The Gospel of Judas

The Gospel of Judas by David Brakke

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Gnosticism is a strange belief system. Reading a Gnostic text is not a straightforward affair because Gnostic beliefs are so heavily mythologized and allegorical, and, yet, Gnostic beliefs also incorporate Christian symbols and characters, creating something familiar and, yet, disturbingly unfamiliar. Christ as a character in a story saying vague and cloudy things mingles with terms like Barbelo, aeons, Sakla and Nebro.

David Brakke's book provides a great way of understanding the Gnostic elements in the so-called Gospel of Judas. His approach is to provide a background history about the text, allow the reader to read the text, and then break down the text section by section with a commentary on the section the reader has just covered. The commentary is more of an essay on various topics in the section, rather than a line-by-line explication of the text.

Brakke's writing is scholarly. This is not for a casual reader. I skipped all of the technical discussions about the translation of the Coptic text. It didn't interest me and was over my head.

On the other hand, I think I got a solid grounding on Gnostic theology as a way that helps unfold the Gospel of Judas. Brakke inclines toward the idea that the Coptic Gospel of Judas was written in the mid to late second century and reflects a text that Irenaeus described in his book “Against the Heresies.” The text describes Jesus's alleged interactions with Judas in the week before the Crucifixion of “the body that carried Jesus.” The Gospel opens with Jesus laughing at his disciples for doing disciple-like things. Judas observes that Jesus comes from the Barbelos. From this, Jesus takes Judas into his confidence

So, what is the “Barbelos”? My understanding is that the Barbelos is the Mother Aeon of Wisdom who in other Gnostic texts spun off or birthed the demiurge - the lower creator god whom the Christians worship, but who is called “Saklas” or “Nebro.” To be fair, although aeon appears to be used in other texts as a term for a subdivine entity, Brakke explains that aeon is used in the Gospel of Judas as a name for a domain inhabited by a subdivine being, angel, or aeon.

The text makes it clear that the disciples are mistaken and conned by worshipping God, who is actually a lesser subdivine being known as Saklas. Judas will turn Jesus over to the authorities so that the one who bears Jesus will be tortured:

//26Jesus said, “Truly I say [to you], this baptism 56 [ . . . in] my name [ . . . ] 4will destroy the entire race of Adam, the earthly man. 6Tomorrow the one who bears me will be tortured. 8Truly I [say] to you, no hand of a mortal human being [will . . . ] me. 12“Truly [I] say to you, Judas, as for those who offer sacrifice to Saklas, they all shall [perish], 15for the [ . . . ] upon the [ . . . ] and all [ . . . ] 18everything that is [evil]. 18But as for you, you will surpass them all, 20for you will sacrifice the human being who bears me.

Brakke, David. The Gospel of Judas (The Anchor Yale Bible Commentaries) (p. 389). Yale University Press. Kindle Edition.

The Gnostic text asserts that the Christian baptism will condemn those who accept it. Moreover, Christians (and Jews, maybe all humans) will be replaced by a Great Race that is totally free of the domination of angels, aeons and subdivine beings.

In performing this task, Judas will replace the disciples, and in fact, he will replace Saklas (or the Jewish/Christian God.)

//15Jesus said, “Truly I say to you (pl.), it is the stars that bring completion upon all these. 18When Saklas completes the times that have been assigned to him, 21their first star will come with the races, and the things that have been said will be brought to completion. 24Next they will fornicate in my name and kill their children, 55 1and [ . . . ] wicked, 2and [ . . . ] 4the aeons, 5bringing their races and presenting them to Saklas. 7And next [ . . . ] will come, bringing the twelve tribes of [Israel] from [ . . . ], 9and all [the races] will serve Saklas, sinning in my name. 12And your (sing.) star will [rule] over the thirteenth aeon.” 14But then Jesus laughed.

Brakke, David. The Gospel of Judas (The Anchor Yale Bible Commentaries) (p. 375). Yale University Press. Kindle Edition.

This is all strange stuff, but I was surprised to learn that the term aeon is found in Ignatius's Letter to the Trallians. I had thought it was a term made up by Gnostics.

The value-added for me is that the Gospel of Judas confirms the Catholic view of the Eucharist as a sacrifice of the body of Christ. The author of Judas clearly had an animus against the orthodox Catholic Church. Thus, the author sought to condemn Catholic practices and rites as misbegotten deviations from true understanding. Brakke explains:

//Likewise, the disciples' dream of sacrifice to Saklas anticipates or is analogous to Judas's sacrifice of the human Jesus. In Jesus's eschatological interpretation of the dream, it signifies end-time events that include the acceptance of a single sacrifice from the hands of a single priest (40. 18–22), which may refer to the sacrifice of the human Jesus, which Jesus later describes as occurring among the events of the end (56.6–22). In that later description, Jesus places in parallel positions “those who offer sacrifice to Saklas” and “you,” that is, Judas, “for you will sacrifice the human being who bears me” (56.13–22). These clues indicate that the sacrificial activity in the disciples' dream has two references: in its contemporary meaning it refers to the eucharist, in which Christians give thanks to god and share bread; in its eschatological meaning it refers to events at the end, which include the crucifixion of Jesus's human bearer. The author criticizes an understanding of the eucharist as a sacrifice made to the god of Israel, over which leaders who claim to be both priests and successors to the disciples preside, and which takes it meaning in part from the death of Jesus. A consensus of historians of early Christian worship, however, holds that Christians did not combine into a single eucharistic theology the concepts that the eucharistic elements are a sacrifice, that the eucharistic sacrifice repeats or reenacts the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, and that the presiders over the eucharist are priests until the third century, when Cyprian of Carthage (among others) exemplifies this understanding (Rouwhorst 2010; Schmid 2012a, 85–86; Bradshaw 2004). Nonetheless, sources from the first and second centuries contain the ingredients for such an understanding, and Judas suggests either that its author saw it as an implication of attested rhetoric or that some Christians did hold such a view, even if other surviving sources do not put all the pieces together in as explicit a manner as Cyprian does.

Brakke, David. The Gospel of Judas (The Anchor Yale Bible Commentaries) (pp. 122-123). Yale University Press. Kindle Edition.

And:

//The sacrificial understanding of worship that Judas criticizes did not characterize all Christians in all places (and probably not even most Christians in most places); rather, it belonged to Christians in the author's context, whether that was Rome or some other location. Or at least so he thought: possibly the author himself put these elements together from his reading of works like the ones I have discussed, although the vehemence of his rhetoric suggests personal contact with his opponents. My interest here has been in establishing the plausibility of and context for the sacrificial theology and ritual that Judas portrays, but this relatively new piece of evidence may suggest also reconsideration of the scholarly consensus about sacrifice, priesthood, and the eucharist in the second century.

Brakke, David. The Gospel of Judas (The Anchor Yale Bible Commentaries) (pp. 129-130). Yale University Press. Kindle Edition.

So, Brakke's book provides a way to understand Gnosticism, which, interestingly, provides an insight into the history of Christian doctrine.