The Unsolved Mysteries Of Jesus Christ | Secrets Of Christianity | Parable

an ancient stone tablet is discovered and decoding its secrets could rock a core belief of christianity it seems to tell the story of a messiah who is killed and rises from the dead after three days sound familiar but this messiah may not be jesus this is one of the secrets of christianity being unearthed by investigative journalist simka yakubovic from deserts to tombs from rome to the holy land simca tracks down the truth behind historical myths long-held beliefs and some of the greatest biblical stories ever told this is a photograph of a unique and mysterious 2 000 year old tablet or stone this is the church of the holy sepulchre where christians come to celebrate and commemorate the resurrection of jesus three days after the crucifixion this may shake up that the stone emerged from the antiquities market and incredibly the ancient hebrew text can still for the most part be easily read the key line is this i gabriel command you the prince of princess in three days live now that may sound strange to the modern ear but when i first heard about it i almost fell off my chair i mean we're talking about a three-day resurrection if it's referring to jesus this bit of archaeology is the earliest archaeological artifact that refers to him if it predates jesus then who is this christ-like figure that we didn't know about before who is this jesus before jesus to decode the stone we have to figure out when was it written where did it come from and first who is this gabriel mentioned on the stone in both the hebrew and christian bibles gabriel is an angel whose main job is to announce the messiah in the gospels he's the angel who announces to the virgin mary that she will give birth to jesus on this stone gabriel is not speaking to a woman rather he is talking to a prince of princes codeword in jesus's time for a messiah so the inscription seems to speak of a messiah who dies and is ordered by the angel gabriel to rise again after three days until now this has been associated only with jesus but renowned biblical scholar israel canola who brought the stone to light believes that the stone predates jesus here we have for the first time an evidence that the belief in the deaths and resurrection after three days of a messianic leader existed even before the time of jesus i can already hear some of the objections what are you saying here that jesus was a copycat and i must say that's a totally unhistorical way of approaching the issue if you think that jesus was influenced by no one and he knew exactly where he was going and he landed like an alien from outer space there's no point looking at any archaeology but if you put jesus in his historical context first century judea he was after all a first century jew then you suddenly have to say wait a minute here's a man living in a country under roman occupation clearly he's going to be influenced by people and he's going to influence people when it comes to this stone now known as the gabriel inscription canal's theory is that jesus was influenced by someone since the stone predates jesus but does it the answer depends on whether the inscription was written before the crucifixion and to find out simca comes to the ancient city of jaffa in israel to meet with robert deutsch deutsch is an epigrapher a specialist in ancient inscriptions he's also one of israel's foremost licensed dealers in antiquities so he should be able to explain how artifacts like the gabriel stone are dated it has here a poster of the inscription deutsch is using a full-size paper copy of the stone prepared by the academics who studied it the gabriel inscription is a very important description the text is important the development of the shape of the letter dates the piece what do you mean that you can date it from the shape of the letter it develops like a car the shape of a car it was never the same before and it would never be the same after that so you if you find a car you can say what year it is exactly this is typology which is a very very accurate tool to illustrate the point in the first century bc and early first century a.d the hebrew letter lamid l in english had a long neck and then lost it during the same period the koof or k lost its little cap and the mem the letter m initially square became rounded losing its squiggles in the process using these techniques deutsch agrees with professor canole dating the gabriel inscription to a time just before jesus crucifixion possibly before his birth and his days to the first century bc and the beginning of this first century a.d so the inscription seems to pre-date jesus but not by much to hone in on a more precise date simca needs access to the inscription but the problem is that the stone belongs to an israeli collector david jesselsen who lives in switzerland hi dr jesselson and he won't give simca access to the artifact do you think i can say anything or do anything to convince you to let us just take a little look simca isn't surprised he believes that david jesselson is like many collectors who don't like investigative journalists around artifacts they've purchased from sometimes shady antiquities dealers well okay if you change your mind i think you have my email and simca is determined to see the stone but since he can't get access to the real one he's commissioning artist dana bendov to make him a replica using photographs published in scholarly journals since we don't have access to the stone itself this is a real one-to-one copy okay so this dome it's three feet high and one foot wide and it's very very very unusual it's got columns it's got an incision the letters are hanging from the lines it's not inscribed which is unusual for a stone it's painted okay with ink so what i'd like you to do because that's what you do for a living is make me make me this make me this exactly building replicas is a highly specialized discipline and the work begins right away from the original photograph the team of reproduction experts are using 3d computer and laser technology to recreate the multiple layers of the stone from the painstaking carving process to laying on the letters precisely as they appear on the original stone making the reproduction as close to a perfect copy as possible this should help simka figure out its date origin and meaning [Music] though some have questioned canola's reading no archaeologists have challenged him simka now shows the reproduction to professor canole who has moved beyond deciphering the text to decoding its earth-shattering message in 2007 an ancient stone came to the attention of scholars that has the potential of shaking christianity to its foundations dubbed the gabriel revelation the text painted on the stone refers to a messiah that lives dies and is resurrected after three days the writing style however seems to suggest the time before jesus if the inscription is not referring to jesus who is it referring to who is this mysterious dying and resurrecting messiah and is he the original inspiration for jesus and his followers when the stone's existence was first made public a few scholars including israel canola were allowed to study it immediately they recognized it as a genuine artifact but since the stone is now out of circulation sumka has brought a replica he commissioned to show canola does it look like the original very much very much and look at this look at the lines yeah the lines it did them very nice yes where are the key words uh i just want to make sure here is uh le schlossitia in three days reading the hebrew text professor canole begins to decode it for canola the key historical clue is a reference to three shepherds i have sent my people my three shepherds three shepherds canola thinks one of these shepherds living around jesus's birth is the messiah mentioned on the stone their story begins at the end of the first century bc with herod the great herod was appointed by the roman emperor augustus to rule judea and do rome's bidding he was a tyrant hated by his subjects paranoid that a christ-like figure would dethrone him herod is remembered in the gospels as the ruler who killed innocent babies fearing that one of them might be a messiah when herod died in 4 bc his death triggered a messianic fever rebellion broke out on three fronts across the country this was the beginning this is the place where the serious rebellion started here at this point where we where we sit here now was this a nationwide revolt yes israel was literally burning during this rebellion yes there were three centers for this rebellion three messianic leaders one judah in the galilee the second one atroungus in a mouse and the third one simon from the perea from the area of trans jordan suddenly our idea of the world that jesus was born into seems very different from anything that we heard about in christmas carols i mean this was no tranquil land with shepherds standing their flock and wise men following stars this was a land riddled by political unrest and violence rape pillage crucifixions jews against romans there was a revolution going on and there were not one but three revolutionary leaders or messianic shepherds one of them seems to have inspired jesus but which one could it have been a tragus from a mouse which is just outside of jerusalem despite more than a century of digging here in jerusalem not a single gabriel-like stone not one has ever been found i mean ink painted on stone anything that resembles it now that's very significant because archaeologically speaking if you have a tradition of memorializing people on stone then you find more than one so the fact that not a single one has been found in this area pretty much eliminates the trongus as the dying and resurrecting messiah mentioned on the stone well that eliminates him the next candidate is judah he operated in the galilee close to jesus's hometown of nazareth and there is one archaeological site associated with him a place called gamla gamla was a center of revolt before and after jesus 37 years after the crucifixion it was utterly destroyed by the romans never to be resettled simca is here with archaeologist danny scion to see if there is any gabriel like stone dating to the pre-jesus judah revolt immediately inside the gate they come across signs of the final destruction essentially you guys were the first to come in here since the destruction some 2000 years ago that is correct the general of the roman armies came here leading three legions three full legions is no less than 30 000 people and then they brought up the siege machines and battering rams and they used artillery barrage to bombard the city with ballista bows here's an example of one such ballista ball this guy weighs about five kilos these things are coming raining down on your head exactly exactly how many have you found of these two thousand two thousand thousand yes in addition to the ballistas they used arrows we found at gamla 1600 arrowheads which is probably more than all the arrowhead finds in all of europe put together but simca is interested in earlier artifacts is there anything here related to the would-be messiah called judah of galilee as it turns out in the period between judas revolt and the final destruction of gamla in 67 a.d the people came back and rebuilt their city except for one area which they left untouched head there now looking for signs of the messianic leader called judah so what exactly are we looking at here sometimes round about the death of king herod this area was completely and totally abandoned so let me get this straight this was a living breathing place and then suddenly you know like a volcanic eruption it comes to a grinding halt that is correct but the bigger enigma is why nobody came back afterwards because life went on around this area people living right around right around could it be that this place that we're standing is actually a in a sense a monument to the revolt at the time of judah the timing is right with the death of herod and the reason that people lived around it but didn't enter it is because so many people died here they didn't want to