Sins of commission and omission: digitally generated marginal ‘fishes’ and overlooked handles on the so-called ‘Jonah Ossuary’

Unfortunately, if we take into account the visual evidence that has been omitted, and we acknowledge the digital manipulations that have been committed to the images, we are left with the following conclusions:

1) The “fish swimming in the margins” are the result of digital “inking” and are not fish after all, but simple unclosed, oval shapes used as decorations in the border.
2) The “half fish” on the side panel of the ossuary has clearly visible handles, and is therefore not a fish, but actually some kind of representation of a vessel.
3) The “Jonah fish,” which possesses oval loop handles similar to the “half fish” inscribed vessel (but which were not represented by the authors), is therefore not a fish, but actually an attempt at a representation of some other kind of vessel.

Because, once again, fish don’t have handles.

Thus the entire theory appears to be one big digitally manipulated fish tale (and not a fish’s tail).

(VIA)

Excerpting it is impossible.  You’ll simply have to go to his blog and read it in its fullness.  It should, and I say should because we all know it won’t, but it should put to rest the claims that have been made by Tabor et al.

And lest you doubt that Robert is the most appropriate person to examine digital evidence I would simply remind you that he is probably (no, he is most certainly) the leading expert in the field of digital materials and biblical scholarship.  If he says something isn’t right with an image, you can take it to the bank.

Related articles

• Talpiot and the Manipulation of Evidence to Suit a Claim (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)
• Lombatti on Tabor and Jacobovici’s Fishy Claim (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)

First, and most importantly, I must continue to stress that my argument is not that the scholars arguing for authenticity are ‘crackpots’.  I’ve never, ever, made such a claim.  James Tabor is an excellent scholar and, in every instance I have spoken with him, he is very lucid and erudite–if not downright polite.  He has a grasp of the primary evidence, a sound background in the field, many peer-reviewed publications, and should be respected.  Standing with Tabor are a handful of other excellent scholars who otherwise have very important and interesting things to say.  While I may joke around at times, I would never suggest that James was anything more than a good human being and a hard working scholar.  Those who feel otherwise would do well to keep in mind that there is a strong difference between a credible scholar who makes claims with which the majority of scholars disagree and a person who might be considered a ‘crackpot’.  Crackpots are those who claim that aliens built the pyramids, or that the Mayans predicted the world would end in 2012, or that Jesus is based on astrotheology.  That is crackpottery.  James Tabor is nothing like that.

Second, it must be remembered that we are discussing a real tomb and real ossuaries.  These are not fake artifacts like the lead codices or even ancient fakes like the Shroud of Turin.  To the best of our knowledge, these are legitimate ossuaries which contain(ed) the bones of ancient individuals who believed in a resurrection (since this was the purpose of the ossuary in Second-Temple Jewish burials).  While many scholars believe that the James ossuary inscription is partially inauthentic (though whether the second half is an ancient or modern forgery remains to be seen), the Jonah ossuary was found roughly in situ  (it had been moved around a few times within the tomb, but to our knowledge has never been removed completely from it).  The contention is with the interpretation of the iconography on these ossuaries.

Third, though perhaps most important, we do not have these ossuaries on hand to study.  The ossuaries, to our knowledge, are still in the Talpiot B tomb and have not been exhumed.  Unfortunately this presents many problems.  All we have are photos–photos which are taken at odd angles and which are grainy.  Though one image, which has been circulating the most, is not an image at all but a ‘composite’ that has been completely computer generated, is particularly unhelpful, the rest of the photos supplied by Jacobovici and Tabor are much appreciated.  But the images do not show the whole picture, only pieces.  It is a big puzzle.  And like a puzzle the pieces have to be sorted out and then put back together and only from that final picture–still with large gaps of information missing, mind you–can any interpretation be made.  I do not suspect any treachery here, at least not with James Tabor who has done his utmost over the past few weeks to be as vigilant in discovering the truth as any of us (though we at times talk past each other).

