Toto

I think Layman is complaining about how unfair it is to point out that Shanks believes in the obvious pious fraud that is the Shroud of Turin. This might lead the reader to assume that Shanks is especially gullible or uninformed, and thus discount his promotion of the ossuary.

But I think this is a relevant data point. If Shanks thinks the Shroud is genuine, or is willing to pretend that he does in front of a Texas audience, and if he is in fact the driving force behind the ossuary, one can draw one's own conclusions.

Steven Carr

'"If that were the end of Jesus' life, if there was nothing more after that, it is impossible to explain why 30 years later somebody bragged, 'My brother is Jesus,'" said Witherington.

James carved his own inscription , to brag about his brother?


'"The Shroud went through a huge fire and Carbon 14 dating dates carbon. When something catches on fire, it is carbonized," said Witherington. "I think what they dated was the fire, not the age of the shroud."'

Witherington waves goodbye to his credibility....

Curiously, mitochondrial DNA can survive a huge fire and carbonisation.

Vorkosigan

'"The Shroud went through a huge fire and Carbon 14 dating dates carbon. When something catches on fire, it is carbonized," said Witherington. "I think what they dated was the fire, not the age of the shroud."'

Unbelievable. How can I ever respect this man again? One feels a kind of distress that anyone intelligent could be so stupid.

But I think this is a relevant data point. If Shanks thinks the Shroud is genuine, or is willing to pretend that he does in front of a Texas audience, and if he is in fact the driving force behind the ossuary, one can draw one's own conclusions.

No shit. For if we were discussed Archarya S., apologists would be the first to attempt to discredit her because of her nutty beliefs in aliens, and have done so on this site in the past. I guess holding fruitcake beliefs is OK as long as you think the Gospel Jeebus really lived.

Vorkosigan

keyser_soze

Someone did before? I stand incredulous. I thought only folks the like of TW went in for such obviously fraudulent crapola like this...

Toto

clonejesus.com is defunct, but Ship of Fools still has a description here

Sauron

First, Shanks and Witherington make a gross mistake about biology and forensics ("they dated the fire, not the shroud").

Second, realizing how damaging that is to their reputation and their other claims, you try to minimize the damage by saying that it doesn't matter in the case of the ossuary. Why? Since other scholars (whom you hope haven't made such obvious gaffes) did all the homework. "Well, they probably don't know much about biology or forensics." (Hmm - maybe they should refrain from making comments on a given topic, if they don't have the requisite expertise - just a thought).

But what's funny about your new position is that you yourself indicated that you believed Witherington was in an excellent position to write such a book about the ossuary, given his superior level of involvement, vis-a-vis other scholars:

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.p...n&pagenumber=2

And yes, I do look forward to reading Witherington's book. He is a fine, respected scholar and has been involved with the discovery longer than most other New Testament scholars.

Pretty lawyerly there, Layman. Now you want us to believe that S & W aren't promoting the authenticity of the ossuary. Why, they're only publicizing it, not promoting it!

But is that the case?

Shanks has toured with the ossuary, given lectures on it, and promoted it in BAR, given interviews, etc.

Witherington has said:
In a world where so many are visual learners, the discovery of this kind of achaeologic evidence of the existence of Jesus is, as Witherington said, "the Word made visible."

and

"The world's leading experts in Aramaic, epigraphy and paleography, leading New Testament scholars, including some Catholic scholars, think this inscription is authentic and that this box is genuine," said Witherington.

If they were only publicizing it, then they wouldn't be making affirmative claims for its authenticity, and painting in such strong colors for their audience's delight.

But noooooo - they're not promoting the ossuary at all, are they? Even though you yourself said earlier in this same thread:

They may be promoting it, but the heavily lifting scholarly work was done by others.