When The Sethians Were Young: The Gospel Of Judas In The Second Century

Abstract

The Gospel of Judas is a text, with a Sethian orientation, that derives from a time no later than the middle of second century. Irenaeus reports that the people behind Gospel of Judas claim that Judas Iscariot knew the ways of God, and that Judas was only one of the disciples who understood the truth. Judas consequently performed the mystery of the betrayal, the handing over of Jesus and this act is linked to dissolution of all that is earthly and heavenly. The place of the Gospel of Judas as a datable mid-second-century text in Sethian tradition has obvious implications for reconstruction and understanding of history of Sethian gnosis, especially in the earlier period of Sethian school of thought. This chapter proposes how the Gospel of Judas may be read as a mid-second-century text and how Judas Iscariot may be interpreted within a mid-second-century gnostic context - when the Sethians were young. Keywords: betrayal; gnostic context; Gospel of Judas ; Irenaeus; Jesus; Judas Iscariot; Sethians tradition