Babylon Rising, Page 5

  “Anyone know what this is?” Murphy asked.

  “How about Fred Flintstone’s lunch box,” came a now-familiar voice.

  Shari turned and gave the speaker a withering glance before offering her own answer. “Is it a sarcophagus? A child’s sarcophagus, maybe?”

  “Good guess, Shari.” Murphy gave her a warm smile. “It’s a coffin all right—a bone coffin. What we call an ossuary. Thousands of years ago, it was a common practice in some parts of the world that after the flesh of the buried dead had decomposed, the bones were dug up, wrapped in muslin, and placed in one of these.”

  “So whose bone coffin are we looking at here?” came a voice from the back. “Russell Crowe’s, maybe?”

  Murphy ignored the laughter. “Well, let’s take a look.” The next slide was a close-up of the box’s side panel showing its worn and faded inscription. “It says here, James—”

  “Hey, Jimmy Hoffa, we was wondering where y’all got to!”

  Seemingly lost in thought, Murphy didn’t hear the comment or the sniggers that followed. He was somewhere else. Somewhere far away in time. He clicked to a greatly enlarged close-up of the ossuary panel and began to read from it.

  “James … son of Joseph …”

  A hush had descended on the hall.

  “… brother of Jesus.”

  He let the silence stretch, then turned back to his audience. “In this little box you see here—which I have actually touched—lay the bones of Jesus’ brother.

  “Normally, only the name of the father of the deceased would be inscribed on an ossuary unless the deceased had another relative who was extremely well known. And no one was more famous, or infamous, than Jesus in that part of the world during that period.

  “What is significant here is that this ossuary not only confirms the historicity of Jesus—that is, that He truly was a real figure in history—but it confirms that He was of such notoriety that the family of James identified his dead brother with him.

  Once this ossuary is proven to be legitimate, it will prove that Jesus not only lived during this time period, but was a prominent person in His day. Just as He is presented in the Bible.”

  As he did every time he looked at pictures of this stone box, Murphy was experiencing a strange, disorienting feeling, as if the thousands of years separating him from this long-dead man had been swept aside, as if they were somehow present together in this timeless moment.

  His mood was abruptly shattered by a voice from close to Shari.

  “Maybe it says that on the box, but how do we know it isn’t a fake? You know, like all those saints’ relics that used to be churned out in the Middle Ages like cheap souvenirs. Like the Shroud of Turin. That’s supposed to be a fake, isn’t that right, Professor Murphy?”

  Murphy looked intently at the questioner. He seemed to be a skeptic all right, but he seemed more serious, more thoughtful, and better informed than the class joker who’d been hogging the spotlight up to then. He noticed Shari had turned to give him a cool appraisal too.

  “You have a good point there …”

  “Paul,” the student offered, then started to blush, clearly not seeking this much attention in the hall.

  “Okay, Paul. Some experts have concluded that the Shroud of Turin probably is a medieval fake. I am not convinced. So, how can we tell the fakes from the real thing? What makes me think that this ossuary really contained the bones of Christ’s brother?”

  “Carbon dating?” The response was quick and confident.

  “Thanks, Paul. Anytime you want to step up and take over the lecture, let me know. It seems you have all the answers,” Murphy said with a smile.

  Paul blushed again, and Murphy quickly realized he’d been too tough on him. This guy wasn’t trying to give him a hard time, he was just that much sharper than the average student.

  “Yes, carbon dating is how we can tell almost to the year when an artifact was made or when it was in use,” Murphy continued. “Carbon-fourteen is a radioactive isotope found in all organic objects. Since it decays at a known rate, the amount of C-fourteen remaining in an object can tell us its age.”

  Paul looked more sheepish now. He clearly didn’t relish being in the spotlight. But he couldn’t keep his questions to himself either. “Um, Professor Murphy, wouldn’t carbon dating just tell us when the original stone was formed, not when the box—the ossuary—was carved out of it?”

