Standing in support of Israel, Jews, and believers in all the nations, in the name of Jesus (Yeshua). Sharing biblical truth, encouragement, news and prophecy.
WALKING WHERE THEY WALKED, ASCENDING TO THE TEMPLE MOUNT 2,000 YEARS AGO
What was it like to "go up" to the Temple, "the house of the God of Jacob"? Starting this week, pilgrims to Jerusalem can walk the same path worshippers took 2,000 years ago. READ MORE...
✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡
RUSSIA TO GIVE HIGH TECH WEAPONS TO SYRIA; WILL THEY MAKE THEIR WAY TO HEZBOLLAH? ...by Brian Schrauger
In an announcement that Jerusalem did not expect, Russia has signaled its intent to provide high-tech weapons to the armed forces of Syria. The problem is that Damascus remains the puppet of Iran and a sibling puppet with Lebanon's "Party of Allah." Their visceral commitment to Israel's destruction is at least as strong as their desire to defeat ISIS. Accordingly, Jerusalem wonders: will these high-tech weapons be added to Hezbollah's vast arsenal for use against the Jewish state? READ MORE...
✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡
NEW DISCOVERY IN THE JUDEAN CAVES OF QUMRAN, HOME OF THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS
Archeologists from Hebrew University in Jerusalem, along with faculty and students from a Christian university in the US, have found "one of the most exciting archaeological discoveries, and the most important in the last 60 years, in the caves of Qumran." READ MORE...
✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡
ISIS FIRES ON ISRAEL
ISIS is not only to Israel's north, in Syria, and east, in Iraq; it is also just across the border to the south. In fact, the terror group has taken over a large swath of the Sinai peninsula. From its stronghold there, it launched four rockets into Israel last night. But this is not the only military activity that occurred during the evening. There were two more. READ MORE...
✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡✡
D O N A T E ! E N D O W !
Around the world, news agencies are finding it increasingly difficult to fund their operations. As a result, the quality of news, especially written news, is suffering. If you do not want to see this happen to news about Israel, from Israel, we need your help.
If you have a passion for the news, especially news about Israel and from Israeli perspectives, help us. Donate a monthly amount, endow us for the present and coming crucial years. CLICK HERE
There is also a need to go on location where stories are happening stories. Because we are already in the Middle East, we do not have to go far. Still, there is a cost in sending reporters to places "on the ground" where stories are happening. Partner with us in this work through your monthly donation.
The Jerusalem Journal is a USA 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. As such donations may have tax benefits. Please, check with an accounting professional to see if a gift has a beneficial impact on your income taxes.
Israeli archaeologists are calling the excavation of a 12th cave that housed Dead Sea Scrolls one of the most exciting discoveries of the past 60 years. (Photo, Casey L. Olson and Oren Gutfeld)
Israeli Archaeologists Call This the Most Exciting Discovery in a Half-Century
Join us on our podcast each weekday for an interesting story, well told, from Charisma News. Listen at charismapodcastnetwork.com.
Israeli archaeologists are calling the excavation of a 12th cave that housed Dead Sea Scrolls one of the most exciting discoveries of the past 60 years.
Archaeologists Dr. Oren Gutfield and Ahiad Ovadia, with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Institute of Archaeology, aided by Dr. Randall Price and students from Liberty University in Virginia, discovered and excavated the cave.
"This exciting excavation is the closest we've come to discovering new Dead Sea Scrolls in 60 years," said Dr. Gutfeld, who directed the excavation. "Until now, it was accepted that Dead Sea Scrolls were found only in 11 caves at Qumran, but now there is no doubt that this is the 12th cave."
Archaeologists found ample evidence to support their conclusions.
"Although at the end of the day, no scroll was found, and instead we 'only' found a piece of parchment rolled up in a jug that was being processed for writing, the findings indicate beyond any doubt that the cave contained [additional Dead Sea] scrolls that were stolen."
