1. A 'values' voter speaks her mind on Obama

Comment #268829 by elvenearth on October 22, 2008 at 9:59 am

One gets the impression that it wouldn't matter what she believed, she would believe it rather firmly.

She would be a scary atheist, a scary Muslim, a scary Hindu.

Might not be an agnostic perhaps... :)

2. Saving Us from Darwin

Comment #193245 by elvenearth on June 15, 2008 at 3:55 am

Quote:

"The goal of such "young-Earthers" is to convince students that the Bible has been proven exactly right: our planet and its surrounding universe are just six thousand years old, every species was fashioned by God in six literal days, and a worldwide flood later drowned all creatures (even the swimmers) except one mating pair of each kind."


Having studied Young Earth Creationist literature I can say that the above is rather inaccurate in details. Most Young Earth Creationists advocate a two tier system of science education - the presenting of two theories as it were (just like ID does). Also, most young-earth creationist thinkers would not say that all the Bible has been proved right but rather that enough of it has to assume that it is indeed "the word of God" (and thus worthy of consideration in science).

The vast majority of Young-Earthers do not believe that God created every species, but rather that he created "kinds" of animals, which later diverged and developed (evolved) into the species of animals we have on Earth today. So for example there would have been a Camelid kind that, under various population pressures and environmental factors, evolved to become species of camels and Llamas etc

The last part of this statement is the most inaccurate. Young Earth creationists emphatically deny that anything other than land dwelling creatures would have had to go the ark. They do not believe in whales, dolphins, fish etc being on the ark of Noah.

I think its important to be accurate and well considered when looking at the beliefs of any groups, so thought I would clarify for you.

3. Science of the Soul? 'I Think, Therefore I Am' Is Losing Force

Comment #52803 by elvenearth on June 28, 2007 at 5:39 am

8. Comment #52641 by wilberforce.parry on June 27, 2007 at 3:32 pm
I see no reason for Descartes' point to lose its force. Surely any animal that thinks on any level "is", to a certain degree. I don't see why we have to presume that thought processes at a human level are necessary for this consciousness. Descartes was saying nothing about the idea of an eternal soul, all he was stating was an idea on proof for a personal existence.


Just what I was thinking. Descartes was suggesting , "Thinking, therefore I am". In otherwords even if everything else is an illusion, we know that we have existence as something that can think. If we are deceived, there is something that must be deceived.

4. Fighting the Fundamentalists

Comment #44609 by elvenearth on May 25, 2007 at 5:30 am

Comment #44588 by Peacebeuponme on May 25, 2007 at 5:11 am

"Will Arsenal win the European Cup next year?"


Such questions are unlikely to be keeping the attention of philosophers a few thousand years from now. Most of us remember and celebrate, after all, the achievements of Plato, Aristotle and Epicurus rather than the achievements of athletes in the ancient Olympics (Nero notwithstanding :P). And of course few of us remember the great questions considered by ancient sports fans. Personally I'm quite happy about that.

5. Would the World Be Safer Without Religion?

Comment #44127 by elvenearth on May 23, 2007 at 10:59 am

Comment #43666 by BillySands on May 22, 2007 at 8:45 am

I know! The point is that it is the words of a different culture and not part of the teachings of a god who is a source of perfect law and moral absolutes as David claims. A long time ago, he said that he did not need to justify why homosexuality is wrong, because it says so in the bible. The point I am making is that if this were a good and valid law - like those on murder and stealing, it would be obvious why it is wrong. Today, this is a big issue in the church, and my friends sister is only one casualty. It is something that will hopefully split the anglican church too.
It's a bit like slavery, the bible condones it, but some apologists say we have to take the culture into consideration, then it is OK. However, morally, slavery is always wrong, no if or butts. A hypothetical moral god would have said so - the same with women and homosexuals.
However, David does not hold the view that these words are the words of men, so that presents him with a problem. They are the commands of his god afterall. At best, all he can do is acknowledge that the bible is not a source of moral absolutes, and as you nicely pointed out, other non yahweh based cultures showed greater wisdom and fairness (do you have any links by the way?)


Well I certainly agree with you in part. If there is a God (or some kind of pre-existing external Ultimate/Absolute to the Universe) then to claim exclusivity of the Bible to knowledge of it is a limited and strange idea. Any knowledge of history, literature and science also clearly reveals that the ancient texts, contained within the variety of Bibles in existence, are imbued with unique cultural ideas - unique to the ancient world and thus not absolute in their scope or claims (at least for the most part).
However I wouldn't like to go to the extent of saying that this rules out some type of Tao like law imbued into the Universe, which people across a variety of regions and cultures have come to a knowledge of. Indeed I favour the idea. From this argument could spring the idea that the Bible too, even in the Jewish Scriptures, contains a record (of sorts anyway) of the realisation of certain moral truths developing in the cultures of the ancient world. The Ten Commandents and the Law of Reciprocity could be examples of this process (as in other parts of the Middle East). Anyway too complicated to get into here...

