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I sit here watching a documentary titled "The Lost Tomb of Jesus" on the Discovery Channel, something that strikes me as one more attempt by a liberal media to take great strides in manipulating the ideas communicated by Biblical texts, a series of letters and stories inspired by an entity I know as the Lord God. I will first note, that my beliefs in this brief article, will be founded upon the beliefs I hold as the truth, that the Son of God was absolute as a sacrifice in a covenant the Lord made with His children - that which is outlined and described in the Holy Bible of today's time. I ask that you consider my stance on this subject from that viewpoint, regardless if the beliefs don't coincide with your own.  I am attempting a summary examination of the confusion or bias I observe in the media's approach to presenting this finding, a coloring of the story I see.Writing this article, I am at war with my own self, having to step outside of my beliefs briefly to reflect on the media's potential motivations in a secular format. Be prepared to encounter a ratio of extremes. Do I deny that the event has actually taken place, that a tomb with several coffers inscribed with old Jewish script comparitive to today's Hebrew in Israel was found back in the 1980's? Of course not. The event is well documented, although scarcely followed by many archaelogistcs, scholars or theologians, until now. However, what I do take issue with is the media's need to format this event in subtle bias, to leave to question whether Jesus' death was forever and that He had not risen to ascend to heaven, such as the Bible reflects. I mention the Discovery Channel, not to discriminately target them or their work, only to use a most recent example of a annual onslaught by the liberal media on beliefs of this generation. The problem comes where man in the modern age has a stellar disconnect with supernatural situations. Miraculous events are not manifested in the ways that the man of the old ages could have experienced them, those that are both documented in sacred texts in several varying religions, from Christianity to Buddhism. Our advances of science and technology have taken the place of any inexplicable events, a greater entity providing for our culture and society being replaced by the digital bit or an atom. I don't believe that our current society could truly begin to comprehend the relation of ourselves, our souls and the miracles of old. This is where, in my beliefs, faith begins it's mark. Faith brings together those sections of history or story that seem risky to a human being, things that our 'flesh' would otherwise repel. This precept could add fuel to the fire being stoked by the world today. At the same time, I have to nod in credit to the idea that there is always the possibility that a copy of a copy of a copy of manuscript, reinterpretted down the line into different languages and cultures, could change meaning or be embellished upon. We can think of this as a two thousand year game of "Telephone". However, we must put trust in man's good intention to properly identity or interpret true meaning. Unfortunately, man and his works, are corruptable. That is why I attempt in concentrating on more of the fundamental principles and leave controversial history to the theologians and scholars, believing that one day, my Lord will remove the confusion around what it is, as it was, what it will be. This leads to the thoughts on motivations. Why now? Why this? What does man and media have to gain in disproving or confusing the facts of a story? Why Christianity? Why not the beliefs of Islam, Buddhism or Sikh? This is confirmation of Biblical teachings, that towards the end days, man will provide 'evidence' in an attempt to confuse or overthrow beliefs of the Gospel of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. It is compelling to find the media's strongarm furvently enhancing and attempting to latch onto the idea that Christianity's primary example of spiritual rebirth and love is questionable at the very least, an attack on beliefs that it left by majority unobstructed by the religious reich, perhaps out of disregard, perhaps out of fear or perhaps out of lack of what our society today must consider as imperical evidence. The same could be said of the story of Noah, incidentally also reexamined and indirectly underminded by the Discovery Channel recently. Although there are several references to the story which are controversial, that I will agree due to the possibility of the telephone effect, these stories are being taken out of context, that which underline fundamental truths that are inspired by God, that man should attempt to adhere to. There will of course be those that say it is the media's intent to review these subjects for clarification of what has actually taken place and not the religious discourse itself. I stand firm in believing that this is a wolf in sheep's clothing form of investigative reporting. I challenge our audience, to step outside of their beliefs and reply on these points:

1. Why now?
2. What motivations could media or man have for 'correcting' stories in a set of beliefs that pose no threat to the global community, other than contradicting the lifestyles many of us choose to engage in?
3. Why are other religion's values, stories or records not being challenged in the same form by the media?
4. Why did it take the the filmmakers so long to acknowledge the point that perhaps it was another man by the name of Jesus (although incredible coincidence it would be to be buried with those exactly named as Jesus' theorized extended family)?
5. Why throw a Hollywood pitch with a soundtrack (auditory cues have often been used to help convince or gather credit to mystery as apart of a marketable psychology - think about the soundtrack to your favorite movie and how it adds credit to a scene)? Why not show it in a proper documentary format?
6. Lastly, why not attempt to play up the idea that the coffer itself, could have been reused for another person? In those ages, it was not uncommon for a closely held outsider to be buried with those who loved them, nor was it uncommon for tombs to be reused - look at the Romans. It very well could be Jason buried in the coffer marked Jesus, who is to know?

I appreciate responses. I realize some may post that which is not in line with my beliefs or thoughts, but that is ok. As long as you're willing to consider my points, whether objective or not, I am more than willing to give yours an audience as well. Will we change eachother's minds? I am pretty sure it is safe to say for the majority, this won't happen - that doesn't mean it isn't worth the discussion.  -UPDATE- A debate show headed by Ted Koppell called "The Lost Tomb of Jesus: A Critical Look", has named many of the same questions I propose as well as breakdown several of the public statements and arguments made by the archaelogists. They also identified several issues on skewed depictions on the dramatizations made throughout the film that lent credit to flimsy ideas proposed. Ted and experts also broke down the 'filmmaker/journalist' roll in producing the film in persuading the audience instead of presenting facts as a outline and definition formatted documentary. When cornered, his cohort responded that it was a 'docu-drama', which is what was NOT that which we were led to belief. All in all, the pro-party's foundations began to partially unravel due to their manipulation of quotes, film and marketing of their ideas as the facts.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 5th, 2007 at 5:16 am and is filed under falsehoods, opinion, religion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.