I hope that these issues have been clarified.  I hold no ill will towards Tabor and hope he recognizes that I do not support nor condone those who call him names or promote incivility.

It is faint, but it looks like it belongs to the rest if the iconography.  Now compare that to my posted images courtesy of Rahmani and the amphora motif is ever more clear.

Now this makes me wonder…I wonder why this is not on the ‘museum quality replica’?  And why is this not a part of the ‘composite’ CGI image passed along to media sources?  Many questions remain unanswered.

UPDATE:

Mark Goodacre posts an excellent article on the side ‘falf-fish’ iconography, suggesting that there are handles clearly depicted on it as well.  Check it out.  I believe he is correct.

UPDATE 2:

After looking at other photos, it is clear the long red line is part of the border of the image.  However, there is a distinct handle on both sides of the ‘tail’, one of which is clear in the image above.  I will update this article once I have additional information since, I believe, one of my colleagues will be blogging about this subject relatively soon.

UPDATE 3:

Bab Cargill not only exposes the handle in his recent post on the subject but he eviscerates the argument that we are looking at fish–anywhere–on this ossuary.  Well done, Bob!

First, the image you’re using is the GCI’d (re: doctored) image.  It’s not the actual photo of the iconography.

Second, you have it oriented incorrectly.  It isn’t oriented sideways (Simcha is really to blame for this since he produced a press kit full of images like this with the iconography oriented incorrectly).  The iconography should be ‘nose’ down.

Third, this is the problem when you use anecdotal evidence (when scholars rely upon laypeople try to analyze the evidence and follow their interpretations).  Here are reasons why this interpretation doesn’t work:

1.  The whole ‘toothy smile’ bit is anachronistic as it is; fish depicted on ancient carvings on ossuaries or on buildings do not have ‘toothy mouths’.  They nearly alwayshave their mouths open or the head isn’t drawn at all.  See this image from an ossuary (you can see it in Rahmani’s catalog; h/t to Antonio Lombatti for the image):
2. ‘Fins’ in this fashion aren’t found on fish iconography.  Again, examine the image closely above.
3. It’s not a fish.  Once you orient it correctly, it is clearly…CLEARLY…a vessel (an amphora or an unguentarium).  Look closely at the sketch on the Jesus Discovery website:
4. The most common criticism is the ‘ball-bottom’ of the iconography.  But we see more often than not on ossuaries, using the vase-motif (amphorae or an unguentarium), a ball-bottom.  Consider these examples from Rahmani’s catalog (image quality is poor because I took them from my cell phone; apologies in advance for your squinting):
   
   
   
   Now these were all done by professional artists in antiquity.  They are deeply cut and symmetrical.  But not all were done so well.  In the instance of our ‘Jonah’ ossuary, we don’t have the original photos from a good angle and it appears to be done by someone who was not as talented (or was pressed for time; like an afterthought after they had already decorated the rest of the ossuary).  Also, not that all the styles of these vessels are different, but they all have similar dimensions and all similarly have a ‘ball-bottom’ or something similar.  Which means that my suggestion that the artist was using an unguentarium or a glass amphora is a lot closer than ‘fish’ (again see the comparison above).

Now the fact that you saw ‘fish’ is not your fault.  You were misled by a marketing campaign.  But the sensationalism has to take a back seat at some point for actual scholarship to be done.  And the consensus right now is that this is definitely not a fish; it is a vessel.  We know the vase-motif was prominent in ossuary iconography.  We also know that ‘fish’ were not used nearly as often, and the reason for their existence on ossuaries has been linked only to profession (cf. Rahmani), like if someone were a fishmonger–they might have fish on the outside of their ossuary.  But frankly, this just isn’t a fish.  The only way one gets ‘fish’ from the actual image is when you take that image, fabricate a brand new one (the image you used to create the ‘toothy fish’ above) and orient it incorrectly.

