Ben C Smith

On another thread I once suggested the following possible option regarding the historicity of Judas:

1. A disciple named Judas, but not one of the twelve, betrays Jesus.
2. Verses from the Hebrew scriptures such as Psalm 41.9, helped along by the simple process of elaboration and exaggeration that obviously affects the Judas tradition as a whole, soon turn Judas into a closer confidant than he really was; at least one tradent erroneously assumes he was one of the twelve.
3. Some strands of the tradition now preserve the original twelve in a postresurrection role (Paul, gospel of Peter, Revelation), while other strands reduce that number to eleven (Mark, Matthew, Luke).

That third point, of course, is the basic reason for positing the not one of the twelve part of the first point; it is possible to suppose that later tradents kept referring to the twelve apostles even with the knowledge that one of them had defected, but this does not seem all that natural, and it is interesting that the texts that know of Judas (Matthew, the longer ending of Mark, Luke) also number the apostles at eleven at that time. Acts 2.14 calls them the eleven even after the addition of Matthias!

I asked for feedback for this scenario on that other thread and got a little bit, but would like here to add one possible bit of data to the mix. A glance at the apostolic lists in our canonical gospels and the Acts of the Apostles yields, not twelve, but thirteen names:

Simon Peter.
Andrew (his brother).
James the son of Zebedee.
John (his brother).
Philip.
Bartholomew.
Thomas.
Matthew.
James the son of Alphaeus.
Thaddeus.*
Simon the Cananean (Aramaic for zealot).
Judas the son of James.*
Judas Iscariot.

I have marked with an asterisk * above the two apostolic names that do not appear in all the lists. Matthew and Mark lack Judas of James, and Luke and Acts lack Thaddeus. (Acts also lacks Judas Iscariot, naming only eleven for obvious reasons.)

What if there are thirteen names, not twelve, because Judas Iscariot was not originally part of the twelve? What if the original list was as follows?

Simon Peter.
Andrew.
James of Zebedee.
John.
Philip.
Bartholomew.
Thomas.
Matthew.
James of Alphaeus.
Thaddeus.
Simon the Cananean.
Judas the son of James.

As soon as some tradent mistakenly identified Judas as one of the twelve, this list had to be modified. One branch of the tradition assumed that Judas the son of James was either a mistake for Judas Iscariot or the exact same person (Judas Iscariot, son of James); another branch decided to remove Thaddeus instead (for reasons not yet clear to me, but perhaps merely because he was the most obscure of the apostles to the tradents of that particular branch). The former led to the lists as we find them in Matthew and Mark, the latter to the lists as we find them in Luke and Acts.

What do you think?

Ben.

ETA: Oh, and pleeeease, no tangents on the existence of Jesus and such. Thanks.

Toto

Peter Kirby wrote an essay on the Seven Disciples that proposed that there were originally only 7 named disciples. I suspect that, assuming a historical Jesus with disciples, the number 12 is just symbolic, and the story about Judas is a much later addition (he is conspicuously missing from Paul). Judas is too much like a stage character, the villain who adds tension to the plot with his evil concerns about finances and his control of the purse. It was a convention of the Greco-Roman theater that such a villain would die a horrible death on stage as part of a satisfying conclusion in which good triumphs and evil is vanquished.

Ben C Smith

Actually, Peter was slightly more modest in his conclusion(s) than that:

So it seems that we are narrowing our focus prematurely when asking, "Are the Twelve historical?" We should really be asking, "Are the Two or the Three or the Five or the Seven or the Twelve or the Seventy historical?" At the least, I think that the tradition of the Seven deserves consideration along with the tradition of the Twelve.

Nevertheless, it is an excellent article; strange that the Christian Origins homepage no longer links directly to it, or to any of its other articles.

I do not think there is much question that the number 12 is symbolic. It is a live question, however, whether that symbolic number came to be attached to an originally nebulous group of disciples after the time of Jesus or whether Jesus himself chose that number precisely for its symbolism.

If Judas was not originally (conceived as) a member of the twelve, the silence of Paul becomes decidedly less conspicuous.

