The tragedy of Judas
Mar. 23rd, 2026 09:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
baroque_mongooseJudas Iscariot is often seen as an enigmatic figure; there's a fairly well ingrained cultural perception that Jesus had eleven good disciples and one bad one, so people have wondered throughout history why Judas was so bad when the others weren't. And I honestly think that's the wrong question.
For a start, they were all flawed human beings, and the Gospel accounts don't skate over that in any way. Peter puts his foot in his mouth on several occasions, once so badly that Jesus has to rebuke him sharply ("Get behind me, Satan!" - you know, if you heard that from Jesus, you'd be pretty sure you'd messed up big style). James and John (John! The one who eventually became the apostle of love, and hands down my favourite New Testament writer!) asked Jesus for places of honour in the Kingdom and wanted him to rain down burning sulphur on some town where they hadn't been welcomed. We read about the disciples completely failing to understand Jesus to the point where they couldn't so much as take in what he was saying, squabbling among themselves, and generally acting like... you and me. Of course, the accounts do mention that Judas was also a thief, but he doesn't appear to have been significantly worse than any of the others. He wasn't even the only one who betrayed Jesus; in different ways, all of them did, with the possible exception of John (and I'm not even 100% sure about him, but he was certainly known to the high priest and therefore allowed into the courtyard, where he was able to record some of the events surrounding Jesus' trial; the rest were probably supplied by Nicodemus). Most of them simply ran away. Peter tried to be some kind of use, and ended up disowning Jesus three times... just as Jesus had said he would. Those eleven "good" disciples were no better than any of us would have been in the same situation, but - and here's the bit that really matters - they knew it. And after Jesus was raised from the dead, they came back to him to be forgiven, restored, and eventually transformed. Foot-in-mouth Peter became a powerful and effective preacher. Hot-tempered John became the gentle, encouraging elder we know and love from his letters.
Judas could have been forgiven and restored in exactly the same way as all the others. But he wasn't. He committed suicide. And that, to me, is the real enigma of Judas.
I'm indebted to Elyse Fitzgerald here for a take on Judas I'd never previously considered. I don't know, of course, whether she's right or wrong; but I do know it's psychologically very plausible. Judas, after all, just like all the other disciples, had given up everything to follow his Rabbi. For all his flaws - and we all have those - he was, in effect, a committed Christian. But what may have happened was that he simply, and tragically, misunderstood the nature of Jesus' kingdom.
The crowds who welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem certainly did. They thought he was coming to deliver them from the Romans, which explains precisely why they were so fickle; once he'd been arrested by those same Romans, their disappointment welled up into anger. After so much promise, he'd been arrested after all! They must have felt he'd let them down. They can't have taken a great deal of whipping up by the chief priests to demand that he should be crucified. What if Judas thought the same thing?
If that was what he had in his mind, the whole thing plays out very logically. Here was Jesus in Jerusalem. The crowds were on his side; one spark of rebellion in the right place and the whole city would go up like a tinder box against the hated Roman occupiers. And yet Jesus appeared to be doing nothing at all to claim his kingdom. What was to be done? And so Judas conceived a bold plan to force Jesus' hand. If he was betrayed to the Roman authorities, he'd have to defend himself, and he'd have to step up as the rightful King as a result. It was a cunning and resourceful move, and of course Jesus would thank him for it later. Why, he'd probably give Judas some high position of command, since he could be trusted to get things done.
But, of course, Jesus didn't do any of that. There was no question of having his hand forced. He didn't have to do anything just because Judas (or anyone else, for that matter) decided he should have to. He not only didn't defend himself, but he had to tell Peter to put his sword away; he'd come to free us from the power of sin and death, which was a great deal more important than freeing Jerusalem from the Romans, and he knew exactly what he had to do in order to accomplish that. Judas, of course, didn't see any of that, because neither did any of the other disciples at the time. All he saw was that his beautiful bold clever plan had gone horribly wrong, and now he would never be remembered as a cunning kingmaker, but simply as a traitor.
