The “Lost Tomb” of Jesus

     When I began to write this article about the Discovery Channel’s March 2007 airing of The Lost Tomb of Jesus, I could not help thinking of this as another “Red Herring” being drug across the trail to detour those who ought to be following the real evidence to the real Jesus (the Jesus of history and Scripture).  But something else happened - the "spirit of Hollywood" overwhelmed me for a moment and I could see potential movie blockbuster written all over this.  Sure, Governor Arnold could return to the silver screen in Terminator IV “The Lost Tombenator” or bring back Harrison Ford for “Raiders of the Lost Tomb of Jesus.”  While they don't want Him as Savior, worldly folks still love Jesus as “spectacle” - things haven’t changed much in 2,000 years, have they?

     In recent years, the over-hyped The DaVinci Code flashed, like a comet, across the Best-Seller list and movie screen only to land with a dull “thud” as it became increasingly obvious that there wasn’t much real historical validity to the story.  Then the Gospel of Judas left a faint trail across the horizon and fizzled.  Now we get some archaeological succotash (a strange mixture) in The Lost Tomb of Jesus.

     Presented as an archaeological documentary, the Lost Tomb asserted nothing less than that ten ancient stone burial caskets - ossuaries - have been found in Jerusalem that “may” have contained the bones of Jesus, His wife Mary Magdalene, and their son, Judas.  There were bones in the boxes that, according to custom, were re-buried when the ossuaries were originally found, back in 1980.  Let’s consider the impact of the claims being made.

Implications

     Jesus married Mary Magdalene and had a child?  Where have we heard this scenario before?  That part is easy - get a little “free ride” off of The DaVinci Code scenario - no wonder part of this sounds like déjà vu all over again!  But the bones of Jesus found in a Jerusalem tomb excavated in 1980 A.D. - wow, that is the knock-out punch that enemies of the Judeo-Christian worldview have been looking for since Jesus disappeared with His ascension.  The body of Jesus dead and buried in an ossuary in a cave in Jerusalem from 30 to 1980 A.D. and then reburied somewhere else in Jerusalem from 1980 to the present?  Yes, that is of MAJOR importance - if this is what really happened.  So, why aren’t the big league atheists latching onto this one?

Credibility

     How Credible is the Claim? - Christians might have reason to feel more threatened by the claims of The Lost Tomb of Jesus if they were being made by professional archaeologists who had just uncovered something new.  However, this is NOT another case of “the Dead Sea Scrolls,” where a shepherd found some pots in a hard-to-reach cave sold them for peanuts to an antiquities dealer, where they sat unrecognized in his shop for years until a capable professional finally got a look at them!  No, these ossuaries were found and examined by a professional archaeologist back in 1980.  The men behind the “Lost Tomb of Jesus” hype are a Hollywood movie producer named James Cameron (Titanic and Terminator) and a documentary filmmaker named Simcha Jacobovici.  Both of these men admit they are neither theologians nor archaeologists (“Hello!” - is this starting to smell like “make money off of the gullible” yet?).  For these two guys, the name “Jesus” resembles "Christmas" - two "S's" and they both look like dollar signs - Je$u$!

     A professional examined the ossuaries and judged them to be from an ordinary middle-class Jerusalem burial cave with names inscribed that were the most common of names used among Jews of that era.  Twenty-seven years later, two non-archaeologists (who know how to make good movies and “cash-in” on the pseudo-historical conspiracy genre) produce a movie that makes audacious claims that no serious professional archaeologist wants to chime in on - that ought to tell you something.  If there really was much to this, you can bet there would have been more interest from at least some professional archaeologists over the last twenty-seven years, for finding an “occupied family tomb of Jesus” would deliver the knockout punch to Christianity and provide a ticket to fame, fortune, a major spread in every magazine on the planet, and the opportunity to write your own career ticket from that point on out.  This hummer has about as much likelihood of being “real” as the 2004 movie National Treasure - the fictional plot for this asserted that there is a secret treasure map on the back of the Declaration of Independence!  Has anyone else been troubled by the fact that there are absolutely no credible early traditions about Jesus being married or buried permanently in Jerusalem?  The early Church Councils dealt with lots of issues, but neither of these notions ever came up.  And is anyone else troubled by the fact that no serious professional archaeologists want to stake their careers on this story?

