HOO-BOY - heads up: Has film crew found the DNA of Jesus?

[radfringe]

---so when will the fundies start their protests and other blathering to ban/boycott the movie?



Has film crew found the DNA of Jesus?
MICHAEL POSNER
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20070226.TOMB26/TPStory/Entertainment

It's an improbable story worthy of a Hollywood film.

In what is expected to be a wild and woolly news conference, the makers of a new documentary film claiming to have discovered the tomb of Jesus Christ and his family -- and his DNA -- will face the media this morning at New York's Public Library.

If their evidence is verified, the film, The Lost Tomb of Jesus, and a companion book, would raise profound questions for Christians and their faith.

The filmmakers -- Emmy-award winning director Simcha Jacobovici and his executive producer, Oscar-winner James Cameron -- suggest ossuaries once containing the bones of Jesus and his family are now stored in a warehouse belonging to the Israel Antiquities Authority in Bet Shemesh, outside Jerusalem.

--snip---

Although the evidence contained in the film and book is hardly definitive, it is compelling.

Inscribed in Hebrew, Latin or Greek, six boxes -- taken from a 2,000-year-old cave discovered in 1980 during excavation for a housing project in Talpiyot, south of Jerusalem -- bear the names: Yeshua bar Yosef ; Maria ; Matia ; Yose ; Yehuda bar Yeshua, or Judah, son of Jesus; and in Greek, Mariamne e mara, meaning 'Mariamne, known as the master.' According to Harvard professor François Bovon, interviewed in the film, Mariamne was Mary Magdalene's real name

--snip--

Nothing in the film or book directly challenges traditional Christian dogma regarding the resurrection. But it could pose a problem for those who believe the ascension of Jesus, 40 days after the resurrection, was both physical and spiritual. And, if further DNA testing were to link Jesus and 'his brother' Yose with Mary, it would call into question the entire doctrine of the virgin birth -- a foundation stone of Christianity.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Catholic dogma says Mary was a perpetual virgin

but I distinctly remember the Protestant church of my youth saying Mary had other children after Jesus--including James.

[Connie_Corleone]

2. You're right.

[papau]

9. Rome thinks "other children" were cousins- and the Titanic fellow forgets that names on the bone box

were very common in that era (apparently we have found many Jesus bone boxes - or so the interview on NBC would imply), so those of the atheist faith can still believe that Jesus never existed, and those whose faith believes that the "whole body rose to heaven and not just the sole" can believe that these are the bone boxes of a random Jewish family of the 1st century.

[dysfunctional press]

11. i'm an athiest, but i believe that jesus existed.

he wasn't the son of god, however- he was probably the leader of one of the many radical apocalyptic jewish cults of the time.

[papau]

26. That view is not unreasonable base on what was going on at the time - but for the believer there is

also a lot of evidence, if you allow yourself to believe the early Christians, that he's something more than just another leader of a Jewish sect.

The New York Times has the story with a comment section with over 200 comments - mostly atheist but with a goodly number of believers - a long read and I got bored after awhile - but interesting.

[tibbiit]

30. Is this a talking point

Names very common? I keep reading this over and over as common wisdom.
Is this really true?
tib

[NashVegas]

3. Tell It To France

Where Magdalene died and was interred for ages.

Sheisterism.

[Marrah_G]

4. Even if it is true

The Vatican will use its wealth and power to squash it as an error or a myth. It would not be the first time.

What I wouldn't give to spend a week, completely unhindered in the Vatican libraries!

[MGKrebs]

5. DNA connection to Mary would not be a surprise, after all,

she did birth him. It's the connection to dad that would be interesting.

[mmonk]

6. The style of writing at the time of the New Testament

from what I've been able to gather is this: Extraordinary births and the use of midrash were the styles used to show or express the greatness of someone. Dogma, I believe came at later church councils. If I'm wrong, let me know.

[SlowDownFast]

16. Council of Nicea....

That's when Constantine supposedly changed/rewrote/made-up a shitload of stuff (dogma) in the New Testament.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Council_of_Nicaea

[trof]

7. Coming up on CNN now.

[AllegroRondo]

8. Can we clone Jesus now?

[radfringe]

10. hehhehheh

maybe that's the way the Second Coming occurs?

[depakid]

13. Potentially, one could emplant the resulting embryo

in an honest to goodness virgin....

[AllegroRondo]

17. Thats it, Im writing a Sci-fi story based on this idea

what should I title it?

