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Thank you for listening to this program today. We know you will enjoy it!
I am going to relate to you what I recently learned about the bone-box of "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus" which is on display at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. When I telephoned today to see if it is still there, a computerized voice said it is "the earliest known biblical record of Jesus." A chill ran through my body as I listened to the voice, reminding me of the reality of the Jesus whose name we take so lightly.
Let us now look at excerpts from a report written by Richard Long, a Canadian pastoral leader of church unity, in a special New Year's edition of his monthly "Together" newsletter. Listen to Richard's fascinating account of his investigation into this recent news-breaking story of the bone-box of "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus." **************************************************************
"As soon as I caught the news item about the possible discovery of the bone box of James the brother of Jesus on the evening CNN news, I knew it was significant. When I heard it was coming to Toronto, I determined to pay whatever it cost to see it with my own eyes. Prayerfully, I stood studying it asking the Holy Spirit to show me anything that was on His mind. Carefully I have clipped all the news I could read about it, sensing that the Lord was trying to get my attention. Here are some of my thoughts.
Is there any significance to the "James Ossuary"? Does it have any greater meaning to the Church? If we have ears to hear, is there more that the Spirit is saying to us?
First, here's a quick review of what happened. In mid October, Hershel Shanks, editor of Biblical Archaeology Review announced the discovery of an ossuary which he said "may be the most important find in the history of New Testament archaeology. It has implications not just for scholarship, but for the world's understanding of the Bible."
The reason it was so important was etched on the side in Aramaic: "Ya'akov bar Yosef akhui di Yeshua" which translated is, "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus".
The Biblical Archeological Review devoted their Nov-Dec. 2002 issue to the James Ossuary. You can read that article at http://www.bib-arch.org/. The opening words of the article state, "The Aramaic words etched on the box's side show a cursive form of writing used only from about 10 to 70 A.D., according to noted paleographer André Lemaire of the École Pratique des Hautes Études (popularly known as the Sorbonne University) in Paris, who verified the inscription's authenticity. The ossuary has been dated to approximately 63 A.D."
What is an ossuary?
Explaining the nature of ossuaries, the Royal Ontario Museum website says, "During the Herodian period in Jerusalem (37 BCE - 70 CE), there had been a growing belief in the coming of a Messiah and the associated idea of resurrection of the dead, as advanced by the Pharisees. It was important to keep an individual's bones together, while allowing the flesh (which carries a person's sins) to decay. Also, cemetery space in the rocky landscape of Jerusalem was scarce and there was the rule of "same-day" burial. To this end, it became common practice to place a corpse in a crypt for a year or so, to allow the flesh to disintegrate. The bones were then gathered and transferred to a stone box (ossuary) inside the family crypt to make way for the more recently dead."
"The quality of the ossuaries produced in Jerusalem declined dramatically in 70 CE following the massacre of many Jews at the time of the destruction of the Temple by the Romans. Those that survived or returned lacked the resources to quarry the best stone. The practice ceased in 135 CE with the failure of the Bar Kokhba revolt of the Jews against the Roman occupation." http://www.rom.on.ca/
Mystery owner revealed in Toronto:
At first the owner of this famous antiquity did not want to be identified. Meanwhile the very first public showing of the ossuary was announced for the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto to coincide with an international meeting of Biblical scholars in mid November. When the box arrived, to everybody's shock, there were new cracks in the artifact, and so it garnered even more international coverage. Eventually the owner, Oded Golan (51) from Tel Aviv, made the trip to Canada and started taking interviews and addressed the convention.
He told a crowd of about 300 Biblical scholars gathered for his presentation that a recent and highly complex statistical analysis, using the most conservative data, showed that not more than three men living in Jerusalem from 20 B.C. to 70 A.D., could have fit all the criteria necessary to have had their names appear on the relic.
To do the math, Professor Camil Fuchs, head of Tel Aviv University's Department of Statistics and Operations Research in the School of Mathematical Sciences, made estimates on the number of adult Jewish males named James who had a father named Joseph and a brother named Jesus during the period. Then he added in literacy rates (because of the inscription on the box) and the affordability factor; how many of those men came from families or communities that could have afforded the custom of ossuary burial (a costly practice by the standards of the day).
Fuchs' less conservative estimates arrived at the conclusion that only one person could be "James son of Joseph brother of Jesus", and that is the man who was known as James the Just, a leader in the early church and the brother of Jesus Christ.
