-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: April 6, 2007 11:42:11 AM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: "Jesus Tomb" Claim Corrected
EXPERT:
JAMES CAMERON'S 'JESUS TOMB' CLAIM BASED ON FAULTY READING
[Inscription sould be read as "Mary and Martha," not "Mary the
Master" --
No relation to the Jesus family, of course ...]
Fox News, March 14, 2007
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,258716,00.html?
sPage=fnc.science/archaeology
A scholar looking into the factual basis of a popular but widely
criticized documentary that claims to have located the tomb of
Jesus said Tuesday that a crucial piece of evidence filmmakers used
to support their claim is a mistake.
Stephen Pfann, a textual scholar and paleographer at the University
of the Holy Land in Jerusalem, said he has released a paper
claiming the makers of "The Lost Tomb of Jesus" were mistaken when
they identified an ancient ossuary from the cave as belonging to
the New Testament's Mary Magdalene.
The film's director, Simcha Jacobovici, responded that other
researchers agreed with the documentary's conclusions.
Produced by Oscar-winning director James Cameron, the documentary
has drawn intense media coverage for its claims challenging
accepted Christian dogma.
Despite widespread ridicule from scholars, "The Lost Tomb of Jesus"
drew more than 4 million viewers when it aired on the Discovery
Channel on March 4.
A companion book, "The Jesus Family Tomb," has rocketed to sixth
place on The New York Times nonfiction best-seller list.
The film and book suggest that a first-century ossuary found in a
south Jerusalem cave in 1980 contained the remains of Jesus,
contradicting the Christian belief that he was resurrected and
ascended to heaven.
Ossuaries are stone boxes used at the time to store the bones of
the dead.
The filmmakers also suggest that Mary Magdalene was buried in the
tomb, that she and Jesus were married, and that an ossuary labeled
"Judah son of Jesus" belonged to their son.
The scholars who analyzed the Greek inscription on one of the
ossuaries after its discovery read it as "Mariamene e Mara,"
meaning "Mary the teacher" or "Mary the master."
Before the movie was screened, Jacobovici said that particular
inscription provided crucial support for his claim. The name
Mariamene is rare, and in some early Christian texts it is believed
to refer to Mary Magdalene.
But having analyzed the inscription, Pfann published a detailed
article on his university's Web site asserting that it doesn't read
"Mariamene" at all.
<_He's made a convincing argument, in my opinion._>
The inscription, Pfann said, is made up of two names inscribed by
two different hands: the first, "Mariame," was inscribed in a
formal Greek script, and later, when the bones of another woman
were added to the box, another scribe using a different cursive
script added the words "kai Mara," meaning "and Mara."
Mara is a different form of the name Martha.
According to Pfann's reading, the ossuary did not house the bones
of "Mary the teacher," but rather of two women, "Mary and Martha."
"In view of the above, there is no longer any reason to be tempted
to link this ossuary ... to Mary Magdalene or any other person in
biblical, non-biblical or church tradition," Pfann wrote.
In the interest of telling a good story, Pfann said, the
documentary engaged in some "fudging" of the facts.
"James Cameron is a great guru of science fiction, and he's taking
it to a new level with Simcha Jacobovici. You take a little bit of
science, spin a good yarn out of it and you get another
'Terminator' or 'Life of Brian,'" said Pfann, who briefly appeared
as an ossuary expert in the documentary.
In Israel on Tuesday for a screening of the film, the Toronto-based
Jacobovici welcomed Pfann's criticism, saying "every inscription
should be re-examined."
But Jacobovici said scholars who researched the ossuary in the past
agreed with the film's reading.
"Anyone who looks at it can see that the script was written by the
same hand," he added.
Jacobovici has faced criticism much tougher than Pfann's academic
critique.
The film has been termed "archaeo-porn," and Jacobovici has been
accused of "pimping the Bible."
Jacobovici attributes most of the criticism to scholars' discomfort
with journalists "casting light into their ossuary monopoly."
"What we're doing is democratizing this knowledge, and this is
driving some people crazy," he said.
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