“Lost Tomb of Jesus” claim
February 26th, 2007 by Leen RitmeyerA brief comment on this, as so many people have asked me about it. It would have to be an archaeologist’s worst nightmare. Imagine - your careful academic work, as was Amos Kloner’s supervision of the tomb’s excavation for the IAA (Israel Antiquities Authority) in 1980 - hijacked by Hollywood. And that to produce a sensationalist documentary that the Discovery Channel website, for whom the “Lost Tomb of Jesus” was produced, foretells “will be carried round the world”. It is possibly the most cynical claim yet to be made in the field of Biblical Archaeology and only serves to give the subject a bad name.
Will the world take heed to the comments of Amos Kloner, quoted in the Jerusalem Post who said that the documentary’s claims were “impossible” and “nonsense” and that there was “no likelihood that Jesus and his relatives had a family tomb in Jerusalem”? Jesus and his family hailed from Nazareth in Galilee, as anyone with a shred of Bible knowledge knows and there was no reason for them to have a family tomb in Jerusalem. It is worth knowing that Jacobovici and Cameron are not original in their claim. The assertion that the family tomb of Jesus has been located was made in James D. Tabor, “The Jesus Dynasty, The Hidden Story of Jesus, His Royal family, and the Birth of Christianity” (2006).
Watch this theory go the way of all such contrived “sizzling” and “staggering” “discoveries”!
Posted in News |
February 26th, 2007 at 5:28 am
Joe Zias just reported on ANE-2 on a visit to the tomb with Reuters and AP reporters
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ANE-2/message/4069
February 26th, 2007 at 6:09 am
One of my staff actually asked me if we should put this in our news scroller on our site. I’ve never been so quick to say no. Total garbage. I really hope they don’t make Kloner’s interview with them sound like he believes it’s really Jesus’s tomb.
Should be fun to see how it plays out though.
February 26th, 2007 at 9:34 am
Excellent post Leen. Great words and conciseness as well.
Just one more thought to add to what you’ve already so marvelously said. The claim of the movie of the “long lost tomb of Jesus and his family” completely omits the Scriptural references at all.
Where are the Scriptures in this? If one were to search the Scriptures, it would disprove these claims almost immediately.
Thanks
February 26th, 2007 at 1:54 pm
[…] Leen Ritmeyer : It would have to be an archaeologist’s worst nightmare. Imagine - your careful […]
February 26th, 2007 at 2:18 pm
Leen, yours is the best comment yet on the subject. Which I also say here: http://drjimwest.wordpress.com/2007/02/26/the-best-comment-on-the-tomb-story-yet/
Well done!
February 26th, 2007 at 11:59 pm
I wonder if Kloner knows they are using him as an “expert” on thier website?
February 27th, 2007 at 10:31 am
Thank you for your sensible comments on this subject. I’ve added my own thoughts on my own blog at http://blue.butler.edu/~jfmcgrat/blog/
March 2nd, 2007 at 6:54 am
[…] more at Leen Ritmeyer’s blog and at ABC News. Check out also Internet Monk for several updates … and Codex for a list of […]
March 3rd, 2007 at 3:12 pm
Dr. R.,
Commendable observations. I welcome you to consider my own comments on the “Lost Tomb of Jesus,” and the flaws in the argumentation used by its promoters, at
www.curtisvillechristian.org/TombOne.html .
My review includes a study of the statistics used, and what they do and don’t mean.
March 5th, 2007 at 12:39 am
[…] Dr. Leen Ritmeyer, biblical archeologist, Associate Professor at the College of Archaeology & Biblical History, TSW University: It would have to be an archaeologist’s worst nightmare. Imagine — your careful academic work, as was Amos Kloner’s supervision of the tomb’s excavation for the IAA (Israel Antiquities Authority) in 1980 — hijacked by Hollywood. And that to produce a sensationalist documentary…. It is possibly the most cynical claim yet to be made in the field of Biblical Archaeology and only serves to give the subject a bad name. (Online Source) […]
March 28th, 2007 at 10:58 am
[…] instead of listening to the Hollywood version of this discovery, why don’t you check it out here and see what an expert has to say about it, one who is really in the know. Why is it that the world […]
April 17th, 2007 at 1:44 am
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July 4th, 2007 at 4:23 pm
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