  “You’re absolutely right, Paul. But inside the box, embedded in minute cracks, we found bits of muslin and fragments of pollen that carbon date to just after the time of Christ—around A.D. sixty And not only that, the inscription was written in a form of Aramaic unique to that time. And if you want more proof, microscopic examination of the patina that formed on the inscription proves it wasn’t added at a later date.”

  Murphy paused and noted the attentive faces. Nobody having private little conversations at the back. No text messaging on handheld devices. Nobody goofing off. Even if they weren’t convinced, at least he seemed to have gotten their attention. Now for the real test.

  “All very well and good, ladies and gentlemen, but everything I just told you is a bucket of hogwash. This box is a complete fake.”

  The class erupted in cries of dismay and confusion. So much for sedate old archaeology, Murphy thought.

  “Make up your mind, man.”

  “That’s right, this ossuary is a fraud. That’s what more than one body of scientists and scholars have said. I, however, have been impressed by both the carbon-fourteen testing, which we will examine in a later class, and by the writing in Aramaic that was limited to the first century. This is a relatively new find, so there will be lots more study and debate over this ossuary in years to come. I raise all this as we get started on the journey of this course for a reason.”

  Murphy paused. “I’m a scientist, the people who have challenged the authenticity of the ossuary are scientists. I’m very proud to be a serious, practicing, full-tilt, believing Christian as well. I suspect the scientists who are crying fake might be motivated to challenge this very important discovery because it could force them to change their preconceived doubts about Christ. Is my religion clouding my thinking; is their lack of religious belief distorting their judgment? Folks, these are just some of the interesting extra issues that an archaeologist searching for proof of the Bible faces. I look forward to exploring all of this and more with you in the coming weeks.”

  Just his luck. He noticed Dean Fallworth pacing the back of the hall. How long had he been back there? Murphy wondered. “Now, not to leave you in suspense, let me assure you that the question of whether Jesus of Nazareth was a bona fide person in history does not rest on the authenticity of this ossuary. We will study some of that body of evidence in this course. But when the ossuary is proven to be authentic, as I believe it will be, this will be further evidence for those who do believe in Jesus that He once walked among us.”

  Murphy checked his watch. “Now, let us go over the course reading list before I ramble us out of time.”

  “Hold it, Murphy!”

  A bony hand grabbed Murphy by his backpack as he left the hall. “Dean Fallworth. What a fine example you set for the students by monitoring my lecture.”

  “Can it, Professor Murphy.” Fallworth was as tall as Murphy but cursed with a library-stack pallor that would make some mummies look healthy by comparison. “You call that a lecture? I call it a disgrace. Why, the only thing separating you from a Sunday tent preacher is the fact that you didn’t pass the plate for a collection.”

  “I will gratefully accept any donation you wish to make, Dean. Did you need a syllabus, by the way?”

  “No, Mr. Murphy, I have everything I need to get the university board to begin accreditation hearings for this evangelical clambake you’re calling a class.”

  “Temper,” Murphy mumbled to himself. “Dean, if you feel my work is unprofessional in any way, then please help me to improve my teaching skills, but if you want to
bash Christians, I don’t have to stand here for that.”

  “Do you know what they’re already calling this silly circus around the campus? Bible for Bubbleheads, Jesus for Jocks, and the Gut from Galilee.”

  Murphy couldn’t help but laugh. “I like that last one. I’m intending this to be a quite intellectually stimulating course, Dean, but I confess I did not post an I.Q. requirement for taking it. The knowledge will be there, I promise you, but I will likely fall short of your apparent requirement that the only acceptable instructional method is to bore your students to an early ossuary.”

  “Mark my words, Murphy. Your hopes of this course surviving and your hopes of tenure at this university are as dead as whatever was in that bone box of yours.”

  “Ossuary, Dean. Ossuary. We’re at a university, let’s try to use multisyllabic words. If it doesn’t turn out to be legitimate, maybe I can get it for you cheap and you can keep your buttons in it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a new artifact to begin work on.”

