Iscariot by Tosca Lee
Biblical Fiction. 336 Pages. 4 Stars
Synopsis:
In Jesus, Judas believes he has found the One—a miracle-worker. The promised Messiah and future king of the Jews, destined to overthrow Roman rule. Galvanized, Judas joins the Nazarene’s followers, ready to enact the change he has waited for all his life.
But Judas’ vision of a nation free from Roman rule is crushed by the inexplicable actions of the Nazarene himself, who will not bow to social or religious convention—who seems in the end to even turn against his own people. At last, Judas must confront the fact that the master he loves is not the liberator he hoped for, but a man bent on a drastically different agenda.
Iscariot is the story of Judas—from his tumultuous childhood and tenuous entry into a career and family life as a devout Jew, to a man known to the world as the betrayer of Jesus. But even more, it is a singular and surprising view into the life of Jesus himself that forces us all to reexamine everything we thought we knew about the most famous—and infamous—religious icons in history.
My Review:
Man, I can only imagine what it took for Tosca Lee to even approach this story. An “origin story” of sorts for the most famous betrayal in history.
I have been intrigued by the premise for this book since I first met Tosca Lee and asked her which book of hers I should start with. (I ended up starting with The Line Between, but knew I’d circle back around to some of her Biblical fiction later.) This year, I decided to read Iscariot leading up to Easter. My goal had been to finish by Easter, but alas, it took me a little longer to finish than I had anticipated.
I’m not quite sure what exactly I expected going into it, but I figured the book would be challenging and that it would provide an interesting perspective. I appreciate the lengths Tosca went to in her research. The story feels so deeply authentic in its portrayal of the setting. It was easy to feel like I’d slipped into Biblical times among the rich historical settings. I love how she gives readers cultural context for the well-known Biblical stories that modern readers often miss.
I was taken a little by surprise at the way we saw some of Jesus’s miracles, but not others. But the more I think about it, the more I think Tosca was probably very strategic about this. The first miracles we “heard” about gave me such a sense of the “rumors” that spread through the land about Jesus and his work. In the gospels, we read the accounts of the miracles. We know them. But to read about them as if through a second or third or more-hand account had an ethereal effect on the tone of the story. It was interesting to see which miracles she showed and which she brushed past a little–and even among the ones she showed, she often would give a new perspective that felt like emphasizing the wrong syllable in a word because I know the bits she brushed past so quickly.
I really liked how the story started with Judas’s childhood. I think Tosca cleverly set the groundwork for the story we all know so well in a foundational way to her story. On the other end, the climactic betrayal and crucifixion we built toward surprised me. Of course I was intrigued to see through this rendition of Judas’s eyes, to learn how we would come to the point of betrayal, to understand his perceived motivations in this story. But I admittedly expected to see more of the “finale” so to speak. That said, the end of Judas’s story held much the same power in the conclusion he came to even with his dying breath.
The one thing that kind of threw me for a loop is how different this book is stylistically from the thriller duology I read. I’m not sure why, but I anticipated a page-turning read. Instead, this was far slower paced. It invited a sense of…dwelling and thoughtfulness. It doesn’t quite feel like a traditional story you’d read, but it still challenges you to push through and see just where exactly this Judas is taking you.
Tosca spins a compelling story of desperation, yearning, and compassion. My heart went out to seeing Jesus through the eyes of Tosca’s Judas. He was mesmerizing and came to life in a whole new way. I’m glad to have read it, even if it felt so different from what I thought it might be going into it, and I would recommend it to anyone interested in a new perspective.
Content: there’s no foul language, and very little romance–though there are some references to nudity within the cultural context and the story does touch on the position of women who are divorced or widowed and pushed to turn to prostitution to survive (including one brief scene with nothing graphic). There is some very intentional violence. The Romans were a violent, controlling people and though Tosca Lee isn’t unnecessarily graphic, she doesn’t shy away from showing the brutality of the time. I’d probably recommend readers 15+