Kiss of Judas


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 the New Testament

The gospels of Matthew and Mark both use the Greek verb καταφιλέω, which means to "kiss, caress; distinct from φιλεῖν ; especially of an amorous kiss" It is the same verb that Plutarch uses to describe a famous kiss that Alexander the Great gave Bagoas. The compound verb "has the force of an emphatic, ostentatious salute". 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: φιλήσω, philēsō, a single kiss, and did so as if from kindly feeling".
According to Matthew 26:50, Jesus responded by saying: "Friend, do what you are here to do". Luke 22:48 quotes Jesus saying "Judas, are you betraying the Son of Man with a kiss?"
Jesus' 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..." :

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, 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. A few examples include: