Wednesday of Holy Week 2022

 21 After saying this Jesus was troubled in spirit, and declared, ‘Very truly, I tell you, one of you will betray me.’ ²²The disciples looked at one another, uncertain of whom he was speaking. ²³One of his disciples—the one whom Jesus loved—was reclining next to him; ²⁴Simon Peter therefore motioned to him to ask Jesus of whom he was speaking. ²⁵So while reclining next to Jesus, he asked him, ‘Lord, who is it?’ ²⁶Jesus answered, ‘It is the one to whom I give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish.’ So when he had dipped the piece of bread, he gave it to Judas son of Simon Iscariot.²⁷After he received the piece of bread, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him, ‘Do quickly what you are going to do.’ ²⁸Now no one at the table knew why he said this to him. ²⁹Some thought that, because Judas had the common purse, Jesus was telling him, ‘Buy what we need for the festival’; or, that he should give something to the poor. ³⁰So, after receiving the piece of bread, he immediately went out. And it was night.

31 When he had gone out, Jesus said, ‘Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. ³²If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once.

 

On the 17^th May 1966, Bob Dylan was performing at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester. He had attracted some controversy, as he had moved away from his acoustic folk origins to embrace electric instruments and played an electric guitar himself. “Judas” shouts a voice from the audience in between songs. “I don’t believe you….. you’re a liar” replies Dylan before encouraging his band to play *expletive* loud.

Judas has become a term for betrayer, which has uses well beyond the Christian community. In fact, there are several Judases in the New Testament, including the brother of Jesus, a disciple referred to as Judas son of James, and 3 more feature in the Book of Acts. That would seem to explain why the New Testament often refers to ‘Judas Iscariot’ or adds a comment about betrayal – to ensure we know who they are talking about.

Tragically, Judas Iscariot has been used in Christian rhetoric to support antisemitism, focusing on him being a Jewish man held responsible for Jesus’ death. (That makes the ‘Judas’ shout at the concert especially barbed, as Dylan is also Jewish.) The truth – as ever with prejudice and bigotry – is of course very different. Jesus and all of the disciples are also Jews, as are the scribes, the Pharisees the priests, much of the early church leadership, as well as the writers of the Gospels. Meanwhile, a Gentile governor sentences Jesus to death, and Gentile soldiers execute him.

However, all good stories need a villain, and Judas does more than enough to qualify for that role. John’s account of these events describes him as essentially the group’s treasurer (adding the detail that Judas stole from the purse for himself). As we heard on Monday, Judas is the one who objected to the apparent waste of perfume used in anointing Jesus’ feet, and today we heard that when Jesus gives Judas bread and he leaves, some disciples assumed it was connected to his role as keeper of the common purse.

So, can we understand anything about this act of betrayal? The accounts of Jesus’ life and ministry in the gospels give us a few clues. Mark and Matthew say he was promised money, Matthew adding that 30 pieces of silver were handed over, whereas Luke and John both describe Satan as being the motivator for the betrayal. I imagine some people might say the two are closely related! Judas leaves the Last Supper and eventually brings back a force to arrest Jesus at Gethsemane where he seems to know that Jesus would be praying. Famously a kiss is recorded as the signal that identifies Jesus, Matthew adding the detail that Jesus calls him “friend”.

Afterwards, Matthew records Judas committing suicide and tells us he repented and gave the money back; Luke in the book of Acts has a more grisly version and makes no suggestion of repentance.

So what was Judas doing? Perhaps he was simply a thief who didn’t really ever properly understand who Jesus was – he is only ever recorded as called Jesus “Rabbi”, not “Lord”. Some have speculated that he was sympathetic to the freedom fighting Zealots, hoping for Jesus to be a figurehead for a popular uprising (like his namesake Judas Maccabeus had led nearly 200 years earlier) If that was the case, we can only imagine his horror as Jesus enters Jerusalem on an ass in peace, or washes his followers’ feet. Perhaps he was more of a religious purist who found it unacceptable that Jesus was so open to “tax collectors and sinners”, to the outcasts and unclean, to lepers and Gentiles unacceptable. Finally at the meal, facing what Jesus’ love was really like, he runs out into the night.

Perhaps Judas points us to just how radical Jesus’ message was, and how Jesus refused to conform to any of the expectations that people might place on him. His revolutionary message was one of peace, not uprising; his preaching was for the lost and the outcast, not the in-crowd; his call for faithfulness was about hearts and minds, not about ritual and dogged adherence to laws and regulations.

And whenever that message is heard, whenever it confronts the norms and expectations of this world, it asks us difficult questions too. Do we want treasure on earth or in heaven? Do we want to believe and trust those with earthly power and might, or one with the power of love? Are we more interested in those who have or pursue status and standing, or are we with the Servant King?