Ossuário de Tiago - James Ossuary

Urna com nome de Jesus causa controvérsia entre pesquisadores

A inscrição em um antigo ossário, que pode ser a primeira indicação arqueológica da existência de Jesus, tem causado ceticismo entre diversos especialistas. Os dizeres "Tiago, filho de José, irmão de Jesus" estão gravados em aramaico --língua próxima ao hebreu-- numa urna funerária de pedra encontrada em Jerusalém, datada do século 1º de nossa era, segundo o paleógrafo André Lemaire. Ele anunciou sua teoria na última edição da revista "Biblical Archaeology Review".

Folha Online: 23.10.2002 – 11h46 

http://www1.uol.com.br/folha/ciencia/ult306u7506.shtml

Arqueólogos israelenses analisam ossário com nome de Jesus

 O sub-diretor da Repartição de Antiguidades de Israel, Uzi Dahari, afirmou que, na sua opinião, o ossário do século 1 recentemente encontrado tem "fortes probabilidades" de ser de Tiago, irmão de Jesus. O ossário tem uma inscrição em língua aramaica que diz "Tiago, filho de José, irmão de Jesus". Os arqueólogos estão agora analisando a inscrição, para determinar se é original ou se foi feita posteriormente à utilização do ossário. Se for confirmada sua autenticidade, esse seria o primeiro objeto arqueológico a confirmar a existência de Jesus. Feito em pedra calcária, ele encontra-se vazio e pertence a um colecionador israelense que pediu anonimato. Porém, ele disse que a caixa foi adquirida de um comerciante árabe, que a teria achado na aldeia árabe de Siluwan, junto à Cidade Velha de Jerusalém.

Folha Online: 24.10.2002 - 13h04 

http://www1.uol.com.br/folha/ciencia/ult306u7521.shtml

Evidence Of Jesus Written In Stone

Ossuary Of Jesus’ Brother Backs Up Biblical Accounts

 After nearly 2,000 years, historical evidence for the existence of Jesus has come to light literally written in stone. An inscription has been found on an ancient bone box, called an ossuary, that reads “James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus.” This container provides the only New Testament-era mention of the central figure of Christianity and is the first-ever archaeological discovery to corroborate Biblical references to Jesus.

Biblical Archaeology Review - November/December 2002

Possible Earliest Reference of Jesus Found

Scholars say a nondescript limestone box, looted from a Jerusalem cave and held secretly in a private collection in Israel, could be the first-ever reference to Jesus in the world's archaeological record. The box is an ossuary, used by Jews at the time of Christ to hold the bones of the deceased. (...)  "I was very excited," said French philologist and epigrapher Andre Lemaire, who was invited by the ossuary's owner to take a look at it this spring. "Could it be James the brother of Jesus? There was no mention of Nazareth, but it was very impressive.."

washingtonpost.com - Monday, October 21, 2002; 12:30 PM

Stone Box May Be Oldest Link to Jesus
Scholar Believes 60 A.D. Relic Authentic

If authentic, the ossuary would have immense significance for Christians everywhere, for it would be the first artifact -- and the only artifact from the first century -- that mentions Jesus. Aside from the Bible, very little is known about the life of Jesus (...) Since Lemaire's examination, scholars and scientists have examined and analyzed the box, seeking to expose it for a fake or otherwise show that it could not be the ossuary that once held the bones of St. James, leader of the Christian church of Jerusalem, and, in the words of St. Paul to the Galatians, "the Lord's brother." So far the ossuary has withstood scrutiny, but even those who have studied it, such as the Rev. Joseph Fitzmyer, an emeritus professor of biblical studies and an Aramaic expert at Catholic University, concede "it will always be controversial." "The problem is how do you determine that the people involved are the people in the New Testament?" Fitzmyer said. "It's certainly possible that they are, but I can't see going beyond that." The journal Biblical Archaeological Review, which formally announced the appearance of the ossuary at a news conference yesterday, is publishing Lemaire's findings in its November-December issue. Lemaire, an expert in ancient Aramaic and Hebrew at the Sorbonne, was a visiting scholar at Israel's Hebrew University when he met the ossuary's owner "by chance" at a reception this spring.

washingtonpost.com - Tuesday, October 22, 2002; Page A01

Does the James' Ossuary really refer to Jesus Christ?

