Posted on 02/26/2007 7:39:12 AM PST by Mr. Brightside
Scholars, clergy slam Jesus documentary
By MARSHALL THOMPSON, Associated Press Writer
35 minutes ago
JERUSALEM - Archaeologists and clergymen in the Holy Land derided claims in a new documentary produced by the Oscar-winning director James Cameron that contradict major Christian tenets. "The Lost Tomb of Christ," which the Discovery Channel will run on March 4, argues that 10 ancient ossuaries small caskets used to store bones discovered in a suburb of Jerusalem in 1980 may have contained the bones of Jesus and his family, according to a press release issued by the Discovery Channel.
One of the caskets even bears the title, "Judah, son of Jesus," hinting that Jesus may have had a son. And the very fact that Jesus had an ossuary would contradict the Christian belief that he was resurrected and ascended to heaven.
Most Christians believe Jesus' body spent three days at the site of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem's Old City. The burial site identified in Cameron's documentary is in a southern Jerusalem neighborhood nowhere near the church.
In 1996, when the BBC aired a short documentary on the same subject, archaeologists challenged the claims. Amos Kloner, the first archaeologist to examine the site, said the idea fails to hold up by archaeological standards but makes for profitable television.
"They just want to get money for it," Kloner said.
The claims have raised the ire of Christian leaders in the Holy Land.
"The historical, religious and archaeological evidence show that the place where Christ was buried is the Church of the Resurrection," said Attallah Hana, a Greek Orthodox clergyman in Jerusalem. The documentary, he said, "contradicts the religious principles and the historic and spiritual principles that we hold tightly to."
Stephen Pfann, a biblical scholar at the University of the Holy Land in Jerusalem who was interviewed in the documentary, said the film's hypothesis holds little weight.
"I don't think that Christians are going to buy into this," Pfann said. "But skeptics, in general, would like to see something that pokes holes into the story that so many people hold dear."
"How possible is it?" Pfann said. "On a scale of one through 10 10 being completely possible it's probably a one, maybe a one and a half."
Pfann is even unsure that the name "Jesus" on the caskets was read correctly. He thinks it's more likely the name "Hanun."
Kloner also said the filmmakers' assertions are false.
"It was an ordinary middle-class Jerusalem burial cave," Kloner said. "The names on the caskets are the most common names found among Jews at the time."
Archaeologists also balk at the filmmaker's claim that the James Ossuary the center of a famous antiquities fraud in Israel might have originated from the same cave. In 2005, Israel charged five suspects with forgery in connection with the infamous bone box.
"I don't think the James Ossuary came from the same cave," said Dan Bahat, an archaeologist at Bar-Ilan University. "If it were found there, the man who made the forgery would have taken something better. He would have taken Jesus."
Although the documentary makers claim to have found the tomb of Jesus, the British Broadcasting Corporation beat them to the punch by 11 years.
Osnat Goaz, a spokeswoman for the Israeli government agency responsible for archaeology, declined to comment before the documentary was aired.
We don't need to be rioting homicidal fools. We know there is nothing anyone can do or say to change the truth. No matter how much they want to discredit or deny Christ, it will never change the fact that the tomb is empty and Jesus is Lord.
I think it is because we are so certain of our God that we can ignore the garbage out there. They, on the other hand, cannot seriously, in the dark recesses of their hearts and minds, believe that black box they bow to in Mecca means anything except evil.
How blessed we are.
Succinctly put. Yes, we are so blessed in having a loving, forgiving Lord.
:)
"Then we went into the parking lot and fired AR-15s and Mini-14s into the air. "
Man I gotta join your church, where is it?
Perhaps one of them was labeled "Leonardo DiCaprio's career".
Then this would be somebody who was son of a greek named Jesus...actually Iesus....as the Son of God was named Yeshua. His momma Mary never called Him Jesus and He would not have been buried as Jesus.
Our Lord was a Jew not a greek. This guy couldn't have produce a good lie...it falls apart from the beginning. Amateur!
