[Straight Vermonter]

You hit the nail on the head. Why would the Vatican deal with these people who are so rude as to publicly accuse the Vatican of lying.

Also, why would the Romans keep the menorah and not melt it down? It's not like they valued the item as a religious icon.

[skepsel]

As to why the Romans would keep something of this nature and not melt it down, well it wasn't unknown for the victors in classical antiquity to dedicate a portion of the spoils of battle to one god or another and for the offerings to be displayed in that god's temple or kept in a treasury.
That said I think if this had been done it would be highly unlikely for an object of that mass of gold to have survived all the wars, invasions and looting of the intervening centuries, but who knows.

skepsel

[William Terrell]

Also, why would the Romans keep the menorah and not melt it down? It's not like they valued the item as a religious icon.

That makes the most sense. Though probably if God wanted to perserve an artifact, I reckon He would.

[Cronos]

Also, why would the Romans keep the menorah and not melt it down? It's not like they valued the item as a religious icon.

That's pretty correct. The menorah to the Romans would just be some artifact of a dead (to their minds) culture. It was only worth anything when it was melted down.