Archaeological find: Historic church discovered ‘could change history of Orthodoxy’

originally posted by: LABTECH767
Wonderful thread, this is pre iconoclasm and somehow survived those periods of eastern religious upheaval when the orthodox church was wracked by a movement whom wanted to adhere to the religious commandment against engraved images.
en.wikipedia.org...

You are quite correct in your assertion that the Orthodox imagery and those in the capadocian region's are probably more like the original image of christ in there depiction's, he came as a Jew, a Semite though it has also to be pointed out that historically fair haired and blue eye's people were actually prevelant in the area for many thousands of years before the european's, the Kurd's whom may be the descendant's of the philistines and other native tribe's (Though the phillistines were really pheonician, at least in there writing and trade link's, so how native they were is an entirely different argument) and the Kurd's are often born blond haired, often with blue or green eye's.

My favourite depiction of Christ is actually the Turin shroud, I know it is contentious but the head of the team whom returned the faulty carbon dating actually made a death bed confession that he himself believed the dating was wrong since his team had not dated the shroud proper but rather the material which had been sown in to mend it after the fire damage it had suffered in the medievil period.

Interestingly the shroud portrays a man with distinctive semitic features, long face and nose, high cheekbone's and though it can not really be represented it would seem to show thick perhaps wavy hair and a thick beard just as a jew of the first century would likely have appeared.

Though you may or may not accept it there is another image, not of christ but of the apparition of the virgin mary, the image on the cactus cloth tilma of Huan Diego which is on display in mexico city.

Though it is possible the image was altered at a later date there are many curiosity's about it such as curved reflection's in the eye's which seem to be of people, the only paint possible to create the colours on the tilma would have been acrylic paints but not only did they not exist but an analysis of the tilma showed no sing's of paint with the exception of the moon and the cherub beneath the woman on the cloak which may have been added later.
youtu.be...

Interestingly images including blured photographic images of the virgin's apparition in europe which sometimes appear to have golden hair seem to have the same feature's as this image.

Both Orthodox and Catholic as well as the Syriac Orthodox, the Ethiopian Orthodox, The Armenian Orthodox and the Coptyc church hold the virgin as Co-Redemtrix as she suffered the pain only a mother can feel as seeing her son die like that on the cross, all of these churches also hold to the traditional belief which can be dated back to the very earliest period of the church that she was raised up to heaven by her son.

Jesus said I shall come unto each as one of there own, why should his mother not also do so.

Miriam the mother of the Meshiach, the Emanuel, Jah incarnate - Jah Saves.

Often finds of sanctified sites like this are for a reason, there is great trouble in that part of the world and great persecution's so for the faithful this will serve as a reminder, that face of Jesus on that Icon is beautiful though obviously he look's more persio-greek on that one as it was of course much like the later works painted by someone whom may only have seen earlier iconographic images of maybe had a vision of the christ.

I always believed in a beared christ with long hair but back in the early-mid 90's I was having a lot of trauma and had a strange vision, I was just about to let go having had enough and in that vision I felt so tired, there before me was a man on a cross, I did not question, did not project my belief but simply accepted him as christ, his hair had been shorn as with a knife and his beard cut off to the skin, he was nevertheless crowned with a crown of thorns and I felt comforted as in the vision I rested my head against his chest, a voice said in the vision "This is what it is like to be dead", of course when My lord was crucified he did die but of course he also rose from death and is alive forever now, when he ascended he rose with the cloud's and that is meaning he became spirit from which he had come, when he come's again he will come in spirit and manifest once again but back from heaven not being born again of a woman.

Sorry if I am drifting but thank you for that beautiful imagery.

Although I have no vested interest in Jesus being any race, nor am I a Christian, I've always found it a bit funny when people say things like "The greatest miracle Jesus ever did was being a white-looking blue eyed man in the ancient Middle East." While it is unlikely he was such, there have been all kinds of caucasoid peoples across both the ancient ME and eastern Mediterranean basin. This is probably even more true if one considers these areas were the "New York" or "London" of their times, and were THE international centers of the world outside of India or let's say parts of China. Just like the NY of today, one can find every conceivable kind of person.

a reply to: Cobaltic1978 What do you hate more, god in the flesh, or his message to you?

originally posted by: chr0naut
a reply to: Ghost147

For some reason, I imagined a more Jewish hairstyle, similar to modern Rabbi's but longer.

To me the picture's hairstyle looks somewhat Greek.

Yes, I agree. I would say the artistic style is probably simply a matter of local than anything else

originally posted by: kenzohattori69
a reply to: Cobaltic1978 What do you hate more, god in the flesh, or his message to you?