UPDATE AND ADDENDUM:

What makes this more likely to be an unguentarium or an amphora might also be related to the fact that we have evidence from ossuaries (again, via Rahmani’s catalog) utilizing the vase-motif will, at times, produce amphora on both the front and sides of the ossuary.  According to Simcha, the ossuary in question has ‘another fish tail’ on the side.  But let us examine this more closely:

And the unfortunate part of this image is that it is cut off and we don’t see what is below what we see.   Simcha and others argue that this is the part of the ‘fish tail’ which, as it were, looks very post modern in development.  Who puts half a fish tail on an ossuary?  What a waste of space.

Instead, I will argue this is another amphora or at the very least part of the vase-motif.  Consider this image from Rahmani’s catalog (better quality image supplied by commenter below):

Note that this is the same ossuary, but the amphorae are on the front and sides.  This is common (and we see this in several other ossuaries in Rahmani’s catalog) and should not be overlooked here.

UPDATE 2:

I may have uncovered what appears to be a handle in one of the press kit photos.  Take a closer look and compare to those from Rahmani’s catalog above:

The current discussion of Talpiot Tomb B, the “patio tomb”, has largely centered on the interpretation of the picture on one of the ossuaries.  But Tabor’s and Jacobovici’s argument that this tomb is linked with Jesus and his disciples is related to their earlier claims about Talpiot Tomb A, the “garden tomb”.  The case that this is the Jesus family tomb was made in 2007 in a book, a film and a website.[i]  It was largely based on a claim about statistics — this cluster of names, bearing so close a relationship to the names of members of Jesus’ family, was most unlikely to have occurred by accident.

At the time, I and many others were sceptical of the claim. It appeared to rely on a dubious identification between the name “Mariamēnē” and Mary Magdalene, who was identified as Jesus’ wife, and it failed to take seriously the non-matches in the tomb, especially “Judas son of Jesus”.

In a bid to explain the difficulties, I turned to an analogy that Jacobovici liked to use, an analogy based on the Beatles.[ii]

Read on here.

…  one thing I haven’t yet seen anyone point out is the fundamental contradiction between Tabor’s and Jacobovici’s interpretation of the Patio Tomb and their interpretation of the so-called “Jesus Tomb.” On the one hand, they claim to have found the tomb of Jesus and his family, where Jesus’ body was moved from its temporary grave after the crucifixion. But on the other hand, they claim the Patio Tomb, all of 45m away (in a tomb they speculate may have been on the property of Joseph of Arimathea), “represent[s] archeological evidence related to faith in Jesus’ resurrection from the dead—presumably by his contemporary 1st century followers.” So let me get this straight: Jesus’ contemporary 1st century followers who were buried next to Jesus’ dead body believed in the resurrection of Jesus? How exactly does that work?

It doesn’t at all.  So nicely spotted.   And then

If nothing else shows just how far Tabor and Jacobovici’s publicity-baiting will go, this outright contradiction makes it very clear: apparently they want us to believe the earliest Christian disciples believed that the Jesus whose body was decaying in a well-marked tomb a stone’s throw away had been raised from the dead. It would take more faith to buy that story than to believe Jesus was resurrected in the first place.

Publicity-baiting.  It’s the perfect phrase.  With thanks to Bob Cargill on FB for drawing Jason’s post to our attention.

Related articles

• There is No Connection Between Joseph of Arimathea and Talpiot (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)
• Talpiot and the Manipulation of Evidence to Suit a Claim (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)

It seems that there were some predispositions towards finding ‘Jonah and the Whale’ on an ossuary.  Both Mark Goodacre and David Meadows (via Goodacre) found evidence of this and have posted some compelling information.  If this is the case, one should not be so surprised by the ‘discovery’ of precisely what Simcha and his team were looking for.

Most absurd is Simcha’s claim that “NOBODY has been able to poke a hole into our reasoning or our facts or our methodology or our reporting.”  How about Mark Goodacre for starters (and as he points out, these mistakes still remain on the website today)?  And while we’re at it, Antonio Lombatti reports that Oded Golan was dishonest (*gasps and collapses under the weight of the shock*) about Rahmani’s impression of the James ossuary inscription.  Jim West points out the obvious errors in the connection of the tomb to Joseph of Arimathea.  But I also highly recommend Christopher Rollston’s critique of these claims as well.  And James McGrath has quite a lot to say about the subject as well.

