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James Charlesworth has a strongly worded statement on the recent Jerusalem Symposium that focused on the Talpiot Tomb. It's on the latest SBL Forum, which also features a letter from James Tabor on the topic:

Rebutting Sensational Claims Concerning a Symposium in Jerusalem
J. H. Charlesworth

A carefully planned and highly successful symposium in Jerusalem—on Jewish views of the afterlife and burial practices near Jerusalem before the destruction of the area by Roman armies in 70 CE—has been high-jacked by two disturbing and unexpected developments . . .

Labels: James Charlesworth, Talpiot tomb

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Last week I posted here a statement signed by several participants at a recent conference in Jerusalem on the Talpiot Tomb, The Talpiot Tomb Controversy Revisited, a statement that also appeared on our Department of Religion blog here at Duke. Simcha Jacobovici has now issued a statement in which he responds to his critics, posted on the Biblical Archaeology Review website:

Simcha Jacobovici Responds to His Critics

Regular readers here may have noticed that I have refrained from posting on the recent news stories, perhaps surprising in the light of my extensive blogging on the controversy last March and April (gathered under the label Talpiot Tomb). The reason for this is twofold. First, I have little fresh to say about the subject at this point, and I was not present in Jerusalem for the conference, and second, my desk has been overflowing with work over the last couple of weeks and my time has been limited. However, I would like to publish a round-up blog of some of the recent developments in due course, and I would like to revisit some of the questions I raised last March and April.

Labels: Talpiot tomb

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The folllowing statement, which also appears on the Duke University Religion Department Blog, is posted here at the request of my colleague Professor Eric Meyers, and Professor Jodi Magness of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Scroll down to the bottom of the post for the list of signatories. Note: slightly revised on 24 January 2008:

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The Talpiot Tomb Controversy Revisited

A firestorm has broken out in Jerusalem following the conclusion of the “Third Princeton Theological Seminary Symposium on Jewish Views of the Afterlife and Burial Practices in Second Temple Judaism: Evaluating the Talpiot Tomb in Context.” Most negative assessments of archaeologists and other scientists and scholars who attended have been excluded from the final press reports. Instead the media have presented the views of Simcha Jacobovici, who produced the controversial film and book “The Lost Tomb of Jesus” with Hollywood director James Cameron, and who claims that his identification has been vindicated by the conference papers. Nothing further from the truth can be deduced from the discussion and presentations that took place on January 13-17, 2008.

A statistical analysis of the names engraved on the ossuaries leaves no doubt that the probability of the Talpiot tomb belonging to Jesus’ family is virtually nil if the Mariamene named on one of the ossuaries is not Mary Magdalene. Even the reading of the inscribed name as “Mariamene” was contested by epigraphers at the conference. Furthermore, Mary Magdalene is not referred to by the Greek name Mariamene in any literary sources before the late second-third century AD. An expert panel of scholars on the subject of Mary in the early church dismissed out of hand the suggestion that Mary Magdalene was married to Jesus, and no traditions refer to a son of Jesus named Judah (another individual named on an ossuary from the Talpiot tomb). Moreover, the DNA evidence from the tomb, which has been used to suggest that Jesus had a wife, was dismissed by the Hebrew University team that devised such procedures and has conducted such research all over the world. The ossuary inscribed with the name “Jesus son of Joseph” is paralleled by a find from another Jerusalem tomb, and at least one speaker said the reading of the name “Jesus” on the Talpiot tomb ossuary is uncertain. Testimony from archaeologists who were involved in the excavation of the Talpiot tomb leaves no doubt that the “missing” tenth ossuary was plain and uninscribed, eliminating any possibility that it is the so-called “James ossuary.”

The identification of the Talpiot tomb as the tomb of Jesus’ family flies in the face of the accounts of Paul and the canonical Gospel, which are the earliest traditions describing Jesus’ death and burial. According to these accounts Jesus’ body was placed in the tomb of a prominent follower named Joseph of Arimathea. Since at least the early fourth century Christians have venerated the site of Jesus’ burial at the spot marked by the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. In contrast, not a single tradition, Christian or otherwise, preserves any reference to or recollection of a family tomb of Jesus anywhere in Jerusalem.

The smoking gun at the conference was the surprise appearance of Ruth Gat, the widow of the archaeologist who excavated the tomb in 1980 and has since passed away. Mrs. Gat announced that her husband had known about the identification all along but was afraid to tell anyone because of the possibility of an anti-Semitic reaction. However, Joseph Gat lacked the expertise to read the inscriptions. Jacobovici now says that Mrs. Gat’s statement has vindicated his claims about the tomb.

To conclude, we wish to protest the misrepresentation of the conference proceedings in the media, and make it clear that the majority of scholars in attendance – including all of the archaeologists and epigraphers who presented papers relating to the tomb - either reject the identification of the Talpiot tomb as belonging to Jesus’ family or find this claim highly speculative.

Signed,
Professor Mordechai Aviam, University of Rochester
Professor Ann Graham Brock, Iliff School of Theology, University of Denver
Professor F.W. Dobbs-Allsopp, Princeton Theological Seminary
Professor C.D. Elledge, Gustavus Adolphus College
Professor Shimon Gibson, University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Professor Rachel Hachlili, University of Haifa
Professor Amos Kloner, Bar-Ilan University
Professor Jodi Magness, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Professor Lee McDonald, Arcadia Seminary
Professor Eric M. Meyers, Duke University
Professor Stephen Pfann, University of the Holy Land
Professor Jonathan Price, Tel Aviv University
Professor Christopher Rollston, Emmanuel School of Religion
Professor Alan F. Segal, Barnard College, Columbia University
Professor Choon-Leong Seow, Princeton Theological Seminary
Mr. Joe Zias, Science and Antiquity Group, Jerusalem
Dr. Boaz Zissu, Bar-Ilan University

Labels: Talpiot tomb

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Thanks to Mark Elliott, formerly of BibleInterp.com (now that was a great site!), for alerting me to the new article he has co-authored with Kevin Kilty:

Probability, Statistics, and the Talpiot Tomb
Kevin T. Kilty, Ph.D., P.E.,
Mark Elliott, Ph.D.

It's already been noted by several people, including James Tabor and Darrell Bock, the latter with some interesting comments on Yoseh. I would like to comment on this article myself in due course, but I am working through a backlog at the moment and may not have time for a little. I look forward to comments from the statistical experts who earlier weighed in on this topic.

Labels: statistics, Talpiot tomb

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Antonio Lombatti emails:

After the documentary The Lost Tomb of Jesus, many foreign scholars asked me about the ossuaries of the Dominus Flevit. Since the publication by Bagatti and Milik is out of print and it was written in Italian, I've uploaded on my website the full list of inscriptions found on the 122 ossuaries. Hope this will be helpful.

http://www.antoniolombatti.it/B/Blog/3BF5DF28-60DF-4E90-BB09-478530685A32.html

Labels: ossuaries, Talpiot tomb

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Our Duke Religion Blog is steadily getting going, and the latest post is from Eric Meyers, offering a previously unpublished piece on his thoughts on Another Ossuary Story: The Tomb of Jesus, written in the days immediately preceding the airing of the documentary.

