The account of Judas, in what is called betraying his Master, is strange indeed. In speaking of that circumstance, Jesus says, “_It would have been better for that man if he had never been born_.” Now if Jesus came to die, Judas, by informing the authorities where he was to be found, did no more than bring to pass what was before ordained should take place. Judas, then, was but the instrument to accomplish the plan of human redemption, by informing the Jewish authorities when and where they could secure the object which they sought after. The very idea of betraying Jesus, proves two things:—first, that Jesus was but little known to the Jews, except from report; and, secondly, that although he held often said he came to lay down his life for sinful man, yet he intended to evade death as long as possible. It was owing to this obscure method of teaching, that his disciples, although always with him, could not understand fully what his objects were; and though he had so often told them of “_the kingdom of heaven being at hand,_” they understood him not. To bring the position of the Jews nearer, at the time of Christ’s appearance in Judea, let us suppose ourselves to have been Jews, then living, and expecting and desiring his coming. At length, it is said, “he is arrived.” The first inquiry would very naturally be, is he the true Messiah, or is he an impostor? If, then, to our inquiries made to him on that point, we had received in return nothing positive, but the vilest abuse, and threatenings of damnation in a future world, could we be expected to view him as the promised deliverer? When the Jews heard him denouncing them as hypocrites, and, at the same time, assuming an authority over Moses, and the laws of Jehovah given by Moses, and calling the Temple (for which they had so high a veneration) a den of thieves, it must have had a tendency to shut up their minds against his divine mission. If Jesus wished the Jews to be convinced of his being the personage whom they had long expected, he should, in the first place, have attended to their inquiry, “_Art thou he which should come, or are we to look for another?_”