Author: Cipriano Bienvenido Bencosme Rosado

After reading A Proposal I was honestly confused at first because I did not understand if Swift was being serious or not. At the beginning he talks about mothers and children in Ireland and how many families were struggling. It sounds like he is trying to find a solution to poverty.. Then he suddenly proposes that poor families should sell their babies as food. That was probably the part of the reading for me because I was not expecting the argument to go in that direction at all. He even talks about how much a child would weigh and how it could be cooked, which makes the whole thing more uncomfortable.

Something else that I found strange was how Swift talks about children almost like they are a business product. He calculates how money the parents could make and how the rich people could benefit from buying the children. Coming from the Dominican Republic this way of talking about families feels especially strange to me because family is usually something people take very seriously even when a family does not have much money. Course I know the situation in the text is from a different time and place but it still made me think about how differently people can look at poverty depending on their society. I also found it interesting that Swift brings religion into the proposal. He says that his plan would reduce the number of Catholics in Ireland, which showed me that the problem was not about poverty but also about religion, politics and social divisions.

The more I read the more I realized that Swift is not really giving a solution. I think he is trying to make people feel shocked about how poor people were being treated. What makes it work is that he uses a calm and serious tone while saying things that are completely horrible. He even says that his proposal would have economic benefits and talks about the money that would circulate in the country. For me that was probably the interesting part because it made me think that sometimes people can become so focused on money and numbers that they stop thinking about the people behind those numbers. I did not love the reading because some parts were very uncomfortable. I think that is also the point. Swift makes the idea so extreme that it forces the reader to pay attention to the problem, behind it: poor people were already being treated as if their lives did not matter.

When I looked at the introduction to The Gospel of Mary, I saw that the text assigns Mary a role which is far more important than is generally expected. It is stated in the introduction that the gospel was composed very early in the history of Christianity, although a large portion of the original text has been lost and only a small part of it has survived as a result of this, making the gospel difficult to understand in its entirety. Despite the sections that are missing, the gospel still illustrates Jesus teaching his disciples about spiritual knowledge and the inner self, and Mary is one of those who appears to understand these teachings better than the rest, thus making her role very significant. 

A particularly interesting aspect is the dispute between Mary and the rest of the disciples, particularly Peter. When Jesus has left, Mary informs the disciples of the teachings which she had received from him. Peter does not think that Jesus would have given a woman teachings that the other disciples did not get. He questions Mary and appears to doubt her since she is a woman. However, Levi supports her and states that the disciples should concentrate on spreading Jesus’s message rather than arguing with Mary. This section illustrates that there were disagreements among the early Christians concerning who had authority and whether women could have important leadership positions. 

To sum up, The Gospel of Mary presents a different view of early Christianity. Rather than containing only the beliefs which later became the most widely accepted, the text indicates that Christians in that early period held various opinions regarding Jesus, spiritual knowledge, and the place of women. The aspect that interested me most was the way in which Mary is depicted as someone who understood Jesus’s teachings and was willing to pass them on to the rest of them. Even though some parts of the gospel are missing, it still offers an interesting insight into the fact that Christianity was still in a state of development and that different voices were included in its history. 

I realised after having read The Gospel of Judas that the way in which this text presents Christianity is quite unlike that of the Bible. A major point of difference lies in its account of creation. It refers to various spiritual beings and states that Saklas took part in the creation of Adam and Eve. The text also dedicates a great deal of space to angels, the stars, and different realms. This is not the same approach as is normally taken in the Bible to explain creation. Since there are these differences, the gospel may be confusing to someone who is familiar with the traditional Christian narrative. 

A major point of difference concerns the way in which Judas is portrayed. In the Bible, Judas is mainly remembered for having betrayed Jesus; in this gospel, on the other hand, Jesus holds private talks with Judas and confides in him information which the other disciples do not get. Judas is therefore treated almost as if he has a deeper understanding of what Jesus is explaining. This alters the way we usually perceive his character. The gospel also contains explanations about the spiritual world which are not typical in most Christian teachings. That is the reason why this text must have appeared problematic to Christians and the Church. 

In summary, The Gospel of Judas offers a wholly different interpretation of some key Christian beliefs. The most notable differences lie in its account of creation, its reference to spiritual beings and the stars, and above all in the way it presents Judas. Because of these differences the gospel is hard to reconcile with the traditional Bible; I believe this is one of the reasons why the text was not included in the Bible. Yet, by reading it we can see that early Christianity had alternative views regarding Jesus, Judas, creation, and the spiritual world. Even though I do not accept all the ideas set out in the text, it is interesting since it illustrates another way in which some people understood Christianity.