Regarding your statements on the issue of homosexuality. Only two fair arguments can really be made by Christians in any case (based on the internal logic of interpreting the Bible). The first would be to argue that a hypothetical 'Fall' caused non-ideal or technically unnatural things to come into existence. In otherwords, humans were created to come together as male and female. However the 'fall' caused caused male to male desires to come into existence. In a fallen world this then becomes in a sense natural. In otherwords to be homosexual would be in-built and natural and not by choice. Dismissing the Leviticus passages as tribally contextual, this would leave only certain NT passages for Christian's to use. They could argue based on these that the act is wrong, but no more so than sex before marriage. In otherwords one sin among many sins that people commit. Nothing particularly special about it at all.
The second argument would be to actually dispute the relevant NT passages. There are many idioms and disputations regarding the translation of Koine Greek. Many Greek words can have multiple meanings depending on their context. To complicate this scholars often have to guess at or seek to reconstruct the context. Two Greek words are of relevance here - Arsenkoitai and Malakoi (a link if you wish it: http://www.opendoorcenter.com/myths_&_facts.htm). Arsenkoitai is condemned as an a great sin along with fornication and gossip and others in (Romans 1:26ff). It literally means Arse F*#ker in English. But what does this mean? Some scholars argue that it only refers to Male Prostitutes or Promiscuous homosexuals. Meaning homosexuals by orientation are fine, monogamous homosexuals are fine etc. Conversely could it refer to any anal s#x at all - meaning male to female as well. I could go on, but I assume you see the difficulties of translation and interpretation. These aren't just endemic to the Bible by the way, but really any ancient text. Based on this an honest Christian would have to acknowledge that there is little basis for roundly condemning homosexuality by orientation based on Biblical texts. And please don't get me started on Sodom and Gomorrah...

Regarding Etruscan and Egyptian treatment of women. I based these statements on my own research while at University studying classics and history. I guess it should generally be noted that Roman women received much relative freedom compared to Greek and middle-eastern cultures (I generalise of course). The Celts are also often associated with remarkable freedoms for women, but this is somewhat disputed and they are more clearly European in any case. There are others of course - the Minoans, certain Persian sects etc... It is the Egyptians who are the most outstanding in this regard however (though they did have a penchant for sibling incest).

Some 'ok' links to wet your curiousity:

http://www.crystalinks.com/egyptianwomen.html

http://www.womenintheancientworld.com/women_in_ancient_egypt.htm

http://www.ancientworlds.net/aw/Post/522662

http://web.mac.com/heraklia/Dominae/context/index.html

6. Would the World Be Safer Without Religion?

Comment #43656 by elvenearth on May 22, 2007 at 7:41 am

88. Comment #43639 by BillySands on May 22, 2007 at 7:01 am

Leviticus 18:22
'Do not have sex with a man as you would with a woman. It is an abomination.'

Leviticus 20:13
'If a man has sex with a man in same way as with a woman, they have committed an abomination. They are certainly to be put to death.'



Historical criticism mate, historical criticism. A bit of critical inquiry and consideration of evidence would reveal quite quickly the context of these verses. We know that in the ancient middle east women were invariably seen as a type of property. In a sense a woman was like a field to be ploughed and the man was the plougher. This was a common worldview across most of the middle east and much of the Mediterranean. Some notable exceptions include Egypt and the Etruscans. In this type of thinking therefore, the man virtually owned the woman and impregnated his property as an investment for offspring. In this context the idea of the homosexual act as an abomination suddenly makes more sense (within the internal logic - I do not in any way support this idea myself). In otherwords to lie with a man as with a woman is to place oneself into the position of a woman. This would be a thing of shame, for the man is meant to be the master - the one who impregnates and dominates the woman. A man should never place himself in the position of being dominated.
Clearly such attitudes are no longer relevant, decent or honourable today. Just because they were practiced a few thousand years ago doesn't make it right then either, but it does help to examine the context of how such views developed.

7. Would the World Be Safer Without Religion?

Comment #43648 by elvenearth on May 22, 2007 at 7:26 am

Comment #43270 by Adrian on May 21, 2007 at 3:21 am
This article posits an interesting thought: that even without religion, conflict would still be rampant and violence and death would naturally follow.

However, it overlooks one important factor: FAITH.

With faith, there is no reasoning possible, therefore you only need to know that 'the others' have different faith, to hate them.

However, without faith, there is ample room for REASON to deflate a conflict and NEGOTIATION to resolve it.

I suggest then, that the author is wrong.


History would suggest otherwise. Conflict has, needless to say, been fairly rampant throughout much of human history and in a variety of cultures. In the ancient world the evidence of archeology and the historical records we do have suggests that the involvement of structured organised cosmological worldviews (usually defined as religions) in conflict was built upon underlying societal and political structures. So for example, a very warlike nation would tend to construct its gods in a more warlike way - think of the adoption of Mithras by Roman legionaries. Similarly God is constructed as rather warlike in the Jewish Scriptures. This is hardly a surprise given the warlike and tribal nature of the middle east at the time.
The Christian Scriptures on the otherhand tended to reinvent and interpret the nature of God based on the teachings of Jesus. The idea of violence and the necessity of conflict was radically re-examined by Jesus as one example of this. Of course the ascendancy of Christianity in the late Roman Empire changed the playing field. Suddenly Christians had to deal with the reality of being in power (read Augustine for example). The point is the religion had to adapt to the underlying social structures - rarely and not usually the other way around (though of course Islam, in an Arab context anyway, is an exception to this in its development). As Christianity became more tied to the political structures of Europe it in turn became more involved in conflict. This is where the idea of faith mixed in with political or social power could play a sometimes troubling or even terrifying hand.