Well there was considerable debate about the authenticity of the ossuary. It continues to rage on as skeptics suggest it was a forgery, or that at least the inscription was made later. The Biblical Archaeology Society arranged for a private viewing of the bone box by two dozen scholars. Harvard University's Frank Moore Cross, acknowledged as the dean of epigraphers (specialists in ancient writing), declared that the inscription was written by one hand. Two Israeli government scientists did a microscopic examination of the artifact's inscription and surface patina. They concluded the box is ancient and there's no evidence of modern tampering.
"Is God trying to get our attention about something?"
I did go to see the James Ossuary myself. It cost an extra $10.00 to enter a plain room in the middle of which there is a simple glass podium housing the small limestone box. Around the walls are the comments of the museum's curators. Here are some of those extracts they posted ...
James, Bishop of Jerusalem
"This same James, who was the first bishop of Jerusalem and known as Justus, was considered so holy by the people that they earnestly sought to touch the hem of his clothing."
Jerome. Commentary on Galatians, 396: 1.19
In the Christian tradition, James was the leader of the Church in Jerusalem. Clement, the man who replaced Peter as bishop of Rome, wrote to him as "James, bishop of bishops, who rules Jerusalem, the holy church of the Hebrews." He was visited in 58 CE in Jerusalem by Paul who referred to him as "the Lord's brother." He was sometimes referred to as James the Just.
"Convening the judges of the Sanhedrin, (Ananus) brought before them a man called James the brother of Jesus who was called the Christ, and certain others. He accused them of having transgressed the law, and condemned them to be stoned to death."
Flavius Josephus. Antiquities of the Jews, 20: 9.1.
James was martyred in Jerusalem in 62 CE after refusing to deny to the High Priest and the Pharisees that Jesus was the Messiah. According to Flavius Josephus, a Jewish historian writing in the late first century CE, James' death was influenced in part by the general lawlessness of Jerusalem at the time and was questioned by many people. In later Christian accounts, James is lured up to the pinnacle of the Temple to address the crowds, and is thrown down by the Pharisees. He was not killed by the fall. James lay on the ground asking forgiveness of God for his attackers and was stoned and beaten to death with a club.
The Lord's Brother?
"Then after three years, I (Paul) went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and abode with him fifteen days. But other of the apostles saw I none, save James the Lord's brother."
Bible. New Testament, Galatians 1:18-19
The curators leave it an open question.
Perhaps it is a call to think more clearly about the Jewishness of Jesus, and Jewishness of the early church. James, a Jew, was the predominant leader in the church in Jerusalem, and obviously influential throughout the whole movement wherever it spread.
Actually many of us have already been doing a lot of thinking about this. Not only are there a number of new books out there on this topic, but also many "prophetic" voices have been challenging us to re-embrace the nature of the church before there was the great parting of the ways between Jewish and Gentile believers in the early 2nd century.
Efforts like the "Towards Jerusalem Council II" have been telling us that we need to receive again the Messianic Jewish believers into the Church, and rediscover what we lost when we rejected them almost 1900 years ago. (For more on this see http://www.reconcile.org).
Perhaps it is time to look at the book of James, which he, under the influence of the Spirit, brought to the early believers. James teaches us how to live by grace, and what a life of faith behaves like if it is genuine. Perhaps the themes of the book of James are particularly needed at this time in the 21st century church.
James was a righteous man. So much so that he was given the nickname "James the Just".
James was a bishop. Authority is something we have misunderstood for a long time. We need a restoration of true authority and government in the Church.
James was a martyr. He wasn't the first James to be martyred, but he died a heroic and challenging death. If the Church in our day is going to make the kind of impact that will truly change the world then the same kind of courage will need to mark our lives. May we also have the grace to forgive those who persecute us as we reach out to them with our last breath.
Is there a challenge being issued to us as Gentile believers?
Here was an artifact that needed to be brought out of its obscurity. Oded Golan said that back in the spring he invited French scholar Andre Lemaire (a Catholic) to his apartment to examine a different ossuary in his collection, and that at the time, Lemaire also took a look at the James ossuary. Golan said he has one of the largest private antiquities collections in the world and that he owns dozens of burial boxes and was unaware of the potential importance of the find because he knows little about Christian tradition. "I certainly didn't tie it to the family of Jesus of Nazareth," he said.
So, it took a Gentile Christian to reveal the real value of the treasure in the hands of an Israelite.
Seems to me that that is our challenge. As Paul said, it is "the Gentiles who will make Israel envious", so they will rediscover the value of the treasure they have in their Messiah. They need our help as they discover the greatest treasure of their heritage, namely JESUS, THE BROTHER OF JAMES..."
Richard Long
Together Ministries
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You may contact Richard at Box 12, Millgrove, Ontario, L0R 1V0 or e-mail him at together@cogeco.ca, telephone 905-690-8777.
(If you have a computer, see the article by Gordon Govier on