By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist

Archeologists say the face of a figure drawn on the cover of a tiny booklet recently found in a crevice in the wall of a Jordanian cave may be the first-ever portrait of Jesus Christ created by the hand of someone who actually knew Him.

London’s Daily Mail is reporting that the booklet was found among dozens of tiny lead booklets that were found in a cave by a Bedouin trucker named Hassan Saida five years ago. Saida refuses to sell the booklets because he  believes they have magical qualities, but did allow two samples to be sent to England and Switzerland for testing. Results showed that the metal booklets were consistent with ancient (Roman) period lead production and that the metal was smelted from ore that originated in the Mediterranean.

The booklets range in size from smaller than three inches to about 10 inches and each contain eight or nine pages that appear to be cast rather than inscribed with images on both sides. Many of the booklets are sealed on all sides with metal rings, suggesting that they were never intended to be opened.

However, the booklets that have been opened thus far seem to contain more pictures than words. The image suspected of being Christ is on the cover of one booklet and depicts a bearded man who appears to have marks on the brow consistent with those caused by a crown of thorns. There is only a small amount of script in the booklets which experts identified as some kind of Phoenician language which could take years to decipher.

One of the few phrases that have been translated thus far is “Savior of Israel” which was found in one of the booklets.

Sources in Saham told the Mail the booklets were discovered five years ago in a cave in the village of Saham in Jordan, close to where Israel, Jordan and Syria’s Golan Heights converge. The area is well known as having been the site of an ancient refuge for Jews fleeing the bloody revolts against the Roman Empire in the first and early second century. A flash flood in the area washed away the soil to reveal what appeared to be a large capstone. When this was moved aside, a cave was discovered with a large number of small niches set into the walls. Each of these niches contained a booklet.

Saida, 30, who owns and operates a haulage business, claims he inherited the booklets from his grandfather. In this part of the world many people supplement their income by hoarding and selling archeological artefacts found in the caves.

However, the Mail learned of other claims that the booklets first came to light five years ago when Saida’s Bedouin business partner met a villager in Jordan who said he had some ancient artefacts to sell. When he saw the booklets, he apparently becames “entranced” by them. Believing them to have magical powers, he decided it was his destiny to collect as many of them as he could find.

Additional booklets were then smuggled over the border by drivers working for Saida, some of who wore them openly around their neck as charms. 

Saida constantly studies the booklets and won’t sell them, even though he’s been offered millions for them. He is supposedly not taking very good care of them, the Mail reports, and is known to be smearing them with olive oil as a “preservative.”

Several years ago, a Palestinian woman became concerned that the booklets would be sold on the black market and contacted a British journalist named Nick Fielding who ultimately approached David Feather, a metallurgist and expert on the Dead Sea Scrolls, who recommended submitting the samples for metal analysis at Oxford University.

The work was carried out by Dr Peter Northover, head of the Materials Science-based Archaeology Group and a world expert on the analysis of ancient metal materials. The results show the booklets date back to the first and early second century and appear to have been created by an early Messianic Jewish sect, perhaps closely allied to the early Christians, which means the images on the booklets could represent Christ Himself.

However, another theory put forward by Feather is that the books are connected to the Bar Kokhba Revolt of 132-136 AD which established an independent state of Israel until the Romans crushed it two years later.

The commander of the revolt, Simon Bar Kokhba, was declared a Messiah. The spiritual leader of the revolt, Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, is known as the man who laid the foundations for a mystical form of Judaism known today as Kabbalah, a version of which is followed by stars such as Madonna and Britney Spears. Yochai was known to have hidden in a cave for 13 years and to have written a secret commentary on the Bible, known as the Zohar, which eventually evolved into the teaching of Kabbalah. Feather is convinced that some of the text on the codices carry the name of Rabbi Bar Yochai.

The debate is expected to rage for years over whether the booklets are from early Christianity or early Kabbalah, but experts the world over are calling them one of the most significant discoveries in the history of archeology.

If the booklets are determined to be Christian, then the etchings found within may well be the earliest images we have of the face of Jesus Christ.

© All Rights Reserved, Living His Life Abundantly®/Women of Grace®  http://www.womenofgrace.com