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The Lost Tomb of Jesus

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posted on Jan, 9 2011 @ 11:53 PM
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I was doing some research about ancient scrolls online, one thing let to another and I found a documentary where they claim to have possibly found the family tomb of Jesus of Nazareth. I went online trying to find a free copy of this program, and since it was apparently first shown in the discovery channel in 2007 I was able to track a copy of the program for everyone to watch.

I have to tell you, after watching the video they do seem to have compelling evidence to the claim that they found Jesus' family tomb, which includes his tomb.

IMO this could be the best evidence that a historical Jesus existed, including his family, which includes both Mary's.

This tomb, if it is the tomb of the real Jesus, and the fact that Mary Magdalene was also found in this family tomb seems to also prove that Mary Magdalene was Jesus' wife, and they also found the tomb of Juda, son of Jesus which would imply that Jesus did have a son.

Here I will post the entire video, which is split in 10 parts.

www.youtube.com...

www.youtube.com...

www.youtube.com...

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www.youtube.com...



posted on Jan, 9 2011 @ 11:59 PM
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I saw that before. I believe a conclusion was made that back then Jesus was a popular name so they can't be sure or not if it is in fact the tomb of the biblical Jesus.



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 12:04 AM
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Originally posted by kimish
I saw that before. I believe a conclusion was made that back then Jesus was a popular name so they can't be sure or not if it is in fact the tomb of the biblical Jesus.


If the name Jesus is taken alone then yes, but when you put in perspective the other names together it does seem to point to this being the family tomb of Jesus.

They didn't just find one ossuary, there were 10 ossuaries, and the 10 names coincide with names of Jesus' family, except that it includes Mary Magdalene, and Juda, son of Jesus.

The tomb is around 2,000 years old, and all these names together in one tomb make it almost impossible for it to be the tomb of anyone else.

Watch all the videos.
edit on 10-1-2011 by ElectricUniverse because: errors.



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 12:14 AM
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Just fyi dude lol it's not a question "did jesus really exist?" he for sure did dude, so did muhammad and budda ect. They were all real people of course it's just whether you choose to believe in what they did ect ect.



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 12:41 AM
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Originally posted by thethetheluis
Just fyi dude lol it's not a question "did jesus really exist?" he for sure did dude, so did muhammad and budda ect. They were all real people of course it's just whether you choose to believe in what they did ect ect.


A lot of people claim that there is no proof of a historical Jesus.

BTW, if you read the non-canonical books such as the Gospel of Thomas, The Gospel According to Mary Magdalene and other Gospels which were not accepted by the Church you would find a different story about what Jesus was actually trying to teach.

For example, in the Gospel of Thomas you can find different quotes of Jesus which contradict much of what is written in the accepted Bible/s.


(3) Jesus said, "If those who lead you say to you, 'See, the kingdom is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you. Rather, the kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living father. But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty and it is you who are that poverty."

www.gnosis.org...

Which contradicts the claim of salvation can be achieved only through Jesus.



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 09:50 AM
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Originally posted by ElectricUniverse
Which contradicts the claim of salvation can be achieved only through Jesus.


... which shows that Gnostic Christians aren't Christians, lol.

The Gospel of Thomas is a forgery (in the sense that it wasn't written by who it claims to be written by -- the twin brother of Jesus, Jude) that is generally dated about 100 years after Christ died, and is clearly a Gnostic document that combines some things that Jesus is quoted as having said in the New Testament with other things that he couldn't possibly have said.

For your OP, there have been a number of refutations of claims made in that film, including some who participated in it:


…a specialist in ancient apocryphal text, Professor Francois Bovon, who is quoted in the film as saying the enigmatic ossuary inscription "Mariamne" is the same woman known as Mary Magdalene - one of the filmmakers' critical arguments - issued a disclaimer stating that he did not believe that "Mariamne" stood for Mary of Magdalene at all.
Source


You can find more, but it seems rather unlikely that this was the tomb of Jesus, the guy in the Bible. Your Christian Gnostics wouldn't have believed it anyway, as most of them viewed Christ as not actually having a body to bury in the first place.



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 02:08 PM
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Originally posted by adjensen
... which shows that Gnostic Christians aren't Christians, lol.

The Gospel of Thomas is a forgery (in the sense that it wasn't written by who it claims to be written by -- the twin brother of Jesus, Jude) that is generally dated about 100 years after Christ died, and is clearly a Gnostic document that combines some things that Jesus is quoted as having said in the New Testament with other things that he couldn't possibly have said.


