Breakthrough Decodes 'Classical Holy Grail'

wka writes "Scientists at Oxford University have made a major breakthrough in their study of a large collection of Greek and Roman writings. Many of the documents known as the 'Oxyrhynchus Papyri' (found at 'ancient rubbish dump in central Egypt') are 'meaningless to the naked eye - decayed, worm-eaten and blackened by the passage of time.' Using an infrared technique originally developed for use with satellite imaging, scientists are able to view the original writing, which 'could lead to a 20 per cent increase in the number of great Greek and Roman works in existence'. Thus far, works by Sophocles, Lucian, Euripides, Hesiod and others have been (re-)discovered. Additionally, scientists think they 'are likely to find lost Christian gospels.' (via The Light of Reason)"

Comments

Potentially Interesting Finds, and a correction

[mrRay720]

'could lead to a 20 per cent increase in the number of great Greek and Roman works in existence'

Well no, but it could certainly increase the number of them that we can read.

Additionally, scientists think they 'are likely to find lost Christian gospels.'

What's the betting that the one that reads "'The Bible' copyright 134AD, Any resemblance to people past or present is purely coincidental" is quickly covered up?

Re:Potentially Interesting Finds, and a correction

[Denyer]

What's the betting that the one that reads "'The Bible' copyright 134AD

Or the Red Dwarf version:

Newsreader: Good evening. Here is the news on Friday, the 27th of Geldof. Archeologists near Mount Sinai have discovered what is believed to be a missing page from the Bible. The page is currently being carbon-dated in Bonne. If genuine, it belongs at the beginning of the Bible and is believed to read, "To my darling Candy. All characters portrayed within this book are fictitous and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental." The page has been universally condemned by church leaders.

Re:Potentially Interesting Finds, and a correction

[STrinity]

For a very interesting read, and a very thought provoking read, try:

Holy Blood, Holy Grail.

It really shows how much the Roman Catholic church has lied, cheated and killed to remain in power.

Too bad it's a work of fiction.

Look, I'm a hard-core atheist who believes organized religion is the biggest scam ever created, but that doesn't mean I have to accept every crazy depredation laid against a church. HBHG belongs in the same category with books about J. Edgar Hoover being on the Grassy Knoll, and Elvis living in Peoria under an alias created for him by the Federal Witness Protection Program.

And while we're at it, the Catholics didn't burn witches in the dark ages; it was a heresy to even believe in them until the High Middle Ages, and it was the Protestants who made witch hunting an organized sport.

Re:Potentially Interesting Finds, and a correction

[Thomas Miconi]

Crackpot alert !

It's highly likely that Jesus had a wife. There's strong evidence to show that Jesus had Rabbii training, and strong evidence that his wife was Mary Magdelene, aka Mary of Bethany (yes, the one and same person). During that era, it was extremely unusual for a jewish male to not be married, and a Rabbii had to be married. It was basically a 'law'.

Voodoo theology. See the wikipedia article for a level-headed description of the matter.

The Roman Catholic church has long sought to hide the line of Jesus, spread by Mary Magdelene when she moved to the area of Marseilles.

Actually, in the area of Arles, in a locality which is now known as the Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer (I should know, I'm from there). Together with Martha, Mary of Bethany, Salome, and Lazarus, among others. Then Lazarus went on to become bishop of Marseilles, Martha went to kill a monster that wreaked havoc in Tarascon, and Magdalene ended her life in the Sainte-Baume moutains.

This happens to be one of the many popular legends that flourished in medieval folk christianism. One of the early bishops of Marseilles was actually called Lazarus, but there is no relation with the resurrected one. Similar stuff occured all over Europe, e.g. Saint-Denis, patron saint of France, has been wrongly identified with Denys the Areopagite. In my own city, Arles, the legendary first bishop Trophimus has been identified with the homonymous disciple of Paul mentioned in the New Testament.

While many such confusions may have arisen out of sincere self-delusion, one should keep in mind that holy relics (which attracted pilgrims in droves) were extremely important at the time, both in terms of prestige and of plain commercial interest. Exposing the relic of a Father of the Church was much more profitable, in any sense, than some obscure 3rd century bishop.

The deal with Clovis was renegged less than 100 years after his death, removing the line of the Menengoverians by the assassination of Dagobert II.

You are an ignorant ass. The Merovingians faded into irrelevance out of sheer incompetence. They were replaced by the descendents of Charles Martel (then a kind of "prime minister", in charge of the actual work of running the empire), not by cunning or assassination, but simply because the guy saved the country and the rest of Europe from Arab domination - which brings us to your next point...

Add to the fact that the Roman Catholic church is highly intolerant of other religions - the murder and war against the Saracens in the 11th century

Look, man, I have no particular sympathy for Catholicism, but you should remember that the relationship between Christian Europe and the Moslem world has been one of constant invasions and counter-invasions - and the Saracens called the first shots in the 7th-8th centuries, until they got their arses kicked big time by Charles Martel, and were driven out by his successors, the Carolingians - eponymous to Martel's grandson, a certain Charlemagne.

When you add up aggressions and atrocities from both sides, all you can say is that there's no winner - only a few million losers.

Thomas-

That's all well and good, but..

[ShaunC]

..can it decipher doctors' handwriting on prescription pads? That would be a momentous scientific advance!

Obligatory...

[Attaturk]

Euripides papyri you pay for 'em.

Classicist 3 Scientists

[Anonymous Coward]

As a classicist, I want to express the incredible debt we owe to physical sciences. We dig stuff up all the time we can't read, and rely on chemists and physicists to find a way to get to the text. The Vindolandum tables, for instance - slats of wood on which Roman legionaires in Britan wrote letter on, and which were burned. Chemists managed to trace the residue of the ink on the wooden remains and we have volumes of personal correpondence.