Labels: Duke University Religion Department, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb

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Over on Deinde, Danny Zacharias draws attention to this new article on the Biblical Archaeology Society website:

The Tomb of Jesus? Wrong on Every Count
By Craig Evans and Steven Feldman

It's a useful and clearly written piece and is a good summary of the issues. Moreover, it avoids polemic. I have one or two minor comments. First, a typo: "Mary Magdalene is healed by Jesus in Luke 8:8" should be Luke 8.2. Second, the article speaks of "Bovon’s theory that the Mariamne in the Acts of Philip was meant to be Mary Magdalene" and it argues against the identification by noting that Mariamne, in this text, is sister to Martha. But Bovon's view is more nuanced than it is presented here; I will quote a short section from an earlier post:

Surprisingly, in the light of the Discovery programme's claims, he does not make a sole identification of the Mariamne character in the Acts of Philip with Mary Magdalene. Although he says "The woman, it is my contention, is Mary Magdalene" (80), he also recognises that this literary character also has traits of Mary of Bethany. Most explicitly, note his remark:

"The text presupposes that Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany are the same person." (82, n.33).

The article also comments that "Bovon has recently stated that he does not think Mariamne is the real name of the historical Mary Magdalene". This is correct; see his short piece, The Tomb of Jesus, over on the SBL Forum. But it needs to be noted that it is not just "recently"; he had already made clear in the original article that he was uninterested in that context in the historical Mary Magdalene (see my earlier post).

A further query. Evans and Feldman say that "Some epigraphers think the Greek inscription on the ossuary actually reads 'Mariamne and Mara.'" This may well be true, though the most widely publicized revised reading was that of Stephen Pfann who reads the inscription as Mariame (no n) and Mara.

There is one fresh argument, or an argument that is fresh to me, which I found interesting:

The filmmakers also misunderstand another of the names found in the Talpiot tomb. The name YWSH should be pronounced “Yosah” (as Professor Tal Ilan in fact does in the documentary), not “Yoseh,” as the documentary consistently does. “Yosah” is not the Hebrew equivalent of the Greek form Joses, the name of Jesus’ brother (as in Mark 6:3 and elsewhere). The Hebrew equivalent is YWSY (and is found on a number of ossuaries in Greek and in Hebrew). The documentary’s discussion of this name is very misleading.

It may be that I have just missed earlier discussions of this point, but I would be interested to hear further discussion.

My only criticism of the article is that it does not directly engage the statistical case which is at the basis of the film-makers' claims, but I suppose one cannot cover every facet of the discussion on every occasion.

Labels: Craig Evans, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb

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Stephen Goranson sent an interesting review of The Jesus Family Tomb to ANE and Xtalk yesterday and I reproduce a cleaned up version, with permission, here. I have not yet read the book myself so am not able to comment myself on Stephen's comments:
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I have read the book, The Jesus Family Tomb: The Discovery, the Investigation, and the Evidence that Could Change History by Simcha Jacobovici and Charles Pellegrino HarperSanFrancisco, 2007). I think it is a misleading book and a disservice to its readers. One can say that it's pretty lively and glib in passages, perhaps because it was so unconstrained by any careful review by historians or even by good fact-checking and proof-reading editors. The foreword by James Cameron oddly assures us that the Titanic history was a difficult task but that this tomb case is practically beyond reasonable doubt.

Simcha Jacobovici fancies himself a fine reporter, but he plainly misreported, for example, Prof. Bovon's views on later literary developments about Mary Magdalen as if Bovon were making claims about first-century history.

Many have commented on the book's misapplication of statistics. Statistics, I suggest, framed differently than the authors have done, could indicate the improbabilities of the book's set of assertions. What percentage of the pre-70 CE population were Christian (or Nazarene, or Jesus of Nazareth followers)? What percentage--if any--of them used ossuaries? "Let the dead bury their own dead" (Matthew 8:22) can be interpreted as a less than ringing endorsement of ossuary-use. What percentage of those were genuinely anciently inscribed (as opposed to later inscribed, either in fraud or in pious memorial)? What percentage of those survive? Here, the flaw of excluding the other, earlier-known Jesus son of Joseph ossuary also comes in, because, if it is genuine (as I think), who is to say that that one had to have been dug by archaeologists in order to be counted? In other words, if there were a Jesus family tomb in Jerusalem, which I doubt, why couldn't *the* Jesus ossuary, if there were such, which I doubt, possibly have been looted, which we don't know of this ossuary anyway (i.e., we don't know how it got to the museum where Sukenik read it). Jesus' brother James was reportedly buried elsewhere in Jerusalem, and reportedly he was poor. Ossuaries were used by a relative few, the more wealthy.

Not only does the book assert the so-called Jesus family tomb has six New Testament-related names; the book also claims several other NT-related ossuaries. There is a tension between the book's claim that the Jesus family tomb is surprising, yet that the Simon (Peter) ossuary was also found, and also that of the Simon who reportedly carried the cross, and also Mary and Martha of Bethany, and also Lazarus, and also the High Priest Caiaphas. The book tries to have it both ways: are these NT-related finds rare or are they not? The book fails to inform readers of substantial reasons to doubt various of these proposed identifictions. It neglects, for instance, to cite Emile Puech and William Horbury and others who argue against the Caiphas identification. The book falsely claims that Alexander was a rare name; Tal Ilan's Name Lexicon lists 31 Alexanders. That is part of the case for claiming Simon of Cyrene's ossuary was found. But, according to its excavators, Sukenik and Avigad, that inscription does *not* say Simon of Cyrene (e.g., Israel Exploration Journal 1962, 10-11). Some of these identifications could be valid, but the book may have muddied the waters more than clarified matters.

Bellarmino Bagatti and some of his Franciscan students in Jerusalem may have overestimated the remaining signs of those Nazarenes and Ebionites that we anachronistically call Jewish-Christians. (The scribble before Yeshua was less likely a Christian cross symbol than the equivalent of testing the writing implement.) Joan E. Taylor wrote a "corrective" to the Bagatti school and rather underestimated Jewish-Christians and their traditions (Christians and the Holy Places: the Myth of Jewish-Christian Origins, 1993). Later, to her own good scholarly surprise, she wrote (in Palestine Exploration Quarterly [2002] pages 173-176) a very good case for early tradition that the Jesus tomb is, after all, indeed within the area of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

There are other problems with the book; if there's interest, others could be listed and discused--for instance, the wild speculations that Templars found the tomb and derived their teaching from it.

Unfortunately, many readers will probably consider criticisms of the book some kind of cover-up. This book, in my opinion, was poorly composed. It seems that Jacobovici's main sense of achievement was in obtaining exclusive contracts and in obtaining signed promises of silence. But that insularity led to a mess, and disservice to readers.

Stephen Goranson
http://www.duke.edu/~goranson

Labels: ossuaries, Stephen Goranson, Talpiot tomb

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In The Aramaic Blog, Steve Caruso has an update on the reading of the "Jesus, son of Joseph" inscription on one of the ossuaries in the Talpiot Tomb:

The Jesus Son of Joseph Inscription Part 2

and

The Jesus Son of Joseph Inscription Part 3

These posts are follow-ups to The Jesus Son of Joseph Inscription, mentioned here last week, Talpiot Tomb: Does it say Jesus?. Ed Cook commented on that post, and I added the comments in an update to the main post, and Steve Carruso now responds directly to those comments. As before, Steve has some useful illustrations.

