, Judas was actually Jesus's trusted friend and the recipient of secret revelation. Simon Gathercole's new book includes a translation of the ancient Egyptian text of the Gospel of Judas and a running commentary, and offers new translations of all the ancient evidence about Judas Iscariot and the Gospel attributed to him. It gets behind the hype which the Gospel of Judas has attracted, and looks at why the group which produced the work were in such bitter conflict with the mainstream Christian church, and shows how the document provides us with a window into the turbulent world of Christianity and Gnosticism in the century after Jesus.

Genres: Christianity, Religion

199 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2007

About the author

Simon Gathercole (PhD, University of Durham) is senior lecturer in New Testament studies in the Faculty of Divinity of the University of Cambridge and Fellow and director of studies in theology at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, England. A leading British New Testament scholar, he has written several groundbreaking books.

Reviews

[Maya · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting first look at the Gospel of Judas, with analysis of the text (as much as possible with chunks of it missing) and with the story of how that Gospel was found and by whom. It also gives you a picture of an alternative Jesus with analysis of that Jesus in accordance with Gnostic slants and an analysis of just how authentic this text is.

A must read if you are interested in Gnostic Gospels, in the Gospel of Judas and in Christianity as a whole.

[Jimmy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this book in one go over 4-5 hours because I wanted to find the saucy and heretic bits (after seeing the sensational NatGeo documentary a few years ago), but there weren't that many. I really don't know what I one could ask from Gathercole, the background of the codex, the actual translated text, intersped with interpretation (I found the story of Sophia interesting), and a final discussion on theological aspects. It is rather disappointing that what seems to be missing in the codex always seem to be the most important sections, and what is available sounds rather bland (another creation myth was the secret kingdom reveal by Jesus to Judas?). While I learned much about the Gnostics and 2-3 century Christians, I think Elaine Pagel does a much better job in creating a sensational story (Yes I know there are some 9000 branches of Christianity, but the amount of diversity is not as great as pre-200AD). Gathercole is presumably more factual, but it's almost like a university essay, with fixed structure and commentary, either afraid or unable to come up with own ideas and pursuing his own lines of research. It's a nice and compact book, and it is pretty boring.

[Matthew Grotheer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gathercole offers a fresh new translation of the well know Gospel of Judas. This book is a very good introduction to some issues surrounding this popular gospel. One of the most helpful items Gathercole includes is a new translation into English as well as a running commentary on Judas. He helpfully portrays the clearly Gnostic ideas at work in its composition (and contrasts it with the canonical gospels). This book helps bring balance to the numerous conspiracy theories out there in certain scholarly circles about the nature of the canonical gospels (as well as the non-canonical ones) and their canonization. I seriously doubt that the discovery of this "gospel" (or any other new ones for that matter) is any real "threat to 2000 years of Christian teaching." I recommend this book for any interested in the area of study dealing with the apocryphal gospels and their significance for further gospel studies.