He couldn't see anything beyond that. So he killed himself.
Whether or not that's the right interpretation, Judas was not some fiend incarnate. He was human.
Like you and me.
For a start, they were all flawed human beings, and the Gospel accounts don't skate over that in any way. Peter puts his foot in his mouth on several occasions, once so badly that Jesus has to rebuke him sharply ("Get behind me, Satan!" - you know, if you heard that from Jesus, you'd be pretty sure you'd messed up big style). James and John (John! The one who eventually became the apostle of love, and hands down my favourite New Testament writer!) asked Jesus for places of honour in the Kingdom and wanted him to rain down burning sulphur on some town where they hadn't been welcomed. We read about the disciples completely failing to understand Jesus to the point where they couldn't so much as take in what he was saying, squabbling among themselves, and generally acting like... you and me. Of course, the accounts do mention that Judas was also a thief, but he doesn't appear to have been significantly worse than any of the others. He wasn't even the only one who betrayed Jesus; in different ways, all of them did, with the possible exception of John (and I'm not even 100% sure about him, but he was certainly known to the high priest and therefore allowed into the courtyard, where he was able to record some of the events surrounding Jesus' trial; the rest were probably supplied by Nicodemus). Most of them simply ran away. Peter tried to be some kind of use, and ended up disowning Jesus three times... just as Jesus had said he would. Those eleven "good" disciples were no better than any of us would have been in the same situation, but - and here's the bit that really matters - they knew it. And after Jesus was raised from the dead, they came back to him to be forgiven, restored, and eventually transformed. Foot-in-mouth Peter became a powerful and effective preacher. Hot-tempered John became the gentle, encouraging elder we know and love from his letters.
Judas could have been forgiven and restored in exactly the same way as all the others. But he wasn't. He committed suicide. And that, to me, is the real enigma of Judas.
I'm indebted to Elyse Fitzgerald here for a take on Judas I'd never previously considered. I don't know, of course, whether she's right or wrong; but I do know it's psychologically very plausible. Judas, after all, just like all the other disciples, had given up everything to follow his Rabbi. For all his flaws - and we all have those - he was, in effect, a committed Christian. But what may have happened was that he simply, and tragically, misunderstood the nature of Jesus' kingdom.
The crowds who welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem certainly did. They thought he was coming to deliver them from the Romans, which explains precisely why they were so fickle; once he'd been arrested by those same Romans, their disappointment welled up into anger. After so much promise, he'd been arrested after all! They must have felt he'd let them down. They can't have taken a great deal of whipping up by the chief priests to demand that he should be crucified. What if Judas thought the same thing?
If that was what he had in his mind, the whole thing plays out very logically. Here was Jesus in Jerusalem. The crowds were on his side; one spark of rebellion in the right place and the whole city would go up like a tinder box against the hated Roman occupiers. And yet Jesus appeared to be doing nothing at all to claim his kingdom. What was to be done? And so Judas conceived a bold plan to force Jesus' hand. If he was betrayed to the Roman authorities, he'd have to defend himself, and he'd have to step up as the rightful King as a result. It was a cunning and resourceful move, and of course Jesus would thank him for it later. Why, he'd probably give Judas some high position of command, since he could be trusted to get things done.
But, of course, Jesus didn't do any of that. There was no question of having his hand forced. He didn't have to do anything just because Judas (or anyone else, for that matter) decided he should have to. He not only didn't defend himself, but he had to tell Peter to put his sword away; he'd come to free us from the power of sin and death, which was a great deal more important than freeing Jerusalem from the Romans, and he knew exactly what he had to do in order to accomplish that. Judas, of course, didn't see any of that, because neither did any of the other disciples at the time. All he saw was that his beautiful bold clever plan had gone horribly wrong, and now he would never be remembered as a cunning kingmaker, but simply as a traitor.
He couldn't see anything beyond that. So he killed himself.
Whether or not that's the right interpretation, Judas was not some fiend incarnate. He was human.
Like you and me.