There are still many questions that need to be answered

Is it a fake? Dr. Lemaire has brought in experts from several different areas of archaeology, archaeogeology, ancient writing styles, and carving techniques. Their verdict is that there is no evidence of modern tampering. Where was the ossuary discovered? That remains unknown, for it was stolen from its original site by gravediggers. This means that there is no scientific or archaeological record of where the box was buried or of the items that were in the ground around it. Not only does this mean that it cannot be proven that the ossuary comes from the Jerusalem area, it also means that it cannot be dated through archaeological criteria (...)  In what Aramaic dialect is the inscription written, and is that dialect appropriate for first-century Jerusalem? It turns out that although the dialect of the inscription can be made to fit into first-century Jerusalem, it actually fits much better with the Galilean dialect of the late second to sixth century. There are two linguistic indications that suggest the dialect of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic, which was used in texts and inscriptions from Galilee of a century or more later.

Bible and Interpretation - 24.10.2002 - By Paul Flesher, Director Religious Studies Program University of Wyoming

http://www.bibleinterp.com/articles/James_Ossuary.htm

ANE - Ancient Near East

ANE (Ancient Near East - Antigo Oriente Médio) é uma mailing list de pesquisas e estudos do Antigo Oriente Médio, desde o vale do Indo até o vale do Nilo e do começo da civilização humana na região até o surgimento do islamismo. Muito interessante para pesquisadores e estudantes interessados em acompanhar o debate atual sobre vários temas ligados a esta região. A inscrição na lista, mantida pelo Instituto Oriental da Universidade de Chicago, é aberta a todos. A discussão sobre o ossuário de Tiago - NY Times: "Jerusalem Artifact" ou "Ossuary of James" - pode ser lida em

http://www-oi.uchicago.edu/OI/ANE/OI_ANE-DIGEST.html

'James, brother of Jesus'?

The Rev. Joseph Fitzmyer, professor emeritus of Catholic University, told United Press International. Shanks called Fitzmyer "one of the world's leading experts in 1st-century Aramaic and a pre-eminent Dead Sea Scroll editor." (Fitzmyer, initially troubled by an unusual spelling of the word "brother," did some research and found other examples from the same period.) In a telephone interview, Fitzmyer noted that in Lemaire's article the Frenchman concluded: "It seems very probable that this is the ossuary of James of the New Testament." But earlier on the same page, Lemaire wrote: "Nothing in this ossuary inscription confirms the identification." Surely, however, Lemaire was making a pro forma distinction between probability and certitude. The Rev. John P. Meier, a professor of Theology at the University of Notre Dame, Ind., said converging lines of probabilities make it more likely than not that the Jesus referred to is Jesus of Nazareth. Meier, a Roman Catholic priest, is an expert on 1st century Palestinian Judaism and author of the four-volume series "A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus." "What are we left with but weighing probabilities?" Meier asked in a phone interview from South Bend. "It's one thing to have scattered probabilities. It's another thing to have lines of probabilities all converging at one point."

UPI - United Press International - By Lou Marano From the Life & Mind Desk Published 10/25/2002 7:45 PM

Explorator

Explorator é uma newsletter sobre arqueologia e história, distribuída livremente via e-mail. Excelente fonte de informação sobre a arqueologia e a história do Antigo Oriente Médio. Para receber Explorator, inscreva-se mandando um e-mail em branco para mailto:Explorator-subscribe@yahoogroups.com . As mensagens antigas de Explorator podem ser lidas em http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/Explorator/. Explorator 5.26, distribuída no dia 27.10.2002 traz uma série de links para o "ossuário de Tiago". 