go into what in essence was a graveyard that is certainly acceptable acceptable proposition is convinced that judah the messianic leader who led the revolution left such an impression on the people of galilee that sections of their towns were left as permanent memorials but no gabriel-like inscriptions have been found in gamla so this leaves simcoe only one candidate for the messiah before jesus simon of perea perea is located on the jordanian side of the dead sea it is here that the most famous writings ever found were unearthed they are called the dead sea scrolls and are housed in a special museum in jerusalem discovered in 1948 the more than two thousand-year-old documents are the oldest biblical texts ever found when scholars first studied the gabriel inscription they were struck by the fact that it looked like a dead sea scroll on a stone the similarities between the scrolls and the gabriel inscription are impressive [Music] both are written in ink on both the text is written in two columns and both have the hebrew letters suspended from the upper guidelines all this suggests that the stone like the scrolls originates from the shores of the dead sea so in search of a gabriel-like stone in the area of perea simka travels here to meet with archaeologist constantinos politis who's been digging in this area for 20 years well this is our dig house for the last 20 years so we built our goodies in here too i'm excited about seeing the goodies please after you wow talk about goodies oh my god well i don't know where these museums have this much well all this is going to go into the museum but for the moment it's in our storage pottery mosaics human bodies in the background are you serious yeah there's about 50 bodies back there 50 maybe more this is really neat among the artifacts unearthed by politis simca is struck by ancient jewish and christian gravestones reminiscent of the gabriel inscription but these don't have writings however politis has a lot more artifacts in his overflowing archaeological workplace well there's a number of tombstones here we're running out of space and we just put them in this bathroom but um like these for instance so what is that it's a marker above the burial simca now understands that gabriel likes stones can be grave markers but everything politus has shown him is inscribed not painted and written in greek the gabriel inscription is written in hebrew well let's see what we've got under here we've been here for a while but yeah look at that my goodness i have dust bunnies under my bed we can pull out some of them rough on the back yeah ah here you go that's it that's a jewish one very simple uh no it's faded but this one is hebrew politis now shows simka several gabrielike hebrew stones it's a tradition of writing in paint directly on a stone without engraving and it seems to be more common amongst the jewish ones we're here for a reason and i think the gabriel inscription seems to come from this area we know that in the dead sea area there is this is a tradition of writing uh painting letters on on stone it's not unlikely that the gable inscription could also be coming from this area as opposed to other eastern desert areas [Music] by tracing the stone to perea the investigation seems to have linked the dying and resurrecting messiah with simon of perea the man who may have inspired jesus only a few kilometers from where politis has found his gabriel-like stones is the exact area where simon began his revolution [Music] we're in an area called in the land called pereira which means in greek beyond beyond the river the jordan river how does this relate to simon of pereira well this is the land that he was in and behind us we have this town of mujeres which is where he was living a roman byzantine early christian town very similar to some of the buildings that have been built here same stones that have been reused here same type of architecture more or less so basically when we talk about simon of perea he might have lived in this village and he might have lived in a house that looked not much different than this oh yes very much so when simon started his campaign he seized this area first it's it's a natural strategic point so if you start a revolution this is a good place to start it it's defended naturally and you have a very good viewpoint right across the dead sea to judea so yes you read in josephus that the simon of pereira led a revolt that it was crushed it's one thing when you actually see you know troughs mills houses when you connect with the everyday life of human existence to think of how it looked like or felt like when people were killed and sold into slavery and raped and crucified there's an emotional connection for me the evidence is mounting that simon is the messiah memorialized on the stone and the man who may have inspired jesus but if the gabriel stone did come from perea how did it get to the west simca now goes inside an illegal jordanian antiquities market to find out in 2007 professor israel know drew the attention of scholars from around the world to a remarkable inscription painted on stone that refers to a messiah that dies and is resurrected the writing style seems to suggest the time before jesus the stone also talks about three shepherds possibly three revolutionary leaders that instigate a revolution around the time of jesus birth the archaeological trail has led us to one of them simon of perea modern day jordan he was a would-be messiah that died around 37 years before jesus crucifixion but before we conclude that it is simon and that he is indeed the model for jesus we have to make sure that we understand how a stone that originated in perea jordan made its way into the modern western antiquities market if he can trace the gabriel inscription back to the antiquities market in perea simca will be closer to linking the messiah celebrated on the stone to the revolutionary leader called simon of perea here we are we're surrounded by literally hundreds of thousands of robbed up tombs and if you look at the entire area the whole hill above us all those dimples all those holes on the side of the hill those are robbed our tombs looters too they come at night and they're digging quickly but that hole could have several tombs underneath there and it's basically people who live around here the people are living on top of the cemeteries of that period underneath the houses when they dig the foundations they found these things and then when they sell one or two they see they make some money they maybe just walk a few hundred yards right here dig it up and sell some more exactly they get about 100 bucks they get whatever they can get they might get ten dollars or they might get a thousand but usually we're talking about small amounts compared to what the middlemen are getting because the middleman is the one who sells it to some gets out of the country so gets out of the country illegally he connects with the art markets in london and switzerland and new york and and then he the price goes up astronomically [Music] how does the market work if the gabriel stone was dug up in jordan how exactly did it end up in the living room of a collector for an antiquity to be legally sold it needs to have been dug up by an archaeologist and its authenticity needs to be verified as simca has discovered there is a vast underground commerce in illegal antiquities looters outnumber archaeologists and regularly dig up ancient artifacts then sell them to dealers on the black market all right you speak english our team now hooks up with one of those dealers transactions like this one take place in secret locations as no one wants to be identified with this kind of illegal business how much for this 10 000 after buying artifacts from looters dealers then sell their wares to collectors and tourists but the whole thing is illegal 21 000 us this works for small souvenirs but what about more significant artifacts like the gabriel stone which fetch a substantial price on the illegal market to find out how the stone might have been smuggled out of jordan simka heads back to israel to see musayev the world's leading collector of biblical antiquities nice to see you personal collection rivals some of the most notable museums in the world these cases hold just a fraction of the thousands of pieces he has purchased simca is astonished to discover that musayev's collection also includes stones like the one politis showed him in jordan the kind that bear a striking resemblance to the gabriel inscription oh this is beautiful painted yeah yes you know what it's amazing though they look to be all about the same thickness and they're rough on the back yes this is the the gabriel is also rough on the back and it's smooth down on the floor yes this is exactly as the gabriel run musayaf stones come from perea once again suggesting that painted aramaic and hebrew inscriptions are unique to the region he bought them from a now deceased dealer named rouhani but how do dealers get large looted pieces out of jordan and into buyer's hands i know 45 years let me get this straight a piece like this right some guy digs it underground he gets it he paid off people on the airline yes and that's how it got to london and then he comes straight to you yeah since rouhani was the address for high-end archaeology that originated in perea and musayev knew rouhani for 45 years simka decides to take a chance okay so what i want to know is this did you ever encounter a piece much bigger three feet high the one that was recently published i saw it it is in zurich honey showed it to you sure showed me why didn't you buy it because he asked me such a big price how much did he ask for it two hundred thousand dollars two hundred thousand dollars but what would you have been prepared to pay at that time hundred hundred and fifty you would have paid 150 000 yeah no more simcas now unraveled many of the stones secrets the writing style the archaeology and the way the stone appeared on the antiquities market all point to perea as its place of origin senka has also discovered that a rebel named simon came from this area and that his followers thought he was a messiah israel canola believes that he has found strong textual evidence suggesting that simon's followers were the first to claim that their leader rose from the dead the argument centers on a word mentioned on the stone that is meaningless to anyone except a biblical scholar the word is doman which means done but canola points out that every biblical reference to doman means one thing only rotting flesh prince of princess and he's decomposed in a gorge because those who have killed him did not let his body to be buried around the time of jesus the story on the stone seems to fit simon and no one else simon's story goes like this at first simon was successful he defeated a roman garrison and crowned himself messiah the romans went after him with a vengeance and they chased simon into a parade and gully like this one after a bloody battle they decapitated him to further demoralize his followers they didn't allow them to bury his body this is the very story canola believes he has decoded on the stone but really this makes sense i can just see a battle right they can come in here a few people can can hold off a lot of people but they can get surrounded so the leader wants to get a little bit of a better position right he runs up he runs up a place like this he's chased he's literally met he's surrounded from that side he's decapitated you know he he he he falls he dies in a place like this you know and then you know this body is all over the place and then it's easy to guard so that the followers can't come to even bury their dead lying down here into tongue domin this word is used several times in the bible where somebody is not allowed to be buried his body stays outside and rats like these animals that we we see here but if canola is right and simon is the man memorialized on the stone why would his followers continue to call him a messiah after his violent death after all a messiah was supposed to defeat his enemies not be defeated by them it is at this