The Story Of Judas

Neville Goddard 12-4-1959

We tell you here that we believe you can be what you want to be in this world and that it is my purpose to tell you. If I have moments in my life I regret it, not in the sense of a change of mind as in the word repent, still I must tell you. I may have moments of regret that you have misused this power for any purpose, yet it is better that you misuse it, rather than not to use it. How many times one feels concerned at the misuse of this principle. Yet it is better to misuse it than to bury it, for even by the misuse we learn, though painfully. In the story of the talents it was only the one who did not use it that was condemned.

We are living in a world that is like a play and some seem from birth to be cast in a difficult role, and yet you tell him that God is Infinite Love. But he is the playwright and the casting director, for this is a play. As Shakespeare says, “All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players. We have our exits and our entrances and one man in his time plays many parts.” But that “time” is not three-score and ten; it is the time it takes to awaken that man, the perfect actor, or God. So I play every part, but playing every part does not mean I play every man or woman in the world. There are billions of actors but only so many parts, and every part you and I must play. The central figure, the star, is Christ, and the whole play is about Christ from Genesis to Revelation, but there are many parts that reveal it. There are twelve main characters (the 12 disciples), and the four-and-twenty elders, and the High Priest Caiaphas and his political opponent, Pilate. These are in every age and every time. The purpose of the play is to awaken in us the actor, God. These characters of the Bible are not people: they never walked the earth as people. We play all the characters, but they do not live any more than Hamlet lived. When Olivier plays Hamlet, Hamlet can do nothing but what Olivier does, and then Olivier can if he wishes play another character altogether. The characters are the eternal states of the Soul, but we must learn to distinguish the man from the characters he is playing. The characters are real in eternity and we assume the character and play it on this sphere. To say that everything in this world is a play does disturb, but I want you to believe it.

Tonight I want to discuss the most difficult of all the characters, and if asked you would refuse to play that role, but it is the most important, for until it is played, Christ cannot awaken within you. It is the character of Judas. People say he is the betrayer, but to be able to betray I must first hold the secret. So I betray you into the hands of your enemies. I reveal you, for that is what “betray” means. Only he who knows God could reveal God. Only Judas did not leave Jesus in the garden. The others left him, but Judas remained to reveal Him, or betray Him, and then Judas commits suicide. But we are told, “No man takes away my life, but I lay it down myself.” So, who is Judas? Until that character is played, Christ is not awakened in the mind of man. He reveals God. Then he repented when he found that those to whom he revealed the Lord spat at him and reviled him and condemned him. It does not mean upon a man; it is a symbol. But I say the time will come when you will not repent, even though you will be concerned as to the consequences of your act. The word is only translated six times in this form. Paul wrote a bitter letter to the Corinthians and he said, “I do not repent or change my attitude toward you.” And another time when Jesus is made a member of the order of Melchizedek he says, “I do not repent.” But in this case when Judas reveals the Lord to the world he repents, for he sees what they did with the knowledge. Not something done to a man, for Christ is invisible, for he is the Lord and the Lord is spirit and spirit is without form. You tell the world who He is, as man’s Invisible Reality, and then when you see that they spit in his face – figuratively – then you are concerned for the consequences of your betrayal of the identity of God.