I just heard this on the news.....
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
Full Version: Jesus "asked" Judas To Betray Him?!?!?!
Oh no another Nonsense. First they say Jesus did not die on cross. Everyone has brought it and now they say Jesus asked Judas to betray what nonsense. I would shut their mouths and their technological crap. Roxgal dont believe those. This things are fake.
First :-
Second :-
Third :-
Fouth :-
First :-
Second :-
Third :-
Fouth :-
QUOTE(Roxygal @ Apr 6 2006, 03:45 PM)
I just heard this on the news.....
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
[right][snapback]51883[/snapback][/right]
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
[right][snapback]51883[/snapback][/right]
I saw this on another forum and someone brought up the question as to "Between when Judas betrayed Jesus and him committing suicide, when did he have time to write a gospel?" I personally think this appears to be something it is not.
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
QUOTE(His love abides @ Apr 7 2006, 02:26 AM)
QUOTE(Roxygal @ Apr 6 2006, 03:45 PM)
I just heard this on the news.....
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
[right][snapback]51883[/snapback][/right]
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
[right][snapback]51883[/snapback][/right]
I saw this on another forum and someone brought up the question as to "Between when Judas betrayed Jesus and him committing suicide, when did he have time to write a gospel?" I personally think this appears to be something it is not.
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
Yup he killed himself. I think this is sometype of consiparcy
QUOTE
I saw this on another forum and someone brought up the question as to "Between when Judas betrayed Jesus and him committing suicide, when did he have time to write a gospel?" I personally think this appears to be something it is not.
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
QUOTE
Yup he killed himself. I think this is sometype of consiparcy
[right][snapback]51896[/snapback][/right]
[right][snapback]51896[/snapback][/right]
WhiteKnight, What do you mean by conspiracy?
QUOTE(WhiteKnight @ Apr 6 2006, 04:00 PM)
QUOTE(His love abides @ Apr 7 2006, 02:26 AM)
QUOTE(Roxygal @ Apr 6 2006, 03:45 PM)
I just heard this on the news.....
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
[right][snapback]51883[/snapback][/right]
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
[right][snapback]51883[/snapback][/right]
I saw this on another forum and someone brought up the question as to "Between when Judas betrayed Jesus and him committing suicide, when did he have time to write a gospel?" I personally think this appears to be something it is not.
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
Yup he killed himself. I think this is sometype of consiparcy
[right][snapback]51896[/snapback][/right]
Let us remember the truth that the Bible tells us about these types of things.....there will come many false teachings, false doctrines and false pastors in the last days.
"Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned into fables. But watch thou in all things, endure all afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry." 2 Timothy 4:2-5 (KJV)
Maintain the truth about who JESUS is and what HE did for all of us.....
"He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him, stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and by his stripes we are healed." Isaiah 53: 3-5 (KJV)
" He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. He was taken from prison and judgement: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut out of the land of the living: for transgression of my people was he stricken. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was there any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed,he shall prolong his days,and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied:by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bear the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors." Isaiah 53: 7-12 (KJV)
JESUS died so that we could live in HIM and through HIM. Amen.
He gives us.....wisdom to understand and discern when these things come about...
"If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men. Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give peace unto wrath: for it is written, Vengence is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome with good." Romans 12:17-21 (KJV)
He gives is the words and wisdom too! These things must be fulfilled as the Scriptures tell us.
"For I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which all your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay nor resist. And ye shall be betrayed both by parents, and brethern, and kinsfolks, and friends, and some of you shall they cause to be put to death. And you shall be hated of all men for my name's sake. ...For these be the days of vengence, that all things which are written may be fulfilled." Luke 21:15-17, 22 (KJV)
AND GOD gives us a promise......
"The LORD shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your place." Exodus 14:14 (KJV)
May the LORD bless us as we understand why these things are coming to pass.
And a big AMEN to that Tig!!!
I wasn't able to comment on this when I posted because I had to run.... It's just amazing how things like this are popping up everywhere!!!
It's no wonder that people will be led astray in these days.
It's time to PRAY for those who may take the wrong path.
Much love...
Lisa
I wasn't able to comment on this when I posted because I had to run.... It's just amazing how things like this are popping up everywhere!!!
It's no wonder that people will be led astray in these days.
It's time to PRAY for those who may take the wrong path.
Much love...
Lisa
QUOTE(His love abides @ Apr 7 2006, 02:34 AM)
QUOTE
I saw this on another forum and someone brought up the question as to "Between when Judas betrayed Jesus and him committing suicide, when did he have time to write a gospel?" I personally think this appears to be something it is not.
