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| Jesus: Tales from the Crypt (or "James Cameron sinks Christianity") |
| 2007-02-25 |
| Posted by Tim McGirk Brace yourself. James Cameron, the man who brought you 'The Titanic' is back with another blockbuster. This time, the ship he's sinking is Christianity. In a new documentary, Producer Cameron and his director, Simcha Jacobovici, make the starting claim that Jesus wasn't resurrected --the cornerstone of Christian faith-- and that his burial cave was discovered near Jerusalem. And, get this, Jesus sired a son with Mary Magdelene. No, it's not a re-make of "The Da Vinci Codes'. It's supposed to be true. Let's go back 27 years, when Israeli construction workers were gouging out the foundations for a new building in the industrial park in the Talpiyot, a Jerusalem suburb. of Jerusalem. The earth gave way, revealing a 2,000 year old cave with 10 stone caskets. Archologists were summoned, and the stone caskets carted away for examination. It took 20 years for experts to decipher the names on the ten tombs. They were: Jesua, son of Joseph, Mary, Mary, Mathew, Jofa and Judah, son of Jesua. Israel's prominent archeologist Professor Amos Kloner didn't associate the crypt with the New Testament Jesus. His father, after all, was a humble carpenter who couldn't afford a luxury crypt for his family. And all were common Jewish names. There was also this little inconvenience that a few miles away, in the old city of Jerusalem, Christians for centuries had been worshipping the empty tomb of Christ at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Christ's resurrection, after all, is the main foundation of the faith, proof that a boy born to a carpenter's wife in a manger is the Son of God. But film-makers Cameron and Jacobovici claim to have amassed evidence through DNA tests, archeological evidence and Biblical studies, that the 10 coffins belong to Jesus and his family. Ever the showman, (Why does this remind me of the impresario in another movie,"King Kong", whose hubris blinds him to the dangers of an angry and very large ape?) Cameron is holding a New York press conference on Monday at which he will reveal three coffins, supposedly those of Jesus of Nazareth, his mother Mary and Mary Magdalene. News about the film, which will be shown soon on Discovery Channel, Britain's Channel 4, Canada's Vision, and Israel's Channel 8, has been a hot blog topic in the Middle East (check out a personal favorite: Israelity Bites) Here in the Holy Land, Biblical Archeology is a dangerous profession. This 90-minute documentary is bound to outrage Christians and stir up a titanic debate between believers and skeptics. Stay tuned. --Tim McGirk/Jerusalem |
| Posted by:anonymous5089 |
| #26 This casual application of logic pretty much crucifies the facts behind this film: Hot Air |
| Posted by: Thromoger Thrumble5163 2007-02-25 22:24 |
| #25 oh wait - money changers would be Kofi Annan, Jaques Chirac, Gerhard, Saddam, etc. |
| Posted by: Thromoger Thrumble5163 2007-02-25 21:36 |
| #24 It is interesting thinking about who Hollywood would cast for a movie about Jesus Christ. Geraldo - opens the Tomb to find Jesus is not there. Margaret Sanger - Plays Herod and orders the death of all first born males Mary - Anna Nicole Smith Joseph - Howard Stern Baby Jesus - Danielle (it turns out Jesus was actually a cross dressing lesbian) The crowd that calls for Jesus' death: the moonbat anti-war protestors complete with puppets Pontias Pilate: Jimmy Carter? Mary Magdalene: Britney Spears, post rehab Money Changers in the Temple - United States House of Representatives I'm not trying to be offensive. Just guessing how Hollywood might cast it. |
| Posted by: Thromoger Thrumble5163 2007-02-25 21:33 |
| #23 "We have no idea how God accomplished Jesus' virgin birth via Mary, but to claim that Jesus has a genetic lineage that is clear and traceable is tantamount to claiming that we can now decode God's DNA!" I'm sorry my Son, but yes we do, and no, you don't. Your faith is misguided and you will burn in hell. Bend over for UFIA. |
| Posted by: ufia 2007-02-25 21:33 |
| #22 However, they are using a 'documentary' technique that is fine for movies but not fine for science Just like The Day After Tommorrow. I smell an Oscar! |
| Posted by: Thromoger Thrumble5163 2007-02-25 20:48 |
| #21 Oh, and the whole "lineage of David" thing, well, why d you think God chose Mary in the first place? She was clearly descended from David and that lineage would have been clear to those who tracked such things amongst the Jewish hierarchy. That would give the child a legitimate descendancy that the scholars could not erase or ignore. That the child did not have actual genetic material descended from the line of David is an argument that cannot be made given the child's divine inheritance and inception. We have no idea how God accomplished Jesus' virgin birth via Mary, but to claim that Jesus has a genetic lineage that is clear and traceable is tantamount to claiming that we can now decode God's DNA! You could if Jesus were partly human, I suppose, but it would leave huge gaps in our understanding of just what we're looking at in the resultant code sequence. "Um, doctor, we get one and a half billion sequences which are clearly human, but we also get one and a half billion sequences which we simply cannot define. It's definitely not human though, but we can't even see what proteins it's made of. They don;t exist in any chemical reference we know of." |
| Posted by: FOTSGreg 2007-02-25 20:27 |
| #20 I don't think Cameron and his partner Jacobovici are moonbats. They are both intelligent people. However, they are using a 'documentary' technique that is fine for movies but not fine for science. The technique is that you find out some facts and if the facts do not rule out a really 'cool' solution, then that solution is presented in the documentary with so much drama that the viewers infer the solution must be true. So they have some inscriptions, they show that some people are related to others and some aren't. The facts would lead to a multiple of solutions but only one solution (the Jesus had a kid solution) is cool (at least to Cameron and Jacobovici). |
| Posted by: mhw 2007-02-25 20:22 |