     What it all comes down to is that it takes people really disconnected from historical reality to suggest or get excited about this kind of stuff - like 21^st century Westerners who are more interested in Hollywood than real history!  Next month, we will take a look at what the credible critics have to say about the "Lost Tomb" story and reconsider the validity of the traditional Christian "Good News" about Jesus' resurrection and earlier "alternative" stories.

     “Lost Tomb” - What do the Pros think?  The ossuaries were examined by Amos Kloner, district archaeologist for Israel’s Antiquity Authority, back in 1980 and he continues to assert that the inscriptions from which the names were taken are not clear enough to base such claims upon.  He doubts that the tombs have anything to do with the family of Jesus of Nazareth.  When the BBC did a brief documentary on these ossuaries back in 1996 and made inferences similar to those of Cameron and Jacobovici, Kloner criticized the failure to hold up archaeological standards in favor of “profitable television.”  Stephen Pfann, scholar at the University of the Holy Land in Jerusalem, also disputes the clarity of the names, asserting that what is claimed to be “Jesus” is more likely “Hanun.”  The inscription from which “Mary/Maria/Miriam” was taken may be more valid, but even then one must remember that this name was given to perhaps 25% of first century Jewish women in ancient Israel.  Shimon Gobson, senior fellow at the W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, is curious and would like to see more information, but also remains skeptical.  Lawrence E. Steger, professor of archaeology pertaining to Israel at Harvard, suspicions that most of the excitement about this is due to the number of Biblically illiterate people around the world who are gullible and open to what he called “fantastic archaeology.”  No wonder the archaeologist who first examined these ossuaries, Kloner, and most of the other professional scholars interviewed recently are skeptical - there just isn’t enough reason to believe that these ten caskets ever contained the archaeological “find of all finds”!

Resurrection - Alternatives

     Revisiting Resurrection Alternatives - Over the years, skeptics have offered a number of alternatives to evade the Christian doctrine of Jesus’ resurrection, not because they had valid evidence that cast doubts on the Gospel story, but because they didn’t want to believe the original story and wanted to fabricate an alternative.  All of these alternatives are skeptical non-sense - if Jesus was not raised, then what did happen to His body (hidden away in a Jerusalem burial cave and totally forgotten by everybody for 1900 years - right!)?  Let’s run through the alternative stories and note why they are pure nonsense.

     The Disciples Stole the Body - This is the oldest alternative “un-Gospel” story and originated with the Jewish authorities (Matthew 28:11-15).  First of all, there is the problem of the Roman Guard placed on the tomb to keep this very thing from happening (Matthew 27:62-66).  Since death was the penalty for failing to protect that which you were charged to guard (Acts 12:19; 16:27), you can bet the guards checked the contents of the tomb before sealing it and standing guard on it!  That alone should let what little air there is out of this one.  But, let’s humor the skeptics and think further on this one.  If the disciples somehow did take/hide the body of Jesus, then we are asked to believe that these blue-collar fishermen, a tax-collector, a zealot, etc. were all willing to give up their businesses/professions/passionate political agendas, etc. and spend the rest of their lives in poverty preaching the message that Jesus died and rose again and then die horrible deaths to foist a massive hoax (that they knew was false) on humanity - give me a break!  What is going on with Islamic suicide bombers in Iraq does not validate their cause, but their sincerity and commitment are beyond question!  The disciple’s lives/martyrdom deaths do not guarantee the validity of their message, but they do validate their sincerity and integrity - and they were in the best position to know if Jesus had really risen or stayed dead!

     Jewish or Roman Authorities took the Body - Although pretty weak, this is the second best alternative story.  Why would Jewish or Roman authorities take the body? - sealed in a tomb under guard is exactly where they wanted the body of Jesus.  If, in fact, the Jewish or Roman authorities stole and had possession of Jesus’ dead body, then why didn’t they produce the body on Pentecost and shut down the Christian movement before it could even get started?  Obviously, neither the Jewish or Roman authorities had Jesus’ body.