Also this morning, Steve Goranson draws attention to a review of The Jesus Family Tomb by Joseph Fitzmyer, in America: The National Catholic Weekly:

Together at Last?
Joseph Fitzmyer

Fitzmyer focuses mainly on difficulties over the alleged MARIAMHNOU H MARA reading, and draws attention to issues also discussed here, especially in relation to Jacobovici's identification this character with Mary Magdalene on the basis of the Acts of Philip (Mariamne, Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany and related posts).

Labels: Fitzmyer, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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There are several additional things that are worth mentioning on the Talpiot tomb story from recent days. Randy Ingermanson has uploaded a clear, detailed investigation of the statistics and the tomb, co-written with Jay Cost. Some will remember his earlier piece, Statistics and the "Jesus Family Tomb". This piece builds on that one and takes it to a whole new level of thought and detail, though with the same conclusion, that the odds are strongly against this being Jesus of Nazareth's tomb. One particularly useful factor in the piece is the assigning of "Jesus factor", "Not Jesus factor" and "neutral factor" to the evidence, the kind of ground work I was attempting to do, in my ham-fisted way, with talk of "matches" and "non matches" and the difficulty of the latter not having been factored in to the documentary's thinking (The Statistical Case for the Identity of the "Jesus Family Tomb"). The new article is found here:

Bayes' Theorem and "The Jesus Family Tomb"

I have been lucky to be able to listen to the experts talking about the statistics in an email discussion initiated by James Tabor and featuring Randy Ingermanson, Jay Costs, Joe D'Mello and others.

Meanwhile, Robert Gundry has a guest post on Bruce Fisk's Crossings:

Robert Gundry on the physicality of Jesus' resurrection in earliest Christian proclamation

The post responds to James Tabor, partly on the Talpiot Tomb but also on The Jesus Dynasty. Speaking of James Tabor, you can now read a helpful summary of his thinking about the tomb on his blog:

The Talpiot Jesus Tomb: An Overview

This overview has brought about a series of responses by Darrell Bock on Bock's Blog, on Historical Context, Statistics, Inscriptions and Tabor's Hypotheticals.

In a March 13 post on Talpiot Tomb Various, I noted Michael Heiser on the ossuaries found at Dominus Flevit:

I want to draw your attention—and the attention of scholars and interested parties who read your blog—to a SECOND site that has all those names. In 1953-1955, Bellarmino Bagatti excavated the site of Dominus Flevit (“The Lord wept”) on the Mount of Olives. The excavation uncovered a necropolis and over 40 inscribed ossuaries – including the names of Mary, Martha, Matthew, Joseph, Jesus. These ossuaries are not, as far as I can tell, in Rahmani’s catalogue. I’m guessing the reason is that they are not the property of the Israel Antiquities Authority (see Rahmani’s Preface). The necropolis was apparently used ca. 136 BC to 300 AD. Here is a link that discusses the site. A few scanned pages of Bagatti’s excavation report (written in Italian) can be found here as well.

Now Antonio Lombatti emails:

I teach Medieval History (my field of research is the cult of Christian relics) and, while reading your excellent NT Blog, I came across the quotation of the Dominus Flevit excavations. There you quoted the Bagatti and Milik 1958 book which is, unfortunately, in Italian. Well, I am Italian... I got it and read it carefully. And I found out that on the 34 ossuaries Bagatti and Milik found there were (also) the following names: Jesus, Mary, Joseph, Judas, Mathew, Martha and... Mariame.

But, above all, the names Mary and Mariame were inscribed on the same ossuary and were found in the very same loculus. And, last but not least, the inscriptions were in GREEK.

The humour is still coming too. Chris Brady links to a delightful cartoon Tomb of Star Trek and there are plenty of places that crack the inevitable but still funny joke that the one thing that would have convinced them that this was Jesus' tomb would have been the discovery of a bracelet in there reading "WWID?"

It is worth mentioning too that discussion of the Talpiot tomb continues apace on the ANE-2 list, including regular contributions from Joe Zias and James Tabor.

Labels: ossuaries, statistics, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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I was away during the latter part of last week so haven't blogged for a little. It's good to see on my return that François Bovon has clarified his role in the Lost Tomb of Jesus documentary over on the SBL Site:

The Tomb of Jesus
François Bovon

See my earlier comments on the use made of Bovon in Mariamne, Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany; the present article makes clear succinctly that "I do not believe that Mariamne is the real name of Mary of Magdalene" and with respect to the Acts of Philip, "My interest is not historical, but on the level of literary traditions." The one slightly troubling element in the piece is the first point:

First, I have now seen the program and am not convinced of its main thesis. When I was questioned by Simcha Jacobovici and his team the questions were directed toward the Acts of Philip and the role of Mariamne in this text. I was not informed of the whole program and the orientation of the script.

Having done some television myself, including several Discovery Channel documentaries (though usually BBC partnered programmes), I have been lucky never to have had that kind of experience and, to be honest, I am a little taken aback by it. I have always talked with the programme makers at some length before the interview, sometimes over a period of weeks and months and I have always known what the programme involved, even if the final product is often spun in a particular direction that I was not completely happy with. But I suppose that the lesson that this teaches is always to make sure that one knows what one is getting involved with.

The SBL Site has a couple of other fresh articles, Steven Fine, Concerning the Jesus Family Tomb and Jonathan Reed, In Response to Tabor. It has to be said that the SBL Forum has done a great job in producing speedy responses from scholars interested in the issue.

Labels: Francois Bovon, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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On Friday, Joe D'Mello noted changes made on the Discovery Lost Tomb of Jesus website with respect to the statistical case. The site has also added more materials since it first went on-line. First, note the new Related Links page, which features follow-up materials on the internet on the tomb (e.g. Magness's article, Pfann's article, some of Tabor's materials) including this blog. Always nice to be mentioned! Most interesting, though, is a little feature only tangentially linked to the tomb, a beautiful graphic depiction of Israel in Jesus' day, with illustrations and clickable hotspots:

The Land of Jesus

A short blurb explains that information is drawn from Crossan and Reed's Excavating Jesus and the illustrations are drawn by Balage Balogh, "renowned as the finest archaeologist to have worked in Israel". It's a lovely looking sub-site and definitely one to recommend to students.

Labels: Historical Jesus, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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Further to my post the other day on Talpiot Tomb: Does is say Jesus?, I am grateful to James Tabor for sending over this PDF, which nicely illustrates Frank Moore Cross's reading of Yeshua` bar Yehosef. This graphical illustration was produced as part of the press pack connected with the Lost Tomb programme:

Jesus Inscription Breakdown (PDF)

Labels: ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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I've had a few days off from the tomb, so now it's back to business. One of the question marks over the Talpiot tomb ossuaries relates to the inscription alleged to say "Jesus, son of Joseph" (Yeshua` bar Yehosef). Rahmani (704) reads "Yeshua`(?)". Anyone who has taken a look at the inscription will understand the reason for the question mark, and several have expressed their anxiety over how one makes out Yeshua` here. As a non expert on such things, I have been looking around for some explanation of how the Yeshua` is derived, ideally with illustrations. As I have previously mentioned, some help comes from Michael Heiser, The Jesus Ossuary: A Critical Examination. But the piece I have been looking for, a kind of "idiot's guide" in which the letters are separated and the reading explained, is available in the following article:

The Lost Tomb of Jesus
Steve Carruso

The piece provides some nice illustrations, explaining how Yeshua` might be derived, adding a question mark over bar and providing some alternative suggestions for reading the letters in question, though none of them provide any recognisable, coherent names. He also asks the question whether the "cross mark" is in fact an aleph. Carruso is not an epigrapher, so I am not drawing attention to his piece as if to flag it up as expert commentary. Rather, I found it helpful for illustrating for non-experts the difficulties that some of the experts are seeing in interpreting the inscription as Jesus. The following thoughts and questions come to mind:

(1) Is Yeshua` the only viable suggestion for this combination of letters? Given the lack of plausible alternatives, it seems that Rahmani's suggestion is still the best, albeit one that requires a question mark to be present.

