Todd Bolen, Author at BiblePlaces.com

Weekend Roundup

Riccardo Lufrani counters the proposal of Amos Kloner that the tombs of St. Etienne were originally the resting places of the last kings of Judah. He essentially addresses the translation of Josephus’s “royal caverns.” He does not mention the fact of that these tombs are located in the midst of an Iron Age cemetery.

Zahi Hawass gives his side of the story and explains why he will not be going to jail. Hershel Shanks has a lengthy interview with Hawass to be published in the May/June issue of Biblical Archaeology Review and now online here. Shanks writes of his time with Hawass, “I found him confident, overbearing, domineering, brash and loud. But he was also sometimes reasonable and often even charming.”

A four-minute video gives some insight into the revived chariot races in Jerash (Gerasa), Jordan.

Italy has announced a major restoration of Pompeii, following the recent collapse of an ancient house.

Christians celebrated Palm Sunday in Jerusalem yesterday.

Bible Gateway has a complex graphic that illustrates the chronology and geography of events during the week leading to Jesus’ crucifixion. “Follow the lines in the chart to see at a glance what people were doing, where they were, and whom they were with at any point during the week.”

We wish a happy Passover to all of those celebrating this evening.

HT: Explorator, Jack Sasson, Carl Rasmussen

Tagged Egypt, Italy, Jerusalem, Jordan, Weekend Roundup

Zahi Hawass Sentenced to Jail

From AhramOnline:

[Egyptian] Minister of State for Antiquities Affairs Zahi Hawass has been sentenced to one year in jail on Sunday for refusing to fulfill a court ruling over a land dispute.
The Egyptian criminal court also said Hawass must be relieved of his governmental duties and ordered him to pay a LE1000 penalty.
Hawass failed to adhere to a ruling in favour of his opponent over a land dispute when he was in charge of the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA).

Another source reports that he was sentenced to a year of hard labor.

HT: Explorator

Tagged Egypt

250,000 Tourists in Israel for Passover and Easter

This will be a busy week in Israel, with Passover beginning Monday evening and Good Friday and Easter a few days later. From the Jerusalem Post:

More than a quarter of a million tourists are expected to visit Israel during the Passover and Easter holidays, the Tourism Ministry reported on Saturday. Of these tourists, at least 100,000 are expected to visit Jerusalem alone. The seven-day Passover holiday begins on Monday evening and is one of the main periods of the year for tourism to Israel, along with the High Holidays in the fall. About a week after, Easter will begin, bringing tens of thousands of Christian pilgrims to Israel. One of the highlights of the pilgrimage for Orthodox Christians is the Holy Fire Ceremony, to be held next Sunday in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the Old City of Jerusalem. The ceremony brings thousands of worshippers into the alleyways of the Old City as the fire is passed among the masses.

The story continues here. For a fascinating description of the Ceremony of Holy Fire, to be observed on Saturday, see here.

Tagged Jerusalem, Tourism

Free Digital Maps for New Moody Atlas of the Bible

>>I wrote the following some months ago for the BiblePlaces Newsletter. In preparing for a new issue of the e-newsletter, I re-read it and thought it worth posting for blog readers who do not subscribe to the free newsletter.

I got the scoop for this story from the trash can. Some of you will be impressed by the serious commitment that I and my sources have for bringing you news that even the famous tabloids have not yet learned about. The scoop is this: all purchasers of the New Moody Atlas of the Bible can get the maps and photos in electronic format, for free. This tip right here is worth the cost of your subscription to this fine newsletter!

When I heard about this, just a few days ago, from my trash-snooping friend, I immediately ordered the book. I have wanted it ever since it came out, but knowing that I could get all of the maps and photos in digital format put me over the edge and I couldn’t spend my $31.49 fast enough.

Of course, Barry Beitzel is one of the finest historical geographers of the biblical world. This is not an atlas written by a one-time visitor to the Holy Land (yes, those exist, and no, I’m not going to name them). Beitzel wrote the first edition of this atlas 25 years ago. The new edition has the benefit of all of his continued years in the classroom and extensive travels in the Middle East. And it won the ECPA 2010 Christian Book Award, Medallion of Excellence, in the Bible Study and Reference category.

As for the digital maps and photos, there are a few things that may be worth knowing. First, the files are available to both past and current purchasers. If you already bought the atlas, then you can email [email protected] or call 1-800-678-8812 to get a code to download the files. If you buy the atlas as I just did, the code is included in the book (at least the copies sitting on the shelves at Amazon; bookstores with a slow turnover may have earlier printings still around).

