Joseph Barsabbas Joseph Barsabbas In the Acts of the Apostles, Joseph Barsabbas (also known as Justus) is one of two candidates qualified to be chosen for the office of apostle after Judas Iscariot lost his apostleship when he betrayed Jesus and committed suicide. After the casting of lots he was not chosen, the lot instead favoring Matthias to be numbered with the remaining eleven apostles. Both Joseph and Matthias had been followers of Jesus from the beginning of Jesus' public ministry after the baptism he received from John. He had continued as a member of the larger company of disciples even to
Judas Iscariot was well-known among Christians in antiquity and was often told in competition with the two conflicting stories from the New Testament. According to the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, which was probably written in the fourth century AD, Judas was overcome with remorse and went home to tell his wife, who was roasting a chicken on a spit over a charcoal fire, that he was going to kill himself, because he knew Jesus would rise from the dead and, when he did, he would punish him. Judas's wife laughed and told him that Jesus could no more rise from the dead