point that canal's detective work becomes most controversial we've been investigating an ancient hebrew inscription written around the time of jesus birth that tells the story of a christ-like figure who comes back to life three days after he's killed our sleuthing has led us to a man called simon of perea simon's followers believed he was the long prophesied savior sent to freedom from roman rule every text in the hebrew bible that talks about this king is coming he does two things he executes justice and righteousness in the land and then he goes and conquers basically the entire world and brings it all under the rule of god i mean this is the messiah this is his like his resume his job description josephus the jewish historian tells us that the reason herod fortified these desert places is he feared more than anything that a native king might rise in korea in judea in galilee and have some sort of claim to the throng now this is very interesting what what could some peasant like a jesus figure even before jesus we've got a number of people that come along they don't have an army they don't have power they don't have the wealth or the influence of herod he could order a thousand troops at any moment to do anything what they have is this pedigree if anybody is a descendant of king david and begins to get the religious call to say i think i'm the one there's the potential for hundreds of thousands of jews to flock to this person and make him king thousands of people did flock to simon's side he was crowned king and declared messiah redeemer in greek he was called christ at first simon seemed to be a god chosen winner he led his followers to victory but then the roman army defeated him decapitated him and left him to rot in the desert at that point according to canola simon's followers did something revolutionary even after death they continued to call him christ so actually out of the gravest crisis a new idea comes an idea that see the suffering and the dying of the messiah as a essential part of the process of salvation change history yes of course in the next generation this ideology will be picked up by jesus it will be a leading ideology for his messianic activity and later on the roman emperor was defeated by this ideology so it seems that simon's followers turned this defeat into victory the death of their messiah they said did not disqualify him in fact his suffering proved that he was the christ according to canola this theological spin was made possible by arguing that all along scripture predicted not one but two messiahs a winner from the line of david and a suffering servant from the line of joseph if canola is right the gabriel inscription which is at least 400 years older than the earliest new testament text is the earliest document ever found mentioning a suffering savior now we have the perfect the smoking gun the smoking gun the messiah son of david and the messiah son of joseph are appearing in the same line in this document two messiahs two messiahs the triumphant messiah and the suffering messiah are both here and it's the earliest reference this is the earliest reference to a messiah son of joseph the suffering dying and rising the sign pretty revolutionary we've got a text now that shows us this notion of a suffering messiah who's raised from the dead is already being developed within judaism so it's not something jesus came up with it's not something the disciples came up with it's something that is beginning to develop out of the hard experience of the jewish people which is everyone we put our hope in is killed why is this happening to us but if simon was the original model for jesus this still leaves one important mystery to be solved how could jesus have been influenced by simon after all one died in what is now jordan and the other lived a month-long journey away in the galilee it seems that the gabriel inscription has been decoded it was probably a gravestone that marked the place where simon of perea was cut down by his roman enemies a reference to three shepherds or messianic figures led simca to three revolutionary leaders that died at the time of jesus birth a reference to one of them decomposing in a gully implies that the would-be messiah was simon of perea a further reference to the angel gabriel suggests that simon's followers believed that he was resurrected three days after his death finally a reference to a suffering servant seems to be the first text ever found describing the long-awaited messiah not as a winner but as a loser all these clues taken together point to simon of perea as the original model for jesus of nazareth we have a new insight with this gabriel text it kind of nudges us toward the idea that jesus before he dies is already anticipating not because god told him in a miracle or because he's the son of god and therefore he knew everything but he's struggling wondering where do i fit in what is my role what do the prophecies say about someone like me and he begins to talk in these riddles that's throwing everybody off and he takes his inner group aside they have a talk about is he the one and he basically admits yes you've got it i i am the one they're thinking oh then we're gonna march down to jerusalem take over armies of angels will command and it'll all be over and he says no no no i'm going to be spit upon and beaten and persecuted and killed and then here's the key and after three days i'll live now where is that coming from i think it's probably unlikely that he took a little trip to perea and read our actual stone and thought oh that you know i'll be like simon but what the text tells us is these ideas are in the air they're being discussed where out in the wilderness out by the dead sea out in the place where messiahs come [Music] but how would jesus who lived in northern israel have been influenced by simon who lived in perea modern-day jordan i mean the two are 130 miles apart a month-long journey in jesus's time well it turns out that in precisely the same location where simon lived and died jesus's cousin john the baptist lived and was beheaded in order to fill in the last piece of the puzzle simca travels with israel canola to macaris and perea where john the baptist was imprisoned by herod the great son herod antipas like simon and jesus john the baptist was preaching a religious revival that set him on a collision course with the roman authorities and it is here in this stronghold that john the baptist lost his life if we are asking ourselves how is it possible that jesus got this ideology who was the link how was the connection made between simon of paris simon of perea and jesus because when simon was killed jesus was probably one year old two years old he couldn't talk to him of course so the ideal solution would be either john the baptist himself of all other people around him john the baptist had a large following many thought that john was the long-awaited messiah but john seems to have deferred to jesus he even baptized him canola believes that john who spent time in perea must have known simon and believed in him perhaps after simon's death the baptist brought jesus into the fold when jesus came to june he could listen and hear this ideology and be influenced by it so really what we're talking about is that this world-changing idea of a suffering messiah a suffering dying and rising messiah was born here and that the link between this idea that grew up around simon of pereira and jesus may have been jesus's cousin john the baptist who was beheaded right here yes you gotta ask what shepherd or messiah was left to rot and die in the crevice of a rock around the time of the death of herod i mean it's rare that we can do this we can pretty well say i think this is this shimon simon and professor israel know has solved a mystery i think at this moment before bce the romans saw okay we crashed this rebellion we kill the messianic leaders simon is dead in transjordan in a narrow valley there at the end but this will take time roman will be conquered by disbelief by the followers of this belief so the jewish messiah wins out the jewish messiah transforming to the christian messiah will defeat the roman empire [Music] some 2000 years ago simon's followers came up with a revolutionary world altering idea namely that a defeated messiah is not a false messiah they argued that the defeat the suffering the death and the resurrection of the messiah is an essential part of redemption this idea that grew up around simon in a desert like this is still celebrated in every church where jesus is worshiped it was the archaeological find of a lifetime the tomb of caithus the high priest of the jewish people who the gospel state sent jesus to the romans to be crucified two nails were found in the tomb could they be the nails that crucified jesus this is one of the secrets of christianity being unearthed by investigative journalist sunka yakubovic from deserts to tombs from rome to the holy land simca tracks down the truth behind historical myths long-held beliefs and some of the greatest biblical stories ever told in 1990 here in jerusalem just a few meters down this hill workers building a park now called the peace park made the most amazing archaeological discovery they found a 2 000 year old burial tomb but it wasn't just the burial tomb of anybody it was the burial tomb of someone mentioned in the gospels the high priest caiphus and he's the man that according to the gospels is partially responsible for sending jesus to the cross for nearly two thousand years caithus's tomb was left undisturbed then in 1990 construction workers stumbled upon a rather large burial site the israeli antiquities authority or iaa sent out archaeologists to excavate the site what they found was a first century jewish tomb inside there were four kohims or burial niches and inside these there were 12 ossuaries or bone boxes these limestone coffins where the bones of the dead are laid including the ossuary which bears the inscription joseph son of caivus that story made headlines but here's a story that didn't make headlines nobody reports that in fact nobody knows if that tomb still exists archaeologists don't know if it was destroyed when the park was built nobody cares and here's something else that no media no media whatsoever reported inside that tomb they found two roman nails wait a minute they found two nails in the tomb of the man who sent jesus to the cross and nobody reports it why and what's more where are they the first stop in any investigation involving an israeli archaeological site is the rockefeller museum in jerusalem it is headquarters for the israeli antiquities authority these archives house the original reports of every archaeological excavation supervised by the iaa simca locates the 1990 kaifus tomb archaeological file in it he discovers the original drawing of the tomb he also finds the final unedited report [Music] and this includes detailed drawings measurements [Music] and photographs and although the two roman nails are mentioned there are no photographs measurements drawings or any information as to their current whereabouts the main find is the now famous ossuary inscribed with the name joseph son of caiphus the christian gospel simply call him caiphus the first century historian josephus mentions a high priest called joseph caithus what's written on the ossuary however is joseph son of caiphus believing josephus is closer to the truth scholars generally agree that despite the different versions this is the bone box of the man who sent jesus to the cross to understand why caiaphas would do such a thing we have to understand the specific historical context in which the confrontation between jesus and caithus took place [Music] the date was 30 a.d and judea was under roman occupation even the jewish religious elite had to answer directly to the roman governor pontius pilate the roman authorities had appointed caithus to the high priesthood the most prestigious and powerful position a jew could hold according to the gospels on the jewish holiday of passover jerusalem was bursting with religious fervor and supported by a large