Vita Judae
Standard abbreviation: Life Jud.
Other titles: De Juda proditore
Clavis numbers: ECCA 678
Category: Hagiographa
Related literature: Gospel of Judas, Golden Legend 45
Compiled by: Brandon W. Hawk, Rhode Island College ([email protected])
Citing this resource (using Chicago Manual of Style): Hawk, Brandon W. “Life of Judas” e-Clavis: Christian Apocrypha. Accessed DAY MONTH YEAR. https://www.nasscal.com/e-clavis-christian-apocrypha/life-of-judas/.
Posted March 2017. Current as of April 2023.
1. SUMMARY
This story, reminiscent of the classical legend of Oedipus, tells about the life of Judas, mainly before he meets Jesus. The beginning tells about Judas’s parents and his unfortunate birth. Before the child is born, his father has a vision that his son will kill him; so when Judas is born, his legs are wounded and he is abandoned outside of Jerusalem. Some shepherds find the baby and he is raised by a woman in a town called Scariot. As a grown man, Judas enters the service of King Herod. When Herod desires fresh fruit for one of his feasts, Judas steals some from a local orchard, and when caught he kills the farmer, not knowing it is his own father. When the townspeople threaten to kill Judas, he finds protection in Herod, who has him married to the murdered farmer’s wife (Judas’s mother, though unknown) to make peace. Judas’s true identity is revealed when his mother sees him naked and recognizes the scars on his legs. His mother asks a series of questions about his origins, and Judas relates what little he knows, both realize their folly: he has killed his father and married his mother. In act four, after he has fled from his mother, Judas seeks atonement and meets Jesus, who receives him as a disciple. Jesus’ ministry is briefly mentioned, as well as Judas’s treachery and suicide. The text offers moralizing aphorisms at both the beginning and the end, framing the story as a negative example for the audience. The most popular version of the text is included in Jacobus de Voragine’s Golden Legend (ca. 1260). In this collection of saints’ lives, the story of Judas is an expanded, adapted version of the earlier Life that forms part of the account of the apostle Matthias (who was elected to replace Judas in Acts 1).
Versions of the story survive in Latin, Greek, and Armenian, although the nature of the relationships between them remains unclear.
Named historical figures and characters: Cyborea, Jesus Christ, Judas Iscariot, Herod, Pilate, Reuben, Wife of Judas.
Geographical locations: Jerusalem, Scariot.
2. RESOURCES
2.1 Art and Iconography
Klosterneuburger Evangelienwerk (Schaffhausen, Stadtbibliothek, Gen. 8; 14th cent.). Includes two pages of illuminations relating to the text: the abandonment and rescue of Judas as a baby (fol. 223v) Judas stealing the fruit and killing his father (fol. 224r). The manuscript is available online at e-codices.
3. BIBLIOGRAPHY
3.1 Manuscripts and Editions
The relationships between the Latin, Greek, and Armenian versions are not clear, although they all share the same basic narrative structures and distinct parallels with each other.
3.1.1 Armenian
The Armenian version has been relatively understudied and no critical edition has yet been published, although it survives in eleven manuscripts from the Matenadaran in Yereven:
A M6616, fols. 23r–23v (15th cent.)
E M515, fols. 8r–9r (17th cent.)
F M665, fols. 306v–307v (1710)
G M706, fols. 209r–210r (17th cent.)
H M1771, fols. 241v–242v (1651)
I M2196, fols. 377r–377v (1683)
J M2242, fols. 387r–387v (17th cent.)
P M1127, fols. 47v–49v (17th cent.)
Q M3366, fols. 7v–8v (1698)
S M3522, fols. 118v–120r (1634)
T M5882, fols. 112r–113v (15th cent.)
Hawk, Brandon W., and Mari Mamyan. “The Life of Judas.” Pages 208–22 in New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures. Vol. 2. Edited by Tony Burke. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2020 (Mamyan’s translation based on these manuscripts at pp. 219–22).
3.1.2 Greek
Greek A (BHG 1318k)
Mt. Athos, Monē Dionusiou, 132 (17th cent.) ~ titled Περὶ τοῦ παρανόμου Ἰούδα ~ Pinakes
Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, gr. VII. 38 (coll. 1385), fols. 224–226 (16th cent.) ~ Pinakes
Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana, gr. VII. 41 (coll. 1468), fols. 273–277 (16th cent.) ~ Pinakes
Greek B
Pamphlet published by a monk of Mt. Athos at Athens in 1889.
Other manuscripts (unclassified)
Dresden, Sächsische Landesbibliothek, A 187, part 1, pp. 422–429 (16th cent.) ~ BHG 1318j
Mt. Athos, Monē Dionusiou, 260, fols. 182v–186v (17th cent.) ~ BHG 1318ke; Pinakes
Mount Athos, Monē Ibērōn, 496 (16th/17th cent.) ~ Pinakes
Archbishopric of Cyprus, 15
Istrin, Vasilii. “Die griechische Version der Judas-Legende.” Archiv für slavische Philologie 20 (1898): 605–19 (editions of Greek A and Greek B).
