The Gospel of Judas (2006 TV Movie) User Reviews

A different perspective on the Judas we all know.

[dy158 · 8/10 · 11 June 2006]

In the entire course of the history of Christianity, he was being labelled as the traitor to Jesus before the cruxification happened. Many condemned him since. But when records of maybe a long-lost scroll about Judas surfaced which showed a different side of him, how will the public react.

This documentary was first shown on the National Geographic around the Easter period this year and I even managed to watch it when it was on the cable here. As from what I remembered in my earlier school days at those chapel sessions (given I once attended a missionary school and the chapel is part of the school), there is a traitor among all of Jesus's disciples when they were all having the Last Supper. So, this documentary began to change from what I remembered and gave me another perspective of who Judas is maybe.

It may be an two-hour long documentary as I realised, but then when there was a repeat of it, even on the local free-to-air television here at a later date, I tried to watch it again. It was really insightful as to hear from those who had researched about the subject and gave their opinions. Even how maybe the Bible we all knew today actually contain many gospels before the ones Christians actually knew nowadays. Real eye-opener for me, even as a non-Christian.

I mean coming back to the documentary, given when the scroll was found, it was almost becoming dust. And when it was being pieced together, it showed a very different Judas that we all knew from the Bible, whether we are Christians or not ourselves. I am not a Christian myself but then I feel the documentary has done a nice job somewhere along the line in shedding the light of Judas.

Maybe it may take some time for people to understand that actually there is a different side of Judas. But given how I had always know of the National Geographic's standards in producing their documentaries, I do have some faith in them. So, if you are not afraid in knowing the other side of Judas, this is recommended.

Decent For What It Was

[gavin6942 · 6/10 · 11 July 2013]

This film chronicles the discovery of an ancient text, known as the Gospel of Judas, that offers a different view of the disciple who betrayed Jesus.

How do we go about rating something that was made for television as a National Geographic special? The commercial breaks should be cut a bit better (on Netflix you are left looking at a blank screen far too long), but all in all it transfers to a 90-minute documentary well.

More or less, all you need is Elaine Pagels, the undisputed expert on the Gnostic Gospels and related books. And she was here, so that worked. Some of the "this is probably how it happened" probably was not necessary. And the order of events was a bit odd at times...

But, for history buffs and religious scholars, this was a good look at an old document that may be greatly important. (Even if it changes Christianity in no way, it changes our way of looking at the early churches and sects that sprouted up.)

Apocryphal gospel of Judas!!

[elo-equipamentos · 8/10 · 25 September 2018]

Those olds scrolls found in Egypt in last century gave us another interpretation over this cursed man called Judas, several Universities on United Kingdom, USA and Germany are studying this olds apocryphal texts with help of most bright intellectual leading experts on this field, the matter exactly explored is about an endless kind of differents texts allowed to study, all them have many sort of directions,in fact it's hard to follow a simply track, it's explained why the church threw away majority them available in 180 A.D. and choose only four gospels, pleased me a Juda's redemption, however it's impossible to apply today over such diffused old scrolls, there are the key to understand all puzzle, more the language used was another crossway to overcame by experts, in my humble opinion no one will get in anywhere with such kind of materials, they were wrote between 50 to 150 years after Jesus Christ's death by others people who pass on verbally spoken until somebody put it in the paper finally, many things probable were added or forgotten!!!

Resume:

First watch: 2011 / How many: 2 / Source: DVD Rating: 8

Very Interesting But Left Me Wanting More...

[victoria4504 · 9/10 · 2 April 2008]

I found this documentary very interesting and eye-opening. While interesting, I was disappointed in what the documentary actually tells us. In trying to put together the ancient text of the Gospel of Judas, the experts tell us that they were able to recover 85% of the text, making it readable for the first time in thousands of years.

Unfortunately, they only gave us a "glimpse" of what is written in the Gospel of Judas. The only written words confirmed were "Gospel of Judas." As far as I could tell, no other original quotes were mentioned. This seems unusual and I tend to question why? I'm going to the Internet to see if I can find more information on the actual words of this Gospel.

Beyond belief - for Christians that is...

[rowland-654-349989 · 10/10 · 26 August 2010]

Christians won't find this documentary or any other scholarly investigation of the roots of Christianity palatable because they are not interested in facts or the roots of their faith, preferring to dogmatically to what they believe to be the unedited (inspired by the holy spirit as one poster put it) account of Jesus of Nazareth. This is a controversy that goes beyond the Gospel of Judas, there are a number of primary historical sources which give us an entirely different interpretation of the ministry of Christ.

The early Christian ministry was a diverse one, with no single accepted version of the events surrounding Jesus' life. It was only the advent of ambitious Roman bishops convening in 325CE, and subsequent ecumenical council's that established what text were to be included and excluded from the Bible. The Romans, being who they were, preferred order and certainty rather than the large collection of often contradictory Gnostic gospels.

