I can set my calendar by it. With winter sliding into spring, someone surfaces with an attack upon Christianity. Last year it was our friends at The National Geographic Society who provided previously discovered Gnostic writings for us. This year the Discovery Channel provides the story.
In this year’s episode, the family tomb of Jesus has been discovered. Well not quite discovered as these ossuaries were found over fifteen years ago. Nevertheless, the Discovery Channel airs a story admittedly produced not by scholars, but by entertainers. Still, unsuspecting people are probably taken in by the story.
Something about these ossuaries looks odd to me. More than odd; its trail of symbols leads me to Athens, not Bethlehem.
Look at the ossuary of the person named Mary pictured at the top of this post. I know that people now suspect the name is actually Mary kai Martha, or Mary and Martha. One notices a fair amount of incised symbolism. In fact, almost all decoration is placed upon this particular ossuary. As a rule of thumb, people spend more time applying design to objects with more importance than to those of lowered esteem. This is just good art history. In general, the higher the value of an object the greater use of design to highlight its importance among peers.
One must come to the conclusion that this Mary must be a more important figure than the supposed Jesus, based upon the elaborate use of decoration and design. The Jesus ossuary is devoid of meaningful ornamentation, and this places it in relative obscurity among the others. This seems odd to me. Jesus would have been the central figure credited with creating this new religion, not Mary. In this family cluster the Mary figure was the central figure. This particular Jesus was just an ordinary person.
As I look more closely at the Mary ossuary, I notice symbols which seem very out of place. If these ossuaries do indeed represent the founding family of Christianity the symbols are seemingly out of place.
The most common Jewsih symbol of the 1st century was the menorrah candlestick. But along the center of the Mary ossuary are not Jewish or early Christian symbols, but two sets of strange,vertical circles, in sets of three. The central thing to note about these circles is that they all contain a point within them. The point in a circle is a classic Gnostic symbol. This is what decorates the Mary ossuary.
In the world of the mystical, drawing geometric symbols like the point in the circle into designs and placing them upon objects is considered sacred geometry. Sacred geometry is the practice of incorporating symbolic forms into art or places of interest with the understanding that such forms will attract, or focus, spiritual energy or powers toward the item. Some attempt to ward off evil such as Amish hex signs. Others such as the occult pentagram desire to draw power closer. A circle surrounding the pentragram contains the power, and one without sets it free. It’s all in how the symbols are drawn, according to those who believe.
The point in a circle motif that decorates the Mary ossuary is a symbol that predates Christianity. It is not linked to biblical symbolism, but to the mystical, and occult, practices of Pythagoras, who was from Greece. This particular symbol is also called a Monad. The Monad was used to symbolize a number of different things. It usually represents the First, or absolute beginning. It is a symbol that can refer to the sun deity, and often the Ra of Egypt in particular. The symbol has been used consistently from the time of Pythagoras to our era and examples can still be found in a number of secret societies. The Masons, for example, make use of the symbol in some rituals.
The larger set of symbols found on the Mary ossuary seem to have a similar pedigree. Flanking the sets of Monads, one finds two large symbols that appear to be circles with lines intersecting like the spokes of a wheel. These two symbols appear to be Pythagorean as well, as they are exact representations of what is called the Decad.
The Decad is a symbol created by Pythagoras to express the association between heaven and earth. It also represents more sacred geometry to the Pythagorean mystic.
A third mysterious symbol is found above the door to the crypt. The authors of the Jesus Tomb seem perplexed about the meaning, and tend to lump the chevron and the circle together as one. By making this simple error, one would certainly be at a loss to understand the symbolism as it does not exist anywhere in any culture. However, the circle standing by itself is perfectly consistent with the other symbols. The circle is also a Pythagorian emblem of sacred geometry and describes the unending nature of eternity. In its full form, it is a serpent eating its own tail. Called Ouroboros, it is also used, as the others, in esoteric Gnosticism. The chevron may merely be an architectural devise to highlight and protect the circle motif.
Placing these three sets of symbols in context, one asks if they do have meaning or are merely decoration? This has a simple answer. Do the symbols in a Pythagorean context make actual sense for an ossuary? It seems obvious that an ossuary carrying a symbol of a singular deity, the point in a circle, as well as a symbol uniting heaven and earth, the Decad, is indeed appropriate for a burial. It makes sense to put an emblem of eternity outside a crypt. But what are these Pythagorean symbols doing on the first family of Christianity, or even good Jews for that matter?
This is where the trail gets interesting. These ossuaries are mysteriously devoid of anything related to early Christianity or even Judaism for that matter. Already in the later years of the first century one begins to find the formation of early symbolism being created by Christians. These symbols revolve around the anchor, the lamb, a figure holding a lamb, and eventually a fish. These can be more fully viewed by a cursory study of early catacomb art in Rome.
Is it not odd that the nucleus of this first family would forgo the natural formation of distinguishing symbolism and adopt the sacred geometry of a system considered pagan by early Jewish thought? Jesus spent his time refuting the pagan views of Pythagoras. It seems bizarre and incredulous that the early church would then link this family in death to this occult school of thought. It is beyond imagination that they would highlight the Mary figure and reduce the Jesus figure to relative obscurity.
More likely, these ossuaries represent a Jewish family cluster that had adopted a Pythagorean and Gnostic world-view. This was all too common in a syncretistic and Hellenistic society. They chose to highlight their tombs with pagan symbols representing their esoteric philosophy, rather than use Jewish symbolic form. It is very simple, indeed.
As Amos Kloner, the archeologist who led the excavation in the 1980’s stated, “their movie is not serious.”