But the problems of both tombs don’t start or stop here.  Bob Cargill and I spent a lot of time analyzing the photos and it is pretty clear that there are cases of digital manipulation.  We both agree that it is likely part of the ancient ‘vase-motif’.  In this regard we also both agree with Antonio Lombatti that the type of vase represented in the image doesn’t matter quite as much (though I certainly feel as though it is an unguentarium).

In other news, but related, the date has (finally) been scheduled for a verdict in the case of Oded Golan (whether or not he is dealing in illegal antiquities trade and his connection to the James ossuary).

… there is reason to believe that an image that has been circulating in the press as part of the marketing campaign in support of the new book by filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici and University of North Carolina, Charlotte Professor, Dr. James Tabor, entitled, The Jesus Discovery, and Mr. Jacobovici’s forthcoming documentary, has been digitally manipulated in such a way as to lead the reader toward a desired conclusion. That is, the image making the rounds in the press and published by Dr. Tabor on the Bible and Interpretation website has been digitally altered and made to look like an engraving of a “great fish” on an ossuary discovered in Jerusalem, in order to support the authors’ rather sensational claim.

What’s more, in Dr. Tabor’s article, the manipulation of the photo of the “fish” on the ossuary has been made without any acknowledgment that the image has been manipulated.

Go to the link above for the rest.  I think that the Discovery Channel needs to know what they’re about to air.  I’ve notified a contact at the Associated Press and I hope that the word gets out to the mainstream media that this ‘discovery’ has more methodological holes than a giant fish-net.

Related articles

• Joan Taylor’s Astute Observations on Talpiot (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)
• Lombatti on Tabor and Jacobovici’s Fishy Claim (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)
• The “Patio Tomb” … Evidence of Early Christianity? I Hae Me Doots (A Classics Perspective) (rogueclassicism.com)

But I still feel that there are some important details which must be considered when making our interpretations of the iconography on the ossuary.   First we must remember that we do not have the ossuary itself.  At best we have a “museum quality replica” but I am not sure that we can have a replica of something we can’t accurately depict yet.  Sure, we have some pictures, but these are not entirely trustworthy.  At present there is a general discussion happening in the comments section of Bob Cargill’s ASOR article on the iconography which has focused on digital manipulation.  While it is clear that there has been some digital work done on the image, the question seems to be about the extent of the digital manipulation.   Bob is an expert on the subject (he headed up UCLA’s Center of Digital Humanities and his work has focused on using digital technology in the field of archaeology) and is more than capable of exposing any digitally doctored image, so if he sees the manipulation at play and can demonstrate it adequately, then we must wonder to what extent this museum replica that Jacobovici and Tabor produced is a precise reproduction of the ossuary.

There are still more troubling factors.  The multiple photos of the iconography are not showing the same thing, as Bob Cargill has made clear in his response to Tabor on the ASOR blog.  This may be the result of photo doctoring, but the fact is that part of the iconography is obscured (see this image):

As you can see, the ‘fin’ is obscured partially in this photo.  Whatever is obscuring the image is not there in other images.  Unless someone moved whatever is obscuring it before snapping another photo (it looks like another ossuary), then it was digitally removed from the image and someone ‘filled-in’ the rest of the ‘tail fin’ before it was given to media sources:

The most striking thing about this isn’t just that there is no longer a mass on the upper left corner of the screen obscuring the object but that there is no indication that there ever was something there.  For example, if we presume that the object was removed by the robot with the camera (like by a claw or something) we would expect to see coloration differences, different types of microbial forms, there would be some evidence of an object which has sat on top of this ossuary for hundreds, if not some thousands, of years.  Yet there is nothing there to suggest to us that this has been the case.  That upper corner looks identical to the rest of the ossuary.  This suggests to me that the image has been digitally altered. So there is no way, at present, we can be certain of the dims of the iconography; there is just no trustworthy image we know of that hasn’t been altered to been skewed by angle or hasn’t had someone digitally add in dimensions using digital media.  This also means that the replica used at the press conference is simply unreliable.

