One year my daughter attended a Christmas Eve service with me. She was studying Holocaust literature at the time and refused to take part in Communion because the standard liturgy began: "On the night he was betrayed, Jesus..." She saw this phrase as part of Christianity's vilification of the Jews over almost two millennia, which had led to discrimination, pogroms and eventually to Adolph Hitler's attempt to eradicate the people whose history gave us the Old Testament and the source of our faith, Jesus. So I looked a little harder, and this is what I found.
Using my Greek-English New Testament, Strong's Concordance, and my trusty Greek dictionary, I found that al of the "betray" words are variations of the Greek word "paradidomi" which means to "hand over" something. It was a neutral word that could be used for anything: a gift, a sale or deed, or a prisoner. "Betray" would be a derivative meaning conveying disapproval.
Retired Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong hypothesized that Judas was a character made up sometime between 60 and 70 CE ("Common Era"; you might prefer the old term "A.D.") to represent all of the "Judaioi" at the time when Jesus' followers were trying to shift the blame for the crucifixion from the Romans to the Jews. Bishop Spong noted that the letters of Paul, the earliest writings we have about Jesus, say nothing about this Judas. He also noted that the authorities did not need someone to identify Jesus who had been walking around causing uproar all week. [Matthew 26:55] Also, he saw indications in Matthew's and Luke's gospels [MT 19:28 and LK 22:30] that there were twelve disciples present after Jesus was executed. (I disagree with this conclusion).
More recently, we have the publication of the Gospel of Judas, now available online in English translation. This incomplete "gospel" makes Judas the hero who was doing what Jesus told him to do. The Gospel of John hints at this when Jesus says to Judas: "Do quickly what you are going to do." [John 12:27] This can be interpreted that Jesus wanted Judas to bring on the Romans.
I agree with Bishop Spong that Judas-the-betrayer has been used to represent the Jews as "Christ-killers," a designation that the Catholic Church repudiated only in the late 20th century. I do think Judas -- the brother of James (Jesus' brother or one of his first disciples?) -- existed and was a trusted disciple, perhaps even in charge of this common purse [John 13:29]. His act was necessary for the story of Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection. I don't think Jesus was wrong about his friend, and I think Judas got a bad rap.
Lyn Pickhover, Unconvinced