This past weekend I sponsored the fourth annual “New Insights into the New Testament” conference, with an array of speakers giving talks for non-scholars on a particular topic.  This year the topic was “Apocrypha and Canon” which was dealing with books that did not make it into the New Testament — other Gospels, Acts, Epistles, and Apocalypses.

The most recent significant discovery in this field was the Gospel of Judas, and we certainly had a paper on that.  It made me wonder when I last discussed Judas Iscariot on the blog and I looked — and it’s been years.

So I thought I should give it another go, either to refresh years-old memories or to inform others who were not here among us at the time.

For starters, if he’s called Judas Iscariot — what’s Iscariot mean?  It turns out, the question is much debated.  Here is what I say about it in my book. The Lost Gospel of Judas Iscariot (Oxford University Press, 2006), which includes a long section on the “historical Judas”

******************************

The Name Judas Iscariot

Sometimes knowing the names of persons from antiquity can give further information about them.  People of the lower classes did not have last names, and so to differentiate people with the same first name, descriptive designations were often added.  For example, there are several different Marys in the New Testament.  “Mary” was one of the most common names in first-century Palestine.  And so each New Testament Mary is given some kind of identifying feature: Mary “the mother of Jesus”; Mary “of Bethany”; Mary “Magdalene.”  This last designation indicates

Unlock 4,000+ Articles Like This!

Get access to Dr. Ehrman's library of 4,000+ articles plus five new articles per week about the New Testament and early Christianity. It costs as little as $2.99/mth and every cent goes to charity!

Learn More!