Two Bible discoveries could be miraculous

It seems too good to be true, but two too-good-to-be-true archaeological finds about the Bible have popped up within less than three months.

Are they not only good but true? It will take considerable time and scholarly expertise to tell.

First came the Oct. 21 announcement from America's Biblical Archaeology Review regarding the discovery of what could be the burial box of Jesus' brother James. Then on Jan. 13, Israel's daily Ha'aretz reported a tablet inscription possibly from 2,800 years ago that would provide evidence for the Jerusalem Temple near the time it was erected.

If fully authenticated, the first ranks as the most sensational New Testament artifact found in modern times; and the second, says Bar Ilan University archaeologist Gabriel Barkai, could be Israel's most significant find ever.

But note the "ifs." And with ancient artifacts, hardly anything can ever be claimed with 100 percent certainty.

The two items share these similarities: They turned up on Israel's semi-legal antiquities market, have unknown histories, are owned by private collectors who wanted to remain anonymous (though the owner of the James box became identified), and received positive early assessments but await further analysis of authenticity by Israeli experts and others.

The Old Testament Temple tablet has the more dramatic implications. Hardly anyone questions the existence of Jesus and James. But radical "minimalists" raise doubts about the Jerusalem Temple and the existence of King Solomon, who built it.

The Temple tablet also could affect the unending religious tensions in the Holy Land that center on the tract Muslims call the Haram as-Sharif (Noble Sanctuary) and Jews and Christians designate as the Temple Mount.

This is Islam's third-holiest site, and Muslim leaders often seek to deny that the great Temple ever stood there. The new find could undergird the geography of Judaism.

The artifact is a tablet the size of a legal pad, inscribed with 10 lines in Phoenician. It tells about Temple repair plans under Judah's King Jehoash (or Joash), echoing the biblical accounts in 2 Kings 12:5-17 and 2 Chronicles 24:4-14.

In typical reckoning from the Bible, Solomon completed building the Temple in 959 B.C., and a tablet from Jehoash's era would have come a mere century and a half later.Electron microscope testing of the surface and carbon dating confirm authenticity and the dating back to Jehoash's time, according to government specialists at the Geological Survey of Israel. A forthcoming anthology from that agency will describe examination by specialists Michael Dvorchik, Shimon Ilani and Amnon Rosenfeld, which might dispel skepticism.

However, a follow-up article in Ha'aretz quoted several Israeli scholars who raise technical questions about the tablet. One of the doubters was convinced the biblical books were written long after the events described, even before the tablet turned up.

Steven M. Ortiz, an American archaeologist at conservative New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, noted that the tablet has not been authenticated by epigraphers (experts on ancient inscriptions). He said initial discussions among scholars speak of a hoax.

The Israel Museum said it cannot rule out forgery, but declined to say anything about the basis for that view.

There's a related dispute about where the tablet was found. Ha'aretz said it was uncovered during disputed excavations by Palestinian Muslims at the Haram as-Sharif and was acquired by the unnamed antiquities collector. But the director of the Islamic Trust that administers the site denies the tablet was found there.