Why do you claim it is a forgery? because of the possible date it was written? I think you have no idea on what dates were written the new testament books of the bible, they all were written around the same time. They all seemed to have been written down at about 33 AD, until about 92 AD. or so, so because of the "possible dates" are from about 130 AD - 250 BCE does not mean this was a forgery, more so when these could be copies of early manuscripts that haven't been found yet.

www.errantskeptics.org...



Originally posted by adjensen

For your OP, there have been a number of refutations of claims made in that film, including some who participated in it:




…a specialist in ancient apocryphal text, Professor Francois Bovon, who is quoted in the film as saying the enigmatic ossuary inscription "Mariamne" is the same woman known as Mary Magdalene - one of the filmmakers' critical arguments - issued a disclaimer stating that he did not believe that "Mariamne" stood for Mary of Magdalene at all.
Source


Did those people watch the documentary? The University of Toronto statistician Professor Andrey Feuerverger said from the beginning what they are claiming in that blog that he is claiming now. in essence they are claiming he backtracked when in fact that is exactly what he said from the beginning "that the possibility of finding those names in the same tomb were those odds."

BTW, that link you gave is a blog for staunch atheists, so it is not an unbiased source. The statitician did not backtrack, he reafirmed what he said on the documentary.

You have to remember this also, the books that form the bible were re-written, and translated to different languages and just like many within the Catholic/Christian churches would claim "it is not possible for Jesus to have said this" the early fathers of the church would also not accept such sayings and would have changed many of them either knowingly, or unknowingly.

The non-cannonical books have gotten to us pretty much in their original form since we have found some of the earliest copies close to the time of Christ, and not as translations of translations, of translations which could have been bastardised to reflect what the early church scholars "could have thought the original books said." Not to mention the bias that most probably found its way into the books to reflect what scholars, or the bosses of scholars "thought" the books and their authors meant.

There is no possible way that several books written in different languages and translated into different languages dozens of times could have survived untouched from bias and from errors for 2,000 years of translations and re-writtings.



Originally posted by adjensen
You can find more, but it seems rather unlikely that this was the tomb of Jesus, the guy in the Bible. Your Christian Gnostics wouldn't have believed it anyway, as most of them viewed Christ as not actually having a body to bury in the first place.


What are the odds of finding all those names together under the same family tomb? It is not like back in those days there were hundreds of thousands, or millions of people living in that area.
edit on 10-1-2011 by ElectricUniverse because: errors



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 02:20 PM
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reply to post by ElectricUniverse
 

A lot of people claim that there is no proof of a historical Jesus.

How would that be a surprise?
If you are a researcher in old writings, then look into the "Hebrew Gospels" which the earliest Christian powers that be went on a military campaign to eradicate, and any people who had knowledge of the books.
That way the people of an empirical centralized church could create Jesus in their own image, regardless of anything approximating a first hand account by the people who were with Jesus or were in the vicinity of Jesus when he was on his Judean mission.
The real center of modern Christianity was in Alexandria and the people of Alexandria wanted it to stay that way and that only their theology would be passed on as the official version. Thus there was money made available for small private armies under imperial protection to round up and destroy any competition for the claim.
So when you have doubts about the authenticity of the Jesus story, well that would be normal considering the dirth of sources and artificial appearance of what we have as a finished product.
That being said, I do think there are details of the Jesus story which are accurate and that the Gospel editors did not see reason to change, such as the tomb being new and previously unused and belonging to someone not directly related but of a friend or otherwise a believer in the holy nature of Jesus..


edit on 10-1-2011 by jmdewey60 because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 03:07 PM
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Originally posted by ElectricUniverse

Originally posted by adjensen
... which shows that Gnostic Christians aren't Christians, lol.

The Gospel of Thomas is a forgery (in the sense that it wasn't written by who it claims to be written by -- the twin brother of Jesus, Jude) that is generally dated about 100 years after Christ died, and is clearly a Gnostic document that combines some things that Jesus is quoted as having said in the New Testament with other things that he couldn't possibly have said.


Why do you claim it is a forgery? because of the possible date it was written? I think you have no idea on what dates were written the new testament books of the bible, they all were written around the same time and some were written. They all seemed to have been written down at about 33 AD, until about 92 AD. or so, so because of the "possible dates" are from about 130 AD - 250 BCE does not mean this was a forgery, more so when these could be copies of early manuscripts that haven't been found yet.


Um, you're kind of all over the map there, but the canonical Gospels (Mt, Mk, Lk, Jn) are all dated probably mid-50sAD to maybe (for John) 90AD or so. Paul's letters obviously predate his death in 67AD. The rest of it probably falls somewhere in between. We have evidence that the New Testament canon was in pretty much the form it is now (with two "extra" books and missing a couple of the Epistles) in the early second century.

