It’s been a while since I’ve posted and so much has happened since then. For example, there is the pop science press blitz that the director of the Titanic discovered Jesus’ tomb. Despite the hoopla, you won’t find anyone at the Vatican packing. Why?
- Most of the information that the “Lost Tomb of Jesus” is putting forward has been known for years and the new additions has done little to bolster its crediblity.
- Scholars are split on the dating of the ossuaries. The “lost tomb of Jesus” could have been made before Jesus Christ was born!
- The names on the ossuaries (burial boxes) are not clear. For example, the ossuary that is supposedly Jesus’ is inscribed in Aramaic a notoriously difficult script to decipher. In fact, some scientists believe the name of the ossuary isn’t Jesus but Yunan.
- The claim that one of the ossuaries is Mary Magdalene’s comes from a reference to Mary Magdalene being called Mariamne in the Gospel of Philip, a gnostic fiction written four hundred years after the time of Christ!
- All the names found in the tomb (e.g. Jesus, Mary, Matthew, Judah) were the most common names of the time period. The stats given tells us more about trends in the names discovered on ossuaries than whether the remains in these boxes are in fact the same individuals found in the New Testament.
If any one of these claims are true, the whole case crumbles. Add to this the fact that the supposed “lost tomb” flatly contradicts the most credible historical sources we have on the life of Jesus (the Gospels), the tomb is from the wrong economic class, and its location isn’t even near the site known to be the place where Jesus was buried. Moreover, it is impossible to belive that Jesus “real life” was unknown to his closest followers and that none of the pagan or Jewish enemies of Christianity bothered to point out that the Gospels were grossly inaccurate. If the “Lost Tomb” is true, these enemies had in their grasp the ultimate incontrovertable proof that the claims of the Christians were false. But they never used it. Why? Because the claims were known to be true and this isn’t the “Lost Tomb” of Jesus.
It is not surprising that the press blitz to advertise the Discovery Channel special and the subsequent book has fallen flat. It, like the De Vinci Code, is just another unfounded attempt to cash in by mocking what Christians hold dear. It’s another lenten poke-in-the-eye for Christians.
What is truly sad is out uncritically the media had broadcasted James Cameron’s outrageous claims. I believe it was the “Today Show,” if I’m not mistaken, that had Cameron on for a chat. They went on and on the monumental Cameron’s claim was without ever presenting any views to the contrary. It was essentially a long info-mercial.
Luckily, the public has more or less seen through the hype and the story has quickly dropped off the charts. In my opinion, this isn’t enough. We need to make it clear to the pop science cable channels that if they are going to make an incredible claim, they’d better have some iron-clad evidence to back it up. Otherwise, the only channel that should air mock-umentaries like “The Lost Tomb of Jesus” should be the Sci-Fi Channel.
