Posted on 01/01/2005 3:03:32 PM PST by wagglebee
Experts advised world museums to re-examine their Bible-era relics after Israel indicted four collectors and dealers on charges of forging items thought to be some of the most important artifacts discovered in recent decades.
The indictments issued Wednesday labeled many such "finds" as fakes, including two that had been presented as the biggest biblical discoveries in the Holy Land - the purported burial box of Jesus' brother James and a stone tablet with written instructions by King Yoash on maintenance work at the ancient Jewish Temple.
Shuka Dorfman, the head of the Israel Antiquities Authority, said that the scope of the fraud appears to go far beyond what has been uncovered so far. The forgery ring has been operating for more than 20 years.
"We discovered only the tip of the iceberg. This spans the globe. It generated millions of dollars," Dorfman said. The forgers "were trying to change history."
The probe began after the Yoash tablet was offered for sale to the Israel Museum for $4.5 million two years ago. Scholars said the forgers were exploiting the deep emotional need of Jews and Christians to find physical evidence to reinforce their beliefs.
The indictment listed 124 witnesses, including antiquities collectors, archaeologists, officials from Sotheby's auction house in Israel and representatives of the British Museum and the Brooklyn Museum.
"This does not discredit the profession. It discredits unscrupulous dealers and collectors," said Eric Myers, an archaeology professor at Duke University.
The forgers would often use authentic but relatively mundane artifacts, such as a plain burial box, decanter or shard, and increase their value enormously by adding inscriptions, Dorfman said. Once the words were engraved, the forgers would try to recreate patina, or ancient grime, to cover the carvings, the indictment said.
The four men indicted were Tel Aviv collector Oded Golan, the owner of the James ossuary and the Yoash tablet; Robert Deutsch, an inscriptions expert who teaches at Haifa University; collector Shlomo Cohen; and antiquities dealer Faiz al-Amaleh. The four are free on bail, police said.
A fifth person was indicted, but his name was not released because he is not in the country. Additional indictments were to be issued in coming days, said Shaul Naim, the chief investigator of the Jerusalem police.
Golan said in a statement Wednesday that "there is not one grain of truth in the fantastic allegations related to me." He said that the investigation was aimed at "destroying collecting and trade in antiquities in Israel."
Deutsch dismissed the indictment as "ridiculous."
Hershel Shanks, the editor of the Biblical Archaeology Review in Washington, said in a telephone interview: "Either this is going to be proven a horrific scandal or the greatest embarrassment to the Israel Antiquities Authority."
Shanks disclosed the existence of the James ossuary at a November 2002 news conference.
Uzi Dahari, a top official in the Israel Antiquities Authority, said in a recent lecture that some of the forgeries were done by an Egyptian artisan who has worked in Israel for the past 15 years. His habit of bragging about his exploits in a Tel Aviv pub brought him to the attention of police, Dahari said.
Naim said that many more fakes are apparently in the possession of collectors and museums worldwide.
Shimon Gibson, an Israeli archaeologist, said that museums should review items of questionable origin. "Now it looks like we are going to have to go backward and double-check all our facts to make sure that what we thought was real really is," he said.
Last week, the Israel Museum said that one of its most prized possessions, an ivory pomegranate scholars long believed served as the tip of a scepter for Jewish Temple priests, was also a fake.
The indictment listed the pomegranate as one of the items forged by the ring, but no charges were brought in this case because the statute of limitations expired. The pomegranate was bought by the Israel Museum in the late 1980s from an anonymous collector for $550,000.
In a statement, the Israel Museum expressed support for efforts to "end such criminal activities," adding that its investigation of the authenticity of the pomegranate was its own.
The investigation trained a spotlight on the sometimes murky antiquities trade in the Holy Land.
"It's a free-for-all market ... and there is no control over something that doesn't come from a proper excavation, photographed and documented," Dorfman said.
I'm sure this is what the AP and their leftist "scholar" friends believe.
GGG Ping!
So, the Josheph box is a fraud?
It always seemed a little to "prepackaged" for me.
"Bible-era relics"
The Bible era? Well, isn't that ...hmmm lets see ... how many thousands years B.C. (Before Christ)?? and we are STILL in the "Bible Era" ??
In other words the Bible Era is the entire HISTORY of MANKIND. I guess there could be a forgery here and there in that amount of time.
As far as the AP and the other leftists are concerned, the Bible is about as relevant to us as Aesop's Fables.
Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on, off, or alter the "Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list --
Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
The GGG Digest -- Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)
The best time for these cases was 500 yrs ago, in an era of relics. There would be three different heads of the same saint, all equally authentic and miracle working, in three different places. So for this funeral box, too: there would have already been several of them, and finding or making one more would not present any problem; the first miracle attributed to it would immediately authenticate it beyond any doubt.
Five hundred years ago, there was no technology to authenticate these objects, so it was merely a matter of convincing a few powerful people. The people who made the fake James ossuary should have known that anything even approaching the importance of this would be examined by the top experts in the world and eventually the fraud would be discovered.
Five hundred years ago the relics were authenticated by inspiring visions and performing miracles. For the times it was not too bad authentication technology.
So much for that one...
Dunno, but it starts "In the beginning..."
...and we are STILL in the "Bible Era" ?
Yup, I think it ends sometime after the end of the millennium.
In other words the Bible Era is the entire HISTORY of MANKIND. I guess there could be a forgery here and there in that amount of time.
Agreed!!!
Father Elijah bump.
The forgers were trying to make a fraudulent dollar, nothing more... HOWEVER--
It's people like those of 'The Jesus Seminar' and frauds who created evolutionary frauds like Piltdown Man, and who are in denial about enormous gaps in the 'fossil' record... who are trying to 'change history' ...
...still, this is indeed a sad day for Biblical archaeology.
Scholars said the forgers were exploiting the deep emotional need of Jews and Christians to find physical evidence to reinforce their beliefs.
I'm sure this is what the AP and their leftist "scholar" friends believe.
_______________________________________________________
probably right.
Hbr 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things HOPED FOR, the evidence of THINGS NOT SEEN. http://www.blueletterbible.org/kjv/Hbr/Hbr011.html#1
Hbr 11:2 For by it the elders obtained a good report...... [AP: read all].......
Hbr 11:39 And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:
Hbr 11:40 God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.
While reading this, I was reminded of my new Christmas gift from the kids, the Luther video, and the hawking of indulgences in the village square. Some of these 'scientists' are a hoot. I figured the 'James box' would prove to be a fraud when I first heard of it, and I didn't know a thing about it. Thanks for posting this.
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