Where Jesus was sentenced to die...

Candida Moss has written an article about a new archaeological site now accessible for tourists, namely, the praetorium in the basement of Herod's palace. No doubt with a wry smile on her face, she mentions that this site has been known since 2001 but is now being publicized because it is now available for tourists. (See Jodi Magness on the archaeology).

Antonia Fortress, apparently NOT
where Jesus was sentenced
or where the Via Dolorosa began. 

This location in Herod's palace is now thought to be where Jesus was sentenced to die (not in the picture).

I'll defer to archaeological experts on this one. It is very frustrating, but I knew better when I was in Israel to think that the sites we saw were the actual sites of most things. We like certainty (indeed, it is almost an idol for many), but real historical study leaves us with more questions than definite answers.

So the current sense of things is that Jesus wasn't sentenced at the Antonia Fortress (to the left) and that the Via Dolorosa you visit today (from the 1700s) wasn't the original one.

I did have one question about the piece. I am pretty sure that the Church of the Holy Sepulcher was actually outside the city walls of Jerusalem at the time of Christ.

A Taste of Scholarship

Most of us don't really know what real scholarship is like by people who are truly experts.  When you see this level of expertise, you immediately recognize it.

Here's a sample in relation to the recent archaeological find in Jerusalem.  I know almost nothing about epigraphy on this level.

Lead Plates Apparently Forgeries

A couple individuals have asked me about some lead plates that surfaced in Jordan recently.  We Christians have to be careful about these things because we are prone to jump on them without sufficient care.  When we are wrong--and these things almost always turn out to be hoaxes--not only we look stupid but we make Christianity look stupid.

First, this article from the Mirror so smacks of sensationalism and unlikelihood that, even if the plates were authentic, this article would almost certainly be a stretch.  The very idea of Jesus keeping a diary sounds massively anachronistic in itself.

But Peter Thonemann, as reported by Daniel McClellan, has apparently correlated some of the writing on the codices with some material on display in the Archaeological Museum in Amman.  James McGrath has links to a number of other bloggers who have concluded similarly, and David Meadows has a sagacious review of the issue.  Thonemann believes that some confusion over what the Greek letters A and L are, as well as the repetition of the same exact Greek phrase in more than one place on the same page, points to someone who did not actually know Greek and was trying to fake it.

None of this disproves anything about Jesus.  It just proves that after the Dead Sea Scroll discoveries, someone was motivated to create something he or she could turn in for money.

Gabriel's Stone and a Suffering Messiah

Ben Witherington and others have drawn our attention to a stone that is raising some discussion in archaeology. Here's the NY Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/06/world/middleeast/06stone.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp

Here is a drawing of the inscription.

The stone has been known for some time but is just now hitting the presses because it is now attached to the idea that the stone, which apparently dates to the 1st century BC, might say something about a dying and rising messiah--and after three days none the less.

I'll remain unconvinced until I study it more carefully. Not that I think it disproves Christ's resurrection or anything. Showing that the idea of resurrection had historical precedence disproves nothing.

But we've seen this before. The text has a lot of missing lines and, surprise, the key ones once again turn out to be the reconstructed ones. Usually, the great discovery turns out to be in the mind of the reconstructor.

But whether it turns out to be legit or not, it's not a problem for faith.

OT Sites: Shechem, Shiloh, Ebal

My Hebrew seminary prof is leading a J term course in Israel and managed to get to Shiloh and a rock's through away from Shechem (deep in the West Bank). His description of the day is interesting:

http://web.mac.com/lawsonstone1/iWeb/StonesFence/Blog/BE7F1086-9916-4F9E-A8F1-73DC78FF3562.html

Some of the historical complications that surround the biblical texts in relation to Shiloh always made me glad I was a NT prof. Why is Samuel a priest when he is not a Levite? Why is there a structure at Shiloh that has lintels and such when Israel was only supposed to have a moveable tent at this point? Why is Israel having one yearly festival of Yahweh when they're supposed to have three and this isn't said to be any of them?

Of course my faith isn't troubled by any of these things because Christ is risen; he is risen indeed...