Second, the maps are presented in very high resolution. You will be impressed! The photos are available in lower resolution. (But who reading this newsletter needs more photos of the Bible lands anyway, right?) Third, you access the materials through WORDSearch. Though the program is free with this code, I would have preferred to have avoided the hassle of installing another program. If you have a Mac, you’ll have to run WORDSearch through WINE or a Windows environment. From this point, you can save the images in png or pdf format. (Or you can do as I did and just poke around in your Program Files or Program Data folder to find all of the images and copy them to a more convenient location if you do not plan to access them via WORDSearch.)

I commented on the blog a few months ago that I really appreciated the publisher’s wisdom in making the ESV Bible Atlas maps available to its users and I noted my hope that others would get on board.

I’m delighted to see another publisher following suit.

You can search the internet for information about this, but I don’t think you’ll find anything. If you’re thinking this is all too good to be true, I’ve uploaded the official document giving the details. Of course, I cut off the part encrusted with noodles first.

>>You may subscribe to the free newsletter here.

Tagged Resources

Franz: No Crucifixion Nails with Caiaphas

One advantage that a scam artist has over his victims is preparation time. He can skillfully prepare his scam over months and years, but when he springs it on the mainstream media, they take his pre-packaged story and go to press with it immediately, lest all of the audience read the story at other outlets. If you take two or three days to investigate, the news is now old. Fortunately for both the purveyor and conveyors of the story, the audience is not so concerned with details and by the time the scam is revealed, the audience is entertained by the newest sensation.

The problems with Jacobovici’s “Nails of the Cross” are in the details. Gordon Franz has done some rather elementary detective work that suggests that Jacobovici is purposefully misleading his audience in order to sell his show.

Jacobovici’s theory is that these two nails from Jesus’ crucifixion were buried with Caiaphas because he converted to faith in Jesus. The problem, as Franz notes, is that these two nails were not buried with Caiaphas. The burial cave in question held dozens of people and six ossuaries (bone boxes).

Two of the ossuaries have inscriptions related to Caiaphas (#3 and #6), but no nails were found in either of these ossuaries. One nail was found inside Ossuary 1, and the other was found in a burial niche. Jacobivici’s presentation assumes that Caiaphas’s remains were interred in Ossuary 3, but this ossuary contained only the bones of women and children. Ossuary 6 had the bones of a 60-year-old man, possibly the famous high priest, but this beautiful and intact stone box did not contain any nails.

Second, Franz observes that there are very obvious reasons for nails being found in a burial tomb.

Sometimes lids were attached to ossuaries by means of a nail. In this tomb, names were scratched into the sides of several ossuaries, and this was done using nails. As Franz writes:

It is highly probable that the nail found in Kokhim IV was used for scratching the names of Caiaphas on Ossuary 6, but it is important to note that it was not found inside the ossuary of Caiaphas and thus not a talisman with divine power to protect Caiaphas in the afterlife as Jacobovici would like to claim.

Third, Franz questions whether a nail only three inches long could have sufficiently held an adult man to a cross. The only nail known to have been used in a crucifixion was longer than four inches.
Jacobovici has said he spent three years making this video, yet if he had spent three hours in a library looking at a handful of articles he would have known that the evidence does not support his theory.

But since his reporting depends on these very same articles, it is impossible for him to claim that he is ignorant of this data. The success of his show is dependent upon the ignorance of his viewers, something that his highly selective presentation is intended to maintain.

Tagged Pseudo-Archaeology

Teaching Archaeology to College and K-12 Students

Teachers of archaeology may benefit from four presentations from the 2010 annual meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research now posted online.

This Forum stems from the session “Teaching Archaeology to Undergraduates and K-12 Schoolchildren” co-chaired by Ellen D. Bedell and Eric H. Cline at the 2010 ASOR Annual Meeting in Atlanta. The theme of the 2010 session was the use of technology to teach archaeology. Four of the presentations are being made available on Dig-it-al NEA in hopes that these papers inspire others to incorporate similar techniques and technology into their own curriculum. Introduction
By Ellen D. Bedell and Eric H. Cline Bringing the Near Eastern Past To Life (pdf)
By Stephanie Langin-Hooper and Terri Tanaka Finding One’s Own Voice (pdf)
By Lisa C. Kahn The Old (World) and New (Technologies) (pdf)
By Elaine Sullivan Creative Teaching: Using Digital Media in the Classroom (pdf)
The Lion Hunt of Ashurbanipal (iMovie)
By Stephanie P. Elkins

See the site for links to the files.

Tagged Resources