Then there is the troubling question: what is it?  Well, speculations about ‘fish’ aside, it looked to me, from the time the orientation was known, that the image is of pottery.  At the beginning, it was suggested that it had been an amphora, but amphora have very specific handles (usually, not always) that this iconography lacked.  The handles one typically finds on amphorae are hooped from the middle of the vessel to the brim at the top:

Though there are exceptions to this; some amphorae have handles akin to those on the ossuary iconography (see the ‘fins’ on the sides):

It is also interesting that there is a ‘ball’ at the bottom of this (this is a Hellenistic glass amphora); this is specifically interesting because Tabor and Jacobovici have claimed ad nauseum that the ‘ball’ at the bottom on their iconography must be a ‘head’ wrapped in seaweed (yep!) and there is no other easier explanation.  But amphorae are not the only types of ancient pottery that sometimes contain a ball bottom like this.  Many unguentarium have this ‘ball bottom’ feature:

Note the shape of this as well; like the glass amphora above, this design contains the ‘fins’, the ‘ball’ at the bottom, and the fish-like shape.  This is why I believe that the ‘fish’ on the ossuary are more than likely an example of this sort of pottery.  As Joan Taylor points out, these ungenutarium serve a specific funeral and ritual purpose and are commonly found in tombs.

Oddly, however, even though this is likely, Tabor continues to point to ‘fish’ and, even more strange still, he continues to suggest that the ball at the bottom of the fish (or, rather, what is coming out of its closed mouth) is Jonah.  And he feels this is the most likely and easiest explanation.  He gives some reasons why he believes that the fish is more likely than the pottery:

1. The “tail” of our image is sharply pointed and quite elongated on the left side. In fact, when we first got a glimpse of the partial image we thought it was the prow of a boat! In contrast, the mouths of amphora and perfume bottles are round and quite symmetrical.

But this is irrelevant, since we don’t know the exact shape of the tail of the ‘fish’.  The fact is the images we have are digitally changed, and often in extreme and tragic ways (see Bob Cargill’s comments here and judge for yourself).  The tail seems to be shaped by digital means and clearly, as demonstrated above, the tail is partially obscured in whatever image we have left. And we can’t rely upon any of our ‘images’ since frankly we can’t trust them.  And that is criminal.  Truly criminal.  Alas, like with the lead codices, we can only go by the photos since we do not have the physical ossuary to examine.  And unless Tabor wants to release unaltered photos that can be examined by experts–and I mean experts not on any payroll associated with this discovery–then the photos must be dismissed as admissible evidence.

2. The clear stick figure in our image with the enlarged “ball” or head at the bottom seems to be in contrast to the typical flattened or knob like ends of some perfume bottles.

One must wonder if Tabor has ever seen glass amphorae or unguentarium?  If not, there are some on site at the Metropolitan Museum he should consider evaluating.

The arms of the figure are positioned in a classic eastern pose (oaanes), in contrast to what we find in the west–the orans position of supplication with both arms raised. This is a major point and we are presently preparing a special paper dealing with the motifs associated with the various sea-man figures of the eastern Mediterrean world in this period.

Here are the facts: the stick figure appears more or less to be wishful thinking.  Let us examine more closely this ‘figure’:

Note how completely ‘unhuman’ the ‘stickfigure’ looks when you isolate the lines (in red) and see what is really there.  Frankly, I’m finding any resemblance to a ‘stickfigure’ to be completely disingenuous.  Also, take note of all the red squares.  Those are repeated notches which indicate to me that this item was not just digitally modified but parts of it were copied and pasted into the image to fill it out.  The left side of one notch in the middle-upper-left of the image has been cut off (and looks like a smudging effect was applied). So how is it that Tabor expects us to carefully examine this iconography in any detail when the iconography presented is not an accurate representation of what is on the ossuary?