     The Apostles Went to the Wrong Tomb - Third (and yes, the alternatives do go from “dumb to dumber”), some have suggested that the disciples were so overwrought with sorrow that they went to the wrong tomb and mistakenly concluded that Jesus had risen from the dead!  Come on, they all had that bad of memory and forgot within a couple of days where a major figure in their lives and a loved one was buried?  Are we also to believe that Joseph of Arimathea forgot where his own family tomb was located?  My Dad has been dead for over eight years and all of my grandparents passed away at least 15 years ago, but I remember exactly where all of them are buried to this day.  What foolishness!

     Spiritual Resurrection - Fourth, the notion has been suggested that Jesus was raised - in a spiritual body.  However, it was to eliminate this notion that Jesus met with the Apostles and allowed them to touch His body (John 20:24-28; 1John 1:1-3), as well as eating a piece of fish in their presence (Luke 24:36-43).  If you are willing to buy into a “spiritual resurrection story, why not just accept the original story of Jesus’ resurrection?  This view still has another problem - what happened to the body of Jesus?  I know, God had the “death fairy” secretly hide Jesus’ body in the “Lost Tomb” so a couple of 21^st century film-makers could “cash-in” and finish-off Christianity for good!  But wait, why would God leave Jesus’ body around to invalidate what He had worked to accomplish?  Ridiculous, let’s move on.

     Jesus Survived Crucifixion - Fifth, the most hilarious alternative, to my mind, is the view that Jesus did not really die!  That’s right, this view alleges that Jesus somehow survived scourging, crucifixion, a spear thrust into his chest cavity, three days with no medical care inside a guarded tomb, and then, in brutalized condition and with torn-up feet, rolled away the stone, outran the guards and lived in total obscurity afterwards?  If a willingness to believe goofy stories was a NASCAR race, I would have to say that the skeptics take the checkered flag by several laps!!!!! 

     To be taken seriously, those who don’t want to believe the traditional story of Jesus' resurrection must provide a credible explanation as to what did happen to the body of Jesus.  Throwing out creative “Just So” stories won’t overcome eyewitness testimony.  When I hear things like “maybe the disciples stole it” or “maybe the Guards stole it” or “maybe all eleven disciples and the women forgot where the tomb was” or “maybe all eleven disciples had “identical, concurrent mass hallucinations,” I realize that the main reason for such stories is that some folks simply do not want to believe the Gospel story!  If people think the Biblical Gospel story is far-fetched, try applying some critical logic to a few of the “Looney-Tunes” alternatives!

     Christianity and the Resurrection - If Jesus was buried from 30-1980 A.D. in a Jerusalem burial cave, then how did Christianity ever get off the ground?  The resurrection of Jesus is the foundational pillar of Christianity - Jesus predicted it (Matthew 16:21; 17:22-23; Luke 9:22; 18:31-33), seeing and learning from the resurrected Christ was the essential element of the Apostles’ resurgent faith and ministry (Acts 1:1-11); the resurrection of Jesus was the central point of Peter’s message in Jerusalem (Acts 2:22-37; 3:15) and to Cornelius’ household (Acts 10:39-41); and the resurrection of Jesus was to Paul the essential proof that Jesus was God’s son (Romans 1:4) and the essential central core truth of the Christian message without which Christianity was totally discredited (1Corinthians 1:3-20).

Jewish & Christian Credibility

     Apostolic Credibility - Without a doubt, Christianity rests on the reality of the resurrection of Jesus and this means that there was NOT a continually dead body/bones of Jesus sitting in a Jerusalem tomb for 1950 years!  Paul’s logic in 1Corinthians 15:12-20 is hard to ignore - if Jesus was not really restored to life as the Gospel message claims, then there are hard-hitting implications and Paul lays them out - why would some say He wasn’t raised (their own philosophical agenda?), the Apostle’s preaching and the beliefs of Christians are empty and pointless, the Apostles are “false witnesses,” all people are still in their sins, the Christian dead are gone forever, and Christians should be pitied as deceived fools!

