Irenaeus

106 Irenaeus: Life, Scripture, Legacy

Survey of Possible Noncanonical Gospel Texts

Known by Irenaeus

The purposes of Irenaeus’s Adversus haereses are perhaps more complex than the author

declares in his preface to volume one. Nonetheless, it can be stated, based upon the

self-professed statements of Irenaeus, that one of the work’s most explicit and transpar-

ent purposes is to refute those whom he accuses of propagating heresy. A key way this

is achieved is by attacking the writings used by individuals or groups to support their

own alternative theological viewpoints. This is stated in the Preface to book one of the

work, where Irenaeus opines that those who set the truth aside “bring in lying words

and vain genealogies” (Hae r. I.1.1). This expression does not necessarily reveal depen-

dence on alternative texts, but later in the Preface he states that such people “falsify the

oracles of God” (Hae r. I.1.1). This, far less ambiguously, appears to denote the use of

alternative, disputed, or modified texts. The negative portrayal of such writings resur-

faces at various points in Adversus haereses, but Irenaeus allows only a few glimpses

into the various writings he considered so repugnant.

The Gospel of Judas

Among the noncanonical writings that Irenaeus cites by name using the term “gospel,”

the first text to be mentioned in this way is the Gospel of Judas. Until May 2006, the

actual contents of a text bearing this name were unknown.^2 At that date, the National

Geographic issue for the month, along with accompanying television documentary and

two book length publications, made known a text with this title.^3 Prior to this, there

were only short descriptions provided by patristic authors. Irenaeus is in fact the earli-

est extant writer to have made reference to a work with this title. He provides the fol-

lowing account of the work:

Others again declare that Cain derived his being from the Power above, and

acknowledge that Esau, Korah, the Sodomites, and all such persons, are related

to themselves. On this account, they add, they have been assailed by the Cre-

ator, yet no one of them has suffered injury. For Sophia was in the habit of

carrying off that which belonged to her from them to herself. They declare

that Judas the traitor was thoroughly acquainted with these things, and that

he alone, knowing the truth as no others did, accomplished the mystery of the

betrayal; by him all things, both earthly and heavenly, were thus thrown into

confusion. They produce a fictitious history of this kind, which they style the

Gospel of Judas. (Hae r. I.31.1)

Since the publication of the text, similarities with and differences from this
description furnished by Irenaeus have been described and commented upon.^4 April
DeConick notes one of the most striking differences between text and description.
Whereas Irenaeus attributes the text to a group that declared itself to be descended
from Cain, Esau, Korah, and the Sodomites, the text of the Gospel of Judas traces its
descent to the great Seth. Obviously, the four ancestral figures Irenaeus states as being
linked to the group behind the Gospel of Judas do not form the type of pedigree that