E na Explorator 5.27, distribuída em 03.11.2002, pode-se ler:

If the James Ossuary was the big news last week, I guess the
big news this week is that it was cracked en route to exhibition in
Toronto. 

Ossuary Was Genuine,
Inscription Was Faked

As an expert on scripts and an historian of writing systems, I was asked to examine this inscription and make a report. I did. The bone-box is original; the first inscription, which is in Aramaic, "Jacob son of Joseph," is authentic. The second half of the inscription, "brother of Jesus," is a poorly executed fake and a later addition. This report has already been distributed on at least two scholarly lists. Please note that the fraud is so blatant that I did not bother to go into extreme detail on whether the faked addition is supposed to be Hebrew or Aramaic. (If that's a vav, -- then it's Hebrew, not Aramaic; if it's yod, then it's says 'my brother', not 'his brother' or 'brother of'. By no stretch of the imagination can one claim this to be in Aramaic... 'of' in Aramaic is 'di'.) You have to be blind as a bat not to see that the second part is a fraud. 

By Rochelle I. Altman,  co-coordinator of IOUDAIOS-L - Special to Jewsweek Magazine November 2, 2002

The James Ossuary and 
The Jesus Ossuary

Brothers and Sisters of Jesus

The Jerusalem ossuary, which carries the inscribed name (in Aramaic) of "Ya'akov bar Yohosef akhui di Yeshua" [that is: "Jacob, son of Joseph, brother of Joshua"], is not a new discovery. It has been reported by the press and media several times since it first came to light in 1926, while ossuaries citing the name of Jesus are mentioned in the 1978 Manual of Palestinian Aramaic Texts and the 1994 Catalogue of Jewish Ossuaries. The Hebrew Union College and Ben Gurion University confirm that the James ossuary has no known archaeological provenance, and it was originally found in a museum basement by Prof. E.L. Sukenik of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

By Laurence Gardner - http://www.graal.co.uk/index.html

 http://www.graal.co.uk/ossuary.html

Final Report on the James Ossuary

The report concentrates solely on the evidence of the writing system. As the evidence requires extensive discussions of background material, in order to keep this report within reasonable limits, people are referred to known experts in their fields on linguistic determination*, materials**, and textual evidence.*** (...) The ossuary itself is undoubtedly genuine; the well executed and formal first part of the inscription is a holographic original by a literate (and wealthy) survivor of Jacob Ben Josef sometime during the Herodian period. The second part of the inscription bears the hallmarks of a fraudulent later addition, probably around the 3rd or 4th centuries, and is questionable to say the least.

By Rochelle I. S. Altman - co-coordinator of IOUDAIOS-L 

James Ossuary Inscription

I find the James ossuary inscription fascinating for many reasons, not least of which are the reactions it has produced. Its discovery has sent many people scurrying into separate ideological camps to prepare for battle. Some already believe that the box is truly authentic and once held the bones of Saint James, while others declare, seemingly without a doubt, that it is obviously a fake. The inscription is currently a hot topic on several online scholarly forums. A few individuals posting to these forums have garnered quite a bit of public attention (or at least net wide public attention) for their views. One such individual is Dr. Rochelle Altman. Dr. Altman believes that the newly discovered ossuary, itself, and the "first part" of its inscription are authentic while the "second part" of the inscription is a fake. She has expressed these views in the Ioudaios-L (of which she is a co-coordinator) and Crosstalk2 forums as well as in an online web magazine by the name of Jewsweek (...) Dr. Altman has recently posted her "Final Report" concerning the ossuary on several websites. Unfortunately, though she has modified her position slightly from what I have addressed above, I believe that many of the things that I have proposed still stand against her arguments in a fairly strong way.

By Bryan Cox - Bryan's Biblical Links - Plano, TX - November, 2002