gathering of followers jesus came to the temple the holiest sight in all of judaism he drove the cattle herders and dove sellers out overturned the tables of the money changers then he warned the romans destroy this temple and in three days i will raise it up talking to the roman authorities in this way was tantamount to a call for revolt there was a near riot and kyphus to keep order has jesus arrested and put on trial jesus is hastily convicted of inciting opposition to the romans and turned over to the roman governor pontius pilate the gospel state that pilate sends jesus to the cross and famously washes his hands of the deed caiphus is left to bear the burden we don't know whether he was or wasn't troubled by the outcome of his decision which has a archaeological connection with the gospels was excavated in the 1990s from the promenade in the southern part of jerusalem there is an inscription you can see it on the side of the archery it mentions caiaphas caiaphas who was the high priest in the time of jesus and jesus is mentioned to be judged by caiaphas the ossuary has been set around the world and millions of onlookers have had a chance to view it in person witnessing up close what scholars believed to be the first ever discovery of a man who came in contact with jesus but is it really the ossuary of the man who sent jesus to the cross to answer that question simca meets with david mevera a curator at the israel museum here's my question how are you so convinced that this is the caiaphas it is a rare name it's a name that we know from both jewish sources and from the new testament and it is good in dating and timing for that period and the most elaborate ossuary very luckily for us had twice an inscription on it naming joseph son of caiphus the one that we know from the new testament so it's definitely the tomb as all tombs were of a clan it's a priestly clan so the kaifast clan were buried in that tomb scholars generally agree with dr mavra caithus is a rare name and the ossuary is very ornate befitting a high priest but what happened to the nails found inside the tomb a starting point would be to find the location of the tomb itself in search of the nails of the crucifixion semka is on his way to the peace park to look for the tomb he has two clues first according to the archaeological report there should be a playground nearby but even if he finds the playground how does he identify the tomb if it's been covered up the second clue is provided by jewish religious law according to this law before sealing a tomb the archaeologist must insert a nephesh or pipe for the free flow of spirits that once inhabited the tomb the nephesh is somewhere in this park but where okay guys this is it at least i hope it's it there's supposed to be some kind of children's park or something nearby and we're looking for a green pipe sticking out of the ground each one of us grab one of these terraces and let's find a tomb even if they are in the right place what are the odds that the pipe is still accessible and not overgrown with bushes but if the pipe in the playground can be found together then the kaifast tomb would be rediscovered [Music] look here's the playground hey guys found the pipe looks like this is our pipe just saw another pipe by the playground over there looks similar another pipe no but then there's two tombs you understand there seems to be two tombs close to one another one of them is the kaephas tomb [Music] given that his intention is to put a camera down the pipe to look for the missing roman nails simka has to ascertain whether the pipe is clear or obstructed something is blocking it we need a gpr we need a ground penetrating radar but the good thing is this is the pipes indicate that the kaifus tomb was not destroyed in 1990 by the people building this park in the original report there is a mention of a second tomb found near the kaifus tomb but the ceiling was collapsed and it was deemed unsafe penetrating radar should reveal which tomb is the collapsed one and which is the kyphus tune susimka has brought in gpr specialists to help determine whether what lies below the pipe may actually be the kaifast tomb first they go to the tomb that is farthest from the playground so it might be quite exciting because we may have an excavated and an unexcavated tomb basically what i'm hoping is that you and your work can throw some light on it [Music] ground penetrating radar can be used to determine whether aries below the surface hold ancient archaeological sites gpr works by bouncing sound waves through rock okay next line and getting feedback revealing different densities and open spaces it looks like there's something there i have been seeing something around this one and a half meter depth it has more potential to being a collapsed cave than being an open cave the radar shows that the first location seems to correspond to the information pertaining to the collapsed tomb not the kaifus tomb i think that we should pack up and move okay [Music] my gut feel we're gonna that's gonna be gonna have a nice open space here 4.24 is on your end okay [Music] see there we have something here that's great that's great that's great okay we've got it too hello felix we've located the tomb could it be that the nails are still down in the tomb of the man who sent jesus to the cross [Music] the only tomb ever discovered that scholars generally agree belongs to someone mentioned in the gospels was found in jerusalem in 1990 it was the tomb of caithus the jewish high priest that according to the gospels turned jesus over to the roman authorities who then crucified him [Music] although kyphus ossuary or bone box was put on display the tomb itself was covered over more than that two roman nails found in the tomb disappeared they were not sketched photographed measured or archived could it be that they were the nails that were used to crucify jesus is it possible that caiphus kept them as some kind of morbid souvenir of the most infamous execution in history although we know that tens of thousands of people were crucified the fact is that there exists only one archaeological artifact attesting to this gruesome practice it was found in 1970 here in jerusalem the artifact is a crucified heel now being kept in a lab at tel aviv university when it was found it made international headlines scholars went out of their way to say that the crucified heel did not belong to jesus but rather to a man called jonathan who lived around jesus's lifetime the heel has never been exhibited in public due to religious sensibilities nonetheless professor hirschkovitz agrees to show it to simcon this is the original this is the only evidence we have for crucifixion in the world in the world i know it's very popular these days to say that to use some kind of ropes to tie the crucified person to the crossbar but in a way it doesn't make sense because you can't do crucifixion without bloodshed the whole philosophy it's humiliation and punishment i myself i disregard the story of of ropes you know for crucifixion i think they were using nails they were using probably short nails for the palm of the hand and longer nails for the heel gun classic jesus painting one going through the hand is more accurate i believe so according to professor hirschkovitz we learn from the crucified heel bone that there were at least four crucifixion nails used two on the heels on either side of the upright post and at least one or two on each hand and we now know from the heel bone that nails had to be at least 12 centimeters long for the heels but we still don't know how big the hand nails had to be now that simkin knows what a crucifixion nail looks like he heads back to the rockefeller museum archaeology is all about context and clusters of artifacts if simca is ever going to figure out the mystery of the missing nails from the kaifast tomb and whether they might be the nails of the crucifixion he has to find out what other artifacts were found with the nails and here there is no lack of detailed information including the nails the report lists five items all of them have to do with the afterlife the first find mentioned is an oil lamp oil lamps were used to commemorate the dead the second artifact is a glass perfume bottle these expensive bottles were associated with women unlike today each woman had her own perfume mixture so it is likely that the scent of a woman was associated with her soul after all perfume is associated with scent and scent in jewish tradition is associated with the afterlife the next item is the most surprising one would not expect to find it in the tomb of a jewish high priest it is a roman coin found in the skull of a woman buried in the tomb a coin in the skull is common to pagan burials not jewish ones coins were placed under the tongue of the deceased so that the soul of the dead could pay the boatmen when crossing the mythical river sticks in hades after the flesh rotted the coin fell into the skull the presence of the coin in the skull shows that this family of jewish high priests were influenced by roman burial practices so the coin was also associated with the afterlife and then there were the nails what possible connection could they have with the afterlife as it turns out in first century judaism only one type of nail was associated with the afterlife nails used in crucifixion they were considered to be a powerful talisman protecting their owner in this life and the next taken together the ossuary the lamp the glass bottle and the coin all tell the same story an obsession with the afterlife it seems the only reason that nails would be part of this cluster is that they were used to crucify someone and since caiphus is associated with only one crucifixion could they be the nails that were driven into jesus you're excavating caiphysis too find iron nails you think ah nails you know you could say look crucifying jesus was a small event in caiaphas is life he's the priest he has many things to do jesus was not important he's important to us but to him he was just one more guy he got rid of i don't think that's the case he might not have known the day it happened this is going to become the biggest thing in my life this is going to haunt me to my grave but i think by the time he died that act was major so if there were crucifixion nails in the caiaphas tomb i don't think most of us would say oh well this is just a coincidence it's a little indication of something much bigger to see if the nails were left in the kaifus tomb simca is attempting to lower cameras into the so-called sole pipe but the sole pipe over the kaifus tomb is blocked now that the gpr has shown senka where the kyphus tomb is simka has to get around the blockage of the pipe so he calls a pipe expert namely a plumber because there is an elbow at the top of the pipe ezra the plumber can't get his equipment down so he elects to cut a hole in the side of the pipe just above ground level which can later be welded shot it looks like there's just garbage on it with the obstruction gone simca might be able to lower a camera down the sole pipe and into the kaifus tomb hopefully revealing the missing nails that's good it looks clear i see the curve it looks empty i didn't expect it simca now gathers his team that includes experts at working robotic cameras after do preparation they're finally ready to put a camera down the pipe bill tarrant is one of these experts all right so go for it all right we're gonna go for it his high resolution camera once lowered into the tomb may detect the nails if they're still there okay there we go so hopefully you'll have beautiful images for me okay going through one pipe there's the other part of the pipe with these clear high resolution images from the camera our simca and his team on the verge of finding the nails of the crucifixion simca is investigating a first century jerusalem burial tomb identified as the last resting place of the high priest caiphus who sent jesus to the cross strangely two roman nails found in the cave possibly associated with crucifixion have gone missing and the cave itself has been covered over simca has