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
QUOTE
Yup he killed himself. I think this is sometype of consiparcy
[right][snapback]51896[/snapback][/right]
[right][snapback]51896[/snapback][/right]
WhiteKnight, What do you mean by conspiracy?
[right][snapback]51898[/snapback][/right]
Oops. I meant Jesus asked Judas To Betray Him. That is conspiracy or blaspheme
. I hope it is clearQUOTE(WhiteKnight @ Apr 6 2006, 06:03 PM)
QUOTE(His love abides @ Apr 7 2006, 02:34 AM)
QUOTE
I saw this on another forum and someone brought up the question as to "Between when Judas betrayed Jesus and him committing suicide, when did he have time to write a gospel?" I personally think this appears to be something it is not.
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
[right][snapback]51895[/snapback][/right]
QUOTE
Yup he killed himself. I think this is sometype of consiparcy
[right][snapback]51896[/snapback][/right]
[right][snapback]51896[/snapback][/right]
WhiteKnight, What do you mean by conspiracy?
[right][snapback]51898[/snapback][/right]
Oops. I meant Jesus asked Judas To Betray Him. That is conspiracy or blaspheme
. I hope it is clear[right][snapback]51915[/snapback][/right]
Yep, clear now. Thanks WhiteKnight for clearing that up.
QUOTE(onetiggerroo @ Apr 6 2006, 03:08 PM)
QUOTE(WhiteKnight @ Apr 6 2006, 04:00 PM)
QUOTE(His love abides @ Apr 7 2006, 02:26 AM)
QUOTE(Roxygal @ Apr 6 2006, 03:45 PM)
I just heard this on the news.....
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
[right][snapback]51883[/snapback][/right]
http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/story?id=1810169&page=1
April 6, 2006 — It is a mystery 2,000 years in the making, buried in the desert and fueled by centuries of debate and doubt, theft and deceit. The question: Was there ever a Gospel according to Judas? And if there was, what did it reveal?
The mystery began to unravel almost 30 years ago, according to a new National Geographic Channel documentary.
Watch the full story on ABC's "Primetime" Thursday at 10 p.m. ET and "Nightline" at 11:35 p.m. ET and get more information from National Geographic by clicking here. Watch the full documentary "The Gospel of Judas" at 8 p.m. ET Sunday, April 9, on the National Geographic Channel.
A farmer looking for treasure in a cave in Egypt instead found a decaying leather-bound book, a codex.
Because the text was written in ancient Coptic, the farmer did not know what it was, but he figured he could sell it. He did, to an antiquities dealer, but still no one knew its secret text — and no one ever would if it continued to disintegrate before it could be translated.
Five years after it was found, the first glimpse of the book's meaning was gleaned when scholar Stephen Emmel was asked to look at the document.
"We were told we were not allowed to make any photographs, we were not allowed to make any notes," Emmel told "Primetime." "I leafed through and by chance spotted a dialogue between Jesus and Judas and his disciples and in particular the name Judas came up again and again. Judas said … the Lord said, blah, blah, blah."
Could it be a Gospel according to Judas? Scholars had long believed such a Gospel existed but that it had been banned by the early church, called blasphemous and ordered destroyed. Had a copy somehow survived, telling the story of the most reviled man in history?
A Great Betrayal
"[Judas is] the one who handed over his friend," said Marvin Meyer, co-chair of the religious studies department at Chapman University. "He's the one who brought about the crucifixion, and he's the one who is damned for all time."
The Bible says Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. The Bible also tells how the other disciples let Jesus down: Peter denied him three times but is nevertheless honored with the basilica in Rome. It is Judas alone who is not forgiven, condemned to the seventh level of hell in Dante's "Inferno," eaten head-first by Lucifer.
"Often they think of him as somebody who was greedy, avaricious, who was more interested in making money than in being faithful to his master," said Bart Ehrman, chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina.
And Judas over the centuries also became a symbol of anti-Semitism.
"Traditionally in Christian circles, Judas in fact has been associated with Jews," Ehrman said. "Of being traitors, avaricious, who in fact, betray Jesus, who are Christ-killers. And this portrayal of Judas of course also leads then to horrendous acts of anti-Semitism through the centuries."
But what if there were more to the story? The first task was to see if the document was genuine. For 16 years, the Codex sat crumbling in the most unlikely of places — a safe-deposit vault in a Citibank on Long Island, N.Y., until the year 2000, when it was purchased by a former antiquities dealer, Frieda Nussberger-Tchacos. "I think the circumstances of this manuscript coming to me were predestined," she said. "Judas was asking me to do something for him."