8. Flea Circus!

Comment #33108 by elvenearth on April 19, 2007 at 7:58 am

Comment #33090 by WilliamP
"My advice is that if you want to sway atheists, you have to show us that belief in a completely undetectable creator that only speaks through independently unverifiable revelation, actually explains something that can't be otherwise explained."

The fact that people have such claimed experiences still needs to be explained. Why do people experience what they call a "spiritual dimension"? Is it all psychological? Perhaps, but there is presently little empirical evidence to support this position. What evidence there is tends to be interpreted philosophically in any case. For example studies of the brain showing how people can experience visions when certain parts are stimulated. This is then interpreted to mean that a naturalistic explanation is sufficient.



"Particularly if you want to reply to Dawkins, address his critiques of arguments for god. How does the existence of a complex god explain order and complexity?"

It can explain it. The problem is, as you have pointed out, that one is then left with the problem of explaining this original complexity. But similarly, if one accepts that the Universe is what is Ultimate, one has to explain its origin and the fact that it exists at all. Surely both seem somewhat inexplicable from the human perspective?

9. Christians at Bible publishers have their throats cut

Comment #32989 by elvenearth on April 19, 2007 at 12:15 am

Comment #32905 by Damien White:

"Thou Shalt Not Kill". It's apalling what happens when two movements who live by this creed get together. Utter hypocracy..."

Imagine if the story had been about rationalists (some type of...) being attacked, would you still have made this statement (rationalists also being against murder)? I think its safe to say that the people who did the attacking did not share the philosophy of "Do not murder" with those they were attempting to kill.


Comment #32907 by maton100:

Love thine enemies, but death to infidels. Alright, we should be so lucky that we don't get our morals from holy books.

Mixing the teachings of Jesus with the actions of these extremist Muslims is a tad rich Maton. Try to actually be a rationalist in everything you analyse, not just some things.

10. Almost Human, and Sometimes Smarter

Comment #32664 by elvenearth on April 18, 2007 at 12:17 am

Comment #32635 by Yorker:

"Was that a joke? If it was, I don't get it, if not, then you evidently fail to see the significance of it.

Would you masturbate over a picture of a female chimp?"


I was curious about two things. One, what types of pictures would they respond to? Two, to what degree would this cross different species? I fail to see how these are not legitimately interesting questions that explore the sexual behaviour of a particular species.
I believe I did understand the significance of the claim - I was simply interested in how much further the case in point could be taken.

11. Almost Human, and Sometimes Smarter

Comment #32612 by elvenearth on April 17, 2007 at 3:24 pm

What else would they masturbate to? Pictures of female chimps? Other ape species? Human males?

12. New Primate Species Found In 42 Million-year-old Texas Fossils

Comment #32166 by elvenearth on April 16, 2007 at 3:42 am

Laurence Winch-Furness: "Seriously though, I'm suprised palentologists still manage to work in Texas."


A bit harsh surely.

13. Even non-believers must recognise the moral necessity of Christianity

Comment #30658 by elvenearth on April 9, 2007 at 8:34 am

Comment: Religious pogroms, on the other hand, persecute their victims precisely because of their beliefs - vide what happened to the Cathars in Southern France.

Yes, but the Cathars were extremely anti-catholic and had the political and military power to be considered a threat to the status-quo political make-up of Europe at the time.
The Reformation also surely succeeded and was given impetus because of political reasons (think German princes and Henry VIII for example). The Counter-Reformation was a response to this from various political levels of secular and and religious power spread throughout Europe.

14. Answers To the Atheists

Comment #30651 by elvenearth on April 9, 2007 at 7:46 am

Fouad Boussetta on April 7, 2007:

Why are Christians so sure there ever was a historical Jesus in the first place? The evidence strongly indicates a purely mythical figure...

Why would the early Christians have died and been persecuted for a figure who was purely mythical? Sure, its safe to say that there are mythical elements given to the life and times of Jesus, but that is a far cry from purely mythical. The early Christians must surely, at the very least, have believed something was going on. To be consistent with your viewpoint you might have to argue that all the Apostles etc were also mythical. But then, where does the impetus for the Christian movement come from?
Interested to hear your answers...

15. Answers To the Atheists

Comment #30649 by elvenearth on April 9, 2007 at 7:39 am

The author says:

"What are the good deeds performed by christians over the centuries because of their religion?"


I simply return the question, find out for yourself - You surely have the intelligence and wit to do so.

16. Darwin 'was committed to publish'

Comment #28940 by elvenearth on March 31, 2007 at 6:03 pm

Quote: "MIND_REBEL on March 30, 2007 at 4:13 pm
avatar: Interesting, but it still doesn't prove that he didn't fear persecution from the church. The Church at the time was still burning witchs at the stake, so it's only logical that personal safety played a role."