located the tomb and a pipe that leads into it in the hope of locating the nails a high resolution camera has been lowered into the pipe at first everything looks good there's the other part of the pipe sitting at the elbow the camera can now see into the second pipe i'm zooming in unfortunately spikes used to secure the joints of the pipe prevent the camera from traveling further simca now has to call for a smaller more flexible camera but it has to come from another town so everything has been put on hold okay coffee break okay okay ignored by the majority of scholars is the fact that there wasn't one but two ossuaries with the kyphus inscription found in the tomb a simple ossuary bearing the name kaifus and an ostentatious ossuary bearing the name joseph son of caithus the first century historian josephus mentions a high priest joseph kaifus this is taken by scholars to be one in the same as the joseph son of caithus buried in the fancy ossuary so they have identified this ossuary with the jewish high priest from the time of jesus but the gospels do not call the high priest who sent jesus to the cross joseph kyphus or joseph son of caiphus they simply called that high priest caiphus can it be that although the gospel writers talk about one high priest called caiphus were actually two two from the same family one was indeed ostentatious but the other one was modest can it be we've been focusing on the wrong caiphas all along to find out more about the real kaifus of the jesus story simca now travels what would have been a 20-day journey at the time of jesus to modern-day turkey and on to a small town called antioch early jesus followers fled here to escape roman persecution and it is here that the christian movement itself was born simca meets new testament scholar barry wilson he's hoping to get a better sense of the historical caiphas to determine which ossuary belongs to the high priest who confronted jesus fantastic mountain riddled with tunnels those holes these were the escape routes of early christians when they were fleeing from the romans it's a fantastic network within this mountain this is where they practice christianity before it was an official religion before it was recognized that's right they had to remain underground they used caves as churches here this was the earliest vatican the christians who worshipped here had access to texts that were later suppressed by the western church one of these deals with guys there's a very interesting document that dates from the 6th century possibly earlier it's preserved in an arabic source and this is an amazing document because it starts off by saying that this is the book of the high priest the one called caiaphas so it's a book that's allegedly written by the high priest caiaphas he's the bad guy he was the bad guy he was implicated with pontius pilate at the trial of jesus but he says in this document about jesus this is the one whom we adored this is the one who for our sakes became incarnate this is the one who for our sakes redeemed us and who has blessed us with everlasting compassion this is the high priest the jewish high priest the one of the two most powerful leaders in judea of the time presented as speaking with a christian voice this text representing a little-known christian tradition portrays kaifas not as a villain but is a devout follower of jesus but if this text is accurate this means that the gospels distorted the truth about caiphus well you know caithy's tomb has been found yes did you know that there were nails no i didn't know that they've disappeared they've disappeared that's a remarkable absence why would it be so remarkable if an israeli archaeologist said ah it's just nails what would you say well i would want to find out what was so significant about these nails that it would be associated with the burial of caiaphas for you this is an important question it's an important question you wouldn't brush it off no you wouldn't lose the nails no no the nails are an important clue to something some link to some other historic person there's only one crucified person that kaifis is linked to and that's linked to jesus [Music] armed with the knowledge that there is an alternative christian tradition depicting caithus as a good guy and knowing that in the caiphas tomb a modest ossuary was found simca now heads back to jerusalem to see what more he can learn about the real caiphus historian dr helen bond has spent much of her career examining the life of this prominent high priest in her writings she argues that the gospel's portrayal of caiphus is historically inaccurate she now takes simca to a church which according to christian tradition is built where kaifus once lived since caiphus was also a judge one would expect to find holding cells under his home and indeed that's precisely what archaeologists have found here jesus could have been held right here the night he was arrested the gospels tend to caricature the high priest he's shown as jealous of jesus he's completely corrupt the whole trial narrative in mark's gospel for example is a kangaroo court it's a terrible picture of a jewish high priest that comes over it's a long way from historical accuracy and the reason for that i think is that all of the gospels are written at the end of the first century at a time when christians and jews are starting to go their separate ways and so in a way caiaphas is sort of a victim of this he becomes caught up in all of this negativity and betrayed in a very negative way and i think caiaphas has suffered because of that um there's nobody particularly interested in rehabilitating him so what if caith is never meant for jesus to be crucified merely arrested what if as the alternative is tradition suggests he became a follower rather than a persecutor of jesus perhaps by re-examining the limestone coffins simka will be able to determine which caiaphas is the one who confronted jesus we have now located kaifis tomb by identifying a pipe that leads into it maybe by re-examining the ossuaries that came from that tomb we will be able to determine whether caiphus is really the bad guy of the gospels or whether he was a good guy who took two of the crucifixion nails with him to the grave [Music] to analyze and compare the two ossuaries simca has come to the israel museum where both are currently stored he's first shown the famous ossuary scholars believe once held the bones of the historic caithus remarkably after 2 000 years it's in unbelievably good shape look at this i've seen a lot of ossuaries and this is this is beautiful ever yeah it is one of the most beautiful i've ever seen yeah it's look how elaborate many of the fancier ossuaries are decorated with what scholars call rosettes although their exact meaning is not known many scholars dismissed the design as merely decorative an ostentatious display of wealth and status simca now examines the famous inscription see this is what we couldn't see when it was on the shelf it's so clear it's joseph son of aramaic bar kaifa there it is the evidence seems to support the argument that this ossuary held the bones of the historic kaifas but simka is now shown the second more modest kaifas ossuary the amazing thing about this one is that this one actually is more consistent with what it says in the gospels because there it doesn't say joseph son of kai-fi just a skaifa incredibly it is this inscription which just states kaifus that matches the gospels scholars have ignored it because they prefer first century historian josephus as a source and they are dazzled by the fancy ossuary but it is the name inscribed on this simple ossuary that is more consistent with the gospels it's beautiful and it's modest and this one is consistent not with the bad guy kaifus but with the good guy kaifus this second kaifus ossuary also has rosettes though clearly less elaborate still they are consistent with the status of a high priest intriguingly there's also an enigmatic symbol between the two rosettes which has never been decoded it shows five temple-like steps supporting a pillar with seven cornices and between the cornices six arrows pointing heavenward it definitely has here symbolism it has several steps leading up and with arrows pointing heavenward as early as the first century the pillar becomes a symbol for jesus of nazareth and the emerging church later it even makes an appearance in the heart of the vatican in michelangelo's painting in the sistine chapel but there is yet one more curious element to the exterior design two seemingly insignificant circular patterns one on each side of the face of the ossuary interestingly they are not positioned at the four corners of the ossuary's facade as you would expect from something simply ornamental instead there are only two of them and they appear on either side of the pillar according to the authoritative rachmani catalogue of ossuaries the circles represent two nailheads syncha is taken aback by his discovery and realizes that he doesn't know where in the tomb the missing roman nails were found were they found somewhere close to the ostentatious ossuary or were they found closer to the more modest ossuary looking at the initial field report written at the tombs discovery the evidence is inconclusive [Music] one nail was found outside the fancy kyphus ossuary incredibly the other was found inside an ossuary but strangely that ossuary is not identified why could it be that it was the plain caithus ossuary what do you make of a nail in an ossuary at all sites anywhere in jerusalem i've dug right here in jerusalem we find 10 nails a day but we're not in a jewish tomb we're in a residential area like this i'm sure many nails were found right behind me when this was excavated but if there's a nail in the ossuary then it opens another possibility that there's something like the coins in the mouth of the skull some sort of superstition going on here the belief attested in a number of sources that crucifixion nail has a great magical power to ward off evil to ward off bad luck maybe to help you in the afterlife can it be that it is the simple ossuary that belonged to the high priest and that the secret of the tomb is that caithus took jesus's nails with him to the grave to answer that we need the nails but the nails are missing and there is no photograph of them in the original report in the hope that the photographs do exist simca now tracks down the original photographer of the site the photographer is gary nalbandian he was hired by the archaeologists to photograph all the artifacts found in the tomb so your mission was to shoot all the artifacts yes from the tomb yes okay let's see what you have that's the ossuary yes this is the oil lamp this is the coin and the nails did you shoot the nails uh i no there were no nails they did not give show me the nails but you asked for all the artifacts yes what the artifacts it was there from the tomb they give it to me i photograph it no nails no nails i did not see that so the nails mysteriously disappeared before garrow had a chance to photograph them for the final report something doesn't make sense nails just don't disappear israeli archaeologists aren't bad they're good archaeologists these are not simple nails that were found in a wooden coffin or a building site or in a boat these were special roman nails and kyphus's tomb one of them inside one of the ossuaries i just can't believe that they simply disappeared as night falls simka gets back to the business of introducing a small camera in the now covered up tomb of kaifus after hours of waiting the second camera finally arrives it is much smaller and more flexible than the one that got stuck earlier called a push camera it has a better chance of moving past the obstructions in the pipe [Music] working into the night the crew is finally able to maneuver the push camera past the screws that stopped them before oh [Music] yeah okay i'll be tilt down more more okay hold it right there there it is [Music] i see what's going on here's the ground the way they found it they went inside and they pulled out the ossuaries and there's the entrance simcoe can now