Searching for Answers
Finally, with the funding of the National Geographic Society and two foundations, a dream team of scientists and scholars was assembled to determine if the document was really an ancient text. Verification was an enormous challenge. The 13 pages of papyrus, with writing on the back and front, were in a thousand pieces. The box with what might be the lost Gospel was shipped to Swiss restorer Florence Darbre. "Your heart is beating a little bit faster the first time you take it in your hand ever," she said, "in your hand, yes, because you can see it but you don't know how he is, how brittle he is, how delicate it is."
Painstakingly, Darbre and her partner fit the tiny pieces together. But just because it looked authentic, it still had to be proved whether it was written 1,800 years ago. For that, Emmel, the scholar, and Rodolphe Kasser, another expert, were brought in. "I've looked at hundreds of papyri, Coptic papyri, in my career, and this is absolutely typical of ancient Coptic manuscripts," Emmel said. "I'm completely convinced. The number of people who could create such a text is very small," he said, perhaps just 25. Kasser estimated there were just four or five people who could create a convincing imitation of an ancient Coptic document.
"We're two of them," Emmel said. "Now, who would create such a thing? Someone would have to know Coptic better than we do. And there isn't anybody who knows Coptic better than we do. I'm sorry."
But the final test of authenticity meant taking a radical step — destroying tiny pieces of the document to carbon date it. "I will have to burn the Gospel of Judas in order to be able to date it," said Timothy Jull, a carbon-dating expert at the University of Arizona's physics center. Fifteen hours later, he had a final answer. The text was real. The Gospel according to Judas, written between the third and fourth century, was believed to be a copy of a much older document written in Greek in the second century. "Radio carbon dating of the papyrus from the Gospel of Judas confirms that it's from the third to the fourth century A.D.," Jull said, "and this supports the authenticity of the Gospel of Judas."
Did Jesus Ask to Be Betrayed?
"You can't fake a codex like this," said Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton University and one of the world's foremost experts on ancient religious texts, especially the so-called Gnostic or secret Gospels, which include the Gospel of Judas, all written in the first and second centuries and banned by the early church.
"It's crumbling; it's a particular kind of papyrus; it's a particular kind of script," Pagels said. "It would be absolutely not worth anyone's while, and far too difficult, to try to fake this kind of text. This is a genuine ancient text." So what is in the Gospel of Judas? It is a dialogue that claims to be a conversation between Jesus and Judas in which Jesus asks Judas to betray him. "Judas has the terrible task of taking it upon himself to turn him over to the authorities for this reason," Pagels said. "Now, the Gospel of Judas also has Judas say to Jesus in fear and terror that he has a dream that the other disciples will hate him and will stone him to death, will attack him. "And Jesus says, 'Yes, in fact, they will think that you are a terrible person because of what you did. This is part of the burden that you bear. But they will be wrong about that.' So it is an extraordinary transformation of the ordinary understanding of Judas Iscariot."
Pagels said the text shows that Christ, in fact, asked Judas to betray him for an undisclosed reason. "The Gospel of Judas does suggest that the betrayal of Jesus is not a reprehensible act, not the act of a traitor, you know, the worst villain in the history of the world, but that it's a secret mystery between him and Jesus," she said. Herbert Krosney, author of "The Lost Gospel: The Quest for the Gospel of Judas Iscariot," one of two new books and a National Geographic Channel documentary about the Gospel of Judas, said the finding is significant.
"Judas is not the betrayer," Krosney said. "Judas is, rather, the favored disciple of Jesus. He is the one whose star shines in the heavens and in the skies, and Judas, therefore, becomes unique. He is Jesus' best friend rather than his betrayer."
A New Perspective
Today the Gospel of Judas got its first public outing at a news conference, and it is on display at the National Geographic Society in Washington, D.C. It will eventually return to Egypt to be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum. It is also available online, in Coptic and English, and is the cover story of the new National Geographic magazine. But while the document is a real one, is what it claims also true? Did the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John get it wrong? Did Jesus askJudas to betray him? "I don't think that we have in this Gospel what I would call historical proof," Pagels said. "We also don't have that in the other Gospels." She said there may never be an answer. "I don't see how we would, although you see we could always find next week or in 50 years other evidence that we don't have now."
In the end, science may have its answers, but questions of spirit and soul cannot be analyzed like a piece of papyrus. If Judas did not betray Jesus and was part of a grand plan, does that change anything for Christian theology?
