Last Supper

The second page of the Gospel of Judas presents a dramatically different retelling of a final meal Jesus shared with his disciples. "When he [approached] his disciples, [who had] gathered together and [were] seated and offering a prayer of thanksgiving over the bread, [he] laughed," reads the manuscript. "The disciples said to him, 'Master, why are you laughing at [our] prayer of thanksgiving? We have done what is right.' He answered and said to them, 'I am not laughing at you. [You] are not doing this because of your own will but because [it is through this that] your god [will be] praised.' " Jesus laughs, scholars say, because the disciples do not understand that the God of the Old Testament, to whom they direct their prayers, is not the true God. In this gospel, only Judas, the disciple reviled by orthodox Christians, understands God's true nature.