Archaeologist Ken Dark analyzed the finds made in Israel during excavations at Nazareth, and found evidence of what was described in the Bible.
According to Live Science, the results of a large-scale study are summarized in the work of Ken Dark, director of the Nazareth archaeological project. Nazareth is considered the city where Jesus grew up. However, it is known from the Bible that in his hometown he was not treated well. Even some of his family members did not accept him.
Archaeological excavations have revealed this secret. They testify that the people of Nazareth refused to accept Roman culture for quite a long time and even rebelled against the Roman Empire around 70 AD.
Nazareth's opposition to Roman customs contrasted with the behavior of the inhabitants of a nearby city called Sepphoris. There Roman culture flourished, and Roman goods were in great demand. When a revolt broke out in Nazareth, Roman coins were minted in Sepphoris. Cultural divisions have effectively created an invisible barrier between these cities.
According to Dark, his research is not intended to shed light on the Bible. But the results may help explain some of the Bible stories about Jesus.
“The people of Nazareth strongly rejected Roman values and customs, considering them unclean, which may have contrasted with some of Jesus' teachings,” says Dark. "The idea of salvation that Jesus preached could also be controversial among the locals, who may have sought to create a cultural barrier between themselves and the Romans."
According to him, Jesus' teachings about religious purity did not correspond to the ideas of the inhabitants of Nazareth about the pure and the unclean. The townspeople adhered to a strict interpretation of Jewish religious law. To do this, they apparently even had to go underground.
“Over a century of excavation has uncovered many vaults and caches in the center of Nazareth dating back to the Roman period,” Dark writes in his study. - There is evidence of developed agriculture, quarries and tombs. Scholars used to think Nazareth was a very small settlement at the time of Jesus, perhaps no larger than a village. But archaeological finds say it was larger than originally thought."
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By the way, in Nazareth, archaeologists unearthed tombs called "kokhim" and were carved into the rocks. The entrances to them were closed with large stones. It is believed that it was in such a tomb that Jesus was buried.
Author: Denis Peredelsky