I ran across this brief article on the discovery of what scholars believe to be a very rare early Christian book. What struck me most about this article were the photos of the relic. As the quote from the article below states, there are numerous symbols in the book that directly refer to the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. For example, as the article explains, one of the “pages” in this book depicts the a cross in the foreground with an small building with an opening (the tomb) behind both outside the walls of a city – a depiction of Jesus’ crucifixion (and resurrection) that Christians have believed in and still hold to today as historically accurate and in line with the Gospels.
That Christians even at this stage were so open to symbol being a powerful conveyance of meaning, just as powerful as words, is a telling thing and a reminder that word and symbol are valuable partners for Christians. It is too early to tell if this truly dates back to the period they believe it comes from, but if it turns out to be true what an amazing find. The link to the full article is at the bottom. Here’s an excerpt from the article:
Philip Davies, Emeritus Professor of Old Testament Studies at Sheffield University, says the most powerful evidence for a Christian origin lies in plates cast into a picture map of the holy city of Jerusalem.
“As soon as I saw that, I was dumbstruck. That struck me as so obviously a Christian image,” he says.
“There is a cross in the foreground, and behind it is what has to be the tomb [of Jesus], a small building with an opening, and behind that the walls of the city. There are walls depicted on other pages of these books too and they almost certainly refer to Jerusalem.”
Book found in Jordan The books were bound by lead rings
It is the cross that is the most telling feature, in the shape of a capital T, as the crosses used by Romans for crucifixion were.
“It is a Christian crucifixion taking place outside the city walls,” says Mr Davies.
Margaret Barker, an authority on New Testament history, points to the location of the reported discovery as evidence of Christian, rather than purely Jewish, origin.
“We do know that on two occasions groups of refugees from the troubles in Jerusalem fled east, they crossed the Jordan near Jericho and then they fled east to very approximately where these books were said to have been found,” she says.
To read the full article, copy and paste the url below:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12888421