Gnostic Christianity espoused such heretical beliefs as gender equality, the divinity of all human beings and tolerance of other faiths - things which to this day most Christians reject. Thomas in particular is rebuffed as an "unbeliever" because he believed that the light of Christ was present within all of us.

The New Testament is largely influenced by "Paul" of Tarsus, a man who never knew Jesus yet claimed to be the foremost authority on his teachings. He frequently came into conflict with the Church of Jerusalem and Paul was quick to ingratiate himself to the Romans after they effectively wiped out all opposition to Paul during the sack of Jerusalem (circa 70CE). Just like the current Pope, Paul's shady background is all to easily overlooked, but by doing so we can never understand his motivations and the subsequent evolution of Pauline Christianity.

I'm not necessarily saying that Nag Hammadi effectively invalidates the New Testament. But the fact is that interest in Gnosticism, however informed or ill-informed, has propagated because of the inability of Christians to come to terms with the diverse origins of their faith, and are no longer able to suppress history using methods they have relied on for the last 2000 years.

Interesting but its presentation creates credibility issues

[tsbrownie · 11 January 2011]

It certainly presents some interesting ideas and findings about the less known gospels of Christianity. That Judas may have unwillingly been doing what Jesus asked him to do, that Jesus orchestrated his own demise, is certainly a new view for those of us raised on the 4 traditional gospels of Mathew, Mark, Luke and John. I wish they had been more reliable and more balanced in their reporting and less dramatic. For example, presenting the "upper room" in the show without telling us that it is certainly not the original place of the Last Supper as it is known to have been built much later. Additionally, they over dramatize the need to "burn the gospel of Judas" to carbon date it. In carbon dating only very tiny pieces need to be subjected to the tests, pieces a couple of square millimeters in size, but that they dramatize and hold back such information makes me wonder if other things were held back or changed to create a marketable show. Overall it's worth watching because it does stimulate an interest in finding out more, but the show itself should be taken with a grain of salt.

Yet Another Attempt to Undermine Christianity

[TheSicilianSage · 1/10 · 11 December 2008]

This so-called documentary is yet another attack on Christianity by the National Geographic Channel.

Ostensibly an authentic Christian text which was suppressed by the Catholic Church, it is, in reality, a Gnostic text and has nothing to do with Christianity.

Gnosticism predates Christianity and proposes that there are actually two gods, one of the spirit (and thus good) and one of the physical world (and thus is evil).

Having seen the effectiveness of Christianity, the Gnostics usurped practically every Christian character and theme in order to make their claims "valid" in the eyes of the early Christian followers. Thus the god of the old testament was made to correspond to the "god of the physical world" and the Christ as the "god of the spirit".

In the Gnostic world Jesus was not even physical (for being of spirit, he could have no flesh, viz. flesh=evil) and thus could not have been really crucified. As to Christ's spiritual nature, only those of "the true faith" had the secret knowledge (Gnosis) which was passed on orally (through secret words) from Christ to his (Gnostic) followers.

For those unfamiliar with Christian history, don't be fooled. - The National Geographic Channel has chronically tried to undermine Christian beliefs by "examining" such "suppressed" books and claiming that Gnosticism was a legitimate Christian sect, when, in fact, such texts as "The Gospel According to Judas" and those found at Nag Hammadi (e.g. The Gospel of Mary Magdalene and The Gospel of Thomas) were written by Gnostics three or more centuries after Christ's death.

A disappointing film that only gets to the crux of the matter at the very end, which is far too late

[bob the moo · 6 May 2007]

A documentary film that looks at the alleged discovery of what appears to be the missing gospel written by Judas Iscariot. Starting with the history of the document and how it was passed around the black market as various attempted sales failed, this looks at the popular conception of Judas within the bible while the attempted restoration continues, threatening (if it is genuine) to challenge all that we know about the character.

You can thank airport novels perhaps but it is certain that questioning the history of biblical times and the conventional religious teachings is certainly in vogue over the last few years. With many "secret" gospels doing the rounds and various other documents found, it is indeed an interesting subject. For Christians I am not sure how the impact is as there has never been a doubt that these documents exist but that they believe that a divine power guided the selection of the books in the bible and just because others exist doesn't mean they are correct, true or sacred.

Of course this does not mean that the documents have no interest because to me personally they do. Judas in particular is an interesting character because of his role – to complete the fate of Jesus, someone had to betray him so was this a role he did because he was greedy, one he did as a sacrifice or one he was fated to do? It is interesting because if he had done the "right" thing then how would things have worked out? Sadly this film does not really get to the core of this revelation of a document. We spend most of our time hearing about the accepted history of Judas and also about the recent history of his document. In regards details of the gospel it is very light – to the point that it feels like a trailer for another film where we will learn this. It is a real shame because this is what we all came for and it doesn't actually deliver a great deal.