In general it was actually the secular authorities who were involved in the execution of accused witches across western and central Europe. King James 1st of England for example had certain of his enemies hanged for witchcraft.
It is true of course that the particular beliefs or motivations of these authorities were instrumental causes to such executions happening.
It should also be noted that individual churchmen, bishops and orders like the Dominicans were often heavily involved in inquisitions etc. However this did not mean that they had the direct approval of say "the Catholic church" (Such inquisitions were usually aimed at heresy and ended up covering witchcraft at some point). In the case of the Spanish Inquisition for example, the Pope actually tried to curb the excesses set in place by Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand (not successfully it must be said - he was mostly ignored).

In any case your idea that people were still being burned at the stake, in England or anywhere else in western Europe, for witchcraft at the time of Darwin is nonsense (an aside, but it is my understanding that hangings were the punishment for witchcraft in England). Besides how could Darwin's theory in any likely way have been linked to witchcraft?

17. In the Beginning

Comment #28934 by elvenearth on March 31, 2007 at 5:05 pm

Quote: Shane McKee on March 30, 2007 at 2:51 pm: "Most Christians don't know their bible very well; when I was a Christian I read and studied it in very great detail, cross-checking all the references and correspondences, and checking the dependability of the various commentaries. *That* was why I became an atheist."

That's not a particularly good reason for becoming an atheist. I hope you had/have others more convincing for the sake of intellectual pride.

18. A History of Violence

Comment #28932 by elvenearth on March 31, 2007 at 4:51 pm

"Religion the cause of all wars?"

Well clearly not - and certainly not even most of them. Historians would generally agree that the main reasons for war throughout recorded history have been the following:

1. Imperialism/Colonialism
2. Racism
3. Religion
4. Nationalism
5. Militarism
6. Alliances
7. Disputed Territory/Resources

Note: This is not a list of ranking, just a list of main causes.

19. A History of Violence

Comment #28929 by elvenearth on March 31, 2007 at 4:44 pm

Two important points/arguments to note regarding the history of warfare:

1. Where the leaders lead people will follow. Note the example of Hitler and the German people in the 2nd World War. Or conversely note that today Western societies have comparatively little violence because of laws enshrined by Philosophic leaders.

2. The integration of a humanities education into teaching curricula at all levels (and in a cross-curricular sense) develops critical thinking skills that reduce the capacity of societies to be taken in by leaders who might wish to subvert the Western laws enshrined by philosophic leaders.

20. Atheist Apostle

Comment #24705 by elvenearth on March 8, 2007 at 6:04 am

"Once again it is as if the religious want to force atheism into a box labelled either a "faith" or "philosophy" unable to see the big picture due to the fact that they themselves are standing in the biggest box of all."

Surely by using a categorisation such as "atheism", you imply something that surely should be considered a philosophy. In otherwords a broadly defined worldview/belief system that understands the Universe in its intricacies to be the sum totality of ultimate reality.
Since Theists (and Deists) make the case that there is something preceding and the cause of this Universe the difference in worldviews can be most fairly applied there. Thus two competing worldviews or faiths.

21. Merkel wants EU to be vocal about Christian roots

Comment #23728 by elvenearth on March 2, 2007 at 9:04 am

Quote: "I am an atheist myself, but the blatant double standards that Christians follow irks me to no end. So much for the pope that went to India urging a renewed "harvest of souls" for the church! Don't Hindus have a right to a Hindu identity in India when he demands a Christian identity for Europe or don't the darkies simply not count?"


I think it is safe to say that one could define India as very much already having a Hindu identity. One visit to India should be enough to convince you of that.
That is partly the point Merkel is trying to make, other countries are quite relaxed about indicating their worldview based roots. By contrast secularism ideology at times seeks to avoid any reference to the particular roots of a tradition in Europe. So for example some campaigners have sought to lessen the overt Christian nature of festivals such as Christmas or Easter.

22. Bishops must not sit in reformed House of Lords

Comment #23474 by elvenearth on March 1, 2007 at 2:27 am

I am curious, what country is actually truly democratic?

23. James Cameron finds grave of Jesus & Son

Comment #23473 by elvenearth on March 1, 2007 at 2:22 am

Blue State Mike said: "True or not, it's just so much fun seeing something like this push the buttons of believers. We really are in a period of socking it to the bastards, aren't we? Alas, it won't last forever, and even more alas, I sadly predict it won't have much impact on their "faith."


Then why are you bothering? Furthermore, I thought the point of this site (or at least the main point) was to win people away from what you (as in atheists or 'non-believers') define as faith to what you define as reason?

24. James Cameron finds grave of Jesus & Son

Comment #23388 by elvenearth on February 28, 2007 at 10:32 am

And further: Ben Witherington adds more analysis:

PROBLEMS MULTIPLY FOR JESUS TOMB THEORY


Having now scrutinized the book The Jesus Family Tomb book which accompanies the show there are further things that need to be stressed that are wrong with this whole theory and its varied speculations. I will list them seriatim as bullet points.