In this case, lost works by Sopholces are invaluable; we have only 7 of his plays complete. Any scrap we can add to the corpus provides a much better perspective of greek tragedy in general. And the possibility of finding lost gospels is always exciting for those of us interested in the development of Christianity.

So to sum it up: Thanks for the help, guys! We'll be sure to include your names when people start asking who's responsible for the next crappy sword-and-sandal flick!

Re:Classicist 3 Scientists

[kfg]

"In this case, lost works by Sopholces are invaluable; we have only 7 of his plays complete."

As Carl Sagan explained it:

Imagine that we had some plays by this Shakespeare fellow, Titus Andronicus, Coriolanus, Cymbaline, Pericles, The Life of Timon of Athens, The Winter's Tale and Troilus and Cressida.

Fine plays all. We know from the record that he wrote a few other plays that were well regarded in his time, but alas, those have been lost.

KFG

This is exciting but not particularly new...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm writing a dissertation on the use of digital imaging technology applied to archaeological artefacts, so have been researching this sort of thing recently.

The use of multispectral imaging (MSI) to view ancient papyri has been going on for some years now, with the following being some of the most interesting projects:

- recovering text from a manuscript containing 10th century copies of some of Archimedes works which had been erased and over-written in the 12th century. http://www.thewalters.org/archimedes/frame.html

- similar to the project above, this is the recovery of carbonised Roman papyri found in Herculaneum (which was covered in 100 feet of lava during the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD) http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-14522 44_1,00.html

There are also lots of other artefact imaging projects, such as that being carried out by the Digital Hammurabi Project (http://www.jhu.edu/digitalhammurabi/), who want to digitise (make high-res 3D computer models of) ancient cuneiform tablets or the work at the University of Kentucky which may allow text to be 'read' without the artefact being touched at all - using a CT scan which can be decoded on a computer http://www.research.uky.edu/odyssey/fall04/seales. html

Awesome stuff...

Now don't let them in on this...

[gt_swagger]

But I've discovered it's really an ancient Linux (kernel 0.2.1), where all console output is put on paper. What did they find important enough to try and save? Apparently the following command, entered over and over:
$ fortune

Copyright?

[MarkByers]

I hope these works are not going to be reprinted without fully compensating the original authors, and their descendants.

Re:God willing...

[Fished]

It's already been written: Matthew 5-7. You might want to take a read sometime.

Non-Ecumenical Gospels

[TheMediaWrangler]

I am fascinated to hear that more gospels may be revealed. The Gospel of Thomas was enlightening and actually led me to a better understanding of mainstream Christianity. Non-ecumenical gospels are fascinating because they haven't been highly tainted through interpretations and translations.

Re:The significance of "new" gospels...

[eddy]

>Think of a 50 foot tall cross walking out of Jesus tomb, shouting imprecations upon Jerusalem.

Yeah, because that's just sooo much more fantastic than floating axes and talking bushes.

Re:The significance of "new" gospels...

[Anonymous Coward]

Early gospels have virtually no historical value? What the hell? That's like claiming that the Federalist Papers or the Declaration of Independence are of little historical value.

I'm guessing you're referring to 'historical' in the sense of the gospels recording historical events. What about the rest of the world? People used the rhetoric and ideas of Christianity to address problems outside the usual scope of the religion, or tried to mold the religion to fit personal or political objectives. These lost gospels tell us how people use religion, whether or not the religion has any sort of cosmic truth to it.

And, as scholars are the people who write the history books, they are the ones who determin what has historical value.

Your post reminds me of the religion students who used to take Greek with me at university. "Why are we reading Attic Greek?" they would ask, "We only need Koine to read the Bible!" There's far more to the ancient world than the 50-something (depending on denomination) books of the Bible, and even the Bible doesn't represent a self-contained system of information.

Re:twenty + comments

[ScentCone]

mostly just bashes on Christians

Well, you can imagine why people in the sciences might be a little snarky on this subject. A lot of the history of Christianity revolves around bashing people who try to point out the actual reality of the universe. Those people (scientists) do get a little tired of the unrelenting "seek to tear down" (to use your phrase) attitude from the religious side of the spectrum. So, must of the comments in that tone about this article are made in the context of a more-secular-than-usual audience, and presume a certain world-weariness on this subject.

You don't find this interesting ????

[anat0010]

You don't see historical value here ? How has the 2nd century view of Christ changed from the modern interpretation ?
Your example suggests that only 150 years after his death Christ was viewed as a super-human avenging spirit. 2000 years later we view him as a meek and mild self-sacrificing man. Yet the text of the gospels remains them same.
If you fail to see any interest here, I suspect you are more interested in reiterating the rhetoric of your teachers rather than studying early Christianity and interpreting the scriptures in the context of the epoch in which they were written and the church founded.

Nonsense

[Fished]

Critical scholarship (i.e. scholarship that has no a priori commitment to the historical reliability of the gospels) dates the gospels more or less as follows:

Mark - 68-75
Matthew - 80
Luke - 80-85
John - 90

Then, consider that most scholars date Thomas in its present form no earlier than 145. Any "new" gospel is likely to be much later. Further, there is good evidence to suggest that the Canonical four existed in proto-forms much earlier, with a proto-Mark dating back to the 40's.

Also, it doesn't help your case that you point to a couple of "Jesus Myth" sites to bolster your case. You realize that these people are considered to be a joke in the world of New Testament scholarship, don't you? The "anti-Jesus" advocates are far worse than the "pro-Jesus" advocates, so far as distorting history goes. I would suggest you read a good, standard intro to new testament, such as Raymond Brown's, before you continue to spout this bilge.