Judas is characterized in all the Gospels as "one of the twelve" - not like the others as "one of his disciples". Siegfried Bergler's thesis is that "the disciples" and "the twelve" designate two different groups: the former, in different numbers, were Jesus' disciples; On the other hand, the fixed lists of twelve names testify to a post-Easter body/presbytery of the early Jerusalem community, which, due to a Christophany, saw itself as representing eschatological Israel. Former disciples of Jesus and Judas (also) belonged to this quorum. Hence the title Judas and the post-Easter Twelve. In addition to the exegesis of all Judas appearances, the monograph includes a consideration of all twelve passages in the NT - beginning with 1Cor 15:5 ("appeared to the twelve") to the finding of the logia source ("... sitting on twelve thrones", Matthew 19 .28 par Lk 22.30) up to Apk 21 (twelve cornerstones). There is also a critical appraisal of the ambivalent image of Judas in the Gnostic Gospel of Judas. Judas, who exercised a prominent function in the church (cf. Acts 1:20: "his supervisory office"), may have renounced the belief in Jesus' divine origin or messianship, turned back to Judaism (cf. Joh 6:64,66,71) and thereby contributed to the dissolution of the Twelve. He was demonized, declared dead (cf. the three different "deaths" of the ungodly: Mt 27, Acts 1, Papias) and finally projected back into the Life of Jesus as his "betrayer", correctly: "deliverer". .
