The Jesus Dynasty / James Tabor

One positive result of the controversy over the Simcha Jacobovici film “The Lost Tomb of Jesus,” is that scholars have turned their attention to the Talpiot tomb and its cluster of names. This can only be good in that a wider and more open discussion of what we can know about this tomb is likely to clarify various unresolved issues. Just in the past few days I have heard through the academic “grapevine” of one or two scholars who are offering new readings of the mariamene/on inscription (IAA 80.500), taking it as two names, Mariam and Mara, with the Greek word kai (”and/also”) between them.

I have now just received a paper from Stephen Pfann, up on his Web site, titled “Mary Magdalene is now Missing,” that appears to make a similar argument, as well as insisting that the inscription was written by two different hands. Apparently from reports on the wires today the press has run with this. The story is all over, repeated as if it is now established. In the stories I have read so far not a single epigrapher has been consulted for an opinion. Rahmani is surely not without mistakes but in years of reading his “readings’ I have come to respect his trained eye and his knowledge of these late 2nd Temple cursive scripts. For Pfann to subtitle his paper: “A Corrected Reading of Rahmani” really gives me pause since Pfann’s training is not in the area of Greek epigraphy/graffiti so far as I know.

I will be most interested in reading the views of qualified epigraphers on this revised reading, contra Rahmani as they have time to weigh in. As far as I can tell the inscription seems to be quite clearly from one hand. It is also almost identical to Rahmani # 108, which could not possibly end with the word “kai.” Also, it does not appear that Pfann has accounted for the “stroke” before Mara, which looks to be a problem for his reading as far as I can tell. Last week Pfann also argued that the ossuary “Yeshua bar Yehosef,” (Jesus son of Joseph) had also been read incorrectly by Rahmani, Kloner, and Tal Ilan, and actually reads Hanun son of Joseph. I have not seen his arguments in that regard though I have noticed that lots of Christian web sites are citing him as an authority over against the confirmed reading as “Yeshua” by Frank Cross.

I have just discussed today in an earlier post that the DNA tests on the bone fragments from this ossuary would have shown two individuals, or more, if they were mixed together in one ossuary. The ancient DNA found showed only one person, unrelated maternally to Yeshua son of Joseph.

My sense until I learn more is that the reading proposed by Rahmani is compelling:

The script is as follows: mariamenou [stroke] mara

1) mariamenou is the genitive of mariamenon, a diminutive form of “endearment” from mariamene, an unusual form of the more common mariame. mariamene is found, also in the genitive, on the lid of another ossuary, #108 in Rahmani. The script and form of these two inscriptions are almost identical and should help to clarify the reading of #701 from Talpiot. It does not seem possible that #108 can be read as “kai.”

The force of the genitive, attested on many ossuaries, is to say [This is the ossuary] of mariamene/on

2) mara is a Greek form of the Aramaic, mar/mara, which is lady or mistress, here in the absolute. The emphatic would be mart(h)a. Since we have no suitable word in English for the feminine of “master” (i.e., “mistress” is misleading), one has to go to something like “honorable lady.” Although mart(h)a can be a name, it is technically not correct to simply say it is an abbreviated form of the name Martha and leave it at that–since they are both connected to the same Aramaic word: mar/mara (see Jastrow, 1926, s.v. mar/mara’). We do have an ossuary that has, in Aramaic, the two names mara and marta (Rahmani # 468) but it well might be two women in the one ossuary, or the inscriber might be saying that Mart(h)a is also known as Mara/honorable lady, as a kind of nickname. Similarly, in Rahmani #35 we have maryam [space] yohana, which might be a double name, though the ossuary is large enough for two persons, so we might have two names. Of note in this regard is the famous ossuary at Dominus Flevit that has the two names in Aramaic: marta and mariam, likely indicating two persons/sisters, as in the “Mary & Martha” tradition in the New Testament.

Tal Ilan only finds seven examples under the root Aramaic mara (Lexicon, p. 422) and not all are feminine. I think her basic original observation that the name means “lord” or “master,” in Aramaic stands, and “Mart(h)a,” which also means mistress is simply another form thereof in the emphatic.

One should also note that the “euphonics” of the terms mar/mara, whether in Aramaic or transliterated Greek, carry a connotation of an attributive “title,” not formally so, but as a term of respect, i.e., Mari Iahosa (Rahmani # 8), or even based on the N.T. marana tha, Mar Yeshua.

A similar usage is round in Rahmani #868 where we have: alexas mara. Alexas is the feminine genitive followed, as with mariamene/on, with mara. Thus, loosely translated “[this is the ossuary] of Alexa/honorable lady.

With Rahmani it seems to me that the “stroke” stands for an eta which is a kind of “aka” abbreviation, thus I would loosely translate the Talpiot ossuary:

“[This is the ossuary] of mariamene [known as/the] honorable lady”

A final note: It is interesting that if Pfann were right, and I am not yet confinced thereof, the reading: Mariame and/also Mara can mean in common Greek, even today: Mariame also [know as] Mara [honorable lady], and Mariame is a quite early and common name for Mary Magdalene. Or alternatively, IF we have two names, the proverbial “Mary and Martha,” then every N.T. reader knows these were two of the most intimate sisters in Jesus’ life–indeed, some have suggested that “Mary,” who sat as his feet and was commended by him in Luke, did in fact become his companion. Up to this point my own view, with Bagatti and others, is that an ossuary that well might refer to the N.T. “Mary and Martha,” ( Dominus Flevit #27/burial #70), with clearer indications of two individuals (according to Milik’s reading) rather than two names for one individual, has already been found on the Mt. of Olives, near Bethany where they lived, along with Shimon bar Yonah, Lazarus, and a few others, see The Jesus Dynasty, p. 235-236 and Finegan, The Archaeology of the New Testament, pp. 368. By the way, this Mt. of Olives ossuary has the names repeated twice, one the cover of the lid and on the long side or face, with Miriam one time and Maria the second time, all Aramaic. Tomb 70 is in a little complex off by itself, separated slightly from the main necropolis complex. Shimon bar Yonah was in tomb 79.