Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.
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The heel bone and nail from the ossuary of Yehohanan, discovered in Jerusalem in 1968.
(photo credit: Courtesy of the Israel Museum. Photographer: Ilan Shtulman)
From TimesOfIsrael.com (See link below).
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In Jerusalem around 2,000 years ago a Jew named Yehohanan, who was in his mid-twenties, committed a crime against Roman authority. The nature of his transgression has been lost to time, but his punishment is known — he was crucified.
Convicts were executed by crucifixion in the Roman Empire as a matter of course, and histories of the time regularly describe the practice, which was designed to make death prolonged, painful and public. After the famous slave uprising led by Spartacus was crushed in 71 BCE, for example, an estimated 6,000 rebels were crucified along a highway leading to the capital as an illustration of Roman power.
Scholars take this spike as evidence of a crucifixion. It might be, but could it be something else? Could it be some other type of torture other than crucifixion. I don't think it would likely be accident. To me, crucifixion seems like one of the better explanations, but there might be some other explanation.
Some have suggested that the feet of the person being crucified could have been placed on each side of the main vertical post of the cross and the feet nailed to the cross, one on each side of the upright post.
We can make the mistake of thinking that things were always done the same way. That is probably not the case. There can be different circumstances and different people that do things differently.
Some crucifixes show the feet on a bit of a stand attached to the cross. If there was a vertical support for that stand, the heels could have been nailed to that rather than the sides of the main vertical post. Or the fellow could have been terribly pigeon toed or had the turnout of a ballerina. There are a lot of possibilities. We just don't know the entire story of this artifact yet.
We can also wonder why the nail isn't all the way in the one or why on the other side it is bent over. Many questions remain.
Part of the value of the artifact is what it tells us, and part of it's value is what it asks us.
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You might enjoy reading other articles in the Israel Times, Many of the articles are on Coronavirus, such as the ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect being hit ten times harder than the general population. It seems the virus hit them even harder than it hit our black communities. Also interesting is the article on a Holocaust survivor's reflections on the virus.
That reminds me of the 104 year-old WWII vet that had the Spanish flu and survived it and also had COVID-19 and survived. That fellow is a survivor.
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Among the most legendary of treasures are the Holy Grail and the Ark of the Covenant. Probably no other treasures have been the subject of so many books, stories and movies. Although they did exist, much of what has been written or portrayed about them is pure fiction.
There are other Biblical lost treasures, such as the priestly breastplate that was made of gold and covered with gems. It has been claimed that one of those gems has been found. I'll get into that more some other time.
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My Easter Story.
As they isolate and distance, Christians await Easter morning and Jews observe Passover. Easter and Passover are inseparable. You'll see that in the Bible.
Passover for the year 2020 starts on the evening of Wednesday, April 8th and ends at sunset on Wednesday, April 15th for Reform and progressive Jews living inside Israel who follow the Biblical text. For Orthodox, Hasidic, and generally Jews outside Israel the festival lasts 8 days ending at sunset on Thursday, April 16th.
Blessings,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
It is therefore an odd fact that archaeological evidence of this punishment — crosses, for example, or perforated skeletons — has never been found anywhere in the world, with one exception: the stone box containing Yehohanan’s remains.
After Yehohanan’s body was removed from the cross, it would have been laid out in a burial cave. After the flesh had decomposed a year or so later, leaving only the skeleton, his bones were gathered in a simple stone box, an ossuary, in keeping with the Jewish practice of that time. Today, the box is displayed in a gallery at the Israel Museum alongside other artifacts from the period of Roman rule in Judea...
Here is the link for the rest of that article.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-a-stone-box-a-rare-trace-of-crucifixion/
Here is the link for the rest of that article.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-a-stone-box-a-rare-trace-of-crucifixion/
Now there is an artifact. It provides a good example of how artifacts provide evidence but do not tell the entire story. As we've seen many times, artifacts can be difficult to identify, but the research can teach you a lot.
This artifact, like so often is the case, presents difficulties. Below is an image of a heel bone.
