DeConick A.D

303
PLEASANTVILLE RELIGIONS
ably Matthias, so that the twelve realms below Ialdabaoth will each have
a ruler. These are the twelve apostles from scripture, who are the core
authorities of the Apostolic Catholic church, which prided itself on exclusively
preaching the teaching of the twelve apostles. It was a lineage they
created to bolster their image as the Christian church possessing teaching
directly from Jesus’ own pupils. Although Gnostic communities relied on
secret teachings of Jesus to special disciples such as Peter and John, to
family members such as Jesus’ brother James, and to friends such as Mary
Magdalene, the Apostolic Catholic church relied on the twelve disciples
as a unified team.
So the author of the Gospel of Judas obliges them, but not before casting
them as ignorant, blind followers of Ialdabaoth. The author compares
them to Jewish priests at the Temple, who are focused on sacrifice at an
altar to appease YHWH, the lord of the universe and “servant of error.”
Apostolic Catholic communities are unaware of their service to YHWH
every time the Eucharist thanksgiving meal is performed, when Jesus’
body and blood is offered to YHWH (Gospel of Judas TC 33.22–34.10).
They don’t understand that there is something holy beyond YHWH and
so they lead Christians astray. On the final day of judgment, the twelve
will be found guilty of worshipping the false God YHWH and leading
astray countless generations of people who are yet to be born (TC 37.20–
39.5). True Christianity, the author insists, is not Judaism.
This negative picture of the twelve actually comes from Christian scripture.
The Gnostic author of the Gospel of Judas is working from the
portrayal of the disciples found in the Gospel of Mark. Here they are
identified by Jesus as the “faithless generation” (Mark 9:19). They are
the disciples who remain unredeemed even through to the end of Mark,
where they are unable to believe those who saw the risen Jesus because
of their “unbelief and hardness of heart” (16:14). Peter, the famous pillar
of the Apostolic Catholic church, is rebuked by Jesus and called Satan
(8:33). It is the demons who know Jesus’ identity and YHWH’s plans in
the Gospel of Mark, not the disciples (1:34, 3:11, 5:6–7).
So in the Gospel of Judas Jesus laughs at the twelve, and at Judas
too, telling them all that they can never be part of the holy generation
that transcends this cosmos (Gospel of Judas TC 36.11–37.20). The twelve
apostles come across in the Gospel of Judas as pathetic, even less knowledgeable
than the worst demon of all, Judas Iscariot.