The Truth About Judas

Book Review -- work in progress -- by DanShaw.com

All people seem to share an archetypal longing to discover long-lost treasure, perhaps gold and jewels, perhaps ancient knowledge and wisdom. We are painfully aware that the achievements of our forefathers have been all-too-often lost and destroyed; the sunken Atlantis, the burned Alexandrian library, six of the seven wonders of the world, the Ark of the Covenant, ad infinitum. The discovery of the Nag Hammadi library in 1945, and the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947 (and their translation and publication) focused the world’s attention and imagination on the fact that these historical treasure troves and more remain to be assimilated into our cultural heritage and zeitgeist, and the fact that the Roman Catholic Church at various times has monkeyed with, translated, edited and expurgated the books of the Bible. As a secular-Jew-turned-mystic, I have been more interested in the Apocrypha, the officially rejected parts of the Bible, than in the officially accepted parts of the Bible. So naturally the story of the discovery of a “Judas Gospel” recounted in The Truth About Judas caught my attention. It deserves consideration of not only Christians, but people of all faiths, and ‘secularists’, for we all live in societies shaped and influenced by the Abrahamic faiths, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The Truth About Judas certainly fulfills its promise to stimulate a new consideration of the central event of the Christian era, the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, and the role Judas played.

The name Judas, like “Benedict Arnold” has become synonymous with “traitor.” But the Judas Gospel, as one might expect, presents a contrary storyline, Judas as Jesus’ co-conspirator in carrying out a plan necessary to Jesus’ fulfillment of Messianic prophecy. The Truth About Judas examines the actual Gospel, recovered after 1600 years of obscurity, and the profoundly positive and transformative implications of the Judas Gospel.

Read more about

The Truth about Judas Iscariot

http://www.truthaboutjudas.com/main/index.php

and author Yitzhak Hayut-Man

http://www.thehope.org/Yitzhak.htm

The Truth About Judas Book Review -- work in progress -- by DanShaw.com