Q-and-A with award-winning author, Distinguished Professor Susan Gubar
In her new book, Judas: A Biography, IU Distinguished Professor of English Susan Gubar delves into how Judas became a symbol of the Jewish people. She analyzes how Judas personifies a composite Judeo-Christianity that illuminates ambivalent relationships between Christians and Jews -- as well as changing attitudes toward the body, blood and money; greed and hypocrisy; suicide and repentance; and homosexuality and divinity.
A pioneering feminist and culture critic, Gubar's books include Poetry After Auschwitz and Rooms of Our Own, and she is co-editor of The Norton Anthology of Literature. In the April 12, 2009, New York Times, Judas: A Biography was named to the Editors' Choice list.
Here, Gubar talks about how she decided to write about Judas -- with a book publication date just in time for Easter -- and what she hopes readers can gain from her reflections.
Susan Gubar
Live at IU: What inspired you to write about Judas?
Susan Gubar: While I was working on a book entitled Poetry After Auschwitz I encountered the view that Christian anti-Semitism generated the genocide in Germany. Some Jewish studies scholars view Judas as nothing but the epitome of Christian anti-Semitism. Yet when I looked at Christian-authored scholarship and theology about Judas, the Twelfth Apostle was credited with facilitating the crucifixion but also the resurrection. In short, there was much disagreement about who Judas was, what he did, why, with what results. That enigma drew me to study the history of Judas from the four Gospel accounts in the New Testament through medieval legend, Renaissance painting, 19th-century poetry, and 20th-century fiction and film.
LIU: Did you learn anything that surprised you about Judas -- or people's perceptions of him -- during research for this book?
Gubar: I found it surprising how often the four authors of the Gospels disagree about Judas' character and fate. Although Matthew describes his repentance and suicide, for instance, Luke believes he was possessed by Satan and he died by bursting open with his bowels gushing out. Although Mark, Matthew and Luke mention a kiss of betrayal, John's Judas does not kiss Jesus at all. I also found it surprising that the medieval pariah-Judas, who is faulted for every conceivable anal and oral crime, morphs in Renaissance paintings into Jesus' kindred spirit and soul mate. These contradictory portraits of Judas continue up to the present day.
LIU: What do you hope readers take away from reading this?
Gubar: Of course I believe that it is very important to understand how anti-Semitic stereotypes fuel violence against innocent people, and Judas unfortunately contributed to violence against Jews. But I also believe that on a profound level -- when we keep in mind that all the players in the Passion are Jewish -- Judas reflects humanity's concern with wrongdoing. Through Judas we understand our propensity for wrong-doing, vacillation, betrayal as well as our wish to disavow that capacity. Judas reflects humanity's disgust and self-disgust, our grief and nausea about our capacity for inflicting pain.
LIU: When did you learn of the New York Times Editors' Choice Award and what was your reaction -- what does this mean to you?
Gubar: I am always pleased at publicity, especially good publicity. I hope that the book reaches a wide audience because it was written for Jews as well as Christians, believers and non-believers, and especially those interested in the ways in which great paintings and great literary texts change our ideas about Judeo-Christianity. Indeed, Judas -- the only apostle to work with Jesus as well as with the Temple -- can be viewed as a figure of the hyphen that appears in the term Judeo-Christianity.
To read a New York Times Sunday Book Review of Judas: A Biography, see http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/05/books/review/Kirsch-t.html?ref=books.
