Q&A Home > S > St. James Did you hear about the burial box found? It is claimed to be a burial box for James, son of Joseph, brother of our Lord Jesus Christ. What do you think of it? Many people, archeologists, geologist and Christians are interested in this burial box. A French archaeologist has discovered this artifact called an ossuary -- or bone burial box -- that appears to date to the middle of the first century and that bears the name of James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus. The bone box is currently in the hands of a private anonymous Jewish collector in Jerusalem. The find, was reported in the November/December 2002 issue of the magazine "Biblical Archeology Review,". The empty limestone burial box with an engraving in the ancient Aramaic language has been creating all kinds of stir recently in the academic world of biblical archaeology between archeologists and Christian believers. The matter, although dismissed by the team of Geographical survey of Israel authority, is still under investigation by others. Two things about this discovery, 1) this is an empty box that does not contain any relics. 2) Although our Coptic Orthodox Church believes that St. James, the brother of the Lord, is actually his cousin according to the flesh, he is the son of Alphaeus and the son of Jesus' maternal aunt, the wife of Clopas (Clopas was also named Alphaeus). However, there is another tradition that says that the brothers of Jesus are the sons of Joseph the carpenter from a previous marriage. Actually our Coptic Synaxarium states this tradition.
So we can say that this discovery (if proved to be authentic) does not disagree with the tradition of the Church.
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