The discovery does not alter the belief of evangelical scholar Ben Witherington that Judas did indeed betray Jesus. "Well, it would mean among other things that Jesus had some kind of death wish, for a start," Witherington said. "And it would raise some questions about his character. "I would think there are some questions of integrity that would be raised about that, for him to sort of script it in such a way that he's using his disciples to go and set this up would suggest a sort of level of hands-on intention to it, where he's not just submitting to the will of God in his life," Witherington said. "He's actually got his hands on the wheel, and he's driving the wheel of history in a particular direction. And some would find that troubling."
The scholars interviewed by "Primetime" agreed that the real importance of the Gospel of Judas is the window it provides into what some early Christians were thinking. But they acknowledged that some in the organized church will not like the discovery of this Gospel. "Absolutely, they won't," Pagels said. "Some will be very offended, and they'll say this proves that all of those texts are rubbish, because it's an utterly preposterous idea that Judas could have been involved in a secret mystery with Jesus."
But that would miss the point, she added. "The Christian message is a message about faith and hope and, you know, the relationship between God and human beings. It's not a matter of historical fact." Pagels said she hoped the find will have a big impact. "I would hope that people appreciate the excitement of this discovery and recognize that it's all right to ask the kinds of questions that sometimes they're afraid to ask, and say, 'What else didn't we know about the early Christian movement? Could, for example, Judas be forgiven?'" she said.
"And when people start asking that question, they'll realize that it doesn't destroy faith, it actually can strengthen it. But it's a different kind of faith; it's informed by what we understand about our past."
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I saw this on another forum and someone brought up the question as to "Between when Judas betrayed Jesus and him committing suicide, when did he have time to write a gospel?" I personally think this appears to be something it is not.
Matthew 27:3-5
3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility."
5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.
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Yup he killed himself. I think this is sometype of consiparcy
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Let us remember the truth that the Bible tells us about these types of things.....there will come many false teachings, false doctrines and false pastors in the last days.
"Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned into fables. But watch thou in all things, endure all afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry." 2 Timothy 4:2-5 (KJV)
Maintain the truth about who JESUS is and what HE did for all of us.....
"He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him, stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and by his stripes we are healed." Isaiah 53: 3-5 (KJV)
" He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. He was taken from prison and judgement: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut out of the land of the living: for transgression of my people was he stricken. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was there any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed,he shall prolong his days,and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied:by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bear the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors." Isaiah 53: 7-12 (KJV)
JESUS died so that we could live in HIM and through HIM. Amen.
He gives us.....wisdom to understand and discern when these things come about...
"If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men. Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give peace unto wrath: for it is written, Vengence is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome with good." Romans 12:17-21 (KJV)
He gives is the words and wisdom too! These things must be fulfilled as the Scriptures tell us.
"For I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which all your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay nor resist. And ye shall be betrayed both by parents, and brethern, and kinsfolks, and friends, and some of you shall they cause to be put to death. And you shall be hated of all men for my name's sake. ...For these be the days of vengence, that all things which are written may be fulfilled." Luke 21:15-17, 22 (KJV)
AND GOD gives us a promise......
"The LORD shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your place." Exodus 14:14 (KJV)
May the LORD bless us as we understand why these things are coming to pass.
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WoW! I'd have to say another big amen to that!!
Thanks Tid!
Roxy....thanks for this post.....
Galatians 1:1-6
Gal 1:6 I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:
Gal 1:7 Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
Gal 1:8 But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
Gal 1:9 As we said before, so say I now again, If any [man] preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.
Gal 1:6 I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:
Gal 1:7 Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
Gal 1:8 But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
Gal 1:9 As we said before, so say I now again, If any [man] preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.
I tell you what, I don't care IF Jesus asked Judas to betray him. It makes no difference to me. It doesn't diminish Christ's glorious resurrection one bit to me and it doesn't lessen God's perfect plan in the slightest.
I don't care IF scientist say Christ walked on ice. To me I believe he still walked on water.
If someone said "here is the bones of Christ," I would not believe them. He may say "you are deceived," I'd say I don't care. I am blind and deaf and I still believe in Jesus Christ as my beloved Lord and savior...there is nothing you can do to me satan without God granting you that much, so you're inconsequential in the scheme of things and you shall be destroyed, while the Word of God goes for all eternity, and I believe to go with the Lord, Amen
I don't care IF scientist say Christ walked on ice. To me I believe he still walked on water.