clearly see the outside of the tomb of the high priest kaifus but there's a problem that is cement because they had to put cement here to fortify whatever they were doing the walls are reinforced with concrete if you can get faster can you get past that avi can you go a little bit more the camera probe inside the pipe that leads to kyphus tomb has hit another problem that is cement can you go a little bit more can you maneuver it to the side more that's it the camera won't reach all the way inside the kaifus tomb the only way to do that would be to get an excavation license and drill new holes even if that were possible the application process would take years okay so three meters yeah and there's probably another one two meters from what we're looking ahead yeah the opening is right here there's no getting into a tomb paved over by a road but simca has learned something now we know it exists the entrance is unobstructed and it's under this this road the point is there's only one set of missing artifacts it's the most important set and that's the nails right unfortunately simca and his crew are unable to gain access to the tomb if the nails are still inside we'll never know but can artifacts from tomb sites simply vanish simka has now asked to speak with v green hut the archaeologist who rammed the kaifast tomb dig unfortunately he has refused an interview the iaa has offered up fellow archaeologist gideon avny to speak in his stead in the tomb there's two roman nails okay doesn't someone go wow i've poured through the material but there is no measurement or pictures of the nails you have to realize in this country every year you have 300 excavations the number of artifacts found in this excavation goes to tens of millions and minor elements like nails either they were lost in the stage of uh processing or storage or they were mixed with some other contacts i'm representing this government institution there was a question asked about this nail we checked all the records relevant to this stone when we discovered that we don't have the nails nails can be either lost or found their way into some other registry or whatever when you said it could be lost or find itself in some other registry you mean like not really lost but internally misfiled in a way it's a possibility meaning it could be sitting in some lab or a shelf maybe gideon avenue has made me think maybe the nails have been under our noses the whole time if my hunch is right and the israeli archaeologists who were involved in the kaifast tomb suspected that the roman nails found there had something to do with crucifixion maybe they send them to professor herzkovich's lab at tel aviv university now he's a forensic anthropologist he deals with bone not nails but crucifixion is where bone meets nail so maybe someone sent the nails there maybe that's the right address for our investigation we've been tracking two nails that went missing the antiquities authorities they say it's probably misplaced did you ever get two nails together yes we have two nails together yes from jerusalem from jerusalem yeah can we go can we go look sure absolutely so these are the nails yes these are the two nails from jerusalem that arrived to the lab more than 15 years ago from the second temple period could it be 18 years ago yeah could be it's the only example of two nails arriving together yes the fact that they're bent this way would this be consistent with crucifixion it could be why would they bend the nail if you put a nail through the palm of the hand you can you can easily fray the hand but if you put an air through the palm of the hand and then you stick it to the wood by actually bending the nail the palm of the hands are attached firmly to the crossbar so the fact they're bent is more consistent with crucifixion than if you saw them straight yes i would say so the kyphus nails were found in a specific chemical setting one was outside the limestone ossuaries and one was inside an ossuary if these are the kaifus nails one should have a heavy limestone deposit collected from inside the ossuary and one should be limestone free since it was found outside the ossuaries incredibly that's just what professor herskovitz finds one doesn't have limestone on it but the other one does what do you see there are remnants of lime on the nail you know limestone most oceans are made of limestone [Music] furthermore professor herskovitz finds that the heads of the nails are similar to the only crucifixion nail found anywhere which is also in professor herskovitz's lab so it seems that these are the missing nails the nails which may have come from jesus's cross why is nobody as excited as i am you know crucifixion is a very sensitive issue from the religious point of view i believe that most people prefer to leave it aside so it seems that religious sensitivities not science dictated policy towards these nails if caiphus kept the nails of jesus for whatever reasons he felt bad he felt he would have healing powers he felt that this shows he has power over him whatever this could be the nails of the crucifixion [Music] here on the campus of tel aviv university our investigation is complete the fact is that the world may be looking at the wrong caiphas ossuary the man buried in the modest one may be the high priest who faced jesus at his trial furthermore i think we've made the strongest archaeological argument ever the two of the nails used in the crucifixion have been found hidden in the pages of the christian bible are clues to a mysterious sea voyage according to the gospels jesus and his disciples travel to a place called the land of the gadarenes where is this place why did jesus journey there if the clues can be decoded will a secret history finally be revealed this is one of the secrets of christianity being unearthed by investigative journalist sunka yakubovic from deserts to tombs from rome to the holy land simca tracks down the truth behind historical myths long-held beliefs and some of the greatest biblical stories ever told behind me is a small lake in northern israel known as the sea of galilee according to christian tradition it's the location for one of the most dramatic episodes in jesus's life it's when he gets on a boat encounters a big storm exorcises a demon and comes face to face with the mysterious people that the gospels call the gadarenes who are these people and why did jesus risk his life to get to them you know what i think we can buck 2 000 years of tradition and show that jesus's voyage did not take place here in fact i think we can figure out exactly where he went to and why more than that i think we can take you to the land of the gadarenes and it's not across this lake but before we do let's look at the story as it's been told and understood for thousands of years almost 2 000 years of tradition says that jesus's dramatic journey took place here on the freshwater lake known as the sea of galilee and that the land of the gadarenes is somewhere on these shores this is one of the most important stories in the gospels because it's the only time that jesus a jewish rabbi ministers to non-jews setting the precedent for the christian church the story of the sea and the storm is highly important because it will basically draw the main theme of the entire gospel and the main theme of the gospel is jesus message is to the entire world although the gospels never name the body of water that jesus crossed they do lay out a set of very clear clues as to his destination the gospel of matthew records that jesus traveled with the twelve disciples and there arose a great tempest in the sea but surprisingly jesus was fast asleep and the ship was covered with waves taking the gospels of their word is there evidence here on the sea of galilee of ships from the time of jesus large enough to sleep in through a storm luckily there is a boat that can be examined it was discovered in 1986 on the shores of the lake tests show that the ancient fishing boat dates to 2 000 years ago the time of jesus pilgrims travel from around the world to see this astonishing discovery which has become known as the jesus boat from the beginning we knew that we're working on something very special here so it dates to the times of jesus yes it you can't never prove that jesus was on it or even saw it there were about 600 boats working this lake at that time it's enough it's from that time from the place that's the only one and this is how they look like archaeologists agreed that this was the largest glass of boat to sail the tiny galilee [Music] but a ride in a replica makes the holes in the story obvious if the voyage took place here jesus all of his disciples and maybe even a crew would have had to squeeze onto this relatively small boat and the gospels are unequivocal there was a great tempest waves crashed over the ship and jesus slept through the storm so is this a good ship to go sleeping in you can't sleep in it but not in a storm the waves are coming over it and they're swamping the boat and you can be sleeping on nets but you will be thrown around by the waste it's the worst place in the boat it's a place that jumps you know left to right up and down ropes are flying and sails the sail is sailors are panicking and make noise and everything and people are shouting and panic if the boat doesn't match the one described in the story the storm is even more mystifying the christian bible clearly describes a powerful tempest that swaps jesus boats this lake doesn't produce storms like the one described in the gospels also when there are the occasional storms you're never more than 15 minutes from the shore hardly the stop to panic experienced fishermen like jesus's disciples after all according to the gospels at least four of the twelve were professional fishermen neither the boat the storm nor the description of jesus sleeping through the powerful tempest fit this location but what about the other clues mentioned in the gospels do any of them fit the sea of galilee the gospel of mark says the jesus traveled across the water to the land of the gadarenes and directly on the shore was a necropolis or city of the dead living among the tombs of that necropolis was a possessed man or demonic jesus exercises the demons from the possessed man sending them into a herd of two thousand pigs the swine immediately plunge off the cliffs into the sea and drown if this story really took place on the sea of galilee where is the necropolis where are the tombs the pigs and the land of the gadarenes around the lake pilgrims point to three candidates for jesus's destination from his base in capernaum they say jesus would have sailed east so the first candidate for the land of the gadarenes is a place that is today called kersey less than nine kilometers from capernaum it's the largest ancient port in the sea of galilee is this the land of the gadarenes where the miracle of the exorcism of the possessed man took place strengthening kersey's claim is the fact that 400 years after jesus christians built a monastery here marking the spot where they believed jesus landed what convinces you that historically speaking that actually it is the place where jesus sailed to the thing that sells it for us is we take the new testament seriously jesus came in a boat this is the only place you can come to by boat across the lake and so uh the process of elimination that's it and and the fact that this church was built tells us that this miracle happens somewhere around here except that they may have done what you just did come here and say well it couldn't have been there it couldn't have been there it says cliff by golly there's a cliff and decided it that way i'm absolutely convinced that happened pilgrims found a port and a couple of 50 meter high cliffs set back from the shore and decided that this must be the land of the gadarenes looking at the cliffs they saw a few caves and they decided these had to be the tombs mentioned in the gospels one of these has been designated the tomb of the demonic since the 5th century what leads you to think that there's even a tomb here we know that in the first century caves were