Is Israel hiding the secret source of Christianity?

The Times of Israel ^ | 28 Dec 2012 | Matthew Kalman

[Fai Mao]

Mary’s tomb is in Turkey near where the Apostle John lived. You can visit it to this day. The Assumption of Mary is a fairly late Roman idea.

[editor-surveyor]

>> including ones with inscriptions identifying them as containing the bones of “Yehoshua bar Yoseph”, “Miriam”, and “Yehuda bar Yeshua (Jesus)”. <<

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Thus marking this article as ridiculous fiction.

This is the kind of crap that prince Charles would enjoy.

[Campion]

Mary’s tomb in Turkey is very much empty, and the Assumption/Dormition of Mary isn’t of “Roman” or western origin at all.

[RegulatorCountry]

It’s a very common claim on FR Religion Forum threads, that Mary has no grave, with such claims coming from believers in the bodily assumption of Mary. You should chime in sometime, it’s bound to be interesting, lol.

[editor-surveyor]

National Geographic has about the same credibility as Wikipedia.

Remember the faked “feathered dinosaur” pictures?

They’re a joke at best.

[mitch5501]

Welcome to FR Fai Mao

"Mary’s tomb is in Turkey near where the Apostle John lived."

"Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth!" (James 3:5)

[Cold Heart]

Yes, National Geographic is tainted material. I was a member for over 30 years and quit when they went over to the dark side.

[terycarl]

we will find the EXACT spot where Jesus was born....the EXACT spot where Mary was born, the EXACT spot where Cain ana Abel were born before we find out where the hell Obama was born.

[aviator]

Been there. Beautiful and peaceful place.

[longfellowsmuse]

Hmmm I certainly know nothing about translating ancient hebrew inscriptions on ossuaries but Dan Brown and James Cameron teaming up together in support of this “find” certainly does make me skeptical....

[El Cid]

... Dan Brown and James Cameron teaming up together in support of this “find” certainly does make me skeptical....

I didn't catch that part of the article. Just more dung masquerading as scholarship. Brown and Cameron certainly made their millions on fiction, and I suppose they can add this one into their fairy tales...

[Fai Mao]

Most ancient tombs are empty. The fact that hers is proves nothing more than that grave robbers don’t care about gender. Most of the Pharaohs of Egypt’s tombs are empty, were they assumed bodily into heaven?

The point is that at the crucifixion Jesus entrusted his mother’s life to John. Thus, she would not have been buried in Judea unless John was and we know that John died near Ephesus.

The only way the origins of Christianity could have been this hidden this completely is if Jesus had never lived. So the tomb actually helps validate Christianity rather than debunk it as said above. The Romans and Sanhedrin would have had these bodies paraded through the near East if Jesus was buried there with criers yelling “Behold your Lord is still dead!”

But no I do not believe in the immaculate conception, Mary was a human woman, just like my wife and daughters and the doctrine of her assumption into heaven is idolatry. That said you are free to believe it if you want.

[muawiyah]

Two Mary’s and a Sarah ~

[ApplegateRanch]

“I don’t agree with everything they say in the films, but they pay me an awful lot more than I could ever earn from writing or teaching,” said one shameless prostitute who has appeared in such productions told me.

OTOH, it is one less ethically challenged "scientist" standing in front of an impressionable classroom.

[kabumpo]

Me too.

[Campion]

Mary wasn't a Pharaoh and did not die in ostentatious wealth. There's no reason to believe her grave would have been robbed. John's tomb was not robbed (it's in Ephesus today), Peter's tomb was not robbed, Paul's tomb was not robbed, etc. We know that the ancient Christians venerated relics, but there are no bodily relics of Mary.

Belief in the Assumption is idolatry? Jewish tradition -- one that is referenced in passing in the NT -- holds that Moses was assumed into heaven. Are traditional Jews idolaters, then? The Bible says that Elijah was taken up into heaven. Is the Bible an idolatrous book? You may want to rethink that comment a bit ... or a lot.

[Craftmore]

differance being,,,,The Bible doesnt say Mary was transported to heaven.

[Bulwyf]

She was a normal woman the bible says, chosen to carry out a duty from God, which she did. Only God is worthy of our praise and worship and prayer is done to Jesus himself, no others. I don’t understand why people insist on praying to other entities.

[SunkenCiv]

Joe Zias, a physical anthropologist and archaeologist who formerly worked for the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) but was let go during a budget squeeze in 1997... in August 2003, Zias (unnamed) had given a sworn deposition to the Israeli police swearing to having seen the ossuary in the antiquities shop -- without "brother of Jesus" on it.

update:

Former IAA employee Zoe Zias told several archaeologists and BAR editor Hershal Shanks in 2003 that he had previously seen the James Ossuary in a Jerusalem antiquities shop without the words "brother of Jesus" at the end of the inscription. At the trial, he admitted he had not seen the inscription and could not read it if he had. -- Joe Zias Under Oath | Excerpts from the Forgery Trial of the Century | Biblical Archaeology Society Staff | 06/14/2012