(2) Is there any chance that the so called "cross mark" is in fact an aleph? I recall seeing that this mark actually lines up with another mark on the lid, in which case there is presumably little chance that this is an aleph. It is a mark for aligning the lid properly.

(3) Are there parallels to this way of representing bar?

(4) In general, is it accurate to say that the person inscribing this ossuary has made a bit of a mess of it? Compared with the other ossuaries in this tomb, the inscription here is by far the hardest to read.

(5) In relation to the previous point, here is one of the major concerns about the potential identification of this ossuary with Jesus of Nazareth. How plausible is it that so little effort would have been made over someone of such obvious importance to so many as Jesus of Nazareth?

Update (22.01): Ed Cook comments, helpfully, to the following effect:

I don't think Caruso has divided the letters correctly. He assigns a long vertical shaft to the "shin", but this vertical is actually (in my opinion) the waw, and the letter he identifies as waw is, conversely, the left shaft of the shin. Also the triangle shape that is part of the yodh (these loops or triangles are common in the ossuaries) he assigns to the shin. In short, I do not believe that Caruso's site is a reliable source of paleographic information. The reading "Yeshua" looks likely to me based on the published drawing.

Labels: ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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Joe D'Mello emails me with the following (see previous posts in this thread):

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I just checked the Discovery Channel website and noticed that all three changes have been made.
================================================================================

Dr. Andrey Feuerverger, professor of statistics & mathematics at the University of Toronto, has concluded a high statistical probability that the Talpiot tomb is the JESUS FAMILY TOMB.

changed to

Dr. Andrey Feuerverger, professor of statistics at the University of Toronto, has concluded (subject to the stated historical assumptions) that it is unlikely that an equally "surprising” cluster of names would have arisen by chance under purely random sampling.

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Taking into account the chances that these names would be clustered together in a family tomb, this statistical study concludes that the odds – on the most conservative basis – are 600 to 1 in favor of this being the JESUS FAMILY TOMB. A statistical probability of 600 to 1 means that this conclusion works 599 times out of 600.

changed to:

Taking into account the chances that these names would be clustered together in a family tomb, this statistical study concludes that the probability under random chance of observing a cluster of names as compelling as this one within the given population parameters is 600 to 1, meaning that this conclusion works 599 times out of 600.

===========

"A statistical study commissioned by the broadcasters (Discovery Channel/Vision Canada/C4 UK) concludes that the probability factor is 600 to 1 in favor of this tomb being the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth and his family."

changed to

A statistical study commissioned by the broadcasters (Discovery Channel/Vision Canada/C4 UK) concludes that the probability factor is in the order of 600 to 1 that an equally "surprising" cluster of names would arise purely by chance under given assumptions.

---------------

Labels: ossuaries, statistics, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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Jack Poirier's article, which I mentioned the other day, on the Statistics behind the "Jesus Family Tomb", is now available at the Jerusalem Perspective Online:

The Statistics Behind "The Tomb"
Jack Poirier

This may be a good occasion to bring together in one place the other major articles on the statistical case:

Statistics and the "Jesus Family Tomb"
Randy Ingermanson

Examining the "Jesus Tomb" Evidence
Jay Cost

The Improper Application of Statistics in "The Lost Tomb of Jesus"
Stephen Pfann

Talpiot Tomb: Statistics
Includes several posts by Joe D'Mello

The last of these links is to all the material relevant to the statistical case from this blog, including several guest posts by Joe D'Mello, in interaction with Andrey Feuerverger, whose most recent statement is on his homepage.

Labels: ossuaries, statistics, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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I mentioned earlier (Talpiot Tomb Various) Stephen Pfann's new reading of the "Mariamenou Mara" ossuary. He has published his full reading in a very clear, eight page illustrated PDF:

Mary Magdalene is Now Missing:
A Corrected Reading of Rahmani Ossuary 701
By Stephen J. Pfann, Ph.D.

I have to admit that to my untrained eye, the case is pretty convincing that we should, all along, have been reading this as MARIAME KAI MARA (Mariame and Mara). The thing that is particularly helpful in Pfann's piece is his illustrations of parallels to the way KAI is written here. The article is a model of clarity. But I should stress that I am no expert at all in reading inscriptions, so I am looking forward to hearing the learned reactions of other experts to this interesting new proposal.

The only thing that puzzles me a little is the title of the piece, "Mary Magdalene is now missing", in that it might be said that Mary Magdalene was never there in the first place, or at least that the case for her identification, even on the previous reading, was weak, as Pfann goes on to note in p. 2 of the current piece. In so far as the new reading provides us with a Mary and a Martha, we have one additional NT related name in the tomb (Luke 10.38-42; John 11-12). As Pfann points out, these are common names ("Yet Another Mary and Martha?", p. 6), so it is still a long way from Simcha Jacobovici's hoped for "Ringo", but the new reading does not detract from a modified case that could be mounted on the basis of a Mary and a Martha, all the more so in that the Acts of Philip, on which the programme makers are keen, assumes that Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany are the same person (See Mariamne, Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany). I should make clear that I would not want to make such a case, but I point it out for the sake of fairness.

Labels: Mary Magdalene, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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I must admit that I thought interest in the Talpiot tomb would quickly die away, but I was wrong. Recent developments of interest include Michael Heiser's A New Twist in the Jesus Tomb Sideshow, which was circulated to lots of us today. Here's an excerpt:

I want to draw your attention—and the attention of scholars and interested parties who read your blog—to a SECOND site that has all those names. In 1953-1955, Bellarmino Bagatti excavated the site of Dominus Flevit (“The Lord wept”) on the Mount of Olives. The excavation uncovered a necropolis and over 40 inscribed ossuaries – including the names of Mary, Martha, Matthew, Joseph, Jesus. These ossuaries are not, as far as I can tell, in Rahmani’s catalogue. I’m guessing the reason is that they are not the property of the Israel Antiquities Authority (see Rahmani’s Preface). The necropolis was apparently used ca. 136 BC to 300 AD. Here is a link that discusses the site. A few scanned pages of Bagatti’s excavation report (written in Italian) can be found here as well.

Meanwhile, I've just received an updated version of Jack Poirier's article on the statistics and the tomb. It is to appear on Jerusalem Perspective Online but isn't there yet. As Jim West points out, Stephen Pfann has announced a re-reading of the "Mariamenou Mara" inscription -- see Scholar: 'Jesus Tomb' documentary got it wrong on CNN. And the SBL Forum carries responses by James Tabor to Jodi Magness and Christopher Rollston and to Jonathan Reed. On his blog, he promises breaking news.

I have one more thing to do, to complete my list of Errors and Inaccuracies later today. There are quite a lot still to get through. I am grateful to hear today from James Tabor that these have been reported back to those responsible for the site with a view to making corrections and adjustments.