The “head” itself has a very distinctive pattern on it which we have taken to be the artists attempt to represent seaweed “wrapped about my head” as mentioned in the text of Jonah (2:5). The “eye” of the fish is also etched on the lower right side, with a curved line. We are not yet certain what the Etruscan “F-like” marking is to the left of the figure’s body as it is now oriented but our guess is it has to do with an eastern mythical hero motif and several suggestions have been made by two of our ancient art historians.

This is simply nothing more than a case of pareidolia.  Tabor is seeing Jesus in a burnt piece of toast and calling it the ‘find of a lifetime’.

3. The patterned body of the “fish” with its scale/tile like patterns, which led some to conclude it was the brickwork of a tower, we understand to be akin to the armor of the mythical fish Leviathan (aka Behemoth, Rahab, etc.)–which in modern Hebrew still means “whale.” In Jewish tradition this unique sea creature represents “death” and the righteous are to eat its flesh in the last days, thus “swallowing up death” forever (Isaiah 27:1; 25:8; Baba Bathra 74b). When this happens the “dew of light” will shine on the world of the death and those in the land of shades will live or be resurrected (Isaiah 26:19).

Again, Tabor is seeing what he needs to see in order to force ‘fish’ into this pottery motif. These are not ‘scales’ at all but resemble more the patterns associated with what one would find on ancient pottery.  Here is an example of ‘scales’ on pottery (or, more specifically, the patterns one might find on amphorae in antiquity):

Again, consider looking more closely at these doctored images:

Looks to me to be patterns one might see on a piece of pottery.  It certainly doesn’t resemble anything I’ve seen of fish scales.  James talks about the oaanes poses but based on his observations that the pose is similar, he doesn’t seem to recall what the representations look like:

Anyone with even a mediocre degree of observation could see that the two are not even close.  And while we’re on the subject, has anyone noticed that the ‘head’ of the images that Tabor provides have been altered in size?  Consider this for reference:

The green lines represent the ‘closeup’ of the image to show the ‘stickfigure’ located on the right.  The red lines are the far-away shot of the whole image on the left. One is flatter than the other.  How anyone could deny some level of image modification and tampering is beyond me.

4. The downward orientation of our fish image, which some have taken as an objection to it being a fish, is to the contrary just what one would expect, as we understand Jonah is being spat out on land in this depiction. To have the nose of the fish oriented upward (heavenward), or to right or left, would be to spit him into the waters of “chaos,” which he is now to escape, by being vomited on dry land. The head of our “Jonah” figure is actually touching the border of the bottom of the ossuary, which seems to represent that land.

Tabor may not be aware of these image modifications, and if that is the case at the very least we could say Tabor has quite the imagination–he would have to in order to present a rationalization like this.  Again, one must ask if Tabor really believes that this is a better explanation than that for pottery.  First, I have never seen any example of a fish spitting out a human before–even in images of Jonah and the fish, the orientation is never down and the mouth is never closed:

And frankly why would it be?  It makes no sense for an artist to draw an image which goes against the known motif of all the images of the fish which would have been commonplace for Christian or Jew in antiquity.  Why would one change the orientation to ‘down’ and make the iconography so counter to what one expects to see?  Now consider more carefully the pottery iconography:

Without accurate representations of the iconography, there is no way to know how the lip (or ‘tail fin’) actually looks.  But even if this is precisely how the image looks, the pottery iconography simply makes more sense.  It explains the orientation (in this case ‘down’ would be ‘up’ and would not require additional explanation), it explains the patterns (pottery patterns rather than the most bizarre form of ‘scales’ ever seen), and the ‘fins’ (top of pottery and handles rather than ‘fins’) and base (part of many glass pottery motifs rather than ‘sea-weed covered Jonah head’).

