That’s Not a Fish on Jacobovici’s “Tomb of Jesus’s Disciples”: (5) The Hezbollah “Terrorist” Katyusha Rocket Launcher Theory; and (6) The Israeli “Iron Dome” Missile Defense System Theory

Two more theories on what Jacobovici’s “Jonah-fish” really is. These were submitted by avid reader of Remnant of Giants Bob Cargill, who in each case merely rotated the original image :

(5) The Hezbollah “Terrorist” Katyusha Rocket Launcher Theory:

(6) The Israeli “Iron Dome” Missile Defense System Theory:

That’s Not a Fish on Jacobovici’s “Tomb of Jesus’s Disciples”: (4) The Roll-On Deodorant Theory

Theory no. 4: What Simcha Jacobovici alleges is a fish symbol on the tomb of Jesus’s disciples is instead what the disciples used to stay fresh all day long.

If I simply rotate the image, you can see it for yourself:

That’s Not a Fish on Jacobovici’s “Tomb of Jesus’s Disciples”: (3) The Noddy Theory

Theory no. 3: What Simcha Jacobovici alleges is a fish symbol on the tomb of Jesus’s disciples is in fact an early prototype of Noddy – perfected by children’s book author Enid Blyton.

If I simply rotate the image, you can see it for yourself:

That’s Not a Fish on Jacobovici’s “Tomb of Jesus’s Disciples”: (2) The 1966 England World Cup Football Champions Theory

Theory no. 2: What Simcha Jacobovici alleges is a fish symbol on the tomb of Jesus’s disciples is in fact a prophecy of England’s 1966 World Cup victory. 

If I simply rotate the image, you can see it for yourself:

That’s Not a Fish on Jacobovici’s “Tomb of Jesus’s Disciples”: (1) The Zeppelin Theory

Simcha Jacobovici holds what he claims may be the fossilized penis of Jesus

Recently, Simcha Jacobovici claimed to have found a tomb of Jesus’ disciples. One of the main foundations for his claim was an engraving in the tomb which he claimed represented a fish with the head of Jonah sticking out of its mouth. The image of a fish was used in early Christian iconography. However, there have been no examples discovered of its use in the first century AD, when Jesus’ disciples would have died. Since Jacobovici’s announcement, anybody with any real expertise in the matter has decided that he is – once again – spouting nonsense.

But the question remains: if it’s not a fish, what is it?

The non-fish-like engraving which Simcha Jacobovici claimed was a fish

As it happens, I have a couple of alternative theories on the matter - each of which is substantially more likely than Jacobovici’s PAP (Pseudo-Archaeological Pareidolia).

Theory no. 1: It’s a Zeppelin. If I simply rotate the image, you can see it for yourself:

It’s Sundown on Purim: Time for Hamantaschen and Goliath!

It’s just gone sundown on Purim, and we’ve already been into the hamantaschen which I had made earlier this afternoon:

Pretty good for a goy boy, eh? These hamantaschen are fairly traditional, made with a sweet poppy-seed-based filling. According to rumour, consuming too many of these hamantaschen can give you an opium high. However, hamantaschen are quite filling, so I can’t imagine that anybody would ever be able to consume enough of them for the residual opiates in poppy seeds to take effect. It would be far easier just to put your poppy seeds in a coffee grinder, give it a good tamper, and then pop it through your espresso machine. A sip of this and you won’t be able to distinguish Arur Haman (“Cursed is Haman”) from Baruch Mordecai (“Blessed be Mordecai”). Perhaps that accounts for what the author of the prologue to Job wrote?

Hamantaschen or oznei Haman (“Haman’s ears”) are named after (the ears of) the defeated enemy of the Jews, Haman, who is the main baddie in the book of Esther – which you should read through at the festival of Purim.

Another fine Purim tradition is the Purim Play or Purim Shpiel. Many of the biblical stories have been adapted into Purim Plays, including - of course - Esther, but also Joseph, the Akedah (Binding of Isaac), Samson and Delilah, and … David and Goliath. 

Ibiblio.org makes available a Yiddish Purim Play, Golias Shpil (גאָליאַס-שפּיל), which is accompanied by a 90s-sounding midi file:

Shtil, shtil, shtil, 
Roysht nit vi ayn mil, 
Hert nor oys “Golias-shpil”. 
Shat, nit shrayt, 
Shtiler zayt. 
Ir yidn, ir kristn, 
Ir daytshishe layt. 
Mit a groys gevakh 
Tsu hern mayn shprakh, 
Mit a klorn zinen, 
Mit a reynem gedank, 
Mit a tifn gefil 
Tsu hern “Golias-shpil”. 
Hert nor uf tsu brumen 
Un oykh tsu shumen, 
Ot do vet bald der aktor araynkumen.

Find out what happens at the end of this Golias Shpil here.

Summary of the Book of Giants by Jim Davila – And Loren Stuckenbruck Turns Into a Woman

Jim Davila (PaleoJudaica) recently noted that he has made available his lecture notes which provide a very useful summary and discussion of The Book of Giants, in its Christian (Manichaean) and Jewish (Dead Sea Scroll) versions. The Book of Giants is a development of the Book of Watchers (1 Enoch 1-36), and includes further stories about the offspring of the Watchers and human women (the Giants).

For a more detailed analysis of the quite fragmentary Dead Sea Scroll version of The Book of Giants, the best discussion is still Loren T. Stuckenbruck’s The Book of Giants from Qumran: Texts, Translation, and Commentary (TSAJ 63; Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997). 

Loren Stuckenbruck: A man

Loren Stuckenbruck is a man, and almost universally regarded as such. But in the Apollos Old Testament Commentary on Daniel, he becomes a woman:

Stuckenbruck (1997) has highlighted the striking similarity between a passage in 4Q530, an Aramaic text generally thought to belong to the Enochic work The Book of Giants, and Dan. 7:9-10. She questions earlier judgments that the Qumran text is dependent on Daniel, and suggests that the two texts make independent use of an earlier theophanic tradition. (p. 175)

The “1997″ reference doesn’t refer to his 1997 book on The Book of Giants, but to Loren T. Stuckenbruck, “The Throne-Theophany of the Book of Giants: Some New Light on the background of Daniel 7,” in The Scrolls and the Scriptures: Qumran Fifty Years Later, eds. Stanley E. Porter and Craig E. Evans, 211-220 (Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha, Supplementary Series, 26; Roehampton Institute London Papers, 3; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997). In that article, Stuckenbruck identifies eight examples of identical vocabulary in the two throne visions in lines 16b-20a (frgs 7, 8) of 4QEnGiants^b (4Q530) and Dan. 7.9-10, seven of which are in identical grammatical form, with remarkably similar sequence of phraseology, including five phrases in 17a, b, c-d, 18b, c which correspond to Dan. 7.9b, c, 10c, d, f and in exactly the same sequence (p. 217; cf. Book of Giants, 118). Comparison of the two texts demonstrates that the version in 4QEnGiants^b is “both structurally and theologically less complex than its counterpart in Daniel” (p. 219).  For example, it is more likely that Daniel has added further details concerning the seated figure, his throne, and the “Son of Man” figure than to suppose that 4QEnGiants^b has removed them. Also, the inflation of worshipers at the divine throne from “a hundred hundreds” and “a thousand thousands” (4QEnGiants^b) to “a thousand thousands” and “ten thousand ten thousands” (Dan. 7) is more likely than a reduction. This indicates that Dan. 7 is probably the later text, and dependent at least on a common tradition to that in 4QEnGiants^b.