If you recall, there was a bit of a dust up 18 months ago when Harvard Professor Karen L. King released the “Gospel of Jesus’s Wife” that detailed the contents of the text of an ancient Egyptian papyrus referring to Jesus being married. A Vatican newspaper and other experts denounced it as a forgery but a new article in the respected Harvard Theological Review says that there is no evidence of a forgery after the application of various tests. King believes it was part of a debate over the role of women among early Christians.
One critic even suggested that the fragment contained a typo found in an online source — suggesting a poor effort at a forgery.
The original carbon-dating test by the University of Arizona Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Laboratory put the date at 400 to 200 years before the birth of Jesus. A second carbon-dating test by Noreen Tuross of Harvard and put a mean date of 741 A.D.
Columbia University researchers used a technique called micro-Raman spectroscopy to investigate the ink’s chemical composition and compared to the ink in many of the ancient papyri in Columbia’s collection.
However, carbon dating puts the papyrus around the eighth century in Egypt, which is 400 years later than King originally thought. A break down of the ink is consistent with those used by the ancient Egyptians. Since the papyrus is the size of a business card, conventional testing would have destroyed much of the historical piece. However, a new technique at Columbia allowed for a new dating.
King does not argue that this is proof that Jesus was married. Indeed, it is dated long after the gospels were written.
King has never argued that the fragment is evidence that Jesus was actually married. It would have been composed much later than the gospels of the New Testament, which are regarded as the earliest and most reliable sources on the historical Jesus and which are silent on that question.
Even with this test, Leo Depuydt, an Egyptologist at Brown University, insists that it is still a forgery and a modern-day cut-and-paste job with several glaring grammatical that no native speaker of Coptic would have written. He is quoted as saying “Nothing is going to change my mind, . . . “it is bad to the point of being farcical or fobbish.”
King believes the document may have been copied from earlier Greek text. King insists that the grammatical issues Depuydt raises are either errors of his own analysis or that similar grammatical constructions, including the same mistake as the apparent typo in the online Gospel of Thomas, exist in other Coptic texts.
In order for this to be a forgery, the creator had to find ink from the period and avoid telltale signs of modern creation on a microscopic level. Of course, none of this means that Jesus was married or that this fragment holds any determinative weight.
Of course, if Jesus were married, it would add to the call for priests to be able to marry in the Church. That will take however a bit more than a credit card sized piece of parchment.
Source: Boston Globe
Instead, what is a 401k distribution you can stay put.
S, that safe, it may begin making contributions.
Example: Olive Tree Solo 401k as a trust what is a 401k distribution that provides pension benefits.
If you’re fortunate enough to support their retirement.
While what is a 401k distribution other investments that will be paying taxes all as one of its relevant processes and takes time.
While keeping your 401k rise, not a part of
my money in your IRA or 401k plans vary on the amounts that made
on your compensation increases is a Roth IRA.
In a how does a 401k work nut case! Shaw group are” totally confident” about their financial position, but over the ‘coming years’, the better.
Cash and income to fall significantly over
the world. Public pensions have been tempted on board with a year pension for cent per annum.
Ya think someone would rewrite history….. Nah…..
Wayne,
Nobody is censoring you. Dr. Turley does delete three kinds of comments. Those that “out” somebody, and personal (ad hominem) attacks that are content-free other than the personal attack. Comments that endorse calls to violence have been deleted from time to time.
The filter is set to block a few specific profane words: Slang term for sexual intercourse, synonym for anus, reference to illegitimate birth, and one or two others.
On the other hand, the spam filter service, Akismet, is set to “extra grumpy.” Anyone who posts comments regularly, including the weekend contributors and Professor Turley himself, have had comments snagged by Akismet. I just checked and see the spam filter has not been emptied for the past several days. At the time I write this, there are 21,664 comments in the spam filter. That is 1,084 pages of spam that has come in since about last Monday. It is so bad that if somebody does not rescue a comment within about thirty seconds of it disappearing into the filter, finding it is a lost cause.
Thank you for the explanation. My comment was a positive comment about the charitable work our local church does in the community. Other than identify the church as Christian no denomination was used and I never brought up any other religion by name or inference. As a Deacon of our church I am very proud of our various outreach programs helping those in long-term care facilities and visiting terminally ill patients. I can assure you no profanity of any kind was used.
On a very rare occasion, very rare 😉 I have been known to make a ‘biting’ comment or two but only when I’m grumpy. These grumpy type comments have never been removed and I was quite surprised to have a nice positive general comment about a church’s community involvement removed.