[cyborg_jim]

19. Rightful Heir

Set it in space, in the 24th century on the Enterprise NCC-1701D.

Oh wait, that's right. It's been done already.

[Ex Lion Tamer]

21. There already is a book . . .

I just can't remember the name of it. I read it a long time ago, and it wasn't bad.

[MGKrebs]

24. The Inconvenient Bones of Our Fathers?

Kind of an Oscar themed title.

[marmar]

12. Sure, and a talking snake caused all the world's problems....

Oy vey!

[Ishoutandscream2]

14. Ah, the religious insanity

Will it ever stop?

[NashVegas]

15. I Just Think This Is So Dangerous for Democracy

Most of the world's elite including our own King George, can trace their lineage to the "supposed" descendents of Christ.

The fundies will eat this up off the floor.

[The Cleaner]

18. Very skeptical.

Apparently some archaeologists are upset with these two guys who are putting forth this theory, James Cameron (a filmmaker) and a journalist. They haven't followed scientific procedure and are not privvy to past research on this topic, which already debunked this entire theory years ago.

Indeed, the names were very common back in the day so what does it really mean? I think these two watched a little too much Da Vinci Code.

[mzteris]

20. you didn't read the link, did you?

*****They haven't followed scientific procedure and are not privvy to past research on this topic, which already debunked this entire theory years ago. ****


". . .Neither the provenance nor the age of the ossuaries is in dispute. The boxes, never out of the control of professional archeologists, are effectively self-dating, since the practice of re-interring the bones of the dead in limestone boxes a year after death was conducted by Jews in the Holy Land for a period of only 100 years. Prominent families stored the boxes in family tombs.

Moreover, all the inscriptions have been corroborated by some of the world's leading epigraphers, including Harvard's Frank Moore Cross."


****Indeed, the names were very common back in the day so what does it really mean?****


". . . if the individual names were common, the film and book ask: What is the likelihood that this particular group of names, so resonant of the Jesus story, would appear together, contained in the same family tomb?

"There are really only two possibilities," Mr. Jacobovici said.

"Either this cluster of names represents the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth and his family. Or some other family, with this very same constellation of names, existed at precisely the same time in history in Jerusalem."

To calculate the odds, Mr. Jacobovici took the data to University of Toronto mathematician Andrey Feuerverger.

Factoring in the commonality of these names in first-century Israel, Prof. Feuerverger puts the odds of this tomb not belonging to Jesus and his family at one in 600.

Another estimate, commissioned by James Tabor, chair of the department of religion studies at the University of North Carolina, puts the odds at one in 42 million. "If you took the entire population of Jerusalem at the time," Prof. Tabor said, "and put it in a stadium, and asked everyone named Jesus to stand up, you'd have about 2,700 men. Then you'd ask only those with a father named Joseph and a mother named Mary to remain standing. And then those with a brother named Yose and a brother named James. Statistically, you end up with one person."

[Nabia2004]

23. The Da Vinci Code: Best selling book - $217,536,138 in US Box Office

There is no doubt they paid extra attention to the "The Da Vinci Code."

[SlowDownFast]

22. It's the Second Coming!

And the Truth will set us free from fundie-fascists!

[maveric]

25. "Hollywood Liberals trying to kill Christianity."

I can hear it now...:yoiks:

[Plaid Adder]

27. There couldn't have been another family in the region

with the same combination of names?

Seriously, I don't see what DNA testing is going to prove apart from the age of the remains and the relationships between the various individuals in the containers. You can argue about the odds till the cows come home but at the end of the day this evidence will convince people who want to be convinced and be inadequate for people who don't.

Sounds like a good setup for a sci-fi novel about the Second Coming, though.

C ya,

The Plaid Adder

[dysfunctional press]

29. exactly- open up any crypt in mexico for instance...

and odds are that there will be a mary, a joseph, and a jesus or two.

[Retrograde]

28. actually, it does contradict traditional dogma

According to the Nicene Creed, the definition IMHO of standard Christianity, Jesus ascended into heaven. I presume he took his skeleton with him.


I'd like to see a sober analysis of the find. It just seems too good, too Dan-Brown, to be credible. What happened to the bones during the 25 years between discovery and announcement, for example. Still, 2000-year old finds are remarkable in and of themselves.

Now, if the DNA tests showed one of the occupants was the father of Anna Nichol Smith's baby....