Posted on 08/01/2002 6:18:17 PM PDT by crypt2k
JERUSALEM - A skeleton discovered near the site where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found may be the 2,000-year-old remains of John the Baptist, an American professor announced Thursday.
But Israeli archaeologists disputed his theory as being far-fetched and said the burial site unearthed is probably that of an 18th century Bedouin man.
Professor Richard Freund, director of the Maurice Greenberg Center for Judaic Studies at the University of Hartford in Connecticut, was part of an expedition at Qumran in the Judean Desert that made the discovery on Monday.
Freund said there was "circumstantial evidence" that the well-preserved skeleton may be the "Teacher of Righteousness," the founder of the Jewish sect called the Essenes whose scribes authored the ancient Hebrew scrolls.
He also said that the leader of the Essenes may be the same person as John the Baptist, the prophet who anointed Christ.
"It is possible that a single person like John the Baptist, a leader in the New Testament, may have been this anonymous mysterious person, the Teacher of Righteousness, mentioned in the text of the Dead Sea Scrolls," he said.
Magen Broshi, one of the heads of the expedition and an expert on the Dead Sea Scrolls, dismissed Freund's theory.
"No person in the world believes there is a connection between the two. There is nothing to it. What we have unearthed is most probably a skeleton of a Bedouin man from about two or three hundred years ago," he said.
Broshi said there was too much of a discrepancy in the dates of the John the Baptist who was killed in A.D. 29 and the sect who lived from 150 B.C. to A.D. 68.
The skeleton was discovered near the site where the remains of two women from the period of the Second Temple, the first century A.D., were found last summer, and where a zinc coffin was also unearthed.
Freund said the skeleton was found about 1.5 meters (5 feet) under the ground in an elaborate burial chamber situated in a prominent elevated position at the far eastern end of the Qumran cemetery, indicating a person of some importance. A piece of ceramic in the style of the first century era was found alongside the skeleton.
The skeleton was also found facing east and the first rays of the rising sun would have hit the burial chamber, he said.
"There is no other burial like this. The Qumran sect were extremely attached to the sun. It is the most elaborate burial one can imagine in a very simple place," he said.
The Essenes were a monastic sect that flourished in Palestine from the second century B.C. to the second century A.D. They followed mystical interpretations of the ancient scriptures and strictly followed Jewish rituals. Detailed descriptions of their daily lives were recorded in the scrolls found by Bedouin shepherds.
Freund said there were a number of reasons scholars believed the leader of the sect and John the Baptist were the same person.
This included the similarities between ideas of John the Baptist in the New Testament and those of the Essenes, the fact that there were several ritual pools at Qumran, and that the early Christian went into the wilderness, was from a priestly family and was an ascetic whose lifestyle was close to those of the sect.
Although John the Baptist was beheaded by Herod, according to the Bible, a skull was found with the skeleton.
However, Freund said the body was not excavated intact, but that it was common to bury the skulls of people who had been beheaded together with their bodies.
Freund called the discovery "remarkable."
"It is the closest thing anyone will ever get to establishing a major figure in the Qumran community. It is the first time we really have someone who can speak by his DNA, by his bones, who can speak for the whole community of Qumran," he said.
However, Hanan Eshel, head of the archaeology department at Bar Ilan University in Tel Aviv and another head of the expedition, dismissed Freund's theory as "nonsense."
"John the Baptist was not part of this group. We don't have a clue who the skeleton buried there belonged to and we won't have," he said.
He said about 900 graves from the time of the Essenes buried in the Qumran cemetery faced north-south. About 50 graves faced east-west and were thought to belong to Muslims buried in cemetery in last couple of hundred years.
The skeleton was found lying in an east-west direction, but a cooking pot found at its feet dated back to the Second Temple period.
"What was found there on Monday is confusing. It is very strange," Eshel said, adding that the process of dating the bones would still take some time.
Adolfo Roitman, curator and director of the Shrine of the Book where the scrolls are kept at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, said some scholars tried to identify the founder of the sect with historic characters mentioned in the New Testament to try and resolve the riddle of the ancient texts.
"We don't know who the real person behind the title Teacher of Righteousness is. But attempts to try and identify these people as the first Christians is a theory most scholars including myself don't accept," he said.
However, Roitman said it seemed "reasonable" that the skeleton and the artifacts found in the gave were from the same period, "but I won't dare to say more than that."
John The Baptist's Cave - And Head? - Believed Found
12-28-00 AMMAN (AFP) - A cave unearthed last year under the remains of a fourth century Byzantine church on the east bank of the Jordan River was the winter home of the Christian New Testament prophet John the Baptist, project director Mohammad Waheeb said Wednesday. But experts are still investigating the identity of a human skull found near the cave to determine if it could also belong to John, who the Bible says was the cousin of Jesus Christ,
Waheeb told AFP. He was commenting on a report published Wednesday by Al-Dustour newspaper, which said the skull found near the cave in Jordan's Wadi Kharrar "could be that of St. John the Baptist". "The cave and the skull were unearthed last year," Waheeb said. "Reseach has determined that the cave belonged to St. John the Baptist, but experts led by Dr. Abdullah al-Nabulsi are still examining the skull," Waheeb told AFP. "Until now, testing on the skull has not been completed, so we can only say it belonged to a hermit, because the region of Wadi Kharrar was inhabited by many hermit," he said. The cave carved into the rock was dated to the 1st century A.D., Waheeb said. The skull was found "directly next to the cave, buried on its own," he said. Remains of three other ancient churches were found around the cave, demonstrating the "sacredness" of the site, where Waheeb and the Jordanian ministry of tourism say Jesus Christ was baptised.
Over the past few years, Jordanian archeologists led by Waheeb have uneartherd ancient churches and huge baptismal pools in Wadi Kharrar, known in antiquity as Bethany Beyond the Jordan. It is located just east of the Jordan River and opposite Jericho. The gospel of Saint John the Evangelist says Jesus crossed to the east bank of the river to be baptised by John the Baptist. Further east is located the biblical site known as Machaerus, where John the Baptist is said to have been beheaded on the orders of Herod Antipas, the ruler of Galilee. Fearful of John's great influence over the people, Herod had him arrested and imprisoned at Machaerus on the Dead Sea when John denounced his adultrous and incestuous marriage with Herodias, wife of Herod's half brother, Philip. John was beheaded at the request of Salome, daughter of Herodias, who asked for his head on a plate at the instigation of her mother after dancing for the king and being promised a reward. Israel and the Palestinians claim that Jesus was baptised in a spot on the western bank of the river known as Qasr el-Yahud.
"John the Baptist was not part of this group. We don't have a clue who the skeleton buried there belonged to and we won't have," he said.
He said about 900 graves from the time of the Essenes buried in the Qumran cemetery faced north-south. About 50 graves faced east-west and were thought to belong to Muslims buried in cemetery in last couple of hundred years.
"What was found there on Monday is confusing. It is very strange," Eshel said, adding that the process of dating the bones would still take some time.
To summarize: "I have no idea who this guy was, but somehow I'm convinced it isnt the baptist. I cannot explain the evidence, which seems to be in line with the theory that this skeleton comes from the era of the baptist, therefore I discount it. In fact, I have no evidence to support a contrary position at all. However, I will state categorically that it is not the baptist, in fact I will state as fact my opinion that he isnt even an Esene, which I cannot prove either."
Think this guy has an open mind?
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Keep the faith!
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