[silverleaf]

It all does seem too very tidy and coincidental to find a whole family of peasants (at least just that generation of the family) with stone coffins listed by name, in one place, buried as wealthy people, and over 2000 years no one ever spoke or hinted of it. And in Jerusalem, many native people still casually acknowledge every place of any historical significance as if the events occurred last year.

[aruanan]

It all does seem too very tidy and coincidental to find a whole family of peasants (at least just that generation of the family) with stone coffins listed by name, in one place, buried as wealthy people, and over 2000 years no one ever spoke or hinted of it.

Jesus came from an artisan family. Stonemasons (or carpenters) were not peasants. They were the middle class of that day.

Too tidy, yes. If the Jewish ruling class debunkers had done this, it seems weird, given everything else they said, that the site wasn't well known. If the disciples and followers of Jesus had known about this and were basing their gospel upon the resurrection of Jesus, it seems inconceivable, given the presence of a strong Jewish following of the Way in Jerusalem, that they would have so boldly labeled everything that they would have wanted to conceal at the very thing they knew the Jewish ruling class was so eager to publicize. Besides, the origin of Mary M as the wife of Jesus is of more recent origin in the Gnostic gospels. There was nothing in the contemporaneous literature to suggest it. This whole thing seems designed to give support to a more current, and less supernatural, myth that a lot of people are eager to believe. Maybe it was something concocted by Gnostics after the fall of Jerusalem that they could point to to support their contention that Jesus never died on the cross.