| #19 Moonbat seems far too kind. More likely he is taken by the shine on those 30 pieces of silver. |
| Posted by: Thromoger Thrumble5163 2007-02-25 20:20 |
| #18 Sorry, John. The Bible makes it abundantly clear that the child Mary carried was not hers nor Josephs' by any nature except adopted parentage. God placed the child within Mary. It carried no genetic material from any parent. That Mary's body was used as the vessel and supplied the child's nutritional requirements for 9 months means nothing in the genetic sense. While there may have been some genetic transfer via blood and material it does not mean that the original genetic material provided by God was contaminated (I'm sorry, there is no other viable word for genetic cross-transfer via blood or other materials) by a human source. I also tend to believe that divine genetic material might be a tad "resistant" to human contamination via cross-transfer. In addition, modern genetic sequencing could determine whether or not the original genetic material had been contaminated with any other genetic material via blood or other means known to man. Simply put, Mary was the vessel, not the mother of God (or Jesus) in anything except a figurative sense. I know that means that, according to the Catholics, I am an apostate, but that is the clear and true reading of scripture so far as I can determine (and I do have a PhD in Religion though it's worth less than a cup of coffee at Starbucks these days). If you know better, or something I do not, I'm willing to listen. |
| Posted by: FOTSGreg 2007-02-25 20:17 |
| #17 my point was that the bodies could all be related by blood. Who would you compare the DNA to to assert this was really Jesus? Cameron has never really been a moonbat, I hope that's not his new MO |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-02-25 20:00 |
| #16 she not only carried Jesus in her womb but also supplied all of the genetic matter for his human body, since it was through her—not Joseph—that Jesus "was descended from David according to the flesh" (Rom. 1:3). um, no. Then Jesus would have been Mary's clone and a woman. She was visited by an Angel. Both in vitro fertilization or artificial insemination would have been unfathomable 30 years ago. Just because you don't understand doesn't mean it is not possible. |
| Posted by: Thromoger Thrumble5163 2007-02-25 19:57 |
| #15 A woman is a man’s mother either if she carried him in her womb or if she was the woman contributing half of his genetic matter or both. Mary was the mother of Jesus in both of these senses; because she not only carried Jesus in her womb but also supplied all of the genetic matter for his human body, since it was through her—not Joseph—that Jesus "was descended from David according to the flesh" (Rom. 1:3). |
| Posted by: John J. Simmins 2007-02-25 18:32 |
| #14 DNA tests, huh? Compared to who, God? Obviously, compared to Al Gore. |
| Posted by: DMFD 2007-02-25 17:47 |
| #13 completing the transformation of the liberals into Puritan-like blind faith fanatics. They will make their pilgrimage to the movie, pay it homage and bow down to the mighty James Cameron. Soon they will all travel many miles to see for themselves the broken stones, complete with it's little brown blood stain - just like those true-believers who travel miles into the Amazon to see the face of the Virgin Mary burnt into a cheese sandwich. |
| Posted by: Thromoger Thrumble5163 2007-02-25 16:18 |
| #12 This'll mean that James Cameron gets to sit with Jimmy Carter and Michael Moore as a guest of honor at the '08 Democratic National Convention. Anyone willing to bet against me? |
| Posted by: Mike 2007-02-25 14:33 |
| #11 Right, Frank. The only thing DNA could prove was that they were related. But it does make for good hype, no? |
| Posted by: Bobby 2007-02-25 12:59 |
| #10 My thoughts exactly, JFM. How about a documentary describing Moohamed as a child-rapist, psycho-killer and cultist as celebrated in various Orcish holy scrolls. |
| Posted by: Excalibur 2007-02-25 11:52 |
| #9 Hum, how about sinking Islam instead? Ah yes, that is danegerouzs. Our intrepid Holywood in action. |
| Posted by: JFM 2007-02-25 11:22 |
| #8 3dc- Think you may be referring to the 'James, Brother of Jesus' ossuary of a few years ago. My ex subscribed faithfully to Biblical Archaeology Magazine, which covered the whole thing in fascinating detail - and from the very beginning warned that the very fact that something so specific suddenly popped up was a warning. The end of the James affair would have been funny if so many people hadn't staked their professional lives on it: the ossuary was mysteriously 'broken' during transport, and in such a way that made the inscription beyond further examination. Betcha we get a rerun of that... Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2007-02-25 10:52 |
| #7 Frank G - good one! Exactly how would one go about making DNA tests on the Son of God anyway? The Bible is pretty clear on this aspect - that Jesus was the embodiment of the Holy Spirit and the Father, and Mary was simply the vessel for that embodiment. There was no exchange of DNA between God and Mary. Also, Cameron obviously does not understand that Christian faith relies on exactly that - faith. Without faith, a belief in things unseen and unprovable, Christianity would be a myth. This is simply dressed up Gnosticism revisiting the 21st Century only a few years after Dan Brown's novel did the same thing. It happens again and again every few decades. |
| Posted by: FOTSGreg 2007-02-25 10:45 |
| #6 Looks like someone is fishing for a Oscar for 'Best |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2007-02-25 10:04 |
| #5 DNA tests, huh? Compared to who, God? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-02-25 09:35 |
| #4 Hey - that stone casket was revealed to be a recent forgery a few years ago. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2007-02-25 08:45 |
| #3 Fiction dissing the matter: Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal |
| Posted by: 3dc 2007-02-25 08:41 |
| #2 And that he travelled in Kashmir in his youth. |
| Posted by: anonymous5089 2007-02-25 08:15 |
| #1 It's also been claimed that Jesus is buried in Japan. |
| Posted by: Mike 2007-02-25 07:51 |