Neville Goddard Lecture, The Story of Judas

The Story of Judas

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THE STORY OF JUDAS

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.
Judas is not a man any more than Christ is a man. Christ is the Invisible Reality, and all the others are states, and we move into states. But when you are cast in the role of Judas you are at the end of the play and the play is over. You betray the identity of the Creative Power of the universe and then you ―commit suicide,‖ you hang yourself upon a tree. As he betrays Him he becomes the very being that he betrays.

Now Judas comes from the same form as the word Judah. It means the hand. It is the first symbol in the name of God, or the Hebrew symbol ―Yod,‖ the hand of worship, the hand of the Creator. Then the second name of Judas is Iscariot. ―Is: means ―Man‖; ―Cariot‖ means ―to lay timber,‖ or the carpenter. So Judas betrays the Lord, for no one knew him, but Judas told them, ―when I kiss him you will know him.‖ And yet Jesus had said to them, ―I have been with you three years and you do not know me?‖ The others ran when he was arrested, but the one who knew him kissed him and said, ―Do not let him go,‖ and that is your Imagination, for that is Christ. There is no other. Christ in Man is man‘s own wonderful human Imagination, and with Christ all things are possible.
So you can take this revelation and go out and be anything you want to be. If using this power I go out and take advantage of another, it means my misuse of what I have just heard. But the one who tells you and then sees what you do with it often repents. So the story is told you that they spat on him – not a man, for who can spit on Imagination – not knowing there is no other: we are all one. This is spitting on Christ or putting stripes upon him. Not on his body for He is invisible, for my Father is spirit and spirit is invisible.
So the most difficult to play is that of Judas, or the betrayer, and if the playwright were casting the play no one would volunteer to play it. But one has to go out and ―betray‖ God by telling his identity, and to the degree that you can do it you will prove it by the behavior of those to whom you tell it. For all the characters of the Bible are true as states and they live forever. God sends his sons through these characters as actors that at the end of time He may awaken these actors as Himself.

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