February 27, 2007
Contacts: See List Below
MEDIA
ADVISORY, Feb. 26 /Christian
Newswire/ -- The claim of James Cameron and the Discovery Channel that a
tomb contains the bones of Jesus is bogus, said leading Biblical and
archeological scholars today.
"Unfortunately,
this is a story full of holes, conjectures and problems," said Dr. Ben
Witherington, author of What Have They
Done With Jesus? and New Testament professor at Asbury Theological
Seminary. "It will make good TV and involves a bad critical reading of
history. Basically, this is old news with a new interpretation. We have known
about this tomb since it was discovered in 1980. There are all sorts of
reasons to see this as much ado about nothing much."
Witherington
and other leading biblical scholars and archeologists say there are at least
10 reasons why the "Jesus Tomb" claim is completely bogus:
There
is no DNA evidence that this is the historical Jesus of Nazareth
The
statistical analysis is untrustworthy
The
name "Jesus" was a popular name in the first century, appearing
in 98 other tombs and on 21 other ossuaries
There
is no historical evidence that Jesus was ever married or had a child
The
earliest followers of Jesus never called him "Jesus, son of
Joseph"
It
is highly unlikely that Joseph, who died earlier in Galilee, was buried in
The
Talipot tomb and ossuaries are such that they would have belonged to a
rich family, which does not match the historical record for Jesus
Fourth-century
church historian Eusebius makes quite clear that the body of James, the
brother of Jesus, was buried alone near the temple mount and that his tomb
was visited in the early centuries, making very unlikely that the Talipot
tomb was Jesus' "family tomb"
The
two Mary ossuaries do not mention anyone from Migdal, but simply has the
name Mary, one of the most common of all ancient Jewish female names
"In
light of all the incredible number of problems with the recent claim that
Jesus' grave has been found, the time-honored, multi-faceted evidence for the
bodily resurrection of Jesus is more convincing than ever," said Dr. Gary
Habermas, an expert on the resurrection of Jesus and author of The
Case for the Resurrection. "Even
the early opponents of the Christian message acknowledged that Jesus' tomb was
empty. And the evidence for Jesus' bodily resurrection appearances has never
been refuted."
These
leading Biblical and archeological experts are available for media interviews:
Dr.
Ben Witherington
Bible
scholar, speaker, author of 30 books including What
Have They Done With Jesus? and The
Jesus Quest
Professor
of New Testament Interpretation
Asbury
Theological Seminary
859-223-6308
Dr.
Darrell Bock
Media
spokesman / Editor-at-large for Christianity
Today /Author, Breaking the Da Vinci Code and Jesus in Context
Professor
of New Testament Studies
214-824-3094
x3715
Dr.
Craig Evans
Author,
Jesus and the Ossuaries and
Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels
Professor
of New Testament
902-585-2221
Dr.
Gary Habermas
Shroud
of
Chair,
Department of Philosophy and Theology
434-582-2577
Dr.
Paul Maier
Bible
scholar / author of more than 15 books including The Da Vinci Code –
Fact or Fiction?, More Than a Skeleton and Josephus – The Essential
Works
Professor
of Ancient History
(269)
387-4816
Joe
Zias
-
Thirty years professional experience in the field of Medical/ Physical
anthropology
-
Over 80 articles in peer reviewed medical and scientific journals
-
Science and Archaeology Group at
972-2-588-2811
Dr.
Amos Kloner
Officially
oversaw the work at the tomb in 1980 and has published detailed findings on
its contents
Professor,
Department of Land of
972-3-531-7283
(from
SOURCE: Christian News Wire