A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

LeftofLarry
RRS local affiliateScientist
LeftofLarry's picture
Posts: 1199
Joined: 2006-02-12
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

JUDAS

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/04/0406_060406_judas.html

Lost Gospel Revealed; Says Jesus Asked Judas to Betray Him
Stefan Lovgren
for National Geographic News

April 6, 2006
He is one of the most reviled men in history.

But was Judas only obeying his master's wishes when he betrayed Jesus with a kiss?

That's what a newly revealed ancient Christian text says.

After being lost for nearly 1,700 years, the Gospel of Judas was recently restored, authenticated, and translated. (Get the full, twisting tale of the document's discovery and authentication.)

The Coptic, or Egyptian Christian, manuscripts were unveiled today at National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C. (National Geographic News is part of the National Geographic Society.)

What Does It Mean?

Some biblical scholars are calling the Gospel of Judas the most significant archaeological discovery in 60 years.

The only known surviving copy of the gospel was found in a codex, or ancient book, that dates back to the third or fourth century A.D.

The newly revealed gospel document, written in Coptic script, is believed to be a translation of the original, a Greek text written by an early Christian sect sometime before A.D. 180.

The Bible's New Testament GospelsMatthew, Mark, Luke, and Johndepict Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus, as a traitor. In biblical accounts Judas gives up Jesus Christ to his opponents, who later crucify the founder of Christianity.

The Gospel of Judas, however, portrays him as acting at Jesus' request.

"This lost gospel, providing information on Judas Iscariotconsidered for 20 centuries and by hundreds of millions of believers as an antichrist of the worst kindbears witness to something completely different from what was said [about Judas] in the Bible," said Rodolphe Kasser, a clergyman and former professor in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Geneva in Switzerland.

Kasser, who is regarded as one of the world's preeminent Coptic scholars, led the effort to piece together and translate the Gospel of Judas. The National Geographic Society and the Waitt Institute for Historical Discovery funded the project, and it will be profiled in the May 2006 issue of National Geographic magazine.

Scholars say the text not only offers an alternative view of the relationship between Jesus and Judas but also illustrates the diversity of opinion in the early Christian church.

"I expect this gospel to be important mainly for the deeper insight it will give scholars into the thoughts and beliefs of certain Christians in the second century of the Christian era, namely the Gnostics," said Stephen Emmel, a Coptic studies professor at the University of Mnster in Germany.

In 1983 Emmel was among the first three known scholars to view the Gospel of Judas, which had been discovered hidden in Egypt in the late 1970s.

Gnostics belonged to pre-Christian and early Christian sects that believed that elusive spiritual knowledge could help them rise above what they saw as the corrupt physical world.

Rehabilitating Judas

Biblical accounts suggest that Jesus foresaw and allowed Judas's betrayal.

As told in the New Testament Gospels, Judas betrayed Jesus for "30 pieces of silver," identifying him with a kiss in front of Roman soldiers. Later the guilt-ridden Judas returns the bribe and commits suicide, according to the Bible.

The Gospel of Judas, however, gives a very different account.

The text begins by announcing that it is the "secret account of the revelation that Jesus spoke in conversation with Judas Iscariot during a week, three days before he celebrated Passover."

It goes on to describe Judas as Jesus' closest friend, someone who understands Christ's true message and is singled out for special status among Jesus' disciples.

In the key passage Jesus tells Judas, "'you will exceed all of them. For you will sacrifice the man that clothes me.'"

Kasser, the translation-project leader, offers an interpretation: "Jesus says it is necessary for someone to free him finally from his human body, and he prefers that this liberation be done by a friend rather than by an enemy.

"So he asks Judas, who is his friend, to sell him out, to betray him. It's treason to the general public, but between Jesus and Judas it's not treachery."

The newfound account challenges one of the most firmly rooted beliefs in Christian tradition.

Bart Ehrman is chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

"This gospel," he said, "has a completely different understanding of God, the world, Christ, salvation, human existencenot to mention of Judas himselfthan came to be embodied in the Christian creeds and canon."

Early Turmoil

The author of the 26-page Gospel of Judas remains anonymous. But the text reflects themes that scholars regard as being consistent with Gnostic traditions.

Christian Gnostics believed that the way to salvation was through secret knowledge delivered by Jesus to his inner circle. This knowledge, they believed, revealed how people could escape the prisons of their material bodies and return to the spiritual realm from which they came.

