# Ossuary of James, brother of Jesus found... maybe **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 21, 2002, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290 "2002-10-21T21:11:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![NurseCarmen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5daacb/32.png) [@NurseCarmen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NurseCarmen)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/21 "2002-10-22T17:12:34Z")
The forgery that claimed to be his grandfather was easier to pick out, it listed his death as 20 B.C. 😃 The whole thing stinks as a forgery to me. But hey, they removed the bones. Did they hose it out afterwards? I would think that a rotting corpse would have ample opporunity to leave some DNA morsels in the nooks and crannies. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/22 "2002-10-22T17:47:48Z")
It’s the kind of inscription that would have come from somone whose family had a re-marriage in it, to specify which marriage the child was born from. Remember–the answer to the question “Who is my brother?” varies from culture to culture, & the Hebrew culture of 2000 years ago is **not** our culture today, nor is it even modern Israeli culture. Very different rules. Isn’t the dervivation of legitimate Jewish descent through the matrlinial line? So…who here can tell us if the condition of “brotherhood” in ancient Israel was derived solely from having one parent in common? ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/23 "2002-10-22T17:56:36Z")
It’s the kind of inscription that would have come from somone whose family had a re-marriage in it, to specify which marriage the child was born from. Remember–the answer to the question “Who is mt brother?” varies from culture to culture, & the Hebrew culture of 2000 years ago is **not** our culture today, nor is it even modern Israeli culture. Very different rules. Isn’t the dervivation of legitimate Jewish descent through the materlinial line? So…who here can tell us if the condition of “brotherhood” in ancient Israel was derived solely from having one parent in common? ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/24 "2002-10-22T18:02:26Z")
It’s the kind of inscription that would have come from somone whose family had a re-marriage in it, to specify which marriage the child was born from. Remember–the answer to the question “Who is my brother?” varies from culture to culture, & the Hebrew culture of 2000 years ago is **not** our culture today, nor is it even modern Israeli culture. Very different rules. Isn’t the dervivation of legitimate Jewish descent through the matrlinial line? So…who here can tell us if the condition of “brotherhood” in ancient Israel was derived solely from having one parent in common? ---
**Author:** ![photopat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e95f7d/32.png) [@photopat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/photopat)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2002, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/25 "2002-10-22T19:08:33Z")
Bos, take your finger off the enter key. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![rocking\_chair](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocking_chair/32/2918_2.png) [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2002, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/26 "2002-10-23T00:02:46Z")
in israel today i’m sure you could find many josephs who have sons named jakob (james), and joshua (jesus). now if the box mention that his brother was known as, the christ or from nazareth, that would have helped out a bit. the boxes only held bones they weren’t coffins. the bones would be placed in them after they skeletized (sp). so no blood or goo would have leaked into the stone of the box. also bones of saints are highly prized relics. i’m sure there are bits and pieces of james in churchs in and around jerusalem. good grief, they have days on the church calendar where the finding of john the baptist head is celebrated. apparently they lost and found his head quite a few times. ---
**Author:** ![Pabitel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bbce88/32.png) [@Pabitel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pabitel)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2002, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/27 "2002-10-24T15:21:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Skammer \* > \*\* > > I think you’re missing a point made in both the NY Times and CNN articles: it is extremely rare for these ossuaries to name a brother at all. Out of the hundreds they have from that era, only two (this, and one other) mentions a brother. The thinking is therefore that this brother ‘Jesus’ is someone important. (How often are brothers listed on modern tombstones, for that matter?) > > . . . > > Again, I’m not saying we have any proof it’s real, but I think it’s not so easily dismissed either. \*\* I don’t have the paper in front of me but the one I saw also said that if the brother’s name is on the box the best explanation was that the brother paid for the funeral. That puts a few kinks in the Chist theory. Unless he managed the second coming to pay this bill and we didn’t hear about it. So I think it is, just that easily, dismissed. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2002, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290/28 "2002-11-07T04:12:16Z")
[“Ossuary was genuine, inscription faked”](http://web.israelinsider.com/bin/en.jsp?enZone=Views&enDisplay=view&enPage=ViewsPage&enDispWhat=object&enDispWho=Article%5El1569) > [@](#): > > The bone-box is original; the first inscription, which is in Aramaic, “Jacob son of Joseph,” is authentic. The second half of the inscription, “brother of Jesus,” is a poorly executed fake and a later addition. This report has already been distributed on at least two scholarly lists. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ossuary-of-james-brother-of-jesus-found-maybe/133290.md?page=1)