Scholar Claims Key Error In Jesus Documentary:

The scholars who analyzed the Greek inscription on one of the ossuaries after its discovery read it as "Mariamene e Mara," meaning "Mary the teacher" or "Mary the master."

Before the movie was screened, Jacobovici said that particular inscription provided crucial support for his claim. The name Mariamene is rare, and in some early Christian texts it is believed to refer to Mary Magdalene.

But having analyzed the inscription, Pfann published a detailed article on his university's Web site asserting that it doesn't read "Mariamene" at all.

The inscription, Pfann said, is made up of two names inscribed by two different hands: the first, "Mariame," was inscribed in a formal Greek script, and later, when the bones of another woman were added to the box, another scribe using a different cursive script added the words "kai Mara," meaning "and Mara." Mara is a different form of the name Martha.

According to Pfann's reading, the ossuary did not house the bones of "Mary the teacher," but rather of two women, "Mary and Martha."

"In view of the above, there is no longer any reason to be tempted to link this ossuary ... to Mary Magdalene or any other person in biblical, non-biblical or church tradition," Pfann wrote.

In the interest of telling a good story, Pfann said, the documentary engaged in some "fudging" of the facts.

"James Cameron is a great guru of science fiction, and he's taking it to a new level with Simcha Jacobovici. You take a little bit of science, spin a good yarn out of it and you get another 'Terminator' or 'Life of Brian,"' said Pfann, who briefly appeared as an ossuary expert in the documentary.

In Israel on Tuesday for a screening of the film, the Toronto-based Jacobovici welcomed Pfann's criticism, saying "every inscription should be re-examined."

But Jacobovici said scholars who researched the ossuary in the past agreed with the film's reading. "Anyone who looks at it can see that the script was written by the same hand," he added.

Jacobovici has faced criticism much tougher than Pfann's academic critique. The film has been termed "archaeo-porn," and Jacobovici has been accused of "pimping the Bible." Jacobovici attributes most of the criticism to scholars' discomfort with journalists "casting light into their ossuary monopoly."

"What we're doing is democratizing this knowledge, and this is driving some people crazy," he said.

I haven't said anything about this movie before because, honestly, it just doesn't matter to me.  I only mention it now because here we have another case of a professional propagandist filmmaker perhaps fudging the truth, but certainly not telling both sides of the debate because doing so would damage his agenda.

I especially like that last line about "democratizing this knowledge."  How dare we ignorant plebs insist on hearing both sides of an argument.  We should just take the words of our elite Hollywood betters for granted, and otherwise shut the **** up.

This post is somewhat related to religion, so if you're not interested, skip it.

The congregation where I attend worship service has someone who, for lack of anyone else, essentially became the full-time song leader. After we began attending there, there were two of us and I get the opportunity to lead singing quite often.

Last night I got a phone call that he was going to be stuck in Houston today, and wanted to know if I could cover for him.  I'm always glad to do so.  The only thing was, my wife had to work today and I didn't have anyone to keep an eye on the kids while I was occupied with my duties.  So I sat them right on the front row, said a little prayer, and took a chance on them not causing too much of a ruckus.  They sat quietly and even tried to follow along in the song book during the song service.  They made me really proud today, and I told them so.

Of course, when they got outside after services they were running around like a couple of psychotic squirrel monkeys, but I let them run.  They earned it.