I agree. However, the gospel of Mark seems to lack these elements. In Mark, Judas Iscariot appears only in the apostolic list of chapter 3 (where it is mentioned that he betrayed Jesus) and in conjunction, later, with the actual betrayal. No concerns about finances or purse strings, no word about Satan entering him, no dramatic questions from him at the last supper.

So... was Judas invented precisely as such a stage character? If so, why does Mark remove most or all of the elements that would make him the ideal villain?

And, yet again, Mark does not discuss the death of Judas.

But examine the OP even with the thought that Judas is a mere invention. Do you think it is plausible that a list of twelve disciples (whether preceded by lists of seven or three or five or not) might have excluded Judas Iscariot, and that the addition of his name actually created 13 names, as we find in the canonical gospels? I mean, whether any of it happened or not. Is the connection itself plausible?

Thanks, Toto.

Ben.

Toto

The home page of christianorigins used to link to all the articles, but the links were off on the side. Then the webpage was down for a bit, and it is back, but without some of what used to be on the home page. I think Peter Kirby has some other demands on his time now.

It is possible that Judas was added to a list of 12, but it seems equally likely that he was just added to a fluid concept of 12 disciples that was never that well defined. If Jesus did pick the number 12 for symbolic reasons, it seems plausible that the 12 might have varied over time.

I don't know how to explain Mark's minimal Judas. There's no motivation for Judas to betray or even "hand over" Jesus in Mark, except for working out the divine plan (unless you see it as a reaction to the woman with the expensive alabaster box of ointment of spikenard pouring it over Jesus - which seems to be reading the embellishments of later gospels back into Mark.) But it still seems that Judas is filling a role in a drama.

DCHindley

Ben,

Assuming Jesus *did* have a group of, say, 12 disciples surrounding him (perhaps each assuming different roles in a formal social organization - e.g., Judas was believed to function as a treasurer - in what?), what is to prevent the individuals who assumed these 12 positions from changing over time? People die, get sick, get arrested, lose interest, and when people leave others present themselves, get appointed, etc.

Of course, this would suggest the Jesus movement possessed a greater degree of organization than many today feel comfortable with. I guess it makes him too "political" or too much like a guru, and/or less a warm and fuzzy wisdom teacher.

DCH

Ben C Smith

I agree that this is possible, and even floated the possibility on my web page quite a while ago:

Which leaves only one unstable slot: Thaddeus and Jude of James. Are they the same person? Is one invented, or wrongly placed amongst the official twelve? Did one replace the other in the twelve sometime during the ministry of Jesus?

I am simply looking into a different possibility.

Thanks for the feedback, fellows.

Ben.

the_cave

I have no idea about Judas or his betrayal, but I did want to note that in the Slavonic Josephus, it's Pilate who is bribed, not Judas (who is not mentioned). In addition, in the Gospel of Peter (which may have a vague connection with the Slavonic Josephus), the Twelve are spoken of after the crucifixion as though they remained a unified group (and there is no mention of Judas's betrayal in GPet either, though it is admittedly fragmentary.)

Ben C Smith

Correct. I wrote in the OP:

That is a great observation, and one I had not considered. Thanks.

The relevant extract from the Slavonic Josephus is available on one of my web pages.

Ben.

spamandham

Considering the confusion over whether there were 12, 11, 13, or seven disciples, isn't the simpler explanation the former, rather than the latter?

Ben C Smith

No one ever says that seven disciples were chosen in some special way. It is just that some of the lists (and depictions) name only seven. This is not entirely unexpected, since 7 is just as symbolic a number as 12.

It is really no different than Mark, for example, explicitly numbering the chosen disciples at 12 yet often depicting an inner circle of 3 (Peter, James, and John). And, you guessed it, 3 is also pretty symbolic.

The number 11 is not as symbolic, AFAICT. The eleven disciples are a direct consequence of there being 12 disciples from whom one defected. Without the twelve, we would not have the eleven. The thirteen disciples are an artificial construct on my part (since I came up with them by conflating separate lists), but that number, too, depends on the lists of 12.

Ben.