Time Magazine Review "Unholy Business"

[john]

All -

Regarding ossuary vessels of all sorts..........

MACBETH
Wherefore was that cry?

SEYTON
The queen, my lord, is dead.

MACBETH
She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.


hoka hey


john

[Grumpage]

Min:

Historian Antonio Lombatti with a recap of the arguments against authenticity.

Lombatti comments and criticises the ossuary according to six points - provenance, palaeography, inscription, traditional belief about James’ tomb, the patina and Mr Forger himself. The first five constitute the academic dispute and that’s OK - no legal or courtroom drama should be necessary here (although that is what we have got).

The last point is the most interesting, Mr Forger, the alleged hands-on perpetrator - an Egyptian known as Marco. So far as I can make out Marco has never admitted to being the forger and, in fact, has explicitly denied it although he may have been reported as, and certainly has admitted to, having done work for Golan. Interviewed on CBS ‘60 minutes’ he denies faking the ossuary. When presented with pictures of the Jehoash tablet he said that he had inscribed some stones like it rather than he had inscribed that particular one. The prosecution, of course, would have had to prove that he forged a particular piece.

The Israeli police cannot officially interview Marco and he refuses to go to Israel. Moreover, the Egyptian authorities have no interest in cooperating with their Israeli counterparts. Unless he is officially ‘processed’ the Israeli prosecutors are nowhere. Even then it might (probably?) have come to nothing. Burleigh’s book includes excerpts of interview transcripts that an Israeli police investigator (presumably unofficially) carried out with Marco. Burleigh rounds off the extracts with a note of regret that they could not be used in court (because Marco didn’t appear). Well, I could see little in them that would have made a difference - I don’t know what Burleigh saw.

It is possible that the Israelis might have broken down Marco but unless they could be certain that he would play ball in court then it would have been a high risk business. On the other hand, Marco might have been offered immunity from prosecution for his cooperation. Perhaps he was so offered and refused it. Who can blame him for not wanting to step into the lions den? In any event, Marco stayed put and kept his mouth shut, so we will never know what might have been.

The point I am making with all this is that Marco may not be the killer witness that Lombatti seems to think.

Fascinating stuff.

[Minimalist]

I don't know that it matters, Grump. He isn't a "witness" as far as this trial is concerned and with relations between Egypt and Israel being what they are it surely seems unlikely that he ever will be.

Meanwhile, this site notes that there are two sides to every issue.

http://jwest.wordpress.com/2008/11/03/t ... -shambles/

The amusing thing about this press release is the final paragraph:

To arrange for an interview with BAR editor Hershel Shanks, please contact Sarah Yeomans. Contact information for other sources, including script experts Andre Lemaire of the Sorbonne and Ada Yardeni of Hebrew University, are also available.

Lemaire has a vested interest in the artifact’s ‘authenticity’ since he was the original ‘authenticator’- and Yardeni has said it’s bunk.

The only ones who still assert that the inscription is genuine are Jack Kilmon, and those who have a financial interest in it.

BAR has been up to its armpits in this whole Jehoash/James stuff since it started.

[Grumpage]

From your link:

Badgering on the stand by Golan’s defense lawyers of epigraphers and other experts proves only that Golan has good lawyers, not that the experts are wrong.

I think this sums it up. Nomatter what the outcome of the trial nobody will change their minds about anything.

I don't know if prosecution witnesses were badgered or not. I do know that if these so-called experts can't withstand cross examination then we are all up shit creek. That is the lesson to be learned here.

[Minimalist]

I don't know what Israeli law is based on but over here lawyers in criminal cases use the concept of "reasonable doubt." "Reasonable" is a rather amorphous term which can mean different things to different people. There has been a lot of weighing in on these "artifacts" which means there is a lot of written opinions both ways. The final judgment of the IAA was that they were frauds but I can certainly see where a defense attorney could pound on a witness about the findings of other experts to create that "reasonable" doubt at least in a legal sense.

Let's not lose sight of the fact that the ossuary itself is "real." It is a genuine ossuary from the time (pre-70AD) when ossuaries were used. What is at issue is half of the inscription.

[Grumpage]

So, reasonable doubt in law is different from reasonable doubt in archaeology. I know what you are getting at, Min, but I just don't buy it.

[Minimalist]

Law is more of an art than a science.