Just in my imagination.
;^)
Sunday, February 25, 2007, Yawn and double yawn, http://www.beliefnet.com/blogs/JWalking/2007/02/yawn-and-double-yawn.html
The bottom line from the whole, "Hey, I found Jesus' bones in a box!" thing by James Cameron - yawn and double yawn. There really isn't anything new - although I have no doubt that there are those who will make it seem like new news. This is a rehash of old accusations made about a tomb discovered 27-years ago. The best piece I've seen about it comes from The Jerusalem Post. Here it is in full: The Israeli-born, Canadian-based filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici is reigniting claims, first made over a decade ago, that a burial cave uncovered 27 years ago in Talpiot, Jerusalem, is the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth and his family. At a press conference in New York on Monday, the two-time Emmy winner Jacobovici and his team - including Hollywood director James Cameron - will detail claims that of 10 ossuaries found in the cave when it was discovered in 1980, six bear inscriptions identifying them as those of Jesus, his mother Mary, a second Mary (possibly Mary Magdalene), and relatives Matthew, Josa and Judah (possibly Jesus's son). Their documentary will be screened this week in the US, UK, on Channel 8 in Israel and around the world. The producers are said to have worked on the project with world-renowned archeologists, statisticians and DNA specialists. But Bar-Ilan University Prof. Amos Kloner, the Jerusalem District archeologist who officially oversaw the work at the tomb in 1980 and has published detailed findings on its contents, on Saturday night dismissed the claims. "It makes a great story for a TV film," he told The Jerusalem Post. "But it's impossible. It's nonsense." Kloner, who said he was interviewed for the new film but has not seen it, said the names found on the ossuaries were common, and the fact that such apparently resonant names had been found together was of no significance. He added that "Jesus son of Joseph" inscriptions had been found on several other ossuaries over the years. "There is no likelihood that Jesus and his relatives had a family tomb," Kloner said. "They were a Galilee family with no ties in Jerusalem. The Talpiot tomb belonged to a middle-class family from the 1st century CE." A spokeswoman for the Israel Antiquities Authority had no comment herself on the documentary and referred inquiries to Kloner, who no longer works for the IAA. The spokeswoman did say, however, that the IAA has loaned out two of the ossuaries that were found in the Talpiot tomb for display by the filmmakers at Monday's New York press conference. She said it was a routine procedure to lend out such artifacts provided the borrowers complied with the necessary handling, transport and insurance requirements and that it did not signal any IAA authentication of claims made in the documentary. Kloner said the IAA had been "very foolish" to agree to the loan. "The left hand there doesn't know what the right hand is doing," he said. The Daily Telegraph reported this weekend that the 10 ossuaries removed from the tomb when it was first excavated "were taken initially to the Rockefeller Archaeological Museum outside the Old City of Jerusalem. Nine were catalogued and stored but the tenth was left outside in a courtyard. That ossuary has subsequently gone missing." But Kloner said the IAA routinely left ossuaries in the courtyard if they were not inscribed and were unremarkable, since it had no room for them all "under our roofs." He added: "Nothing has disappeared." The Jacobovici documentary comes more than 10 years after similar speculation about the so-called Jesus family tomb made world headlines, prompting a London Sunday Times feature entitled "The Tomb that Dare Not Speak Its Name" and a BBC documentary. The assertion that the ossuaries found in the Talpiot tomb were those of Jesus of Nazareth and family members was branded by The Sunday Times at the time as an archeological discovery "that challenges the very basis of Christianity." The makers of the documentary are refusing to discuss its content prior to their New York press conference.
thanks go to GoLightly and xcamel for compiling the list (thus far) of such topics:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1789769/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1789966/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1790456/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1790579/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1790608/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1790818/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1790884/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1790953/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791244/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1791251/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791352/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791365/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791383/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791513/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791544/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791583/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791588/posts
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1791610/posts
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