Codices older than the Dead Sea Scrolls?

Jordan's Department of Antiquities is claiming a new archeological find that may provide Christian writings older than the Dead Sea Scrolls. How old? Possibly within a few decades of the Crucifixion.

They seem almost incredible claims - so what is the evidence?

The books, or "codices", were apparently cast in lead, before being bound by lead rings.

Their leaves - which are mostly about the size of a credit card - contain text in Ancient Hebrew, most of which is in code.

If the relics are of early Christian origin rather than Jewish, then they are of huge significance.

Of course, the Jordanian claims should be taken with a grain of salt. They have a vested interest in this discovery being huge. But it is still exciting.

Ancient Persian Army Found!

C.S. Lewis coined a term "chronological snobbery" to refer to moderns who laugh off most ancient historical records as "mythological" or "inventions of oral history". The fact is that more often than not ancient historians - whether Josephus, Herodatus, or Luke - tend to be remarkably accurate. We have a new example in Egypt where a Persian army who disappeared 2,500 years ago has been found.

According to Herodotus (484-425 B.C.), Cambyses, the son of Cyrus the Great, sent 50,000 soldiers from Thebes to attack the Oasis of Siwa and destroy the oracle at the Temple of Amun. Alexander the Great had famously sought legitimization of his rule from the oracle of Amun in 332 B.C., but according to legend, the oracle would have predicted the death of Cambyses...After walking for seven days in the desert, the army got to an "oasis," which historians believe was El-Kharga. After they left, they were never seen again.

"A wind arose from the south, strong and deadly, bringing with it vast columns of whirling sand, which entirely covered up the troops and caused them wholly to disappear," wrote Herodotus.

As no trace of the hapless warriors has ever be found, scholars began to dismiss the story as a fanciful tale...Now, two top Italian archaeologists claim to have found striking evidence that the Persian army was indeed swallowed in a sandstorm. Twin brothers Angelo and Alfredo Castiglioni are already famous for their discovery 20 years ago of the ancient Egyptian "city of gold" Berenike Panchrysos.

Underestimate ancient historians at your own risk!

FOUND: The Ark of the Covenant?

Make of this what you will. An archeologist has claimed to have found the Ark of the Covenant in an ancient town in Zimbabwe. he is unsure if it is the original ark, or a replica made during the Diaspora to replace a destroyed original, but he believes he has discovered it.

Parfitt's final hunt for the ngoma, which dropped from sight in the 1940s, landed him in sometimes-hostile territory ("Bullets shattered the rear screen," of his car, he writes). Ark leads had guided him to Egypt, Ethiopia and even New Guinea, until one day last fall his clues led him to a storeroom of the Harare Museum of Human Science in Zimbabwe. There, amidst nesting mice, was an old drum with an uncharacteristic burnt-black bottom hole ("As if it had been used like a cannon," Parfitt notes), the remains of carrying rings on its corners; and a raised relief of crossed reeds that Parfitt thinks reflects an Old Testament detail. "I felt a shiver go down my spine," he writes.

Honestly, I think this is really Time Magazine's attempt to capitalize on the new Indiana Jones movie to sell magazines. But it is interesting to see the search for the Lost Ark is still ongoing.