Labels: ossuaries, statistics, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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Thanks to Joe D'Mello (see previous posts in the "Jesus Family Tomb" Statistics series) for this update concerning the Discovery Tomb Website:

==================
Discovery Channel has made one correction!

Note that the following paragraph from the 'Tomb Evidence' PDF file:

Taking into account the chances that these names would be clustered together in a family tomb, this statistical study concludes that the odds – on the most conservative basis – are 600 to 1 in favor of this being the JESUS FAMILY TOMB. A statistical probability of 600 to 1 means that this conclusion works 599 times out of 600.

has now been changed to

Taking into account the chances that these names would be clustered together in a family tomb, this statistical study concludes that the probability under random chance of observing a cluster of names as compelling as this one within the given population parameters is 600 to 1, meaning that this conclusion works 599 times out of 600.

I believe that this is an acknowledgement that the computed 600:1 odds really have no direct bearing to whether or not this is the family tomb of Jesus. It is very disappointing to note that Discovery is using a misleading play on words even in this "corrected" version. Notice that they are using the statistical term "population" (in this case the name combinations on the inscribed ossuaries in the roughly 1,100 family tombs) in a manner that the majority of readers will interpret as the "Jews who were living in the area at the time". There is a big difference! The odds would be much less with that latter interpretation!

While I am clearly happy that a change has been made - at least we are moving in the right direction - there are two other paragraphs (below) that are still not corrected, and I have e-mailed Dr. Feuerverger again inquiring why these were not changed. I hope that this will be the beginning of many changes that Discovery will make to correct inaccurate statements on their sites. Inaccuracies don't make for good and healthy debates!

"Dr. Andrey Feuerverger, professor of statistics & mathematics at the University of toronto, has concluded a high statistical probability that the Talpiot tomb is the JESUS FAMILY TOMB."

AND

"A statistical study commissioned by the broadcasters (Discovery Channel/Vision Canada/C4 UK) concludes that the probability factor is 600 to 1 in favor of this tomb being the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth and his family."

====================

Labels: ossuaries, statistics, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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I have spent some time on the Jesus Family Tomb Website over the last week or so while blogging reactions to the documentary that aired this time last week. I've noticed a lot of errors and inaccuracies on the site and I will address some of them here, perhaps in the hope that the site's authors will address some of these errors and inaccuracies. The list is incomplete -- it could be expanded with many more examples -- but I will begin with this representative sample of problems that I have found:

• Historical Jesus: "It is here [Nazareth], we are told, Jesus grew up. We know nothing more about him until we are told that, at 13, Jesus awed the local rabbis with his wisdom.": Luke 2.42 makes him twelve years old, and it is not "local rabbis" but teachers in the Temple in Jerusalem (Luke 2.46).


• Theological Jesus: "In fact, the Gospels reveal two genealogies for Jesus, one of his father’s line (the Davidic throne) and one of his mother’s (making him heir to the House of Judah)": both Genealogies (Matt. 1.1-17, Luke 3.23-28) trace Jesus' lineage through Joseph and David and Judah. A similar claim is made on the page on "Matia": Matthew where it is claimed that the idea that Luke's genealogy is Mary's is a "more widely accepted view", which is incorrect. The same claims are made again on The Gospel of Luke page.
  


• Maria / Miriam: "Isn’t it at least suggestive that the mother of Jesus has always been called “Maria?” In many surviving apocryphal books, like the Acts of Philip and others, the Virgin Mary was distinguished from Mary Magdalene by this very name": Contrast François Bovon:

  There is evidence that the same person may have received each of the three forms of the name. The mother of Jesus is called Μαριάμ or Μαρία in the New Testament, Μαριάμμη in three passages of the Protevangelium of James . . . . The assignment of names to Mary Magdalene is identical. She is called Μαρία ἡ Μαγδαληνή in Matt. 27.56, Μαριὰμ ἡ Μαγδαληνή a few verses later in Matt. 27.61; and Μαριάμμη in the Gospel of Mary, Hippolytus Haer. 5.1.7, Origen Cels. 5.62, and, in a Latin form, Priscillian's Apologeticum 1.
  
  Is there a tendency in the catholica to call Jesus' mother Μαρία and a pattern in nonorthodox communities for referring to Jesus' friend as Μαριάμμη? Probably not. ("Mary Magdalene in the Acts of Philip," F. Stanley Jones (ed.), Which Mary? The Marys of Early Christian Tradition (Leiden: Brill, 2003): 75-89: 80).
  

• The Historical Mary Magdalene: "The Gospel of Philip is a particularly valuable source of information about Mary Magdalene": the link given on the site is to their page on Acts of Philip, not the Gospel of Philip.


• The Theological Mariamene: "Astonishingly, Mariamne is the name by which the Magdalene has been known, as found in such non-canonical works as The Acts of Philip. Prominent Harvard scholars Francois Bovon and Karen King point out that not only is Mary Magdalene called “Mariamne” in these texts, Jesus’ mother is called “Maria”—coincidentally the name inscribed on the other “Mary” ossuary": see above (under Maria/Miriam) and note that Bovon in fact thinks that Jesus' mother is not present in the Acts of Philip.


• "Matia": Matthew: "Furthermore, Matthew, one of Jesus’ Twelve Apostles, is no relation to Jesus (his father is “Alphaeus”, and his brother is also one of the Twelve)": Matt. 9.9-13 (Call of Matthew) is parallel to Mark 2.13-17 (Call of Levi, Son of Alphaeus) but Matthew is not called "son of Alphaeus", nor is he described as the brother of James, son of Alphaeus who was one of the twelve (Mark 3.18 and par.)


• Probability: "When a tomb holding ossuaries with the names Jesus, Mary, Mary Magdalene, Judah, Yose and Matthew was discovered in 1980 . . .": there is no ossuary with the name "Mary Magdalene". This is seriously misleading. The same page goes on, "So just what is the likelihood that this tomb actually contains the remains of that same Jesus, in addition to his wife, Mary Magdalene, and his son, Judah?" This begs the question.


• 1st Century Writing: "It is believed that Jesus spoke to Pilate in Greek, and it is indeed likely that Jesus was familiar with Greek since he was trained as a Rabbi. Galilee is believed to have been predominantly Greek-speaking": it is not believed that Jesus spoke to Pilate in Greek; where this is claimed, it is a minority view; so too the idea that "Jesus was familiar with Greek". The statement that "Galilee is believed to have been predominantly Greek-speaking" is an error. Those few who think that Greek was spoken in Galilee argue that it was used alongside Aramaic.


• Historical Precedents: St Peter: "Peter did in fact carry on Jesus’ teachings. According to the Gospel of Luke, Peter was even able to perform miracles and healings": Presumably, Acts of the Apostles is meant here. The same page refers to "discpiles". It goes on, "However, the Acts of the Apostles tells us that he was later arrested by King Herod and eventually persecuted by the Romans": the first part of this is correct (Acts 12.1-4) but the latter part is incorrect, though vague. The same page goes on, "Scientists and archeologists later confirmed that this bone box did indeed belong to the same Simon, son of Jonah, whom Christ had renamed Peter": the identification has not been "confirmed".


