There was an interview with Professor Marvin Meyer on CNN this morning about the Gospel of Judas, which will be the subject of a TV special on the National Geographic channel Sunday, April 8, and the cover story on the magazine this week. Marvin Meyer is known for Gnosticism and for his participation in the Jesus Seminar. His latest effort to dilute Christianity and lead people down a false path is the Gospel of Judas. He seems a great deal more interested in the “spiritual” than in the biblical.
Professor Meyer describes the gospel of Judas as “rich and lovely.” Dogs find the taste of antifreeze pleasing, but it’s not a good idea to feed it to them, as it will kill them. The Gospel of Judas might seem equally inviting, but it’s something that people will do well to avoid.
In another interview, the professor was asked if he had a favorite saying in The Unknown Sayings of Jesus. He replied,
Yes—Saying 194, “The Dead Dog’s Teeth Are White”:
“Malik, son of Dinar, said this: one day Jesus was walking with his followers, and they passed by the carcass of a dog.
“The followers said, ‘How this dog stinks!’
“But Jesus said, ‘How white are its teeth!’”
I can’t think of a better analogy for the false doctrine Professor Meyer promotes. The dog’s teeth may have been white, but the dog will never use them again. These feel-good false gospels put a pretty smile on death.
UPDATED: Ben Witherington III, professor of New Testament interpretation at Asbury Theological Seminary was interviewed in the NYT about the gospel of Judas and discussed it in his blog. One point in his excellent post was:
Much of what Jesus is depicted as saying in the Gospel of Judas the historical, thoroughly Jewish, resurrection believing Jesus could never have said. In other words it is revisionist history being done by a splinter group of Gnostics.
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