More on the Gospel of Judas

Ben Witherington, one of my favorite New Testament scholars, has posted two helpful pieces on the 'Gospel of Judas.' See here and here.

Witherington makes a point which, to my thinking, may or may not have significance:

...we do not have a Greek text of this Gospel, we have a Coptic one from which the English translation has been made. To simply state this text was based on Greek text is to argue without hard evidence. The fact that Irenaeus mentions this document may suggest there was a Greek original, but we do not have it, and the translation done is not based on any Greek text.

I confess that I had taken on face value the claims of the National Geographic's team that the Coptic text they've released was a translation of an earlier Greek document. There have long been rumors of a Greek-language 'Gospel of Judas.' So, I simply leapt to the conclusion that the current document translates that one. This may not be true. There may have been no Greek-language document.

The potential importance of there being no original Greek-language text is this: Greek was the international community's second-language in Biblical times. It was the lingua franca, much as English is today: the language of commerce, of philosophy and the arts. This is why all the canonical works of the New Testament were written in Greek.

We know that gnositicism was a perversion of the good news about Jesus Christ already being proclaimed immediately following His death and resurrection. The non-existence of a Greek document could indicate the lateness with which the Gospel of Judas was composed, thus undermining its credibility.

But even that, to me, isn't as significant as Witherington seems to think that it is. As I indicated in my post on this subject on April 6, the theology of this gnostic gospel is so counter to the faith traditions of Judaism, to the agreed-upon utterances of Jesus, and the other writings of the New Testament, that it's clear that the Gospel of James was never in the running for inclusion in the Bible, it ever it was considered. That's because it doesn't comport with what history, faith, and experience have taught about Jesus Christ or Judas.

[My first post on 'The Gospel of Judas' can be found here.]

UPDATE: Thanks to Redhawk Review for linking to my original post on 'The Gospel of Judas.'

ANOTHER UPDATE: Thanks also to Alex Jordan and the rest of The Best of the God Blogs crew for linking to my original post on the Judas document. Alex's blog can be found here. (I met Alex last October at the first-ever GodBlogCon in the Los Angeles area. He is a thoughtful, articulate man, both in person and in his writing. The Best of the God Blogs site has been very kind to this blog and I'm thankful!

AND ANOTHER: Thanks to Wounded Healer for linking to my original post on the Gospel of Judas.

ANOTHER THANKS: This goes to Kevin Creighton of Balaam's *ss for linking to my original post on the 'Gospel of Judas.'

MORE THANKS: This time to Brian Bill for linking to my original post on 'The Gospel of Judas,' listing it along with several other pieces dealing with the document. Thanks, Brian!

ANOTHER THANKFUL UPDATE: Thanks to Ron Jones of Three Things for linking to my original post on the Gospel of Judas!