Posted Mar 02, 2007 at 06:14AM by Glen D. Listed in: Archaeology Tags: James Cameron, University of Toronto, Discovery Channel, Israel, DNA
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the controversial There's a great deal of hype surrounding the upcoming James Cameron documentary which airs on the Discovery Channel. And why not? The date may mark your last day as a believer.

The documentary titled "The Lost Tomb of Jesus" seeks to establish that ossuaries excavated in Jerusalem belonged to a married Jesus, Mary Magdalene and quite possibly their "son", Judah. Some experts, however, are not convinced, calling the film "nonsense."

The Oscar-winning filmmaker Cameron and Canadian-Israeli journalist Simcha Jacobovici are the main forces behind the upcoming presentation. The documentary carries the same hype as "The Da Vinci Code" and both men are confident that their evidences will prove some points come March 4.

The excavation, contrary to popular assumptions, are not newly excavated. They were unearthed a decade ago in Jerusalem by Israeli archaeologist Amos Klooner and were discovered by Jacobovici only three years ago. Being the investigative reporter that he is, Jacobovici was captivated by the find and set out to do a deeper study.

The tomb allegedly contained bodies in ossuaries where the names "Jesus, Son of Joseph," Mary and "Judah son of Jesus" were inscribed. Jacobovici consulted a panel of experts to have some questions answered. He got DNA tests, statisticians, archaeologists and scholars on ancient texts to do the job. He came up with the following findings, which Cameron in turn described as "compelling."

  1. DNA Tests - According to DNA experts consulted by Jacobovici, the bodies in the tomb of Jesus and Mary were not related by blood, eliminating the possibility that the Mary there is the mother of Jesus and leading to the notion that the two must have been married. There was no mention of findings on the tomb of Judah.
  2. Ancient texts - the name "Mariamene" is inscribed in the ossuary of the woman, and according to the fifth-century script called "acts of Philip" the name was used interchangeably for Mary Magdalene.
  3. Statistics- experts in the University of Toronto have calculated the possibility of the name combinations to coincide in the same grave. the result was 600:1.
All of these, claimed the journalist, are facts and said that the world needs to see this and called for a "scientific, academic, theological debate" to commence.

more shots of the controversial tomb - Image 1 more shots of the controversial tomb - Image 1 


Other experts are not impressed, however, dismissing the so-called evidences as "much ado about nothing much." Klooner himself, who worked first hand at the tomb's excavation, is quite skeptical about the whole matter. These are the rebuttals issued by naysayers:
  1. There is little to no chance that the family of Jesus, which is from Galilee, can have their tomb in Jerusalem. The owners of the tomb were most probably middle to upper-class citizens who could afford the burial.
  2. The name inscription "Jesus son of Joseph" has been recorded in other inscriptions in four separate occasions, and those left behind by Christ would not have used the inscription anyway. At least a dozen other graves labeled "Yeshua" (Jesus) were found throughout history, and at the time when Christ existed, about a fourth of the women in Israel were named Mary, which makes the names argument inconclusive.
  3. They also debunked the DNA test as an irrelevant factor, saying that the fact of the matter is that people in the same tomb can seem unrelated by blood because it was common practice during that age that members of widely extended families can be buried together. Ergo, the man and woman in the tomb, may or may not be related, and there is no basis in the belief that they were married.
  4. The statistical argument is lacking in the sense that the sampling done to create the formula was too selective and that lowers the accuracy because tweaking the factors is a sign of bias or miscalculation.
The documentary airs on March 4. See for yourself and tell us what you think.


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