If someone said "here is the bones of Christ," I would not believe them. He may say "you are deceived," I'd say I don't care. I am blind and deaf and I still believe in Jesus Christ as my beloved Lord and savior...there is nothing you can do to me satan without God granting you that much, so you're inconsequential in the scheme of things and you shall be destroyed, while the Word of God goes for all eternity, and I believe to go with the Lord, Amen
QUOTE(Humble Bob @ Apr 6 2006, 05:34 PM)
I tell you what, I don't care IF Jesus asked Judas to betray him. It makes no difference to me. It doesn't diminish Christ's glorious resurrection one bit to me and it doesn't lessen God's perfect plan in the slightest.
I don't care IF scientist say Christ walked on ice. To me I believe he still walked on water.
If someone said "here is the bones of Christ," I would not believe them. He may say "you are deceived," I'd say I don't care. I am blind and deaf and I still believe in Jesus Christ as my beloved Lord and savior...there is nothing you can do to me satan without God granting you that much, so you're inconsequential in the scheme of things and you shall be destroyed, while the Word of God goes for all eternity, and I believe to go with the Lord, Amen
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I don't care IF scientist say Christ walked on ice. To me I believe he still walked on water.
If someone said "here is the bones of Christ," I would not believe them. He may say "you are deceived," I'd say I don't care. I am blind and deaf and I still believe in Jesus Christ as my beloved Lord and savior...there is nothing you can do to me satan without God granting you that much, so you're inconsequential in the scheme of things and you shall be destroyed, while the Word of God goes for all eternity, and I believe to go with the Lord, Amen
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Amen to that HB!
Even though we are told that all this would transpire, It all still amazes me that it is really happening in my lifetime!
Lord give us the understanding and the strength to walk through these days.
Your Friend in Christ,
Valerie
Messiahiscoming
QUOTE(messiahiscoming @ Apr 6 2006, 07:18 PM)
QUOTE(Humble Bob @ Apr 6 2006, 05:34 PM)
I tell you what, I don't care IF Jesus asked Judas to betray him. It makes no difference to me. It doesn't diminish Christ's glorious resurrection one bit to me and it doesn't lessen God's perfect plan in the slightest.
I don't care IF scientist say Christ walked on ice. To me I believe he still walked on water.
If someone said "here is the bones of Christ," I would not believe them. He may say "you are deceived," I'd say I don't care. I am blind and deaf and I still believe in Jesus Christ as my beloved Lord and savior...there is nothing you can do to me satan without God granting you that much, so you're inconsequential in the scheme of things and you shall be destroyed, while the Word of God goes for all eternity, and I believe to go with the Lord, Amen
[right][snapback]51948[/snapback][/right]
I don't care IF scientist say Christ walked on ice. To me I believe he still walked on water.
If someone said "here is the bones of Christ," I would not believe them. He may say "you are deceived," I'd say I don't care. I am blind and deaf and I still believe in Jesus Christ as my beloved Lord and savior...there is nothing you can do to me satan without God granting you that much, so you're inconsequential in the scheme of things and you shall be destroyed, while the Word of God goes for all eternity, and I believe to go with the Lord, Amen
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Amen to that HB!
Even though we are told that all this would transpire, It all still amazes me that it is really happening in my lifetime!
Lord give us the understanding and the strength to walk through these days.
Your Friend in Christ,
Valerie
Messiahiscoming
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Oh I agree,
Lord, we need You.
We always have.
We are clinging to you and only You.
Help us to keep our joyful praise in everything that we go through.
And always discerning what is true and what is false.
what good posts!
i especially loved the part about,
WHEN did JUDAS have TIME to write a gospel!!
most excellent reasoning from what is written in the scriptures!
good!
as for Jesus walking on ICE...
if we look at the account, it says that the disciples were hard put to ROW THE BOAT in the storm winds and waves.
now when can you ever ROW A BOAT through ICE?
Jesus, did indeed, walk on the water.
He is the "Bread that is cast upon the waters that returns to you after many days." as written in Ecclesiastes, (i think.)
also, about the SHROUD OF TURIN...
the scriptures say, plainly, that there was a SEPARATE piece of cloth,
lying by itself, that had been around his head. .....
not just a big long sheet....
yes, if we rely upon what is written, then we shall discern what is true.
good for you all!
God bless you.
bz
i especially loved the part about,
WHEN did JUDAS have TIME to write a gospel!!
most excellent reasoning from what is written in the scriptures!
good!
as for Jesus walking on ICE...
if we look at the account, it says that the disciples were hard put to ROW THE BOAT in the storm winds and waves.
now when can you ever ROW A BOAT through ICE?
Jesus, did indeed, walk on the water.