• Nazareth: "Some sources say that they could have also been stone masons who worked in the nearby town Sepphoris": there are no sources that say this, though there may be secondary literature that speculates that this is the case. The same page says that after moving to Capernaum, "He returned to Nazareth twice and preached in the synagogue but the townspeople were so outraged by his teachings, they tried to throw him off a cliff." He only returns to Nazareth "twice" if one does not read Luke 4.16-30 as parallel with Mark 6.1-6. The same page goes on, "The people angrily demanded miracles as were done in Capernaum and Bethsaida": Luke 4.23 only mentions Capernaum. The same page goes on, "Needless to say, Jesus did not return to Nazareth": we do not know that.


• Gospel of Mary: "In December 1945, a collection of Christian Gnostic writings said to be dating as far back as the 2nd century AC were discovered near the town of Nag Hammadi in Egypt": AD?


• Gospel of Mary: "Recent controversy has surrounded the role of Mary Magdalene as wife and companion of the historical Jesus. Some scholars believe that remaining by the side of the crucifixion confirms the role of a wife and widow, while others believe that the washing of feet represents an old marriage ritual. Others contest that the Bible never explicitly states that Mary was a prostitute, and that indeed she comes from a royal bloodline that would make for an ideal marriage between Mary and Jesus": I don't know of any scholars who think that Mary Magdalene was Jesus' "wife and companion", or that "the washing of feet represents an old marriage ritual". The latter is not connected with Mary Magdalene in any Gospel (Luke 7.36-50, anonymous; John 12.1-11, Mary of Bethany). It is inaccurate to say "Others contest that the Bible never explicitly states that Mary was a prostitute". It is a fact that she is never called a prostitute. The "royal bloodline" comment here takes us even further into Da Vinci Code territory.


• Gospel of Thomas: "It has been suggested that the Gospel of Thomas has been suppressed by Christian authorities due to the status allotted to Mary of Magadala (sic) as master. Others believe that the Gospel of Thomas has been suppressed because it reveals the Gospel of Jesus' son, Judah Thomas, whose identity has remained under debate": both statements are false. The Gospel of Thomas was not suppressed "due to the status allotted to Mary of Magadala (sic) as master", not least since the text does not even say that. No one thinks that Thomas was suppressed because "it reveals the Gospel of Jesus' son, Judah Thomas". This is nonsense.


• The Gospels Nazarene: The Gospel of the Holy Twelve: This page is, I am afraid, nonsense from beginning to end, so I quote it in full:

  The Gospel of the Nazarenes or the Gospel of the Holy Twelve is considered to be the original Gospel or one of the first complete written manuscripts of the original word of Jesus.
  
  The term "Nazarene" is used by some to refer to early Jewish followers of Christianity in connection with the ancient Essene sect of Judaism which Jesus is often associated with. The original Gospels of Nazarene are said to have been written by St. John, who passed the manuscript along to a trusted friend in 70 AD following his arrest.
  
  In the nineteenth century, the Gospel of the Holy Twelve was rediscovered by a friar. However, since its exposure to Church Authorities in Rome, it has remained hidden in the Vatican archive, which some say is due to newly discovered content that would discredit the Church and the Council of Nicea.

  There is no reliable historical information contained on this page.


• The Essene Gospels of Peace: the information on this page concerns something of no ancient historical value whatsoever:

  In 1937, the first English translation of the Gospels of Peace appeared, following a 1928 translation of the ancient manuscript. The Gospels of Peace represent one ancient manuscript discovered in the Secret Archives of the Vatican.
  
  In these Gospels, Jesus is identified as a part of the Essene or Nazarite community of an ancient Jewish sect, whose early followers of Christianity are often attributed authorship of early writings such as the Dead Sea Scrolls.

  As with the previous example, this kind of material has no part to play in any serious discussion of ancient Christian Gospels.


• The Book of Jonah: It is not clear what this is doing in a list of "New Testament Apocryphal Texts", nor why it is thought to be important to studies of this tomb. I do not know what is meant by the second half of this sentence:

  Writings such as the Book of Jonah have interested biblical scholars and those considering the Jesus tomb, since the inclusion of the text in historical writings has proved inconsistent.

  The rest of the page also looks confused.


• Ebionites: this page overall needs revisiting, but a couple of particular oddities are:

  It does seem clear, however, that this Judeo-Christian sect did officially break from its supposed predecessors after the second century B.C.E. Religious scholars assert that this was partly a product of Christianity’s growing rupture from Judaism, resulting in the Roman Catholic Church’s desire to separate the two.

  The Roman Catholic Church? See too:

  Indeed, according to the Romans the Ebionites were heretics who rejected Paul, as well as Jesus’ divinity, including his "virgin birth."

  There is clearly some confusion here too.

Labels: Francois Bovon, Mary Magdalene, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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One of the key claims made in the recent documentary on the "Jesus Family Tomb" is that the ossuary inscription "Mariamenou Mara" is likely to identify Mary Magdalene. The authority for this identification is the fourth century Acts of Philip and the programme makers appeal to François Bovon (bio on Discovery here) to establish the identification. The Discovery site, for example, says the following:

From the Acts of Philip, a fourth-century work ostensibly written about Mary Magdalene's brother, Phillip (sic), which recently was recovered from a monastery at Mt. Athos in Greece, Professor Franois (sic) Bovon (Harvard University) has determined that Magdalene's real name was "Mariamne"

But does this accurately represent François Bovon's view? In an earlier post, Mariamne and the "Jesus Family Tomb", I wrote the following:

On Apocryphicity, Tony Chartrand-Burke asked whether Mariamne of the Acts of Philip is indeed Mary Magdalene, raising the possibility that she is Mary of Bethany. I've done a little reading since then and it seems that scholars are divided on the issue of the identity of this character in the Acts of Philip. It is clear that she is Philip's sister, but it also seems that she shares traits commonly associated with Mary, Jesus' mother, and Mary of Bethany, as well as Mary Magdalene. Stephen Shoemaker, for example, argues in a couple of publications that "the Gnostic Mary" is a kind of composite Gnostic character with characteristics from these several Marys.

But at that point, I had not had the chance to check to see what François Bovon actually says about the identification of Mariamne in the Acts of Philip. Some kind anonymous person put a copy of his "Mary Magdalene in the Acts of Philip," F. Stanley Jones (ed.), Which Mary? The Marys of Early Christian Tradition (Leiden: Brill, 2003): 75-89 in my pigeonhole earlier this week (excerpts on Google Books) so now I've had the chance to check to see what Bovon's view is. Surprisingly, in the light of the Discovery programme's claims, he does not make a sole identification of the Mariamne character in the Acts of Philip with Mary Magdalene. Although he says "The woman, it is my contention, is Mary Magdalene" (80), he also recognises that this literary character also has traits of Mary of Bethany. Most explicitly, note his remark:

"The text presupposes that Mary Magdalene and Mary of Bethany are the same person." (82, n.33).