I have nothing but respect for James Tabor; I think that when he is not working with Jacobovici, he is lucid and erudite and an exceptional scholar.  But every time he backs one of these sensational stories, I do have my concerns.  I can’t fathom–not now, perhaps never–how someone can look at all this data and say ‘Yes, that is definitely Jonah and the Whale’.  It mystifies me.  It should concern Tabor; if nothing else the evidence of the manipulation of the photos should concern Tabor!  It certainly concerns me.

UPDATE 3/5/2012:

Bob Cargill has posted a very thorough article on the digital manipulation of the images and why it matters.  here is a snippet:

Unfortunately, the visual evidence detailed above compels us to conclude that Fig. 21 from pg. 42 of Dr. James Tabor’s original Feb 28, 2012 Bible and Interpretation article entitled, “A Preliminary Report of an Exploration of a Sealed 1st Century Tomb in East Talpiot, Jerusalem,” has experienced a high degree of digital manipulation. Given the changes to the “tail fin” of the supposed “fish,” and given the deliberate rotation of the image’s orientation causing it to more resemble the natural orientation of a fish without offering a compass point or any indication on the image whatsoever that the image has been rotated, it can be argued that the motivation behind making these digital alterations to the image was the desire to create, or at least “enhance” the illusion of a “great fish” swimming freely in the ocean, while vomiting forth a human head.

Read on here: http://robertcargill.com/2012/03/05/if-the-evidence-doesnt-fit-photoshop-it/

His most damaging point, in my opinion, is the revision of pg. 42 of Tabor’s Bible and Interpretation article:

Make specific note of how the orientation of the fish sideways in the original version has an image from the Roman catacombs depicting Jonah and the Whale sideways as if to suggest a similar motif.  In the context of the new version, having that image makes no sense (see my argument above).  The motif is usually always sideways up oriented up, never down.

JACOBOVICI AND TABOR PROMOTE THEIR CONTROVERSIAL NEW BOOK.

James Tabor and Simcha Jacobovici are lucky that Christians are more forgiving than fundamentalist Muslims. Otherwise, the archaeologist and the documentary filmmaker would be running for their very lives.

Remember when Salman Rushdie published his fourth novel, “The Satanic Verses”? Muslims were offended. Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, actually issued a  fatwa against Rushdie, calling for his death. The novelist went into years of hiding.

The so-called “Jesus Discovery,” a project by Tabor and Jacobovici, that includes a book and film, is, in many respects, more grossly insulting to Christians than “The Satanic Verses” was to Muslims.

Rushdie didn’t pretend that his book was anything other than fiction. Tabor and Jacobovici, on the other hand, insist that they truly have found the 1st-century tomb of Jesus and his family inJerusalem.

And they did not stop at that controversial claim.

They also maintain that ossuaries – caskets – inside the tomb not only contain the bones of Christ’s family members, but those of Jesus Himself. And, to add insult to offense, purport that writing on the outside of the tomb indicates that Jesus had a wife and kids.

Of course, the wild claims by Tabor and Jacobovici are completely contrary to the gospel. But even members of the scientific community, who are not Christian, criticize the pair for their shoddy, unscientific methods; for their leap to unproven, sensationalized conclusions.

More than 30 years before Tabor and Jacobovici made their putative “Jesus Discovery,” Amos Kloner was the very first archaeologist to examine the site. “It’s an ordinary middle-classJerusalemburial cave,”he told MSNBC. “The names on the casket are the most common names found among Jews at that time.”

Kloner said that Tabor and Jacobovici are making false archaeological claims to pimp their new book, which was released this week. “They just want to get money for it,” he told MSNBC.

Christian ought not threaten violence against Tabor and Jacobovici, as Muslims did against Rushdie. But they also ought not let the attack upon their faith go unchallenged.

They should e-blast their indignation both to Simon & Schuster, publisher of “The Jesus Discovery,” and the Discovery Channel, which plans to air a documentary based on the inflammatory work of comtempt.