A little over a year ago, Israel launched a three-year expedition to explore hundreds of caves in the Judean Desert where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947.
For years, Israel has battled thieves attempting to sell ancient manuscripts and other priceless antiquities that affirm its biblical heritage to the highest bidder.
"The findings include the jars in which the scrolls and their covering were hidden; a leather strap for binding the scroll; a cloth that wrapped the scrolls, tendons and pieces of skin connecting the fragments; and more," Gutman explained.
Israel Antiquities Authority Director General Israel Hasson said the discovery affirms that there's a lot more work ahead of them.
"The important discovery of another scroll cave attests to the fact that a lot of work remains to be done in the Judean Desert and finds of huge importance are still waiting to be discovered," Hasson said.
"We are in a race against time as antiquities thieves steal heritage assets worldwide for financial gain," he continued. "The State of Israel needs to mobilize and allocate the necessary resources in order to launch an historic operation, together with the public, to carry out a systematic excavation of all the caves in the Judean Desert."
Leaders are readers! Subscribe now and get 3 magazines for the price of 1. Get Ministry Today, Charisma and SpiritLed Woman all for $24. YES - Sign me up!
3 Reasons Why you should read Life in the Spirit. 1) Get to know the Holy Spirit. 2) Learn to enter God's presence 3) Hear God's voice clearly! Click Here to draw closer to God!
This week, incredible cutting-edge technology allowed archaeologists to finally read the contents of a burned 1,500-year-old scroll found near the Dead Sea in 1970. The remarkable discovery of verses from the Book of Leviticus, which matched, letter for letter, the Hebrew text still in use today, is the first instance of one of the Five Books of Moses ever found in a Holy Ark.
On Wednesday, researchers in Kentucky and Jerusalem announced in the Science Advances journal the success of new technology called ‘virtual unwrapping’. A complicated and difficult process based on the technology used in medical CT scans, researchers said it “represents a significant leap forward in the field of manuscript recovery, conservation, and analysis”.
The technique allowed scientists to read the Ein Gedi Scroll, a charred, ancient parchment discovered in an ancient destroyed synagogue on the shores of the Dead Sea more than forty years ago which has sat on a shelf, untouchable and indecipherable, ever since.
Completed virtual unwrapping for the Ein-Gedi scroll (Brent Seales)
When the researchers saw the first results, it made for a startling revelation: the scroll contained the first eight verses of Leviticus, making it the earliest Torah writings ever found in the Holy Ark of an ancient synagogue and marking a significant discovery in Biblical archaeology.
Studies based on historical handwriting placed it at either the first or second century CE. When the researchers read the digitally enhanced text, they discovered that all of the words and paragraph breaks were absolutely identical to the Torah text still used today.
“This is quite amazing for us. In 2,000 years, this text has not changed,” Emmanuel Tov, a participant in the study from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, told the Times of Israel,
“There are clear signs of continuity of tradition,” Professor Tov said in an interview with National Geographic. “It can’t be coincidental that the synagogue in Ein Gedi that was burned in the sixth century housed an early scroll whose text was completely identical with medieval texts. The same central stream of Judaism that used this Levitical scroll in one of the early centuries of our era was to continue using it until the late Middle Ages when printing was invented.”
Torah-observant archaeologist Benyamin Storchan, who straddles the two worlds of science and religion, agreed. According to him, the discovery fits perfectly into Judaism’s spiritual history.
“This a textual building block in the big story. The consistency of the text shows that we have an unbroken chain, the end result being present day Judaism,” Storchan told Breaking Israel News.
The scroll was first discovered in 1970, when archaeologists were working near Ein Gedi, a natural spring oasis on the shore of the Dead Sea. They discovered the remains of a Jewish community dating back to eighth century BCE.
The small city had thrived until 600 CE, when it was destroyed and the buildings burned. In the remains of the ark of the synagogue, the archaeologists found a parchment rolled up but entirely burned, so damaged by fire that it was impossible to unroll it for inspection without the charred parchment crumbling into ashes.