Note too that Bovon is clear that he is discussing a literary figure in this text. He makes no claims at all about any alleged historical pedigree of the character in question. He says:

To be clear, I am not interested here in the reconstruction of the historical figure of Mary Magdalene, but in her portrayal in literary texts, particularly the Acts of Philip (80)

Labels: Francois Bovon, Mary Magdalene, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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It is sometimes said that there are no academics who think that the Talpiot tomb might be identified with Jesus' family tomb. I noted last week that this is incorrect, not only because of James Tabor's involvement (and I should have added Shimon Gibson), but also because James Charlesworth was reported as saying "A very good claim could be made that this was Jesus' clan" and he was present at the original press conference (see James Charlesworth on the "Jesus Family Tomb"). Now, Deinde point out that Prof. Charlesworth has provided an updated statement on the Princeton Theological Seminary website (also reproduced by permission on Deinde). In the statement, he distances himself from the notion that the "Yeshua" ossuary belonged to Jesus of Nazareth, but suggests that the tomb might still be that of his extended family. Read the statement here:

Reflections on the so-called "Lost Tomb of Jesus" (PDF)
James Charlesworth

A couple of key sections:

Jesus did not place his own bones in an ossuary. If any one did so, it would have been his followers. They proclaimed him as The Messiah, the Son of God. They would not have put him in a very common ossuary with a sloppy graffiti. My judgment is that this ossuary does not belong to Jesus from Nazareth. Again, the names “Jesus” and “Joseph” are extremely common in the first century. . . .

. . . I have stated that a good case has been made for the possibility that the tomb of Jesus’ “clan” may have been discovered. By “clan” I mean “extended family group”. This possibility needs to be researched and debated in a scholarly symposium. If Jesus’ clan had a tomb, it would postdate 30, which was the date of the crucifixion.

But of course it is important to read the whole statement, about a page long.

Labels: James Charlesworth, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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Regular readers will remember that I have reproduced a couple of posts on the statistical claims of the Discovery documentary on the "Jesus Family Tomb" written by Joe D'Mello, The correct interpretation of Dr. Andrey Feuerverger's 1:600 odds calculation and The "Jesus Family Tomb" Statistics: Further Developments, the latter posted just 25 minutes before the documentary aired last Sunday. I now have an update to those earlier posts from Dr Joe D'Mello, who has continued his conversation with Dr Andrey Feuerverger. The latest post is available here in full as a PDF:

Discovery to Update Website Claims (PDF)

And I excerpt the major part of it here:
---------------
Date: Friday, March 9, 2007

I am pleased to state that as a result of several e-mail exchanges I have had with Dr. Andrey Feuerverger over the past few days, and a phone conversation with him this morning which confirmed our informal understanding reached by e-mail yesterday, he has agreed that the following two statements made on Discovery Channel’s website:

1. “A statistical study commissioned by the broadcasters (Discovery Channel/Vision Canada/C4 UK) concludes that the probability factor is 600 to 1 in favor of this tomb being the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth and his family.” (from http://dsc.discovery.com/convergence/tomb/about/about.html)

2. Dr. Andrey Feuerverger, professor of statistics & mathematics at the University of Toronto, has concluded a high statistical probability that The Talpiot tomb is the JESUS FAMILY TOMB. In a study, Feuerverger examined the cluster of names in the tomb …… Taking into account the chances that these names would be clustered together in a family tomb, this statistical study concludes that the odds – on the most conservative basis – are 600 to 1 in favor of this being the JESUS FAMILY TOMB. A statistical probability of 600 to 1 means that this conclusion works 599 times out of 600.
(from http://dsc.discovery.com/convergence/tomb/explore/media/tomb_evidence.pdf)

ARE NOT A CORRECT INTERPRETATION OF HIS STATISTICAL COMPUTATIONS. He has also confirmed for me that, at his urging, Discovery Channel has agreed to “undertake the required updates to their website”. As evidence of this, I have appended at the end of this message the relevant portions of the last few emails I exchanged with Dr. Feuerverger.

Dr. Feuerverger indicates that an accurate interpretation of his results are to be found at his recently updated “Tomb Computation” link on his University of Toronto website. Please note the following excerpts from that website:

A. It is not in the purview of statistics to conclude whether or not this tomb site is that of the New Testament family. Any such conclusion much more rightfully belongs to the purview of biblical historical scholars who are in a much better position to assess the assumptions entering into the computations.

B. The role of statistics here is primarily to attempt to assess the odds of an equally (or more) `compelling' cluster of names arising purely by chance under certain random sampling assumptions and under certain historical assumptions In this respect I now believe that I should not assert any conclusions connecting this tomb with any hypothetical one of the NT family.

C. The computations do not take into account families who could not afford ossuary burials or who did not have sufficient literacy to have their ossuaries inscribed, and does not take into account families living outside of the Jerusalem area.

I wish to thank Dr. Feuerverger immensely for his efforts to ensure that the viewing public receives the honest and truthful reporting they are entitled to! I also hope and trust that Discovery Channel will follow suit and retract these inaccuracies quickly. As I have stated before, my efforts were never aimed at defending Christianity, because I truly believe that all religions must and will eventually reconcile themselves with science and our God-given reason. It is not Christianity that is at stake here but the honest and enlightened use, application, and interpretation of science and reason. Discovery Channel’s unqualified assertions that the 600:1 odds are specifically associated with the tomb in question being that of the New Testament Jesus family are, in my opinion, untenable and inaccurate in light of the clarifications on Dr. Feuerverger’s website.
--------------------------

Labels: ossuaries, statistics, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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On the Discovery: Lost Tomb of Jesus Discussion Forum, Amy-Jill Levine now responds to several of those who have posed their questions on the forum:

Expert Q&A: Dr Amy-Jill Levine

Perhaps her most interesting answer is the last one:

According to Acts (see above, on Mary), at least part of the family relocated to Jerusalem. We do know -- not only from Acts and from Paul, but also from the first-century historian Josephus -- that James the 'brother of the Lord' (as he is called) was the leader of the Jerusalem church. Thus, it is by no means inconceivable that there would be a family tomb in the environs of Jerusalem. The Church presents itself in Acts as comprised not just of James, but of multiple members, some of whom are wealthy or at least of some means (e.g., Mary the mother of John Mark, who seems to be the patron of a house church in Jerusalem; Ananias and Sapphira, Barnabas....). Again, it would not be surprising to think that the followers of Jesus would have had sufficient funds to set up a burial site for his relatives, such as James. My point is not to argue for, or against, the Talpiot tomb's being connected to the family of Jesus; it is simply to note that the idea of a family tomb for James et al. is not inconceivable.

Contrast the slightly different assessment of Jodi Magness on the SBL Site in Has the Tomb of Jesus been Discovered?. I must admit to finding the claim about an expected Galilean burial one of the weaker arguments against the Discovery film, as I previously commented in response to Ben Witherington III's article:

The problem with the original formulation [of Ben Witherington III] was that there is no claim by the film-makers that Joseph was buried in this tomb. I must admit to being unconvinced also by the reformulation of the point, though. There is nothing intrinsically unlikely about members of Jesus' family being buried near Jerusalem since our sources all place them there the last time that we hear of them, Mary and the brothers in Acts 1, James in Acts 21. We have no evidence of a return to Nazareth. In fact, we don't have much evidence at all for the family's movements. This is not a major point, but as one who is critical of the claims of the film-makers, I think it important that the grounds for one's criticisms are solid (Ben Witherington III on the "Jesus Family Tomb")

Labels: Amy-Jill Levine, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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There is an article in this morning's Wall Street Journal Online on the "Jesus' Family Tomb" documentary (thanks to Stephen Goranson for pointing it out):

Odds of 'Lost Tomb' Being Jesus' Family Rest on Assumptions
Carl Bialik

. . . "As you pile on more assumptions, you're building a house of cards," says Keith Devlin, a Stanford mathematician and NPR's "Math Guy." (Scientific American also challenged the calculation on its Web site.) . . . .