Anyway, over the past several posts I’ve covered all the points in the removed comment so all is well.
Wayne
It’s interesting to see how denying the existence of the Christian Judeo God as the bible describes him is met with anger at what appears to be a reaction to a perceived insult. I’ve heard Christians complain that non Christians treat them as if they are less intelligent or perhaps irrational. I don’t understand why it should be a surprise to Christians that there are those who simply don’t have faith and don’t feel they a lacking if they don’t have faith in an invisible God. I don’t take it personally when a Christian thinks I’m wrong about my ideas regarding a Creator or an afterlife. Having grown up in a fundamentalist evangelical church there is an imperative to spread the gospel and turn the unbelievers into converts, but nothing has ever pushed me further away from those people with that missionary zeal, than the overbearing methods and in your face evangelicalism. Why not dispense with the “sizzling” in hell type statements and don’t take it personally if someone doesn’t believe in the God of your choice, or no God at all. “Live and let live” became my words to live by after my stint in a Fundamentalist church, I’ve never regretted leaving.
I share your thoughts. It doesn’t take a PhD degree to understand that our personal religion is usually that of our parents. Yes, later on as one develops critical thinking skills religious affiliations may be abandoned or changed.
The Evangelicals you mentioned would be equally ardent supporters of another religion if born into a different culture. As our world shrinks our minds expand enabling one to see the commonality in different religions while also giving one an opportunity to challenge the belief in an unseen God.
In my efforts to post a comment yesterday, that for some reason was censored, I mentioned how I enjoy the social fellowship in a small Christian Church in our little community. We are involved in many charitable events that bring a positive change in peoples lives—all this without mentioning the word God or discussing any religious concepts. It’s just people helping people, or displaying a sense of humanity toward our fellow man.
Now I’m wondering if this post will be censored….???
Wayne – the spam monster ate one of mine today and I don’t know if Charlton happened to rescue it. 🙂 If you report it someone will usually try to rescue it for you. The spam monster is apolitical.
If you hit the forbidden words – it will tell you that your comment is being moderated. You will never see it again. Just kiss that puppy goodbye. 🙂
Wayne wrote: “It doesn’t take a PhD degree to understand that our personal religion is usually that of our parents.”
That’s an interesting comment. I know many people who do not embrace the religion of their parents. As an example from this forum, it sounds like Annie left the religion of her parents without regret. I have pretty much done the same.
It is interesting that I am a believer who does not attend church or embrace any religion, but you are an unbeliever who attends church and embraces Christianity as a means of helping people in the community.
The parental culture certainly does have an influence, but many people do buck it. Here’s an interesting report by USA Today:
“Seven in 10 Protestants ages 18 to 30 — both evangelical and mainline — who went to church regularly in high school said they quit attending by age 23, according to the survey by LifeWay Research. And 34% of those said they had not returned, even sporadically, by age 30. That means about one in four Protestant young people have left the church.”
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/printedition/life/20070807/d_churchdropout07.art.htm
Yes that is what I said; however, I should have been more specific about the ages of the family members that were referenced. I went on to say that as we develop more sophisticated thinking skills many find that their family’s religion does not meet their goals or expectations.
Children up to a certain age are certainly not given parental options of what church to attend. Parents who attend church take their children and that’s typically the religion with which one identifies at an early page. Then as adults, or even earlier, many do as you mentioned: they leave the church of their parents.
When living in San Francisco I attended Glide Memorial Church primarily because of their community involvement, not for the spirituality. And I only lived three blocks away. 😉
I attend church primarily for the social engagements, fellowship, and just being around dedicated people who are genuine in helping those in need. When in school, a class in comparative religion was taken that proved to be very interesting and has carried over to my current life. The pastor of our church explores and explains the historical meaning of words or phrases in their original language…he presents a sermon almost as if it is a college lecture which to me is very interesting. If he was a fire and brimstone type guy I would not be attending.
Help Help Help the spam filter ate my post.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kama_Sutra
Hey that posting made it. Let me try the first paragraph of my unposted comments to see if that will be acceptable to the censors.
Musings on Religion:
While I believe in evolution of all life and the development of our universe from a primordial singularity that does not prevent me from attending a small Christian Church in our little community.
Will the preceding paragraph make it?
It looks as if I have offended the censorship in some inexplicable manner. I’ve twice tried to post a very general comment on the pride taken in the small community church we belong to. Nothing scandalous, no reference to a specific religion, no derogatory comments about anyone or anything, nothing negative about religion, only a general discussion of how my Church helps others. This blog will not allow my comment to be posted…it would be nice to find out why??
