BAR posts a further comment on Talpiot. Me too

It has been written by Eldad Keynan. Let me briefly add some considerations. Keynan writes:

The great problem connected to Simcha was (and still is) a simple fact: though the Tomb has been discovered 28 years ago, no professional made any effort to study it seriously.

Aren’t A. Kloner and L. Rahmani professional scholars? Well, they have written a paper and a book on the ossuaries found in the Talpiot tomb.

As a result, only a handful of professionals ever knew something about it.

This has always happened in biblical archaeology. Unfortunately, too much of the available studies fall into two categories: popular quackery and scholarly esotericism. Pseudo-experts clutter the web with absurd claims and reliable reports (Kloner, Rahmani) sit unread in university libraries.

Then along came a filmmaker and aired his film, by which pushed the subject to the front of what should have been a scholarly debate. This is Simcha’s “great sin”.
Wrong. The film was aired first in 1996 on BBC. So, it’s old stuff. And professional scholars had already dismissed that hypothesis 12 years ago.
And he finally writes:
Thus we are still left with simple questions, leaving theology aside.
1. Can any epigrapher, based on her/his expertise, totally dismiss the possibility that the Talpiot Tomb is Jesus’tomb?
2. Can any archaeologist, based on her/his expertise, totally dismiss the possibility that the Talpiot Tomb is Jesus’ tomb?
3. Can any historian, based on her/his expertise, totally dismiss the possibility that the Talpiot Tomb is Jesus’ tomb?
4. Can any person say is it reasonable that a Second Temple period scholar “bumps” into the Taliot Tomb names cluster and nothing crossed his mind?
I think the right question is: Can any scholar prove that Tapiot is Jesus’ tomb? I’d say that there’s an overwhelming archaeological, historical, and epigraphical evidence that say the Jesus of Nazareth was not buried there.
The “totally dismiss” or “totally prove” things are rarely written in professional researches.
By the way: Talpiot ossuary has ישוע בר יהוסף and not יוסף.

giovedì 28 febbraio 2008