Desperate attempts at alchemy

I didn't think I'd post again on the so-called "Gospel of Judas," because it really doesn't merit that much attention, but Gerard Vanderleun looks beyond the gnostic text itself to the motivations of people who publicize it, and doesn't like what he sees. Moreover, his screed is exceptionally well-written:

Your gedankenexperiment for today is to ask yourself, regardless of your religious beliefs, if the editors of National Geographic, being given an ancient manuscript that "proved" the Koran was nothing more than the blatherings of some ergot-besotted Bedouin who had munched one too many hallucinogenic plants while hanging out in a cave near Mecca, would have published the same "proof" as loudly and as broadly? Would they have done so, or would they have issued a Press Release citing concerns for the "provenance" of the manuscript and their employees' safety? Regardless of your religious beliefs, you know the shameful answer.
But beyond these considerations, the publication of the "Gospel" of Judas has another, deeper and more lasting benefit to our neophytes of nihilism. It puts one of the final elements of their anti-morality play at center stage. It seeks to sanctify treason.

It was never a question of "if," but only a question of "when" our contemporary society would discover an avatar who would make treason acceptable.

What Gerard doesn't mention while smacking around this particular instance of defining deviancy down is that National Geographic is comparatively late to the party. Later than Judas himself, certainly. But also later than British novelist E.M. Forster, who put a noble gloss on treason more than half a century ago.

I first thought about this for a 1999 essay called "E.M. Forster and the Politics of Betrayal." To quote my more youthful self:

Forster died in 1970. Filmed adaptations of his elegant books continue to win acclaim, providing a steady income for actresses like Emma Thompson and Helena Bonham Carter. In spite of this legacy, it is one memorable sentence from an essay called "What I Believe" that makes Forster a pundit for our times.

"I hate the idea of causes," he wrote, "and if I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country."

Because the most important and demonstrably righteous cause when Forster said this was fighting Nazis, his words shocked a few people. Sixty years later, his confession remains the pithiest summary of postmodern thought in captivity, far outstripping nice things in the same essay about "the aristocracy of the sensitive, the considerate, and the plucky."

(snip)

That Forster was wrong about betrayal requiring guts might not matter if his comment had a good influence in the lives of those who swear by it, but it does not. Ironically, people who disagree with Forster are more likely to make the sacrifices that friendship requires than people who agree with him. Two movies help make the point.

In Casablanca [1942], Rick (Humphrey Bogart) loves Ilsa but lets her go because he knows that only with her help can Laszlo lead anti-Nazi Resistance effectively. Rick puts country above friendship, and this noble act makes him a better friend. It also makes the movie's last line ("I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship") especially poignant.

Years later, The English Patient [1996] asks us to sympathize with a man of the Casablanca era who gives military maps to the Nazis in retaliation for British failure to help rescue his girlfriend. He and she have a torrid, toxic relationship that by their own reckoning matters more than the lives lost when the Nazis put the maps to use.

We need not rely on Humphrey Bogart to shame Forster; we can also call Confederate general Robert E. Lee. In 1861, Lee disappointed friends by rejecting command of the United States Army. He declined the command because it would have put him at odds with what he thought of as his country, Virginia, on the brink of civil war.

Just in case you're wondering, I didn't like The English Patient, but I did like both Glory (1989) and Gods and Generals (2003).