Jumping on the bandwagon...

Well. The entire American media machine seems to be crankin' regarding the discovery* of the ossuary of Jesus of Nazareth** and his wife***, Mary Magdelene****.

Being without cable stinks on days like this, but thankfully our neighbors allowed us to crash in front of their tv set for a couple minutes. Three thoughts:

• It's a cash rush... Plain and simple, and masterful to tell the truth. Cameron and Jacobovici are picking a perfect apple to dangle in front of the post-DaVinci Code minds.
• I accept, categorically, that the 'Jesus' and 'Mary' DNA samples this film's staff analyzed are from unrelated people. Whoop-tee-doo. When you produce a third, control sample that will verify that the DNA in the ossuaries actually belongs to either the Jesus of Scripture or Mary Magdelene, I'll start weeping bitterly. In the meantime, pardon me for delaying the purchase of extra tissues.
• If I hear one more person say, "I'm not a statistician" and follow their comments with their opinions re: statistics, I'm going to go postal.

In short, nothing new to see here... Move along. If you're looking for more info, iMonk and Pulpit Blog seem to have the best running list of resources.

*Did I mention that someone actually dug these up 25 years ago? And that these Holy Land archaeologists thought that it was not worth pursuing?

**Jesus came from Nazareth. Why would his broke family have a middle-class burial tomb in Jerusalem?

***As stated over and over during the DaVinci code, there is no reputable historic source claiming marriage of Jesus and Mary.

****Actually the ossuary just says, "Mariamne", a greek (?) variation on Mary. Mary just happens to be the name of 20% of Jerusalem's female population at the time.