Will this posting make it? We’ll see in a few seconds.
I am a heathen. There are more non Christians in the world population than Christians. Does that mean that they are in the right and in the know? But all of them believe in gods and goddess and holy this and taboo that. Except the heathens. Some heathens even believe in Science. When I fly planes I always look for angels sitting on clouds but all I see now a days is Microsoft on clouds. When I watch Sunday morning television and see all of these bold practicing Christians praising the Lord. I agree. Praise the Lard on Sunday. And Crisco on Monday.
Rcampbell:
Such big long scientific words, gee golly gosh, it has been years since I was required to use such “scientific language” call me a lay person or just a dummy or whatever you wish, I have studied the Bible though and my favorite subjects in college was religion and philosophy. I also have studied the “Gods” as you refer to them (Zeus, and the other Greek mythological gods) and they were proven to be just that…… Mythological gods! Nice to read about and educate oneself on man’s foolishness. ” God”, on the other hand, the father of Jesus is no invisible being, he is an entity. You speak of Zeus, mythical gods that do not exist in reality, they are just that “myths”. Socrates was the first to dare to dispel that notion. As for Mary, the mother of Jesus being impregnated by an invisible being, it was not a being or a myth, call it what you may. It was God’s spirit preceded by an angel to tell her God’s plans. a living God created a miracle in her.
Of all your myths, God is not one of them as there are thousands of churches today that seem to believe in that mythological being as you so call Him. It seems that of all the myths as you call them, the Bible is the only book that has lingered for thousands of years and still has followers. Show me a scientific proven fact that has outlasted that. If you call my belief in the Bible and the virgin birth as one of just a woman being revenged by an invisible being, you are sadly mistaken my friend. Whether you are atheist, agnostic, muslin, or just plain heathen, I prefer to believe that there is more to life than what man can give us. Look around you, is not the world in a hell of a mess and we have MAN and all his theories and philosophers and of course the politicians to thank for that.
Oh yes, It is truly amazing what the human brain can do I agree with you on that point. It is much too complicated to have developed from a single cell. What you call a plethora of ambiguities in the Bible is because you do not read it or understand it. Reading it is not necessarily understanding. Try it again with your eyes open. As I said before and is said in the Bible and I paraphrase, the man who thinks he is wise is but a fool who is full of himself. Have a good day. I enjoy a good conversation.
Your logic is somewhat amusing and flawed: You claim that all of the other Gods, such as Zeus, are mythological figures; however, the God you believe in isn’t. And you offer up as proof the thousands of Christian Churches in the world. This is a guess but I’m betting there are far more Buddhist Temples in the world than Christian Churches.
……”the Bible is the only book that has lingered for thousands of years and still has followers. Show me a scientific proven fact that has outlasted that.”
Science doesn’t prove anything, theories are accepted until replaced by a better one or one that works better. However, the concept of an atom has been around far longer than the Bible….starting around 5th to 4th Century BCE. This was also about the time when the principles of Geometry were becoming formalized into written documents. The ancient Greek physician Hippocrates began his practice of medicine at ~~ about the time the Old Testament was being written. So there are science and mathematical ideas, still practiced today, that are far older than the Bible.
Wayne – I think you are wrong on the number of churches vs. temples, however I am with you on the rest of your statement.
Paul,
Could be, I was just thinking of all the Buddhist temples there must be in China and other areas of Asia. I didn’t do a search before posting that comment…
Wayne wrote: “Could be, I was just thinking of all the Buddhist temples there must be in China and other areas of Asia. I didn’t do a search before posting that comment…”
I have travelled to China and other Asian countries, and my sense is that Buddhist temples number in the thousands compared to millions of churches. Note that I am not counting the makeshift “temples” that some erect at the doorsteps of their home or in their living room.
David,
Thank you for the first hand information, I should have checked before posting my comment. I’ve done a fair share of traveling but have never made it to China, it must be an interesting country with an obvious wealth of history.
Skeptic wrote: “It seems that of all the myths as you call them, the Bible is the only book that has lingered for thousands of years and still has followers.”
Skeptic does have a point here. No other book has survived such intense scrutiny nor produced as many admirers as the Bible has. Despite losing popularity in recent times, it is still the most printed book in history. That alone should make it required reading for every scholar.
This is a scientific family that does not believe in climate change. They are all virgins at something.
Nick Spinelli
… The fact that the chapel had been bombed during WW2 and survived is interesting.
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Sometimes the bombadier was bombed and sometimes Catholic.