I hate neither god in the flesh or his message, for I do not believe god exists.

originally posted by: Ghost147

originally posted by: chr0naut
a reply to: Ghost147

For some reason, I imagined a more Jewish hairstyle, similar to modern Rabbi's but longer.

To me the picture's hairstyle looks somewhat Greek.

Yes, I agree. I would say the artistic style is probably simply a matter of local than anything else

I wouldn't say it's that off.

Jerusalem is a crossroads like a lot of hubs in the Middle East were. The Greeks, the Romans, and the Persians all had their influences through there. Between the Persian Empire and Alexander and the Roman's in Christ's time.

The dress and hairstyles would have been reflective of it. Unless every Jew of the day was dressed exactly like modern day rabbis, then you would expect them to reflect the influences of the contemporary cultures meaning there might well be Greco-Roman hairstyles.

a reply to: Ghost147

Good find. S&F

When I look at Israel leaders, their parliment and population I see many who are white however anyone who cares about the skin color of Jesus is racist. I don't care if he is pink.

I also don't care if there are mistranslations in the bible or errors within the bible..... most errors are simple mistranslations by scribes... others may be intentional BUT is it not important to know the MAIN theme of these 66 books that have been combined? From the book of Genesis until the book of Revelation what is its overall theme? It is about the Messiah..... and he came and was called Jesus... (Yeshua) our Christ.... our savior. This is the key theme throughout the OT and NT.

Instead of arguing over Noah's ark or who Paul was etc.... why not concentrate on the issue at hand about Jesus, the one that will crush the serpents head....(Book of Genesis) From the beginning of the bible ........ lets US make man in OUR image.....

To really dislike ...... actually hate as some do here at ATS concerning Christian belief and how they try to tear it apart will do NOTHING for you. To judge an ENTIRE belief of over two BILLION and base your FINAL opinion of it due to a few thousand maybe even a million of misguided sinners in the past and present who have called themselves Christians but clearly are not ...... is clearly closed minded and there is clearly another reason ...... it is a personal choice, one that you have made from personal reasons.......not from some misguided fool from the past or present.....it runs much deeper within.

It is written that many will walk away from their faith based on what? Errors in a book? Really? Have you not had the intimacy of knowing Christ? If not than you never had faith for faith will reveal Christ and his love for you.

a reply to: DeathSlayer

Is hate of Christianity the real issue or is it people wanting the truth rather than the stylised brands of orthodox dogmatic religion with its wealth of busybody men trying to dictate how people should live their lives, not only from Christianity but all the desert religions.

As an archetype I couldn't agree more with you that Christ is one of the best with his teachings. But there are a lot of others giving a similar message throughout time and other parts of the world.

Personally I wasn't that fussed about the painting of him because like every picture you look at through history what is depicted is what was in fashion at that particular time in history and that is what you have at Capodocia.

I am wondering if there were other forms of religion around or was only Christianity presented there? This society is one of the most fascinating and I am glad they are still excavating.

a reply to: Cobaltic1978


You don't know anything about me and just because i find the Hagia Sophia beautiful makes zero indication that im deeply religious. What does dinosaurs have anything to do with the subject about an Orthodox Church found that dates to the time of Justinian?

I'm actually a really serious history nerd and I especially like Byzantine history so your assumptions have zero merit.

Also, I would be excited about dinosaur finds although I believe you're just throwing a jab at Christians and trying to throw the topic off.

a reply to: Quetzalcoatl14

Correct, the Macedonian Greek's were actually a different sub group to the nordic european's, they were of course another blonde group, the egyptians were said to be red skinned and sadly there gene's have now been so mixed with other groups' we can only get the impression from tomb painting that they were actually more of a chocolate brown race of north african's with likely very strong nubean features and they were perhaps the most advanced civilization of the ancient world for a considerable time.

I for one think there were actually other african high civilization's which have been lost to history such as one which may have carved a giant female form into the mountains of MALI, while many see only natural rock formation and wishful thinking there is some potential evidence such as the claim's of blue ceramic buried near to the site solarey.net...
If it is an artifact as opposed to a natural formation as many will argue then it may be over ten thousand years old, evidence perhaps of a lost civilization or perhaps shared culture that may once have been present in this region.

Back to the subject at hand though I do believe the Lord came as a Jew, what ethnic distinction's that mean's is another argument as racism is rife even in modern Isreal against non Caucasoid Jew's.
This is a disgusting story, Jew's acting more like NAZI's and playing at eugenic's to keep there nation Caucasian.
www.independent.co.uk...
But they are not alone in this racist agenda.
www.theguardian.com...
youtu.be...
www.globalresearch.ca...

So what would Jesus have said about this? or indeed Moshe whom led a probably very racially diverse group of ex slaves from egypt into the desert.