“Centuries earlier, before this folio found its way into the archive, it passed through fire and blood…”
The smell of ash still clung to its pages.
In a dim archive in Carcassonne, among shelves of inquisitorial records, lies a folio that should never have survived. Its edges are blackened, as if the parchment had been yanked from the pyre at the very last moment. Scrawled across the cover in the hand of a medieval clerk are the words: Interrogatio Iohannis. The Interrogation of John.
To most who handled it in the thirteenth century, it was not a treasure but evidence—a smoking gun used to condemn men and women accused of heresy. Possession of this text, the inquisitors noted, was enough to prove a soul guilty, enough to justify chains, torture, or flames.
And yet, by some irony of history, the book the church most feared was preserved by the very machine built to destroy it.
When you open its pages, you are not greeted by the familiar voice of the Gospel writer who speaks of beginnings and words made flesh. Instead, you hear whispers of another Jesus—one who does not bless the world as sacred, but unmasks it as counterfeit.
In this Secret Supper, John asks about the origin of creation, about the God Moses met on Sinai, about the commandments carved into stone. And the answers Jesus gives shatter the foundations of Christendom:
The god of this world is not the Father of Light, but the prince of darkness in disguise.
The flesh is not a temple, but a prison. Birth itself is a trick played upon the soul.
Even Moses, in his awe, was deceived by the adversary. The laws he carried down the mountain were not from heaven, but from hell masquerading as holiness.
This was no small theological quibble. This was a cosmic indictment—and for those who dared to believe it, a path of escape.
The Cathars of Languedoc read these words in secret. To them, the text was not blasphemy but liberation, a lamp revealing the bars of a cage. Jesus, they believed, was not the founder of a worldly empire but the awakener of souls, the one sent by the true God to expose the lie and guide humanity back to the realm of light.
Rome could not allow this vision to live. To preserve their authority, they launched not only sermons and disputations, but armies and inquisitions. They burned villages and libraries alike. Entire towns were put to the sword, and the smoke of heretics mingled with the smoke of their books.
But fire is a clumsy censor. Ashes can hide embers. And in a handful of archives—in Carcassonne, in Vienna, and in fragments elsewhere—the words of this forbidden gospel endured.
What happens when you read them today is not unlike what John must have felt as he sat at that secret table. The Jesus you meet here is unsettling. He does not soothe with promises of earthly kingdoms or institutional power. He does not sanctify empire or law. He pulls back the veil and asks: Who, truly, have you been worshipping?
The church called it heresy. The inquisitors called it evidence. The Cathars called it truth.
And we, centuries later, are left with the charred remains of a book pulled from the fire—waiting to tell us a story that might upend everything we thought we knew about God, scripture, and the world itself.
Inquisitorial records whisper of how it happened…
The square reeked of smoke and sweat. Torches crackled as the crowd pressed closer, eager to see justice done. Bound to a wooden stake stood a man accused of heresy, his lips moving in prayer no one recognized. Around him, the Inquisition’s officers stacked faggots of wood higher and higher.
But before the flames were lit, the inquisitors rifled through his satchel. Out slid a slim volume, its parchment edges smudged and worn, its binding fragile from use. A clerk flipped it open, scanning the ink with suspicion. He froze. Across the top of the first page, the words leapt out like a curse:
Interrogatio Iohannis.
The Interrogation of John.
The order was immediate. “Do not let it circulate. Copy it for evidence. Then burn the rest.”
The executioner’s torch fell. The man’s cries rose. And in the chaos, a single folio—half-singed, half-saved—was slipped into a chest marked with the seal of the Holy Office, destined not for destruction, but for preservation. Evidence, they called it. Blasphemy bound in leather.
Centuries later, in a quiet archive in Carcassonne, that very folio rests. Its edges are blackened, as if the fire had nearly swallowed it whole. The smell of ash lingers, faint but undeniable—a ghost of the day it was almost erased.
When opened, it reveals not the Jesus preached from pulpits, nor the Christ enthroned in cathedrals. Instead, it whispers of another:
A Jesus who declares the god of this world is not the Father of Light, but the prince of darkness in disguise.
A Jesus who insists the flesh is a prison, birth a deception, law a snare.
A Jesus who warns that Moses did not meet God on Sinai, but the adversary himself.
For the Cathars, these words were a lamp in the night—a gospel that revealed the world as hell in disguise, and the way of escape through awakening, not ritual. For the church, they were dynamite: a gospel that undermined sacraments, authority, and empire itself.
The penalty for owning such a book was death. And yet, by some twist of fate—or providence—the text survived in the very archives of its persecutors.
What happens when you read it today is as dangerous as it was in the thirteenth century. Because the Jesus you meet in this forbidden gospel does not bless the empires of men. He does not sanctify violence or canon law. He tears away the veil and asks the question the church dared not let survive:
Who, truly, have you been worshipping?
That charred folio, pulled from the fire, is the beginning of this book.
The rest is up to you.