Gnosticism wasn't a Christian religion -- it predated it by at least 100 years prior to Christ. Christian Gnosticism, however, which is what Nag Hammadi gave us, including the Gospel of Thomas, represents a later adoptive view, coming out of the teachings of Marcion (see en.wikipedia.org...) and Valentinus (see en.wikipedia.org... ), who came to prominence in the mid-second century.

So, by nature of the fact that the Gospel of Thomas represents this later, mature view of Christian Gnosticism, it cannot have been written by the Apostle Thomas (which is a misconception, anyway, but it's what some believe for some reason) or Jesus' twin brother Jude (which is what the text testifies to.) In terms of description of ancient manuscripts, this is why it is referred to as a forgery.


Did those people watch the documentary? The University of Toronto statistician Professor Andrey Feuerverger said from the beginning what they are claiming in that blog that he is claiming now. in essence they are claiming he backtracked when in fact that is exactly what he said from the beginning "that the possibility of finding those names in the same tomb were those odds."

BTW, that link you gave is a blog for staunch atheists, so it is not an unbiased source. The statitician did not backtrack, he reafirmed what he said on the documentary.


Well, you're talking about someone else than the person cited there. Regardless, there are plenty of critics of your documentary, I merely cited one.


What are the odds of finding all those names together under the same family tomb? It is not like back in those days there were hundreds of thousands, or millions of people living in that area.


I have no idea, not being an archaeologist, but there probably were hundreds of thousands living in that area, and if you read the Bible, one thing you're struck with is how unimaginitive they were with names -- tons of Johns, Simons, Marys. Not a Britney or Dylan in the lot

edit on 10-1-2011 by adjensen because: tag repair and I give up after four edits, lol



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 05:40 PM
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Originally posted by adjensen

Um, you're kind of all over the map there, but the canonical Gospels (Mt, Mk, Lk, Jn) are all dated probably mid-50sAD to maybe (for John) 90AD or so. Paul's letters obviously predate his death in 67AD. The rest of it probably falls somewhere in between. We have evidence that the New Testament canon was in pretty much the form it is now (with two "extra" books and missing a couple of the Epistles) in the early second century.


Since when does 67 AD predates Jesus' death? Jesus Christ supposedly died in 33 AD. Or are you talking about Paul's death? Either way, it took Paul 34 years to start writing about Jesus?

Why are you so willing to accept the claimed writings of Paul, which were 34 years after Jesus' death, but not that of non-canonical books?

And where is this proof that the New testament was written in the same form as it is now?



Originally posted by adjensen
....
So, by nature of the fact that the Gospel of Thomas represents this later, mature view of Christian Gnosticism, it cannot have been written by the Apostle Thomas (which is a misconception, anyway, but it's what some believe for some reason) or Jesus' twin brother Jude (which is what the text testifies to.) In terms of description of ancient manuscripts, this is why it is referred to as a forgery.


No, they are viewed as a forgery because these books give a completely different view of what could be the real teachings of Jesus and his disciples, that's why.

Just because the church decided to put together some books in around 325-333 AD and they decided what should be allowed, and what shouldn't doesn't make these non-canonical books any less real or authentic.

These books had to be hidden not only because they were labeled as "heresy" but because the church went on a campaign to try to burn, or hide anything that didn't correlate THEIR side of the story.



Originally posted by adjensen
Well, you're talking about someone else than the person cited there. Regardless, there are plenty of critics of your documentary, I merely cited one.


And it can clearly be seen that so far the claims being made about this find being a forgery are misconceptions, and falsehoods.

Is it possible that there was another, or other families with the same names as Jesus family and which were interred in one tomb? There is a possibility, but unless something more concrete doesn't prove the contrary it is also extremely possible that this tomb is exactly what the evidence seems to point to what it is.



Originally posted by adjensen
I have no idea, not being an archaeologist, but there probably were hundreds of thousands living in that area, and if you read the Bible, one thing you're struck with is how unimaginitive they were with names -- tons of Johns, Simons, Marys. Not a Britney or Dylan in the lot

edit on 10-1-2011 by adjensen because: tag repair and I give up after four edits, lol



Excursus: The Number of Pilgrims
The book estimates about 125,000 pilgrims to the festivals. This study is based on the number of animals killed at a Passover (18,000), how many could eat of each animal (ca. 10), the number of people killed at wars during the festivals, and the number in the courts. The population of Jerusalem was about 50,000 (so the number rose to 125,000 in the festivals. This number is too high, probably; most would say a population of about 30,000 in Jerusalem, swelling to 80,000 or even more at the festivals.

bible.org...
edit on 10-1-2011 by ElectricUniverse because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 10 2011 @ 07:33 PM
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Originally posted by ElectricUniverse
Since when does 67 AD predates Jesus' death? Jesus Christ supposedly died in 33 AD. Or are you talking about Paul's death? Either way, it took Paul 34 years to start writing about Jesus?