  EIGHT

  CLOSING THE LAB door behind him, Murphy breathed a sigh of relief. This was his inner sanctum, a place where bloated egos and petty academic infighting had no place. The only thing that mattered here was truth. Fittingly, the pristine space was painted pure white. Bathed in halogen light, the room was lined with high-tech lab benches and chrome-plated equipment racks, the only sound the quiet hum of computers and high-tech environmental control systems.

  In the middle of the room was a table specially equipped for photographing artifacts, with two halogen strobes for shadowless and colorless lighting and scales for size reference. Perched on a tripod was a state-of-the-art digital camera. Shari Nelson, in a clean white lab coat, was hunched over it, loading a diskette.

  “Hi, Shari,” said Murphy. “Thank you for clearing your schedule to help me this afternoon. Laura’s going to try to get away, but let’s get started, because I’m sure she has her office full of huddled masses of youths yearning to complain for free.”

  “Professor Murphy, sometimes I think you were never young.”

  “I wasn’t. I have an ancient soul. Just ask my mummy.”

  “Ancient jokes, anyway.” She looked up and gave him a radiant smile. “I’ve been here an hour, getting everything ready. I mean, it’s so exciting!” She pointed to the metal tube clutched tightly in his hand. “Is that it?”

  He placed it on the table in front of her. “I don’t want you to be too disappointed if it turns out to be nothing, Shari. Until we look at it, I really have no idea what it is.”

  “But you think it could be something big, right? You said so. I mean, I could tell from your message how excited you were.”

  She was right. At three in the morning, half delirious with pain and exhaustion, Murphy had been convinced he was holding something of monumental importance, and his slightly manic e-mail message to Shari had reflected that. Now, in the cold light of day, doubts were creeping in, along with a throbbing pain in his shoulder.

  “I hope it is, Shari. But you remember the first law of Biblical archaeology?”

  “I know, I know,” she chirped. “Always be prepared to be disappointed.”

  “Right. Don’t let your hopes cloud your objectivity.” She knew the drill, but it did not sound as if she had really taken it to heart. He hoped for both their sakes that the tube had more in it than a handful of ancient dust.

  Before he and Laura had finally fallen into a fitful sleep, they’d examined the tube minutely, and discovered the almost invisible seam in the middle. It looked like the two halves screwed together precisely to form a perfect seal.

  Shari seemed mesmerized as Murphy took the tube in both hands and prepared to unscrew it.

  “Wait!” Shari shouted. “Isn’t there something we need to do first?”

  Murphy looked puzzled. “Oh, you mean X-ray it? Shan, you’re a credit to your old professor. You’re right, normally we’d want to get some idea of what’s in there before we expose it to the air and potential damage. But I’ll bet you lunch that what we have here is a papyrus scroll. It’s the only thing that could be that small and light and still contain the clues that I was told were in this tube. And if it is papyrus that has survived for a couple of thousand years or so without rotting, that means it’s pretty well dried out, which also means as soon as you’ve taken your photographs—”

  “We have to rehydrate it!”

  Murphy couldn’t help smiling at Shan’s enthusiasm. Even though she was still a student, she was probably the most levelheaded person he’d ever met. But the prospect of a genuine Biblical find had her bouncing on the balls of her feet like a hyperactive two-year-old. “Exactly. So, you all set? Okay, let’s do it.”

  As Murphy tightened his grip and began to exert pressure on the seal, Shari slid a white plastic tray onto the table beneath his hands. The tray would catch any debris that came loose from the papyrus, fragments that could be used for carbon dating. The background hum of the machines seemed to increase in volume as they concentrated intently on the tube. With a pop the seal gave way. He was pretty sure that Methuselah must have already opened the tube to verily what was in there, but he had somehow sealed it up as perfectly as the original owner had. Now the two halves slid apart, revealing a faded papery scroll. Murphy tipped it gently onto the tray.

  “Lunch is on me, I guess, Professor,” said Shari breathlessly. “I’d say that was genuine papyrus.” She hesitated. “Isn’t it?”

