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Abstract

The discovery and publication of the Gospel of Judas from an unknown papyrus manuscript attracted a remarkable attention of public interest. This text is regarded as a very important contribution to our understanding, both of the figure of Judas Iscariot and of early Gnosticism. However, the same codex also contains other texts, among them one with the title Jakob (or: James). Despite the fact that this text has not reached the same degree of popularity as Judas, for future study in Gnosticism it is very likely Jakob and not the Gospel of Judas, which appears to be the most important text in Codex Tchacos. That is owing to the fact that this text together with the first Apocalypse of James from Nag Hammadi Codex V gives us a glimpse of the history and transmission of apocryphal texts in antiquity. This raises new perspectives with regard to the use in the early church of this kind of texts, especially concerning their authority and apparently non-canonical status