The kiss of Judas, also known as the Betrayal of Christ, is the act with which Judas identified Jesus to the multitude with swords and clubs who had come from the chief priests and elders of the people to arrest him, according to the Synoptic Gospels. The kiss is given by Judas in the Garden of Gethsemane after the Last Supper and leads directly to the arrest of Jesus by the police force of the Sanhedrin.
Within the life of Jesus in the New Testament, the events of his identification to hostile forces and subsequent execution are directly foreshadowed both when Jesus predicts his betrayal and Jesus predicts his death.
More broadly, a Judas kiss may refer to "an act appearing to be an act of friendship, which is in fact harmful to the recipient."
In Christianity, the betrayal of Jesus is mourned on Spy Wednesday (Holy Wednesday) of Holy Week.
In the New Testament Judas was both a disciple of Jesus and one of the original twelve Apostles. Most Apostles originated from Galilee but Judas came from Judea. The gospels of Matthew (26:47–50) and Mark (14:43–45) both use the Greek verb , which means to "kiss, caress; distinct from ; especially of an amorous kiss." It is the same verb that Plutarch uses to describe a famous kiss that Alexander the Great gave to Bagoas. The compound verb () "has the force of an emphatic, ostentatious salute."Vincent's Word Studies on Matthew 26, accessed 27 February 2017 Lutheran theologian Johann Bengel suggests that Judas kissed him "repeatedly": "he kissed Him more than once in opposition to what he had said in the preceding verse: (Matthew 26:48), and did so as if from kindly feeling."Bengel's Gnomon on Matthew 26, accessed 27 February 2017
According to Matthew 26:50, Jesus responded by saying: "Friend, do what you came for." Luke 22:47 notes that Judas "approached Jesus to kiss him," but does not say that he did so; in Luke 22:48, Jesus says "Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?"
Jesus's arrest follows immediately.
In liturgics In the Divine Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom the Greek Orthodox Church uses the troparion Of thy Mystical Supper.., in which the hymnist vows to Jesus that he will "...not kiss Thee as did Judas..." ():
Commentary Justus Knecht comments on Judas's kiss, writing:
Cornelius a Lapide in his Great commentary writes,
In art The scene is nearly always included, either as the Kiss itself, or the moment after, the Arrest of Jesus, or the two combined (as above), in the cycles of the Life of Christ in art or Passion of Jesus in various media. In some Byzantine cycles it is the only scene before the Crucifixion.Schiller, Gertrud, Iconography of Christian Art, Vol. II, p. 52, 1972 (English trans from German), Lund Humphries, London, A few examples include: Probably the best known is from Giotto's cycle in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua The Taking of Christ by CaravaggioFor a discussion of the kiss of Judas with respect to Caravaggio's The Taking of Christ (now in the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin), together with a summary of traditional ecclesiastical interpretation of that gesture, see Franco Mormando, "Just as your lips approach the lips of your brothers: Judas Iscariot and the Kiss of Betrayal" in Saints and Sinners: Caravaggio and the Baroque Image, ed. F. Mormando, Chestnut Hill, MA: The McMullen Museum of Art of Boston College, 1999, 179–90. A sixth-century Byzantine mosaic in Ravenna A fresco by Barna da Siena A sculpture representing the Kiss of Judas appears on the Passion façade of the Sagrada Família basilica in Barcelona
See also Bargain of Judas Chronology of Jesus Gospel of Judas Kiss of death (mafia)
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