He is the "Bread that is cast upon the waters that returns to you after many days." as written in Ecclesiastes, (i think.)
also, about the SHROUD OF TURIN...
the scriptures say, plainly, that there was a SEPARATE piece of cloth,
lying by itself, that had been around his head. .....
not just a big long sheet....
yes, if we rely upon what is written, then we shall discern what is true.
good for you all!
God bless you.
bz
None the less, it has been verified to be a 1,700 year old document. Which means it very possibly was rejected at the Nicene council. Inspired by God or not, it still serves to confirm that the story of Christ is fact. Strange that it gets released at Passover.
sojourner
sojourner
good point, sojo, that it still ACKNOWLEDGES that the CHRIST is JESUS.
listen.
it is going to be DIFFICULT in the coming days, to be CHRISTIAN.
and the words of JESUS will prove to be true.
you will delivered up, to persecution,
and haled before governors and judges,
but it will TURN out to be a witness to them,
concerning the TRUTH.
but as he told us, do not rehearse before hand
what things you will say....
for holy spirit will be speaking for you in those days.
FOr the Glory of GOD.
and do not be fearful of those that can kill the body
but cannot destroy the soul, or LIFE.
for JESUS has already LED THE WAY.
and his sheep will FOLLOW HIM.
love,
bz
listen.
it is going to be DIFFICULT in the coming days, to be CHRISTIAN.
and the words of JESUS will prove to be true.
you will delivered up, to persecution,
and haled before governors and judges,
but it will TURN out to be a witness to them,
concerning the TRUTH.
but as he told us, do not rehearse before hand
what things you will say....
for holy spirit will be speaking for you in those days.
FOr the Glory of GOD.
and do not be fearful of those that can kill the body
but cannot destroy the soul, or LIFE.
for JESUS has already LED THE WAY.
and his sheep will FOLLOW HIM.
love,
bz
Thank you for that bz... I really needed that today
QUOTE(sojourner @ Apr 6 2006, 09:16 PM)
None the less, it has been verified to be a 1,700 year old document. Which means it very possibly was rejected at the Nicene council. Inspired by God or not, it still serves to confirm that the story of Christ is fact. Strange that it gets released at Passover.
sojourner
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sojourner
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It is strange the timing in releasing this. I do not believe that Judas wrote this. It does not hold true to the Word. It is in conflict with scripture that is written about this.
People can say what ever they want to it does not make it true. Thy Word is Truth!
QUOTE(karen vaughn @ Apr 6 2006, 09:52 PM)
People can say what ever they want to it does not make it true. Thy Word is Truth!
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Amen to that!!
I read the CNN article on this
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/04/06...s.ap/index.html
One part of the at least 1700 year old document says
"You will exceed all of them. For you will sacrifice the man that clothes me."
(I only bold biblical scripture when quoted...)
Then commentators say that it has to do with helping Christ liberate the spiritual self by getting rid of the flesh...That is very intriguing.
John 13:26-27
Jesus answered, He it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it. 27 And when he had dipped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. And after the sop Satan entered into him. Then said Jesus unto him, That thou doest, do quickly.
Jesus, of course knew Judas would betray him, Judas I imagine would not have known from the start. I would even imagine Judas loved Jesus and repented even onto the end.
Matthew 27:4-5
4 Saying, I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What is that to us? see thou to that. 5 And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.
If anyone has the grace and glory to forgive Judas it would be Christ himself. And if Judas is found in heaven would that disturb the believer?
The point is that a fact is of something on how things had actually happened, so how would one react if this were an undeniably true thing? One of four things:
i. The believer denies the fact and adheres to his or her view of Christ.
ii. The believer realizes the fact and their faith in Christ diminishes because it conflicts with their view.
iii. The believer accepts the fact but they understand it doesn't conflict with Christ and the resurrection.
iv. The believer acknowledges they just don't know.
Which is the ignorant answer? Which is the answer guided by the flesh? Which is the answer guided by the Holy Spirit? Which is the honest answer?
Zechariah 4:4-5
4 So I answered and spake to the angel that talked with me, saying, What are these, my lord? 5 Then the angel that talked with me answered and said unto me, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my lord.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/04/06...s.ap/index.html
One part of the at least 1700 year old document says
"You will exceed all of them. For you will sacrifice the man that clothes me."
(I only bold biblical scripture when quoted...)
Then commentators say that it has to do with helping Christ liberate the spiritual self by getting rid of the flesh...That is very intriguing.
John 13:26-27
Jesus answered, He it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it. 27 And when he had dipped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon. And after the sop Satan entered into him. Then said Jesus unto him, That thou doest, do quickly.
Jesus, of course knew Judas would betray him, Judas I imagine would not have known from the start. I would even imagine Judas loved Jesus and repented even onto the end.
