The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus

BOOK: The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus
8.16Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE MYTH OF NAZARETH

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE MYTH OF NAZARETH

 

The Invented Town of Jesus

 

Scholar’s Edition

 

 

 

René Salm

 

 

 

 

 

2008

American Atheist Press

Cranford, New Jersey

 

 

 

 

American Atheist Press

P. O. Box 5733

Cranford, NJ 07016

 

www.atheists.org

 

Print ISBN-10: 1-57884-003-1

Print ISBN-13: 978-1-57884-003-8

 

E-Book
ISBN-10:
1-57884-023-6

E-Book
ISBN-13: 978-1-57884-023-6

 

Scholar’s Edition Copyright © 2006, 2007 by René Salm

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

 

Published February, 2008

Printed in the United States of America

E-Book Edition Published May, 2013

 

Unless otherwise noted, the Scripture quotations contained herein are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 of the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., and are used by permission. All rights reserved. Photograph of Nazareth from the SE © BibleWalks.com, used by permission. Photograph of Church of the Annunciation courtesy of gallery.tourism.gov.il.

 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

 

 Salm, René.

  The myth of Nazareth : the invented town of Jesus / René Salm. -- Scholar’s ed.

       p. cm.

  ISBN 978-1-57884-003-8

 1.  Nazareth (Israel)--History. 2.  Excavations (Archaeology)--Israel--Galilee.

 3.  Galilee (Israel)--Antiquities. 4.  Jews--History--168 B.C.-135 A.D.

 5.  Jews--History--70-638.  I. Title.

 

  DS110.N3S35 2008

  933--dc22

                                                            2008004416

 

Contents

                                                                           

                  

Introduction

 

Chapter One
:
The Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages

The Nazareth basin
The Stone Age
The Cave of the Leap
The Bronze Age
The Early Bronze Age
The demise of cities
The Intermediate Period
The earliest Nazareth evidence
The Middle and Late Bronze Ages
The general evidence
The Bronze Age tombs at Nazareth
Historical considerations
The Iron Age
The end of settlement in the basin
The Iron Age evidence
Summary of the Iron Age evidence
Excursus
: The Bronze Age location of Japhia

 

Chapter Two
:
The Myth of Continuous Habitation

The Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian Periods
The end of habitation in the Nazareth basin
The Babylonian period
The Persian period
The Question of Continuous Habitation
The early archaeologists
Father Clemens Kopp and the new evidence
A  changing landscape
Father Bellarmino Bagatti
Ritrovamenti nella Nazaret Evangelica (1955)
The Shrine of the Annunciation
The Dictionnaire de la Bible (1960)
The silos and cisterns
Continuous habitation since the dawn of history?
Excavations in Nazareth (1967/69)
Secondary References to Continuous Habitation

 

Chapter Three
:
The Hellenistic Renaissance Myth

The Hellenistic Period
Ptolemaic times
The Seleucids and the Maccabean revolt
The Hasmonean Age
Claims of Specific Hellenistic Finds
The Richmond report
The kokh tomb
The infamous “Hellenistic” nozzle
The Galilee boat
The Church of St. Joseph material
Remaining material represented as Hellenistic
Unsubstantiated Hellenistic claims
Summary
General Hellenistic Claims
The Hellenistic renaissance myth
Point-by-point
Sepphoris

Chapter Four
:
The Time of Christ

The Time of Christ
A note on method
Roman burial customs in Palestine
The kokh tomb
The so-called “Herodian” tomb
The earliest Nazareth evidence
The ancient oil lamp
The bow-spouted (“Herodian”) oil lamp
“Herodian”
Other alleged evidence from the first century CE
Pottery
Stone vessels
Roman oil lamps
“Rolling stones”
Ossuaries
Sarcophagi
Inscriptions
Graffiti
“Domestic installations”
Basins
Coins
Representative passages from the secondary literature
Other considerations
The site of the “casting down”
A synagaogue of the first century CE?
The neighborhood of Nazareth
Conclusions

Chapter Five
:
Gospel Legends

The location and size of the ancient village
Competing  literary traditions
The tombs of the Roman era
The size of the village
The venerated area
The slope
The cavities in the ground
The question of habitations
The home of the Blessed Virgin
The Church of St. Joseph
The tombs under the Church of the Annunciation
Artefacts and tombs
Tomb 27
Tomb 29
Graves o/p
Conclusions

 

Chapter Six
:
Nazareth and Nazara

Between the Revolts
The Roman Evidence
The structural evidence
The movable finds from Roman-Byzantine Nazareth
Evidence from the tombs
Non-funerary finds
The Hapizzez and the Caesarea Inscription
Count Joseph of Tiberias
The narrative of Epiphanius
Did Count Joseph build a church in Nazareth?
Who was buried where?
The Secondary Literature
A characteristic passage
BOOK: The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus
8.16Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

Forever Ashley by Copeland, Lori
Paper by Roxie Rivera
Reading Rilke by William H. Gass
Mosby's 2014 Nursing Drug Reference by Skidmore-Roth, Linda
Machine Of Death by Malki, David, Bennardo, Mathew, North, Ryan
Learning to Spy by Moore, Leigh Talbert
South Phoenix Rules by Jon Talton