Layman

Andre Lemaire, a specialist in ancient inscriptions at France's Practical School of Higher Studies, may have done it again.

Lemaire is a leader in his field and is the one who discovered a ninth century B.C. stone inscription created by King Mesha of Moab that referred to "the House of David."

The Associated Press is reporting that Lemaire -- writing in Biblical Archeology Review -- has discoverd a first century inscription referring to the most important of New Testament figures: Jesus, James, and their father Joseph.

<a href="http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20021021_898.html" target="_blank">http://abcnews.go.com/wire/US/ap20021021_898.html</a>

The inscription is in the Aramaic language and appears on an empty ossuary--a limestone burial box for bones. The writing states: "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus." It is dated by Andre to 63 A.D., the year after James -- according to Josephus -- was killed by the High Priest. Other evidence shows it most likely was from the first century.

Anyone heard anything else about this? I'm kinda skeptical of new, sensationalistic claims (from either side), but this one sounds like it might be legitimate. Any other sources would be appreciated.

[ October 21, 2002: Message edited by: Layman ]</p>

Toto

I'd be interested in seeing how this estimate was arrived at. But doesn't it mean that the odds of this being James the brother of the Jesus whose existence is in question are about 5%?

Sauron

I saw this today as well. I'm curious about something. According to the Wash. Post, here is the inscription:
<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59389-2002Oct21.html" target="_blank">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59389-2002Oct21.html</a>

The box is an ossuary, used by Jews at the time of Christ to hold the bones of the deceased. The ossuary has almost no ornamentation except for a simple, yet riveting, Aramaic inscription: Ya'akov bar Yosef akhui diYeshua, it says -- "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus."

I don't speak biblical Hebrew. However, I have two issues with this text.

1. It seems to say "Jacob, son of Joseph, brother of Yeshua." Jacob - not James.

2. The compound noun-in-construct for Semitic languages is usually just to put the two nouns together. So "Jacob brother of Jesus" would be "Ya'acov akhui Yeshua." Yet this inscription contains the particle "di", which is Latin. So it seems to have some Latin (or Italian) in it.

Does anyone have an explanation for how these two issues could be resolved? Or do they point to a forgery?

Layman

The notion that the odds are only 5% overlooks the very next paragraph in the article (and assumes that all 20 would have an equal chance of being buried in an ossuary):

Sauron

And note that if either of these would point to a forgery, I would be very surprised that BAR wouldn't catch it long before someone like myself would see it. :-)

Layman

I don't have any detailed answer other than these scholars are leading experts in Aramaic, so I doubt such a problem would escape their notice. The three issues I am most interested in is:

1. The reaction of the scholarly community to the news, especially the still cloudy origins of the inscription.

2. The rarity with which such ossuaries refer to brothers.

3. The significance of the ossuary's aramaic inscription, where most other ossuaries had Greek or dual language inscriptions. Does such a fact make it more or less likely to be the New Testament James? Or does it have no impact at all on that count.

Thanks for the link.

[ October 21, 2002: Message edited by: Layman ]</p>

Radcliffe Emerson

If authentic, it just tells me Jesus existed, even if he was important.
I personally don't doubt an historical Jesus existed, I strongly doubt all of the supernatural aspects.

Layman

What do you guy have? An automatic "it doesn't prove anything supernatural" button that unleashes these posts?

Here's an idea.

Why not wait until someone claims it proves the miraculous before punching that button?

Peter Kirby

Sauron writes: 1. It seems to say "Jacob, son of Joseph, brother of Yeshua." Jacob - not James.

There is a quirk in the English naming system whereby IAKOBOS (Jacob) is translated as "James" when it would actually be more appropriate to translate as "Jacob," especially since the OT figure by that same name is translated as "Jacob." Indeed, if the ossuary had some cognate of "James," that would be knock-down proof that it is a fake.

Here are some of the NT references to "James."

Mark 6:3
Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, and brother of James, [και αδελφος Ιακωβου] and Joses, and Judas, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us? And they were offended in him.

Acts 15:13
And after they had held their peace, James answered, saying, [Ιακωβος λεγων] Brethren, listen to me:

Galatians 1:19
but I saw none other of the apostles, but James the brother of the Lord. [Ιακωβον τον αδελφον του κυριου]

best,
Peter Kirby

MortalWombat

I'd like to know how he arrived at a specific year of 63 AD. The only clue to how it was dated, as stated in the article, is based on the writing style (which to my knowledge can't be used to date something to a specific year) and that Jews only practiced ossuary burials between 20 BC and 70 AD.

It seems to me that Lemaire may be projecting the year 63 AD onto the object because Josephus dates James' death at 62, and then added a year for the custom of waiting about a year for the body to decompose before placing the bones in an ossuary.

Also, according to <a href="http://www.jerusalemperspective.com/articles/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=1633" target="_blank">this website</a>:
It doesn't seem that family relationship inscriptions and Aramaic are that unusual.