‘Lord, is it I?’

A sermon preached by Professor John Hull in the chapel of the Queen’s Foundation,

on Good Friday, 21st March 2008 at 7pm.

So! He is dead. The Prince of Life is dead, and what shall we do now? Who did it? The religious state and the imperial power, they did it. It was them, their responsibility. And who betrayed him? Judas Iscariot, it was he who betrayed him.

Often in art, Judas is shown as an evil-looking figure, with hooked nose and eyebrows meeting in the middle, clutching a bag of money, and not looking directly at Jesus and the others. But I am told that in the television version of the Passion, broadcast a few days ago, Judas was shown as a perfectly normal young man, fresh faced, a chap who could have been in your local football club, or behind the counter at your nearest pub. Which is the true picture of Judas? What do we know about him?

The first incident in which Judas features prominently is the time when a woman gate-crashes a dinner party and before anyone could stop her, kneels at the feet of Jesus, breaks open a jar of precious ointment, and pours it over the feet of Jesus. John’s Gospel says that the question about the terrible waste was asked by Judas. John adds his own interpretation of this. He says that Judas asked about the poor, not that he cared for the poor, but because he was the treasurer of the disciples, and used to take money whenever he wanted it. John says bluntly that Judas was a thief. But when you go back to the Gospel of Matthew, usually thought to be older than John, you get rather a different picture. Here, Judas is not mentioned at all! The objection to the waste of the perfume is attributed to the disciples as a group. Matthew says that they were indignant, and muttered among themselves, but Jesus in reply, spoke to ‘them’, to the whole group.

Even more remarkable is Mark, which is generally thought to be the oldest of the four gospels. Here, the objection to the wasted ointment is not even attributed to the disciples, but Mark simply says that someone said it. As for Luke, he doesn’t mention this incident at all, but goes straight on to tell how Jesus told his host off for his lack of hospitality. So the situation is that the image of Judas gets worse as time goes by!

And this is not the only time when this happens.

Another case is the account of the Last Supper and the betrayal of Jesus by Judas. Once again, it is the Fourth Gospel that is hardest on Judas. John is perfectly blunt about it. The devil, he tells us, entered into Judas Iscariot. In response to a hint from the disciple whom Jesus loved, Jesus gives a piece of bread to Judas, who asks ‘Is it I, Master?’, almost as if he didn’t know. Jesus remains in control, but Judas is the pawn of Satan. But the most surprising feature of this story, the story of the last supper and the betrayal, is that when Jesus said that one of them sitting at table with him would betray him, they did not all turn and stare at Judas! They did not know whom Jesus was talking about. Mark and Matthew both report that the disciples one after the other, said to Jesus, ‘Is it I?’ and Luke tells us that although they didn’t ask Jesus, they all talked among themselves, asking who Jesus might have meant. No one automatically thought of Judas. So Judas did not have a bad reputation. He was just one of the disciples, no better and no worse than the others, and the truth is this: it could have been any of them. When Jesus made his remark about one of them at the table betraying him, everyone felt guilty.

After all, who was Judas? The accounts all agree that he was ‘one of the twelve’. Judas was an apostle. When the remaining eleven gathered together after the resurrection to fill the place left by the suicide of Judas, they described their missing friend as ‘one of our number’. Exactly. He was one of us.

And where does that leave you, my friend? Where does it leave me? We look critically at Judas, and regard him with a mixture of contempt and horror as a traitor and a thief. But you know and I know the truth. We are all the same. Would we have been braver than those who forsook him and fled? Would you have had the courage to admit what Peter denied, that you had been with Jesus? Would I, sitting at the table, have felt the same stab of conscience at the statement: ‘One of you will betray me.’? Yes, and that must mean that there was not a single one of them who had not had the thought earlier. So it was not Judas alone who betrayed Jesus; it was all of them, it was all of us, it was me, it was you.

And now we must notice another remarkable fact about the stories about the Last Supper. Judas was there throughout. Matthew, Mark and Luke all agree that Judas did not leave the room until after the supper. Judas heard the words ‘This is my body, given for you’, and he ate the bread; he heard the words ‘This is my blood of the new covenant’, and he drank the wine just like the others. As for John, he also agrees. Judas was present at the foot washing. All four gospels agree that Judas was not asked to leave! He was not denied Holy Communion! How to explain this?

Whatever we make of the picture he gives of the character of Judas, on this point there is no doubt that John’s Gospel gets it right. Jesus, he tells us, loved his own, and kept on loving them right to the end. And Judas was one of his own, and in spite of everything, never ceased to be one of his own, and Jesus loved him to the end.

What does this mean?

I conclude by mentioning one final and mysterious place in the New Testament. It is in First Corinthians where Paul is describing the resurrection appearances of the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul says that ‘he appeared to the twelve’. But how could this be? Who was the twelfth person? It could not have been Matthias. He was not appointed to the twelve until after the Ascension. It could not have been Paul himself, because Paul mentions his own resurrection appearance a verse or two later. So who could it be? Judas was an apostle, and he was one of the twelve, and he never ceased to be that.

But did not Jesus say that it would be better if the one who betrayed Him had never been born? And does not the Fourth Gospel describe Judas as a ‘son of perdition’, one ‘doomed to destruction’? No doubt these terrible words point forward to the shocking way that Judas died, but was there no hope? Could not the one who greeted Judas as a friend, even at the moment of betrayal still hold him? And does not Paul say that the resurrected Lord appeared to the twelve?

Don’t ask me how Jesus could appear to Judas when Judas was already dead. I don’t know. Maybe Paul got it wrong. Maybe I got it wrong. Maybe we are all wrong about pretty well everything! But this I do know: Jesus loved him to the end.

Consider then, my brothers and sisters, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Even on this night, the darkest of nights, the love of God through Jesus Christ reaches out to you! God’s love will not let you go! Whatever you have done, or might have done, or think you once did, or fear that you might do, that amazing love holds you, and will go on holding you and holding you and holding you… up to death, and beyond.

Readings and References:

The Fragrant Ointment:

Matthew 26. 6-16, Mark 14.3-9, Luke 7.36-50, John 12.1-8

The Last Supper:

Matthew 26, Mark14, Luke 22, John 13

Additional References:

John 17.12, Acts 1.17, 1 Cor. 15.5