Matthew 27:4-5
4 Saying, I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What is that to us? see thou to that. 5 And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.
If anyone has the grace and glory to forgive Judas it would be Christ himself. And if Judas is found in heaven would that disturb the believer?
The point is that a fact is of something on how things had actually happened, so how would one react if this were an undeniably true thing? One of four things:
i. The believer denies the fact and adheres to his or her view of Christ.
ii. The believer realizes the fact and their faith in Christ diminishes because it conflicts with their view.
iii. The believer accepts the fact but they understand it doesn't conflict with Christ and the resurrection.
iv. The believer acknowledges they just don't know.
Which is the ignorant answer? Which is the answer guided by the flesh? Which is the answer guided by the Holy Spirit? Which is the honest answer?
Zechariah 4:4-5
4 So I answered and spake to the angel that talked with me, saying, What are these, my lord? 5 Then the angel that talked with me answered and said unto me, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my lord.
Im glad someone posted the warning of being deceived in the last days. If God were to have allowed a Gospel according to Judas then it would be in the New Testament along with Mathew, Mark, Luke and John.
In the book of Revelation John saw the twelve apostles sitting on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel...NOT THIRTEEN.
The treachery of Judas also discloses that the scars of sin callus ever thicker. The Bible records the numerous times Jesus lovingly reached out to call back Judas. Not once did Judas even hint at responding. For instance:
Two nights before the betrayal, Judas questioned Mary of Bethany’s anointing of Jesus. While Mary’s heart was in the right place, Judas asked why the disciples shouldn’t sell the costly perfume and feed the poor. But Judas had seen Jesus feed 5,000 with no money. It was the greed of a man who stole from the treasury that prompted Judas’s indignant query.
Though Jesus rebuked Judas, the traitor ignored the message. The Gospels indicate that Judas, perhaps even angry over the rebuke, immediately approached the religious establishment with an offer to betray Jesus.
Next, John 13:26 states that Jesus identified His betrayer by dipping a morsel of bread and handing it to Judas at The Last Supper. Traditionally this was a gesture reserved only for honored guests. Judas’s response was cold. Satan entered him, and Judas rose and departed, shutting the door in the Savior’s face. "And it was night," John writes.
So all was dark when Judas approached Jesus in Gethsemane. One final time, Jesus gave Judas the chance of eternal asylum. Matthew 26:50 records that Jesus addressed Judas, even after the dastardly kiss, as "friend." But sin had so blinded Judas that he could not see the Way, the Truth, and the Life. It was his last chance. A hangman’s noose would usher him into eternal torment.
In the book of Revelation John saw the twelve apostles sitting on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel...NOT THIRTEEN.
The treachery of Judas also discloses that the scars of sin callus ever thicker. The Bible records the numerous times Jesus lovingly reached out to call back Judas. Not once did Judas even hint at responding. For instance:
Two nights before the betrayal, Judas questioned Mary of Bethany’s anointing of Jesus. While Mary’s heart was in the right place, Judas asked why the disciples shouldn’t sell the costly perfume and feed the poor. But Judas had seen Jesus feed 5,000 with no money. It was the greed of a man who stole from the treasury that prompted Judas’s indignant query.
Though Jesus rebuked Judas, the traitor ignored the message. The Gospels indicate that Judas, perhaps even angry over the rebuke, immediately approached the religious establishment with an offer to betray Jesus.
Next, John 13:26 states that Jesus identified His betrayer by dipping a morsel of bread and handing it to Judas at The Last Supper. Traditionally this was a gesture reserved only for honored guests. Judas’s response was cold. Satan entered him, and Judas rose and departed, shutting the door in the Savior’s face. "And it was night," John writes.
So all was dark when Judas approached Jesus in Gethsemane. One final time, Jesus gave Judas the chance of eternal asylum. Matthew 26:50 records that Jesus addressed Judas, even after the dastardly kiss, as "friend." But sin had so blinded Judas that he could not see the Way, the Truth, and the Life. It was his last chance. A hangman’s noose would usher him into eternal torment.
Hey People!
