According to Tim Rice, JCSS arose from a line in a Bob Dylan song - "I can't tell you, you'll have to decide, did Judas Iscariot have God on his side?" This was Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Tim Rice's third joint project, following on from the less successful "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat", and a musical about the life of Doctor Barnado which was never produced.
This is a rock opera in the truest sense, with the entire story being told in song, without a single line of dialogue.
It presents Judas as a concerned friend of Jesus, terrified that the whole Jesus Movement has got out of hand and scared of the possible repercussions on the occupied Jewish nation, if the Roman conquerors take action to supress this potential rebellion. His betrayal of Jesus is shown as a desperate practical action, to protect the Jews from themselves, and he is tortured by concience into suicide
Jesus is portrayed as a reluctant hero, overwhelmed by what he has to do, and exhausted by the pressures placed on him, but resigned to the inevitable fact of his death.
The dislike of fundamental Christians for JCSS probably springs from a combination of its sympathetic stance toward Judas and showing Jesus as a man beset by doubts
The songs are great and the approach engrossing