used for burial and here we have a large cave and there's some others here in the area so that leads us to believe that these were areas were used for tombs and believed to be the tomb in which the demoniac would have lived why do we think that just because there's a cave there's no necropolis here it's just the caves are our best example of one cave this was the largest and usually you take the largest and say that's the cave in fact ongoing excavations show no evidence of a tomb or a necropolis here and there's one last problem with the checklist a large herd of pigs hardly seems plausible in a jewish country let me ask you have you found pig bones here you know i don't think we have uh we found every other kind of bone just about but you found no ancient pig bone no not that i know of because of all this even the early pilgrims weren't fully satisfied with this location so they kept looking two kilometers away at a place called hippos they marked another site with the church just in case the land of the gadarenes was further inland i'm standing at the site of ancient hippos you could see it's being excavated it's not quite open to the public yet it's literally being unearthed right now and right over there you see the sea of galilee so this is one of the great candidates for where the miracle of the swine the demonics happened but there's a problem it's not on the sea there are no cliffs right next to the water there's no necropolis or city of the dead so there's a lot of problems with it the only part of kersey and hippos that matches our checklist are the cliffs but they are hardly impressive and they're far from the water and yet there is one final candidate in this area for the land of the gadarenes one which attracts more pilgrims than any other the reason for its popularity is that it's actually called gadara so this is the gate to gadar this is the gate of the first century a.d together so we're talking jesus this time yeah this is jesus time when 5th century christian pilgrims came here they found a necropolis that suggested a connection to the gospels and built a church over the most impressive tomb the people who built this church believed that this could be the place of the man with the demons inside and the story with the pigs and that jesus came to this place and exorcised these demons here the name of the city the necropolis the size of the tomb and even the cliff-like escarpment suggests a match with the gospels but there is a problem the gospel of mark explicitly says that the cliffs and the necropolis were right by the sea but we're very far from the sea of galilee right that's right it's a problem of course but you see it's a miracle and people just believed in the story but it's a six kilometer hike that's it but um you don't have to look word by word of this miracle in fact godara doesn't really match the story at all it's not only far from the water but there's no evidence of an ancient port anywhere at the southern end of the lake nowhere at all for jesus to land the necropolis at ghidara has no port and the port at kersey has no necropolis hippos doesn't match at all and the sea of galilee is too small the boat too small the destinations are too close nothing in this story matches with this holy land location so if jesus didn't cross the sea of galilee what body of water did he cross where did he go and why interestingly at the time of jesus there was one other city named gadara not on the sea of galilee but far far away across the mediterranean in southern spain the gospels tell us that jesus embarked on a sea voyage to a mysterious place called the land of the gadarenes most people place the gathering somewhere on the sea of galilee but as we've seen nothing absolutely nothing here fits that story so where did jesus go and why to answer those questions simca heads to jerusalem to look at an original greek version of the gospel of luke of the three gospels that mention the voyage luke is the earliest because it relies on an even earlier version that scholars call the q source in the library of the rockefeller museum he meets biblical scholar james tabor and together they find that jesus does give a clue as to what his mission was all about we're going back to the original greek original greek but also the original greek of what we call the q source now the q source is now in luke it's embedded in luke meaning there's a source before the gospel that he had that's embedded and it's a the earliest collection of the sayings of jesus so he i've got a page of luke here and it's the best one and it says he begins to say to them an evil generation seeks a sign so this is the greek word for sign yeah and it's what it's a mayon [Music] and then he just makes this absolutely declarative statement there will be no sign given but the sign of yonah there's you see [Music] now a lot of people when they read this they say oh but i know what the sign of jonah is that's that jesus would be in the tomb three days and three nights like jonah was in the belly of the fish but this text doesn't say that that's very important he's talking code he says you're evil for wanting a sign but you're gonna get a sign you're gonna get the sign of jonah so the code here is sign of jonah in other words and it doesn't mean the sign of jonah meaning a sign that jonah gave it means jonah is the sun so whatever jonah did in his time that's what you would look at to decode the sign right let's look at what jonah did the prophet jonah is best known for his sea journey gone bad after surviving a storm jonah ends up in the belly of a whale or a great fish is jesus telling us that he's following in the wake of the prophet jonah who undertook a sea voyage some 700 years earlier after all jonah was in a storm jesus was in the storm jonah fell asleep during the storm and so did jesus jonah quelled the storm jesus quelled the storm what if jesus is telling us that whatever mission jonah was on jesus was on the same mission if we're going to rediscover the lost voyage of jesus we have to trace the journey of jonah and that journey had nothing to do with the tiny lake of galilee jonah's voyage began in the ancient mediterranean port of jaffa in the land of israel can it be that by following jonah jesus began his journey in the port of jaffa and sailed across the mediterranean we shouldn't assume that people in this period didn't travel and travel all the way to france and spain it was done all the time especially by seafaring people and military people so we tend to think of jesus as this quaint guy who just walked around the lake all day and talked to fishermen but here we have this story that doesn't seem to fit a little lake in a storm and essentially he says in greek let's go across he doesn't call it a lake it says he gets into the boat and that's when he falls asleep in the stern and there's this he says a great storm and then he says and he went across the thalassa thalassa is not the word for like now all these words you say well it could mean like it could mean ocean but it's the normal word for c if jesus's journey began here in the port of jaffa and he was following in jonah's footsteps it's clear where he would have been heading the bible tells us that jonah was heading to a place called tarshish scholars generally agree the tarshish is ancient tartassos in southern spain somewhere beyond the straits of gibraltar the area called tarshish in jonah's time was called gaddara in jesus's time they were sailing to the same place the details provided in the gospel suddenly make sense on the mediterranean sea ships have always been large enough to fall asleep in during a storm if jesus and his disciples were sailing towards ancient gadara now modern cadiz then there should be impressive cliffs here traditions of demonics a pig-centered culture and finally a necropolis by the sea on the way to ancient gadara one must first pass through the straits of gibraltar gibraltar is famous for some of the most remarkable cliffs in the world rounding the southern tip of spain ships sail into the waters of cadiz ancient gadara today cadiz sits on a peninsula however geologists tell us that in jesus's time before it silted up gadara was situated on a large island part of an archipelago of islands located at the very edge of the known world matching the gospels this area is world famous for the black iberian pig for more than two thousand years these animals have been the mainstay of the local diet and the most famous festival here is the annual carnival incredibly once again matching the gospels the central figure of the celebration is a demonic according to the gospels the demonic lived in a tomb in an acropolis by the sea have any tombs been discovered under the streets of modern cadiz in fact there have been and they contained some of the most magnificent marble coffins found anywhere in the world [Music] but what about the necropolis that once housed such breathtaking coffins have any of the tombs survived a site just a few kilometers inland from cadiz may hold the answer ultimate [Music] according to professor mata dona blanco was the ancient port of cadiz geological research shows that 2000 years ago instead of flatlands there was a rocky shore here and a sharp drop off around the ruined city there were cliffs like the ones described in the gospels and there were tombs lots of tombs [Music] if jesus sailed into this necropolis he might have seen an abandoned burial site a demonic living in an ancient tomb and swine grazing among the trees but of the five thousand tombs found here only one has been excavated professor mata agrees to take simca to it this excavation has never been filmed or published the tomb conforms to the traditions of the early canaanites in israelites in a spanish context scholars call these people phoenicians clearly this tomb is big enough for a demonic to live in in fact professor mata has a surprise for simcha [Music] there was a man living in the tomb clearly we're in the right area we seem to be in the general area described by the gospels as the goal of jesus's journey but around here you have several necropolis by the sea the one at gadara is not the only one and it would seem to me that if jesus did come here there would be some kind of oral tradition preserving that event so i want to find the exact spot where jesus landed [Music] simcoe believes the area of cadiz called gadara in ancient times is the land of the gadarenes mentioned in the christian bible he also believes that this was jesus's destination when he embarked on the sea voyage recounted in the gospels but there is no oral tradition that jesus made landfall here so he's now looking for a nearby island that has the physical characteristics required along with a living tradition that jesus was there the key is the storm described in the gospels if the storm defines where jesus made landfall then it would have to be around the balearic islands just off spain an area notorious for its life-threatening gaels if jesus set sail from the port of jaffa across the mediterranean what would have happened he probably would have been caught in a storm that's what happens and sailing then was a little more dangerous than sailing today and when that happened when you were caught in the tempest sailors set sail for the largest of the balearic islands here mallorca and if you came into this safe harbor or one like it you're confronted with cliffs on the one hand that's the geology of the place but the culture of the place is cities of the dead dwellings of the dead tombs as in nearby cadiz the geography of this area fits the story in the gospels as in cadiz the people here buried their dead on the beaches in tombs large enough for the living to take refuge in necropolis just outside cadiz this necropolis was already 700 years old by the time jesus was born if jesus did come here some of his first followers all of them from israel and all of them jewish would have followed in his footsteps after the crucifixion but is there any hard archaeology linking this island with those early hebrew speaking followers of jesus [Music] hidden away in a corner