12 Jul 2020
Shri Anil asked: Judas was one of the 12 disciples of Jesus. He was entrusted with financial matters. However, in the end, he betrayed Jesus so that the soldiers could identify Jesus and arrest Him. Even though Judas was associated with Jesus; why did this great sin happen through Judas? Also, why did Jesus not save Judas from his suicide?
Swami replied: The case of Judas reveals the state of a devotee who cannot be reformed through normal devotion. He was acting in the role of a devotee to betray Jesus. His suicide revealed his reformation on seeing the love and kindness of Jesus, as He prayed to God to excuse the sinners for their ignorance. Judas represents the middle state of devotion, which is neither very high, with total surrender nor very low, lacking the very possibility of reformation. If a very low-level devotee had been in the place of Judas, he would not have committed suicide. Judas’ suicide represents the intensity of his repentance after fully realizing his sin. God wanted to give him a fresh birth with a perfectly reformed soul to make a fresh start in his spiritual effort, forgetting the mistake done by him in the previous birth. If God had saved him from suicide in that very birth, Judas would not have pursued the spiritual path since he would not have been able to ever forget the mistake done by him in cheating Jesus and becoming the cause for His crucifixion.
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