People are free to express their theories and even defend them in face of complete disagreement. But in my estimation this whole episode has never been about Tabor- it’s been about bad archaeology, bad supposition, and leaps to conclusions. He shouldn’t be at all surprised that colleagues have reacted so vociferously towards a claim that is utterly unsupportable. If someone who worked at UNC-Charlotte claimed today in a paper at a conference that Jesus spoke English and that he and the disciples used the 1611 KJV Tabor himself would join the chorus denouncing such madness.

Further, and this is the most important part to me, if Tabor’s discovery is what he claims it is, why didn’t he present his findings at a meeting of SBL or ASOR where it could be thoroughly vetted by colleagues or why didn’t he publish it in NEA or JBL? What purpose does a ‘press conference’ have except publicity? This isn’t ad hominem, this is a reasonable question.

I don’t know of anyone who has attacked Tabor personally. No one has said ‘Tabor is a liar’ or ‘Tabor is just out for money’. They’ve said ‘Tabor’s suggestion doesn’t match the facts’. And it doesn’t.

So it seems to me that Prof. Tabor’s plea for cordiality is a straw man- a red herring- a distraction- a bit of sleight of hand. It’s, if I may, a ‘look at what they’re saying about me and by the way don’t really pay attention to the holes in my theory’. It’s a diversionary tactic.

I think that Antonio Lombatti has it right. The supposed ‘fish’ is an amphora. That isn’t an attack on Tabor (and he certainly shouldn’t imagine anything I’ve said above is either, because it isn’t), it’s a straightforward evaluation of the artifact. That being the case, the entire theory of Tabor is undercut and his points moot.

And finally, I would make a plea of my own: I would plea with Tabor et al to stop promoting ‘discoveries’ before they’re professionally evaluated. I’m sure that James believes in peer review. I think he should submit his work to colleagues before he holds press conferences. That’s my plea- and it’s a plea for more than cordiality, it’s a plea for collegiality and scholarly discourse taking precedence over press conferences and secrecy.

Related articles

• Lombatti on Tabor and Jacobovici’s Fishy Claim (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)
• ASOR Makes an Impact (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)

The interpretation presented by Professor Tabor is not grounded in the evidence, nor in even the most basic rules of art-historical analysis. The image has nothing to do with Jonah, Jesus, or Judea in the first century. Elsewhere I have referred to this genre of media-driven discoveries as the “DaVinci Codification” of our culture—the presentation of odd and associative thinking previously reserved for novels as “truth” to the general public (http://sbl-site.org/publications/article.aspx?articleId=655). The “Jonah Fish” is just the next installment in the Jesus-archaeology franchise—timed, as always, to proceed a major Christian feast.

I, for one, am wearied by the almost yearly “teaching moment” presented by these types of “discoveries.” I am hopeful, however, that—this time—a forceful and quick display of unanimous dissent by the leading members of the academic community will be taken seriously by the media and the public at large.

Indeed.  We all share Steven’s sentiments.

In a post titled ‘Never Seen a Fish Depicted Upside Down‘-

I had already expressed my skepticism on the ‘Jonah and the big fish’ iconography. Frankly, I’ve never seen a fish or a fish-like image depicted upside down: I’ve realized it only after the publication of the photo of the ossuary. The picture was given to the press two days ago, but it was rotated. Therefore, I’m now convinced that it represents an amphorae like those found on several Second Temple Jewish ossuaries.

Tabor’s work is becoming fishier by the day.  If we had seen the photo of the ossuary itself instead of just Tabor’s deceptively cropped image days ago we all would have known instantly that his claims were patently false.  Now we all do without question.

Related articles

• Lombatti on Tabor and Jacobovici’s Fishy Claim (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)
• Rollston Eviscerates the ‘Jesus Discovery’ Claim (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)
• Robin Jensen Repudiates the Claims of Tabor in No Uncertain Terms: Or, How the ‘Jesus Discovery’ Deceives (zwingliusredivivus.wordpress.com)