thegdin

i watched passion of the christ for the first time tonight. i watched it while getting ready for work. didnt feel i needed to pay too much attention to it cause ive heard the story already. well anyway,,,while watching judas betray jesus something occured to me. christians claim we have free will. however, jesus told judas that he was going to betray him. this pretty much negated judas' free will. my question i wish to pose to theists is: if jesus told judas that he was going to betray him, wouldnt that take away all responsibility from judas for his betrayal and eventual suicide? i think that it would. not only is judas' actions predetermined by god, he is even made aware of them.

anyway, just a thought. something to get another perspective on the old gods will vs free will argument.

thegdin

upon further thought perhaps this should be in the general religious discussion forum. oops

JEST2ASK

John 17:12 While I was with them in the world, I kept them in your name. Those whom you gave me I have kept, and none of them is lost except the Son of perdition that the Scripture might be fulfilled.



I also think there is another passage that speaks about Judas being predestined before the foundation of the World ....


Of course I do not believe that free will is possible if there is an omni-max creator

Weltall

Yeah, you've got the right idea. There's another interesting angle other than the free-will one as well: As the story goes, Judas' betrayal is needed in order for Jesus to get nailed up, die and rise again after three (whoops, two) days yada yada. Anyhow, given that Judas supposedly spends eternity in hell as a necessary condition of the redemption process, you really think believers should be worshipping him since he's the one who really sacrificed something. Just a thought.

thegdin

good point. i didnt think of that. maybe instead of a cross there should be a noose.

another thing. if we do have free will, what would have happened if judas didnt betray jesus. especially based on the fact that jesus warned him. jesus would have never been nailed up and we wouldnt have to deal with christianity. jesus would have also been proven wrong.

im glad i thought of that one. that is something ill use next time im discussing religion with a fundy.

Avatar

I ran into a scholar who suggested that Judas was a hapless dupe of the Hebrew priests...that he did not know what Jesus's fate would actually be until after the fact. Part of what suggests this is Judas's reaction to the news of Jesus's sentence. He threw the silver back at the priests, and later he committed suicide from either grief or guilt.

Are those the actions of an evil agent of Satan?

spin

Nice'n'dramatic, but according to the story -- or at least one clear version -- he bought a plot of land with it and fell headlong into it and busted his gut. (Acts 1:16-19) Oh dear.


spin

Derec

I always thought the Last Temptationm version of betrayal made much more sense. Plus, Harvey Keitel was great as Judas.

UMoC

Magdlyn

Of course, the whole thing is a made up story to appease the Romans so they would quit persecuting Xtians.

Judas's name sounds remarkably like Judah, does it not? He is a symbolic figure created to represent the anti-Semitic idea that "the Jews" (Judahites) killed Christ. He takes the fall to let Pilate (anti-historically) off the hook.

That whole silly "free will" debate was not even involved in the invention of the narrative. IMO.

thegdin

i agree that the free will idea probably paid no part whatsoever in the writing of the little judas ditty. however, i think the judas story does kinda shoot the idea of free will right in the foot. IMO.

:thumbs: