By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON -

For 2,000 years Judas has been reviled for betraying Jesus. Now a newly translated ancient document seeks to tell his side of the story. The "Gospel of Judas" tells a far different tale from the four gospels in the New Testament. It portrays Judas as a favored disciple who was given special knowledge by Jesus — and who turned him in at Jesus request. "You will be cursed by the other generations — and you will come to rule over them," Jesus tells Judas in the document made public Thursday. The text, one of several ancient documents found in the Egyptian desert in 1970, was preserved and translated by a team of scholars. It was made public in an English translation by the National Geographic Society. Religious and lay readers alike will debate the meaning and truth of the manuscript. But it does show the diversity of beliefs in early Christianity, said Marvin Meyer, professor of Bible studies at Chapman University in Orange, Calif. The text, in the Coptic language, was dated to about the year 300 and is a copy of an earlier Greek version. A "Gospel of Judas" was first mentioned around A.D. 180 by Bishop Irenaeus of Lyon, in what is now France. The bishop denounced the manuscript as heresy because it differed from mainstream Christianity. The actual text had been thought lost until this discovery.

Elaine Pagels, a professor of religion at Princeton University, said, "The people who loved, circulated and wrote down these gospels did not think they were heretics." Added Rev. Donald Senior, president of the Catholic Theological Union of Chicago: "Let a vigorous debate on the significance of this fascinating ancient text begin." Senior expressed doubt that the new gospel will rival the New Testament, but he allowed that opinions are likely to vary. Craig Evans, a professor at Acadia Divinity College in Nova Scotia, Canada, said New Testament explanations for Judas betrayal range from money to the influence of Satan. "Perhaps more now can be said," he commented. The document "implies that Judas only did what Jesus wanted him to do." Christianity in the ancient world was much more diverse than it is now, with a number of gospels circulating in addition to the four that were finally collected into the New Testament, noted Bart Ehrman, chairman of religious studies at the University of North Carolina. Eventually, one point of view prevailed and the others were declared heresy, he said, including the Gnostics who believed that salvation depended on secret knowledge that Jesus imparted, particularly to Judas. In Cairo, the editor of the Coptic weekly "Watani," Youssef Sidhom, did not want to make an immediate judgment on the manuscript.

"However," he said, "this will not greatly affect the central belief that considers Judas as a traitor, but there is an old school of thought that says one should not persecute Judas because his role was to complete the prophecies. It seems that the new manuscript will support this point of view — that Judas role was pivotal to completing the prophecies." The newly translated documents text begins: "The secret account of the revelation that Jesus spoke in conversation with Judas Iscariot."  In a key passage Jesus tells Judas, "You will exceed all of them. For you will sacrifice the man that clothes me." This indicates that Judas would help liberate the spiritual self by helping Jesus get rid of his physical flesh, the scholars said. "Step away from the others and I shall tell you the mysteries of the kingdom," Jesus says to Judas, singling him out for special status. "Look, you have been told everything. Lift up your eyes and look at the cloud and the light within it and the stars surrounding it. The star that leads the way is your star." The text ends with Judas turning Jesus over to the high priests and does not include any mention of the crucifixion or resurrection. National Geographic said the author believed that Judas Iscariot alone understood the true significance of Jesus teachings. The author of the text is not named in the writings...

The so-called Gospel of Judas is thought to be the most important manuscript found in the last 60 years since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls near Kumran, 40 miles from Jerusalem, in 1946. The text of the Gospel first surfaced in the 1970s, after about sixteen centuries in the desert of Egypt as a leather-bound papyrus manuscript. The papyri on which the gospel is written are now in over a thousand pieces with many sections missing. Some ten years alter the manuscript turned up under murky circumstances in one of the Swiss archives. Having conducted a closer examination of the crumbling papyri, which contained scattered information with regard to the stay and fate of Jesus Christ in Galilee and Jerusalem, researchers reportedly found out that the manuscript had been signed by Judas. Following the study of the text, researchers were amazed to conclude that the Gospel of Judas interpreted the betrayal of Judas positively. According to the gospel, Judas betrayed Jesus to the Jewish authorities in obedience to the instructions of Jesus, with Judas acting as a divinely appointed instrument to help implement the plan devised by Jesus himself for crucifixion and subsequent resurrection. It is worthy of notice that the above interpretation of the Biblical stories is not a novelty. Back in the second and third centuries AD, various authors belonging to a large number of Gnostic sects maintained that Jesus, equated with the omniscient god, could not but know what Judas was secretly plotting, and therefore the plan was of his own making or Jesus did nothing to alter the course of events, at the very least. Why did Jesus act as he did? Because he aimed to create Christianity, a fundamentally new religion, which could have taken a bit more than preaching about “turning the other cheek” or “love for thy enemy.” Some extraordinary and memorable event had to be accomplished. The act of redemption of mankind by the death of Jesus’ mortal body and his resurrection was both the most incredible and suitable for the purpose. To view this rest of this article please visit the source

He is one of the most reviled men in history. But was Judas only obeying his master's wishes when he betrayed Jesus with a kiss? That's what a newly revealed ancient Christian text says. After being lost for nearly 1,700 years, the Gospel of Judas was recently restored, authenticated, and translated.The Coptic, or Egyptian Christian, manuscripts were unveiled today at National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C. Some biblical scholars are calling the Gospel of Judas the most significant archaeological discovery in 60 years. The only known surviving copy of the gospel was found in a codex, or ancient book, that dates back to the third or fourth century A.D. The newly revealed gospel document, written in Coptic script, is believed to be a translation of the original, a Greek text written by an early Christian sect sometime before A.D. 180. The Bible's New Testament Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—depict Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus, as a traitor. In biblical accounts Judas gives up Jesus Christ to his opponents, who later crucify the founder of Christianity.

The Gospel of Judas, however, portrays him as acting at Jesus' request. "This lost gospel, providing information on Judas Iscariot—considered for 20 centuries and by hundreds of millions of believers as an antichrist of the worst kind—bears witness to something completely different from what was said [about Judas] in the Bible," said Rodolphe Kasser, a clergyman and former professor in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Geneva in Switzerland.

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