James Joyner, in writing about a controversy concerning profits made over the Gospel of Judas makes the following statement:

This, it seems clear to me even as a non-believer, is the Big News: “No one questions the authenticity of the Judas gospel, which depicts Judas Iscariot not as a betrayer of Jesus but as his favored disciple.” Given the importance of Christianity to world civilization, this is a fantastic discovery.

I would clarify (and speaking as a believer, in the interest of full disclosure), I don’t think anyone is questioning the authenticity of the document as a being a document that was written roughly in 300 AD by Gnostics. Further, as has been noted elsewhere, the existence of this document was previously known, although I don’t think a known copy of the document existed prior to the discovery of this codex.

The question of its profoundness or lack thereof, is the real issue in terms of its effects on Christianity. If it is a reflection of the view of the Gnostics, who were considered heretics by the early church (and still are considered such today) then all this document does is reinforce something that was already known about a particular sect. If the document could be demonstrated to be an actual first person testimony of Judas, that would be a wholly different thing and would put it on par with the documents currently included in the Christian Bible, the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Indeed, there are a number of non-canonical (i.e., apocryphal) gospels–see, for example, here.

However, there is little doubt that the document is a Gnostic text, making it historically interesting, but likely of little consequence in religious terms.

To put it it in scfi geek terms for the non-religious, the significance of this document vis-a-vis the Christian faith is about the same as unearthing a piece of Star Trek fan fiction from 1971 would be in terms of the “official” history of Trek. It might be interesting, but it doesn’t change the story as we know it. If you are neither religous nor a Trek geek, I can’t think of a good analogy, so sue me.