Instead we get terrible re-enactments with stiff actors and the experts are not given enough time to discuss content so much as the challenge of getting to it. A disappointing film then that feels like it spends 90% of its time skirting around the issue and barely 10% discussing the content of this document we are told is a biblical revelation.

Not yet understood, even by the 'experts'

[fuzzrabbit · 10 December 2016]

OK, buckle up. You are going to hear from the only one in the world who understands the Gospel of Judas. Not boasting, just stating a fact so we can set this explanation in the proper context. I am not just positing another opinion. I am, for one thing, a PRACTICING GNOSTIC, or as we are known today, a mystic. Gnostics were mystics. They, as mystics today, practiced a discipline of spiritual self-sacrifice. In a nutshell, the goal is the sacrifice of the individual person, or personality, if you will, in favor of assuming the being of the Master, or the one who holds the true Being of God. Sounds lofty. It is lofty. As some Eastern mystics have said, be prepared to offer your head on a platter (think John the B) and don't even think of crying about it. The Path isn't for everyone.

I wrote two books on this subject, and you can find them by searching Amazon with my real name and key words "Judas" and "Saviors". In writing the first one on saviors in the Bible, I discovered what was in the Gospel of Judas. I knew about it before, sure, but not what it said. Only after an introduction to Dr. Robert Eisenman's work on other Apocryphal texts and especially the Dead Sea Scrolls did I get interested in Judas. Dr. Eisenman pointed out that the characters of Judas and Stephen covered the man, James the Just, in the canonical telling of the history of the Church, Acts 1 and 7 respectively. Acts 1 is the "replacement" of Judas as he dies, a cover for the succession of James to mastership, and Acts 7 is the death of Stephen as cover for the blasphemy stoning of James -- both events covered in sources other than the New Testament. Eisenman, being Jewish, didn't recognize the living Masters tradition, but I do (rssb.org). I decided to look into the character Judas in the one place he should really reveal himself, the so-called "Betrayal": Matthew 26, Mark 14, Luke 22, and John 13/18. Yes, Judas is James in nearly every line. The proof is in the Nag Hammadi Apocalypses of James and Peter. This is what my second book is about, written as a sequel to the first, after learning what Eisenman taught me.

There will be this, and much more than this, coming out in the near future. I am still learning. It is my life's work now to bring this realization to the public awareness. I am not a Christian-basher. I used to be one. SO,God bless all who want to learn the truth about this. Salvation awaits. Not salvation from death, but rebirth.... That's mysticism. :)

More faith history revealed.

[Blueghost · 9 February 2012]

I'm an atheist. I don't believe in any gods whatsoever. I no more believe in Yaweh than I do in Thor, Zeus, Ra, or Quetzalcoatl or the Thunderbird.

But, I'm always happy to see history unraveled, and things explained to iron out centuries of misunderstanding. So it is with the gospel of Judas. I first heard about it on NPR some ten years ago, or thereabouts, and thought to myself "Ah, maybe Christianity can straighten itself out now."

Well, wishful thinking is just that. Still, it's nice to see and hear the what seems to be a tale that's very much in line with the pro- humanist message of the philosophy that was transported from India's Krishna to Imperial Roman occupied Judea (and beyond).

As historical documents go, this really isn't much of one, so much as it is a document of thinking through parables of right action, or what was considered right action in a very forward thinking way.

Rome is a military oligarchy. Caesar rules with the senate suggesting policy. The days of Cincinatus, the famed Roman general who was once a farmer and then returned to his humble life once having saved Rome, are long over. The phalanx dictates policy. And this new cult is eating into the fabric of Roman society. The gods are losing power to this imported "god" with a philosophy that, like all things, taken to a breaking point, becomes unhealthy.

The Romans realize this, but fail to realize their own shortcomings, and address this cult's shortcomings unsuccessfully by ignoring their own and playing into Krishna's (Christianity's) hand. The idea was that if the people did not sacrifice chickens and other animals or things to appease the gods, then the people would ignore the teachings and fray the social fabric that held Rome together; namely the slaves.

Sound familiar?

Regardless, the story of Judas is one that has been ignorantly bastardized, and now that new scholarship has shed light on this figure, it may be that the Krishna/Christian cults can begin to get their bearings.

At least that's the final point of the piece. There's a lot of story and exposition put into the film, and a good deal of scholarly talking heads bringing up heart felt thoughts on their philosophies of both their passions and scholarship. Some good meat for those inclined to revel in the Krishna/Christian mythology.

All in all a good watch, and something interesting to listen to in the background. If you like tidbits of history, then this should entertain.