Alternative Religions

Alternative Religions Blog

From Jennifer Emick, for About.com

Resurrection Re-run?

Tuesday July 15, 2008

Cave at Qumran, where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered.

Alistair Duncan/Doring Kindersley/Getty Images

This week's issue of Time magazine carries a story of enormous import in the religious world (meaning it will likely be ignored for another decade). The piece is written by David Van Biema and concerns an unassuming looking stone tablet thought to be related to the Dead Sea Scrolls. The tablet, which dates to a period just before the birth of Christ, contains an apocalyptic narrative in the voice of the angel Gabriel, and mentioning a messiah who will die and be resurrect in three day's time- a concept often believed to be unique to the Christian faith and the life narrative of Jesus. What is to come of this interesting artifact remains to be seen.

Comments

July 21, 2008 at 3:00 pm (1) Sandy S says:

It seems that “scholars” don’t seem to know as much as some of the general public (like me.) The so-called Christian Bible OLD Testament has “predictions” of a Messiah etc.

Another thing, it wasn’t just old Hebrew manuscripts found in the Dead Sea Scroll cave(s.) It was a lot of the Gnostic testaments including the one supposedly written by Judas…and it has taken them up to or more than 60 years to translate and make the texts know to the general public.

And pagans know, that Jesus wasn’t the only Messiah that was resurrected in three days. DUH.

July 21, 2008 at 5:07 pm (2) Mekashef says:

As a researcher in the field of intertestamental literature, I resent that comment about scholars.

Scholarly articles are very often misquoted, & oftentimes dubious discoveries get blown out of proportion by the uneducated media. Academics must always be careful what material they release. Well meaning journalists are sometimes misread by popular critics, triggering a domino effect of misinformation.

This article is fairly decent in that it points out the significance of this finding lies in the close correspondence of the inscription with the prevalent Christian narratives on the Resurrection with regards to a specific detail. To be sure, the Gnostic texts are replete with such references — but these are for the most part post-Christian documents, generally in Koine or Syriac (i.e.: not Hebrew). This isn’t the first messianic statement in Hebrew Scripture (apocryphal or otherwise) but it’s the first one which speaks unambiguously of a resurrected Messiah. As far as I know, it is the only such document which could conceivably testify to a larger trend in Judaic culture.

An astute reader will appreciate this distinction. This is important news. It is still fairly fresh news, & I hope that the scholars — the real experts on the subject, the ones who actually read Semitic languages — will perform more research which will unveil an important aspect of Christianity’s ancient context.

Sliha, marat Sandy, aval at lo yoda’at ma at ‘amaret. Shequet, plishtim.

July 21, 2008 at 7:02 pm (3) jay says:

One of the clearest expositions I’ve seen is in the beginning of the 2007 movie “Zeitgeist,” which explains that the Jesus story is similar to stories from Egypt, Greece, and other ancient civilixations

July 21, 2008 at 8:17 pm (4) Borsia says:

Its amazing how many messiahs have been born in a barn to a virgin mother only to be sold out by a follower be executed and to rise in 3 days.

It reminds me far more of Rambo 13 than of any great deity to worship.

July 22, 2008 at 4:39 am (5) Ephrem Hagos says:

First of all, the Christian faith has little or nothing to do with Jesus Christ. It has no way of establishing firsthand His real identity. The death of Jesus on the cross actually defines His immortality and divine identity transcending historicity. Resurrection on the third day is not a substance for faith but for unbelievers (Matt. 12: 38-42)!!!!!