Gnostic sects looked to their gospelsamong them the Gospel of Mary, newly famous for its role in the best-seller The Da Vinci Codeto authenticate their distinctive beliefs and practices. (See "Da Vinci Code Spurs Debate: Who Was Mary Magdalene?"Eye-wink

Contradicting the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, these texts were later denounced by orthodox Christian leaders and refused entry into the Bible. Scholars believe that followers of the texts hid copies of them for preservation. (See our interactive "Lost Gospel" time line and map.)

Scholars knew of the existence of the Gospel of Judas because of references to it in other ancient texts as early as A.D. 180.

To today's biblical scholars, the Gospel of Judas illustrates the multitude of opinions and beliefs in the early Christian church.

"This ancient text helps the modern world rediscover something that the early Christians knew firsthand," said Reverend Donald Senior, president of the Catholic Theological U_nion in Chicago, Illinois.

"In the early centuries of the Christian era there were multiple sacred texts resulting from communities in various parts of the Mediterranean world trying to come to grips with the meaning of Jesus Christ for their lives."

Brian Handwerk contributed to this report.

Atheist Books, purchases on Amazon support the Rational Response Squad server which houses Celebrity Atheists.


n8
Posts: 13
Joined: 2006-04-04
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

this could have been forged and the texts of jesus may have been forged


LeftofLarry
RRS local affiliateScientist
LeftofLarry's picture
Posts: 1199
Joined: 2006-02-12
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

Carbon dating has placed it at the right time. Unless it was a forgery back in the days of the "supposed" jesus, which could very well be, then it's a real gospel. The real issue is this: it is obvious that the church has destroyed, hidden and distorted chains of events sorrounding the life of jesus because it had an agenda. This clearly shows some of hte cracks in the xtian's story of jesus. The gospels could be nothing but made up false stories as well. There are plenty of pre-cannonical gospels that are impossible to find. Which is where Luigi Cascioli finds most of his information regarding jesus as being John of Gammala and nothing but a revolutionary with his borthers (the apostles) claiming the throne fo the hebrews. The thing is this, we know that the church's version of the chain of events is false. This only confirms that religious doctrine and religious dogma are not TRUE as they have been taught for 2000 years. so....the more of the hidden "gospels" they find, the better the picture of xtianity comes to light....

Atheist Books, purchases on Amazon support the Rational Response Squad server which houses Celebrity Atheists.


Obscure
Posts: 8
Joined: 2006-04-13
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

One of the people on the translation team, Bart Ehrman, is in the running for dumbest person on Earth. This is the guy (a Christian) who wrote an entire book pointing out the contradictions and inconsistencies in the gospels, the events falsely attributed to Jesus' mystical powers, etc. (I wouldn't expect a Christian, on their own, to figure out that Jesus never actually existed, so, i'm not mad at him about that.) He then came to the conclusion that Christians should view the Bible, and Jesus, in a MORE favorable light than before their learning of these descrepancies. Friggin' dipshit.

[/b]


MattShizzle
Posts: 7966
Joined: 2006-03-31
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

That makes sense. Laughing out loud


Sapient
High Level DonorRRS CO-FOUNDERRRS Core MemberWebsite Admin
Posts: 7587
Joined: 2006-04-18
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

LeftofLarry wrote:
Carbon dating has placed it at the right time.

The "right time" is 260 AD? I'm watching the National Geographic show now, and they just told me that this is when it is dated to with carbon. Did N.G. have their head in their asses here?


Sapient
High Level DonorRRS CO-FOUNDERRRS Core MemberWebsite Admin
Posts: 7587
Joined: 2006-04-18
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

Ok, they just said that "we know the gospel existed in 180 AD and have no way to know when the original was written."

Anyone find it weird that the Gospel of Judas contains private conversations that NOBODY was privy to except Judas and Jesus? :roll:


Samuel
Samuel's picture
Posts: 121
Joined: 2006-02-18
User is offlineOffline
A new gospel revealed..by guess who?????? you got it...

Why are we debating this? Jesus didn't ask Judas to betray him.

JESUS DIDN'T EXIST.

Go on, slap yer foreheads, you know you want to.

Carbon dating placed it around 180 AD? How could they possibly know that Jesus asked Judas to betray him 150 years after Jesus died?!

You are all debating whether or not this is forged or not...
Of course it is!
The whole damn Bible is!

Now stop arguing.