Backstabber Report

Judas Iscariot – Backstabber In The Christian Faith

Among Christians, Judas is considered the backstabbing Apostle to Jesus of Nazareth. According to the New Testament, it was Judas who betrayed Jesus (by identifying him with a kiss) to the chief priests, who brought him before the Prefect of the Roman province of Judaea, Pontius Pilate. Ultimately Jesus was crucified on a cross and the Christian faith was born.

For this act of backstabbing Judas was paid 40 pieces of silver. Money seems to have been important to Judas, for among the Apostles, Judas alone is reported to have kept a “money bag.”

The name Judas has entered many languages as a word for betrayer, traitor, backstabber, among others.

Though some scholars have embraced the alternative notion that Judas was merely the negotiator in a prearranged prisoner exchange (following the money-changer riot in the Temple) that gave Jesus to the Roman authorities by mutual agreement, and that Judas’s later portrayal as “traitor” was a historical distortion.

Other scholars argue that Judas acted in obedience to God’s will. The gospels suggest that Judas is apparently bound up with the fulfillment of God’s purposes. Simplifying what these scholars believe; If Judas had not been born, the Son of Man will apparently no longer go “as it is written of him“. The consequence of this apologetic approach is that Judas’s actions come to be seen as necessary and unavoidable, yet leading to condemnation.

Some have even argued that Jesus, himself, chose Judas to perform the act of betrayal in fulfillment of God’s will, so that the prophecy and the salvation of man could be completed to it’s unavoidable conclusion.

In the 1970s, a Coptic papyrus (a book) was discovered near Beni Masah, Egypt, which was a copy of an original text written in about 180 A.D. The text identifies itself as, “The Gospel of Judas” and described Jesus’ death and the circumstances according to Judas. The discovery was given dramatic international exposure in April 2006 when the US National Geographic magazine (for its May edition) published a feature article entitled The Gospel of Judas.  The article’s introduction stated: “An ancient text lost for 1,700 years says Christ’s betrayer was his truest disciple”.

Many variations of Judas Iscariot’s death are supported in ancient writings. The most accepted is that he hung himself, thus being damned to Hell for eternity. Some scholars argue that it wasn’t the betrayal of Jesus, for which he showed contrition that damned him, but the act of suicide. Arguments arise about the 40 pieces of silver. Some say he returned it to the priests, while others say he simply discarded it.

Among other writings, Judas:

• used the money to buy a field, but fell down headfirst, and burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels gushed out.
• was stoned to death by the eleven other disciples when they discovered his betrayal.
• walked about in this world a sad example of impiety… and was crushed by the chariot.

Whether Judas was a victim of fate, a tool of prophecy, or a plotting betrayer with free will, he is remembered as a “Backstabber.”