The scroll was faithfully stored away by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) with little hope of ever being able to study what was written on them.
Forty years later, in 2015, computer scientists at the University of Kentucky developed software for unraveling damaged and delicate texts. Originally designed for deciphering Roman scrolls, the technique is even more successful with ancient Jewish texts written with ink containing a metal element that shows up more clearly on the X-ray scans.
Scroll fragment as it was delivered to The Lunder Family Dead Sea Scrolls Conservation Center, IAA.
The researchers scanned 100 sections from the charred remains of the Ein Gedi scroll, which had been rolled five times. Incredibly, they were able to create a digital image of the scroll and “unroll” the image without even touching it. The scan revealed two columns of writing, composed of 35 lines, 18 of which were preserved while the other 17 had to be digitally reconstructed.
Until 1947, the oldest known Biblical texts dated only to the tenth century. The Dead Sea Scrolls, written in approximately the third century BCE, provided a rare and exciting glimpse into even earlier ancient Jewish texts. Now, the Ein Gedi scroll is filling out that picture and confirming the authenticity of present-day texts.
Jewish scribal tradition ensures that discrepancies in reproduction do not occur. Holy texts are hand-copied letter for letter from accepted originals. Strict guidelines are given for writing techniques, shapes of letters, and breaks in the text, striving to maintain an unbroken chain from Sinai. The latest discovery is the closest Jews have yet come to proof that the chain has remained intact.
“The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my rock, in Him I take refuge; my shield, and my horn of salvation, my high tower.” Psalms 18:3 (The Israel Bible™)
Above: Volunteers at work in the archaeological excavation. (Photo: Yoli Shwartz/IAA/JNi Media)
The Israel Antiquities Authority is promoting a national plan for comprehensive archaeological excavations in the Judean Desert caves, and for rescuing the Dead Sea Scrolls, which are among the earliest texts written in the Hebrew language. The plan is carried out in cooperation with the Heritage Project in the Ministry of Jerusalem Affairs, and Minister of Culture and Sport Miri Regev (Likud).
Israel Hasson, director-general of the IAA, said in a statement, “For years now our most important heritage and cultural assets have been excavated illicitly and plundered in the Judean Desert caves for reasons of greed. The goal of the national plan that we are advancing is to excavate and find all of the scrolls that remain in the caves, once and for all, so that they will be rescued and preserved by the state.”
The cave where the archaeological excavation is being conducted is situated c. 80 meters from the top of the cliff and c. 250 meters above the base of the canyon. (Photo: Guy Fitoussi, courtesy of the IAA Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Robbery)
Minister of Culture and Sport Miri Regev said in a statement, “The antiquities robbers are plundering the Land of Israel’s history, which is something we cannot allow. The Dead Sea scrolls are an exciting testament of paramount importance that bear witness to the existence of Israel in the Land of Israel 2,000 years ago, and they were found close to the Return to Zion and the establishment of the State of Israel in the Land of Israel. It is our duty to protect these unique treasures, which belong to the Jewish people and the entire world. I will work to increase the punishment against those that rob our country’s antiquities.”
Last week, the IAA took a first step in the plan by commencing a complicated and extraordinary archaeological excavation in search of scrolls in Nahal Tse’elim. A team from the IAA’s Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Robbery accompanied by researchers from the Caves Research Center of the Hebrew University and hundreds of volunteers from across the country is participating in the excavation, which is taking place with the support of the Heritage Project in the Ministry of Jerusalem Affairs.
The excavation is being directed by archaeologists Dr. Eitan Klein, Dr. Uri Davidovich, Royee Porat and Amir Ganor. For many years, IAA inspectors have been proactively enforcing the law in the desert, during the course of which they have made a number of seizures and foiled bands of antiquities robbers that sought to become rich through the detrimental exposure of items of great historical importance. However, these actions are a mere drop in the ocean and the IAA stresses that only by excavating all of the scrolls in the ground and transferring them to the state, will it be possible to ensure their well-being and preservation for future generations.
