Yet, taking refuge in Ramallah was not good enough, as the West Bank, and with it Ramallah, came under Israeli occupation. To add to the challenge, one of my brothers was in Jordan looking for work at that time and was not allowed to come back home. So, my family worked relentlessly trying to get him reunited with us in Ramallah, but the Israeli occupation authority rejected every application we submitted on his behalf. As a result, my brother ended up in Lebanon where he worked as a Journalist, and he consequently served some time in prison for criticizing the Lebanese government. After the beginning of the civil war in Lebanon in 1975 we didn’t hear much of him; we had no idea what happened to him.

Observing the unfolding events in Palestine, my father, like many Christians, saw it as the fulfilling of biblical prophecies. So, when Israel bombed the PLO headquarters in Tunisia on October 2, 1985, my father thought of Israel’s retaliation power as another proof for these prophecies. Sadly, three days later, we received the news that my brother was among those killed in the attack. My brother apparently had joined the PLO after suffering the loss of his homeland, offering his intellectual services. I am not sure how my father felt afterwards, but I vaguely remember him saying that my brother must have influenced the PLO towards peace. And I kept hold of that idea, that my brother gave his life, not only for his homeland, but also for peace.

Palestinian Christians do suffer for being Christians; they also suffer for being Arabs. Yet, in spite of their sufferings, King Hussein once said that Arab Christians are the glue of the Middle East—no peace would be possible without their contribution. But, the number of Arab Christians in Palestine has dwindled significantly during the past century, and even more in the past few decades. Still, many Christians in the US seem to be ignorant or indifferent about the need to support their brothers and sisters in Palestine. One preacher reportedly went as far as describing Arab Christians as “Christians with a Muslim mind,” apparently attempting to reduce the significance of their existence, or to disqualify their much-needed, balanced view of the ongoing conflict between Arabs and Jews.

Indeed, many Christians in the US are encouraged to think that Israel’s presence can be a substitute for the Christian presence in that troubled part of the world. Nothing could be further from the truth. National Geographic, in its June 2009 issue, published an article that underscored the indispensible role of the Arab Christian minority in the Holy Land. As Palestinian Christians, we have been privileged with both a long history and a unique identity in Christ; we also have our own unique mission: through our living Christian witness we strive to bring individuals closer to God; and consequently, we give reason and hope for equality and reconciliation between the different groups in Israel/Palestine.

—Mourice Mrabe

Mourice Mrabe was born in Ramallah in 1962 and moved to the USA in 1989. Mourice came to a personal relationship with Christ in 1981 and serves as a lay worship leader in the Arabic Church of Sacramento.

According to Michael White, director of the Institute for the Study of Antiquity and Christian Origins at the University of Texas Austin, “Scripture, like history, was codified by the winners, by those who emerged with the greatest numbers at the end of three centuries of Christianity.”[3] Manuscripts such as the Gospel of Judas did not make it into the Bible because they were out of line with the direction “winners” wanted to take their newly minted religious notions. As a result, dozens of credible gospels simply lost out and we ended up with the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Bart Ehrman, who chairs the department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, is so enamored with the Gospel of Judas that in his view, had we embraced its perspective on Judas, we might well have avoided the Holocaust.[4]

In short a new generation of scholars is disseminating the notion that the Bible is merely the product of historical winners who preferred the dark and anti-Semitic overtones of manuscripts such as the Gospel of John over the more racially sensitive texts such as the Gospel of Judas.

A new myth, a new day, we’re constantly being barraged by myths and we have to have discernment skills to separate wheat from chaff and heat from light. We’ve addressed this in two ways recently in my new resource The Bible Under Siege and in an article in the new issue of the Christian Research Journal about a new archeological find called “Gabriel’s Revelation.” I also spoke with the author of the article Dr. Craig Hazen on the June 6, 2009 Bible Answer Man broadcast. To obtain these resources or listen to my interview go to our Website at www.equip.org.

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[1] See Dan Vergano and Cathy Lynn Grossman, “Long-Lost Gospel of Judas Recasts ‘Traitor,’” USA Today, April 6, 2006 (http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2006-04-06-judas_x.htm). All Websites accessed 6/9/09.

[2] The Gospel of Judas, National Geographic Channel, aired April 16, 2006, (http://www.nationalgeographic.com/lostgospel/).

[3] Ibid. Vergano and Grossman, “Long-Lost Gospel of Judas.”

[4] See Gospel of Judas, National Geographic Channel.