Saturday 8 April 2006

Are they gonna sanctify him now?

Yesterday, National Geographic announced the discovery upon the research done on the Gospel of Judas. It seems, after many hundreds of years, that Judas didn't betray Jesus.
But the thing is that I knew that for a very long time. In December 2002 (or perhaps 2001) I saw a documentary at Discovery Channel (I think). The program was telling about the mistakes on the reading of the Bible. One of them, when, just before Jesus is captured, he sweats blood: doctors explained how normal it can be for someone who knows is going to suffer soon, like someone who is victim of Capital Punishment. I don't remember much, but I remember I loved it. Another thing was that Jesus Christ would not probably be crucified but hung in a olive tree (not with a rope, hung in a similar way of that in the cross). As well, they explained the resurrection saying they were given water with vinegar on a sponge with a stick and they could have added some kind of fungi that would make him to seem asleep. I don't remember well.
But what I certainly remember is about Judas: it seems that there would have been a mistranslation and the Greek word for "turn in" would be close or related to the word for "betray". These words are προδίδω for betray and παραδίδω for deliver; as you can see they are very close: prodido and paradido. If my ancient Greek studies are still well kept in my mind (besides, it is not difficult to discover for a Romance language speaking person), those words are compounds of the prefixes pro- and para- and the root dido which means "give" (δίδω). So, let's say *paragive would be deliver and *progive would be betray.
I wonder if anyone, that same Christmas, saw that documentary (in Spanish satellite) or any other time and can help me find it so I can see it again.
Now that I am thinking it over, it is not exactly the same. Yes, the end is the same (Judas wasn't a bad boy) but the documentary I saw was saying he didn't betray him but turned him in, and the Gospel of Judas says he turned him in because he was asked to do so by Jesus and on top of it he knew he was going to be insulted for doing that during many generations.
Anyway, how many times we misunderstand something and go to someone and start shouting and arguing and then we have to apologise? And how many times something said in the past has been misinterpreted? And how many times some words of dead people have been used for totally different purposes? This is life. Now, with the new technologies, it surprises us that this can happen. Everything seems so perfectly written. But who knows if a hacker is gonna go into the newspapers' sites and write that the III WW has started?

Translation engine used.

The Gospel of Judas documentary by National Geographic will be swhon at its channel:
In the UK and Polska on Sunday 9th at 9pm.
In the US on Sunday 9th at 8P et/7P pt and 10P et/9P pt.
In España on Sunday 9th at 10pm (other showings).
Other countries check here.

In Catalunya will be shown on Wednesday 12dn at 2130 in TV3.

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