In November 2014, inspectors of the IAA’s Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Robbery apprehended a band of robbers, residents of the village of Sa‘ir near Hebron, in the act of plundering the contents of the Cave of the Skulls in Nahal Tse’elim. The suspects who were caught “red-handed” were arrested on the spot, interrogated, and later sentenced and served a prison sentence, and are required to pay the State of Israel a fine of $25,000. At the time of their arrest they were in possession of important archaeological artifacts that date to the Roman period, c. 2,000 years ago, and the Neolithic period, c. 8,000 years ago.
Access to the cave is complicated and for safety’s sake requires the use of rappelling equipment. (Photo: Yoli Shwartz, courtesy of the IAA/JNi Media)
In 2009 an ancient papyrus that was written in Hebrew and dates to the Year Four of the Destruction of the House of Israel (139 CE) was seized. The papyrus was confiscated in a joint operation by the IAA’s Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Robbery and the Israel Police during a meeting with antiquities dealers in which the papyrus was offered for sale for the amount of $2 million. The investigation of the robbers revealed that this papyrus had also been discovered in Nahal Tse’elim. The contents of it, which mention the towns and settlements in the area of the Hebron hill-country, suggest that the papyrus was part of an archive of documents belonging to Jews who fled to the desert from the Hebron area after the Bar Kokhba uprising. Now, the IAA hopes to find similar documents.
The Cave of Skulls, where the excavation is taking place, is located about 80 yards from the top of the cliff, and about 750 ft above the base of the canyon. Because of the difficulty in reaching the site, the IAA obtained a special permit from the Nature and Parks Authority to construct an access trail, which requires the use of rappelling equipment for the safety of the participants in the excavation. More than 500 volunteers and field personnel from Israel and abroad were required for the undertaking, and they are sleeping and living in a camp in desert field conditions. Many requests by individuals offering to participate have been denied because of the lack of infrastructure to provide for such a large group of archaeologists, volunteers and interested parties. The current excavation season will end in another two weeks, assuming this will be sufficient time in order to extract the valuable archaeological information from the cave.
The ancient text that dates to the Year Four of the Destruction of the House of Israel (139 CE), which was seized in a joint operation by the Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Robbery and the Israel Police. (Photo: Shai Halevi, courtesy of the Leon Levy Digital Library, IAA/JNi Media)
According to Amir Ganor, director of the IAA’s Unit for the Prevention of Antiquities Robbery, “The excavation in Nahal Tse’elim is an operation of extraordinary complexity and scope, and one that has not occurred in the Judean Desert in the past thirty years. Despite the rigorous enforcement actions taken against the antiquities robbers, we still witness acts of severe plundering that unfortunately are possible in such large desert expanses. There are hundreds of caves in cliffs in the area, access to which is both dangerous and challenging. In almost every cave that we examined we found evidence of illicit intervention and it is simply heart-breaking. The loss of the finds is irreversible damage that cannot be tolerated.”
Israel Hasson, director-general of the IAA, added, “It is exciting to see the extraordinary work of the volunteers, who have lent a hand and participated in the excavation in complicated field conditions, out of a desire to join in an historic undertaking and discover finds that can provide priceless information about our past here. The time has come for the state to underwrite broad action so as to rescue the cultural assets of enormous historical importance while they still remain in the caves. Substantial amounts need to be allocated which will allow the IAA to embark upon a large-scale operation for studying the desert, including the caves, and excavating the artifacts. After all, the Dead Sea scrolls are of religious, political and historical importance to Jews, Christians and all of humanity.”
There's new evidence that parts of the Bible may have been written long before some scholars thought.
