 Archaeologists
in Jordan are making the case that they've discovered a cave
underneath one of the world's oldest churches, one that they
contend may have been an even more ancient site of Christian
worship.
But outside experts expressed caution about
the claim.
Archaeologist Abdel-Qader al-Housan, head
of the Rihab Center for Archaeological Studies, said this
week that the cave was unearthed in the northern Jordanian
city of Rihab after three months of excavation and shows
evidence of early Christian rituals.
The cave is
under St. George's Church, which some believe was built in
the year 230, though the date is widely disputed.
That would make St. George's one of the oldest churches in
the world, along with one unearthed in the Jordanian
southern port of Aqaba in 1998 and another in Megiddo,
Israel discovered in 2005.
The implication is that
the cave underneath it is older still, possibly by
centuries.
 Al-Housan
said there was evidence that the underground cave was used
as a church by 70 disciples of Jesus during the first
century after Christ's death around A.D. 30, which would
make it the oldest Christian site of worship in the world.
RIGHT: the ruins of the old church, called St Georges.
He described a circular worship area with stone seats
separated from a living area that had a long tunnel leading
to a source of water. He said the early Christians hid there
from persecution.
A mosaic inscription on the floor
of the later church of St. Georgeous above refers to "the 70
beloved by God and the divine" who founded the worship
there.
Thomas Parker, a historian at the University
of North Carolina-Raleigh, who led the team that discovered
the church in Aqaba, said that while he hadn't seen the
Rihab site, any such claim should be taken with a degree of
caution.
"An extraordinary claim like this requires
extraordinary evidence," he said. "We need to see the
artifacts and dating evidence to suggest such an occupation
in the 1st century A.D."
Parker asked how
archaeologists could be certain whether the "cave was
actually a center of Christian worship."
Parker also
noted that mosaics are difficult to date unless there is a
precise date in the text of the mosaic inscriptions
themselves, and typical mosaic inscriptions with Christian
themes are from the 5th to 6th century.
"It's quite
possible that there was a cave with earlier occupation which
was later converted to Christian use. But to make the jump
that this was actually used by Christians fleeing Jerusalem
in the 1st century A.D. seems like a stretch to me," Parker
said.
Australian archaeologist Kate da Costa of the
University of Sydney, who works in northern Jordan where the
cave was found, also said the evidence needs to be confirmed
by other archaeologists.
"And even if the cave can be
proved to have been in use in the first (century) A.D.,
there needs to be additional evidence that it was used by
Christians," she told the AP.
 She
also said that St. George's church is not universally
accepted as the oldest church in the world.
RIGHT:
Leaving the cave after a day's work.
Da Costa said a
date of 230 for a constructed church "is over 200 years
earlier than any other known church."
Archimandrite
Nektarious, Bishop Deputy of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese
in Amman, nonetheless hailed the discovery, calling it an
"important milestone for Christians all around the world and
right here at home."
"It confirms that Christians in
this region are not strangers," he said. "They are real
citizens who have always had roots in this region from those
days until the present."
The eastern shore of the
Mediterranean was predominantly Christian from the time of
the Roman imperial conversion in the early fourth century
until Islamic invaders arrived in the mid-seventh century.
Source:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,365626,00.html?sPage=fnc/scitech/archaeology
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