Curiosity prompts novelist to write new version of Judas' story

Published: 2007-03-20

ROME (CNS) -- Curiosity about the New Testament figure of Judas and a feeling that his reputation as the worst sinner in history "isn't fair, isn't right" led British novelist Jeffrey Archer to attempt a new version of the story. Archer, presenting "The Gospel According to Judas by Benjamin Iscariot" at a March 20 press conference in Rome, said he is a practicing Anglican who wanted his new book to be backed up by solid biblical scholarship. So he convinced Father Francis J. Moloney, provincial of the Salesians in Australia and a former president of the Catholic Biblical Association of America, to collaborate. Father Moloney, who served on the International Theological Commission for 18 years when it was under the presidency of the future Pope Benedict XVI, provided scholarly criticism of the text and wrote the bulk of the theological notes and clarifications found at the end of the book. The text in the gilded pages of Archer's book is organized into chapters and verses, like a real Gospel, with the words he attributes to Jesus written in red.

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