Israeli mathematicians and archaeologists used handwriting analysis technology, similar to what's used by banks and intelligence agencies, to analyze the signatures.
The researchers from Tel Aviv University say they found proof that some biblical texts from the Book of Joshua to 2 Kings may have been written before the Babylonian captivity following the destruction of the First Jewish Temple, built by King Solomon, in 586 B.C. and lasting 70 years until 538 B.C.
Some scholars say this period actually began in 587 B.C.
In any case, that's several centuries older than when scholars believe the Dead Sea Scrolls were written.
Cuba now hosts a collection of some of the rarest biblical texts and manuscripts in the world.
For the first time since the United States and Cuba restored their diplomatic relations, a cathedral in Santiago displays one of the largest private collections of ancient biblical artifacts.
The collection which contains historical biblical texts, manuscripts, and art is on display in Cuba until March 13.
The artifacts are pieces from the Museum of the Bible Collection, an organization that encourages people around the world to engage the Bible through exhibits containing authentic biblical artifacts.
The exhibit has given Cuba's 11.2 million residents unique access to interact with the Bible up close and through the eyes of their own culture.
The Cuba exhibit entitled La Biblia: The Way of God in the Way of Man is a unique exploration of ancient biblical history and the Bible's relevance in the Caribbean nation's culture. The Cubans who attend the free exhibit view special artifacts from the Museum Collection, along with biblically themed art from Cuban artists.
Attendees will view a prized painting from Cuban priest Jesús Rivera of Bartolomé de las Casas. The priest is especially important to the nation's history because of his celebrated devotion to human rights activism and the abolition of Caribbean slaves of the Spanish Empire.
The exhibit also displays ancient biblical texts on papyrus, a replica of one of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the first Bible in the Spanish language.
David Trobisch, the collection director for Museum of the Bible said, "More than 30,000 peopple visited a similar exhibit in Havana in 2014, and we are thrilled to return to this vibrant country to share access to such a diverse collection of rare biblical artifacts with other Cubans."
In 2014, thousands of Cubans came to Havana's main cathedral to see a collection of Bible manuscripts and artifacts from the Green collection. CBN News Latin America correspondent Stan Jeter had this report.
"Museum of the Bible's vision is to invite all people to engage with the Bible," Trobisch added.
The Museum of the Bible is advancing its vision to bring unity through the Bible by bringing pieces of the Cuba exhibit to the United States in 2017.
Next year many of the same artifacts from the Cuba exhibit will be on display in the 430,000-square-foot, $400 million museum on the Bible in Washington.
The Museum of the Bible plans to continue bringing the Bible and ancient biblical texts to people and nations around the world.
Ron Cantor: 'This Archaeological Find Proves Yeshua Is the Messiah'
In 1947, a goatherd accidentally uncovered the oldest Hebrew manuscripts of the Bible.
Not only did these manuscripts prove the authenticity of the Bible, but they also confirmed that first century Jews were expecting a suffering Messiah (unlike the rabbis claim today). There was a conspiracy to keep the scrolls hidden for decades, but in 1991, Robert Eisenman went rogue and released copies of the secret scrolls.
What they tell us is amazing. See it in the video below:
Ron Cantor is the director of Messiah's Mandate International in Israel, a Messianic ministry dedicated to taking the message of Jesus from Israel to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). Cantor also travels internationally teaching on the Jewish roots of the New Testament. He serves on the pastoral team of Tiferet Yeshua, a Hebrew-speaking congregation in Tel Aviv. His newest book is Identity Theft. Follow him at @RonSCantor on Twitter.
For the original article, visit messiahsmandate.org. The opinions of this writer do not necessarily represent those of Charisma Media.
NEW - Life in the Spirit is your Spirit-filled teaching guide. Encounter the Holy Spirit, hear God speak to you, and enjoy timeless teachings on love, mercy and forgiveness.LEARN MORE!
Did you enjoy this blog? Click here to receive it by email.
Tweet
