Judas (Jude)

Judas, a Greek form of the Hebrew name Judah ("praised"), is a personal name borne by several different men in the New Testament, and by far its most famous bearer is Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve apostles, who handed Jesus over to the authorities. Because the name was common, the Gospel writers distinguish its bearers by patronymic or place — Judas the son of James is listed among the Twelve in Acts 1:13, and the surname "Iscariot" most likely identifies the betrayer's family or hometown, though whether it derives from the Judean town of Kerioth or from a Latin term for a dagger-bearer is a matter of long-standing scholarly disagreement rather than settled fact. English translations also use the short form "Jude" for the same name, which is why a letter of the New Testament and one of its authors are called Jude while the betrayer is always "Judas."

What the Gospels say about Judas Iscariot is concentrated in the passion narratives. John 13:2 states that during supper the devil had already put it into the heart of Judas, Simon's son, to betray Jesus, and John 17:12 calls him "the son of destruction" whose loss fulfilled Scripture. Luke records in Acts 1:16 that Judas became "guide to those who took Jesus," and the prayer in Acts 1:24 for the Lord to show which of two men he had chosen follows the need to replace him. The Gospels also read his betrayal through Psalm 41:9, where the psalmist's trusted friend "who ate bread with me" lifts his heel; John 13:18 quotes that line as fulfilled in Judas. Matthew 27:4-5 describes his end differently from Acts: in Matthew he declares, "I have sinned in that I betrayed innocent blood," throws the silver into the sanctuary, and hangs himself, while Acts 1:18-19 describes a fall and a field named for blood. The two accounts agree on the betrayal, the money, and a violent death, but they are not easily harmonized in detail, and honest reading acknowledges the tension.

Whether Judas was a doomed instrument or a free agent is a question the texts themselves leave open rather than resolve. John's language of the devil's prompting (John 13:2) and of Scripture being fulfilled (John 13:18; 17:12; Acts 1:16) sits alongside Matthew's account of his own remorse and confession of sin (Matthew 27:4), and the New Testament nowhere narrates his restoration.

Christian traditions have read him very differently, and no single reading is simply the Christian one. Most Western traditions treat Judas Iscariot as the archetype of the betrayer and the hopeless reprobate, while a minority strand of speculation has wondered whether his repentance left room for mercy. Eastern tradition, by contrast, carefully venerates Jude the apostle — Judas son of James — as a saint while regarding Iscariot with dread, and the two are never confused in liturgy. Preaching across denominations has also moved between treating him as a warning about greed and hypocrisy and as a tragic figure caught in a plan larger than himself.

AI-generated reference entry, grounded in the passages where this term appears — history and Scripture stated as such, interpretation labeled as interpretation. Not a substitute for the text itself.