  Murphy didn’t seem to hear her at first. He was leaning close, already trying to decipher the faint marks on the surface of the scroll. Ink? Or just spots of decay? Was that a man-made shape or just a stain? After a moment he grinned and patted her on the shoulder.

  “I’ll have my usual, please, Shari. Chili cheeseburger with extra pickles.”

  “And a root beer,” she added happily.

  They set to work, Shari alternately taking pictures and sucking dust and debris from the tray with a flashlight-sized vacuum, while Murphy scrutinized the scroll from every angle. When she was done, Murphy carried the tray over to what looked like an oversized microwave, complete with windowed door and electronic control panel on the side. He slid the tray inside the hyperbaric chamber, latched the door, and keyed in the settings for humidity and barometric pressure.

  With luck, the scroll’s ancient fibers would gradually absorb moisture until it was supple enough to be unrolled without disintegrating. If not, then the photographs Shari had just taken would be all they had to unlock its secrets.

  Together they gazed through the opaque glass like new parents anxiously watching a baby in an incubator.

  “And now,” said Murphy, “we wait.”

  As Shari Nelson left Professor Murphy’s lab, Paul Wallach had to quicken his step to catch up with her. He was at risk of losing her as she strode briskly through the mazelike corridors of the history building.

  “Excuse me. Can I talk to you for a moment?”

  Shari turned, and Paul was surprised to find her smiling at him. With her jet-black hair tied back in a short ponytail, and dark blue jogging pants and sweatshirt, she looked as if she didn’t work on the way she looked. But the effect, especially with those sparkling green eyes, was captivating. Paul was suddenly at a loss for words.

  “Look, I … I know you work with Professor Murphy, and I just wanted to apologize for what I said back at the lecture. I didn’t want you to think I was trying to be a wise guy or anything.”

  She tilted her jaw as if she were weighing his words in the balance.

  “You raised an important question. Isn’t that what they keep telling us we’re supposed to do here? Ask questions?”

  “I guess. It’s just that I noticed you were … you know.” His eyes went to the simple silver cross at her throat.

  She frowned and he felt himself blushing. She was being nice, and now he’d offended her. If he was so smart, how come she made him feel so dumb?

  “Christians can ask questions, too, you know. So, he
re’s one. Who are you?”

  He blushed even deeper. “Paul Wallach. I just switched to Preston this semester.”

  Shari held out her hand. “Shari Nelson. Nice to meet you, Paul. And I didn’t think you were being a jerk, not at all. Actually, when it comes to the really big questions, maybe it’s the atheists who don’t like to ask them.” She laughed. “Sorry, I’m sure you didn’t come to Preston to be lectured by me.”

  “Well, no, I mean, it’s fine, you can …”

  He took a deep breath to compose himself. Come on, get a grip here.

  “I’d certainly like to ask you some stuff, if that’s okay. If you have time. About the lecture and Professor Murphy. I’ve heard there are some doughnuts in the cafeteria that are in urgent need of carbon dating. What do you say?”

  “So what’s he like, Professor Murphy?” asked Paul. “He seems like a cool guy.”

  “For a Biblical archaeologist, you mean?”

  Paul and Shari had been chatting for twenty minutes. One ancient-looking doughnut sat uneaten on a paper plate in front of them, alongside two now-empty mugs of coffee, and as far as he could tell, she wasn’t getting bored with his company. But she still had this unnerving ability to make him feel like a total bumbler.

  “No, I didn’t mean that. Really. I meant cool for a professor.”

  She gave him a smile to show she believed him, or maybe that she’d just been teasing him. Either way, his sigh of relief must have been audible.

  “Murphy is cool. And he’s the best at what he does. I’ve learned an awful lot from him.”

  “You said he lets you work in his lab sometimes, on his finds. Is that right?” Paul asked.

  “That’s the best. I’m so lucky. Sometimes I can’t believe he trusts me not to drop these things—really important historical artifacts, you know?”

  She looked at Paul with those green eyes that he now realized could be as intimidating as they were enticing. Maybe she’d told him more than she’d meant to.