Not to speak for him, but I believe he was referring to PAUL'S death in 67AD, not the death of Jesus. Paul's letters were obviously written before his death. Get it?
edit on 1/10/2011 by schuyler because: (no reason given)



posted on Jan, 11 2011 @ 01:01 AM
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reply to post by ElectricUniverse
 



Since when does 67 AD predates Jesus' death?


Lolwuuut? The poster said Paul died in 67 AD. When you see a pronoun it refers to the last proper name given in a paragraph.



posted on Jan, 11 2011 @ 03:55 AM
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No matter, it still took from 19 years to 89 years for the New testament books to be written, so you want to accept just some books but not others because the church claims those are the ones you must believe? And please don't tell me "the boks were chosen by God" because hey were chosen by men who THOUGHT they knew what God wanted from them.

For almost 2,000 years the church went against everything that Jesus himself said they should be doing. They went so far as to burn anything, and everything they could, and if it wasn't because of some brave souls, and some of them were scholars and even some priests, we wouldn't have the non-canonical books this day.

The church would not want their followers to think for themselves and find salvation by themselves, instead the followers of the church have been brainwashed into believing they must follow everything the church says, even though we have seen in the history of the church that for most of the last 2,000 years they did more harm than good.

If this is the tomb of the family of Jesus it doesn't mean that his spirit didn't go to heaven, or that he didn't appear to his apostles, after all he even died on the cross.

I am thinking most people who posted here didn't even watch the documentary.



posted on Jan, 11 2011 @ 04:54 AM
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reply to post by ElectricUniverse
 



No matter, it still took from 19 years to 89 years for the New testament books to be written, so you want to accept just some books but not others because the church claims those are the ones you must believe? And please don't tell me "the boks were chosen by God" because hey were chosen by men who THOUGHT they knew what God wanted from them.


All the books for the NT were written within one lifetime. Before 67 AD except for John's last book "Revelation of Jesus Christ" which was written in 95 AD. The epistles of the apostle's disciples (Polycarp, Clement of Rome) were not included because they were a generation removed. So why would there include works written in the 3rd and 4th centuries like the Gnostic texts were?



posted on Jan, 11 2011 @ 09:17 AM
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Originally posted by ElectricUniverse

Originally posted by adjensen

Um, you're kind of all over the map there, but the canonical Gospels (Mt, Mk, Lk, Jn) are all dated probably mid-50sAD to maybe (for John) 90AD or so. Paul's letters obviously predate his death in 67AD. The rest of it probably falls somewhere in between. We have evidence that the New Testament canon was in pretty much the form it is now (with two "extra" books and missing a couple of the Epistles) in the early second century.


Since when does 67 AD predates Jesus' death? Jesus Christ supposedly died in 33 AD. Or are you talking about Paul's death? Either way, it took Paul 34 years to start writing about Jesus?


As the others have pointed out, I was referring to Paul's death in 67AD, and I didn't say that he wrote all of his letters in his dying days, the time frame appears to be that they were written over at least a decade.

People labour under a pretty big misconception about writing in the first century, spoiled, perhaps, by the ease by which we communicate today. They had no typewriters, no Xerox machines, no faxes. Letters or books were written by hand, often "hired hands", because most people in the time were illiterate, and being a scribe was a job, not something that just anyone did.

And for something to survive 2,000 years, it generally needed to have enough copies out there that some would survive. That means that someone had to read, say, Paul's letter to the Corinthians and decide that it was worth preserving or sharing, hire someone to make copies by hand, and pass those copies out. There are clear indications that Paul wrote more than 13 letters, he references them himself, but those are the ones that the early church a) had copies of and b) thought were relevant.


Why are you so willing to accept the claimed writings of Paul, which were 34 years after Jesus' death, but not that of non-canonical books?


Well, the criteria that the early church used to determine the canon was that the works needed to have an apostolic connection, that they support what we now call proto-orthodoxy and that they were widely used. Some things (like the writings of Clement or Justin Martyr) were rejected, not because they were wrong, but because they lacked one of those criteria. Others, like the Gospel of Thomas, are non-canonical because they are heretical (and, thus, were probably never considered for inclusion, though the Gnostic Christians would, of course, include it in their canon.)