1) There is a major problem with the analysis of the names on these ossuaries. By this I mean one has to explain why one is in Hebrew, several are in Aramaic, but the supposed Mary Magdalene ossuary is in Greek. This suggests a multi-generation tomb, not a single generation tomb, and indeed a tomb that comes from after A.D. 70 after the Romans had destroyed the temple mount and Jewish Christians fled the city. This tomb is not in old Jerusalem. It is nowhere near the Temple mount, and we already know that the tomb of James was near the Temple Mount. The earliest Jewish Christians in Jerusalem, including the members of Jesus' family and Mary Magdalene, did not speak Greek. They spoke Aramaic. We have absolutely no historical evidence to suggest Mary Magdalene would have been called by a Greek name before A.D. 70. She grew up in a Jewish fishing village called Migdal, not a Greek city at all. It makes no sense that her ossuary would have a Greek inscription and that of her alleged husband an Aramaic inscription.

2) The argument that the 'Matthew' ossuary still works with the theory this is a clan tomb because Mary had ancestors named Matthew does not work. We would need more distant descendants named Matthew, or immediate offspring named Matthew, neither of which we have. Ancestors are irrelevant, and in any case it is disputed whether the genealogy in Luke 3 is Mary's rather than Joseph's. None of the brothers of Jesus as listed in the NT are named Matthew.

3) Mary Magdalene is called 'Maria' constantly in first century Christian literature, and indeed well into the second century as well. She is never called Mariamene or the like. It is anachronistic and inappropriate to bring in later Gnostic document evidence from the Acts of Philip or the Gospel of Mary, neither of which date before the end of the second century A.D. to make your case when you have perfectly good first century data to help you. In fact, in regard to the former manuscript what we have is a 14th century manuscript which is theorized to go back to the fourth century A.D. It does not identify Mariamene as Mary Magdalene, rather it identifies her as the sister of Philip the apostle. It is the unproven theory of Francis Bovon, without real supporting evidence that Mariamene refers to Mary Magdalene. There are two problems with this: 1) we have both Mary Magdalene, and Philip in the NT, and the two are never connected at all. Indeed they are from different cities it seems clear. In terms of historical methodology you cannot use later Gnostic documents filled with wild fictional accounts, indeed fairy tales, about talking animals (yes we have that in the Acts of Philip) and like and be taken seriously when you want to make historical claims on the basis of such later and non-historically oriented evidence; 2) the accounts in the Acts of Philip have Maramene evangelizing foreign countries, yet on the argument of the film producers of this Discovery Channel special, she stayed in Jerusalem and was buried there with Jesus. In other words, we have no good historical connection between the sister of Philip, and Mary Magdalene. None.

4) Jesus is never called 'son of Joseph' by anyone who knew him intimately in the NT--- not by his family members, and not by his disciples. Indeed where this idea arises, for example, in John 6.42 the Jewish officials who are accosting Jesus call him 'son of Joseph' (cf. Jn. 8.41). These can only be called hostile witnesses, not those who were likely to have known the actual case. It is telling that in Nazareth itself, in our account in Mk. 6.1-6 in our earliest Gospel Jesus is called "the carpenter, the son of Mary". Now in that patriarchal culture you don't call a person a 'son of their mother' even if the father has died. That is a pejorative way of addressing a person, rather like calling them an S.O. you know what today. Did the people in Nazareth know there was something unusual about Jesus' origins, and it disconnected him from Joseph? Yes they did, which is why they were angry and did not think Jesus had any right to teach them. He was probably viewed as a mamzer, as Dr. Bruce Chilton has argued—an illegitimate child. And this is precisely what James Tabor argues in his Jesus Dynasty book, claiming he was the son of a Roman soldier named Pantera. But of course now, he has reversed himself to support the Jesus Family Tomb theory. You can't have it both ways, and in fact neither are correct. Jesus was not the physical descendent of Joseph, was known not to be by his hometown folks. The uncharitable suggested he was illegitimate but Mary claimed his conception was a miracle. Those are the two opposing explanations we have from the first century about Jesus' origins. What we do not have is a tradition that Jesus would have been called 'son of Joseph' by members of his own family or his disciples—and that is what is required if the Talpiot tomb is a family tomb.

5) The second word on the Mariamene ossuary is Mara which is short for Martha another female name. It is not a reference to her being a master or teacher. You need to remember that the inscriptions on these ossuaries are very different in character to the one on the James ossuary. The latter has an honorific or monumental inscription on the side of the ossuary in a clear steady hand. The former all have what I call toe tag inscriptions scrawled hastily on the boxes as they are interred in order to distinguish the ossuaries. All that was required then was names, just names. No honorific additions like we find on monumental inscriptions would be used. So either we have two women in this ossuary, perhaps sisters, or we have one woman neither of which names match up with the first century naming of Mary Magdalene.

6) There is an interesting rosette or symbol over the Talpiot tomb, and from the pictures in the book inside the tomb as well. This is very interesting and it tells us one thing. This was a highly unusual and ornamental tomb meant to be recognized by the symbol. It is not, and indeed was not a secret tomb where a despised split off sect of Jesus following Jews could have hidden the bodies of Jesus or James or other family members. The ornamental decoration is meant to attract attention and draw people to the tomb. Indeed it is meant to distinguish the tomb from others. This is the opposite of what we would expect if this is a pre-70 A.D. Jesus family tomb. Remember we have clear historical evidence that Saul of Tarsus, from his own letters and from Acts was a persecutor of Christians. By the 40s this persecution got so bad that some Christians fled the city (see the sweep and trajectory of the story in Act 3-9). Under no circumstances would these beleaguered early Jewish Christians have been advertising where the bones of Jesus laid, if they knew.