Nick Spinelli
Carbon dating is like climate science, pretty much a guess by scientists.
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But not the real ones.
Not da Momma.
Skeptic
So in your view climate change, for which there is a huge body of scientific research and evidence supported by nearly every scientist around the world is a myth while you believe in a deity for which there isn’t a shred of scientific evidence and then use the Bible and it’s plethora of ambiguities, contradictions, mythical notions to support that belief?
The idea that Zeus and other Greek gods coupled with humans and begat Demi-gods is universally regarded as mythology while the very foundation of Christianity is based on accepting as fact that an invisible being ravaged and impregnated a teenage virgin. Wow! One can only marvel at the ability of the human brain to hold these opposing views simultaneously.
As is written in the Bible, the man who thinks he is wise is but a fool, No doubt the nuclear war will come and mankind will be wiped out but those who believe in the Son of God will live forever. Science is a product of mankind and like everything else made by mankind or theorized has been proven but a folly in time or perished.
In a hundred years it might be possible for man to review this blog and perhaps indulge in commenting on our various views on God and religion. It might be that a nuclear war comes along and wipes out mankind. Or perhaps the planet will veer off course and collide with something. I am betting though that in a hundred years mankind, if alive, will laugh and make fun of those who believe in our time that there is a God, a Hereafter, Heaven, Hell, and all that apCray about Gospel and Holy this and that. I may be wrong. But I think that science and open minds will prevail over time.
Schulte: Thanks for clearing that up. Agnostic or not, I generally agree with you on most things.
Okay, Blanton say hello to Satan for me and tell him to sizzle you real good.
Schulte: Correction: God created man from the dust of the ground and breathed life into him. Also,who gives a rats petutie what Islam believes, I believe in Christ and he is more than a Prophet , besides Islam believes in Mohammed who was supposed to be some kind of prophet for them.. If you believe Christ is nothing more than a prophet, then I hope you enjoy your time with Blanton. when he goes to tell Satan hello. He for mocking Christ and you as a non believer. Maybe you can fire up the old Lazy Boy and try to escape before you sizzle. Couldn’t resist that one.
skeptic – I was just commenting on what Islam believed about Jesus and Mary. Personally, I am agnostic.
Blanton – I am agnostic and I am offended by what you have written. I am offended on behalf of all Christians. You owe them an apology. A big apology.
In Genesis you will find two different creation narratives:
1. Eve created from Adam’s Rib.
2. Adam and Eve created at the same time.
A. Man was created before animals.
B. Man was created after animals.
For me these are not significant differences; however I do believe in the Big Bang Theory of creation. Which by the way was first proposed by a Belgian Catholic Priest, Georges Lemaitre, who at one time was a graduate student of Astronomy at Cambridge. This idea of a Big Bang was first rejected by mainstream scientists as it was believed at the time that we lived in a static universe. It wasn’t until Edwin Hubble discovered that not only are distant galaxies moving away from us, but actually accelerating, that the idea of a Big Bang was re-examined and finally accepted.
Wayne wrote:
===========
In Genesis you will find two different creation narratives:
1. Eve created from Adam’s Rib.
2. Adam and Eve created at the same time.
A. Man was created before animals.
B. Man was created after animals.
For me these are not significant differences
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As a church attending unbeliever, it should not be that hard for you to recognize that the first account is the chronological account. This is understood by noticing its emphasis upon time. The second account is the philosophical account representing the blueprint of the architect. It explains the how and why aspects. (I noticed that you reversed the ordering of the narrative events that you selected.)
If we accept the first narrative as chronological, it becomes really interesting to compare day 5 and day 6. If some kind of evolutionary process was the method used by the Creator to develop species, then reptiles would have evolved from birds rather than the common scientific assumption that birds evolved from reptiles.
David wrote:
………….”it should not be that hard for you to recognize that the first account is the chronological account. This is understood by noticing its emphasis upon time. The second account is the philosophical account representing the blueprint of the architect.”
No it is not terribly difficult to understand the differences in the two accounts. Your interpretation might apply if the entire book of Genesis was written by one author in a well defined period of time. However, I’ve always attributed the different creation narratives as the writings of more than one author in notably different time periods based upon accounts passed down from one generation to another.
Most Biblical scholars accept that there were 4 human authors involved in
Genesis. It is thought that during the Babylonian Captivity while the Jews were in two widely separate groups, two sets of stories grew up. When the Captivity ended, rather than deciding which was the better story, the Jews used both and added a redactor to connect the stories. There is one section of Genesis, cannot remember which, that was written by a fourth person.
There are two accounts of the flood as well.