I don't understand why you question the inclusion of Paul's writings because they were 34 years after the death of Christ, but you argue for the inclusion of something like The Gospel of Truth which was written over a 100 years after Christ's death, and claims "secret knowledge" from Christ, when the author couldn't possibly have met him, or anyone who knew him.


And where is this proof that the New testament was written in the same form as it is now?


It is in the Muratorian Fragment, dated 170AD or so. Apologies for my error in stating that it was "early 2nd century" -- it's a bit later than that. But the books that make up that canon are, indeed from the 1st Century.


No, they are viewed as a forgery because these books give a completely different view of what could be the real teachings of Jesus and his disciples, that's why.


Again, you are confusing terms. Your "different view" is why they are considered heretical (which means, literally, "wrong teaching", it's not an evil term,) but persons who study ancient documents use the term "forgery" for a document which claims to be something that it is not. It was fairly common, because no one wanted to read "The Gospel of Roger", who had ideas, but was a nobody. But they'd certainly read "The Gospel of Simon the Zealot", when Roger titled his missive that, never mind that Roger lived 100 years after Simon.


Excursus: The Number of Pilgrims
The book estimates about 125,000 pilgrims to the festivals. This study is based on the number of animals killed at a Passover (18,000), how many could eat of each animal (ca. 10), the number of people killed at wars during the festivals, and the number in the courts. The population of Jerusalem was about 50,000 (so the number rose to 125,000 in the festivals. This number is too high, probably; most would say a population of about 30,000 in Jerusalem, swelling to 80,000 or even more at the festivals.


Like I said, I'm not an archaeologist, but you're missing two things -- the factor of geography, as Jerusalem likely represented a cool place to be buried in for a Jew, so one might guess that non-inhabitants of the city might be interred there. And the factor of time -- the population of a city at one point in time is not a limiting factor. People were being buried there for centuries, and would continue to be buried there after Jesus was dead.
edit on 11-1-2011 by adjensen because: Meant Clement, typed Origen. doh!



posted on Jan, 11 2011 @ 02:15 PM
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I think the discussion is diverging to an argument over the gospels, which one is correct, etc. How about returning to the subject at hand, which is the truth or falsity of finding the Jesus family tomb in Jerusalem. I also think we need to put things in context here.

Yeah, I watched the whole thing. Thank you. This was done by James Cameron (Titanic, Avatar) and the filmmaker who did the "Naked Archaeologist" series. Neither is a trained archeologist. Op is basically parrroting the film's conclusions and arguing that the film must be, or is likely true. However, it's been out for awhile now and the experts disagree. For a summary of the issues involved, check this Wikipedia entry which gives lots of references on both sides of the story. The point is that the film is extremely controversial. It may be true. It may be, but if you're actually doing "research" then you owe it to yourself to examine these claims thoroughly and be familiar with both sides of the story. From an academic standpoint, this film is flawed. It's a popular sensationalistic treatment of the issues that is biased in favor of its own conclusions.

Now I also believe some of the criticisms of the film are flawed as well. To a traditional Christian the idea of a tomb for Jesus is anathema. If he physically ascended, how can this be? Many theologians today are perfectly content with a tomb saying such an issue does not really affect faith, so I'm not promoting this kind of argument as particularly worthwhile, though you can se why it would be upsetting.

Here is an example of a critique that is worried about the implications of finding bones, however, its arguments are still worth looking at.
Here is the official movies site and here is the Discovery Channels's own site.Here is another critique of the movie.



posted on Jan, 11 2011 @ 02:44 PM
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Originally posted by schuyler
I think the discussion is diverging to an argument over the gospels, which one is correct, etc


It is often the case that those who question the historical existence of Jesus, or the Jesus as depicted by mainstream Christianity, turn to alternative views and texts for some sort of evidence. But so much of it is misunderstood, misinterpreted, or accepted without any sort of "smell test", because too many people just want to believe anything that is counter to what facts, authority or tradition points to.

I like this quote, from the Wikipedia article that you cited:


Lawrence E. Stager, the Dorot professor of archaeology of Israel at Harvard, said the documentary was "exploiting the whole trend that caught on with The Da Vinci Code. One of the problems is there are so many biblically illiterate people around the world that they don't know what is real judicious assessment and what is what some of us in the field call 'fantastic archaeology.'"


In this case, there are extraordinary claims which fail to have any reasonable basis, promoted by an atheist (James Cameron) so it takes a bit of a "leap of faith" to see this as anything but a biased and highly questionable work.




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