7) No explanation is given as to why we have a monumental or honorific inscription on the James ossuary, but not on these other ones. My view would be that this makes clear that the James ossuary was not originally in the Talpiot tomb, indeed not likely there at any point.

8) Much is made of the fact that the chemical analysis of the patina on the James ossuary and some of the ossuaries in the Talpiot tomb match up. This is not actually surprising at all since you can find terra rosa in various locales in and around Jerusalem. This analysis cannot prove that these ossuaries all came from the same place or were interred in the same spot. Terra rosa is not a soil specific to the Talpiot region! And why is nothing at all mentioned about the very different sort of soil found within the James ossuary and not in these others--- namely soil from Silwan, which is where the James ossuary likely came out of the earth. Silwan is indeed within sight of the temple mount. Talpiot is not. It is miles away.

It is incumbant on any historian who wants to dispute a theory about the Jesus tomb to provide some other explanation for the Talpiot tomb. Clearly it is an important tomb, and it may be a Christian one. It would be interesting to know about the Greek inscriptions on the ossuaries or at least in the adjacent tomb which are pictured in the book The Jesus Family Tomb. Since they are in Greek it suggests to me they are not from early Aramaic speaking followers of Jesus, but they could be from later Christian ones, after the profile of who was Christian had broadened considerably with many Gentile Godfearers as converts even within Israel. It is therefore my tentative suggestion that the Talpiot tomb may well be an early Jewish tomb not connected with the followers of Jesus, but it could also be an early Christian tomb from a generation subsequent to the time of Jesus. And what we know about those Christians is that they related to each other as family, even when they were not physically related, and were in some cases buried together, not in clan tombs, because their religious families were more important to them than their physical ones. This tomb may reflect that later Christian practice and reality. It would be nice if the other ossuaries from the Talpiot tomb could be DNA tested so we could find out if any of the folks in this tomb were related. We do not know. But it would not surprise me if none of them were. The practice of osslegium, or burial in ossuaries, continued on after A.D. 70 until the Bar Kokhba revolt at least. There is no reason why this Talpiot tomb might not reflect the period between A.D. 70 and 125 or so.

ADDENDUM FROM PROF. RICHARD BAUCKHAM
Here is some additional data from Richard Bauckham on the names on the so-called 'Mary Magdalene' ossuary. He is more of an expert in early Jewish names than I am.

"The form of the name on the ossuary in question is Mariamenou. This is a Greek genitive case, used to indicate that the ossuary belongs to Mary (it means 'Mary's' or 'belonging to Mary'). The nominative would be Mariamenon. Mariamenon is a diminutive form, used as a form of endearment. The neuter gender is normal in diminutives used for women.


This diminutive, Mariamenon, would seem to have been formed from the name Mariamene, a name which is attested twice elsewhere (in the Babatha archive and in the Jewish catacombs at Beth She'arim). It is an unusual variant of Mariame. In the Babatha document it is spelt with a long e in the penultimate syllable, but in the Bet She'arim inscription the penultimate syllable has a short e. This latter form could readily be contracted to the form Mariamne, which is found, uniquely, in the Acts of Philip.

So we have, on the one hand, a woman known by the diminutive Mariamenon, in the ossuary, and, on the other hand, Mary Magdalen, who is always called in the Greek of the New Testament Maria but seems to be called in a much later source Mariamne. Going by the names alone they could be the same woman, but the argument for this is tenuous.

A final point about the Mariamenou inscription. The inscription also has a second name Mara. When Rahmani published this inscription in his catalogue of ossuaries he conjectured that the Greek particle 'e' (meaning 'or') should be supplied between the two names, making them alternative names for the same woman. The 'e' is not actually in the inscription, nor is there space for it between the two names. It is better to suppose that the bones of two women (or perhaps a woman and her child, the diminutive Mariamenon being used for the latter) were placed in the same ossuary (this would not be not unusual). The name Mara is known to have been used as an abbreviation of the name Martha. The programme makers take it to be the Aramaic word for 'master,' but this is implausible in the context. Beside the name Mariamenou on an ossuary, one would expect Mara to be a name, and since it is attested as a name this is the obviously correct reading."

I concur with this conclusion having now looked closely at the inscription on this particular ossuary. There is no word 'or' in the inscription, in fact there is a slash line separating the first name from the name Mara indicating we are most likely dealing with two different people. Prof. Bauckham has suggested to me that since these are all attested and some are very common Jewish names, that it is more probable this is a Jewish tomb but with no connection to Jesus of Nazareth. This may be so.

25. James Cameron finds grave of Jesus & Son

Comment #23387 by elvenearth on February 28, 2007 at 10:31 am

A reasonably well laid out overview of the evidence and problems associated with this has been found at http://benwitherington.blogspot.com/. I enclose the article here:

THE JESUS TOMB? 'TITANIC' TALPIOT TOMB THEORY SUNK FROM THE START


(This picture of the Talpiot tomb courtesy of the Discovery Channel via the Toronto Star article).

