The Gospel of Judas
The newly discovered and restored Gospel of Judas is both amazing and controversial. It contains Gnostic viewpoints, which consider the way to salvation was through secret knowledge revealed by Jesus to His disciples. The main controversy in this document surrounds the theory that Jesus wanted Judas to betray Him, and asked him to do so, which diminishes Judas' reputation as traitor. This is contrary to the canonical Gospels in the New Testament, which blatantly paint Judas as the betrayer of Jesus.
The text of this controversial Gospel was written originally in Greek around A.D. 180, however the original author is unknown. The Gospel was written on papyrus, probably at a Gnostic monastery in Egypt. A copy was not discovered until the late 1970s. This one surviving copy was most likely concealed in a tomb in Egypt, perhaps buried there during St. Athanasius's fourth-century campaign to destroy heretical texts.
Sometime between A.D. 220 and 340, decades after the original was written, the surviving Gospel of Judas was probably copied. The Gospel was one of three texts bound together in a codex, or ancient book. Four samples of the papyrus dated by radiocarbon process places the codex in this time period.
The fragile document was examined by leading scholars who concluded that that both the theological concepts within the text and its linguistic structure are very similar to those found in other noncanonical documents of the same time period. Another clue to the codex's dating is the handwriting. Experts say the script used is the work of a professional scribe of this period who used distinctive marks of that time. The ink has been tested and dated as well, and is also consistent with that used during the third and fourth centuries.
The Gospel of Judas was lost for almost 1,700 years before it was discovered during the 1970s, but surfaced for only a short while before disappearing again. It is unknown as to who first discovered the codex, but it is thought to have been hidden at a site on the east bank of the Nile River, which is near El Minya, an Egyptian village. In May 1983 some U.S. university scholars received a strange phone call that led them to Europe, where they viewed some valuable Coptic manuscripts for sale by an Egyptian owner. They were shown boxes of papyruses concealed in newspapers, and after a brief inspection, suggested that these documents were of great importance. The mysterious seller asked for three million dollars for the sacred documents, which of course the scholarly group could not afford. Thus, the documents vanished for almost two decades.
After this first failed attempt to sell, the documents were offered to potential buyers in Egypt, Europe, and the United States. Ownership of these documents took many forms before landing in the right hands in 2001. The Swiss-based Maecenas Foundation for Ancient Art purchased the codex with the goal of restoration and preservation, as well as returning it to the country of origin. The foundation formed a partnership with the National Geographic Society, and now the Gospel of Judas has been brought to the world after near 1,700 years of concealment.
By the time the Gospel reached the Coptologist in charge of restoration, it was terribly deteriorated, scattered into nearly a thousand pieces which crumbled at the slightest touch. It is sheer luck that the document survived the rough journeys and was able to be restored. For five years a team pieced it back together using tweezers and computers to reassemble the fragments into a whole. Once completed, a team of scholars translated the document into English and has thus brought this long lost text to the modern world. The restored original will be housed in Cairo's Coptic Museum.