Off topic: When Gospel imitates art

Few of you know this, but when I'm not writing about science I dabble in biblical archeology and religious history - the last refuges of the lapsed Catholic. So I've been really excited reading about the discovery and translation of the lost Gospel of Judas. This gnostic work (a 3rd century Coptic translation of a 1st or 2nd century Greek text) recasts the relationship between Jesus and his biblical betrayer, Judas, portraying Judas as Jesus's closest confidant and willing participant in the events leading up to the Crucifixion.

What I find ironic here is that Martin Scorcese's controversial The Last Temptation of Christ portrayed Judas in just this way.

While most biblical scholars are either a) excited to get another view on the earliest history of Christianity and the various forms it took, or b) don't think it will have any effect on current thinking in the Roman Catholic or Orthodox churches, I have to ask: What does are the implications for the Papacy and the leadership structure of the Catholic Church, which draw their authority from the leadership of the apostle Peter, if Judas was the real successor to Jesus's teachings?

And now back to the regular theme of our forum....

[If you get the National Geographic Channel, check out the documentary on this new text.]