Remember the tale of the Titanic? How it was supposed to be impregnable, and nothing could poke holes in it? How it would never be sunk? Well all I can say is that human hubris knows no bounds, and that hasn't changed in the last century. On April 15th 1912 the supposedly leak proof Titanic rammed into an iceberg and sank—sank like a giant stone. Sank quickly, with great loss of life.
Why do I bring this up? Because in one of the interesting ironies in recent memory, James Cameron the movie director who made the enormously successful film "Titanic", on the night after the Oscars, will give an Oscar winning performance at a news conference along with Simcha Jacobovici who have now produced a Discovery Channel special on the discovery of Jesus' tomb, ossuary, bones, and that of his mother, brothers, wife, and his child Jude as well! Who knew! The show will air on March 4th. In addition we are now regaled with a book by Simcha and Charles Pellegrino entitled The Jesus Family Tomb: The Discovery, the Investigation, and the Evidence That Could Change History just released today by Harper-Collins timed to co-ordinate with their news conference and the Discovery Channel special. Why should we be skeptical about this entire enterprise?

First of all, I have worked with Simcha. He is a practicing Jew, indeed he is an orthodox Jew so far as I can tell. He was the producer of the Discovery Channel special on the James ossuary which I was involved with. He is a good film maker, and he knows a good sensational story when he sees one. This is such a story. Unfortunately it is a story full of holes, conjectures, and problems. It will make good TV and involves a bad critical reading of history. Basically this is old news with a new interpretation. We have known about this tomb since it was discovered in 1980. There are all sorts of reasons to see this as much ado about nothing much:

1) The statistical analysis is of course only as good as the numbers that were provided to the statistician. He couldn't run numbers he did not have. And when you try to run numbers on a combination name such as 'Jesus son of Joseph' you decrease the statistical sample dramatically. In fact, in the case of 'Jesus son of Joseph' you decrease it to a statistically insignificant number! Furthermore, so far as we can tell, the earliest followers of Jesus never called Jesus 'son of Joseph'. It was outsiders who mistakenly called him that! Would the family members such as James who remained in Jerusalem really put that name on Jesus' tomb when they knew otherwise? This is highly improbable. My friend Richard Bauckham provides me with the following statistics:

Out of a total number of 2625 males, these are the figures for the ten most popular male names among Palestinioan Jews. the first figure is the total number of occurrences (from this number, with 2625 as the total for all names, you could calculate percentages), while the second is the number of occurrences specifically on ossuraies.

1 Simon/Simeon 243 59
2 Joseph 218 45
3 Eleazar 166 29
4 Judah 164 44
5 John/Yohanan 122 25
6 Jesus 99 22
7 Hananiah 82 18
8 Jonathan 71 14
9 Matthew 62 17
10 Manaen/Menahem 42 4

For women, we have a total of 328 occurrences (women's names are much less often recorded than men's), and figures for the 4 most popular names are thus:

Mary/Mariamne 70 42
Salome 58 41
Shelamzion 24 19
Martha 20 17

You can see at once that all the names you're interested were extremely popular. 21% of Jewish women were called Mariamne (Mary). The chances of the people in the ossuaries being the Jesus and Mary Magdalene of the New Testament must be very small indeed.

By the way, 'Mara' in this context does not mean Master. It is an abbreviated form of Martha. probably the ossuary contained two women called Mary and Martha (Mariamne and Mara).

There are so many flaws in the analysis of the statistics themselves, that one must assume the statistician did not have the right or sufficient data to work with.

2) there is no independent DNA control sample to compare to what was garnered from the bones in this tomb. By this I mean that the most the DNA evidence can show is that several of these folks are inter-related. Big deal. We would need an independent control sample from some member of Jesus' family to confirm that these were members of Jesus' family. We do not have that at all. In addition mitacondrial DNA does not reveal genetic coding or XY chromosome make up anyway. They would need nuclear DNA for that in any case. So the DNA stuff is probably thrown in to make this look more like a real scientific fact. Not so much.

3) Several of these ossuaries have very popular and familiar early Jewish names. As the statistics above show, the names Joseph and Joshua (Jesus) were two of the most common names in all of early Judaism. So was Mary. Indeed both Jesus' mother and her sister were named Mary. This is the ancient equivalent of finding adjacent tombs with the names Smith and Jones. No big deal.

4) The historical problems with all this are too numerous to list here: A) the ancestral home of Joseph was Bethlehem, and his adult home was Nazareth. The family was still in Nazareth after he was apparently dead and gone. Why in the world would be be buried (alone at this point) in Jerusalem? It's unlikely. B) One of the ossuaries has the name Jude son of Jesus. We have no historical evidence of such a son of Jesus, indeed we have no historical evidence he was ever married; C) the Mary ossuaries (there are two) do not mention anyone from Migdal. It simply has the name Mary-- and that's about the most common of all ancient Jewish female names. D) we have names like Matthew on another ossuary, which don't match up with the list of brothers' names.
E) By all ancient accounts, the tomb of Jesus was empty-- even the Jewish and Roman authorities acknowledged this. Now it takes a year for the flesh to desiccate, and then you put the man's bones in an ossuary. But Jesus' body was long gone from Joseph of Arimathea's tomb well before then. Are we really to believe it was moved to another tomb, decayed, and then was put in an ossuary? Its not likely. F) Implicitly you must accuse James, Peter and John (mentioned in Gal. 1-2-- in our earliest NT document from 49 A.D.) of fraud and coverup. Are we really to believe that they knew Jesus didn't rise bodily from the dead but perpetrated a fraudulent religion, for which they and others were prepared to die? Did they really hide the body of Jesus in another tomb? We need to remember that the James in question is Jesus' brother, who certainly would have known about a family tomb. This frankly is impossible for me to believe.

