Ancient Possibly Christian Books Found In Jordan

70 metal bound books have been found in a cave in Jordan by a Bedouin. These books appear to date to the first century, and may be the oldest collection of texts in existence. Written on lead leaves, no bigger than credit-cards, these 70 books could reveal a wealth of information about 1st Century Christianity, and may even contain books that were thought to be lost.

Of course, all of that is purely speculation. They were discovered 6 years ago, but the news is only really now breaking.

As exciting as this discovery is, the books are not yet available for scholarly exploration, as they are still haggling over the price. Jordan (the country) wants them back, and the enterprising Bedoin wants some money for them. The price seems to be around 250,000 per book. Even after they are owned by someone who can look after them (and we all hope that they do go to someone who will conserve them, and not some private collector) it will still take a few years of conservation, X-Raying and cleaning before any writing is visible. Then they will be able to go to scholars for translation.

In this digital age, of course, we would like high-res images to make it to the web as soon as possible, but when something valuable like this comes to the fore, as we saw with the dead-sea scrolls, often they are sat on, or only a small, select team are allowed in to view them. While it is understandable that the owner would want to get their money back (by producing the first translation in book form, for example), if these books are as important as it is suggested then high-res images should be made available as soon as possible so that many scholars, both professional, and not so professional can have a go at translating them, and hopefully put their (no-doubt varied) translations up for people to read.

IF these are genuine books, these could have big changes for Christianity. Theologians are going to have to be ready to read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest these translations and see what difference they make to our current understanding of Christianity.

~BX

Source : http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12888421