     The Apostles claimed to have seen and touched[1] the resurrected Jesus and, to this day, the best evidence in a court of law is multiple eye-witnesses.  The Apostles’ testimony was/is either true or false, but they were in the best position to know if Jesus returned to life and their dramatic change from unbelief and fear to the boldness they demonstrated from Pentecost onward is best explained by them experiencing something on the order of what they claimed to have seen and heard.  Then, consider how they all gave the rest of their lives to promote this message without personal gain, but rather enduring hardship, rejection, and finally (except, according to tradition, for the Apostle John) agonizing deaths, without a single tradition of any ever renouncing what they preached to save their lives.  I find the Old Testament prophecies fulfilled in Jesus, the Gospel records of His life and teachings, and what happened through the Apostles very hard testimonies to dismiss.  Some men will die for a cause that turns out to be untrue, but they at least they believe it is valid - sensible men do NOT willingly die to promote what they know to be false!

     Jewish Credibility - Another item that I come back to from time to time has to do with what hostile Biblical criticism and these alternative scenarios suggest about the Jewish people 1450 B.C. - 100 A.D.  Hostile Bible critics, coming from an Enlightenment rationalism approach, essentially portrayed the Jewish writers of Biblical books as outright deceivers and Jewish people in general as uneducated fools who were easily duped by all of these “allegedly spurious” Bible documents suddenly appearing long after they were supposedly a foundational part of Jewish national life.  The German Enlightenment’s Higher Critical portrayal of the Jewish Bible as coming from deceiver priests/scribes and being embraced by ignorant Jewish people (Old and New Covenants) bears an uncanny similarity to later Nazi portrayals of Jews as ignorant, evil, and filthy people.  Both views arise from the same German Enlightenment base.

     Just a passing familiarity with Old Testament history is enough to make one doubt that Joshua through 2Kings were falsified “feel-good” pseudo-history written to make later Jewish kings and people feel good about their heritage, as Silberman[2] and others have asserted.  The same assumptions are at work when New Testament/early Jewish Christians are assailed with a similar lack of respect for their integrity and intelligence.  Jewish people may have a Biblically-attested history of unfaithfulness to the Mosaic Covenant (Judges - 2 Kings) and rejection of Jesus and the New Covenant, but they were/are not a group of people that I would consider easily duped, uneducated, or gullible.  If I wanted to identify people like that, I would point a finger at those who promote and embrace nonsense like The DaVinci Code, the Judas Gospel, and the Lost Tomb of Jesus!

     I approached The DaVinci Code movie[3] with an attempt to be open-minded and willing to see what all the fuss was about.  At least, I was hoping for a thrilling historical-fiction experience something like National Treasure (Disney 2004; where a supposedly vast treasure has been hidden away with information as to its location stored on the back of the Declaration of Independence).  Clive Cussler writes good stories along this line - a little piece of historical reality as the springboard for some well-done fiction.  I enjoy those kinds of stories, as do many others.  However, I was really disappointed in The DaVinci Code movie because the story tried to weave in so many improbable and strained historical connections that it ceased to even be enjoyable fiction for me.  I am a Christian, but I want to remain reality/evidence/reason-based enough that my faith could be shaken if truly sound contradictory evidence came to light.  However, I have yet to see that kind of “faith-shaking” evidence show up on the table and stand the tests of time and “cross-examination.  Thus, the traditional New Testament story of Jesus still gets my vote as the truth about what happened.  As is, The Lost Tomb of Jesus ranks right up there with the stuff on the cover of the National Inquirer.

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Sources:

     James Cameron & Simcha Jacobivici, “The Lost Tomb of Jesus” (aired on the Discovery Channel, 3/4/2007).

     “Claims about Jesus’ tomb stir up a tempest” by Marshall Thompson (AP; MSNBC online 3:43 PM 2/26/2007 - http://www.msnbc.msn/id/17345429/?GT1=9033

     “Crypt Held the Bodies of Jesus and Family, Film Says” by Laurie Goodstein (NYTimes online, 2/27/2007)

     “The Jesus Tomb on TV” by Sandra Scham, Archaeology Online Reviews (3/3/2007);

www.archaeology.org/online/reviews/jesustomb2.html

     “The So-called Jesus Family Tomb ‘Rediscovered’ in Jerusalem” by Gordon Franz, from the Associates for Biblical Research Electronic Newsletter (Vol. 7, Issue 3 - March 2007); http://BibleArchaeology.org/articles/article70.html

     Ben Witherington’s web blog on “The Lost Tomb of Jesus” - http://benwitherington.blogspot.com/2007/02/jesus-tomb-titanic-talpiot-tomb-theory.html