5) One more thing of importance. The James ossuary, according to the report of the antiquities dealer that Oded Golan got the ossuary from, said that the ossuary came from Silwan, not Talpiot, and had dirt in it that matched up with the soil in that particular spot in Jerusalem. In fact Oded confirmed this to me personally when I spoke with him at an SBL meeting. Why is this important? Well because the ossuaries that came out of Talpiot came out of a rock cave from a different place, and without such soil in it. To theorize that there was a Jesus family tomb, and yet the one member of Jesus' family who we know was buried in Jerusalem for a long time did not come out of the ground from that locale contradicts this theory. Furthermore, Eusebius reports that the tomb marker for James' burial was close to where James was martyred near the temple mount, indeed near the famous tombs in the Kidron valley such as the so-called tomb of Absalom. Talpiot is nowhere near this locale.

6)What should we make of James Tabor's being co-opted into this project? You will remember his book which came out last year The Jesus Dynasty. In that book he had quite a good deal to say about the Talpiot Tomb, and about Panthera being the father of Jesus, and about Jesus being buried in Galilee, and of course nothing about a ossuary which claims that Joseph is the father of Jesus. Why such a quick reversal of his earlier opinions? This makes him appear very quixotic, not a very reliable witness who sticks by his guns when he draws a conclusion, for he has now reversed himself not just on one or two minor points, but on several major ones. My advise to James, whom I respect and who has not only done some fine archaeological work but is a nice guy, is to disassociate himself from this speculative and flawed theory just as quick as possible if he cares for his reputation as a scholar.

In the Toronto Star article from Sunday's paper, we find that the unraveling has begun before they even hold the news conference today--- here is a brief quote from the article written by Stuart Laidlaw---

"But there is one wrinkle that is not examined in the documentary, one that emerged in a Jerusalem courtroom just weeks ago at the fraud trial of James ossuary owner Oded Golan, charged with forging part of the inscription on the box.

Former FBI agent Gerald Richard testified that a photo of the James ossuary, showing it in Golan's home, was taken in the 1970s, based on tests done by the FBI photo lab. The trial resumes tomorrow.

Jacobovici conceded in an interview that if the ossuary was photographed in the 1970s, it could not then have been found in a tomb in 1980.

But while he does not address the conundrum in the documentary, he said in an interview that it's possible Golan's photo was printed on old paper in the 1980s."

Here is the link to the Toronto Star article.

http://www.thestar.com/News/article/185708

In fact the same article reports that Professor Amos Kloner from bar Ilan University has already told the German press "It's a beautiful story but without any proof whatsoever." He is important since he did extensive work and research on this very tomb and its ossuaries and came to negative conclusions published in a journal in 1996. In short, this is old news, to which has been added only the recent DNA testing and statistical analysis neither of which makes the case the film makers want to make.


I feel sorry for Simcha, but I know how these things happen. One's enthusiasm for a subject propels one into over-reaching when it comes to drawing conclusions. The problem with keeping these ideas secret for the sake of making a big splash of publicity, and lots of money, is that peer review by a panel of scholars could have saved these folks a lot of embarrassment down the road. 'C'est la vie.'

So my response to this is clear--- James Cameron, the producer of the movie Titantic, has now jumped on board another sinking ship full of holes, presumably in order to make a lot of money before the theory sinks into an early watery grave. Man the lifeboats and get out now.
For those wanting much more on the historical Jesus and James and Mary see now my WHAT HAVE THEY DONE WITH JESUS? (Harper-Collins, 2006).

NEW ADDENDUM

And one more thing to add---Eusebius the father of church history (4th century) tells us that there had been since NT times a tomb of James the Just, the brother of Jesus, which was near the Temple mount and had an honoric stele next to it, and that it was a pilgrimage spot for many Christians. It was apparently a single tomb, with no other Holy family members mentioned nor any other ossuaries in that place. The locality and singularity of this tradition rules out a family tomb in Talpiot. Christians would not have been making pilgrimage to the tomb if they believed Jesus' bones were in it-- that would have contradicted and violated their faith, but the bones of holy James were another matter. They were consider sacred relics.

Here is part of the passage from Eusebius on Jesus' brother--- James "was buried on the spot, by the Sanctuary, and his inscribed stone (stele) is still there by the sanctuary." (Hist. Eccles. 2.23.18). This is clearly not in Talpiot, and remember to claim there is a Talpiot family tomb means that Jesus would have been buried there long before James was martyred in A.D. 62. In other words, the James tradition contradicts the Talpiot tomb both in locale and in substance. James is buried alone, in another place.