Gospel of Judas may be for reals, ink-studying scientists say (msnNOW)
Gospel of Judas may be for reals, ink-studying scientists say
msnNOW – April 8, 2013
You’d expect a sign that the Gospel of Judas (a fragmented ancient text that casts Judas in a more sympathetic light than the gospels published in the Bible) is authentic would come as a flash of divine inspiration. But scientists are basing their belief on the extremely mundane analysis of … ink. After examining other third-century documents like marriage certificates and land documents, experts realized that folks then were moving from using lamp black ink to brown iron gall ink. Turns out the raggedy document scrawled out in Coptic (Egyptian) was written in a mixture of both. This explained its odd chemical makeup, dating the doc to around A.D. 280. Experts caution that this doesn’t prove it’s real, but makes it far less likely that it’s forged.