One of the difficulties is that the spike goes through the side of the heel, which is not how crucifixions are pictured. Like the crucifixes I showed yesterday, they usually show a single spike going through the top of both feet, with the two feet being on top of each other.This artifact, like so often is the case, presents difficulties. Below is an image of a heel bone.
Scholars take this spike as evidence of a crucifixion. It might be, but could it be something else? Could it be some other type of torture other than crucifixion. I don't think it would likely be accident. To me, crucifixion seems like one of the better explanations, but there might be some other explanation.
Some have suggested that the feet of the person being crucified could have been placed on each side of the main vertical post of the cross and the feet nailed to the cross, one on each side of the upright post.
We can make the mistake of thinking that things were always done the same way. That is probably not the case. There can be different circumstances and different people that do things differently.
Some crucifixes show the feet on a bit of a stand attached to the cross. If there was a vertical support for that stand, the heels could have been nailed to that rather than the sides of the main vertical post. Or the fellow could have been terribly pigeon toed or had the turnout of a ballerina. There are a lot of possibilities. We just don't know the entire story of this artifact yet.
We can also wonder why the nail isn't all the way in the one or why on the other side it is bent over. Many questions remain.
Part of the value of the artifact is what it tells us, and part of it's value is what it asks us.
---
You might enjoy reading other articles in the Israel Times, Many of the articles are on Coronavirus, such as the ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect being hit ten times harder than the general population. It seems the virus hit them even harder than it hit our black communities. Also interesting is the article on a Holocaust survivor's reflections on the virus.
That reminds me of the 104 year-old WWII vet that had the Spanish flu and survived it and also had COVID-19 and survived. That fellow is a survivor.
---
Among the most legendary of treasures are the Holy Grail and the Ark of the Covenant. Probably no other treasures have been the subject of so many books, stories and movies. Although they did exist, much of what has been written or portrayed about them is pure fiction.
There are other Biblical lost treasures, such as the priestly breastplate that was made of gold and covered with gems. It has been claimed that one of those gems has been found. I'll get into that more some other time.
---
My Easter Story.
They say you can never go home again, but last night I did. It was before 4 AM when I awoke and vividly remembered an experience that put me at a particular time and place of my youth.
It was sixty-five years ago, late afternoon or early evening, the Saturday before Easter. I and a few of the other kids had just finished our imaginary rendition of a major league baseball game on a field on top of a hill that would a little later in the year be covered by hay tall enough to hide in.
I could see my young mother in her apron standing on the porch off the kitchen half way down the hill as she called me in. The water for the Easter egg dye just reached a boil.
The kids scattered in four or five different directions, each towards their home, but I stood there for a moment and looked out over the green valley that was my world. I had no way of understanding it at the time, but it felt like time froze for a moment as everything I saw and felt was being stamped indelibly into my mind.
At the bottom of the valley was a creek, and above that a red dog road, and on each side of the road at various distances were the few scattered homes, each one having a name, such as Bristers, Simpsons, Hamiltons, Harts and Mounts.
As I looked over that green valley with my young eyes, it was a scene that would never change for me. I noticed a wisp of smoke rising from Brister's trash pile. The smoke drew my attention. It seemed slightly strange or out of place on such a bright clear beautiful scene.
Mom was so young. And dad was still here. The kids are now scattered away from that valley. Some of them are gone too, maybe like that wisp of smoke.
But I'm still that young boy. Mom is still that young woman. Dad is still here. The valley never changed. I know that because I visited that place again last night.
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The surf is still small, but the tides are still big.---
As they isolate and distance, Christians await Easter morning and Jews observe Passover. Easter and Passover are inseparable. You'll see that in the Bible.
Passover for the year 2020 starts on the evening of Wednesday, April 8th and ends at sunset on Wednesday, April 15th for Reform and progressive Jews living inside Israel who follow the Biblical text. For Orthodox, Hasidic, and generally Jews outside Israel the festival lasts 8 days ending at sunset on Thursday, April 16th.
Blessings,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net