The Silly World of Biblical "Archeology"

That some are taking serious the claims that a set of six bones found in a stone reliquary with an inscription reading "God, save your servant Thomas. To St. John. June 24" might be the bones of John the Baptist gives you an idea of the nonsense that will follow.

Donald Barthelme could not have written a more surrealistic or absurd story on his best day. The premise is laughable from the start. Even setting aside that there is virtually no evidence that John the Baptist existed, which I'll get back to, the basic scenario laid out in the CNN story defies reason. The reliquary states that it is the remains of someone named Thomas. There is no amount of linguistic gymnastics that can turn Thomas into John. Being dedicated to John, the Patron Saint of the church it was found in, also does not magically alter the meaning of the inscription. Then there is the problem with cultural norms. John would have been, according to scripture, an itinerant Jewish preacher. He is said to have been decapitated but otherwise his body would have been in tact. In Jewish tradition that would have been very important. Disfiguring your body while alive was abhorrent, dismembering a body after death would have been horrifying. How did John's body come to be separated (a variety of other Religious sites claim his relics)? How was his body found to begin with? Digging him up would have been sacrilegious. Who among his followers would have had the motivation to do so and who would have had the means to acquire proper vessels to house his "holy" remains? Look at the reliquary pictured in the news piece.

Despite the claim that, "There is reasonably good historical evidence that John the Baptist, whom Christians believe baptized his cousin Jesus, did exist..." the basic assertion that John existed is not supported by historical research. There is only one reference to him outside scripture anywhere near the time-frame he is believed to have lived. The passage in Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews (Book 18 Chapter 5) is highly suspicious. If this sounds familiar, it should. Christian copyists are known to have embellished and altered his works. Even if it was authentically written by Josephus it is essentially here-say. Josephus did not witness it and it does not sound like anything more than a retelling of a folktale. This should also not surprise anyone who has spent any time researching early scripture or the various interpretations of them. The only "proof" that seems positive is actually very superficial. The bones in question have been dated to the 1st century which would put them around the estimated time of John the Baptist' life-time. Again, this says nothing about whose bones are actually in the box. One of the few somewhat accurate commentaries in the article points out, "But the mere fact that the testing didn't prove the bones are fakes is unusual." There's a big hint right there. Biblical Archeology enthusiasts will no doubt see that as very encouraging. It wasn't immediately proven a fake like virtually every similar claim. What a triumph!

That, of course, does seem to be the mentality and tone of the whole article. I think the second sentence is actually a good example of this, "The most famous of them all, the Turin Shroud, is widely regarded as a Middle Ages forgery, and even the Catholic Church does not insist the shroud was actually used to wrap the body of Jesus himself." Notice "widely regarded." The only people who haven't accepted that it is a forgery are religious zealots and ignorant fools. It's been carbon dated, twice. It has been chemically analyzed. Mathematicians have subject the measurements to basic geometry. Unless you believe Christ was a time traveling mutant with a freakishly huge head, was unusually tall, and bled ink, the Shroud can only be a fake.
The bones, though real, are almost certainly not John the Baptists. The odds that these relics are what some have claimed them to be are so astronomically negative that it is hardly worth the effort. But for the sake of history I sincerely hope they are able to trace the bones journey. The identity will probably never be known but the research could reveal valuable information.