Family Life

03.31.11 | Bob Price

     British archaeologists are seeking to authenticate what could be a landmark discovery in the documentation of early Christianity. A trove of 70 lead codices, or scrolls, appear to date back to the 1st century.  The writings include key clues to the last days of Jesus' life before his crucifixtion. Some researchers are suggesting this could be the most significant find in Christian archeology since the dead sea scrolls in 1947. The codices turned up five years ago in a remote cave in eastern Jordan- a region where early Christian believers may have fled after the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in 70 A-D. The codices are made up of wirebound individual pages, each roughly the size of a credit card. They contain a number of images and textual allusions to the Messiah, as well as some possible references to the crucifixion and resurrection.