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Jordan Backlash

Thanks to David Meadows for bringing our attention to the first broadside against the recent discovery in Jordan. My favorite line from his post: “it’s interesting that the ThaiIndian piece originated at National Geographic … an organization which, of course, NEVER sensationalizes any discoveries and certainly has no archaeologists-in-residence who regularly do such.” Anybody remember the Gospel of Judas?

Critics dub worlds oldest church discovery ridiculous

Washington, June 14 (ANI): The recent discovery of the world’s first Christian church by a Jordanian archaeologist has been dismissed by critics as ridiculous.

A team of archaeologists in Jordan led by Abdel-Qader al-Housan, director of the Rihab Center for Archaeological Studies had announced the discovery of the worlds oldest church dating from 33 AD to 70 AD.

The church was found underneath the ancient Saint Georgeous Church, which itself dates back to 230 AD, in Rihab, northern Jordan near the Syrian border.

Al-Housan also said that the cave showed evidence of early Christian rituals.

However, Ghazi Bisheh, former director general of the Jordanian Department of Antiquities dubbed the claims as “ridiculous,” saying the archaeologist behind them “has a tendency to sensationalize discoveries” and offered no evidence to back his recent assertion.

The team had found a mosaic in church that described these Christians as “the 70 beloved by God and Divine”.

According to Al-Housan it referred to 70 disciples who fled Roman persecution in Jerusalem during the first century A.D., after the death of Jesus Christ.

But Bisheh says the identity of the disciples mentioned in the mosaic is not clear.

The experts widely believe that organized churches didn’t exist until at least the third century A.D.

After the death of Jesus Christ, Christian worship used to be in homes and other domestic buildings or, less commonly, by rivers outside city walls during the first century A.D. The organized churches did not emerge until the Byzantine period, in the fifth century A.D.

“It sounds rather anachronistic,” National Geographic quoted Biblical scholar Stephen Pfann, president of the University of the Holy Land in Jerusalem, as saying.

He said that during the first century, the term “church” or “ekklesia” was used for the assembled body of believers and not the building or catacombs where they were assembling.

“If they are talking about a cave, it could have been a hiding place. In timeif there were martyrs there or something significant that took place there or a well-known individual who was among the disciples of Jesusthen you would have had reason to commemorate the site, which could later be used by the church’s monks, he said.

“But the cave that’s there is one that doesn’t necessarily commemorate anything I don’t know how you can take an underground cave and say it could present itself as a first-century church,” he added.

“The experts widely believe that organized churches didn’t exist until at least the third century A.D … The organized churches did not emerge until the Byzantine period, in the fifth century A.D.”

Well, which is it — the third or the fifth? In any event, the statement is a gross over-simplification.

4 thoughts on “Jordan Backlash

  1. Mike, as you know, I hold no brief for the 33-70 AD date that was thrown around in the first article you posted. However, it seems that the actual evidence does support a date before 230 AD. As for “organized churches” not appearing until the third or fifth century (which is it, guys?), what does it take to have an “organized church”? An open space with enough room for, say, twenty people, an altar, and a lectern. Throw in a presider (called Episkopos in Greek), a lector, and a deacon, and you have all the structure you need. The congregation provided the bread and wine, and the financial support for the ministers, as well as for the needs of the poor. An archaeologist could be standing inside such an “organized church”, and never know it, unless there were inscriptions and artwork, as in the house-church at Dura.

    In the case of this particular site, you have a cave under a church that can be securely dated to 230. The cave has Christian inscriptions. It is not unreasonable to assume that the cave was in use before the Church was built over the top of it. That would make it one of the earliest Christian sites on record. However, there is no evidence that I have seen that justifies the claim that the cave was used by the Seventy between the years 33-70 AD.

  2. ‘The team had found a mosaic in church that described these Christians as “the 70 beloved by God and Divine”.’

    Any better photos of this?

  3. Better pictures will come, and better information. The inscription might mean that the 70 were present in the cave, or it might simply mean that the church had a special veneration for those saints.

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