. . . . "I wouldn't be comfortable coming up with a number like this, because the general audience will not understand that it is very, very subjective," says Ivo Dinov, assistant professor of statistics at the University of California, Los Angeles . . . .

. . . . He still hasn't provided full documentation of his calculation, saying he'd wait until his paper, not yet completed, is accepted by a journal. "There is a mismatch between how the media works and how academia works," Prof. Feuerverger says. "Obviously it would have been a whole lot better if I had completed the paper" before the documentary aired . . . .

. . . . . "When I was doing the calculation, I was naively unaware of the extent to which the filmmakers might be depending on the ultimate result of it," he says. "I did carry out the calculation in every good faith. I hoped it would be interpreted in that light."

The article doesn't tell us much more than we already knew, but it does help to underline the point that I have been making since my post last week on The Statistical Case for the Identity of the "Jesus Family Tomb", viz. that any statistical calculation is only as good as the data fed to the statistician; the numbers are only as good as the assumptions they are based on, and here there are major problems with those assumptions.

Labels: ossuaries, statistics, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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In no particular order, I want to tie up some loose ends and air some niggles about the "Jesus Family Tomb" claims.

• On the question of DNA and the ossuaries, James Tabor notes that "Unfortunately, the only two ossuaries that had not been cleaned/vacuumed out were the Yeshua and the Mariamenon". That explains, then, why those two were chosen. I had queried why one would choose those two when one could have chosen Yeshua and Maria where there was a chance that the claims could be falsified (with a negative result on the mitochondrial DNA test). Of course, it has been pointed out several times also that we don't know that the bone fragments that remain are those of the people in the ossuary in question.


• It has often been said that four statisticians were consulted, but we have only heard from one, Andrey Feuerverger. Who were the other three statisticians and what did they say?


• It is sometimes said that the only academic paper to have been written on thistomb is the 1996 paper by Amos Kloner. However, as Rick Brannan pointed out on Ricoblog, Dr. Michael S. Heiser presented a paper on the "Jesus Ossuary" at the 2003 meeting of the Near East Archaeological Society. Last week he uploaded a PDF of it to his website, which also features other material on the Talpiot tomb, including an MP3. The paper is called The Jesus Ossuary: A Critical Examination. It is largely a refutation of someone called Gardner who had claimed that this was connected with Jesus of Nazareth.


• I've been meaning to mention that Heiser article all week because it was on reading it last week that I realized that it really is not clear what the inscription says. Yeshua is the best guess, it seems, but it is really hastily scribbled. I had come across an excellent blog site in which the letters of the alleged Yeshua inscription were separated and studied for non-experts (like me) but I can't find it now. I still don't understand, though, where Pfann's "Hanun" comes from.
  


• Does anyone know yet when the film is to air on Channel 4? Are they going to save it up for Easter day?!


• Has the Discussion Forum on the Tomb on the Discovery Website stalled? There have been some answers (7) from James Tabor, and James Charlesworth provided a few short answers, but then there has been nothing more for almost a week. The promised discussion with Amy-Jill Levine simply hasn't happened -- there is nothing yet from Prof. Levine.


• A lot of people have asked if I have seen Randy Ingermanson's page on the Statistical Argument. I have, and think that there is a lot of useful and interesting material there, presented clearly. I hope to get a chance to comment on it in due course.

Labels: James Charlesworth, ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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I am not yet convinced by one element in the scholarly reaction to the "Jesus Family Tomb", the claim that the case should have been made through the normal channels of academic peer reviewed journals. The claim has been made on several occasions and I don't need to illustrate. A large part of this scholarly reaction is, I think, understandable. It proceeds from the frustration of having to make a speedy judgement, when a paper calls you for a quick comment, on a case that one has not had the time to begin to digest. Even those who have already written more extensively on the case have often confused the filmmakers' case over the "Yose" tomb, which is that this is Jesus' brother Joses, not Jesus' father Joseph, something that comes from having to rush to comment while the topic is hot, while the wider world is interested. Scholarship is rarely about snap judgements, and it is not easy to provide a quick and easy answer to the claims when approached to do so by the papers. Few took the time last week to familiarise themselves with the basics of the case , but even if one does have the data at one's fingertips, one can hardly begin to get into any kind of detail when approached for a quick comment by the media.

All those things having been said, I think it is unreasonable to expect Jacobovici to have published his case in academic peer-reviewed journals. As he has repeatedly insisted, he is a journalist and a filmmaker and not an academic. It is notoriously difficult for non-professional academics to make it into a peer reviewed journal, all the more so if the case one has might be seen as imaginative or speculative. To turn it around, how often do we academics first publish our results by means of television documentary? If a filmmaker were to complain about our not having gone first to television, we would rightly point out that our access to that medium is limited and that we do not have the requisite expertise and experience to go through that portal. I realize that for some this might be seen to be begging the question. Their complaint is that the case for the identification of the Talpiot tomb needs to be properly set out, fully sourced and carefully argued. I agree that this is ultimately necessary if the claim is going to be properly explored, and James Tabor mentions that he and Shimon Gibson are working on such a piece (see The Jesus Dynasty blog, bottom of that entry). But I wouldn't expect a filmmaker like Jacobovici, without such academic expertise or experience, to be able to prepare such a piece. Under such circumstances, and if one were convinced one had chanced upon something massive, surely one would pursue it using the avenues available to one as a filmmaker.

I remain unpersuaded by the claims made in the film, and there are points where I wish Jacobovici had run his scripts through (at least) some fact-checking academic consultants, but I am not sure that it is right to criticize him for doing something that would have been outside his remit as a filmmaker. After all, if one were to ask the question about whether he has done what he can to get the data out to the public, one would have to say that he has done a good job. The reason that so many academics have been able to weigh in so quickly is that the Discovery website and the Jesus tomb website have featured so much of the necessary data, including even PDFs of earlier works (like Kloner's article, the pages from the Rahmani book), and then interviews and more.

Labels: ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries

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I don't have a lot left to say about The Lost Tomb of Jesus documentary which aired in the USA on Sunday night. I didn't get any time to blog yesterday because Monday is my heaviest teaching day by a long way, and I had meetings most of the rest of the time. I did manage to catch my colleague Eric Meyers on The Diane Rehm Show, though, in odd five minute snatches. (You can still listen on-line from the previous link). I thought Simcha Jacobovici was in a much more conciliatory mood than on the Ted Koppel programme, much less confrontational, perhaps then because he was so annoyed by Jonathan Reed's "archaeoporn" comment. He began the programme by expressing admiration for Eric Meyers as one of his heroes! Perhaps he should have said something similar at an early enough point re. Jonathan Reed on Sunday. There was nothing in the programme that anyone who has followed the debate will have been surprised by, though it still sounds to me like Jacobovici is using the misstatement of the statistical case, viz. that there is a 600:1 chance that this is Jesus of Nazareth's tomb, which is not the correct interpretation of the statistics that Feuerverger provided. On the Jesus Dynasty blog, James Tabor has a useful post providing some follow-up to clarify and correct details in Tal Ilan's book.

On Codex: Blogspot, Tyler Williams has a helpful catch-up post with links to recent material of interest, with special reference to the biblioblogosphere. I may have a few further thoughts of my own as I clear out my mailbox.

Labels: ossuaries, Talpiot tomb, TV documentaries