The Gospel of Judas

[David Morris]

http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2011/04/in-honor-of-easter.html

So once upon a time…

The Kingdom of Judea was in upheaval as is had been for years. The
Romans had conquered the region and had tried to bend in into becoming
another distant province of their empire.

Their success was…mixed.

The Occupiers were militarily superior to the locals in every way, and
there were a lot of advantages to being a client-state. And, yes, they
had effectively co-opted many of the local elected officials, but
everyone knew what the score was.

[...]

The Occupiers were almost uniformly seen an affront to their God and
despoilers of their holy places.

Some people just wanted to be left alone. Some thought cooperation was
the lesser of many evils; the only way to stave off something much
worse. Many were seething with rage. And a few of them took up arms
against the Occupiers and those they saw as collaborators.

And those who drew blood in their cause saw it as a sacred thing.

It was a cauldron of faith, politics, family, tribe, righteous fury,
military power and insurgency, always gurgling away at a low boil and
kept in check by compromise when possible, and massive shows of force
when not.

And I don’t think it is exaggerating the situation by a whole lot by
describing it as an on-again-off-again form of urban warfare taking
place in the context of a low-grade civil war.

Say, does ANY of this sound familiar?

[...]

In a city in the middle of a guerilla war, where leaders desperately
rose up again and again only to be killed, again and again.

And then a young warrior-priest hit on a new strategy.

He is well-educated in both tactics and law. He is of royal blood, and
like true royalty feels quite at home talking to people of every
station in life. The Essenes know him, as do the Zealots. Even to the
worshipers of Mithras he would not be a stranger.

He has developed what we would call a broad constituency, and he also
has a duty. The same duty every Jewish lead bears in his turn: to
drive the Romans out.


On Tue, Apr 26, 2011 at 2:58 PM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
> http://www.blizzpub.net/forums/topic/47233/
>
> Manuscript Indicates Jesus Urged Judas' Betrayal
> From Associated Press