"JUDAS"

Fredrik Jan Hofmann, Actor,

 presents a thought provoking alternative 

to the commonly accepted portrayal of "Judas Iscariot" 

The Dutch author, Lot Vekemans wrote the monologue “Judas” in which she presented the archetypal Traitor in an interesting, new light.

The Theater Graz, last evening, gave a riveting performance in Bleiburg's Catholic church, with Fredrik Jan Hofmann playing a convincing "Judas Iscariot"

Vekemans allows “Judas” to explain himself, his motives and the conditions out of which his actions arose.

Hardly any reference is made to God, who, according to the only existing work in which Judas is mentioned, should play a central role.

This Monologue, however, deals with Judas as a person, motivated by issues other than God.

It was the Bible and the subsequent religious movements which painted the one sided picture of Judas as the evil, money hungry traitor,

In their grab for power, Christianity, and in particular Roman Catholicism, made Judas, the Jew, responsible for Christ's martyrdom and eventual death.

The slogan was loud and clear: It was the Jews who killed Christ, and Judas, the Traitor, gave the Romans the tool they needed to rid themselves of a “revolutionary.

But, according to the play, “Judas” expected Jesus Christ to have come as a liberator from the Roman joke, and finally to save the world. He, so tells us Vekemans, no longer wanted to be suppressed by the Romans. He wanted to be the Master in his own land.

Was Judas just disappointed in Jesus's seeming disinterest in Politics, in his almost exclusive concern with the afterlife?

This one-man-play urges the viewer/listener to consider Judas in a new light. It asks many questions but stops short of giving answers, leaving the “thinking” to the viewer..

In the Bible, John 17:12, Jesus says:

While I was with them I protected them and none of them is lost, except the son of perdition that the Scripture might be fulfilled.

The question rises: Was Judas's betrayal an act necessary for the fulfillment of the Scripture? If so, why is he not celebrated instead of being condemned? Why does Jesus call him “the son of Perdition?”

Does any of this really make sense? Or is it just part of the entire biblical gobbledygook?