Mega, Georgiou. A. “Ο Ιούδας εις τας παραδόσεις του λαού.” Επετηρίς του Λαογραφικού Αρχείου 3 (1941–1942): 3–32 (edition of Dionysius Monastery 260 collated with Archbishopric of Cyprus 15, pp. 29–32).
3.1.3 Latin
Latin A
Ap Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, lat. 14489, fols. 109v–110r (ca. 1160–1170)
Latin H, the longest, most elaborate version, represented by three manuscripts from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries:
Hd Cambridge, University Library, Ff.Ii.20 (14th cent.)
Hb London, British Library, Add. 15404 (13th cent., prov. Cambron Abbey, Hainaut)
Hr Reims, Bibliothéque municipale 1275 (13th cent., prov. Reims Cathedral)
Latin R
Rc Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, 66A, fol. 232v (14th cent.)
Rg Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College 225 (13th cent., Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk)
Rl Lille 138 (1481, written by Henry Descamps)
Rm Munich, lat. 21259 (12th/13th cent.)
Rb Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud. Misc. 633 (13th cent., Premonstratensian House in Pöhlden, near Brunswick)
Ra Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal 387 (13th cent., prov. St.-Victor, Paris)
Rg Paris, Bibliothéque nationale de France, lat. 11867, fols. 179r–179v (13th cent.)
Rn Paris, Bibliothéque nationale de France, nouv. acq. fr. 4413 (13th/14th cent.)
Ro Paris, Bibliothéque nationale de France, lat. 4895 A (14th cent.)
Rj Vienna, lat. 1180 (Rec. 3167a) (uncertain date)
Re Unidentified copy (uncertain date)
Latin L (as in Voragine’s Golden Legend), twenty-one manuscripts
Lv Vatican, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Pal. Lat. 619, fols. 18r–19v (12th/13th cent., Worms or Trier?): the earliest witness
Additional manuscripts listed in Baum.
Latin P, poetic adaptations (in two manuscripts each)
Pi Munich, lat. 23490 (13th cent.)
Py Munich, lat. 237 (15th cent.): copy of Pi
Pz Maihing II, lat. 1 (15th cent.)
Pœ Wolfenbüttel 212 (15th cent.)
Latin M (miscellaneous)
Mw Munich, lat. 12262 (15th cent.)
Mh Wolfenbüttel 1199 (15th cent.)
Additional Manuscripts:
Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, 275, fols. 238r–239r (15th cent.)
Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, 323, fols. 3v–5r (13th/14th cent.)
Baum, Paull Franklin. “The Mediaeval Legend of Judas Iscariot.” PMLA 31 (1916): 481–632. Editions of Latin A, H, and R, with some passages from P.
Rand, E. K. “Mediaeval Lives of Judas Iscariot.” Pages 305–16 in Anniversary Papers by Colleagues and Pupils of George Lyman Kittredge. Boston: Ginn & Co., 1913. First preliminary study of the legend; editions of Reims 1275 and Paris 14489.
3.1.3 Middle English (poetic version incorporated into the South English Legendary)
London, British Library, Harley 2277 (ca. 1300) ~ CATALOG
Furnivall, Frederick J. Early English Poems and Lives of Saints. Berlin: A. Asher & Co., 1862 (text based on BL Harley 2277, pp. 107–11).
3.1.4 Middle Welsh
Aberystywth, National Library of Wales, Peniarth 5, fols. 11r–11v (ca. 1350)
Aberystywth, National Library of Wales, Peniarth 14, pp. 161–165 (ca. 1250–1350)
3.2 Modern Translations
3.2.1 English
Edmunds, Lowell. Oedipus: The Ancient Legend and Its Later Analogues. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985.
Hawk, Brandon W., and Mari Mamyan. “The Life of Judas.” Pages 208–22 in New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures, Volume 2. Edited by Tony Burke. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2020 (Latin A and Armenian versions).
3.3 General Works
Archibald, Elizabeth. “Gold in the Dungheap: Incest Stories and Family Values in the Middle Ages.” Journal of Family History 22.2 (1997): 133–49.
Edmunds, Lowell. “Oedipus in the Middle Ages.” Antike und Abendland 22 (1976): 140–55.
Hahn, Thomas. “The Medieval Oedipus.” Comparative Literature 32 (1980): 225–37.
Hawk, Brandon W. “Translating the Traitor: A Medieval Life of Judas.” Ancient Jew Review. Posted 14 April, 2021. Online: https://www.ancientjewreview.com/read/2021/3/20/translating-the-traitor-a-medieval-life-of-judas
__________. “The Literary Contexts and Early Transmission of the Latin Life of Judas.” Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures 44 (2018): 60–76.
Lehmann, Paul. “Judas Ischarioth in der lateinischen Legendenüberlieferung des Mittelalters.” Studi medievali n.s. 2 (1929): 289–346.
Mize, Britt. “Working With the Enemy: The Harmonizing Tradition and the New Utility of Judas Iscariot in Thirteenth Century England.” Journal of Medieval Religious Cultures 36 (2010): 68–110.
Ohly, Friederich. The Damned and the Elect: Guilt in Western Culture. Trans. Linda Archibald. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992.