of the archaeological museum of mallorca there are three led hebrew inscribed anchors found in a christian necropolis anchors are perhaps the earliest christian symbols someone was literally buried with them ah that's really heavy [Music] the hebrew inscription names the man buried with these anchors he was called samuel son of hanai suddenly simkin notices something i have a surprise for you there's more inscriptions here more ancient inscriptions see here i see here this looks like either an alef or a mem this is a shin let me get this straight somebody was buried with us discovery draws the attention of the head curator of the museum this is our usha it may say from jerusalem have you ever seen this before no never we've discovered a new inscription that's right right in the place where jesus would have had to take shelter if he was caught in a mediterranean storm simca has tracked down a second century jewish christian burial that is commemorated with anchors he's also discovered an inscription that seems to point to jerusalem the center of the jewish christian movement after the crucifixion these anchors could be archaeological evidence that jesus's earliest hebrew followers lived in mallorca but is there any tradition or physical evidence that jesus actually set foot on this island incredibly all it takes is a question to the driver to reveal that there is a local tradition claiming that jesus came here and left his footprint as a permanent reminder of his voyage to my orca there's a little sign here hermitage bethlehem yeah right you know what is a holy place it used to be a place for programmers yeah pilgrimage yep yeah it's a sort of pilgrimage place you're kidding simka's driver takes him to the footprint that locals treat with venerations did i understand him correctly he said that jesus came to visit this is not israel this is not jerusalem why is there a tradition that jesus was here it seems clear that majorca was an early christian colony the evidence suggests that jesus himself may have journeyed here does this island preserve a lost tradition since some of jesus's earliest followers included members of his family is it possible that simca can now come face to face with their forgotten descendants traditionally people have assumed that jesus never ever left the shores of the holy land but our investigation has led us to the conclusion that his famous journey to the land of the gadarenes mentioned in three of the four gospels was not a nine kilometer trek across a tiny lake called galilee but an epic voyage across the mediterranean to spain we have revealed that the geology geography culture and archaeology mentioned in the gospels match southern spain and nowhere else in fact on the island of mallorca we found a living tradition that jesus made landfall there this even a stone revered as a cast of his foot after the crucifixion his movement which included disciples and family were on the run from the roman authorities is it possible that they literally followed in their master's footsteps is it possible that majorca is home to his descendants sometimes called the ebionites did the ebunites think of jesus the way other christians do they would probably think of jesus more as a human being he was on a mission sent by god he was in the long lineage of the kind of prophets and leaders of ancient israel but he was a human being they would never have thought of him as a as a divinity or a son of god let's say they were still alive their descendants what would have been preserved what traditions first of all i think it's a remarkable idea i mean it's a question that's never been asked before because everybody assumes that the ebonites disappeared from history and i think it's very possible that that uh tradition could survive and i think there would be a consciousness at least of being descended from his first followers his first followers in jerusalem included family members but if they're still around is that possible that 2 000 years after the crucifixion there would be echoes of some of these traditions there probably would be but it would be a diminishing kind of echo but there would still be jewish practices jewish beliefs and i think a kind of a jewish sensibility simca now inquires if there are any people claiming traditions like these in mallorca ebionites means poor ones he now discovers that there is a movement in mallorca known as the poor church could this group possess remnants of ebonite beliefs is it possible that some of these people are of the bloodline of jesus simca learns that like the ebionites these catholics are attracted to judaism and believe in jesus not as a god but as a jewish teacher jesus this perfectly matches the beliefs of the ebionites even more astounding the group's main spiritual leader cayetano who recently passed away taught that they were descendants of jesus and his original jewish followers in the room are cayetano's brother daughter and granddaughter i'm very interested in this tradition and the family that you are from the family of jesus [Music] if these people are right this young girl is a direct descendant of jesus or his disciples or at least his first jewish followers but she seems more interested in their religious beliefs than her bloodline [Music] is this really possible are these people of the bloodline of jesus if jesus did come here and if the gospels recorded the journey why have we not known about it until now the gospels record a sea voyage by jesus to a place we've traced the southern spain jesus thought this mission was so important that he tells one of his disciples to get on the boat instead of bearing his father he tells him let the dead bury the dead essentially he is telling him to break one of the ten commandments honor thy father and thy mother what could be so important jesus says that if you want to understand him we've got to look at jonah he calls it the sign of jonah and as we've seen jonah too traveled to southern spain why just when you say the word spain to me in my field it rings all kinds of bells because in the prophets it's the ends of the earth and the messiah has to reach to the ends of the earth there's something in the agenda of a messiah that people tend to forget he's got to do a number of things basically three things he's going to sit on a throne and rule over his people and he's going to bring peace and justice to the world but the third thing that's often forgotten is he's got to bring in the rest of the tribes of israel that are not living in the land during the time of jesus ten of the twelve tribes of biblical israel were exiled from the holy land around 700 bc one of these tribes was called gad at the same time as the exile of the tribe of gad historians tell us that a colony was established in southern spain in fact most places in the area such as guadalcabir guardiana and guadalat include the spanish word for gad in their names interestingly the israelite tribe of gad originated on the eastern side of the jordan river where the only other city of gadara existed can it be that the exiled gadarenes that once lived in modern-day jordan made their way to southern spain amazingly to this day people living in cadiz don't call themselves cadesians rather they call themselves gaditanos gadites but is there any hard archaeological evidence linking the lost tribe of gad to spanish gadara overlooked in a corner of the museum of cadiz is an ancient inscription that dates to the 7th century bc the time of jonah when the tribe of god would have arrived here the inscription is in hebrew and it reads my father is gad if jesus like jonah was trying to return the lost tribe of god he failed the gospels tell us that the gatherings asked him to get back on his ship and go back where he came from it seems that when the gospel writers set this story to paper they removed some important details they shrouded the land of the gadarenes in mystery leading pilgrims to situate it in the galilee a place where it doesn't belong could it be that the big secret of the trip to gadara is that actually jesus failed because the gadarenes clearly say get back on that boat and get out of here he does say that he was only sent to the lost sheep of the house of israel fish and sheep are the two images of the lost tribes i'll raise a shepherd and he'll bring back the lost sheep tell stories about lost sheep and then fishing pulling fish in since he doesn't do it it's not something the gospels would report triumphantly there's no record of huge numbers from spain you know coming to jerusalem and saying here we are so maybe if it's a fail mission you just lose it or forget it whether it's conscious or unconscious i don't know [Music] if it was a failed mission that would explain why the story has been lost it would also suggest that his closest followers would have expected the second coming to occur in spain they would have expected him to succeed where he had once failed perhaps that's why james son of zebedee one of the twelve disciples followed in jesus footsteps he went to spain and tradition holds he was buried there making santiago de compostela the third most important pilgrimage destination in all of christendom and what about paul it may surprise people to learn that paul was also determined to go to spain romans 15 24 states explicitly that paul was on his way to spain and the earliest evidence outside the christian bible suggests that he got there the tribe of god did not sail to the holy land with jesus nonetheless it seems that jesus's most intimate followers believed that the second coming would only happen when the gadites the gatherings of the gospels rejoined the jewish people as it turns out there may have been repentant gadarenes who did journey to jerusalem after the crucifixion incredibly at the church of the holy sepulchre in jerusalem a holy site for christians and the traditional location of the crucifixion hidden from public view is christianity's earliest inscription and it may be the defining evidence that at least one member of the tribe of gad came home a door behind the altar leads to a tunnel and a long walk beneath the traditional site of jesus's burial secret chapel and there next to an altar dedicated to the virgin mary is a second century graffiti of a seafaring boat beneath it there's a latin inscription suggesting that it came from the west the man or woman who drew this may very well have come from spain what we can see here is a boat which where you can see the mast the sails are in red very difficult to see you can see the ores you can see the steering tale you've got everything here i see here a pilgrim coming from the western part of the empire it can be as far as spain he says two things first of all see how i came here by boat but the most important and most significant thing is the inscription which says domine eviemus in latin which means oh lord we have come [Music] two thousand years of christian tradition says that jesus never left the holy land and that his famous sea voyage was across this tiny lake i think we've made a powerful case that this is not where the voyage took place it took place across the mediterranean he didn't go to modern day jordan he went to modern day spain he went there to fulfill his messianic messiah agenda to bring the lost tribe of god home to the land of israel ironically the tribe of ghad did not follow him to the holy land but after the crucifixion it seems that one group of gadites did finally make the voyage

Channel: Parable - Religious History Documentaries

Views: 4,707,129

Keywords: Biblical Mysteries Unveiled, Christianity Origins Insights, Christianity's Hidden History, Early Christian Mysteries, Historical Facts About Jesus, Lost Voyage Theory, Messiah Identity Revealed, Messiah theories, Religious Truths Revealed, Sacred Relics Examination, ancient mysteries uncovered, biblical analysis, documentary series, faith documentaries, historical enigmas, historical revelations, historical spirituality, religious secrets, religious symbolism

Id: 5mwq1QFRcKM

Length: 131min 26sec (7886 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 17 2022