There is one big, huge, tremendous deception. Bogoy posted the site where the gospel of judas could be read. If this is the true document, the Judas is NOT Judas Iscariot! No statement such as is being presented is contained in the document! The wool is being pulled over all our eyes by the media! Go to Bogoy thread on the Gospel of Judas and read it for yourselves! It does not belong as part of scripture, but neither can it claim what is being said about it!
j
There is one big, huge, tremendous deception. Bogoy posted the site where the gospel of judas could be read. If this is the true document, the Judas is NOT Judas Iscariot! No statement such as is being presented is contained in the document! The wool is being pulled over all our eyes by the media! Go to Bogoy thread on the Gospel of Judas and read it for yourselves! It does not belong as part of scripture, but neither can it claim what is being said about it!
j
QUOTE(blindzebra @ Apr 6 2006, 08:14 PM)
what good posts!
i especially loved the part about,
WHEN did JUDAS have TIME to write a gospel!!
most excellent reasoning from what is written in the scriptures!
good!
as for Jesus walking on ICE...
if we look at the account, it says that the disciples were hard put to ROW THE BOAT in the storm winds and waves.
now when can you ever ROW A BOAT through ICE?
Jesus, did indeed, walk on the water.
He is the "Bread that is cast upon the waters that returns to you after many days." as written in Ecclesiastes, (i think.)
also, about the SHROUD OF TURIN...
the scriptures say, plainly, that there was a SEPARATE piece of cloth,
lying by itself, that had been around his head. .....
not just a big long sheet....
yes, if we rely upon what is written, then we shall discern what is true.
good for you all!
God bless you.
bz
[right][snapback]51964[/snapback][/right]
i especially loved the part about,
WHEN did JUDAS have TIME to write a gospel!!
most excellent reasoning from what is written in the scriptures!
good!
as for Jesus walking on ICE...
if we look at the account, it says that the disciples were hard put to ROW THE BOAT in the storm winds and waves.
now when can you ever ROW A BOAT through ICE?
Jesus, did indeed, walk on the water.
He is the "Bread that is cast upon the waters that returns to you after many days." as written in Ecclesiastes, (i think.)
also, about the SHROUD OF TURIN...
the scriptures say, plainly, that there was a SEPARATE piece of cloth,
lying by itself, that had been around his head. .....
not just a big long sheet....
yes, if we rely upon what is written, then we shall discern what is true.
good for you all!
God bless you.
bz
[right][snapback]51964[/snapback][/right]
And how did Peter sink in ice? That would have to hurt pretty bad!
I don't buy it. First off Satan is a dog gone liar! Second to believe its been proven to be 1700 years old mean only that we have to take the word of some stranger on tv. Who's to say this guy doesn't serve satan himself.
QUOTE(justaservant @ Apr 7 2006, 07:36 AM)
Hey People!
There is one big, huge, tremendous deception. Bogoy posted the site where the gospel of judas could be read. If this is the true document, the Judas is NOT Judas Iscariot! No statement such as is being presented is contained in the document! The wool is being pulled over all our eyes by the media! Go to Bogoy thread on the Gospel of Judas and read it for yourselves! It does not belong as part of scripture, but neither can it claim what is being said about it!
j
[right][snapback]52037[/snapback][/right]
There is one big, huge, tremendous deception. Bogoy posted the site where the gospel of judas could be read. If this is the true document, the Judas is NOT Judas Iscariot! No statement such as is being presented is contained in the document! The wool is being pulled over all our eyes by the media! Go to Bogoy thread on the Gospel of Judas and read it for yourselves! It does not belong as part of scripture, but neither can it claim what is being said about it!
j
[right][snapback]52037[/snapback][/right]
Jim..will check it out. Might I also add that it doesn't suprise me the media is going to take off with this big time after the DiVinci code crap and run with this one. They'll spout off all kinds of nonsense....this has to be looked at very carefully!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
HISLOVEABIDES,
Awesome Cindy and these verses couldn't be more FITTING!!!
QUOTE
Galatians 1:1-6
Gal 1:6 I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:
Gal 1:7 Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
Gal 1:8 But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
Gal 1:9 As we said before, so say I now again, If any [man] preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.
Gal 1:6 I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:
Gal 1:7 Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
Gal 1:8 But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.
Gal 1:9 As we said before, so say I now again, If any [man] preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.
Galations....1-6...this was released yesterday.....4-6....just observing.
The following days we are being tested....
10 days from now on the 17th the Knesset and Olmert....the Golden report...
http://www.thegoldenreport.com
QUOTE
A terrible event is scheduled to take place on April 17th every MK that will be sworn into the new Israeli Knesset all have agreed to the platform of dividing the Land of Israel, giving the enemies of God and the enemies of Israel rewards for killing so many of us over the years, not to mention going against the Word of God.
Thanks for the update Jerry!
Sorry my post seems so random....so many thoughts just scattered around here in pieces and just trying to put them all together.
God works in mysterious ways and THE ALMIGHTY amazes me everyday!! PRAISE HIM and ALL HIS GLORY!!!
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