I agree.
This is the first article I have read that deals with the symbols found among the contents of the tomb and on the tomb itself. Thanks for your insights! I would be interested to know how historians are approaching the ‘symbol factor’ here, especially given that I have read that the previously found Caiaphas ossuary (that which held the remains of the high priest mentioned in the Gospels) was the most decorated ossuary every recovered from this period in history. Any ideas?
It is interesting to note that the Caiphas ossuary, that of the High Priest during the life and death of Jesus, has also been located. It is indeed, as you have correctly pointed out, the most decorated ossuary of the period. It interestingly also contains the point in the circle, or Monad, and the Decad, a six pedaled rossette figure.
It isn’t shocking(or is it), to find Hellenistic, pagan symbols on the ossuary of Caiphas. Caiphas was the High Priest who organized the plot to kill Jesus. He was against Jesus at every turn. He was appointed by a Roman procurator and garnished enough resentment for his syncretistic ways that splinter groups within Judaism were calling for a return to purity of faith in all directions. Caiphas represented the apex of a Hellentistic, or Greek influenced Judaism. At the time of his death, over 70% of funeral inscriptions were in Greek, rather than in Hebrew. It is no accident that he too adopted Greek, pagan symbolism in his death ossuary rather than Hebrew symbolism we would somehow wish.
The sharing of Hellenistic symbols in both the Caiphas and Mary ossuary suggests that both represent syncretistic Judaism, rather than the emerging Christian movement.
Check out this article that discusses how the documentary makes ‘sense’ out of the symbols on the tomb:
http://str.typepad.com/weblog/2007/03/speculations_go.html
Great post, David!
I hope you keep on posting.
Hi David, I would appreciate your opinion on this symbol. thanks. Andy M
Didn’t Jesus request the plainest burial stone? It makes sense that his family would have honored his wishes. Don’t religious groups typically adopt symbols and dates from preceding societies as well as creating their own, unique symbols? I doubt that many Christians, while celebrating Christmas, believed that they were also observing the pagan winter solstice, for example.
You do great work. Awesome material. One thing to bring to mind: How could a Hebrew Messiah have a greek/latin pagan name, when the Hebrews were totally against and had nothing to do with a pagan? Surely the Angel/Malak would not have been sent from heaven by YHWH with a heathen/pagan name for the Saviour of the world. We have all been deceived by the enemy into believing that our Hebrew Saviour name is Jesus/Zeus/Ieous/Iesus(which means hailing zeus a greek god), would have this paganistic name. Why can we not see this? Simply, because we are blind to the truth. There was no letter J until the 16-17 century and what was His name before then, most certainly not Jesus, no J letter existed. His name is Yahshua(which means salvation of YHWH), the Hebrew names which should be in our bibles instead of those pagan names given to them by man kind.
[…] Note also that the Bavarian Illuminati’s symbol mentioned below of a dot within a circle representing the Sun & also the Monad, the first, the absolute beginning is an ancient Gnostic symbol, as detailed in this most interesting article at https://davidjanssen.wordpress.com/2007/03/05/the-jesus-tomb-and-its-tale-of-symbols/ […]
Happy Easter
Very interesting article. I agree with the opening… first the “Gospel” of Judas, then the “tombs”. For some reason it really gets a rise out of the average person, without them actually realizing its just a flimsy attempt to discredit the Bible. Particularly, I found your site while trying to research the monad, or Illuminati dot within a circle. Interesting how it goes to the Pythagoreans, is found in Masonry, and also can find roots in the Egyptian diety of Ra.
Many of folks blog about this topic but you said some true words!!
Good discussions!
I have heard it said that religion is 90% culture and 10% spirituality. I think that today’s Christian theology came from a whole lot of places, but very little from Jesus of Nazaerth.
I would like to get the Roman and Greek culture out of Christianity. But that will be a huge task, and I think only small groups will succeed.
The Jesus Tomb story promises to uncover something historically accurate, but I think it’s another false lead. I think David Janssen is right that they are Greek symbols, because the Jews were interacting so much with the prevailing Greek culture.
In Hebrew Satan merely means the Accuser. I can work with that. When Satan got translated into Greek we inherited Diablo, the Devil, and all the Halloween superstition that came along with that. More pagan concepts.
I like what Jaunita Jones says above, about Jesus getting his Greek name associated with Zeus. Jesus even sounds like Zeus. I believe that we should give him the name he really used on earth, Yahshua. It has the word Yah in it referring to the God of monotheism.
Few Christians even know that God’s name is YHWH, and fewer know what the meaning of His Name is.
The Gnostics were here long before Yahshua was born. If Gnostic, Greek, spirituality was the anwswer, God would not have prepared the Jewish race to bring the Messiah, nor would He have needed to send a Messiah. I cannot accept the Gnostic thinking that infiltrates Christianity.
We owe to Gnosticism the devaluation of God’s physical creation, and we are destroying the planet because of our attitude. When sick religion starts destroying our chances for survival, we will have to abandon heresies.
In 2 John, the Disciple forsees the challenge of Greek Gnosticism in overtaking the real gospel of Jesus and calls it the antichrist.
I love symbols. But I have not gotten any inspiration about the tomb symbol. The chevron looks like a roof. It could be the top half of the Star of David, pointing to the sky for heaven, but I think that’s really stretching it.
I am unaware of Jews having any symbol for God. God’s Name YHWH is what’s important.
I would love to hear from people who have done more research than me.
David Ben Chayim Christensen
Everything is very open with a clear clarification of the issues.
It was truly informative. Your site is very useful.
Thank you for sharing!
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